Constitutional Republic v. Theocracy, Dare I Say Becomes All of Our Business

Normally I do not willingly encroach into this dynamic of our society, leaving that to those of you who are much more acquainted with this very emotional facet of our lives than I. However, when the spokespeople, or influential spokesperson, not so subtly advocates for changing the form of our government to specifically give control and power over everybody's lives to one group of people, I dare say that becomes all of our business. That is religion, specifically in this case Catholicism, and I would like to know what you think about it.

This particular individual's name is Michael Voris, and he is the president and founder of St. Michael’s Media. Michael is a 49 year old graduate of Notre Dame, and he trained in theology at the doctrinally-sound St. Joseph’s Seminary in New York, but in April of 2009, he received his Sacred Theology Baccalaureate (STB) from Sacred Heart Major Seminary/Angelicum in Rome – Magna Cum Laude.

Michael has worked as a CBS affiliate anchor, and as a producer and reporter in various markets, winning multiple Emmys for his work in broadcast news. Through his Catholic television show, The One True Faith, and his collaboration with www.realcatholictv.com, Michael is advocating for a change in our constitutional republic, to a theocracy. I have posted his You Tube video at the end of this post so you can determine for yourself whether or not this is the type of rhetoric that presents a danger to our society.

A theocracy you may think might be a good idea, and Mr.Voris makes it sound very appealing. If you are religiously inclined, and feel as many of you do, that religion is a very important ingredient for a moral society, and may be lacking in American society today, you may be tempted to jump on this theocratic bandwagon. I urge you however, to think long and hard before accepting this premise, because ultimately your personal religion may not be one that is selected to survive the elimination process.

Now I am not going to pretend that religion is not a major influence in American society, because clearly you are presented with this reality in everything you do and everywhere you go. The difference however, in the first two centuries of the United States, as opposed to other religion dominated societies, is that we have been granted in our constitution the freedom to practice the religion that each of us individually choose, up to and including the right to not believe in a particular deity at all if we so wish.

Religion has been, and will continue to be a belief system held by many throughout the world to help answer long sought after questions about the human condition and our place in nature. It has helped relieve the stress and calm the fears of an uncertain world and satisfactorily answers the question for many of what to expect after the inevitable termination of life as we know it.

To remove our ability to be free to pursue our individual interpretations of what is necessary to achieve this purpose, and replace it with a singular totalinariast belief system, which is similarly practiced in many other regions of the world, denying many sectors of their population the right to the freedom of equality, would be a ghastly reversal of fortune for Americans, and in my estimation intolerable.

Hey Dad, Got A Minute?

by E. Raymond Rock
Dhammabucha Rocksprings Meditation Center



"Hey Dad, got a minute?"

"Not now, I have to get these emails out."

"Cool. See you later."

"Hold on, hold on.  . . . what's up?"

"Nothin'. I'll catch you later."

"No, hold up. Lets go for a walk, I need a break. . . . So, what's up?"

"It's not a big deal, I was just thinking about college and stuff, I mean, why am I going to college?"

"Why are you going to college? C'mon, what the hell are you talking about? If you don't, you'll be working at dead-end jobs you hate for the rest of your life. You know that. Things are getting hairy out there in case you haven't noticed."

"Yeah, I been noticing. Lots of people losing their jobs through no fault of their own. And nobody seems to have time for anything important anymore."

"So what do you mean by that? What do you mean ‘important?‘ Like I love to work my ass off to support you guys? C'mon. I'd like to hang out in Hawaii too and surf all day. You want to pay the mortgage with your part time job? You gotta get real, Son, you gotta have the right goals."

"Okay, I'll get real. Why am I going to college?"

"I just told you. C‘mon."

"No, I mean, I'll graduate, probably with honors. I'm pretty smart you know. Give me a goal and I'll exceed it. It's easy. I mean, why have goals anyway? You only need goals when you're not content with what you are or what you have. Right?" 

"You're smart because you got my genes, Son. Here, let‘s sit down on this bench for a minute."

