Sermon: Funeral of Helen Chiasson

2 March 2009 at Salem Lutheran Church, Gretna, LA

Text: John 14:1-6 (Ps 121, 1 Cor 12:31b-13:13)

In the name of + Jesus. Amen.

Dear Lloyd, Lloyd, Shannon, Marnie, Cassidy, Henry, Audrey, family, friends, and brothers and sisters in Christ: grace mercy and peace be unto you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

We knew today was coming, and yet that provides little comfort. Our dear sister in Christ Helen knew she was dying, and so did all of us. We all shared her last few months of life with her on this side of the grave knowing that each day was a gift from God – and yet we still grieve the loss of our wife, mother, mother-in-law, grandmother, sister, and dear friend.

And though the temptation is for us to minimize our grief by rationalizing away death as some kind of a friend, as some natural or God-pleasing phase in our existence – Holy Scripture teaches us that nothing could be further from the truth. For the truth is that our Father and Maker did not create us to die – and especially not after a long illness. Death is not natural, and it is certainly not our friend.

Death is the wages of sin – our own sins, as well as the sin we have inherited from our ancestors who rebelled in the Garden of Eden. Death is the consequence of this flaw in which all of us hold a share. And yet, death does not have the last word.

For our Father allowed another death to come into the world – a completely unjust death that justifies us – including Helen: the death of our Blessed Lord on the cross. This is how it is that the Psalmist can proclaim: “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints.” For it isn’t death that is precious – it most certainly isn’t – but rather the fact that death does not conquer the saint, but the other way around. What is precious to God is the victory His dear children have over death because His dear Son conquered death by death.

And this is confirmed by the resurrection.

A passage in which Helen took great comfort is St. John’s quotation from our Blessed Lord: “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?”

This preparation and the fact that even in death we have a place in the Lord’s kingdom is how our Lord can say to us even now: “Let not your hearts be troubled.” For Helen was prepared, and the Lord has prepared a place for her. She was created according to the Lord’s plan for her. She was born not once, but twice, having been born again by water and the Spirit in this very font more than eighty years ago. She not only lived a full and rich life according to the flesh, but also in the spirit. She shared a long life of love with her family, and enjoyed intimate communion with her Lord Jesus in His body and blood for some seven decades since her first Holy Communion right here at Salem.

For the Lord’s love for Helen was such that He willingly sacrificed Himself to redeem her from her sins, and to give her everlasting life over and against her own mortality – through the gracious waters of Holy Baptism, as well as through His body and blood, born of Mary, sacrificed at the cross, and truly offered as food and drink in the Lord’s Supper.

St. Paul’s famous passage on love is often read at weddings, less often at funerals. But in this case, it is fitting that we be reminded that love – especially married love – is a picture of Christ’s love for His bride, the Church. Lloyd and Helen’s love for one another has been apparent to me as I have had the privilege to minister to them over these past few months. Sixty-three years did not diminish their affection and devotion, but in fact added to it. Helen’s intense love for Lloyd beamed from her face, even when she became too weak to speak it out loud. Lloyd’s selfless and tender devotion and dedication to his beloved bride knew no sacrifice too dear for her honor and her comfort.

And, Lloyd, I am humbled and privileged that I was able to bring the Lord Jesus to you and Helen in His body and blood and in His Word these past few months. Any blessing that I have been to you has been as a simple messenger of Christ. But you and Helen have been a far greater blessing to me as living icons of not only married life, but of the intense and selfless love our Lord has for us: His people, His Church, His own dear bride.

For you brought Christ to me as well: Christ in suffering. Christ in service. Christ in love.

And what more beautiful picture do we have of this kind of holy love than this: “Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends”?

For though all of us walk in the valley of the shadow of death, we need not fear anything, not even death itself. The Lord is with us. And as the Psalmist proclaims in the very text Helen herself wanted read today:

“My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber…. The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade on your right hand…. The Lord will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life. The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.”

Indeed, we grieve the loss of our dear Helen. We miss her. We will always miss her on this side of the grave. And yet we do not grieve as those who have no hope. We have the promises of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Victor over death and the grave, the One into whose name Helen was baptized, and whose name she confessed all the days of her life. We have the hope and the promise of being reunited with her at the resurrection, in our heavenly home, in the mansions prepared for us, in the newly-created universe promised to us by our Lord Jesus, who overcame sin and death to replace it with righteousness and life.

For hear anew the Gospel, that is the Good News, from the Apostle our Lord loved:

“‘And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going.’ Thomas said to him, ‘Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?’ Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.’”

This is the promise of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is the faith which Helen confessed. This is the creed which the Church proclaims. This the hope to which we Christians cling – now and unto eternity. Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Sermon: Lent 1 Invocabit

1 March 2009 at Salem Lutheran Church, Gretna, LA

Text: Matt 4:1-11 (Gen 3:1-21, Heb 4:14-16)

In the name of + Jesus. Amen.

It is no coincidence that our Lord Jesus Christ is tempted by the devil, nor is it just by chance that our Blessed Lord defeats the tempter with the Word of God.

For this meeting was inevitable. It was going to happen one way or the other. The payback was going to come to the serpent, the one more crafty than any other beast of the field, the one who raised doubts in our ancestors Adam and Eve by simply asking a question: “Did God actually say…?”

Satan tempted Eve by causing her to doubt, by making her think that God’s Word was a lie. Satan tempted Adam by appealing to him as well that it was possible, through disobedience to God, to become like God.

And just like that, it was over. Mankind had exchanged God’s true words for the serpent’s twisted utterances. Mankind brought death to the world, and had destroyed his perfect harmony with God. Just like that. The serpent was indeed more crafty. And the serpent was given a promise from the mouth of God: “I will put enmity between you and the women, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.”

For thousands of years, the universe awaited this clash to come. Mankind clung to the promise of this Seed of the woman, this Savior, this Christ who would crush the skull of the old evil foe. And the serpent waited as well, like a cobra waiting to strike, seeking to plunge his venomous fangs into the heel of the Seed of the woman. Only one would be victorious.

In the Garden of Eden, the man and the woman were soundly defeated by the tempter. All Satan had to do was dangle a falsehood in front of them. There was not much of a struggle. Adam and Eve were quick to believe the devil’s lie and to reject the truth of God’s Word. But this was to be undone thousands of years later in the wilderness.

This time, the Man, the Human Being, the Seed of the Woman – was prepared for battle. This time, the Man was hardened by fasting and strengthened by the very Word of God.

The same distortions would come from the mouth of the venomous devil. The same half-truths, the same outright lies, the same appeals to vanity, and the same pressures to disobey the Word and command of God. But this time, the Man would beat back the crafts and assaults of the devil.

