Lets put the Reason back in the Season.

There is a lot of hoopla going on right now by some conservative groups to "put Christ back into Christmas". I personally don't think we need to "put Christ back into Christmas", instead I think we need to remember the "reason for the season"...Jesus.

The conservative christians focus so much on Christ that they seem to forget about Jesus. They focus on the words of Paul and seem to forget the words of Jesus. Jesus of Nazareth seems to have become completely unimportant in their worship of Christ of Paul.

Jesus of Nazareth was not about exclusion, he was not about following the letter of the law, he was not about don'ts and shall nots. Paul is the writer of those things. Jesus of Nazareth was about love and acceptance. He was about the spirit not the letter. He was about the do's and the shall's. Paul said "don't associate with non-christians", Jesus said: "love your neighbor as yourself". Paul said "hold yourself apart from the world", Jesus said: "let he who is without sin cast the first stone." Paul said "christians should only marry christians", Jesus said "let all come to me".

Christmas is about more then just the birth of Christ, it is supposed to be a celebration of the gift to the world of Jesus. The early church realized that you can not keep out the world and that you cannot force converts, so they incorporated important things from other religions into Christianity. The exact date of the birth of Jesus is not known, because they did not find it an important event. They were more focused on the resurrection or the rebirth of Jesus. When it came time to establish an observance of the birth of Jesus, they chose the date of an important pagan celebration..Mithras day and changed that to the birth of Jesus and ordained that instead of orgies and secular celebrations, it would be observed with a Chirst Mass, a day of worship. They practiced what Jesus had taught, inclusion-not exclusion.

You can not celebrate the birth of Jesus if you are only concerned with Christ. This season forget about "putting Christ back in Christmas" and instead work to be a living reminder of the "reason for the season". Emulate Jesus and accept all people without judgement by wishing each and everyone of them a "happy holiday", because their is only one God, no matter what the name that is used, and when you try to claim exclusive right to God, you have already taken Christ out of Christmas and forgotten the reason for the season.

Explain to me again how stem cell research is *immoral*.

Thirty plus years ago my father watched as his parents slipped into the mist of time. Isn't that a pretty way to say that they went, as it was called then, senile?
They both had hardening of the arteries. First they would forget things. Nothing major, they still were able to live alone, together. I was only 3 or 4, and I only have vague memories of these grandparents. I remember (or think I do) that my grandpa was a big man. About the only clear memories I have of grandpa is sitting on the porch and listening to him tell stories about working on the railroad. I can't remember those stories, I just know that was what the stories were about. I can remember him singing "Old Dan Tucker", and I can remember walking down the block to the gas station to get a soda pop. My sister would get a grape soda, I would get an orange soda and Grandpa would get a root beer, and he would always tell us not to tell grandma, cause she didn't approve of *beer*. I must have spent all my time at their house with grandpa outside, cause I don't have any memories of being inside with grandma.
But slowly their forgetfulness became worse and my father had to place his parents in a rest home. He didn't want to, but had no choice. He didn't have the money to hire home health care, and our house wasn't big enough to take them in. He had three children and a two bedroom home. Thankfully my father will be spared losing himself to *the mists of time* because when he was in his 60's his doctor discovered he had morbidly high chloresterol. Not just high, his was past that designation, and chances are so were his parents. My dads number was 430. No that is not a misprint 4 (four) hundred and 30 (thirty). Medication and diet has brought his count down and his arteries now at age 80 are *clean as a whistle*.
Asthma runs in our family. Severe asthma. Asthma that mimics cystic fibrosis. Asthma that causes high fever and so much mucus that mucus plugs form and cause you to choke and gag for air. Constriction that sends you into dry heaves and delirium from oxygen deprivation. My dads grandmother died 3 yrs (to the day) before he was born from an asthma flare. When my dad was 8, his 15 yr. old sister died from asthma as well, following a burst appendix. Because of medical advances my son survived his asthma (at least he has to age 24) and my neice survived a burst appendix last year.
Last May my dad set by the bedside of my mother as she finally lost her fight with ovarian cancer. After 7 yrs of fighting, after 4 operations, after countless hours of chemo, my mom took her last breath and went home to God. Leaving dad alone, at age 80, after 46 yrs of marriage to carry on alone. She also left him to face their oldest daughters cancer and death alone as well. The same day as my mom had her final surgery, a week before she died, my sister was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer that has metasticized into 4 lung nodules and 12 lymph nodes.
Not too long ago I sat in church and listened as my priest explained how we as catholics have a responsibility to make sure that medical advances are ethical. How using embryonic stem cells for research is not ethical, because those cells come from potential life. My thought was and is: explain to me what is ethical or moral about allowing people to suffer, go through torture, and die when we can prevent it? Who are we to decide that the ways and means that God has given us to try and prevent this is *unethical*. Why is it ethical and moral to allow the already living to die, because of refusal to use cells that have the *potential* for life? And please explain to me how it is ethical to allow others to go through the torment of watching loved ones suffer and die when we have the ability to use stem cells to prevent this? Because I just don't get the reasoning. It doesn't seem either ethical or moral to me.
I guess I just have to accept that different people have different views of what is and isn't *ethical*, but I am not sure why in a country that holds as one of its highest principals, the separation of church and state, we are so willing to allow religious ethics and morals to make medical and scientific decisions.