"Look Dad, what happens after I graduate, after I meet all your goals? I'll have more goals, I'll get married, have kids, pay the mortgage like you, and life will be good. But what if we all nuke each other in the meantime, or I accidentally come face to face with a starving baby in Africa? It seems to be coming to that."

"You can't worry about something you can't control."

"So it's all out of our control?"

"Look, I can control our life, but I can't control what other people do."

"Right."

"I mean, we do what we can. Let our elected officials worry about those other things, just do ‘your' job and go to college."

"I don't think so, Dad."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"I think I'll pass on college."

"Sorry. You're going to college."

"What's the point? College is nothing a but big business now, indoctrinating us to become cogs in the wheels of Wall Street. Who wants to participate in continuing this greed that has taken over everything?" 

"Are you stupid or something?"

"Dad, look; people have gone to college for generations, and guess what, we're still killing ourselves over differences in religion, and skin color, and honor, ideals, politics and nationalism. Look at the stupid wars we are in. Maybe I'll just sit it out and find out what it is inside of me that keeps this bullsh*t going."

"Just sit it out, huh. And do what? Give up?" Go on welfare?"

"Open your eyes, Dad. Look what ‘we‘ college graduates have created. Look at the poverty in the world, while the American Dream looks the other way. People without food, without housing, clothes or basic drugs, all because of individual and corporate greed, indifference, fear. Yeah. I'm giving up on a lot of things, but not my feelings, my gut feelings, my intuition, my passion, my heart. And you know why? Because I'm better than all the bullsh*t that‘s coming down right now."

"Hah, you're better than the rest of us? Right. We'll see how ‘better' you are when you're walking to work because your ‘89 Honda just broke down and you can't pay the rent. Don‘t call me!"

"Don't worry, I won't call you. And I won't have much, but I'll feel good about myself. You know why? Because I'll have the guts to go another way, and I'll just bet that I'll find someone who wants to go with me. I'm done chasing after the promised crap that even when I get it is as hollow as the eyes I see every day on worried faces. I'm done with your agenda for me, Dad, I‘m trusting in my heart from now on, I‘m listening to my heart. I know who I am Dad. Do you? I‘m going back to the house, I'll see you later."

"Hold on a minute, hold on there. How long have you been thinking this way?"

"For awhile. One day I saw a homeless guy laying on the sidewalk by the Metro Parking Lot. I asked him if he was alright. He looked me in the eyes, right in the eyes, and said, ‘Take a good look, kid, because I am you.' I didn't get what he meant right away, but then I got it - we're all in the same boat, Dad, and I can't have a bigger seat than the next guy. I just can't, because my bigger seat makes someone elses seat smaller. I'm sorry."

"Let's talk about this, okay?"

"I don't know if I can talk about it anymore, I just feel it."

"C‘mon. What you are feeling is compassion, compassion for humanity. And a lot of kids your age go through this. But you'll get over it, like every kid does because it's stupid. Look, as a college graduate, you will make lots more money and then you can help humanity and poor starving people even more. Doesn't that make sense?"

"And lose my soul in the process to the puppeteers, pay off college loans forever? And kick this can we call humanity down the road one more time? You just don't get it, Dad. My life won‘t change the world, but it will change my world, and I‘ll be true to my heart. How many can say that?"   

"Look, you can't help humanity by not fulfilling your potential. You can only help by doing the best you can, setting the right goals for yourself and going as far as you can. Only then does humanity progress."

"Bullsh*t."

"What do you mean; ‘bullsh*t?'"

"Bullsh*t, that's all. Our ‘potential' has brought us to the brink of nuclear war over religion, and mass starvation in an abundant world, and you know it. I bet you didn't even know that half the kids in the world go to bed hungry every night while you and mom are forever trying to lose 30 pounds. You and Mom pretend to know everything, but when you go to sleep at night, you wonder what it's all about. I know you do. The difference between you and me is that I'm going to find out what it's all about, and already, at sixteen, I know what it's not about."

"Oh yeah? And what's it not about?"

