Bill Gates reportedly compared the computer industry with the auto industry and stated, 'If GM had kept up with technology like the computer industry has, we would all be driving $25 cars that got 1,000 miles to the gallon."
In response to Bill's comments, General Motors issued a press release stating: If GM had developed technology like Microsoft, we would all be driving cars with the following characteristics:
1. For no reason whatsoever, your car would crash........Twice a day.
2.. Every time they repainted the lines in the road, you would have to buy a new car.
3. Occasionally your car would die on the freeway for no reason. You would have to pull to the side of the road, close all of the windows, shut off the car, restart it, and reopen the windows before you could continue. For some reason you would simply accept this.
4. Occasionally, executing a maneuver such as a left turn would cause your car to shut down and refuse to restart, in which case you would have to reinstall the engine.
5. Macintosh would make a car that was powered by the sun, was reliable, five times as fast and twice as easy to drive - but would run on only five percent of the roads.
6. The oil, water temperature, and alternator warning lights would all be replaced by a single 'This Car Has Performed An Illegal Operation' warning light.
7. The airbag system would ask 'Are you sure?' before deploying.
8. Occasionally, for no reason whatsoever, your car would lock you out and refuse to let you in until you simultaneously lifted the door handle, turned the key and grabbed hold of the radio antenna.
9. Every time a new car was introduced car buyers would have to learn how to drive all over again because none of the controls would operate in the same manner as the old car.
10. You'd have to press the 'Start' button to turn the engine off.
PS - I'd like to add that when all else fails, you could call 'customer service' in some foreign country and be instructed in some foreign language how to fix your car yourself!
Of the thousands of people who rake in the dollars because of their psychic ability, not one is on the public record before the fact in predicting this.
Is it you think all psychics suck and are fake because you didn't find one so far that predicted this bridge collapse ?
No. I think all self-proclaimed psychics suck because they haven't predicted ***anything*** with any specificity that can help anyone else. After 9/11, all kinds of psychics claimed they predicted the event. Fine. Where were they before the event? What so-called psychics do usually is either one of two things. First they predict with such little specificity that their predictions will as a matter of unfolding national events come true. Hey, I can play that silly game. I will right now predict that a plane with crash in the Western United States in the next month; I see the letter "K" and the number "4", and I sense anguish in Dallas. Time will tell whether Dallas is a person or a city or if the plane is a Boeing 737 or a Piper Cub. Secondly, they predict the same thing with such regularity that the prediction will come true in the same way that the clock must strike 12 at least once a day.
I certainly allow that there is much in life that cannot be explained and may be beyond what science can ever tell us. I also happen to think that there is something to be said for karma-- that one's past behavior or wiring leads to predestined events. You see this on the highways everyday where choleric people had car accidents more so than others who take it easy.
Other than that, I would have to disagree that there is anything predestined about the bridge falling, for example. In a parallel universe, if there were better contractors and better inspectors and money available for timely maintenance, it would not have fallen. The laws of nature are implacable. So, all things been equal, gravity, rust, the vibration of a 100,00o cars will take its toll and bad things in the absence of human intervention will happen.
The basic difference philosophically between you and me is that you think the future is "real"-- that we are riding on a ribbon of time to encounter a future that was witten in the stars a thousand years before the ocean's rolled. My view is that we live in the subjunctive-- if I do this, that not this will happen-- and that there is no future-- there is only now. The future is created in real time as we make choices, and since those choices I make multiplied by four billion are infinitely variable, the futures we can encounter are also infinitely variable.
None of this is provable, of course, but I think my theory makes more sense and also forces me to assume that I can take responsibility for myself much more so than by presupposing fatalism.
I am open to be persuaded by a simple test. Predict an event that will save at least one person's life, making sure that your prediction is publicably verifiably before the event.
Feel free to post your prediction on this thread, answering the standard journalistic questions of who, what, when, and how.
So, yes, I don't need this bridge collapse to prove to me that psychics are frauds that play of people's credulity. Their own track record has established that beyond a shadow of a doubt.
There are certainly people that are highly intutional and animals like Oscar, the fuzzy feline of death,
that have senses outside the ranges of other people or animals, even. But this has nothing to do with the paranormal. It is merely people or animals with refined senses sensing what is happening in the present. I am talking about sensing what hasn't happened at all. I haven't seen any proof of that.
Yikes. I can understand a skeptical point of view, but skepticism without understanding the scientific method leads to sheer silliness.First of all, there is no such thing as "proof" except in math and alcohol. There is evidence, evidence, and more evidence. An inability to predict a large disaster is evidence, not proof, that people aren't good at predicting large disasters.(The same thing applies to believers, too. You can't present smoking-gun PROOF that psychic phenomena exist, either - you can only present what you believe is evidence.)As you can see from other peoples' posts, not everyone believes that psychic abilities should predict disasters (or at least, not large-scale disasters that won't directly put them in harm). To them, your position that an inability to predict a large-scale disaster disproves psychic ability is a straw man.Now, that said, I believe people who claim that they can predict a major disaster before it happens should put up or shut up, so to speak, if they want to be taken seriously. The hits should not be explainable by chance nor by simply having a keen sense of the obvious, nor by being so vague that any number of events that were bound to happen could "fulfill" them.
I can respond on two levels. First is that in studies of non-locality (Google it or YouTube it) science has indeed proven that psychic connections exist between people whether they are aware of it or not. This was a first. Second, psychism has little to do with predictions. Psychism has to do with being sensitive to a person's aura or "vibes" and understanding something about their condition. The impressions that come through may or may not deal with conditions in what we call the future. What the future "is" is still a mystery.
Even Einstein remarked, "Time and distance are not conditions in which we live, they are modes in which we think."
Psychism is not to be confused with mediumship which may also deal with a person's condition, but the source in mediumship is a celestial one -- perhaps the person's guides and teachers or loved ones. In this, mediumship can be far superior to psychic impressions.
Just because I have a right, does it always make sense to exercise that right?
Here is what I do understand.
1. Owning a gun to kill Chip, Dale, and Bambi-- so long as you eat them. 2. Owning guns as part of an antique collection. 3. Owning a gun as a tribal statement. Just as Indians used to carry tomahawks and Sikhs today carry daggers, neo-nazis and hillbillies may own guns as a statement of affiliation. I get that. 4. Owning a gun as a professional requirement, for example, as an abortion provider. 5. Owning a gun for sentimental reasons-- to bring back fond memories of storming the beaches of Normardy.
I understand all of that. I also don't dispute the traditional right to bear arms under the constitution.
But what I don't understand is the need to own a gun on the premise that you will need it to protect yourself or your family.
When you do that, you firstly surrender to fear and often bigotry. You secondly assume that you have the clarity of mind to not mistake a halloween prankster or a tardy mailman for a murderer. You thirdly assume that a jury of your peers will exonerate you should you make a mistake that leads to manslaughter and that you won't be charged by the estate for civil remedies, as happened to OJ-- to say nothing about the $200-$400 per hour lawyers now charge. You finally assume that a curious or a a suicidal youngster won't blow her head off, or that such rationality prevails in your household to the extent that you in a moment of passion won't blow off their heads.
These are a lot of dubious assumptions that make it not worthwhile for me to pack heat. There are better ways.
The Bill of Rights grants you the right to march through Skokie carrying a Nazi flag. The Bill of Rights also grants you the right to drink Jonestown joy juice if that is your religious bliss. But it doesn't follow that the exercise of these rights are wise. So, yes, you have the right to be stupid-- and silent forever.
They'll have to pry my gun from my cold, dead, stiff fingers.
Quoted from Men in Black. Your proposal is acceptable.
Because of Obie. Because of ACORN. Because of lesser criminals. PEOPLE ASK WHY I CARRY A GUN~~ author unknown
My old grandpa said to me son, "There comes a time in every man's life when he stops bustin' knuckles and starts bustin' caps and usually it's when he becomes too old to take an ass whoopin."
I don't carry a gun to kill people.I carry a gun to keep from being killed. I don't carry a gun to scare people. I carry a gun because sometimes this world can be a scary place. I don't carry a gun to impress women. I carry a gun to protect my woman. I don't carry a gun because I'm paranoid. I carry a gun because there are real threats in the world. I don't carry a gun because I'm evil. I carry a gun because I have lived long enough to see the evil in the world. I don't carry a gun because I hate the government. I carry a gun because I understand the limitations of government. I don't carry a gun because I'm angry. I carry a gun so that I don't have to spend the rest of my life hating myself for failing to be prepared, including from angry people seeking to harm. I don't carry a gun because I want to shoot someone. I carry a gun because I want to die at a ripe old age in my bed, and not on a sidewalk somewhere tomorrow afternoon. I don't carry a gun because I'm a cowboy. I carry a gun because, when I die and go to heaven, I want to be a cowboy. I don't carry a gun to make me feel like a man. I carry a gun because men know how to take care of themselves and the ones they love. I don't carry a gun because I feel inadequate. I carry a gun because unarmed and facing three armed thugs, I am inadequate. I don't carry a gun because I love it. I carry a gun because I love life and the people who make it meaningful to me. Police Protection is an oxymoron. Free citizens must protect themselves. Police do not protect you from crime, they usually just investigate the crime after it happens and then call someone in to clean up the mess.
Personally, I carry a gun because I'm too young to die and too old to take an ass whoopin'. if you break into my house in the middle of the night, you'll know for sure. or if you try to hijack my car. plus i like the feeling i get when i shoot at targets, power.
I'm thinking Viagara is cheaper.
You might look at Zero's latest Czar, the Czar of Social Philosophy, then go read 1984 by George Orwell. A gun is to protect oneself's personal liberty, this takeover will be stopped.
Come the the end of days, I would rather be rampaging with the mob than huddled in a bomb shelter. Takeover will bes topped? if there was a real civil emergency, the first thing the government will confiscate is the NRA's membership list. The second thing will be all those "private militia" guns. We saw this after Katrina struck.
I assume nothing, dead people tell nothing.
I can assure you that you are making a mistake that could put you behind bars. I speak from some experience, as we had a break in while we slept at night in our home. I once heard G. Gordon Liddy, the conservative commentator say that if you encounter a burgler in your home, you should blow his head off as you can always claim imminent harm. The policeman I talked to said this was terrible advice. You will be sued by both the state and the presumed criminal's estate, and there will be plenty of motivation to challenge your account/lies. What if, Iasked the policeman, I saw the burgler with my things in my child's room-- could I go with him with a knife or a gun? What if I saw him running out of my house with my stuff? Could I run him down with my car? Absolutely not to any of that, he said. There needs to be a demonstrable threat to your life or someone in your home-- he is lunging at you or your child, for example. And if he is unarmed, it is almost certain that you would be convicted of manslaughter. You don't have the right to act as an executioner no matter what the provocation. But, as I said before, you can certainly test your legal theory for tens of thousands of dollars by the time litigation wraps up.
Damn! Where do you live? It's sure not around here! Here, we take a more enlightened view of criminal vs. homeowner. If the DA wants to be re-elected, he won't try to indict you for killing some scumbag who breaks into your home. We kinda figure that anyone breaking into a home is looking to commit violence and that should be stopped -- permanently.
But the mere commission of a felony isn't reason enough for you to execute someone else. Depending on what state you live in, even pulling a gun on you is not enough for you to fire at the criminal.
The bigger point I'm trying to make is that there is a gap between what we think are our rights and what are our rights-- and it is a distinction that can get you killed. It is certainly your constitutional right to own a gun just as it is your right to walk any street you choose to walk in Chicago or New York City. But it doesn't mean it is the smart thing to do in either case. And nor is it the law that your home is your castle, as Harvard professor Gates found out last week, who was arrested for so far as I can tell for being mouthy while black in his own home.
I had a newborn baby, and the two of us were sleeping in the bedroom.I woke up to see flashlights scanning the living room, and heard two men walking about. I was terrified. I stayed as quiet as I could and hoped the baby didn't wake up.
The footsteps came closer and the flashlights shone into the bedroom. I was sure I was going to die.
Then I noticed their police uniforms. Only then did they apologise and explain. Prowlers with guns in your home? A lot of folks on this thread would have had no probem shooting these cops dead. Sometimes we don't know intentions until it is too late. The other day, someone knocked on my front door at three in the morning. It turned out he had the wrong address. But again, some people would have killed him for his crime of confusion.
"If there's a blue pill and a red pill, and the blue pill is half the price of the red pill and works just as well, why not pay half price for the thing that's going to make you well?" -- President Obama
Please let this notsound strange to you, for my family lawyer who would have handled this executor ship of my will on mybehalf, died early this year after a protracted illness. I prayed and got your email ID from your country's guest book. I am Mrs. Anita Williams from Oman, 58 years old. I am suffering from a protracted cancer of the lungs, which has also affected my braincells as a result of complications. From all indication my condition is really deteriorating and it is quite obvious that, according to my doctor I have been advised that I may not live for the nexttwo months, this is because the cancer stage hasgotten to a critical and life threatening stage.
