(Originally posted 10/01/13. Reblogged 11/28/24.)
Video: Amazing Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church in East Baltimore
Link to it early and often throughout the day!
My first audition tapes will probably be PSAs (public service announcements) for this congregation.
(Originally posted 09/30/13.)
Don’t let that odd title put you off. I think this op-ed by Robert J. Samuelson is pretty important.
The question is whether we direct the economy so as to increase wealth for everyone, or instead merely give poorer or richer people larger pieces of the “pie.”
In my conversations with other homeless folk and poor people generally, I hope to emphasize the desirability of creating wealth as opposed to merely taking it away from others.
On that point, I’m certainly prone to agree with Andy Kessler, though I have uneasiness as to whether or not he would support corresponding policies.
Other recent articles on similar questions:
An Obituary for the American Middle Class
Race, income, education increasingly polarize U.S. families since recession
Higher education’s biggest challenge is income inequality
As to Catharine Hill’s piece, I really have to question what “special services” rich families are “demanding” that are bidding up tuition costs.
(Below appears a tract I passed out with the Hallowe’en candy in 2007. “Chaos overwhelms the poor” describes that neighborhood. Originally posted here 10/26/13. Reblogged 10/31/24.)
Hallowe’en is the night before a Christian holiday. The name of the holiday is “All Saints’ Day.” Years ago, they called it “All Hallows’ Day,” and the night before, “All Hallows’ Evening.”
(Originally published 08/11/12 at Trojan Horse Productions; reblogged 10/30/13 here.)
If you go into a men’s room and see that someone’s taken his backpack and perhaps suitcase with him into the stall, you can conclude two things: (1) He’s homeless. (2) In his world, squalor is so intense he can’t leave his bags anywhere, or things will be stolen.
All kinds of people steal from the homeless.
They’ll steal your socks. It may only be a pair of socks, but if it’s your only pair of socks, it really hurts.
I stood smoking outside Dunkin’ Donuts and this man came up to talk. He was looking pretty rough. Walked on crutches, and one bare foot. He told me he’d spent the night outside, and while he slept, someone stole one shoe.
One of the few shreds of dignity left to me is that I don’t have to take my bags with me into the bathroom stall. At Dunkin’ Donuts or Lenny’s or the library, I leave my bags in a certain place and they’re all still there when I return. At the shelter, I stash my bags under the bunk, and no one disturbs them. I do lock the bag that has my phone, my cash and my prescriptions (link).
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I knew I was likely to become homeless months before it actually happened. I had contacts with the City’s Office of Homeless Services and obtained a list of shelters Continue reading * Must I work for Rent-a-Bum?
(Originally posted 05/12/13. Reblogged 04/18/24.)
Wednesday 04/24/13
Facing various issues as to how to spend my time. The current appearance of this blog is a far cry from what I want, but I don’t want time spent redesigning it to take away from job search. The same dilemma presents in choice of whether to use my tax refund to restore my former website on Yahoo! for $125.00/year, or instead rebuild the site as part of this blog.
My church is about to launch Saturday morning prayer services in which I will have a leadership role. I will be offering teachings on prayer; I think I have about two hours’ worth of material, and an issue rises of whether to try to organize that into 10-minute or instead 15-minute segments. And there’s an issue that what I would present to the prayer team members only, isn’t necessarily what I’d present to the general public.
This morning at McDonald’s I was reflecting on these things, and on what I might teach to an audience drawn from the general public. I began to understand why Ambrose Worrall fails to refer to Kabbalah.
Prayer team members will be principally interested in learning how to pray effectively for others. People who come from the general public will be principally interested in how to pray effectively for themselves — how to get their own prayers answered.
I presume to be pretty good at the former. That’s how I became prayer ministry coordinator to start with. I’m not so good at the latter.
Continue reading x From my diary: Learning to pray
I have chosen to keep the alliterative title for this post, though it proves mistaken. Below appears an e-mail exchange of August 20, 2013 between Brian Williard, O.B.M., and myself. In his original message, Brian copied, as he often did, the program summary of a segment on Coast to Coast, a nighttime radio talk show that often deals with UFOs and other strange subjects. The “imminent blog post” referred to appears to be “The New Age is a lot of hooey.”
Related:
Leadership, Patton and Jesus
Through a glass, darkly
Brian wrote:
I don’t know if he promotes this idea, but some believe this guy is the reincarnation of Edgar Cayce:
In this poem, George S. Patton sets forth his impressions of his previous lives.
Related:
Leadership, Patton and Jesus
Hancock, Hannibal and Hitler
THROUGH A GLASS, DARKLY
by Gen. George S. Patton, Jr.
Through the travail of the ages,
Midst the pomp and toil of war,
Have I fought and strove and perished
Countless times upon this star.
In a blog post of July 19, 2014, I declared my ambition to become the “Nemesis of the morning glories” in the garden out behind my church. My plan was to spend four hours per week specifically weeding the morning glories in that garden.
On Monday, October 20, 2014, I wrote, “The morning glories are vanquished. As of today, they are under control throughout the entire garden.”
From a 03/31/08 e-mail to my supervisor at the dollar store. This was a young man who had never had a paying job before, and thus certainly no experience in supervision; and I had a mind to give him some pointers on the nature of leadership. Previous conversations had already established that he regarded himself as a devout Christian.
If you’ve never seen it before, I’d urge you to see the movie Patton (link to Wikipedia). Actually, I’d urge you to buy a copy (link to Amazon).
Luke 7:
2A centurion there had a slave whom he valued highly, and who was ill and close to death. Continue reading * Leadership, Patton and Jesus
The Homeless Blogger 