The Original Religious Right

The Religious Right of Jesus' day

The religious right is nothing new. They existed at the start of the Church as well. These were the Jews who were only concerned with the letter of the law and with making sure that everyone else lived by their interpetation of that law.

But they weren't the Pharisees, the Pharisees were the Liberal Jews. They were the Sadducees..and they were despised by the religious right then just as now. The problem with this behavior by the current day religious right, by the current day Sadducees, is that Jesus was a Pharisee..a liberal...and when they condemn the Liberal Christians they are condemming Jesus, in essence.

The Religious Right, the Conservative *christians* are not really followers of Christ the Pharisee, they are actually followers of Paul, the Sadducee.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadducee ....Most of what we know about the Sadducees comes from Josephus, who wrote that they were a quarrelsome group whose followers were wealthy and powerful, and that he considered them boorish in social interactions.....They rejected the rabbis' interpretation of the Torah, and are presented as denying that any of the Hebrew Bible, apart from the Torah, is authoritative. As to the Torah itself, the Sadducees are presented as interpreting it literally and rigorously on subjects it directly covers, while rejecting the Rabbinic traditions that mitigate the harsher penalties or aim at preventing unintentional rule-breaking......According to the Talmud, in regard to criminal jurisdiction they were so rigorous that the day on which their code was abolished by the Pharisaic Sanhedrin under Simeon ben Shetah's leadership, during the reign of Salome Alexandra, was celebrated as a festival. The Sadducees are said to have insisted on the literal execution of the law of retaliation: "Eye for eye, tooth for tooth", which pharisaic Judaism, and later rabbinic Judaism, rejected. On the other hand, they would not inflict the death penalty on false witnesses in a case where capital punishment had been wrongfully carried out, unless the accused had been executed solely in consequence of the testimony of such witnesses.......and the Liberal Lefthttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharisee .....In contrast to other Jewish groups of the time, such as Sadducees, Pharisees held that the books of the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible, also called the written law) have always been transmitted in parallel with an oral tradition. They pointed as proof to the text of the Torah itself, where they said many words were left undefined, and many procedures mentioned without explanation or instructions; the reader is assumed to be familiar with the details from other sources. This parallel set of material was originally transmitted orally, and came to be known as "the oral law". By the year 200 much of this material was edited together into the Mishnah, the core document of rabbinic Judaism. Thus, from the Saduccee and Essene point of view, the Pharisees were the liberal party, which allowed for flexibility in the interpretation of the law..... The Pharisees, on the other hand, claimed Mosaic authority for their interpretation, at the same time asserting the principles of religious democracy and progress. With reference to Ex. xix. 6, they maintained that "God gave all the people the heritage, the kingdom, the priesthood, and the holiness" (II Macc. ii. 17, Greek).....the Pharisees represented also the principle of progress; they were less rigid in the execution of justice ("Ant." xiii. 10, § 6), and the day when the stern Sadducean code was abolished was made a festival (Meg. Ta'an. iv.).While the Sadducees in adhering to the letter of the law required "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth," the Pharisees, with the exception of Eliezer ben Hyrcanus, the Shammaite, interpreted this maxim to mean due compensation with money (Mek., Mishpatim, 8). The principle of retaliation, however, was applied consistently by the Sadducees in regard to false witnesses in cases involving capital punishment; but the Pharisees were less fair. The former referred the law "Thou shalt do unto him as he had intended unto his brother" (Deut. xix. 19, Hebr.) only to a case in which the one falsely accused had been actually executed; whereas the Pharisees desired the death penalty inflicted upon the false witness for the intention to secure the death of the accused by means of false testimony (Sifre, Deut. 190; Mark i. 6; Tosef., Sanh. vi. 6; against the absurd theory, in Mak. 5b, that in case the accused has been executed the false witness is exempt from the death penalty, see Geiger, l.c. p. 140). But in general the Pharisees surrounded the penal laws, especially the death penalty, with so many qualifications that they were rarely executed (see Sanh. iv. 1)The laws concerning virginity and the levirate (Deut. xxii. 17, xxv. 9) also were interpreted by the Pharisees in accordance with the dictates of decency and common sense, while the Sadducees adhered strictly to the letter......