I was brought up in an orphanage home as a child of circumstance, having been abandoned at birth by myteenage biological mother and taken to an orphanagehome by a Good Samaritan. I was married to my latehusband Mr. Gamal Williams for twenty years without a child. My husband was hypertensive and died ofcardiac arrest.
Since my husbands death I decided not to re-marry,when my ailment became terrible, I sold off all our choice properties and personal belongings including ashopping mall, an hotel, shares, bonds, jewelries andother valuable family treasures and deposited theproceeds amounting to USD$10.2 million dollars with First Inland Bank Plc. Presently, this money is stil llodged with the Bank, and the management and board ofdirectors of the bank just wrote me as the sole owner to come forward to receive the money after having kept it for so long a time in their coffers, or that I can issue a letter of authorization to somebody toreceive it on my behalf since I can not come over and claim the funds due largely to my illness or they get it confiscated.
Presently, I'm writing you with my laptop in a hospital in England, located at fulham road in west London. It is the leading cancer treatment hospitalin the world. I have been undergoing treatment forcancer of the lungs. My doctors like I said earliertold me that I have only two months to live. It is my last wish therefore to see that 70% of this moneywhich amounts to usd $7,140,000.00 (seven million onehundred and forty thousand dollars only) is investedto any organization of your choice and distributedeach year among charitable Organizations, the poorand the motherless babies homes.
You can also extend to churches and mosques, if you wish. 30% of the money which amounts to usd $3,060,000.00 (three millionsixty thousand dollars only) is for your personal use.
I want you as a God fearing person, to take it upon yourself and use this money for the aforementioned purposes, I took this decision in other to helphumanity in my little capacity, before I rest inpeace in the bosom of the almighty, because accordingto my physicians my time will soon be up.
As soon asI receive your reply I shall give you the officialcontact of the First Inland Bank plc officials, to enable you reach them without delays. I will alsoissue you a letter of authorization that will proveyou as the new beneficiary of my will. The funds havean open beneficiary mandate, and as such it is whom I authorize to act on my behalf that the bank will recognize and release the funds to. Please assure methat you will act accordingly as I stated herein.
Oh my God! Barack Obama's running the old Kenyan Prince Birth Announcement scam! Here's how it goes: you want to destroy America from the inside but you can't because you're a foreigner. So first, you gotta find yourself a good ol' American to reproduce for you. Then, you have that child on foreign soil, while simultaneously placing the birth announcement of that child in one of our "fringe" state's local newspapers. ... And then, you wait until this baby is a middle-aged man. Now the trap is set---you just sit back and let that child go out and win the election for President of the United States.
Now here's where the scam gets tricky; they can't just win the popular vote. He or she must have a strategy to win the electoral vote---that's what trips up most grifters. But, if you pull it off, you and your puppet child can sit back and destroy the fabric of the country you both hate so much. It's almost too easy.
Actually, they are not. Some self-described rednecks are radical populists. But most are passively conservative or apolitical, voting for the party that best seems to reflect their social rather than their economic values. The paradox is that by doing so, they often vote against their own economic self-interest. Norman Thomas, the six time socialist presidential candidate, was reviled most bitterly and sometimes egged by those whose cause he supported, poor non-urban whites. Perhaps the reason is that such people see their lives with the attitude that it is what it is. They have their god and their guns and their grandparents. And newfangled notions such as social security and community colleges could only intrude on and upset the rhythms of their world. Thus, they chose conservatism and destitution over progressivism and hope.
Southern comedian Jeff Foxworthy defines "redneck" as "a glorious lack of sophistication," stating "that we are all guilty of [it] at one time or another." Redneck has two general uses: first, as a pejorative used by outsiders, and, second, as a term used by members within that group. To outsiders, it is generally a term for white people of Southern or Appalachian rural poor backgrounds — or more loosely, rural poor to working-class people of rural extraction. (Appalachia also includes large parts of Pennsylvania, New York, and Ohio.) In the West Coast, there are regionally specialized versions of the term, namely Okie and Arkie, for poor rural white migrants from respectively Oklahoma and Arkansas, displaced from the Great Plains by the Dust Bowl years of the 1930s. Poor economic conditions across the Southern US also pushed people to migrate to the farming valleys of California.
Lyndon Johnson kept the following rules on his desk on how to influence people around him.
1. Learn to remember names. Inefficiency at this point may indicate that your interest is no sufficiently outgoing. 2. Be a comfortable person so there is no strain in being with you. Be an old-shoe, old-hat kind of individual. 3. Acquire the quality of relaxed easy-going so that things do not ruffle you. 4. Don't be egotistical. Guard against the impression that you know it all. 5. Cultivate the quality of being interesting so people will get something of value from their association with you. 6. Study to get the "scratchy" elements out of your eprsonality, even those of which you may be unconscious. 7. Sincerely attempt to heal, on a honest Christian bsis, every misunderstanding you ahve had or now have. Drain off your grievances. 8. Practice liking people until you learn to do it genuinely. 9. Never miss an opportunity to say a word of congratulation upon any one's achievment or express sympathy in sorrow or disappointment. 10. Give spiritual strength to people and they will give genuine affection to you.
These rules may seem trite. But Johnson's ability to persuade came out of the relationships he formed with peers, and it took great self-discipline to keep his ego in check and control his own passions. It was this self-discipline that gave Johnson his intellectual flexibility and allowed him to be an effective politican.
"Put it before them briefly so that they read it, picturesquely so they will remember it, and, above all, accurately so that they will be guided by its light." Joseph Pulitzer
I liked Borat, portrayed by English comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, although there was one scene where my eyes went to the ceiling. Our kids, being teenagers, thought it was the greatest movie ever. Brüno is a different matter. We lasted about a half hour, leaving as a joke was being made about the abortion of a baby. The plot was thin-- a failed Austrian fashionista trying to be a professional celebrity in Los Angelas. Rather, the movie was a collection of skits with the intent of inciting homophobia in one way or another. The Harkins theater cautoned that this movie had "strong sexual content". What that meant was not pretty nudity or joyous love-making but visuals of ugly naked men and bodily fluids and mechanics. It wasn't funny or entertaining. So we swapped in our tickets for the romantic comedy "The Proposal".
In this movie, Sandra Bullock plays a ruthless book editor Margaret who faces deportation to her native Canada. She blackmails Andrew, her compliant excutive assistant, into a ruse of pretend engagement to avoid the wrath or the immigration authorities. They end up in Alaska where they battle wits with with his rich father, played by a Craig T. Nelson and his fiesty grandmother, played by Betty White. The plot was predictable but the characters were likable and it was an improvement over Bruno.
The Sunday New York Times interviewed Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, in which she made the following comments. Ginsberg: Reproductive choice has to be straightened out. There will never be a woman of means without choice anymore. That just seems to me so obvious. The states that had changed their abortion laws before Roe [to make abortion legal] are not going to change back. So we have a policy that affects only poor women, and it can never be otherwise, and I don't know why this hasn't been said more often. Question: Are you talking about the distances women have to travel because in parts of the country, abortion is essentially unavailable, because there are so few doctors and clinics that do the procedure? And also, the lack of Medicaid for abortions for poor women?Ginsburg: Yes, the ruling about that surprised me. [Harris v. McRae – in 1980 the court upheld the Hyde Amendment, which forbids the use of Medicaid for abortions.] Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don't want to have too many of. So that Roe was going to be then set up for Medicaid funding for abortion. Which some people felt would risk coercing women into having abortions when they didn't really want them. But when the court decided McRae, the case came out the other way. And then I realized that my perception of it had been altogether wrong. Politicans and bloggers have pounced on these statements to suggest that Ginsburg supported eugenics, the theory that selective breeding can better the human race. For example, on July 17th, Rep. Joseph Pitts, a Republican from Pennsylvania, declared Ginsburg's "eugenics way of thinking debases all human life" and he expressed shock that a Supreme Court justice would suggest certain classes of people are not worthy of life and should have been aborted.
I agree that eugenics is a discredited notion that is empty of both science and ethics. I also concede that eugenics informed the population control movement that included the legalization of abortion. Margret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, for example, often asserted a racist, eugencist point of view. I think it is disingenuous, however, to associate either racisim or eugenics with those who are pro-choice. People arrive at policy conclusions in different ways, and an abortion-should-be-legal position need not be predicated on a hatred of other races or a desire to breed out inferior humans. But no where in that quote that Ginsberg suggest that she supports eugenics or wants to use eugenics to control certain groups of people.
I'm amaze that people can absorb the same words and those words can trigger interpretations that are diamentrical to what the writer or speaker intended. This is a good example of such a situation.
So what is Ginsberg saying? Let's break down the statements.
Ginsberg: Reproductive choice has to be straightened out. As a legal question, Ginsberg suggests, the question of reproductive choice remains unsettled. There will never be a woman of means without choice anymore. That just seems to me so obvious. And it is also obvious to me that women with money have choices that women without money do not have. Thus, before Roe v. Wade, a women could travel to a different state or country to get an abortion. The overturn of Roe would only put the question back to the states. The states that had changed their abortion laws before Roe [to make abortion legal] are not going to change back. So we have a policy that affects only poor women, and it can never be otherwise, and I don't know why this hasn't been said more often.
I disagree that the decision to abort or not abort is primarily financially driven. There are surely social and psyuchological factors at play as well. But I cannot disagree with her statement that states allowed abortions are going to repeal their laws to restrict abortions, and states that don't allow abortions clearly impact poor women and families.
Question: Are you talking about the distances women have to travel because in parts of the country, abortion is essentially unavailable, because there are so few doctors and clinics that do the procedure? And also, the lack of Medicaid for abortions for poor women?
Ginsburg: Yes, the ruling about that surprised me. [Harris v. McRae – in 1980 the court upheld the Hyde Amendment, which forbids the use of Medicaid for abortions.]
Ginsberg answers this question in the context of the prohibition of the use of Medicare.
Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don't want to have too many of.
"There was concern." Ginsberg is making a statement about motivations behind Roe. She is not saying that she shares those motivations. The "we" as used in this sentence refers to prevailing sentiment and "that we don't want to have too many of" refers to people who could burden the state in one way or another-- the premise behind eugenics.
So that Roe was going to be then set up for Medicaid funding for abortion. Which some people felt would risk coercing women into having abortions when they didn't really want them.
Ginsberg is clearly troubled about the potential abuses of public funding of abortions, and that some states could use Roe to coerce women into having tubal ligations or abortions.
But when the court decided McRae, the case came out the other way. And then I realized that my perception of it had been altogether wrong.
And so here she disassociates herself from the eugenics premise and implies consideration for pro-lifers who are appalled at the notion that some women are predestined to have their fetuses aborted. Ginsberg has clearly wrestled with this issue, and she is far from the feminist ideologue that some have painted her.
A federal judge in Santa Ana, Calif., ruled Thursday that former Boeing Co. engineer Dongfan "Greg" Chung stole 300,000 pages of sensitive documents that included information about the U.S. space shuttle and a booster rocket.
(Scarecrow) I could wile away the hours Conferrin' with the flowers Consultin' with the rain And my head I'd be scratchin' While my thoughts were busy hatchin' If I only had a brain
I'd unravel any riddle For any individ'le In trouble or in pain
(Dorothy) With the thoughts you'd be thinkin' You could be another Lincoln If you only had a brain
(Scarecrow) Oh, I would tell you why The ocean's near the shore I could think of things I never thunk before And then I'd sit and think some more
I would not be just a nuffin' My head all full of stuffin' My heart all full of pain I would dance and be merry Life would be a ding-a-derry If I only had a brain
Says a reader: "Perfection, I believe, is a state of being."
Actually, wouldn't perfection be a state of non-being? A biography of Walt Disney ended with his death and the ironic remark that finally he (or at least his body) had found perfection. If something is inert, it is devoid of possibility-- anything more than what it can be, which would have to be an atom. Perhaps the reducability of that atom through fission or fusion into a mushroom cloud is the apotheosis of perfection. It is a grim throught that perhaps mankind will only reach perfection by being finally consumed in a sea of fire from a thousand mushroom clouds.
Another reader opines: "In reality, God is Perfect, so is His Law, so is His Book, so is His Envoy, so are His Law Enforcement Officers."
I'm not sure what your theology is, but it cannot be Christian. No such canonical claim is made that God is "perfect". To the contrary, we see an evolution of God from the polytheism of Genesis to the monothesism of the Old Testament to (what many Christians believe) is the Triniterianism of the New Testament and from an anthromorphic God that walks with some humans and smites others to a redemptive God that is the spirit or logos of the Greek testaments. That God's "law enforcement officers" (I assume you mean the clergy) are perfect makes no historical sense to me.
"You are right. It's not christian. I am a Muslim."
