November 25, 2014

The Mind's Giving to Things

"Truth consists in the mind's giving to things the importance they have in reality." - Jean Daniélou

November 19, 2014

About as Kind-Hearted as a Wolf

When I was a kid I took for granted that America was the greatest country in the world, if it ever was. Didn’t we hear it all the time? In movies and speeches, classrooms and hallways, it just was. It was reality. Who wouldn’t want to believe something so lovely? I felt like a hero just knowing that fact.

No one questioned it. We didn’t know that was even an option, but why would you? You can’t question something so – so true!

The brilliance of our republic was great. It was a real beckon of hope to millions of lives. No one would argue. But with such a bright history it’s no wonder so many find it (seemingly) unbearable to say goodnight to those national hopes. We don’t want to believe all that is over.

But over it is. Gone are the days when our presidents were respected, when our citizens were happy, when the world awed at our blessings. Long gone. If you haven’t realized this, you probably feel it.

Soon though it will be clear as a bell.

The reasons for the end of our glory days are many yet people I see and work with everyday aren’t aware and live as if it all means nothing. So I’m going to spend time laying out (some of) the elements, one by one. The ones that can’t go ignored.

***

"A nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves." - Edward Murrow

I was washing dishes one morning at work – in a home with intellectually-handicapped children – and one of my coworkers can’t not have the local news blaring whether she’s in the room or not. I can’t stand that. Plus, to make things better, she’s terrifically in love with complaining about her life to everyone not interested.

From where I was in the kitchen you could look through a cutout in the wall directly above the sink and see the television in the living room. The news anchor started talking about armored vehicles or something for local police in western Washington. Hello! A jolt of information went off in me. I looked up, listening with all my life, drying some dish.

I tuned everything else out. Had to. She, the anchor, went on about the government’s new policies or some new program - maybe she said it was issued from the Pentagon, I can’t remember. Basically, local police were getting an upgrade. A militarized upgrade.

Then the next topic. That was it. So nonchalant and smooth. Accept it and move on, they seemed to say.

But how could we, especially when we know the founding fathers would whole-heartedly disapprove? Why do the local police need equipment used in war?

This has spawned heaps of books and articles and interviews with experts, one of them being John Whitehead, attorney, author of A Government of Wolves: The Emerging American Police State, and president and spokesperson of The Rutherford Institute, a nonprofit devoted to civil liberties and human rights.

American historian, political analyst and author Tom Woods interviewed John Whitehead and there is a sixteen-minute clip that lays out some of the important basics. Take 1% of your day and listen to it (watch below).

And if you like to read, two other books that may be of interest are Rise of the Warrior Cop: The Militarization of America's Police Forces and How America Was Lost: From 9/11 to the Police/Warfare State. All three books are available on Kindle as well.

Bigger guns, more gear, stronger and tougher machines may not seem like a huge deal. After all, we've been told the Pentagon just had extra stuff and gave it away. That was it, simple. But why couldn't police in San Diego return their armored vehicles? I mean, let's be honest, when will they ever use them? Useful or not you don't just send back a gift from the Pentagon.

There's more going on here than just an awkward gift exchange. There's an agenda. More on that next. In the meantime, start asking questions, read some articles (there are dozens online), and talk with local police.

***



photo credit: JD Hancock via photopin cc; photo credit: trainman74 via photopin cc

November 12, 2014

He Said Unto Me, Dig!


It started with JFK. I didn't know much about the conspiracy to kill president John F. Kennedy until early this year. Hearing bits and pieces throughout my life was never enough to get me interested. Until... Scanning books on my Amazon app, a small addiction of mine, I came across a book by a guy named Jim Marrs called Crossfire: The Plot That Killed Kennedy, which was later used by filmmaker Oliver Stone for his 1991 film JFK. Something about the book, but probably just the possibility there was an actual "plot" to murder a president, got to me. I stared at the photo on the cover and read reviews.

Lee Harvey Oswald, Lyndon Johnson, Jim Garrison, Jack Ruby, the freakin' Mafia, Cuba, Russia, double agents, reality doesn't get much more interesting than this, folks! I found and devoured They Killed Our President: 63 Reasons to Believe There Was a Conspiracy to Assassinate JFK authored by Jesse Ventura with the help of researchers Dick Russell and David Wayne. It immediately became apparent (but don't take my word for it) that the "theories" of an outrageous and inconceivable plot to murder in cold blood one of our most beloved presidents were hardly theories at all. The evidence that JFK's assassination was the machinations of a top-secret and widely-
collaborated effort was overwhelming, and that's the most neutral way I can put it.