How do we change the perception of Mr. & Mrs. Middle America

I recently read two articles about *why* the democrats lost the election from the viewpoint of the other side. I posted these on a democrat support board and all the responses were "well I am not going to change to repug" or "if you support them you should go there".

Not one single poster seemed to care that these viewpoints are what Mr. and Mrs. Middle America believes, because of the superb selling job by the radical conserves. I am not talking the fundamentalist who voted for Bush. I am talking about your moderate neighbor. The ones that you can't understand why in the world they voted for Bush, cause after all financially they are in the same place that you are.

What many liberals, especially the more extremist ones, do not get is that Mr. and Mrs. Middle America, do not vote based on the economy or on the war. They don't believe their finances are affected by who is in power. They completely believe that *all* politicians are rich boys, who are out to screw the middle and lower class.

Instead they base their vote on *god, guns and booze*

Here are short excerts of the two articles:
http://www.oaoa.com/columns/edit111004.htm The post-mortems on the Bush election victory have been fascinating, especially those coming from supporters of Sen. John Kerry. Some Democratic backers have been remarkably sober in their judgment. But others have drawn conclusions of the sort that will only make it more difficult for Democrats to win future national elections.Democratic strategist Bob Bechtel said on the Fox network’s “Hannity and Colmes” that Democrats need to reach out to pro-life voters. That’s an amazing concession and a recognition that the reason Democrats failed to attract enough voters in the red states has something to do with Democratic priorities and the contempt Democrats often have for Middle America....Democrats need to evaluate these trends rather than engage in the name-calling and demonization of red-state America that some commentators are engaging in. That may be enjoyable, soon after a bitter election loss, but it’s destructive in so many ways.

http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=5699 Have you witnessed the fallout from the latest election -- how it has affected Liberals? It has unmasked them entirely. They think religious people are stupid. Not just stupid, dangerous.Make that Christians. More specifically, make that Evangelicals. The Left, the base of the Democratic Party, hail the virtues of tolerance and consider themselves to be the tolerant citizens of America. In their touting of tolerance they express their obvious disdain for those whose views run contrary to that of enlightened Liberalism. Dare to make a statement of conviction of any kind, and one of these Leftists will set down his cheese and wine, pause his lecture on the virtues of plurality and the absurdity of the belief in absolute Truth, and tell you your convictions -- everything you believe and hold dear -- are absolutely wrong. Where does he get his understanding that what you claim is "right" is actually not? Against what standard is this wrongness measured? He can't say. All he knows is that you're a bigot, you're intolerant, you're not worthy of being an American. In fact, you're not smart enough to understand what it means to be an American.And not only are you dumb, you're dangerous. Fanatics like you don't belong in a "tolerant" culture like ours. You and your beliefs and the people who share them should not be allowed in our civilized society . . . or, at the very least, you should be denied the right to vote. Because when you vote, when you're politically active, you screw everything up. People like you foist upon the world monsters like Ronald Reagan, George Bush, Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and Antonin Scalia.People like you are the most likely to attack America: you're no different than the Islamists who fly planes into buildings, suicide-bomb pizzerias, detonate car bombs in the middle of busy streets, and blow up buses. At least those Islamic terrorists had a reason: America, pushed by people like you, has oppressed the Arab world. Yes, you are the reason 3,000 Americans were killed on September 11.Nowhere has your un-Americanism been more poignantly explained and demonstrated than on the New York Times opinion pages over the last two days. Need evidence? Here are portions of five opinion pieces that made it into the ever-so-prestigious (and self-righteous) newspaper of record........
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This is the perception of the dems and libs that the repubs have been able to sell to Mr and Mrs middle america.
I am not saying change to repub or that bushie boy has did anything good for the country.
And even if I were, that is not relevant to the situation.
Because Mr. and Mrs. middle america doesn't *get* that..to them the repubs are protecting their god, guns and booze...and keeping the dems from turning all their kids into promiscous gays and lesbians..who will use abortion as birth control and do satanic and pagan rituals in school...
These articles hit it exactly bullseye on how the dems and libs are now percieved by Mr. and Mrs. middle america, not just by the extremist fundies.
So how do we change this perception..cause the way we did it in this election did not work...and going even further to the left wont work.
In my dream america Dennis Kuc would be president and Bill Clinton would be Secretary of State..but I know that will never happen..so I am willing to compromise on what my exact perfect situation would be and try to come up with candidates and stances that while staying true to the core of the liberal platform and beliefs are watered down enough that we can win back the middle vote..cause right now all we are doing is to let the conserves have all the power and I have to live with the very realistic fear of all abortion becoming back alley again, the government being in all of our bedrooms and McCarthy style witchhunts starting up again...and I am not willing to be at blame for those things simply because I refuse to compromise while bitching that the conserves wont compromise and have no concern w/what 49% of the voters want...