My apologies. Granting however that Allah, The Koran, and The Prophet are perfect, what is your warrant this "His Law Enforcement Officers" are perfect? Does perfection mean dogmatic correctness? And if so how does that differ from the perfection of the gods, holy writs, and officers of the Hindus?
"God said He perfected them and then ordered their utmost love and respect. His Law Enforcement Officers are perfect in that they never go against God's will. They have perfect knowledge of the Divine Law, and they implement it perfectly. If Hindus system has similiar perfection, then it is the same. Although I don't hear Hindus making such claims."
You haven't talked to enough Hindus. I grew up in Asia where I saw rampaging Hindus battle rampaging Buddhists, burning to the ground entire city blocks, because they claimed the perfection of their respective theisms. True believers-- fanatics-- populate and drive all mass movements be they religious or political. Those Hindus and those Buddhists along with the Christian crusaders of the Middle Ages and the 21st century and the Islamists that drove jets into skycrapers and strap dynamite to thir daughters are all brothers under the skin in that they have a cast of mind that cannot allow for the possibility that all value systems and god conceptions including their own are imperfect and defective and thus are subject to challenge and reformation.
Fanaticism will be the death of our planet, and, as I said in a previous post, perhaps the annhilation of humanity in a sea of nuclear fire will be a kind of ironic perfection.
"Let there be spaces in your togetherness, And let the winds of the heavens dance between you. Love one another but make not a bond of love: Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls. Fill each other's cup but drink not from one cup. Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf. Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone, Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music. Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping. For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts. And stand together, yet not too near together: For the pillars of the temple stand apart, And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow." — Khail Gibran
I never dated in high school and, while I had some friendships in college, I never “coupled up.” Part of the reason was that I was motivated to make something of myself, and love and marriage weren’t a part of my plans until well after college. That I was poor and didn’t have a car until I was 25 didn’t help me in the pursuit of love. But, overtime, I began to understand the inner logic of dating that culminates in the “greasy spoon test.” (If your date agrees to spend time with you at a less then posh restaurant, say a Wendys, you know that she is a keeper.) It was during my Willow Creek days when I came alive socially. Nancy thinks I’m too jaded in these generalizations, but they were for me hard lessons learned, as there are few decisions that are more critical to your lifelong happiness than who you will marry. Most of your happiness or our misery that we will experience for the remainder of our life comes from the singular decision as to who you will marry.
Girls judge boys on first appearances and on how well you meet their immediate emotional needs. They are impressed by neatness, cleanliness, boldness, fun, and affluence, although they may claim that they do not. They don’t care for religion, politics, or talk about work, although they may claim that they do. (This insight disappointed me as I enjoy talking about religion, politics, and work.)
It’s always better to end an undesirable relationship quickly than to let it fester on. An undesirable relationship is when you are constantly giving more emotionally or in other ways than you are getting. It’s also when she has severe emotional, financial, or family-related problems. It never pays to help a woman with significant problems. These problems are deep-seated and beyond your capability. Don’t try to rescue her. Your love cannot save her. There are times when you should be a hero, but this is not one of those times.
Avoid fanatics-- someone given to extremes, be it in politics, religion, or work. Not all that glistens is gold, and women to the manor born may have expectations that you can never meet. On the other hand, a woman from poverty might have other needs or aspirations that are incompatible with you. While I don’t think that the income her parents make is an important factor, you should take that into consideration. How she handles money is a significant window to her soul. She should fill some of the gaps in your life, but also at the same time you would be wise to look for core compatibilities, especially in terms of values and life goals. She should be your complement, but not your mirror.
Love is thin ice. And, while that is true, and while the desire to possess and be possessed is intoxicating, it is also important to remain true to your beliefs. One such example is the question of marrying across faiths, such as, for example, a Mormon or a Catholic. I admire that members of the Church of the Latter Day Saints for their strong family ethics and I credit the Catholic church for preserving the Bible through the Dark Ages. Many good Christians populate both churches. Such people will be your neighbors, friends, employers, and colleagues. However, I think it is compromising to walk away from core values and principles of belief for reasons of emotion.
Much of dating is to determine what those mutual goals are in a casual, non-judgmental way. For example, while I was walking with a woman through a park, we noticed some kids playing on the slides. Brittany made it clear that she had no interest in becoming a mother. My relationship to her soon came to an end as it was clear that we were on different pages on this key issue. You can also get insight into her soul by observing how she interacts with her parents, friends, children, and animals or pets. Cruelty of any kind is always a disqualifying red flag.
What you see if what you get. If you find yourself arguing with yourself or trying to justify her behavior, you need to listen to your feelings and trust yourself. Your intuition is telling you that she will be trouble with a capital T.
Selflessness is a virtue except when looking for the one you may marry. It’s the one time in your life when you must be utterly and ruthlessly selfish. There are few decisions in your life that will be more important to your happiness and even your sanity. If you find that she has smitten you, you need to hang on to your senses long enough to ask yourself this key question: Is she good for me? Only when you can answer with a strong, clear affirmative should you take your relationship to the next level.
Know what is negotiable and what isn’t negotiable. For me, for example, my love for my cat Rex was non-negotiable, who was a part of my life for a third of my life. Thus, if Nancy would have rejected Rex, the relationship would have collapsed. Also, I could have never married someone that smokes or someone who was irreligious. On the other hand, I don't think I could have married someone who was contemptuous of those who smoked or the irreligious. Since a child’s academic interests largely come from the mother, it was important to me that Nancy also had a curiosity about life and a love for learning. You can learn a lot about a woman in what kinds of friends she has and her relationship to her parents and siblings. Observe, listen, and process, but keep your opinions to yourself.
Some girls show a liking for “bad boys” and may want you to mistreat and dominate them. Perhaps they like the thrill of being on the edge of violence and the law. Such people have self-esteem issues that aren’t healthy to them-- or to you. My advice is to treat your date like a queen. If she doesn’t want to be treated like a queen, you can be sure that she will never treat your kids as princes and princesses. It’s a relationship that is doomed from the start.
Look for a kind heart, a strong mind, character, and love for conversation and children. Look for a woman who neither needs to be on a pedestal or treated like a doormat, but someone who can be your partner through richer or poorer, in sickness or in health, for better or for worse for the rest of your days. For a definition of the ideal woman, you cannot beat Proverbs 31:10-31. “Who can find a virtuous woman? For her price is far above rubies. The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her. She will do him good. She considereth a field and buyeth it; with the fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard. She is not afraid of the snow for her household; for all her household are clothed in scarlet. She openeth her mouth with wisdom, and in her tongue is the law of kindness. Her children rise up and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praiseth her. Give her of the fruit of her hands, and let her own works praise her in the gates.” It is your good fortune that your mother and my mother were as Solomon described.
But to get the ideal woman, you must try to be the ideal man. As you date, reflect on what you have learned, and if the relationship comes to an end that is not on your terms, don’t despair. These emotional disappointments are all part of making you a better, stronger person. Abraham Lincoln once said that just because a stove burned a cat, it doesn’t mean that a cat will never try to get warm again. Speaking of wounded hearts, I recall a ditty that we once used to try to console ourselves:
My heart that broke so many times And always in a different place Has mended been—as many times— Repaired without a trace And just because it looks so new Your fingers itch to break it too I don’t care greatly if you do— The next in line has mending glue.
The Bible advises, unenthusiastically, that “It is better to marry than to burn.” Marriage, it has been said, is reaching into a bag of snakes and hoping you grab an eel. “Needles and pins, needle and pins, when a man marries his trouble beings,” and for the half of the marriages that fail, that surely must be true. “Love is a folly of the mind, an unquenchable fire a hunger without surfeit,” wrote Richard de Fournival in the 13th century, “a sweet delight, a pleasing madness, a labor without repose and a repose without labor.” But after the marriage, the living begins—the hard work of finding a common round between two independent people. Marriage is a learned skill. While it is a natural relationship, it is not a natural condition. Nothing outside of the nuclear family provides the warmth, security, and guarantee of permanence that makes for mental health. It takes work, and if you find yourself falling out of love, take the effort to fall back into love again. It is good advice to “never get married until you have kissed the Blarney Stone,” and daily affirmation of your wife and children can go along way in making the remainder of your life pleasant. “A drop of honey catches more flies than a gallon of gall,” does another wise folk saying. Marriage is no place for candor, and words said in anger will linger above your heads long after you have forgotten why you argued.
There will be reasons why you find yourself falling in love. If you ever find yourself falling out of love, my most heart-felt suggestion is to re-discover those reasons why you fell in love in the first place. Nancy and I married in our middle thirties when we had established routines that worked for us. It hasn’t always been easy to find a middle ground, and there have been times when we have argued, sometimes long and loudly. But if there is one thing we have going for us, it is that when we fight we fight fairly and we can talk things out. A teacher once told me that I was “very dumb but very verbal”—and perhaps that’s my saving grace. On our honeymoon a couple that had been married for 50 years remarked that “Nancy is not just a good conversationalist but also a good listener” and said that we would someday celebrate 50 years of marriage. We both have strong communication skills and enjoy our Saturday morning pillow chats that let us translate frustrations into words and words into solutions. For us, divorce isn’t an option.
As the poet said, “let their be spaces in our togetherness . . . for the pillars of the temples stand apart and the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.” We cherish our family time and our together time, especially our date nights. But there is also something refreshing about our times of separation. Just as we appreciate America more after we visit Mexico for a week, so too we appreciate each other more after a few days or a week a part. And Nancy and I enjoy our occasional separate vacations. I’m expecting Nancy and the boys back from Chicago on Monday evening.
"Man can will nothing unless he has first understood that he must count on no one but himself; that he is alone, abandoned on earth in the midst of his infinite responsibilities, without help, with no other aim than the one he sets himself, with no other destiny than the one he forges for himself on this earth.” -Jean-Paul Sartre
"The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion.” -Albert Camus
“You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist.” - Friedrich Nietzsche
"Where am I? Who am I? How did I come to be here? What is this thing called the world? How did I come into the world? Why was I not consulted? And If I am compelled to take part in it, Where is the director? I want to see him.” - Soren Kierkegaard
"Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it." -Andre Gide
"Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity.
"Surely some revelation is at hand; Surely the Second Coming is at hand. The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert A shape with lion body and the head of a man, A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds. The darkness drops again; but now I know That twenty centuries of stony sleep Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle, And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?" - William Butler Yates
John Calvin's 500th birthday is on July 10. Here, perhaps, he anticipates social networking.
"It is the common habit of mankind that the more closely men are bound together by the ties of kinship, of acquaintanceship, or of neighborhood, the more responsibilities for one another they share. This does not offend God; for his providence, as it were, leads us to it. But I say: we ought to embrace the whole human race without exception in a single feeling of love; here there is no distinction between barbarian and Greek, worthy and unworthy, friend and enemy, since all should be contemplated in God, not in themselves. When we turn aside from such contemplation, it is no wonder we become entangled in many errors. Therefore, if we rightly direct our love, we must first turn our eyes not to man, the sight of whom would more often engender hate than love,but to God, who bids us extend to all men the love we bear to him, that this may be an unchanging principle: Whatever the character of the man,we must yet love him because we love God."
It's a nice thought. But I cannot lose sight of his intolerence that led to the execution of Servetus. But nor should I forget his positive impact. From Wikipedia: "Calvin's writing and preaching provided the seeds for the branch of theology that bears his name. The Presbyterian and other Reformed churches, which look to Calvin as a chief expositor of their beliefs, have spread throughout the world. Calvin's thought exerted considerable influence over major religious figures and entire religious movements, such as Puritanism, and his ideas have been cited as contributing to the rise of capitalism, individualism, and representative democracy in the West."
A half millenium after Calvin's birth, I along with many others continue to dispute his Five Points. Perhaps that too reflects his legacy and his greatness.
I dusted off an essay I wrote about five years ago on how to do well on these miserable tests. This October, my boy will be taking the PSAT in California where we will be on fall break. I picked up Kaplan's 2010 prep book for $15.06. It seems solid, with a diagnostic test and three full-length practice tests. In places, I've updated the essay with comments in italics. Aptitude tests include such tests as the ACT, SAT, GRE, GMAT, LSAT, MCAT and others. They, of course, do not measure aptitude, if by aptitude we mean inherent intellectual ability and potential. I deny that there is such a thing as an “IQ”—a relatively constant numeral that represents your “intelligence.” Top grades were for me a grind. I aced Social Studies and English, but I struggled in Physics and Geometry. When I look at myself, it makes me question where the intelligence of someone can be reduced to a number or a couple of numbers, and I suspect there are as many kinds of mental capacity as there are people. I cannot carry a tune, catch a football, do calculus, or give a speech. To paraphrase Gilbert and Sullivan, in things arithmetical and mechanical, I’m far from the model of a modern Major General! But teachers liked me. I did my homework, enjoyed class discussions, took leadership roles when the opportunities arose, allied myself with brighter kids, and was highly motivated. All of that helped me to succeed in school.