Like in the Garden, the tempter would use food as a means to try to entrap the Man, using his stomach and lust for the satisfaction of his hunger as a means to wrest disobedience from this new and greater Adam. But our Lord repelled this assault by appealing to the Word of God – for “Man shall not live by bread alone,” but indeed by every Word of God.

Satan then tempted our Lord to test God, to take an action motivated by doubt, to act in a way that essentially challenges God and calls him a liar (“Did God actually say…?). But this time, the Man, the Son of God in human flesh, the Son of Adam who lacks the sin of Adam, refused to take the bait. Again, He appeals to God’s Word: “It is written….”

Once more, Satan ruthlessly attacked our Lord Jesus Christ, this time tempting Him to abandon the worship of His Father, to overturn the fabric of the universe by obeying Satan and disobeying God – but unlike His ancestor Adam in the Garden of Eden, our Lord would remain true in His worship of the one true God. Our Lord would again invoke the Word of God to dispel the temptations of the devil.

“Then the devil left him.”

This first battle between the Seed of the Woman and the tempter was the beginning of the undoing of the damage Adam and Eve caused in their fall into sin. Three times, our Lord counterattacked the devil’s lies with God’s truth as expressed in His Word. Where Adam failed, our blessed Lord was victorious. Where Satan had defeated man with a lie, the Man would defeat Satan with the truth. And with “one little word”: “Be gone,” Satan is felled.

And yet, the devil continues to attack us. His old lies of the Garden still work on us. And even though we know Satan is the father of lies, we are all too quick to want to hear him. Indeed, we prefer Satan’s lie over God’s truth – for Satan tells us what we want to hear: that we can turn stones into bread, we can take risks without consequences, and we can worship anyone and anything we want to. Satan tells us we don’t need God, that God is a liar, that the Word of God is not true, that we can and should serve ourselves, that we have no need for a Savior, that we can serve the false gods of pleasure, of riches, indeed, of anything – other than the God who loves us enough to send His Son to become one of us, a champion of our own race and flesh, a promised Messiah, the Christ, the Seed of the Woman who has come to defeat the tempter once and for all.

Again and again we fall for the lie – because we like it.

And, dear friends, this is exactly why, in the words of Luther’s hymn: “with might of ours can naught be done, soon were our loss effected.” For we face the devil over and over, and we fall into the same trap over and over. And if it weren’t for God’s mercy, God’s love, God’s promise, we would be lost and condemned, without hope, and with nothing to look forward to other than death and hell. But again, as we sang: “But for us fights the Valiant One, whom God Himself elected.”

For when our Lord Jesus defeats the devil, he does so not just for Himself, but for all men. He is truly our champion in the fight, our general in the warfare. But what’s more, he is our high priest. He is the intermediary between us men and the God we so horribly offend by our disobedience. For this Man would not repeat the mistake of Adam, of Eve, of all of us. This Man hurled the Word of God at the beast, because this man is the Word of God.

Our high priest is not only God’s Spokesman to us, He is also our Spokesman to God. Our high priest is not only God, He is truly bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. He is a high priest who hungered, who was tempted, and who rebuked the prince of demons by the same Word of God given to us. And as that Word of God testifies: “We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who is every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.”

Dear brothers and sisters, this is remarkable! This is good news! Our advocate is God Himself in the flesh. Our Champion is a Man Himself who is also God. We have not been abandoned to what we truly deserve, but we have been rescued according to what we don’t deserve.

And this is why we are here, in both space and time. In space, we are here in a church sanctuary, a holy place where the Word of God is proclaimed. We come to this place to combat the devil, and we use the same weapons against the old evil foe as did the Seed of the Woman, our Blessed Lord. We hear the sacred words of Holy Scripture. We hear the Words of Holy Absolution declaring us to be forgiven of all our sins. We hear the preaching of the Holy Gospel, which tells us how God has become one of us to rescue us by His crucifixion and death, to be raised again from the dead for our justification. And we come to this place for Holy Baptism and the Holy Supper, which send the devil and his demonic hordes running in terror from the “Valiant One whom God Himself elected.”

We also come back again and again to this time, our own 40 days of fasting, our own time in the Lenten wilderness of the church year, coming back again and again to wrestle with our own sins and with our own Old Adam. We come to this first Sunday in Lent, this time to hear God’s Word proclaim to us about the Word of God in the flesh, whose appeal to the Word of God begins that process of bruising Satan’s head on our behalf. Our Lord Himself not only fights for us, but shows us how to fight as well.

For make no mistake, dear brothers and sisters, the devil will be whispering in your ear, tempting you, cajoling you, trying to convince you of your own unworthiness, attempting to drive a wedge between you and your loving Father – whether by appealing to your guilt, or by convincing you that you have no sins to feel guilty about. And this tempting and diabolical nattering in your ear will continue until you draw your final breath on this side of the grave.

But the good news is this: We have the truth. He is not only our Champion, but our Weapon. He has already defeated the devil for us. The truth always stamps out the lie, and He will never leave or abandon us. Let us indeed, then “with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” That is a promise from the Word of God, the same Word of God that brings us victory over sin, death, and yes, even over the devil. Thanks be to God, now and unto eternity. Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Gretna's "most famous son"

The City of Gretna, Louisiana will be dedicating a life-sized bronze statue to her "most famous son," major league baseball legend Mel Ott (1909-1958), a few days after what would have been his 100th birthday. I will be giving the invocation at the ceremony this Saturday (March 7) at 10:00 a.m. at 4th Street and Huey P. Long Avenue (just over a block from my front door). This central location in the heart of Gretna's historical district is very close to where Ott was born on March 2, 1909.

Mel Ott was a member at Salem Lutheran Church, and still has relatives who are current members. I found his baptismal record when I was first approached about giving the invocation.

Several of my parishioners remember him warmly, and in spite of his remarkable achievements as a pro athlete (entering the major leagues at the age of 16!), he remained humble and good-natured. He died tragically in a car accident in New Orleans at the age of 49.

Thomas Edison State College

The above video is actually done by UPS and highlights their partnership with Thomas Edison State College to help their employees get college degrees. Here is Wikipedia's article about TESC, and here is TESC's website itself.

TESC pioneered distance education in 1972. It is a State College of New Jersey (located in Trenton), and is fully accredited. They currently offer 6 associate, 6 bachelor, and 4 master degrees. It is possible to earn a degree from TESC without setting foot in a classroom - though most people take classes in a combination of ways - from traditional university classroom instruction (and transferring the credits to TESC), to testing out of college level courses, to studying by correspondance or by internet.

TESC is especially helpful for adults who want to return to college to earn a degree - as it affords maximum flexibility and minimum expense. You can earn a degree at your own pace - whether for professional advancement, or to get into a graduate program, or just to get a college degree for the personal satisfaction of doing so. A former co-worker of mine used to take a class every few months, knowing full well that earning her bachelor's degree would take more than a decade. Like the proverbial tortoise, she just kep plugging away.