Debt Reduction and Real World

I sat in church on sunday and listened as the priest spoke about some old friends who are involved in a debt reduction contest. He spoke glowingly of how they able to reduce their debt by $92,000 by selling one of their houses and no longer eating out and only doing family recreation that was free. He enthused about how these people would have did well living in the time of Christ, because they understood the message of *living simply*.

But what I heard was a story of a family who was blessed with material wealth. Their *sacrifice* did not seem like a sacrifice to me, or an example of living simply.

What the priest apparently doesn't realize is that most people don't have an extra home they can sell to reduce their debt. They have one home, either with a mortgage or rental payments.
And as the economy has spiraled downward and jobs and salaries have done likewise, as the cost of living has climbed. Most middle americans and those below the middle mark already don't eat out. They don't take family vacations and they only do family activities that are free.

The lifestyle he was enthusing about is the reality of much of the real world.

I would have been much more impressed if his story had been about Mr. & Mrs. Average American who were now growing their own food, making their own clothes, cutting their own wood for heat and walking or riding a bike to work and/or school.

His example was simply of a family blessed materially who had fat that could be easily cut w/out any worries about how to pay for the medicine that the doctor prescribed for a sick child.

Don't get me wrong, some of the stories on the website are inspiring. However the one the priest held up as an example, to me, was not one.

The website he referred to is: http://www.totalmoneymakeover.com/challenge/vote/

Extremist Christians and Extremist Atheist: Two sides of the same coin

I have come to notice when discussing religion that there are three subgroups.

The largest group are those who believe that everyone should believe whatever they want/need to believe. This group is made up by both christians and atheist.

The other two groups are much smaller, but also much more vocal.

They are the extremist christians and the extremist atheist.

They are really one and the same.

I am sure both sides will take offense at that statement, but it still holds true.

Both groups of extremist have more in common then they do in opposition.

They believe in their moral and intellectual superiority.

They believe that they hold the patent on the *truth*.

They refuse to compromise their beliefs in any way, shape or form.

They want to inflict their viewpoint on everyone and force everyone to conform to that viewpoint.

So I have an idea.

They should start their own political party.

Instead of Conservatives, Moderates and Liberals and instead of Republicans, Democrats and Libertarians, lets have Extremist and Non-Extremist.

The only hope for this country is if those in the middle start to speak up and neutralize the extremist on each end of the spectrum.

What is Lady Liberal

Just what it says. A blog by a lady liberal. One who is desparately trying to understand what has happened to our country.
Why have the forces of fear been embraced by so many?
Is it because of the internet and instant news?
Is the world really such a scarey place to so many people that all they want is for someone to tell them what to do so that everything will be okay?
How do we teach people that it is okay to think?
Okay to question, okay to not be sure?
That admitting you don't know or that you made a mistake, or that you didn't have all the info is not a weakness, but actually a sign of strength.
How do we convince people that just because someone can scream the loudest "I am a christian and I *know* what Jesus would do", doesn't mean a whole lot, if they also don't live the life?
Why is this country once again regressing to the same social conditions and beliefs that led to the Salem Witchtrials and the McCarthy witchhunts?
I am scared by what I am seeing occur in our country..it is a repeat of what has happened so many times before in so many other places, and it never has a good result in the long run.