What these tests do measure is your understanding of how to take the test—a meaningless skill in itself but an essential skill for differentiating yourself from others throughout your life. I’ve yet to go on a job interview where someone has quizzed me on the Binomial Theorem or has asked me to do analogies. And in all my years as a computer programmer, I’ve never used mathematics beyond that of what an eighth grader would know. I consider such tests a perversion of our meritocracy and yet another characteristic of our unfair society. It is a doorway that filters out talent. Economic advantage allows wealthier families to take the test prep courses and, more importantly, have a parental and peer ethos where high scores are respected. It is their kids that go on to the elite schools and careers. A child from a slum who has a SAT of 1000 and a child from a prep school with a SAT of 1000 don’t have the same intelligence, and it is the latter who is the dunce.
You're entering a never-never land where you must learn an artificial language, suspend common sense, and never use your knowledge and judgment. The premium is not on answering questions deeply but answering those questions with the answer that ETS wants—which isn’t always the correct or appropriate answer. To do well in these tests, it helps to understand how these tests are constructed, with what one prep course book calls Joe Bloggs answers-- superficially appealing but wrong answers that appeal to the credulous Joe Bloggs.
The most important thing you need to understand is that is possible and likely for you or anyone else to get a top score. The Educational Testing Service of Princeton, New Jersey, will deny that there is a system for getting high scores on these tests. Here is a typical nugget of misinformation from ETS about the GMAT, and it will be your loss if this is what you believe: “The GMAT is an aptitude test rather than a test of knowledge. It is not designed to test specific knowledge in business or other specialized subjects. Cramming, therefore, is neither advisable nor recommended.” The mere fact that test prep companies and publishers year after year make millions of dollars from students who want to get high scores is proof that ETS is mistaken. On that basis alone, I would say that cramming is both advised and recommended. I hasten however to define cramming as something more than memorizing lists of words and formulas the night before the test. The difference between my SAT and my GRE was 230 points and my MAT score was above the 98th percentile. My intelligence didn’t change. All that changed was that I didn’t took the SAT seriously whereas I did take the GRE and MAT seriously. For a few years in the late 1970s and early 1980s, I was in Mensa, the so-called high-IQ club. When I was at Manhatten’s Williams Club where the monthly meeting was held, I met F. Lee Bailey, Isaac Asimov, the Australian ambassador and other interesting people. In the five years that I was in the organization, I came to realize two somewhat contradictory things. First, that there is quite a gap from being smart and testing smart, especially after meeting many Mensans who believe in astrology and other such nonsense. Secondly, if you can test smart, door to opportunities will open for you. For example, I met my book agent through Mensa and not a few people met their spouses in Mensa as well.
Perhaps at the end of the day aptitude is nothing more than awareness, will, and effort. This essay will give you the awareness. It is up to you to marshal the will and effort. Whenever I find out that I have to take a test by ETS, my confidence soars, as I know that these tests have a common parentage and test-writing methodology.
Here is what I would do to get a top score on any aptitude test:
1. Get as many copies of the ETS test that you can get. ETS publishes these. It is important that you get old copies of the ETS test, not tests published by test prep companies, who for copyright reasons must write their own tests.
2. Survey the geography of the test. Deconstruct the test. What kinds of questions are they asking? What kind of knowledge do they require? Do you understand all the terms that they use? This is especially important in mathematics. For example, consider this question: If the radius of a circle is 33 feet, what is the area of the inscribed hexagon? We cannot begin to solve this problem until we first decode terms used in the question, such as radius, inscribed, and hexagon. What formulas or short-cuts are you expected to know? Take the time to thoroughly master all terms that you don’t understand. Commit all basic formulas to memory. Slowly, and without consideration to time and with all definitions and formulas available, work through all problems, trying to be as accurate as possible.
3. Search the internet for braindumps of questions posted by those who have taken the test.
4. I had a college friend who got into the Harvard MBA program after taking a prep course. However, some people have been disappointed by test prep companies. They can bring someone who was at 50 percent level to the 75 percent level. They are not quite so good at bringing someone at the 75 percent level to the 95 percent level. On the other hand, some people need the structure prep companies provide and appreciate the self-confidence they get from going through such companies. But they can be expensive—sometimes several thousands of dollars.
5. About two months before you take the test, put yourself on a disciplined schedule of taking one full-scale test each week. This will take between two and three hours to take the test and another hour or so to review the results. Take the first test without consideration to time. Try to logic out every question and note those questions that confound you. For all subsequent tests, put yourself under realistic test conditions—number two pencils, no distractions, candy bars, and an alarm clock. You may find that the first few tests are difficult. But before long, you will find that you are entering what athletes call the zone—a mental state when excellence is effortless.
6. Keep track of your progress and remember that the good is the enemy of the best. Don’t settle for a mediocre performance. Keep pushing yourself to do better or to understand why you are not doing better. At the end of each test, evaluate what you did right and what you did wrong. If there are subject areas that need study, spend the week studying that area. Develop a personal strategy for answering different kinds of questions, such as chart or geometry questions. Think out loud if necessary. Ask yourself lots of questions. Don’t jump to conclusions. Break the problem down into sub-problems. Think step by step. Note fine distinctions. Be as mentally flexible as you can. Look out for distracters. Keep track of any new terms used within the problem. Develop a guessing strategy; despite what ETS may say, the evidence is that it pays to guess. Analyze your own thinking. Work systematically. Be meticulous. Answer every question. The approach in solving a question is as follows: decode terms à apply formulas à solve the problem à verify the solution. In the week before the test, summarize everything thing you learned and commit it to memory. Take two more tests under realistic test taking conditions.
7. Have a good sleep the night before the test and a light breakfast on the day of the test.
8. Arrive on time. Bring a water bottle and some snacks for energy bursts, a calculator and a handful of number two pencils, and everything else you need for the test. Put yourself into a mode of focused self-confidence, akin to a basketball layer at the top of his or her game. player
9. Take the test with utter confidence that you’ll get the highest score possible.
Some college aptitude tests will now include an essay section. This will test a number of qualities that the gatekeepers think are important, such as grammar, creativity, vocabulary, and possibly Palmer Method penmanship.
I’ve never taken an aptitude test that has an essay section, so you will need to pay attention to the instructions. An essay, a sally of the mind, is your effort to express a point of view. But facts and illustrations must buttress your opinion. Make sure you understand the question, and pay particular attention to such words as “explain” or “contrast.” Before you start writing, spend a few minutes organizing your thoughts by writing notes of the margin of test booklet. These can be nothing more than lists of facts or ideas. The construction of the essay should generally follow this format:
I. Strong introduction or opening topic sentence A. What I’m going to write about B. How I’m going to describe that II. Body with illustrations, facts, and anecdotes that support the topic sentence III. Strong conclusion or closing statement A. What I just wrote about B. How the facts, illustrations, and anecdotes have supported the topic sentence
Write carefully and concisely, with nouns and verbs. Avoid generalities or clichés. Try to express a clear point of view. Be careful about presentation. Make sure your pencils are sharp and that you write a neatly and as accurately as possible. If you must erase, be sure that you erase the mistake completely so that your don’t smear the paper. Leave yourself a few minutes so that you can review your essay before time has run out.
A reading comprehension test is a bit like an essay test, except that someone else has written the essay. Read the questions first. Underline the topic sentence, which is usually in the paragraph, and the conclusion, which is usually in the last paragraph. Circle key facts-- names of places or people, numbers, and statistics. Look for assumptions—what the author believes but doesn’t necessarily state—and implications—conclusions that we can infer but the author doesn’t necessarily state. Read slowly and try to comprehend the thrust of the essay before you answer any questions.
A good vocabulary starts with curiosity. If you encounter a word you don’t know, make an effort to find out what it means and then look for opportunities to use it yourself. Words you find in aptitude tests are words you would find in the New York Times or TIME. On occasion, read those publications. Be alert for any new words that you see. Try to figure out what they mean from the context. If you still don’t know what they mean, get out your dictionary and find out for yourself.
Mathematics is a staple of most aptitude tests. To do well on these tests, familiarize yourself with the kinds of questions that will be asked. Take as much algebra and geometry that you can get by tenth grade. The best approach is to master the mathematical principles that will allow you to solve an application of that principle by breaking down the resolution into logical steps.
Here are five typical examples.
Note the step-by-step process of logically moving from principles through resolution. Algebra
A coin collector has 1000 old coins. Some of them are worth $10 each, the rest are worth $5 each. If the total value of the 1000 coins is $6000, how many are worth $10 each?
1. X = the number of coins worth $10 each 2. 1000 – X = number of coins worth $5 each 3. 10x dollars = value of all the $10 coins 4. 5(1000 – X) = value of all the $5 coins 5. 6000 = 10X + 5(1000 – X) 6. 6000 = 10X + 5000 – 5X 7. 6000 = 5X + 5000 8. 5X = 1000 9. X = 200
The Pythagorean theorem
The legs of a right triangle are in the ratio 1:2 and its area is 36. What is the hypotenuse of the triangle?
1. X and 2X = legs of the triangle 2. 36 = area = ½(base X height) 3. 36 = ½(2x)(x) 4. x squared = 36 5. x = 6 6. 2x = 12 7. hypotenuse squared = 6 squared + 12 squared = 36 + 144 8. hypotenuse squared = 160 9. hypotenuse = square root of 180 = square root of (36)(5) = 6 square root of 5
Distance and Rate
A man drives a distance of 120 miles at an average speed of 40 MPH and then returns at an average speed of 60 MPH. What is his average spending in MPH for the entire trip?
1. 120/40 = 3 hours 2. 120/60 = 2 hours 3. 240 miles in five hours or 48 MPH If X = Y, then 2X = 2Y 2 + 1 + ½ + ¼ + 1/8 + 1/16 + … = X 1. 2X = 4 + 2 + 1 + ½ + ¼ + 1/8 + … 2. -X = -2 – 1 – ½ - ¼ - 1/8 - … 3. Add both equations 4. X = 4
Simplification
Simplify 7/y + y/7
1. 7y is the common denominator 2. y/7 = y squared/7y squared 3. 7/y = 7 squared/7y = 49/7y 4. y/7 + 7/y = y squared/7y + 49/7y = (y2 + 49)/7y
How can you ace a grammar test? You won’t be asked to parse a sentence. I don’t even know how to parse a sentence, despite my command of English. Rather, you will usually have to identify errors within a sentence. The best preparation for this is to read, so that you can distinguish a well-written sentence from a poorly written sentence. I don’t think knowledge of grammar in itself is as important as having a sensitive ear for words in sentences that just don’t sound right.
Here are some examples. I have put in parenthesis the correction. Read these sentences and try to understand what is wrong and why it is wrong.
1. There seem (seems) nowadays to be little of the optimism that imbued our ancestors with courage and hope.
2. The high school graduate, if he is eighteen or nineteen, has these alternatives: attending college, finding a job, or (joining) the army.
3. Since it was an unusually warm day, the dog laid (lay) under the tree all afternoon.
4. There was (were) only an apple and three pears in the refrigerator.
5. The Chairman of the Board made it clear that that meet that he will (would) not step down from his position as chairman.
6. I have no doubt about my being able to run faster that him (he) today.
7. These kind (kinds) of people are not the type I wish to associate with.
8. After the critics see the two plays, they will, as a result of their experience and background, be able to judge which is the most (more) effective and moving.
9. Each of the hotel’s 500 rooms were (was) equipped with high quality air conditioning and television.
10. The lilacs smell sweetly (sweet) at this time of the year.
Some Miscellaneous Advice
1. Think clearly. Work systematically. Be meticulous and focused.
2. Don't get bogged down. Be aware of the CATS-- correct answer to time spent ratio. This is especially import on essay questions, where perfectionism can be costly. (In essays, there is research that suggests a positive relationship between the word count and a favorable score. In other words, it pays to write as long an essay as you can.)
3. If you can definitely eliminate even one of the multiple choices, it is better to guess on the remaining answers than to leave it blank.
4. When four relatively simple answer choices appear together with a large or complex fifth choice, you want to avoid the latter. The complex choice is almost always a distractor.
5. Try to backsolve. When in doubt about selecting from two or more answers, try each answer out experimentally. Attempt trial solutions by plugging in arbitrary values.
6. For reading comprehension, read the question before reading the passage. Circle crucial information requirements in the question and corrspond that to circles in the passage. Answer the factual questions first and the inferential questions later. Frame the reading of the passage by asking: what is the premise or theme; and what are the implications of the passage.
7. Generally, questions are weighted the same. Math questions are ranked from the simplest to the most complex. If you have time, review your answers. If there is time remaining in the test, stay with the test until the procter calls STOP!