In my own case, I attended the University of Akron in the 1980s, but left the university to attend a technical school (the Cleveland Institute of Technology), where I earned the equivalent of an associate degree in computer programming. In 1999, I applied to go to seminary. I needed a bachelor's to be admitted, and was about a year's worth of credits short.

TESC crafted a degree program that applied earlier college credits and some credits for continuing education classes that I took as a technology professional (which I didn't realize were accredited college classes). I was able to earn a BA in History by taking a series of CLEP tests (which transfer to TESC for full credit) as well as a couple correspondence classes from Brigham Young University (BYU).

I was able to work at my own pace, and I actually enjoyed the challenge of study as an adult. The CLEP program allows you to do as much or as little self-study as you want on a topic - and then take the pass/fail final exam. I took CLEP tests for U.S. History, Soviet History, the History of the Vietnam War, and the History of Modern Europe. These exams can be taken at any local university or community college (they are proctored by professors). I also took two genealogical research courses from BYU - Latin for Genealogists and Genealogical Writing - in which I worked at my own pace and mailed classwork to the professor in Utah.

Within a year's time (2000), I graduated with my BA, which was accepted for admission to Concordia Theological Seminary.

TESC does have a campus and has professors and onsite classrooms, but its real strength is its flexibility in recognizing offsite coursework for credit. There is no football team, no fraternities, no dorms, and no marching band - but TESC is about earning your degree without such distractions. I think it would also be an ideal solution for homeschoolers - as people who tend to be autodidactic will do well under the discipline of working at one's own pace and learning through non-traditional methods.

In my own case, I received a thorough education - because I took my studies seriously and worked hard. I actually received college credit for doing the kind of reading in History and watching video documentaries that I had formerly done just because I was interested in it.

If you want to earn an accredited degree, and especially if you've dropped out of college and want to finish what you started a long time ago, contact TESC. They can take your transcript(s) and put together a curriculum so that you can achieve your goal on your own timetable. It really is affordable, and there are a lot of technological advantages (such as online classes) that really weren't an option for me when I was a student ten years ago.

I'm grateful for the opportunity that TESC gave me, and as money gets tighter and education costs continue to spiral - TESC may give a lot of people opportunities that they wouldn't have otherwise.

The Times They Are a Changin'

Here is past Wednesday's "Freedom Watch" with Judge Napolitano on FOX-News. It is mesmerizing. Who would have ever imagined a FOX-News show not only criticizing President Bush, but calling him a Socialist and a disaster for conservatism? Who could have imagined FOX-News calling the Iraq War a mistake?

Once again, we learn that Congress is clueless, the two major parties are two sides of the same coin, and in the end, we're likely headed toward nationalization and hyperinflation.

I believe that either we will see a brain- and capital-drain away from the United States (assuming that some country somewhere in the world becomes what the United States used to be: a beacon of freedom), or there will be a revolution of sorts as the younger generation (the ones who are being currently saddled with all of this debt) rise up against Keynsian economics and rediscover the blessings of liberty and the driving power of free markets, savings, and investment.

And with some 25 states mulling over reassertions of sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment, one has also to wonder if we will see a repeat of the principles of nullification, if not outright secession. The Federal government has become the very Big Government the founders and our ancestors fought a revolution against, and I believe it is imperative that we dust-off the long-forgotten Constitutional checks and balances against Leviathan unless we want to eventually see violence in the streets.

One thing is sure: the house of cards is teetering, and something is going to have to give. And let's pray that freedom wins and not fascism.

Sermon: Ash Wednesday

25 February 2009 at Salem Lutheran Church, Gretna, LA

Text: Matt 6:1-6, 16-21 (Joel 2:12-19, 2 Peter 1:2-11)

In the name of + Jesus. Amen.

“Remember, O man, that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

These are painful words, just as harsh today for us as they were when God first pronounced them over a terrified Adam in Genesis chapter three.

For these words are harbingers of death, reminders of our own mortality. The ashen cross marks us as condemned prisoners waiting for our appointment with the hangman. For the wages of sin is death. Death came into the world through one man. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

The condemnation of Adam applies to all of us children of Adam. The things we treasure are in reality only so much dust and debris, and the one thing we treasure above all, our very lives, are passing away with each day.

This is why one of the Sons of Adam, the One who is also the Son of God, tells us: “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth” – for these things are all temporary. Rather we are to “lay up” for ourselves “treasures in heaven.”

This is exactly what the prophet Joel means when he speaks God’s Word: “return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning… return to the Lord your God, for He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love.”

Rather than wallow in the passing things of this fallen world, we are to fix our eyes above, to those things which are not passing away, to our Lord Jesus Christ, whose death defeated death, whose perfect life is given to us as a free and sacrificial gift. We are being rescued, dear friends! Though we are now in a pit, our impending help is from above. Hold your heads high, looking toward heaven. Hold your heads up as conquerors, not down as the defeated and the downtrodden.

We can indeed repent. We can indeed hear the holy words of the Ten Commandments, the Law of the Lord, calling us back to Himself like a Father bidding His children into His strong and loving arms.

Today, in the words of the prophet Joel, we “consecrate a fast.” Let every man, woman, and child look to his true treasure, that is, to become, in the words of St. Peter, “partakers of the divine nature.” For consider our blessed Lord’s divine nature – though He died in His flesh, He rose again in that same divine nature, defeating the devil, destroying death, conquering sin. We are partakers, dear brothers and sisters, with that same victorious divine nature. For He is not only our Lord, but also our Savior: the king who comes to save us. He came not only to crush the serpent’s head, but also to rescue those condemned to the dust, so that we might escape “from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.”

For that is the cause of it all, of our destiny to return to dust, of the Lord’s dusty walk to the cross, and of the dusty cross traced upon our foreheads along with the reminder of what we are. The cause of it all is sin. Sin leads to death. Sin wrought the cross. Sin stands in the way of our treasures in heaven.

But thanks be to God that His death on the cross as our Savior pardons us from this death sentence. For the Lamb of God, pure and holy, has mercy on us. In conquering sin, our Lord conquered death. And in conquering sin and death, our Lord crushed the devil’s head and rendered him powerless – even in the face of death.

For the great paradox is this: though we are dust, and though we shall return to dust (as is the just penalty for our sins and the sins of all mankind), we will not remain dust. And what’s more, this is not merely a paradox, but is good news, dear friends: we will rise from the dust. Not like a Phoenix, but as ourselves, as the men and women the Lord created us to be. This is the greatest news of all: that our sins are atoned for, our death rendered only temporary, and our redemption as certain and sure as the black mark on your forehead.

