Broken hearts and getting away with murder #TamirRice #DCprotest #pray

Broken hearts and getting away with murder

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by Stan Faryna

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Tamir Rice

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It has been said that when evil, immorality and self-serving license prevails in the world, the human heart will grow cold. That our compassion, empathy and desire to be a comfort and help to others shall be greatly diminished. I wonder if these are those times.

I wonder now if my own heart has grown cold.

Because I watched surveillance video footage that provided a view of the murder of a 12 year old child and I did not weep.

I understood it was a true horror that I was watching. I felt deep sympathy for Tamir Rice’s parents, but what I felt did not go deep enough. An awkward sound escaped my mouth but I should have sobbed. And I knew the fault must be mine. That my heart was growing cold.

Has my heart been so broken that it is beyond repair. Yes and no. Comfort and convenience will not heal this heart. Technology cannot fix it. Nor chemical prescription – legal or illegal. Nor government.

The hows and whys of the murder of Tamir Rice will be argued with heartless contention, legalistic pageantry and much anger. But I will not put the murder of a child behind me. I will not move forward in my thoughts. There is enough evil in the murder of a child to claim my hearts’ complete attention. Racism and prejudice is also evil and, yet, I cannot move past the greater evil to feast and rail upon the lesser evil. There is time to account for all of our evil.

There is enough evidence in the paltry, unadorned facts that a child was murdered for you and I to understand that the world is broken and that we, collectively as the human family, are exceedingly worthy of a curse upon our heads- a curse that follows each one of us wherever we go and whatever we do, and confounds us with unrelenting hardships, misery and unbearable misfortune.

Some say that this is what is happening now. Others even suggest that those who do murder or other evil, they share their curse with us all. And those who get away with murder, they break the human heart (all hearts) in ways that shall never be healed – even until the last star blinks out. Yet we also know, deep down, that the answer is not to tear them to little pieces.

I feel the curses piling up upon me, my body, mind and soul. Upon my family, friends and neighbor. Upon my nation and all of the human family. I feel the poverty of my spirit growing wide and deep as oceans. For what should I be proud?

If only I could have wept, I could almost imagine that I could step out from underneath this particular curse – one among the millions. And so I put my face on the ground and I repent for us all.

If we say that we have not sinned, we make [God] a liar, and [God’s] word is not in us.

1 John 1:10

And I beg God to have for mercy on us and on the whole world.

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Stan Faryna
06 December 2014
Fairfax, Virginia

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One Ugly American Reflects On Syria, War, Evil

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by Stan Faryna

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Black Eyed Peas, Where is the Love?

 

I’m not unsympathetic to Syrians in their struggles, sorrows and agonies. I pray for them with this intention: I want and hope the Syrian people (and all people) will enjoy those freedoms which ensure the dignity of the human person AND provide each individual person with every opportunity to love, to live in great virtue and to be a blessing to the world.

That want and hope, I imagine, must be accomplished under the custody of good government and the exceptional exercise of a passionate citizenship. I also imagine that such want and hope must pour from the hearts of the people in that nation that seeks deliverance from evil. In this regard, I am not convinced that the majority of the people of Syria are ready to repent, forgive, and, yes, deliver themselves from evil.

I may be very mistaken in my impression.

I am under this impression because the Syrian people have accepted great evil in their midst for too long.

I am under this impression because I have not seen a million Syrians walk together a long road, non violently and their hearts lifted in love, in search of freedom, justice and righteousness. Nor 100,000. Not even 10,000.

And I would like to believe that if I had seen and heard such a thing, I do not require my government to cast missiles upon the armies of their dark lords. I would like to believe that I have the courage to go there, myself, and join arms with Syrian men, women and children and face evil with love.

Love never fails.

And as Martin Luther King, Jr. insisted with great urgency, we will not overcome evil by doing evil. There is no exception. Period.

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Stan Faryna
01 September 2013
Fairfax, Virginia

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Who the bleep is the NRA?

And other social media DOHs.

by Stan Faryna

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I find myself unable to express illuminating feelings and thoughts about the evil that has happened at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Or the loss and grief of mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, family, friends and neighbors.

But worse than this, I fear that the evil is not finished. It stretches out from Newtown to all of the world.

The full horror and impact of this evil remains to be seen.

I fear that we cannot yet see how broken our world was broke by those terrible shots.

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Evil, too, is difficult to speak about. It does not parse easily – regardless of the abounding interpreters, compilers and commentators. Perhaps, this is why evil always takes us by surprise.

Evil, itself, seems intangible and fictitious. Yet it is real as you. And me.

It has dreadful impact – even if a particular instance of evil has no real or apparent causalities.

And, evil, it ever lurks in all of our hearts, minds and spirit.

Beyond this fact, I do not understand much more about evil.

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The National Rifle Association

What does all this have to do with the NRA?