I think Palin will be indicted before the month is out-- the upshot of an investigation into the Palin Crime Family's use of state money for private contracting work. Her motive is her family? Hardly. Where was this motive when she was running for the White House? Her lila feeewings were hurt from Mr. Lettermen's naughty words? Will her lila feeewings be hurt from naughty words coming from Iran or North Korea? If she cannot stand the heat, she should go back to the kitchen, where she makes great moose.
I think she may have made a good director of publicity for Coca Cola, but, as Andrew Sullivan notes in the video below, it is frightening that anyone considers this person a credible potential leader of the free world.
"If she cannot stand the heat, she should go back to the kitchen, where she makes great moose."
As I mentioned in another post, the blatant sexism in our country is pathetic.
What is sexist is the elevation of this (ahem) person to a position where she was seriously considered as a potential president, devoid as she was of any foreign policy expertise and even the ability to speak a simple and coherent declarative sentence. If she were twenty pounds heavier and twenty years older, do you think for a second that anyone would consider Palin for the presidency? You have your own blinders of bigotry on, especially the blinder that places ideological purity over endurance, integrity, common sense, and competence.
I had no idea that conservatives were so sensitive to "sexism". Could it be that you are grasping for a way to defend the indefensible?
"Sarah Palin's friends say they are worried about her because she looks frail and her hair is thinning. It's all part of her plan to run for president in 2012 as John McCain."
"Folks say that if you listen real close at the height of the full moon, when the wind is blowin' off Nantucket Sound from the nor' east and the dogs are howlin' for no earthly reason, you can hear the awful screams of the crew of the "Ellie May," a sturdy whaler Captained by John McTavish; for it was on just such a night when the rum was flowin' and, Davey Jones be damned, big John brought his men on deck for the first of several screaming contests."
These turds are incredible. They wage an absolute unprovoked character assassination on all political enemies with little or no evidence, but demand their politicial and cultural heros be proven guilty in a court before admitting the obvious. These double standard laden morons are so completely twisted, so hypocritical and so sick I have reached the conclusion they are all mentally ill - seriously.
How is it these sickos get up in the morning and manage well enough to get through the day? Surely they must be locked up somewhere and given computer access only as a gesture of good will by their keepers....sick...sick...sick
Me:
Well, aren't you the one who is typing furiously from your mother's basement with you baseball cap on backwards and your jaw somewhat slack? Isn't it time to wrap up your homeschool assignment-- perhaps the Color the Ducky page? You do realize that political thought and discourse is an adult custom, and you still have a few years to go.
He:
I so enjoy these lame efforts at humor - all of which have been scribbled out before by your breathren....face it moron - you can;t defend yourself so you project your own lifestyle on others inhopes that it matters. You're just a case of empties, a phony and a wannabee charlatan who doesn't pack the gear to offer anything factual or at least original in your own defense...
Me:
Republican Whine List
Obama was not born in the US. His birth certificate is a fake. Obama is a muslim Obama is an arab Obama is a terrorist Obama uses drugs Obama bought the election The 2008 election was rigged Obama is trying to sell his Senate seat He smokes cigarettes. Remember when senators represented the public for state, national and international issues and were qualified to do that? Seems they were elected by the public, not appointed by some bureaucrat. It appears we now have acquired a "royalty" who believe in divine entitlement. Obama fathered two black children in wedlock! Obama is a fraud. Obama will say anything and align himself with the lowest scum job Earth to get ahead. Obama has dual citizenship and is disqualified of being president! Obama is racist. Obama asked for spicy mustard on his hamburger. Obama's wife insults the poor with her choice of shoes. Obama habitually thinks before he speaks. Very annoying.
He:
ZERo The Nothing is failing and N Korea would hate to loose him. Yeah, every one of the leftist trash are sick and twisted, unfit to be called Americans as far as I can tell...
ZERo The Nothing, lying leftard ghetto trash crack head POS communist filth and the single greatest danger to America and freedom ever in the history of this nation.
Me:
I think you're foaming.
He:
I think that you are stupid, but than, stupidity is a prerequisite for being a leftard POS, isn't it?
ZERo The Nothing, lying leftist ghetto trash POS communist filth and the single greatest danger to America and freedom ever in the history of this country. Me:
Isn't it time to launder your sheets and return to your kkk klavern?
He:
Seems like its time for you to get on back to your ghetto and business on your corner, crack head.
I think that you are stupid, but than, stupidity is a prerequisite for being a leftard POS, isn't it?
ZERo The Nothing, lying leftist ghetto trash POS communist filth and the single greatest danger to America and freedom ever in the history of this country. Me:
What is POS?
He:
Are you a foreigner?
POS = Leftist = piece of shit..
Me:
Ah, so that what POS means. As a well-educated, church-going liberal, I find there is no need to resort to such gutter crudities to communicate. Naturally, our political superiority is in sync with our moral superiority.
He:
ROTFLMFAO.................know any more funny jokes? Thanks for the comedy.....lol
Me:
I think it puzzles and then destroys you when you realize the simple fact that Obama-- a black man-- is your intellectual, moral, and spiritual superior.
He:
ROTFLMFAO, again, your comedy is funny as it can be. Also full of untruths, first of which is the fact that ZERo is not a 'black man', his mother was a caucasian making him a zebra, bi racial, a halfrican-American, a mullato.ZERo, the Affirmative Action stooge is no ones 'intellectual, moral, and spiritual' superior, except for the stupid leftards that think that he is their 'Messiah'. You fools got snookered and all of America lost big time.
(Mercy! In the land of GOP, the man with one brain cell is king. So, at this point, I tip toe quietly, stage left, from this lovely thread.)
"Republican U.S. Rep. Jeff Flake is catching flak from conservatives for missing a key vote Friday on a "cap-and-trade" climate-change bill that is strongly opposed by the GOP. Flake also opposed the bill but said he had to skip the vote to be with his daughter, who was competing in the 2009 Junior Miss pageant in Mobile, Ala . "Obviously it was a tough decision to miss voting against the cap-andtrade bill," the District 6 representative said in a statement. "But I've let my daughter down enough over the years, and I felt I just couldn't let her down again."
No flak will come from me. Family must always comes before politics, business, charity, or religion. It is too easy to justify ever increasing sacrifices to your family in the name of "the people's business" or "humanity" or "God." However noble these ends are, the ends do not justify the means if those means involve the subordination of family to achieve those ends. Family comes first.
Jeff Flake did the right thing and he set a good example for all of us.
Nancy and the boys are looking forward to spending ten days in Chicago starting this Friday. They plan to see the Museum of Science and Industry, Lincoln Park, Zoo, Great America theme park, and relatives in the area. Zach plans to see Northwestern University, one of his college choices. We signed the boys up for their classes. Ben is now three years ahead of his peers in math, and will be taking a high school course—talent that surely didn’t come from me! I’ll probably spend the week moping around the house and trying to work down my honey-do list. Kitty will keep me company.
We’re happy that Peter will be joining his family shortly.
I’m glad you liked my reflections on the ethics of suicide. Like most of what I write, I wrote it quickly-- but it is really the result of many years of thinking, and it grew out of a project I gave myself at Willow Creek’s ironically name Camp Paradise, in Northern Michigan in 1987. My goal was to read through the entire Bible looking for my life-theme that “you matter to God”. One day at the camp, I saw what looked like a star slowly sweep almost parallel to the horizon and then ignite into a flare of orange and purple before descending into the woods miles away. The next day, the paper reported that a Soviet satellite had come through the atmosphere near where we camped. In Arizona, stars of the Milky Way spangle the firmament like salt strewn on onyx. I’m starting to teach my boys what little I know about astronomy. I can show them Pleides in the Taurus Constellation, Vega in Lyra, and Deneb in the constellation of the Swan. One night, I’ll show Zachary and Benjamin a haze of light in the constellation of Hercules. That haze is a great nebula—the light of 50,000 suns 30,000 light years away. In the Grand Canyon State, as in South Dakota, no one grows up without knowing size and distance. (I recall my awe when I saw the Canyon for the first time in 1992, at night under a full moon, the boundless chasm disappearing into a bottomless sea of black while the ridges and mesas were etched in silver and red.) Australia is also a home to vastness. In contrast to my urban experiences, where property is measured by the square foot, my cousin Barbara, the daughter of Uncle Frank White, live on an 11,500-acre cattle station in western Queensland. In the wilds of the western United States or eastern Australia, we learn the relative size of a person compared with the lay of the land. Under an immense sky, a man is small and at the mercy of God. And he is wrong if he thinks otherwise.
There is star that shines brightly in the velvety black of the Arizona sky. It’s a symbol of our future, for one day our descendants may well pioneer among the stars as our fathers did in the Dakotas. And this star is a symbol of our past. Pointing upwards from the two stars, Merak and Dubhe, on the outer edge of the Big Dipper, the Pole Star is positioned one degree from the north celestial pole. This magnitude two star has guided mariners for hundreds of years, sparkling with constancy in the purpling dusk and the diamond night. It’s one star that will never fall. In Lamentations chapter three, clouds of gloom part to reveal a sunbeam of hope: “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning. Great is thy faithfulness.” And the song that was sung so many times at Norbeck echoes those verses:
Thou changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not: As Thou hast been, Thou forever will be.
As children, we would sing “This little light of mine/I’m going to let it shine.” And what others will see from our little light is our Christian heritage. (“We are all worms,” Winston Churchill said. “But some of us are glow-worms.”) Eloise and LeRoy Nelson, in their 1986 Christmas card, chart this legacy, our spiritual roots:
Jesus Apostles Early Church Fathers Augustine Ansgar St. Francis Martin Luther Olaus Petri Philip Spener C. O. Rosenius N. P. Wik
To which of course I should add Harold Wik.
My cousins conclude their card with these words: “And so we build our lives on the foundation of those who have come before us, just as our forebears built on the heritage passed on to them. And now it’s our duty to pass this on to our children—to be another link in the long chain that started with Jesus’ birth.” The Star in the East that twinkled over a manger 2,000 years ago and the Star of the North that guided the captains of ships that brought our ancestors to this country 100 years ago retain their meaning today. And, I hope, will do so for our children’s children until the end of time. It’s this guiding star from which came the name of the ship that took our maternal ancestors to America in 1869– the SS Guiding Star.
Here is some more of Our Story, written about five years ago.
Towards the end of their time in Malaysia, my parents helped the boat people that fled Viet Nam after the war came to an end. After about 70 years of combined service, they returned by way of Athens, Jerusalem, and Amsterdam to retire in the United States on May 17, 1982. “At Singapore, we changed planes for the flight to Athens where we spent four days,” my parents wrote in a circular shortly after their trip. “The main tourist attraction there is the Acropolis. Nearby was Mars Hill, which we climbed and read Paul’s sermon as recorded in Acts 17:22-34. We also visited the National Archeological Museum at Athens and took a bus trip to Delphi, a round trip of about 200 miles. On May 3, we flew to Tel Aviv and when the plane touched down many passengers clapped their hands. The next day, we took a guided walking tour outside the walls of the old city. On two occasions, we walked completely around the old walls. This takes about 45 minutes. On Sunday morning, we joined a large group of Christian worshipers at the Garden Tomb for a Sunday morning service, and were thankful that the tomb in which our Lord was laid is empty. Christ is risen! While we remained based at Jerusalem during our stay in Israel, we were able to visit such places as Bethlehem, Jericho, Nazareth, the Sea of Galilee, and Masada by the Dead Sea. While we did not need to visit Israel to validate our Christian faith, the trip did add to our understanding of our Judeo-Christian heritage.” Mom and Dad later flew on to Amsterdam where they visited famous masterpieces in the National Art Museum and marveled at the beautiful tulip fields. I’m so glad that Mom and Dad were able to visit Israel as it puts a fitting cap on their many years of Christian service. “Truly goodness and mercy have been following us a family and will continue to do so,” they wrote in their last letter from Malaysia, dated April 25th. Thirteen days earlier, Paul and Joyce sent them a telegram informing them of their new grandchild: “PETER NATHANIAL BORN 723 AM APRIL 12 9 LBS 8 OZ 21-1/2 INCHES ALL ARE WELL LOVE PAUL AND JOYCE”. My parents noted in a letter to me that “we appreciate Joyce with her talents and high aspirations. She has put a lot of sparkle into our family.” Today, both of my parents now in their 80s live active lives in Roslyn, a suburb north of Philadelphia, residing at their home at 1561 Birchwood Avenue. The death of Grandma left Mom money to buy the home. They paid $49,000 for the left side of the 25 year-old ranch duplex, on a lot 39 by 110 feet. Twenty years later, the other side of the duplex sold for about $150,000. Mom enjoys walking to Willow Grove Mall a few blocks away where she can greet a dozen or so of the regulars while Dad likes tending his garden in the back yard of tomatoes and lettuce. He also likes the routine, exercise, augmentation of income, and occasional opportunities for witnessing by working part-time removing trash from some local strip-malls. “Spud, I think you’re the only in the family who is still working,” Uncle Reyn wrote Dad in 1994. “The rest of us are unemployed and on welfare, all waiting for a raise in Social Security.” Ten years later, Dad was still toiling at his jobs at Regents Park and elsewhere. Mom and Dad are both involved in Berachah in Cheltenham, their local church, and the lives of their four children and seven grandchildren. (My sister Anne Birch and her family and brothers Paul and his family and Tim live in the area, all within about an hour of each other.)
