Lest Blood Be Shed

The more and more I venture into Chicago the less and less I find it appealing. I have yet to meet one person there who has any endearing qualities. In fact, every person I've attempted to engage in florid conversation with has turned out to be selfish. The city itself is dirty and racist with a horrible mass transit system. It's as if the entire city has it's soul bound by fear. A fear that it can't let go of because to let go of the fear would be to admit the emptiness that exists within the city. It seems the people reflect this city-wide disease and can't escape.

I do not like Chicago. Chicago I do not like.

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The ideological appropriation of the Christian doctrine of reconciliation by liberal capitalist system in order to conceal the brutal facts of class and imperialists exploitation and conflict is one -- if not the major heresy of our time.

Jose Miguez Bonino Doing Theology in a Revolutionary Situation

Exodus 22:20-26
1 Thessalonians 1:5-10
Matthew 22:34-46

We live in a society of self-comfort. Everywhere we turn we are offered any number of new gadgets to make our lives easier and more comfortable. When the speakers of our elaborate entertainment systems aren't filled with the entertainment of our generations, endless voices try and convince us of a "once in a life time sale," "a new and improved" this or that, "which we can't live without." Walk down the bath aisle of any store and you will find row upon row of chemicals to increase our comfort and we lay or stand around in a tiny room in our house. Somewhere it has entered the American psyche that self-gratification is the highest goal to be obtained and it is honorable to obtain it at whatever cost. I've heard horror stories of people simply going to Wal-Mart to "pick-up a few things" and be overcome with the urge to satisfy every desire of his or her heart at the moment and spend 30, 40, even 70 dollars every week seemingly by accident. Even I am not immune to this culture of consumption. Just this weekend I spent $50 at Walgreens on a heating pad, a bucket, a digital food thermometer, and medium sized cylindrical plastic jar. And all of it was so I could make for myself homemade yogurt. It would seem that if this society has taught us anything it is how to love our self.

Deuteronomy 34:1-12
1 Thessalonians 2:1-8
Matthew 22:34-46

We live in a society of self-comfort. Everywhere we turn we are offered any number of new gadgets to make our lives easier and more comfortable. When the speakers of our elaborate entertainment systems aren't filled with the entertainment of our generations, endless voices try and convince us of a "once in a life time sale," "a new and improved" this or that, "which we can't live without." Walk down the bath aisle of any store and you will find row upon row of chemicals to increase our comfort and we lay or stand around in a tiny room in our house. Somewhere it has entered the American psyche that self-gratification is the highest goal to be obtained and it is honorable to obtain it at whatever cost. I've heard horror stories of people simply going to Wal-Mart to "pick-up a few things" and be overcome with the urge to satisfy every desire of his or her heart at the moment and spend 30, 40, even 70 dollars every week seemingly by accident. Even I am not immune to this culture of consumption. Just this weekend I spent $50 at Walgreens on a heating pad, a bucket, a digital food thermometer, and medium sized cylindrical plastic jar. And all of it was so I could make for myself homemade yogurt. It would seem that if this society has taught us anything it is how to love our self.

I can see a lot of life in you.
I can see a lot of bright in you.
And I think the dress looks nice on you.
I can see a lot of life in you.

I can see a bed and make it too.
I can see a fireside turn blue.
And I can see the lot of life in you.
Yes, I can see a lot of life in you.

When the world looks back,
when the face looks after that,
I can see a lot of life in you.
Yes, I can see a lot of life in you.

I can see a lot of life in you.
I can see your bed and make it too.
And I think the dress looks nice on you.
Yes, I can see a lot of life in you.
I can see a lot of life in you.
Yes, I can see a lot of life in you

-- Sufjan Stevens (2004)