For just as the dust will wash off by water, your sins have been washed away permanently by water and the Word, not merely by a symbolic cross traced in dust, but by a real cross soaked in blood.

Never forget that after Ash Wednesday comes Easter. And yet, for the time being, it is a helpful discipline to ponder your sins, meditate on your mortality, and allow the Law of God to crush your pride and self-reliance into dust. And as our Lord says: “When you give to the needy… When you pray… and when you fast…” do not seek the praise of other men who are likewise dust, but seek the reward from your Father who is in heaven, the Father who loves you, who sent His Son to redeem you, who faithfully calls you to repentance, and who promises through the tears of our dusty faces: “there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Feast of St. Polycarp, Bishop and Martyr

Today is the modern Western Church's date of the Feast of St. Polycarp of Smyrna, Bishop and Martyr - which includes commemoration by the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod in the sanctorial calendar of its latest hymnal, Lutheran Service Book (LSB).

St. Polycarp (c 69 - c 155 AD) was a pivotal figure in the early church, and is considered an apostolic father, a link to the original apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ.

St. Polycarp was himself a disciple of St. John the Evangelist, the one entrusted to take care of the mother of God and the author of the fourth Gospel (as well as the three Epistles of John, and the Revelation) - the last living apostle. St. Polycarp was also the spiritual father of the great theologian and defender of the faith, St. Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons (died c 202 AD), and is St. Irenaeus's link to the apostles.

St. Polycarp's faithfulness unto death has inspired persecuted Christians since the second century. You can read the ancient account of St. Polycarp's martyrdom at the age of 86 for steadfastly refusing to worship Caesar here.

You can also read the holy bishop's early second century Epistle to the Philippians here. It is his only known extant work.

Sanctus Polycarpus orat pro nobis.

Happy Lundi Gras

Today is Lundi Gras (Fat Monday) - the day before Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday), and two days before Ash Wednesday, the somber beginning of the penitential season of Lent.

Before the days of refrigeration, people had to use up all their fatty foods, like cream and meat, before Ash Wednesday - or else it would go bad and go to waste. So, Carnival (Latin: Carni vale, "farewell to meat") began as a pre-Lent last gasp of feast before the fast.

I think we in Louisiana have it just right.

Carnival, for us, involves family celebrations of parades, food, music, and fun. Salem Lutheran Church is having a Mardi Gras party tomorrow, as two krewes (private parade organizations) will parade right past our church. There will be marching bands, high steppers, jazz music, colorful floats with costumed and masked riders tossing out beads, stuffed animals, toys, candy, doubloons (colorful "coins"), plastic cups, and other "treasures." There will be families out and about with children running to and fro, laden with toys and beads.

To many outsiders, the image of New Orleans Carnival is not this local family celebration, but rather a more trashy display of reveling tourists on Bourbon Street. As one of my parishioners put it, some (certainly not all) tourists come from somewhere else, behave shamefully, and then go back home - leaving their reputation behind. But the reality is this: the tableau of drunken people exposing themselves can indeed be found, but it is confined to Bourbon Street, and once again, is really a tourist phenomenon. My aforementioned parishioner grew up in the French Quarter, and until recent years, even the Quarter's version of Carnival was squeaky clean family fun - as it still is in most of New Orleans and its environs.

But there does seem to be an "attitude of latitude" involved in Carnival. There is indeed a relativity to the intensity of the revelry in proportion to one's distance from the tropics.

While New Orleans Carnival seems exotic, if not downright decadent and weird, to our neighbors in the North, we're really pretty tame compared to Carnival near the equator, as in, say, Brazil - where samba teams compete with one another riding gargantuan floats, with riders decked out in a combination of elaborate feather costumes and full nudity. Actually, that's an exaggeration (let's be fair here). Carnival rules ban nudity, so the samba girls must at least wear a piece of tape. Last year, one of the contestants drew a penalty for losing her four-inch long, inch-and-a-half wide piece of tape. Oops! Not that the tape, or lack thereof, can really be seen from a distance anyway. This year, she apparently added body paintings of the President of the United States and of the President of Brazil in addition to her piece of tape - perhaps reflecting a more conservative trend in Sao Paulo's Carnival.

So you see, we're not really that crazy after all. Brazil's Carnival is way more wild than New Orleans's.

But by contrast, many churches in the Northern U.S. do mark the Mardi Gras with a Carnival of their own: a pancake breakfast on "Shrove Tuesday." That's it. A pancake breakfast (which would be what we in New Orleans would consider a Lenten meal - just kidding, but barely). Pancakes. Now, that's living on the edge. And I'm sure the really "wild and crazy" revelers liberally douse their flapjacks with a scandalous helping of maple syrup. Can you just stand the excitement?

I guess it's not a stretch to surmise that if four inches of skin is covered in Brazil, then it is likely that four inches of skin is actually exposed in the land of the midnight sun (or in the winter, the land where the sun doesn't shine, pun intended). I guess there is some method to the madness.

We New Orleanians really do cut a Goldilocks and the Three Bears kind of via media between the extremes of naked girls and pancakes. Surely, there must be a happy medium! I think we do a good job of finding it here.

So, you Yankees, why not turn off that YouTube of the (almost) naked Brazilian girls while you eat your pancakes, and instead, why not come on down to da Big Easy next year for a real Mardi Gras, Dawlin? Forget the pancakes, have a po-boy, gumbo, jambalaya, oysters, crabs, crawfish, or maybe even some alligator or raccoon. Join us for parades, music, and lots of good clean fun.

And leave that parka behind.

But if you really must go to Bourbon Street, make sure you wear a Michigan or Ohio State shirt while you're doing things you just wouldn't do in Lansing or Youngstown. Don't make us look bad, y'all. Either way, just make sure you spend lots of money. Hurricane Season is only four months away, and we got levees to build.

Meanwhile, Happy Carnival, and laissez les bons temps rouler!

Sermon: Quinquagesima and Baptism of Megan Elizabeth Smith

22 February 2009 at Salem Lutheran Church, Gretna, LA

Text: Luke 18:31-43 (Isa 35:3-7, 1 Cor 13:1-13)

In the name of + Jesus. Amen.

St. Luke gives us not just one, but two accounts of blindness. The most obvious is the blind man on the road. He is a beggar. He hears the commotion, and upon learning that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by, the blind man cries out with a prayer that we repeat nearly every time we gather for divine service: “Have mercy on me!” He addresses Jesus as “Son of David,” thus appealing to Jesus as no mere commoner, but as a Lord, a man of royal blood.

We repeat this prayer when we sing: “Lord, have mercy upon us” in our liturgy.