On February 10th 2002, we honored their fifty years of marriage with a dinner of baked sugar-cured ham and chicken marsala at Williamson Restaurant in Horsham. Sister-in-law Joyce did much of the planning and constructed a beautiful album of photographs and letters from friends and relatives. “In a time where so much is expendable, it’s wonderful to look to something that has stood the test of time,” I wrote for my family. “Your fidelity through five decades is a model to Nancy and me. And, someday, Zachary and Benjamin will also look to your example with appreciation. Your life’s journey has taken you to distant lands and fantastic adventures. But, through it all, your love for each other as endured. And from your commitment to each other has come your love for us, and I remember with fondness your tender words and actions over the years. Bukit Sepit. Rawang. Chefoo. What memories those names evoke! Ivyland. Chicago. Scottsdale. Although separated by many miles, your love for us has never wavered. And so it is therefore right that we honor and celebrate fifty amazing years of marriage. Nancy, Zachary, and Benjamin also join me in expressing their love for you and in rejoicing in this celebration.”
In 1965, we left Malaysia for Australia by the ocean liner Oranje. Tangerine and blue paper streamers between us and those on the dock stretched and snapped as the ship pulled away. After my parent’s furlough, my parents left Paul and me at a home for missionary kids in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. The law office of Grubb & Guest had my parents transfer guardianships to the Grays in the Orphan’s Court of Philadelphia County, “wherefore petitioners pray your Honorable Court to enter a Decree appointing the said Kenneth T. Gray as guardian of the persons of Philip G. Wik and Paul R. Wik.” The sign facing Jacksonville Road read Happy Hollow Farm, but no one called it that, especially after a neighborhood kid painted one day over the word Hollow, as if the farm was an institution for the “differently abled”. We called it “Ivyland”, after the name of the small town where we got our mail. The borough of Ivyland takes on aspects of a Victorian painting at Christmas time, with streets lit by luminaries, and skating and caroling. The boarding home was a colonial-era Georgian mansion on a country farm of about thirty acres. The walls were white with the classic green shutters that are familiar to many colonial homes in Bucks County. It had a two-acre lake fed by a stream that bisected the property, a large red barn with pigeons cooing in the rafters, horses and pastures, and between ten and fifteen other MKs. We went to the local public schools, and I graduated in 1973 from Council Rock High School, in Newtown. Although I was in the choir and the drama club (I was Edward in Charles Dicken’s Christmas Carol), most of my extracurricular activities revolved around Ivyland, with my five-mile paper route and eight pet rabbits.
“I do not think you will have to do much to prepare the children for the new adjustment,” Kenneth Gray wrote to my parents in 1965. “We have animals (ten rabbits, six horses, chickens, ducks, goats, and cats) down here, and the barn and the family are usually sufficient drawing cards for the kids to spend a good deal of their free time down here. We’ve yet to see a child really homesick, for there is almost too much life throbbing around here for them to be lonely for more than an occasional moment. “There have been trips to the shore, with hilarious times of riding the breakers or sunning on the sand—drinking in the beauty of the riot of color that is Longwood Gardens-- fountains, colored lights, and gorgeous flowers everywhere. Other times, we have gone to Philadelphia, and push buttons in the Benjamin Franklin museum, where there is a seemingly endless array of electrical gadgets to demonstrate some principle or other. All these activities afford wonderful opportunities to get to know the kids better, hearing their chatter and enjoying their enthusiasm.
“Your enthusiasm for the place is the best preparation that you can possibly give your kids. Keep in mind that the sacrifice is on your part far more than on theirs. Our family is very happy, and the kids adjust to life here at home in a wonderful way. You are the ones who take the gaff, and, believe me, we feel for you, but our field experience helps us to know that there is no real alternative worth considering. We have also had enough experience here at home to realize that the educating of children all the way through high school on the field is not without very serious problems for the children when they come home to the States for further education.”
We seemed to have adapted well to our new surroundings, as we read in a letter from Maybeth Gray to Aunt Elsie in 1967: “Paul and Philip both seem happily settled in. They obviously have a good time. The snow and ice-skating has been sheer joy to them, and it’s fun to see them laughing and shouting as they toboggan or skate or build snow forts. I was measuring and weighing Philip this evening—a ritual we go through on the night I wash their hair and he really is gaining and getting taller—at least an inch taller than last September and several pounds heavier too. He weighs 72 pounds now . . . Best wishes to you and your work and thank you so much for all your interest in the Wik boys. You have been so good to them and I know they really appreciate it.”
Christmas in Ivyland was special. Presents piled high around the towering Christmas tree. Outside, neighbors cut figure eights with us on the ice to the music of Broadway tunes, Strauss waltzes, and Gilbert and Sullivan:
My good little butter cup My dear little butter cup
I earned a few battle wounds playing ice hockey, including stitches in my chin and a gouge in my leg.
To get a flavor of the holidays, here are excerpts from letters I wrote in 1970, 1971, and 1972:
“Two weeks ago, we decorated our ten foot evergreen tree with lights, tinsel, and colored balls,” I wrote in 1970. “A small layer of icy snow is on the ground with periodic flurries helps set the Christmas scene. We have had great fun sledding on the hills. The ice isn’t strong enough to skate on yet. Many people are home for the holidays from college. For Christmas, we had about 40 people eating here. My favorite gifts were the presents you gave me—clothes, games, gloves, a radio, and a book about a lioness called Born Free.
“Thank you so much for the gift of the art supplies,” I wrote in 1971. “We didn’t get any snow this Christmas. As a matter of fact, the temperature is about fifty degrees. We did the play The Christmas Carol at the intermediate school in Newtown. On Wednesday night, we put on the lay for the public. On Christmas Eve, we went to a candlelight service at church. When we came home, we opened our stockings. On Christmas day after diner, we opened our presents. I received many things but I especially liked the paint supplies you sent me.”
“I hope you had a merry Christmas in Malaysia,” I wrote in 1972. “On the 16th, the concert choir (in which I sing baritone) put on a Christmas concert. All the Christmas trimmings this year were homemade. Frankly, the result was a mess. Naturally, everyone likes their own creation of half-baked ginger-bread men, fermenting cherries, and roasted popcorn. Periodically, groups of carol singers would start to howl in front of our house. Once, a group of seven came caroling on horses. We woke up early on Christmas morning, ate breakfast, had our devotions, and opened our presents. At about four o’clock in the afternoon, we ate the annual Christmas bird. The Christmas in Ivyland, although quite enjoyable, is but a glimmer of the grand Christmas we had in August in Malaysia together!”
The Grays retired in 1971 to Stroud, Canada. In April, 1973, Ken lifted the oxygen mask off his face and said to Maybeth “Now I’m going home.” There was no funeral as Ken had made arrangements to donate his body to science, but there was a memorial service. In a letter to my parents at the time, I wrote “I shall always remember Uncle Ken for his dynamic, caring personality spiced with a pinch of whimsy. I shall never forget how he helped me countless times in school—on my science projects, on reports, and at home—weeding, seeding the corn, mowing, racking leaves. The fun we had in the snow on Christmas day, reading Dickens around the cackling fire at night, going to Canada’s Expo, New Hampshire’s White Hills, the New Jersey shore, Longwood Gardens, and the operettas in Philadelphia shall always remain in my memory, and I will feel a loss.”
In 1987, an Ivyland Alumni Fred Fry passed on Maybeth Gray’s address. (Leslie Lyle, Maybeth’s brother, was a missionary who traveled with Dad from Shanghai to Hong Kong.) “You get the sense from Fred’s letter that Ivyland casts long shadows over the lives of those who lived there,” I wrote to Maybeth. “That’s certainly true with me. On balance, however, I think the Ivyland experience was good for me. I probably wasn’t the easiest person to manage, and it must have been hard to run things-- taking care of a dozen kids with different abilities, ages, temperaments, and backgrounds, the mansion, and the farm. This is a roundabout way of saying ‘thank you’ for your contribution in raising me during my formative years.
“As time goes by, the past recedes into a misty nostalgia bringing back a collage of associations. Do you remember these snapshots from the past?
Sledding on the hill by the Big House Canoeing, fishing, swimming, skating Our pet cats, rabbits, and horses Our dogs Dale (beagle), Rufus (Irish setter), and Friskie (mixed) Building elaborate hay tunnels on the second floor of the barn Chicken picking under a full moon Uncle Ken playing “Red River Valley” on the living room piano The mountain of presents around the fifteen-foot Christmas tree The Gate House, where we would stay during furloughs Dorney Park with its rickety wooden roller coaster Salty breezes and taffy on Ocean City’s boardwalk Sipping a malt at the Tanner Brothers Farm Store in Northampton Strawberry and cherry picking on a blue and gold autumn day Annual trips to downtown Philadelphia to see Gilbert & Sullivan The Philadelphia Zoo and museums Marcia Haynes, David Cox, Beth Carlson, David Almond Canada geese swooping down over the lake in autumn Summer vacations in Franconia Notch, New Hampshire
I’m sure we could go on forever.”
“What a surprise!” Maybeth wrote. “A delightful surprise! After these 16 or more years, it was just great to hear from you and get caught up on your life history so far!”
In the summer of 1972, my sister and I visited my parents in Malaysia. We visited many familiar places of our childhood, including Rawang, Chefoo, and Port Dickson. On the flight from Singapore to Bahrain, the British Caledonian Boeing 707 with its 197 passengers had to make an emergency landing at Changi airport because of a fuel line rupture. We spent a few days at the swank Imperial Hotel, before flying on to London. We visited Westminster Abbey, St. Mary’s, Number Ten Downing Street, The Mall, Buckingham Palace, the Tower of London, and took a trip down the Thames before flying on to Philadelphia. In all, I’ve lived in Malaysia with my parents for just under nine years.
The mission sold Ivyland in 1982. The grounds have been subdivided, the barn razed, and the mansion remodeled. “It’s in a state of decay, with the old marble mantels long gone, paint pealing, extensive water damage, and an overall look of faded grandeur,” I wrote in 1993, before the remodeling began in earnest. “The lake hasn’t been maintained and is half empty. A paved road called Gwyn Lynn Drive meanders through the old horse pastures, now replaced by ten homes selling for $450,000 each. (The Big House is now 148 Gwyn Lynn Drive, but the entire property was 186 and then later 657 Jacksonville Road during my time.) The mansion is on one acre and an additional twelve acres of wetlands were sold to a doctor’s group for $350,000. (In the mid-50s, the OMF bought the farm for about $60,000 and by the mid-70 it was appraised for under $150,000.) Brambles and poison ivy cover the lawn. (When I had just arrived in Ivyland at the age of ten, I made the mistake of confusing the Malaysian vines with Pennsylvanian vines, and made good use of calamine lotion. I thought we should modify the name Ivyland by the word Poison!) Most of the old trees still exist and I could still see some of the remains of my old tree houses.”
I enjoyed climbing some of the two-hundred year trees. A row of mature oaks, pines, sycamores, and spruces mark the path of the original gravel road that now runs through the back yards of the houses that were built in the 1990s. I climbed some of these trees. The lake is now called Spring Mill Pond and no doubt it will someday be but a marsh. But, when I was a kid, it was perhaps six feet higher and far broader and wider, maintained by an input pipe from a dam at the far end of the property that has since washed away. What memories we have of that lake! I learned to swim in that lake and we had a diving board, dock from which to fish for Sunnies, home-made rafts, and canoes. The bottom of the lake was black goop and yellow algae spread across the lake as the summer months went by. But we still loved that lake with its willow trees and painted turtles. In contrast to the almost impassable brambles of today, a dozen horses would keep the pastures surrounding the lake trimmed to look like a park. In the winter time, we would sled down the hills from Almshouse Road toward the lake or skate and play ice-hockey with the kids from Traymore. I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that sometimes hundreds of people would crowd that lake in the winter, while music played from loud-speakers throughout the day.
Towards Hunt Drive was the remains of an ancient carriage house. I used to find weathered nails amid the brick. When I went to Churchville Elementary, I would wait for the school bus at Hunt Drive and North Traymore Avenue. But for middle and high school, we would trek through the fall leaves to the end of the lane on Jacksonville Road. Two white stone pillars that no longer exist marked the entrance of our property. Moving leftward was the garden where we weeded carrots and cabbage, the 1950s era ranch called the Canfield House, a shed for tractors and plows, a gasoline fuel pump, and a large sixty-foot-high L-shaped barn. It was brown stone with red wooden walls trimmed in white and with massive interior beams. Further in the back was a pen for chick. At the bottom level of the barn were work shops, stalls for the horses, pens for the chickens, and cages for my rabbits. On the top level was bales of hay. Paul would drive the tractor that pulled the carts up the dirt ramp. We would often arrange these bales into tunnels, sometimes going down thirty feet. We used to play kick the can near the manure pile that was behind the barn. There was also more farm land for corn and potatoes. Continuing our walk in memory was the two-story brick Lane House, which was also of colonial-era vintage. We would stay here on furlough. Today, it has been resurfaced with brown-stone, but the walls used to be white plaster.