But even with gapping holes in the official story the heralds of the masses continued broadcasting their message. The official story, that Lee Harvey Oswald, a lone lunatic working by himself, murdered JFK, is no doubt less-demanding on us citizens than a conspiracy involving the highest government officials and members of the Mafia. Because if the latter is true we can't in good conscience just continue our daily routines unmoved, believing foolishly everything is hunky-dory. And if what the U.S. citizens are (still) being told are blatant lies than we have a moral issue on our hands and that demands proper reflection and action. The truth complicates.

That was almost a year ago. Since then I've zig-zagged across the spectrum of lies and coverups. I learned about John Perkins, an economic hit man, and how his whole job was ensnaring developing countries in a web of debt with the United States (see Confessions of an Economic Hit Man). I learned about Project Paperclip, the secretive searching-out and bringing-over of Nazi scientists to our country during and after World War II. We gave them homes, cars and jobs in universities and invited them to continue their research and experiments in things like mind control, which led me to Brice Taylor, MKULTRA and the splitting of personalities through trauma. The deeper I went the more outrageous and heinous things got.

But even with many of these being common knowledge I get looks from people that tell me I've crossed the line. They don't want to know. Though, the terrible truth is there are weightier issues, things I've heard and wish weren't true.

In the end, everything hidden will be uncovered (Luke 8:17). But what you know and understand now just could save a life. Lacking knowledge destroys (Hosea 4:6).

Your thoughts He knows. My plans He knows. Even the birds He pays mind. Nothing escapes God. No sleight of hand is quick enough to slip pass His eyes. No game of hide-n-seek will conjure the same excitement. His knowledge of us is annoyingly and awkwardly intimate. So surely the conspiring of crooked criminals and corrupt angels God knows as well. Ezekiel the prophet found out just how heartbreakingly-thorough God's knowledge was. God had to take - literally, by his hair! - the prophet and show him what was happening in the dark of His temple, His holy house. "Then said he unto me, Son of man, dig now in the wall: and when I had digged in the wall, behold a door." (Eze 8:8, KJV) Ezekiel eventually discovered, with God's help, scores of men throwing out God's commands as if an old rag, erecting images and worshipping false gods; gods unworthy of even the lower-case-"g" version of that word.


God knew. Ezekiel didn't. God showed. Ezekiel wrote.

The truth is not easily apparent, often. Add on top of that the fact that elaborate systems function to keep certain truths suppressed. If a person or a society live within such a false reality long enough the Actually Real will become un-confront-able (to a certain extent). And thus, God Himself had to baptize Ezekiel into Reality!

I have never met someone who was snatched up by God by the hair but my spirit knows God reveals truth today to those called, to those willing and seeking, to those humble and lowly. Discovering the truth will mean digging. Digging is work. Ezekiel dug. Jim Garrison dug. Splitting the Sky dug. Mark Flynn dug. They too found doors leading to secret chambers.

For the next little while, if you visit this space, I pray you will find light in the labyrinth and hear whispers through a megaphone. The evening news, the political charades, the happy-clappy mantras of collapsing empires that drown out the quiet voice of Truth end here. The bulk of my writings will be sharing what I've learned, what, by God's grace, I have read and researched, resources to learn more and anything else I think will help or inspire normal people to know and act and live in a world gone mad. After hours and hours of gathering information, in my opinion, our world and specifically the United States is ripe for major shifts and not for the better. Like I said, the truth complicates, but it also compels. May it compel you!

Jesus is the real, "the really Real" as Brennan Manning puts it, the ultimate and most invigorating Truth. Truth is a person and I love and follow Him and thus we should never shy away from that which is real, big or small, because, at the end of the day, Jesus knows all about it. If He desires He'll give us all the grace to handle and understand.

Grace and Peace to you.

***

photo credit: macabrephotographer via photopin cc; photo credit: U.S. Embassy New Delhi via photopin cc; photo credit: Sebastiano Pitruzzello (aka gorillaradio) via photopin cc

February 15, 2014

If the False Self Could Sing: Art With Neko Case


Oh, I would never do that!