To the dismay of many, the blind beggar refuses to be silent. He continues to pray for mercy. He continues to confess Jesus as “Son of David.” He continues to forcefully ask for the attention of the Lord.

And he gets it!

“What do you want me to do for you?” asks the merciful Son of David. “Lord,” he replies, “let me recover my sight.” The Lord commands it to be done, saying: “your faith has made you well.”

Thus sight replaces blindness, wholeness replaces brokenness, health replaces infirmity – all given by the Word and physical presence of Jesus, all received by the man’s faith.

But this isn’t the only example of blindness.

Just before, the Lord Jesus takes the twelve aside and speaks His Word to them, plainly without parables, straight talk without symbolism, speaking of Himself, He says: “For he will be mocked and shamefully treated and spit upon. And after flogging him, they will kill him, and on the third day he will rise.” But the disciples cannot understand what He is saying. The simple meaning of His blunt words were “hidden from them.” They were themselves blinded to what He was telling them.

Just as the faith of the beggar made him well and gave him sight, the lack of faith of the disciples left them in the dark, blinding them to the prophetic utterance of our Blessed Lord.

Often, the Lord rebukes the disciples as “you of little faith.” He is often frustrated, if not outright flabbergasted at their spiritual blindness. And yet, He continues to love them.

He patiently and kindly continues to preach to them in spite of their weak faith. He does not boast or lord over them, nor arrogantly or rudely hold His divine nature over their heads. Though He is “the Way,” He does not force the disciples or compel them – in fact, one of them would leave the Way by his own fallen free will. Jesus is not irritable or resentful, nor does He rejoice when His disciples behave foolishly and childishly. Rather, our Lord Jesus always rejoices with the truth. He bears all things, even being delivered to His enemies to be mocked, spat upon, flogged, and killed. He believes all things, never abandoning His Father’s will though His body and soul are utterly agonized by the cup He must drink. Our Lord Jesus Christ endures to the end, and even then beyond, to the blessed hope of the resurrection.

His love never ends.

For He promises to hold even those of weak faith in the palms of His battered and bloodied hands, imprinted with nails, and yet raised in blessing over those of little faith. He promises that “a bruised reed he will not break, and a faintly burning wick he will not quench.”

And what a great joy and blessing this is to us today, dear brothers and sisters. For we are not only like the blind beggar crying out: “Son of David, have mercy on me,” as we cry out in our private prayers and public liturgy to our Lord who draws near to hear us. Even as He proclaims: “your faith has made you well,” we are also like the disciples, weak of faith, and at times perplexed by the simple and direct Word of God.

How little faith we display! How often are we shocked when the Lord answers our prayers? How often are we amazed at the report of a miracle? How often do we pray thinking that the Lord will never grant what we ask? When we behave in this way, we are more like the disciples who are weak in faith than we resemble the blind beggar whose faith made him well.

For faith is belief. If we truly believe, we should never marvel at miracles. We should never pray out of despair, but always out of hope. We should never take God’s grace for granted, or ever see anything as more important than being in the miraculous presence of God in the divine service.

But we are blinded by our weak faith. We who don’t flinch at spending hours in front of a TV or at a movie or at a sporting event will fidget and fuss if the service “takes too long.” We have plenty of faith in pledging to pay a mortgage and a car note, but balk at committing even a small amount to support the work of our congregation. We who would never miss a day of work are quick not to pray. We who wouldn’t think of missing a meal at a nice restaurant think nothing about missing the Lord’s Supper if church attendance becomes inconvenient.

But there is hope for all of us of little faith, just as there was indeed hope for the disciples. Hear the prophet again, who was told to “strengthen the weak hands and make firm the feeble knees.” He tells us as the Lord commanded him: “Be strong; fear not! Behold your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He will come and save you.”

He has indeed come to save us: from sin, death, and hell, from the grave, from mourning and frustration, from the devil, from our sinful flesh, and from our weak faith.

Hear the prophet Isaiah yet again: “Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy.”

The Lord accomplishes this through His Word and by His Sacraments. He draws us into His own faith by His own command and through His own death and resurrection. Just as little Megan was born again today by water and the Word, every Christian can and must cling to the promise our Lord made as he washed us in the waters of regeneration: “He who believes and is baptized will be saved.”

This, dear friends, is why we, the baptized (and unworthy) children of God, come back week after week to this place, to where baptismal water flows, where forgiving words resonate, where the miraculous presence of the Lord Jesus Himself in His Holy Supper strengthen our faith and deliver the promise of sins forgiven. We Christians gather here not because we are strong in faith, but because we are weak. The well need no physician. The perfect need no Savior. Those with impeccable faith do not need the Holy Word and the Holy Sacraments.

And that is exactly why He gives us eyes to see and faith to believe. He makes us well by the very faith He imparts to us. And we beggars can plead and cry out in faith – even faith that is at times like a dimly burning wick. We are indeed weak and blind. We certainly need a Savior.

And though we are like the disciples of little faith, we are also like the blind beggar crying out to the Lord Jesus Christ for help, again and again, week after week, year after year: “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” And again and again, week after week, year after year, we hear our Lord answer this prayer: “Recover your sight. Your faith has made you well.” Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Let it Be!

Great title. "Let it be" also means "Amen." If you would like, click on the widget to the top right (above my profile) and sign the petition to President Kieschnick and the Board of Directors to end this litigious arm-twisting and just "let it be."

TV worth watching

This is an hour-long program called Freedom Watch that seems to fly by in a couple minutes (it is posted on YouTube in six segments). It is hosted every Wednesday on FOX-News by Judge Andrew Napolitano, and yesterday's (Feb 18) program took up the federal government's so-called stimulus package.

I had just about given up being able to find a defense of the free market and real conservative values in the mainstream media - and I have never been so delighted to be wrong!

Back in the USSA

More evidence of our descent into a fascist police state.  

This is the kind of bullying that inevitably accompanies the centralization of power into a single party, single branch of government, and/or single person - whether he is lauded and exalted as: Our Commander in Chief, the Caesar, the Dictator, or the Obama.

This is why the founders of the United States created a republican form of government with checks and balances, in which the president "presides," he does not rule or reign.  The president oversees only one branch of only the federal level of government.  He is one cog in a complex wheel of the republic.  He is not our president; he does not preside over us - but rather is the chief executive of the executive branch - which is supposed to be checked by the courts and by the legislature.  He is also the commander in chief of the military - not of the civilians - and, if we were true to our founders and to the Constitution, we would have no standing armies (Jefferson considered standing armies and paper money to be the most dangerous threats to liberty - and history bears him out).