The gravel path ended in a circle around the Big House. The only other structures was a horse shed behind the barbed wire and a crumbling smoke house below the lake that is still a home to suckers and toads. I would mow this lawn and join the others in raking the fall leaves. Next to the dock with a diving board below the large Eastern White Pine that still exists were several picnic tables and canoes.
As we open the door to the Big House, we would see a couch with perhaps the Daily Courier, Christian Science Monitor, and back editions of Popular Mechanics. To the left was the living room with its high ceilings, fireplace, many books, and a grand piano. Here is where we would celebrate Christmas. On the other side was the dining room with the marble fireplace. At Christmas time, Maybeth would thread the many cards together to deck the room. We would find letters from our parents and also lists of chores that would be posted each day on the bulletin board, such as “Pots & Pans” or the much dreaded “Eggs”. A staircase ascended to the rooms above. I was adept at sliding down the banisters from my room on the top floor near the roof floor by floor. Moving past the dining room was the powder room – a room that probably hasn’t changed much over the years—and the kitchen—a room that has probably changed a great deal. Ken would snip our hair here while Maybeth and Pat would bake the pies or mix the ice-tea. I remember the distinctive bang! of the screen door when I came in with by school books each days. Stairs for the servants would ascend from one side of the kitchen. On the other side, Dale, our friendly, corpulent beagle, would gaze into the fireplace. My bedroom was always on the top floor, while the girls enjoyed slightly more opulence in the floor beneath. In the back was a walk in freezer—an entire room kept to negative ten degrees. We also had shelves where we could keep our things, such as boots, gloves, and school books.
I enjoyed taking black and white pictures with my twin lens Yashika camera. But perhaps my favorite pastime was biking. I bought a red three-speed Schwinn and put it to good use, making money by distributing The Daily Intelligencer for a few years. I especially enjoyed going on bike hikes, sometimes as far away as New Hope and New Jersey. I bought quite a number of antiques at the flea markets in Lahaska and that honed my interest in American history. I biked with David Cox (whose father worked for twenty-one years among the Mien (Yao) of North Thailand after fighting piracy as a chief officer in the British Navy along the China coast before he joining the CIM). But generally I traveled alone, usually on the back roads that even today retain their verdant beauty. Sometimes, I just had to leave what my brother Tim calls “a feudalistic dreamland” with its weeding and its rules and peddle furiously with the brisk autumn wind in my face through flurries of gold and red leaves down the curving Dark Hollow Road to the Neshaminy Creek.
It is hard to believe that as I write this in 2005, some Ivyland alumni are now in their sixties. “I personally like it when my kids put my wheelchair close to the fire with my dentures close by so that I can munch on health snacks that Anne finds in Prevention Magazine,” Fred Fry writes, with tongue firmly in cheek. “As my head droops in exhaustion, usually about 6:30 or so, I drift off into my memories. Many of my fondest are from that era so many years ago in the big white house …or was it grey…with the Whites…or was it the Grays …? “ “Someone could, and should, write a book about Ivyland,” Fred continues “Is that native Bucks County resident, James Michener, still in business? Who built that big white house? Who lived in it between 1790 and 1958? Our era would occupy many chapters. Who took the marble mantles? Where did all the wood and stone from the barn go? Do the current occupants of those $450,000 homes even know that there was a time when an old John Deere tractor would drag a line of sleds through the snow on the sites where they now watch Oprah and water their petunias?
“I wonder if on some quiet mornings, their eyes play tricks on them and they think they see silent, misty figures up in the trees, riding horses, fishing off the dock, taking out the garbage, ice skating to the amplified Strauss waltzes, playing tackle football, painting shutters, doing dishes, putting together jigsaw puzzles, swimming, studying, driving trash to the dump in the cut-off Chevy, feeding a roly-poly beagle, playing capture-the-flag in the barn, walking the quarter mile to the bus stop at 6:45, gazing longingly at Bobbie Arbor, mowing the lawn a stocky balding bespectacled man doing his accounts at his desk in the hall, a woman in her mid-twenties doing laundry, a lady with her graying hair in a bun reading stories to her own infant daughter, spreading manure behind that same John Deere, celebrating twenty to thirty birthdays a year, stringing barbed wire and yes—slaughtering, picking, and gutting chickens. I wonder.
“If there were, they’d all have names that are very real—Maybeth and Ken, Bob, Peter, Bill, David, Wendy, Pierre, John and Josie, Ian, Doris, Ruth, Pat, John, Esther, Anne, Miriam, Marcia, Paul, Beth, Sue, Timothy, Pam, Margaret, David, James, Ralph, Kathryn, Ian, Sylvia, Rachel, and many, many more.”
“I loved the picture of your two little boys,” Maybeth wrote to me in January 1997. “I bet they are going to have a lot of fun playing together as the baby gets a bit older. Enjoy your children while they are young, for they do grow up so fast and before you know it they are leaving home. I’m fine as I go into my 84th year with no aches or pains, and just very thankful to God for good health. I do tire more easily though and am ready to go to bed when the time comes. It has been nice to hear from quite a number of our Ivyland gang and learn more of what they are doing. But I must stop. I did want to thank you so much for your newsletter and the picture of your darling boys. God bless you in the year 1997. Much love to you both and the boys. Love in Christ. Maybeth Gray.”
Three months later, I got a letter from John Cox. “I assume you will have heard about Maybeth Gray’s death on April 12,” he wrote. “Your letter was the first I heard of this and of course I feel a great deal of sadness,” I wrote back. “ My most recent letter was from January of this year, which I’ve enclosed. I was glad to have renewed our relationship over the past few years, giving me the chance to express my gratitude for her role in shaping my character and interests. Only last week I came across a paper Aunt Maybeth typed for me when I was in fifth grade. It says much for her as a Christian and a person that she is remembered fondly by so many people despite the passage of time—in my case about a quarter of a century. As one of the little boys, I only vaguely remember you. I of course recall Elizabeth and Peter, and I thought of David as one of my best friends. The shadows of Ivyland are long. And in the lingering gloaming, lights and shadows play in the kaleidoscope of memory: Uncle Ken reading “The Christmas Carol” by the fire and playing “Red River Valley” on the grand piano. Aunt Maybeth, much like the card she sent me, looking past her African Violets over the sloping green, watching us swim or play…chicken picking in the morning and an operetta in the evening…bike hikes and vacations, the barn and the lake … lots of work, lots of animals, lots of fun, some tears, but much joy as well.”
“She died on Saturday in her sleep, peacefully and without pain,” John wrote. “I called a travel agent on Monday and explained the circumstances, requesting bereavement fare. She asked Maybeth’s relationship to me, and I said she was my foster mother. The agent said, “Let’s just make that “mother,” so I didn’t argue with her.
“People in Vancouver were extraordinarily kind. Pam, Esther, and I borrowed a pick-up truck from someone at Clarendon Court (where Maybeth had lived) and ran errands with it. One of them involved making photocopied enlargements of photographs that were to be displayed at the reception following the memorial service. One of these was in color, and we were unsure how to use to color copier at the little shop where we were doing the copying. The proprietor came over to help us and paused when she saw the picture. “I know that woman,” she said. Esther told her that it was her mother and that she had just died and why were making the copies. The woman gulped and showed us what we needed to do. When we went to pay for the copies the woman told Esther that she recently had cancer and chemotherapy. “Your mother was so kind to me,” she said. “No one else was such a comfort to me.” This from a complete stranger at a shop we just happened to walk into! Esther burst into tears, and the woman became very apologetic, but none of us could explain that the tears were not so much for sorrow as for this chance encounter with evidence of Maybeth’s unfailing goodness to everyone she met. What an amazing legacy.
“The memorial service was wonderful. We sang “I Sought the Lord and Afterward I Knew” and Pam played “Amazing Grace” very impressively on her violin, beautifully accompanied by a pianist from the church. Ian delivered a wonderful eulogy. And at the end of the service, we sang “How Firm a Foundation” to a traditional American melody (rather than Adeste Fidelis) that I remembered singing with Ken around the piano at Ivyland and that I have heard many times as one of the airs that Aaron Copeland weaves into “Appalachian Spring.” We sang all six stanzas, but for the last two Pam grabbed her violin and played along by ear, inventing descants and harmony as she went. Those of us sitting at the front had been doing pretty well for the first four stanzas but we all fell silent when Pam’s violin began to sing.
“It was an utterly satisfying trip, and I was glad I was able to make it. It was sad of course and I still feel sad at the loss of Maybeth, but it was triumphant and happy at the same time. Being whom I am and doing what I do, I inevitably think of something from Shakespeare at this juncture, so I’ll close with Prospero’s loving praise of Miranda in The Tempest, because it applies so perfectly to Maybeth: “She will outstrip all praise and make it halt behind her.”
We hope you continue to be well and remain in our fondest thoughts and prayers.
I laughed, I cried, I remember SO many of the people and events (the pond, ice skating, sledding, swimming, the chickens, etc.). In fact, I remember at least at one point there were 100 chickens at the OMF, and one of the chickens -- no one seemed to know which ONE it was among the others -- layed bloody eggs. We would buy our eggs from the OMF and were told to be aware of that fact. It struck me then and I began to sing that age old hymn (though this time directing it to the OMF Chickens): "There were 90 and 9 that safely lay..."
I have fond memories of Uncle Ken and Aunt Maybeth, and of Pam (and her horse Charger). I also remember one of the smaller brown horses had a propensity to buck riders off! I also remember the manure pile outside the barn, and the fact that in the gloaming, the wretched pile became a beautiful pile of glittering fireflies! I also remember having sleep overs with Anne, and when I stayed over, I was expected to contribute to the chores of the day. I remember one time particularly: buttering countless pieces of bread to make grilled cheese sandwhiches in the oven! I also have fond memories of the barn, playing in and on the hay and the rope swing there. So much of what you wrote triggered memories I have that center on the OMF. I remember the "Happy Hollow Farms" sign as well along with the stigma attached to it. Hence, we always called it "The Mission" or "OMF." I remember the Mission lane, and the countless ruts (which were impossible to see in the rain, until l your vehicle was swallowed up)!
One of my last memories of your mother was when my family lived in Roslyn one street over from your folks. I went to visit with her one time when Anne was visiting. My husband and I were in the process of adopting from China, and I wondered if your mum could teach me to sing "Jesus loves me" in Chinese. I had learned part of it, but needed help remembering and with pronunciation. She delightedly obliged me, and sung that sweet song without hesitation or inhibition (wish I'd thought to tape it)! "Jesu Ai Wah."Thanks for sharing your musings and too your thoughts on suicide. Sometimes life can get awfully bleak, and then, unable to pray for ourselves we plead, "Holy Spirit, pray for me!"
This is part of a recent letter to my father in which I reflect on the roots and ethics of suicide.
Thanks for your recent letter, in which you make reference to an OMFer who recently hanged himself. Here is an essay I wrote on this topic when Zach was three months old now a decade and a half ago.
One of Nancy's favorite catch-phrases is "Who is better than me?" (Strictly speaking, the phrase should be "Who is better than I am?", but we're not strictly speaking!) Nancy's strong sense self-worth, which took a battering when she was a teenager as her parent's were divorcing, is one of her most attractive qualities. Our boys have clearly benefited from having a mother who is so self-assured, and I think that is the secret to Nancy's confidence in advocating and negotiating so effectively on behalf of our family. She is quick to note that the phrase doesn't mean that she is better than you or I. It simply means that from her perspective, she is the best and she would like nothing better than for you to also say without blushing as a mantra of self-esteem Who is better than me?
My self-esteem was flaccid when I was in grade school. As I did more and experienced more and achieved and failed and then achieved some more, my self-esteem grew. I think my self-esteem was also retarded by a theology that stressed our sinful nature, that we were conceived in iniquity, born in sin, and all we like sheep have gone astray and will continue to do so. There was the conflation of self-esteem with pride, the former having to do with a clear self-appraisal and the latter having to do with attaching excessive significance to status and achievements in comparison to others. There are dangers to pride, and that pride can go before a fall. False pride and any kind of boasting is a sign of low self-esteem rather than a healthy self-esteem, which merely set you up for manipulation by others. On the other hand, I think there is both a distinction and a relationship between our spiritual well-being and our psychological well-being. Damage to our self-worth damages us spiritually, although one can clearly have a strong self-esteem and can still be rotten to the core. But the mere fact of original sin in no way erodes the prevailing fact that we are forever children of a King and ambassadors of His kingdom. In the Parable of the Prodigal Son in Luke 15, the lost son said to his Dad "Father, I have sinned against heaven and in they sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son." But the father embraced his son, assuring him that he was still is on, and had a party. "It was fitting that we should make merry and be glad," the father said to his other son. "For this, thy brother, was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found."