To this a good psychologist might ask, "And just who is this I?"

Is the "I" not that which we wish to show to the world? That image of smart, strong, moral, sexually proficient - whatever it is - we are preserving, creation of our own hands, to illicit the response we want most desperately from people? Say, respect or admiration.

As necessary as that is at some level, the "I" has an issue with honesty. This is because it's proficient in lying. It's not that the "I" isn't strong or smart or hip or whatever at times. What's false is the uniformity. There's more. There's a surplus to the "I" we present to the world. These other selves (of ourselves). Which forever haunt our nice and pretty images like ghosts on strings.

And this is where we get into trouble because the fortress of our "I" doesn't have extra room (or time!) for loose, wandering selves. "We're running a tight campaign here, people! Anything that doesn't fit with our agenda - our image - must be thrown into the dungeon! Capiche?!"

What happens is the parts of ourselves that don't line up with how we want to be seen get the shaft and get roped down in the dark depths of our unconscious, rarely, if ever, to see the light of day, except of coarse by mistake (Freudian slips, etc.), so as to leave the parts in the limelight untainted. Let's face it: we all do this.

People, though, are these other parts and that's important. Repressing them only makes matters worse. A perfect and primmer image often means imminent breakdown, which, psychologically, is really good. This fortress, castle, and self-created image is what Thomas Merton and Richard Rohr and David Benner would all call the False Self.

One of the absolute worse things you could do to your False Self is to be honest. Being honest about all the parts of yourself, but particularly the parts you've hidden away, out of sight, out of mind, because they don't look good with the image you've become obsessed with maintaining, begins the dismantling of the image and the journey toward genuine change.

Try it. When quiet and alone, sit down and openly and sincerely invite all the parts of yourself to get together, no matter who might show up. Like an AA meeting of sorts. This will probably take loads of time, and several tries to get everyone there. Having removed all filters, corporate political agendas, and other truth inhibitors, hand the microphone around and give voice to everyone present. Let them introduce themselves and share a little of their testimony. Listen up.

Maturity: giving opportunity for the beautiful in us, as well as the disfigured and downright absurd, to speak and to sing.

All this really annoying talk of psychology and spiritual formation has got me thinking about my favorite musician at the moment, believe it or not.

On ANTI Record's website, I started searching for tantalizing new music to send chills tap-dancing down my spine. Or just something that didn't suck, something better than, say, Chumbawamba. Cake for a record label with the brains to sign brilliant musical artists such as Sean Rowe, Mavis Staples, The Milk Carton Kids, and Saintseneca.

I clicked Neko Case.

I'd seen that name before, but now I had her cover art staring at me, which I found weird. She's running, with sword in hand, toward three sketchy els. What an oddball. The album is called The Worse Things Get, The Harder I Fight, The Harder I Fight, The More I Love You. Plus, she's from Tacoma, Washington (where I live). What's not to love?

I bought the album eventually, having only heard two tracks. Shit, it's good. I was surprised. A country twang here. Lyrical swag there. Sometimes bold and haunting. Always alternative. Some melodies are lovely and arresting. Others almost make me want to skip the track.

But it's that very element I find so alluring in Neko Case. It's her difference. Her multifacetedness. (If I can make up a word!) Her ability to pull out the charming and unnatural. Her album lacks shallow uniformity.

If the False Self could sing it'd belt out its baritone as a created image, as a neat and tidy, all-together and presentable "work of art." The False Self cares too much about how it looks to its audience in order to make good and honest music. And oh how it loves its audience! (What's stupid, though, is I don't know if Neko Case is writing music freed from image. It's impossible to say since an individual living as a False Self is usually unaware themselves of this very fact! Her album could end up being the very manifestation of a False Self, although I don't believe so. All I know is her stupid album has got me thinking too damn much.)

It seems to me that good, mature songwriting takes place after one couldn't care less about the False Self and all image-making and maintaining. This kind of music would be honest above all else, giving voice to whatever there was to give voice to, the lovely and beautiful, the odd and absurd. No filters. No agendas. Just great music.

Go listen to Neko Case to see what I mean (or this will forever remain incoherent babble). And might she be our soundtrack to writing, painting, and dancing after having given our ears to the hidden and suppressed, odd and absurd selves of ourselves.

Be honest.