Over time, the American Presidency has become a Caesarship waiting to blossom.  And we have seen past presidents acting with Caesarian pretensions, as in the overtly-fascist Lincoln and FDR administrations.  And, of course, most of us have been "educated" not to point out the emperor's nakedness, even though we can read the Constitution with our own eyes.  To the contrary, we're taught that the Constitution must be read and interpreted by judges and lawyers, the secular priests who assure us we can't read the "sacred" text of the "living" Constitution ourselves.  We're also brainwashed from an early age to accept any and all claims of government power as that which makes us "safe."

And instead of resisting this ominous trend toward hypercentralization and concentration of power - the citizenry just goes along like sheep.  

Even the prayers from the LCMS Commission on Worship use almost worshipful terms of the president of the United States, speaking of him (and other government officials) as "our rulers" and our "leaders" (which takes on a different tone if translated literally into the German of our forefathers).  I remember the negative reaction of a few conservatives when one of Obama's spokesmen said he was ready to "rule" from day one - and yet, our own synodical prayers use this kind of language without flinching, as though we, like the early church, lived in an imperial military dictatorship, or like the church of the reformation era, live under a system of potentates and princes.  

When Washington refused to be crowned, some Americans adopted "No king but Jesus" as their motto.  The people of Israel themselves refused God's advice that they have no monarchical system of secular government - but they wanted to be like other nations, with disastrous results.

But now that Washington has become synonimous with the city that serves as the seat of Big Government, and now that his image is on a fiat note of debt and spent entirely on credit - Americans now shrug and presume that stopping, harassing, and performing searches and seizures on citizens for having anti-abortion literature is normal in a republic that guarantees individual liberty.  We collectively either condone or excuse, or simply surrender to the ridiculous notion that these words were a threat to Mr. Obama - who is ensconced hundreds of miles away surrounded by heavily armed military personnel and an army of secret service agents.  We consider it completely reasonable that agents of the government entered this man's home and snooped around to make sure he wasn't part of a "hate group."  Our ancestors at the time of the American Revolution certainly had other ideas about such "proactive" government.  Our kith and kin in Europe and Africa in the twentieth century also knew a thing or two about it.

We are also all-too-quick to accept government explanations for banning shampoo bottles and nail files from airplanes, not to mention allowing government bureaucrats at the airport to either fondle or look at nude images of our wives and children - all in the name of "safety."   And a police officer in Oklahoma City can't seem to figure out that Barack Obama's life was not in danger because of a sign on a car.  Even he could not resist the urge to harass and bully a citizen going about his business.  What was really happening was that Barack Obama was in danger of being criticized.  And that is something a Caesar cannot endure.  That is the real issue here.  We're even seeing this same tableau in the LCMS - which incidentally also has a "president" who is also seeking a centralization of power, as well as a bureaucratic board that is using threatening legal letters to strong-arm a "no criticism" agreement from the men who run the radio program Issues, Etc. outside of synodical control.

And the last word is the key to understanding this failure of common sense.

It's always about "control."  That's why Lincoln shut down critical newspapers and FDR seized private gold, whose investors were critical and dubious of his redistributive "stimulus" plan.  That's why Julius Caesar was declared dictator for life, why Stalin murdered his critics by the thousands, why the Chinese government is always seeking to censor the internet.  It's about control.  It's also why the founders of our republic did everything they could to decentralize and dilute power with healthy checks and balances and a dose of humility to elected officials - to avoid the kinds of things we see every day and accept as normal and healthy: the desire for government to control everything in our lives.

But that's how the police state works.  It depends on all of us to shut up and allow it to happen.  Police states (and churches) depend on duping the many (by propaganda) into believing these things are all for our good, as well as bullying the few (by threats and force) who know better.

Dr. Veith has a great blog entry quoting Alexis de Tocqueville on how these things generally weasel their way into democratic societies.

The police state's worst enemy is the little boy who points out the emperor's nakedness, the one not buying the propaganda and not intimidated into silence.  That's why the police state doesn't want those "little boys" of every age and sex to have signs, blogs, or radio programs.

Enjoy Every Sandwich

My colleague in the ministry, Rev. Mason Beecroft, has a post about the latest dust-up in the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod - this time, yet another scandalous use of lawyers and their threatening letters directed at men who are doing nothing wrong, but simply using the gifts God gave them to further the Gospel - which the synod said could not be done under the synod's banner in a financially responsible way. The fact that they are doing it and succeeding independent of the synod seems to irk some of the suits at the Purple Palace.


In his analysis, Pr. Beecroft made a fleeting reference to Warren Zevon and his iconic pop song "Lawyers, Guns, and Money." Indeed, this ditty often comes into my head when I ponder the sorry state of the Missouri Synod these days. While guns aren't being used, there sure are a lot of lawyers sucking the life out of our fellowship, like parasitical vampires draining the very blood of Christ from the Church itself. And just about every communication from synod and its districts involves its not-so-subtle fundraising program couched under the biblical imagery of ordination: Fan Into Flame (I guess my idea "When the Coin in the Coffer Rings..." didn't catch on with the marketing wonks in St. Louis).


So, "Lawyers, Guns, and Money" may not be the perfect anthem to describe our synod, but as Meat Loaf would say, "Two Out of Three Ain't Bad."


I do believe that if our synodical hierarchy enjoyed the kind of power that church bureaucrats had at the time of the Reformation, we would see the duo of lawyers and money rounded out by guns as well. Thanks be to God that the Missouri Synod cannot threaten people with the stake or the inqusition - but can only resort to the more "civilized" intimidation and bullying from hired "guns" in the form of corporate lawyers.


Or, as I believe Scripture generally calls them: "teachers of the law."


But anyway, for a few weeks now, I have been re-discovering the late Warren Zevon's music. As an artist, he was creative. As a rock-singer, he was unique. He wrote not only catchy tunes, but clever lyrics with tongue-in-cheek plays of words and a dark graveyard humor showing the gritty underbelly of original sin at work. He also demonstrated an epic James Bond sort of imagination combined with vivid (and at times even lurid) storytelling. And, unlike a lot of singers of his genre, he actually had a melliflous and melancholic voice that hints of real musical training and polished showmanship. Over the years, Warren Zevon struck up a friendship with Late Show host David Letterman, and was a frequent guest on the program.


After he was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer in 2002, Zevon made his final appearance on Letterman, and the entire program became a tribute, almost a premortum obituary, a touching, and yet irreverent and bittersweet celebration of the art and work of a cheeky pop singer who always seemed to have the Grim Reaper looking over his shoulder. When Zevon was introduced, the Late Show band played his song "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead."


The video above is taken from that performance, and is one of my favorite Warren Zevon tunes (which was David Letterman's favorite as well): "Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner." This was to be his last public performance, and is a rollicking modern folk tale about a European mercenary who fought in Africa, was killed by a traitor in cahoots with the CIA, but who takes his revenge in the afterlife as a headless ghost.