So many Christians in particular lack a sense of self-worth to the point of depression. It is as if they have over internalized to their harm the hymn that God saves "a wretch like me." My thoughts when I hear "Amazing Grace" is that while I've done bad things in my life, I'm far from wretched. So perhaps it is worth asking: why do we matter?
All theology is, I think, a restatement of this song from our nursery days:
Jesus loves me this I know For the Bible tells me so Little ones to Him belong For I am weak but He is strong
But what does the Bible tells us and why is there warrant it that?
We matter because we were made whole. Genesis 1:27-28: “God created man in His own image, and in the mage of God created He him: male and female created He them. And God blessed them.” We matter because Jesus died for us:
They stretch Him on a cross to die, Our Lord who first stretched out the sky.
Whose countenance the cherubim dare not gaze on, They spat on Him.
He prays for them “Father Forgive.” For He was born so that all might live.
We matter because God has promised us peace of mind in the storms of life, the peace, as Pascal writes, of “being in a storm-tossed ship and knowing that it will not sink.”
“Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you. Let not your heart be troubled.” John 14:27
“There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.” Romans 8:1
“The peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4:7
The Bible has a word of advice for all people who feel sad and alone. The word is: Rejoice. “Rejoice in the Lord always,” said Paul under more difficult circumstances than we face today. “Again I say rejoice.” That we matter is indeed warrant for the joy that cannot be dampened under any circumstances. Lift up your hearts. Be joyful. Be thankful. That advice is just as relevant today as it was 2,000 years ago. If we can accept nothing more about Christianity, I ask you to accept the proposition that you matter. For the jump from “I am” to “God is” isn’t nearly as great as the chasm that separates “I am nothing” to “I am someone.”
So how can we believe that we matter when we believe that we don’t matter? We do it by believing the affirmation of others, by seeking supportive relationships, but letting go of the negatives of life, by accepting our limits, by daring to say yes and by daring to say no, by closing some doors and knocking on other doors, and by treating ourselves kindly and gently.
A healthy self-esteem manifests itself in awareness of and love for others. Our personality is a blade that can either heal or kill. Oscar Wilde’s melodrama The Picture of Dorian Gray portrays the depravity of Dorian that was reflected in his painting but not in himself. Dorian surrenders his soul to be young. But it is the painting that corrodes with viciousness even as he retains his youth. And so as we look at the mirror, we see an image—but what is in and behind that image? Are we unaffected by pain, as Dorian was when his girlfriend Sibyl Vane killed herself? The outer world—what we falsely call the real world—is not nearly as dark and foreboding as our inner world. It’s this world of impulses and feelings that I write about in this section. We’re like spiders at the center of the web of existence, but it ought not to be for narcissistic reasons that we look inward. Rather, we do so that we can penetrate the consciousness of others. Like the surgeon who sees the skull behind the face, we must be able to perceive the soul behind the artifice. By understanding and mastering the forces that compel men and women to act as they do, we can through will or sometimes charm get what can not be achieved in ignorance.
From the 5th through the 12th grade, I was at a boarding home for missionary kids in Pennsylvania. Perhaps because they were former missionaries themselves, the first set of foster parents were exemplary. The second set were a young couple who came out of Arizona’s juvenile delinquency system. Suffice it to say that proof that they were in the wrong job was confirmed years later in the suicide of my foster mother, not privately and painlessly but publicly and painfully.
“I must admit that I found your conclusion that Josie’s suicide confirmed her unfitness for the parenting role a bit harsh to take,” my sister-in-law Joyce Wik writes. “Remember that Josie was on quite a bit of pain medication as a result of a car accident that had left her with permanent injuries. Who knows how that medicine affected her emotional and chemical balance?
“All my interactions with her were very positive. Of course, I was relating as one adult to another. She and I were not that far apart in age. The Ivyland alumni that came to her home obviously loved her fiercely.
“On the other hand, I did observe a somewhat adversarial feeling about the missionary parents. More than once she made comments that reflected her belief that the parents were wrong to ‘abandon’ their children. Perhaps some of that was communicated to the children too.”
In a letter from 1984, Joyce wrote that “a visit with the Reuters is always pleasant. They are still struggling financially. I wonder if they’ll ever really get on their feet. Josie has a permanent limp since the car accident two years ago. But they seem happy.” And so we continue to peal the onion looking for answers that elude us.
Just after I moved into my house in Lake in the Hills in 1990, I wrote that “the lake stretches in from of me like a huge backwards “C”. The apple tree is starting to blossom and most ice has gone. From my living room window, I can see on the peninsula the house in which a twenty year-old girl shot herself last week, two houses from mine. So there is pain even while surrounded by beauty.”
Here are two all too typical news clippings.
“Sitting on a bed of oak leaves in the woods behind school, Melissa and her twelve year old cousin finished their picnic lunch and swallowed the last of their wine. Twelve minutes before noon, a tiny white fleck of light appeared far down the railroad tracks. Ten seconds later, the crescendo of engines going 100 miles per hour. Amtrak 141 was on time. Melissa ran to the tracks, knelt between the rails, and clasped her hands in prayer. Her cousin, Pearl, tried to stop her, but Melissa had always been bigger and stronger. Melissa Courtney Putney made the sign of the cross. On that warm Tuesday mid-day last week in rural Maryland, a troubled eighth grader died.”
“Lynn Ann Miller, 13, an exceptionally bright but shy girl, worshipped television star Freddie Prinzie and kept his autographed picture of “Chico” close by her. When Prinze committed suicide, firing a bullet through his brain, Lynn Ann made up her mind. Three hours after Prinze was buried Monday, Lynn Ann took her father’s .38 caliber pistol while her parents were out of the house, put the gun to her right temple, and pulled the trigger.”
One year after I graduated, Donald Wilkerson ’77,a friend of mine and like me a missionary kid, lay down in front of a Chicago Western freight train at the Chase Street crossing in Wheaton after he broke up with his girlfriend. “We were sad to hear of the death of your fellow student during your Wheaton College days,” my parents wrote to me. “It’s hard to imagine the depths of disappointment that this lad was suffering. This tragedy need not have been. No matter how big the disappointment or overwhelming the problem our God is bigger than all these. He has provided a way of escape in the severest trial (I Corinthians 10:13) and we need not succumb to the lies and devices of the devil but should rather resist him. In times of crisis and calamity, our minds focus on the calamity. However, the Biblical corrective is to focus not on the problem but the problem solver: ‘Looking to Jesus the author and finisher of our faith’ (Hebrews 12:2). Our hearts go out in sympathy to all those who are affected by this untimely incident.”
The pianist Arthur Rubinstein writes in his autobiography My Young Years a moment of despair when he tried to kill himself with a belt from a bathroom clothes hook. He pushed the chair away, the belt tore apart, and Rubenstein fell crying to the floor with a crash.
“When one stops crying, the suffering subsides, the same as when laughter dies, the fun is gone. And so, nature claiming its own, I began to feel hungry. “This time I shall have two sausages,” I decided.
“Out in the street, however, a sudden impulse made me stop. Something strange came over me, call it a revelation or a vision.
“I looked at everything around me with new eyes, as I had never seen any of it before. The street, the trees, the houses, dogs chasing each other, and the men and women, all looked different, and the noise of the great city—I was fascinated by it all. Life seems beautiful and worth living, even in prison or in a hospital, as long as you look at it that way.
“I felt as if I had been reborn.
“Well, on that night, right there in the street, on my way to Aschinger’s for my dinner de luxe, my brain was full of philosophical thoughts, and it resulted in a new conception of life and a new criterion of values, all for my private use. Let me say only in this chaos of thoughts I discovered the secret of happiness and I still cherish it: Love life for better or for worse, without conditions.”
There are people who kill themselves in the grip of insanity, and my sympathy goes to them and those they leave behind. Most people who commit suicide kills themselves quickly, but some die slowly, stunned over a long period of time by inertia. But I do strongly believe that if we’re cogent, we should never take our lives for any reason. I speak from experience when I say that suicide leaves a wake of grief that stretches decades. I don’t deny the complexity of reasons for suicide. I think it’s simplistic to say that suicide is the product of a diseased mind. But it appears that it is a combination of biological, psychological, sociological, and spiritual factors produce an inimical feeling about existence itself—a need to stop unbearable anguish-- by doing to escape being. There are answer—within us—from others—clergy, social workers, friends, psychologists, doctors—and also from our faith. But I do believe that suicide in the main is an act of selfishness masquerading as desperation. I believe that there are always options and there are always people that can provide us with options. But destructive hate turned inward is never an option.
Some people that kill themselves are insane—they have no mind, no cognition, no sense of proportion, no sense of past, present, and future, no values, no intentionality, and thusly no will that can prevent their own annhilation. However, I don’t think this is true with most people who kill themselves, and for such people I do think they are committing the unforgivable sin. “ According to Mark 3:28-29, there is but one unforgivable sin. “Verify I say unto you,” Jesus says, “All sins shall be forgiven unto the sins of men, and blasphemies with which they blaspheme; but he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Spirit hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation.” Some people interpret this verse as God’s condemnation against anyone who is impious or irreverent to God, Christianity, a creed, or the church. However, this interpretation puts the focus on the act of impiety, rather than the object of blasphemy, who is the Holy Spirit. According to John 14, Jesus leaves with us the Spirit’s indwelling. “And I will pray the Father. And he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever, even the Spirit of truth.” And in chapter 16, we read “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you.” So, to the question, how do you blaspheme the Holy Spirit, I would say from these verses you do so by denying the comfort and truth that God provides. So it is not a denial of creeds or even God that is the greatest sin as much as it is our lack of confidence in the Holy Spirit that causes us to lose that faith in God and that faith in our own humanity.
William Buckley quotes in Execution Eve a last sermon by fifty-year old Charles Pinckey Luckey of the Middlebury Connecticut Congregational Church, perhaps one of the most moving credos of the Christian faith I’ve read. Two weeks after he read this letter, he died, on January 20, 1976, of Jakob-Creutzfelds disease.
“What does the Christian do when he stands over the abyss of his own death and the doctors have told him that disease is ravaging his brain and that his whole personality may be warped, twisted, changed? Then does the Christian have any right to self-destruction, especially when he knows that the changed personality may bring out some horrible beast in himself?
“Well, after 48 hours of self-searching and study, it comes to me that ultimately and finally the Christian has to always view life as a gift from God, and every precious bit of life was not earned but was by grace, lovingly bestowed upon him by his Creator, and it is not his to pick up and smash.
“And so I find the position of suicide untenable, not because I lack the courage to blow out my brains, but rather because of my deep, abiding faith in the Creator who put the brains there in the first place. And now the result is that I lie here blind on my bed and trusting in the sustaining, loving power of that great God who knew and loved me before I was fashioned in my mother’s womb.
“But I do not think it is wrong to pray for an early release from this diseased, ravaged carcass. Loving given to my congregation and to my friends if it seems in good taste”
“Three months ago, you came into our lives,” I wrote in my diary on May 24th, 1994, about my son Zachary. “Today, you’re a pink-cheeked boy with big, brown eyes and a cooing smile. We want to give you the world. But the world isn’t easy. Your peers will grow up in well-manicured neighborhoods, attend first-rate colleges, and flaunt the trappings of affluence. But there’s trouble in paradise. Last month, two girls gassed themselves after a party in a suburb not far from here. A local TV report documented a new fad among children called carving. Kids use acid, blades, and fire to mutilate themselves. We see young lives trashed by drug abuse, alcoholism, and depression. At the root of this lie a sickness of the soul called self-hate. Self-hate tries to claim that I’m worthless, undesirable, bad. And out of this soul death comes that most fundamental question of existence:
I. Why?
To be or not to be, that is the question. What is the answer? Beloved child, there’s nothing we want to give you more than a foundation of granite self-esteem that can stand the stresses of life. “Give me a place to stand,” Archimedes said 2,000 years ago, “and I will move the world.” We want you to stand on a place of unconditional self-acceptance. We want you to accept yourself without condition, and thusly to accept others and life itself without condition. This we want you to know. You matter. You’re special. You’re wanted. Believe it. Hold on to it. Cling to it with the tenacity of a terrier. Make it part of you. You are because you are. Your existence needs no justification. It’s not based on achievement, what you look like, what you wear, what your grades are. You are—not because of what you do—but because you are.Dearest Zachary, here at home, you’re safe and free. Safe to have roots, free to have wings. Here you’re free to experiment, to make mistakes, to grow. Here you’re free to be you. Zachary, we love you!”
