Towards Love, Not Away From Fear

OK, art lovers, I just got back from three weeks in the Bible Belt, and I have to report that all the bathrooms in Silver Dollar City (a kind of pseudo-Disneyland in Branson, Missouri) have biohazard waste recepticals in them for the many diabetics to safely dispose of their needles. I am not judging people who eat and drink so much they make themselves sick, I'm just pointing out a trend. I was shocked by the obesity - at Dolly Parton's Dixie Stampede we were instructed to eat with our "ten little utensils" - and I worry about a country so sick and numb that when the time comes, no one will be able to run.

Now this. Somehow I got on the Holy Roller email chain, and once again I am shocked shitless. We thought the New Yorker cover was in poor taste, but people, it is real. Oh, and a separate email (which rantings I will not broadcast) points out how consumer confidence has eroded, unemployment has risen, gas prices have gone through the roof etc. since the DEMOCRATIC CONGRESS TOOK OFFICE.

DISCLAIMER: I DIDN'T WRITE THIS, I'm just quoting it as a window into a white, elderly Republican's pathological reality:

----- Original Message -----
>
> Sent: Monday, August 11, 2008 10:44 AM
> Subject: Please Pray!
>
>
> I was very dismayed when, recently, a family member of mine
> said to me with great resignation that Obama will take the
> presidency. These words came from someone who in the past
> has been a great prayer warrior. "What is
> happening?" was my question.
>
> Why are we Christians just "settling" and not
> issuing a battle cry and falling to our knees and taking our
> country back? We allow ourselves to be stripped of the right
> to pray at school functions and in school, we have the 10
> commandments removed from government places and are told we
> cannot pray in school, all the while providing public prayer
> places for Muslims. What in the world is going on and why
> are we being apathetic?
>
> Why aren't we praying? Our God is a mighty God who is
> waiting patiently for us to raise our voices to heaven to
> stop the tide of the anti-Christ actions in our world today!
>
>
> Now we find we have a charismatic candidate for president
> who does not respect our flag and refuses to wear one on his
> lapel except when it becomes politically expedient and whose
> own wife and pastor that he loves profess to have strong
> anti-white and/or anti-American feelings, and we sit back
> and say 'it is a given, we can do nothing.' There
> has NEVER been a time in 2000 years that we can do nothing,
> never a time that we must sit back and allow the evil in
> men's and women's hearts to take over our world. We
> should be very afraid, because our apathy is leading us to
> perdition!
>
> It is time for all Christian Americans to raise the battle
> cry and take our nation back. Maybe McCain on his own cannot
> defeat Obama, but our God can and He will if we take to our
> knees in prayer and raise a mighty cry to the heavens to
> 'Save us O Lord.' We have the power to change the
> course of this election and to keep a man as suspect as
> Barack Obama from leading our country to who knows where
> with his message of 'change' - a change which I fear
> will be away from our Christian ideals and away from Christ
> and further away from one nation under God -- to one nation
> under Allah.
>
> We are great at passing stories and pictures around the
> internet, but where are our prayers and prayer warriors
> praying to stop this tide of Barack Obama? God parted the
> red sea, Jesus raised himself from the dead, and we can
> bring our country back to its Christian roots and stop the
> move to the rise of Muslims in our country. We can stop our
> country from being 'under Allah,' but we must begin
> to pray, to pray as if our country and our lives depended on
> it, because they do. We can stop all these atrocities
> against God's commands that have taken root in our
> country through something as simple as sincere prayer, a
> call to God to deliver us, to forgive us our sins of apathy
> and to protect us from the evil that is upon us.
>
> Okay prayer warriors, here is your challenge: start those
> prayer chains! Get the spiritual power working on our behalf
> and stop Barack Obama the proper way -- by calling on our
> God to save us from the deception that charismatic preaching
> is using to lead us on the wrong path. Stop those who would
> take God out of our country and our government. Raise up
> good men to lead us and protect us. George Bush is being
> buffeted because he has fought a holy war against the evils
> that attack us and we should not be surprised because a
> prophet is not honored in his own country. But we should not
> rest on our laurels and allow ourselves to be taken further
> off the path of Christianity and to have God removed from
> our presence in our schools, courts, government and
> businesses. Invite God into the fray. Ask that His power
> rest upon us and give us the victory. Ask him to raise up a
> might army to defend us and to protect our country as he did
> in days of old.
>
> Let us be victorious beginning NOW. The battle is His but
> we must call on Him without ceasing and unite our voices and
> hearts in prayer and fasting.
>
> Please pass this around to all people of prayer that you
> know and maybe, just maybe, a more eloquent person of prayer
> will write something better and more inspiring -- and even
> the rocks will shout that Jesus is Lord and our Mighty God
> is with us, bringing the victory for us and ultimately for
> Him!
>
> 'Be joyful always, pray continually, give thanks in all
> circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ
> Jesus. 1 Thes. 5:16-18