When asked if his diagnosis taught him anything, Zevon quipped: "Enjoy every sandwich." This off the cuff remark became a posthumous motto, and was repeated back to Zevon by Letterman at the end of the program. After the show, Zevon presented his guitar to David Letterman, and asked him to take care of it.


Warren Zevon died at the age of 56 on September 7, 2003 surrounded by family. His last album, a sort-of last will and testament, The Wind, was made when he knew he was dying, and includes a cover of Bob Dylan's "Knockin' on Heaven's Door."


In 2004, a group of musicians released a tribute album featuring Zevon's music, calling it Enjoy Every Sandwich. And since it is now noon, that's just what I am going to do with my wife and son!

Sermon: Sexagesima

15 February 2009 at Salem Lutheran Church, Gretna, LA

Text: Luke 8:4-15 (Isa 55:10-13, Heb 4:9-13)

In the name of + Jesus. Amen.

“To you,” dear brothers and sisters in Christ, “it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God.”

For on this day, we have not only heard a parable of our Lord, we have heard the Lord Himself explain its meaning. And what a treasure this parable is, dear friends, for in it, the secret of the kingdom is revealed. How very sad that so many of our brethren are not here, refusing to hear the good news as well as the warning of our Lord.

The secret of God’s kingdom is in its propagation. Every time you eat an apple or orange, every time you spit out a cherry pit or a watermelon seed, you are being reminded of our Lord’s parable about the kingdom of God and how it grows. For sadly, not every seed of every fruit you eat is destined to become a tree or vine. In fact, the vast majority fail to germinate. Every seed bears the potential of not only life, but a fruitful life – and yet, most seeds never make it to the soil. Even those that do are often eaten by animals. Even those that sprout often die off very soon thanks to adverse conditions.

So very few grow to maturity, to bear fruit, to provide seeds themselves as a continuation of the chain of life that spans from the present, generation by generation, back to the original six days of creation.

The seed is a metaphor for God’s kingdom, which propagates from a minority of fruitful seeds planted into good soil. And in spite of this minority status, the miracle happens, life struggles against the forces that would snuff it out, and we do indeed see glorious trees bearing luscious fruits that not only feed us with the nectar of life, but themselves provide hundreds or even thousands of new seeds spreading the Lord’s creation thousands of years after the Word of God first said: “Let there be….”

And that is another revelation in this remarkable parable: the Word. For “in the beginning was the Word” and the “Word was with God” and the “Word was God.” And “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” Through Him all things were made. This Word through whom God creates is also the promised Seed of the woman, who crushed the head of the devil, who ransoms sinners, and who destroys death. Truly, truly, He has said to us, “unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” He is that Seed that died, was buried, and yet rose to bear much fruit.

The Seed Himself told us in His own Words: “The seed is the Word of God.”

The Word of God is the Bible, to be sure. The Word of God is preaching, to be sure. The Word of God is Holy Absolution, to be sure. But the Word is ultimately not a “what,” but a “Who.” The Word is not merely scribbles on a page or vibrations hitting our eardrums. The Word is Christ, and Christ is the Seed. And the Seed is life.

In this Word, we find the words of eternal life. In this Seed we find life in the most unlikely of places.

For to the naked eye, words are powerless, and seeds are of little consequence. But when the Word is Christ, that Word is omnipotent, all-knowing, and true. That Word creates, redeems, and hallows. That Word gives life and gives it abundantly. And the living, incarnate Word Himself taught us not to judge by what the naked eye sees – for if we have faith as small as the mustard seed, which looks insignificant to the eye, we can move mountains. For the little seed grows to be a tree, capable of providing a place for birds to nest, to lay eggs, and to raise their own young, a place of nurture and of life, of the miracle of procreation, and of propagation.

The kingdom of God is spread by tossing about the Seed, that is, by casting Christ in every which way: on paths, on rocks, among thorns, and on every kind of soil. For the sower has no way of knowing where the Seed will end up, which ground will be receptive, or which individual seeds will survive. But the sower has a promise: “so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty.” Whether a particular seed sown at a particular time upon particular soil produces or does not is not his concern. When it comes to the Word of God, there is no science, no husbandry methodologies, no techniques to increase yield. There is just a man tossing seeds in what seems to be a terribly inefficient way.

As the hymnist puts it, the sower plants it home “to men who like or like it not.” For the “sower sows; his reckless love, scatters abroad the goodly seed.”

For the power is in the tiny seed itself, not in the muscles of the arms of the farmer. The power of the Word is in the Word, not in the preacher of the Word. For it is the Word of God, the Seed of the woman, “that bears a harvest hundredfold.” For “the Word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit.” The power of the seed lies within the Lord’s Seed itself – our task is merely to cast it around.

Obviously, the preacher has the task of casting the Seed of God’s Word from the pulpit, in the classroom, and even to those on the highways and byways of the world. But all Christians likewise cast the Seed of God’s Word in their own way as well – in teaching your children the catechism, in praying before meals, in bringing your family to where the Word is proclaimed and the Seed is implanted into their hearts. All Christians are themselves offshoots of the Holy Vine that is Christ, commanded to bear fruit themselves – for such fruit also bears seeds.

To us “it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God.” In whatever way we are called to do so, we are to sow the Seed of Christ, we are to speak the Word of God, we are to scatter the Lord’s reckless love, “intent alone that all may have the wholesome loaves that all men need.”

For seeds not only sprout in the ground, they are also ground into flour that becomes the bread that sustains us: “giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater.” But we do not live by bread alone in this kingdom, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.

Let us sow in whatever way the Lord calls us to sow. Let us do so in love, knowing that the seeds we scatter are givers of life. Let us do so in humility, knowing that the power is not in our eloquence or piety, but only in the Word’s itself. And let us do so without growing discouraged, for the Lord Himself has given us His Word that: “It shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.”

Preach you the Word and plant it home
And never faint; the Harvest Lord
Who gave the sower seed to sow
Will watch and tend His planted Word.

Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Socialism: A Long-Term Bipartisan Project

A tip of the hat to my friend Greg, a missionary in Africa with roots in the Crescent City, also a fellow advocate of constitutional, limited republican government and individual liberty - for this. He is indeed right about the picture to words value ratio - the above picture says it all, and leaves one speechless.

Obviously, the nationalization of banks and the federal grab of entire industries and the specter of the President of the United States setting corporate salaries in a hasty trillion dollar federal spending spree supported by only one party is an obvious paradigm shift into Marxism - we need to guard against seeing this as a sudden act of the Democrat Party.

Our slide into Socialism has been gradual, and a result of Republican and Democratic cooperation - as can be seen by the graph above. And the old paradigm that Republicans advocate the warfare state while Democrats push the welfare state has shifted as well, as those partisan lines are being thoroughly blurred.