"It's not about getting more and more. It‘s not about struggling with goals to make my life easier, or make me famous, or make me better than the next guy. It's not about setting goals to avoid pain, which is the only reason anyone would set a goal anyway. Sh*t dad, it's about giving. Don't you get it?  People want more and more, making bigger and better goals to help themselves. They don't even know who they are anymore, or what their true feelings are. Their hearts are dead. They are just puppets with someone yanking their strings as they dance all over the place. Their lives are all crooked and distorted, being encouraged to want more and more as if they don‘t already have enough. What kind of pressure is that? I've had it, Dad. I don‘t need to take any goal pills to ease the pain of not having enough. How much is enough? How much is enough, Dad? You know what? Getting more and more comes from being afraid. Are you afraid Dad? Well, I'm not."

"You haven't lived long enough to be afraid, Son. I've taken care of you. All you can think about is yourself. You're a spoiled brat. Wait until you're supporting yourself. You'll wake up."

"Oh yeah? Well just watch me wake up. Just watch me and my dead end job, and watch how I pay attention to those that are silently crying out for help, starting right there at my dead end job with all the people I work with who will be scratching out a living with no benefits so the greedy can buy more yachts. And watch how I live in poverty all my life by choice because I won‘t need much. And then watch what happens when I die. Watch all that Dad, and then tell me where I went so wrong. Oh, and another thing; why don't you tell Christ how stupid he was to live as a pauper and lift up the helpless, and tell the Buddha how off-base he was to live in rags in order to become enlightened. I can't do your thing Dad.  I Can't keep this insanity going. My road will be a far different road from yours."

"Well, if you feel so strongly about this, why don't you just HIT the road, big shot."

" Go on back to the house and finish your emails, Dad.  . . . I want to sit here by myself for awhile." 

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anagarika eddie is a meditation teacher at the Dhammabucha Rocksprings Meditation Retreat Sanctuary     (www.dhammarocksprings.org), and author of "A Year to Enlightenment"  which can be found here

His 30 years of meditation experience has taken him across four continents including two stopovers in Thailand where he practiced in the remote northeast forests as an ordained Theravada Buddhist monk.

Originally published on SearchWarp.com for E. Raymond Rock Sunday, August 22, 2010
Article Source: Hey Dad, Got a Minute?

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For Our Children We Must, Because It's In Us That They Trust

Escaping conflict is not easy to do,
because what's sanity to me, is insanity to you.
So what do we do if we want to be free,
if the laws that we write are for you or for me.

How about we just let one another be free,
to be who we want, is it that hard to see?
For some reason we can't, because one must be right,
so forever were doomed to keep up the fight.

Think about it my friend, this one no one can win,
so please let's find a way, so this fight we can end.
For our kids and our grand kids there must be a way,
so they can look forward to a much brighter day.

Self righteousness led us to where we are now,
why we got that way doesn't really matter how.
But to find the key, so we all can be free,
for a better life for us all is what matters you see.

To think that we must fight to the end,
when all the while, you could be my friend.
Just isn't what life should hold in store,
when for both of us, it could be much more.

So let's put down our arms, and clasp our hands,
together we can make our live's much more grand.
For our children we must, because it's in us that they trust,
and for our families to be free, It's simply a must.

Poem by admin "Street Lights"

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"Street Lights" is dedicated to illuminating the effects of the interaction of Americans. A street level, up, view of how our laws and our actions combine to form what America has become, and where we intend to go.

Our intention is to illicit the experiences and thoughts of the ordinary people that make up the streets of America, to those that have the power vested in them to effect those citizens right to pursue the primary mission of this union of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

For without these we do not have freedom, and without freedom we do not have union, the most essential ingredient to peace. We will not agree on everything, nor should we, but through this interaction can learn to accept people for who they are instead of demanding that they be who we want them to be.

We can still make this American experiment work, and once again become that shining light on the hill that the rest of the world aspires to be, but only through the exchange of thoughts and ideas and not the demand to conform or to forfeit your freedom.

So please leave your comments on all submitted material, and use the contact information provided to request that your work pertaining to current events, your opinions on how they effect our society, and what you feel should or shouldn't be done to help make this a more accommodating society in which we can all live in peace, be added.

Thank you,

Admin, "Street Lights Political Opinion Articles"