“A true marriage of conscience and economy will not depress the economy; it will rebuild it from within, revitalizing it.”

• Founders did not seek to block the religious path, but free it from obstruction
• Should be taking stock of our own sins rather than cataloging someone else’s
• Atonement is a corrective device; more than apology – a commitment to never do again
• Helping people become “more like us” is oppression, not liberation

• Personal power arises from confidence and courage for self-expression
• We need to DECLARE peace now
• Encouraging a generation to reply on psychiatric drugs – WHY?
• Illegal drugs are called “drugs” but legal drugs are called “medication”
• Intent to fight drugs without promoting recovery
• Pop culture is a cult of pleasure; inappropriate response to deep unhappiness
• Genetically engineered products SHOULD be labeled
• Too much shopping or television is lulling; there is much that lulls
• Politics can tempt us to stray from our spiritual centers
• New politics of power by sharing, not by dominance
• Is it possible to have a compassion-based society?
• Need for mystery, intuition, ritual, relationship, healing, emotion, soul, community, imagination
• There will be no real peace in the world until there is peace in our hearts

I was reading Philip Yancey’s Where is God When it Hurts one evening, trying to bolster my spirits. Two names stood out to me: Joni Eareckson Tada and Corrie ten Boom. The next morning, following morning Bible Study, I asked to look in a box of books that were for sale – “Non-fiction, please, any box will do.” As I opened the box, the first two books were Kathleen White’s Joni Eareckson Tada and Corrie ten Boom! I was quite taken aback by this and knew I had been led for a reason.

The following day, while having my hair styled, I was reading Joni and much to my surprise, my stylist engaged me in a conversation as she had also read and enjoyed it and found great inspiration from it. The following day, I savored the icing on the proverbial cake. As I was reading Corrie ten Boom’s story, it dawned on me that my husband had been telling me the story in bits and pieces for months.

In my bleak moments, he would tell me that everything was God; God was found everywhere. I read about Corrie and her sisters, grateful for the lice and the fleas infiltrating their barracks in the concentration camp. Rather than be dismayed, they were grateful as the vermin meant the guards would not come in and they could study the Bible in peace. What a miracle to have these books enter my life. God knows the reason!

xposted to http://blog.holistic-ontario.com