President Bush and the GOP ballooned the size of the national debt while pushing increased domestic pork projects, such as federal healthcare funding and unconstitutional involvement in "education." For their part, the Democrats have recently engaged in aggressive nation-building and unconstitutional military endeavors as much as the Republicans. How quickly we forget that Truman (D) dropped the atomic bombs, and Kennedy (D) and Johnson (D) radically escalated the Vietnam "war" - while it was Nixon (R) that ended it.

It was also President Nixon who closed the gold window and imposed fascist and unconstitutional domestic "wage and price controls," and it was President Clinton (D), whose aggressive, imperialist foreign policy was roundly criticized by Republicans, chiefly by presidential candidate George W. Bush, who advocated a "humble foreign policy" and "no nation building" - in the GOP's broken promise to restore constitutional balance. It was President Eisenhower (R) who warned America about the looming "military industrial complex" and it was President Clinton who was far more fiscally conservative and who did a much better job of balancing the federal budget than any Republican in recent memory.

President Obama is intent on increasing both the welfare and warfare state at any cost - be it blood or money, be it at the cost of the destruction of the Constitution or the dollar. He toyed with the anti-war element of his own party by promising withdrawal from Iraq, while keeping the economics of arms production and international intervention moving forward with pledges to escalate American involvement in Afghanistan (aka the Graveyard of Empires, the same country that cost the Soviets their empire, where U.S.-trained Osama bin Laden led militias to defeat the mighty invaders from the USSR). Obama is taking the next logical step of escalated socialist fascism at home and imperialism and aggression abroad. He also has a Congress of rubber-stamp Democrats who will not check his power - but then again, nor would a Republican majority do anything to rein in the Chief Executive, as we saw during the Clinton years.

Bipartisanship has become a unified commitment to fascism, socialism, despotism, and imperialism - with two rotating teams taking turns sitting in the big chair. I'm afraid that only a catastrophic failure of our economy, and perhaps even a decisive military defeat, will cause the American people to wake up, learn the dangers of Big Government and imperial blowback, and rise up against the Democrat and Republican two-headed monster and re-chain it with the Constitution. The question is, will the awakening come too late?

Expect the above graph to not only continue, but to increase, as the government becomes ever-increasingly central to the American economy, at home and abroad, even as domestic manufacturing becomes nearly a thing of the past.

Modern-day Roman Catholic Simony

Noted blogger Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) conducting an interview with Pope Nicholas III (ca 1220-1280) from the latter's Eighth Circle of Hell office while doing some research about simony

There is nothing that unites Lutherans more than attacking the Roman Catholic Church. So, in the interest of Lutheran unity, here is a piece by Roman Catholic columnist Jeffrey Tucker that is critical of the Roman Catholic Church's use of copyright to limit access to liturgical texts.

Can you imagine that? Putting the ancient texts of the Church under copyright and limiting access to those texts to "paying customers"? "When the coin in the coffer rings..."

Goodness! Why, that would be like not letting parents write out the text of Luther's Small Catechism or make verbal recordings of it to teach their children the faith. That would be like making congregations buy licenses to reprint the ancient words of the Church's common liturgical treasure in their bulletins. In some cases, church bureaucrats could even use copyright laws to limit the access of congregations to materials they no longer publish, but refuse to release to the public domain in order to bully them into buying the new materials. Perhaps even bloggers who simply want to put the church's collects on their blogs will be contacted by papal henchmen with cease and orders from the Purple Pal..., er, I mean, the Vatican, and forced instead to use versions of other church bodies who have placed their translations into public domain.

Can you just imagine how vile that would be?

Why, next thing you know, someone will suggest that videotaping a church service is a copyright violation. Can you just imagine the ultimate act of Antichrist, say, the pope actually threatening legal action against a priest and a layman for, say, trademark infringement? So, all the good Lutherans out there who know being the first to throw stones at the pope is as Lutheran as lutefisk on Friday, well, here is your chance to take a few "pope-shots" at the modern practice of simony.

And if we get 95 comments, we can call them "Theses" and nail them to the church door (er, the Theses that is, not the bureaucrats).

[Note: I also published this at Gottesdienst Online, click here to join the discussion in that forum. +HW]

What if...?

Did you ever thing you'd see the day...

When the Prime Minister of Russia would be warning the U.S. not to be seduced by Socialism?

How long before we're saying: "Mister Obama, tear down this wall!"?

What's Happened to Olive Garden?

The Hollywoods made a trip across the Mississippi River today, venturing into the wilds of the East Bank to attend to a few errands. While there, we decided to eat lunch while there - having a couple gift cards that we've been hanging onto for a long time. One of them was for Olive Garden - which was nearby.

I know it's a chain, but I've always really liked Olive Garden. My friends even threw a bash for me after my Holy Ordination at the Fort Wayne, Indiana's OG. I've always found the food to be tasty, interesting, served in good portions, and fresh. And in my experience, the service has typically been very good.

But admittedly, we haven't been there in quite some time.

Oh boy.

The menu has shrunk considerably. My seat in the booth was broken. Mrs. H.'s cream for her coffee was curdled. My pizza was very small, bland, and absolutely miserly with regard to the ingredients, and bordered on being undercooked. Some of the pieces literally did not even have a single whole slice of pepperoni on them. The green pepper on each slice amounted to maybe four pieces each of about a quarter inch in length. The side of sauce tasted like the tomato sauce that used to come with the Easy Bake oven. The chicken and dumpling soup was okay - especially the second bowl that actually had dumplings in it (which I suppose nullified the chicken bone I got in the first one). Mrs. H.'s minestrone was also different than the soup of the good old days, being heavy on pasta, and light on veggies. Even the bread sticks, which we both remember as being fresh and golden brown, were only worthy of a "meh" and were served in plastic imitation baskets that still had water from the dishwasher in them.

Our waiter was lackadaisical. He never offered us wine nor dessert. He mumbled his way through all the motions. He really didn't seem happy - and neither did any of the staff. But I suppose it may have been related to the meeting of the sober-looking suits that was going on in the back room.

Now, I know you can't judge a whole chain by one experience. But one thing is for sure - the quality of the ingredients has diminished. The Italian sausage was not nearly as good as I remember it to be - not even close. Overall, the food was bland and boring. It tasted like Olive Garden has opted to cut corners by buying cheaper ingredients. I think that is a risky strategy in depressed economic times. Restaurants need to compete as patrons eat at home more often. If going out to eat is going to be increasingly rare, we won't squander it on boring, bland, corner-cutting food and mediocre service.

But then again, maybe that explains the sober-looking suits and worried looks on the faces of the staff.

A Little Glimpse into the Once and Future Paradise

Thanks to Beth and Sidney Lanier for passing this along.