Writes Gary Fields, Stephanie Blanchero and Colleen McCain Nelson in the Wall Street Journal:

WASHINGTON—The nation’s biggest gun-rights lobby called Friday for placing an armed security guard at every school, as it for the first time entered the re-energized public debate over gun laws in the aftermath of last week’s school shooting in Connecticut.

In fact, the NRA has pledged to immediately invest significant resources (money, know how, and people) in support of the creation of a national school safety and security program.

Who else has pledged themselves to today’s task of protecting American children?

CNN?  The Wall Street Journal? The New York Times?

None.

Randi Weingarten, head of the American Federation of Teachers, decried the NRA proposal to be “irresponsible and dangerous.”

Irresponsible and dangerous as a bank, a government building, an airport, an embassy, etc.?

“Schools must be safe sanctuaries, not armed fortresses,” added Weingarten as he clicked his ruby heels.

There’s no place like home.

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The NRA (a.k.a. The National Rifle Association) is a non-profit organization that represents the specific and express interests of millions of U.S. citizens. Those interests can be characterized as an interest in preserving a Constitutional right to own and bear arms for the purpose of defense – mostly against (but not limited to) tyranny. In 2008 and 2010, The United States Supreme Court expanded our understanding of the Second Amendment in District of Columbia v. Heller to include the individual’s right to possess and use a firearm in the lawful exercise of personal self-defense.

The NRA, in other words, represents the interests and beliefs of some Americans who especially hold dear the promises and guarantees of the Second Amendment, the Bill of Rights, and the U.S. Constitution.

There are other Americans, however, that want you to think that the NRA is something else – the them. That the NRA does not speak on behalf of Americans who believe (rightly or wrongly) in the wisdom of the Law of the land, of the founding fathers, and the cornerstones of the Republic.

It is this kind of divisive propaganda (the us and them mentality) which we must all resist – a word-craft that reminds me of the past and terrible argument that ignored the imperative of the American Declaration of Independence and set brother against brother.

That all men are created equal in human dignity and providence.

What would Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States, have said of Martin Luther King, Jr. and his Dream?

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Americans may be divided in opinion about the relevance of the U.S. Constitution to the 21st Century. Or the relevance of the Bill of Rights and/or specific Amendments. A great and passionate debate may, in fact, be in the stirring. But let us not forget that we are all Americans in this debate – where ever you are.

It’s not about us or them. Or just about crazy Americans. The questions and debate belongs to us (the human species) and we must individually wrestle with them in the face of fear, pain, loss, and wisdom.

It is, yes, all about we. We the people (of the world) must seek good answers and truer questions – together.

Scapegoats, however, speak to none of our intimate questions about the meaning of life, liberty and our happiness. Scapegoats only fuel contempt, misunderstanding, ignorance, brutality, terror, loss, and hate. The Israel and Palestine problem is an illuminating example.

Yes, Virginia. Evil will grow greater – if and only if – you believe or act otherwise.

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Stan Faryna
21 December 2012
Fairfax, Virginia

DOH! I can’t believe I’m putting this out there! What’s wrong with me?!

For my friend, K. May God be with him.

Where is the Love, The Black Eyed Peas
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Sucking in Syria

Syrian protesters are dying. Everyday, it seems. Maybe, eight were killed yesterday. Four, the day before. More Syrians will die, tomorrow. Through links on Twitter, I’m getting to see some videos of the dead and dying. There’s blood. Tears. Crying. There’s the crack of AK47s.

The protesters are demanding Freedom. Change. Opportunity. Reform. They want to make a better world.

Syrians are not just dying. They are being murdered. The killing is intentional.

Protesters are being murdered by soldiers or police who have been ordered to do so by their government. They might not look like you or me. They may not even speak the same language. But, unless, you are hopelessly all wrapped up in you, you know that other people are losing the people that they love and care about. In an instant.

In a gruesome, grim, split-second instant, love seems to be cancelled.

A Sermon for Sci-Fi Fans: Who knows right from wrong?!

Below, the cinema trailer for Season Four of the new Dr. Who.

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Although the large base of Dr. Who fans tend to be from the UK, the BBC sci-fi tv series made some headway in Europe and in the US in the past. And, also now in the present. Dr. Who is about a human-looking alien (his mother was an Earthling) who has a fancy for Earth, humanity, and British chicks. Dr. Who may be the longest running sci-fi tv series ever, anywhere. It first aired in 1963. The television show has also received many British television awards through the years.

Below, background music. Geoff, Rose.

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For those unfamiliar with the Doctor, the Doctor travels through time and space in an unsual and, perhaps, organic, transportational unit called the Tardis. The Tardis looks like an old British police call box from the outside. The Doctor tends to “land” or “appear” in the nick of time to save the day – wherever and whenever the Tardis “lands” or appears. Another thing: the Doctor reincarnates which makes it convenient for the producers to change the actors playing the Doctor.

And another thing: the old show was more of an intellectual experience; it was more about the human story. In fact, the special effects, sets and costumes were really proaste. No, I mean really, really bad…