Well, perhaps this really is the end of el web-site. As in nothing further to add after this. And I know some will say “mucho repetido” or some such. Well, I guess since I’ve visited el journal I’ve answered what someone said is the only true philosophical question, that is whether or not to commit suicide. I’m not going to, except maybe facing a painful end I’m willing to take the coward’s way out.
Let me start in the middle and see if I can get where I want to go.
Here's pretty much what i sent in an e-mail to a Catholic men's group as an introduction.  I told the leader of the group later that maybe i'm the only member who thought the church sent the Vatican money every week.  i lost most of the formatting in this conversion to html, and all i'm gonna try to recover with two exceptions is highlighting what i had emphasized in the e-mail.  Here we go, after i point out that Ash Wednesday fell in the time i was writing this e-mail and i thought "what could be better than to start with this:"

Pope’s Ash Wednesday 2017 message:

In his annual Lenten message, the pope writes, "Indifference to our neighbor and to God also represents a real temptation for us Christians.  Each year during Lent we need to hear once more the voice of the prophets who cry out and trouble our conscience."

Describing this phenomenon he calls the globalization of indifference, Francis writes that "whenever our interior life becomes caught up in its own interests and concerns, there is no longer room for others, no place for the poor.  God's voice is no longer heard, the quiet joy of his love is no longer felt, and the desire to do good fades."  He continues that, "We end up being incapable of feeling compassion at the outcry of the poor, weeping for other people's pain, and feeling a need to help them, as though all this were someone else's responsibility and not our own."

This is joel parker, the guy with the beard (see here). If you’re still reading, I e-mailed Don the morning of the first meeting I attended and told him I felt like a stranger in a strange land and my beard saves a lot of talk. I added that I consider myself much stranger than the land in which I live, because here, like apparently everywhere, the rich get richer. And this was before the election.
In the small group of ************** facilitated by *********, in the next-to-last session, I mentioned that the book that’s been translated into more languages than any book except the Bible says there are four great powers in the universe and one of them is the will of the people, the will of man is what I said. Then, at the last session of the year, when the moderator of the video said, “Family is at the heart of the struggle between good and evil,” I made a note of it. And toward the end of our discussion I repeated most of that quote and added, “I’m afraid it’s the family of man.”
Check this out from something that was posted on the Internet in 2012: Oh, did the Petal News have a great column this week? Titled “Sacred Cows” it is from Ronnie McBrayer’s “Keeping the Faith” column [to get regular e-columns in your inbox see www.ronniemcbrayer.net ; here’s about three paragraphs from it :

Whenever I hear the phrase, “We are called to be good stewards,” I take it as a code word for self-preservation that is breaking us. Consider this: Americans give more to churches and religious organizations than any other charitable vehicle. Eighty-five cents out of every dollar given to churches is spent internally and only 2%--two cents out of every dollar put in the offering—ever makes it out of our country.
If American churches reallocated the dollars they spend on building construction and maintenance to food and education programs (about $19 billion a year), global starvation and malnutrition would be eliminated in less than a decade. American churches could provide clean drinking water and sanitation to every person on the planet with only 15 percent of their annual corporate income.
May our eyes be ripped from their sockets to see that 1 billion people are living in wretched poverty; 700 million live in slums and substandard housing; 500 million are on the verge of starvation; and 2.5 billion people are thirsty for clean water—all while we have the resources to do something about it.

I don’t think his facts are straight on how much it would cost to eliminate global starvation and malnutrition, but 15% of American churches corporate income could perhaps even change mankind’s destiny. The kingdom of heaven is at hand.
As a matter of fact, the title of that last session in my notes is “A New Day for Man” and I think the moderator of the video quoted Matthew 4:16 (The people which walked in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up.) and proclaimed it springtime for Christianity, and “the way of the family.”
Seems to me that we still sit in the region and shadow of death and John 1:5 (And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.)’] is the appropriate response to the question which might be gleaned from a “humanity’s destiny” mention in the video. Then we are told “God seems absent;” well, yes. The light is on but too many don’t see it, and too many more don’t walk in it.
But let’s let Deacon Ralph have the last word on light, from his homily of January 8th: In the darkness and gloom, light has shined. And who’s carrying that light into the darkness? Me. (Be loving; be kind, he continued. “The Holy Spirit continually is calling us to come out of ourselves and be more like Him.”)
Seems to me the hearts of the children of many Christian as well as secular families aren’t turned to their parents, though God knows the hearts of the parents are turned to their children, which brings to mind the warning in the last verse of the Old Testament.
Skip the next four paragraphs if you’re in a hurry.
Please allow me a digression: an excerpt from an e-mail:

How is evil like a trap?
[Evil] always looks like something good for us, but it does not ask about God or other people, and it does not ask about long term effects. In the process the boundaries and values by which God orders life are distorted.
The spiritual forces of evil in Ephesians are trap setters, seeking to delude us into shifting the boundaries. Some traps we recognize easily, for we see the paths to destruction worn down by previous captives. Other traps we hardly notice, for we have accepted the revaluing. In most cases our choice is not between obvious evil and something good but between two seemingly good and right options. As Walter Wink points out, Satan watches our inclinations and throws us to the side to which we are leaning... Evil traps us with the good, only slightly out of bounds. Each choice slightly out of bounds redraws the boundaries until nothing remains of God's intent. That is why evil is deceptive and why we need to be alert…

Yes, generally speaking God seems to be absent from the world. Like when Jesus took the form of man and visited the earth and changed history. The stone which was rejected became the chief corner stone. And please note, when speaking of great powers of the universe, that Jesus might be just one stone in the building, a building that could well have four corners.
Think about it. At first Jesus’ message was simple: The kingdom of heaven is at hand; repent and believe the Gospel, the good news. Then it became take up your cross and follow.
Also remember Him saying to John the Baptist’s emissaries that the poor were hearing the good news.
Well, according to me, the good news for the poor was that they would be getting their share before humanity returned to the kingdom of heaven. “The kingdom of heaven is at hand,” Jesus promised. In 30 A.D. Seems like he was talking about mankind returning, I say, to heaven. (“Return is the motion of the Tao,” Lao Tsu wrote around 400 B.C.)
Yeah, seems to me Jesus was very proactive when it came to the poor, about redistributing the wealth. Maybe read Luke 12 (below) and ask yourself if that bit about “sell that ye have and give alms [to the poor]” wasn’t preached to that “innumerable multitude of people” because, big picture, he’d have multitudes following Him and then preach a sermon about “You don’t know God or love; loving God should be so significant that love for children falls below the median on the love/hate continuum,” (see Luke 14:25-27) and the crowds would depart.
And daily bread was something He and the disciples sometimes didn’t have. And there was certainly no discussion about buying a tent when it came to the 300 pence they could have sold the ointment for in Mark 14. Which interestingly is where Jesus says whenever we will, we can do the poor good. Yeah, think about “he was rich and became poor for us.”
“Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” Christians mostly pray a lot. In the parable of the one lost sheep, where the shepard perhaps inexplicably leaves the ninty-nine to find the one, Jesus concludes it is not the will of the Father that one of these little ones should perish.
Just suppose that the eight thousand children who will die today of hunger, of slow starvation, are the “little ones” of Matthew 18. And the eight thousand adults who will die the same death today, are they more guilty than we of sinning against God?
Suppose our neighbor is everybody else in the world. The world is certainly getting smaller. And more crowded. (I still find it hard to believe Jesus answered the question “Who is my neighbor?” with a parable.)
Perhaps there is no consensus on the matter of “am I my brother’s keeper?” Perhaps there’s debate about neighbors. Perhaps this quote from the November 29 Living Faith is pertinent: “As Pope Francis said on Holy Thursday this year, ‘an excess of complicated theology’ can blind us to the needs before our eyes.”
And the 500 million people malnourished statistic might be all too true.
Perhaps a petition to the Pope, requesting that St. Thomas be allowed to send ten percent of its weekly income to a charity devoted to eliminating poverty, abject poverty in particular, would prove to be a light shining in the darkness, good news for the truly poor who might be provided their daily bread. Every time I say an Our Father and come to the line “Give us this day our daily bread” I think about the Proverb that says “Open your eyes and you’ll be satisfied with bread.”(Proverb 20:3b) There are maybe 500 million people on the planet who would be satisfied with bread for a long time. Maybe that’s where the sense of entitlement so many young people seem to have comes from, seeing simply that there’s plenty of food for everybody and all I want is mine. Lots of greed in the world, lots of covetousness, sins of which I might be chief sinner.
Think of the gift of $20 to Heifer International as a gift of a flock of chicks or geese to an impoverished family. Those gifted are trained in the care and raising of their livestock with an obligation to pay it forward. Five hundred dollars buys a heifer.
Think how much livestock just every Catholic church could buy in a year. Every American church the world might well shortly be ready for His return. The parable about the vineyard in Matthew 21, Mark 12 and Luke 20 could be also about the world today, and we are the keepers of the vineyard. Same thing with the house in Luke 12 (see below) being today the world and us people all the keepers of it. I mean, everyone will be called into account on the day of judgement, huh? And there are people starving to death every day in the vineyard and the house. Maybe there’s a big yard for the homeless.
Paul might have been prophesying about the owner’s return when he wrote “What will ye? shall I come unto you with a rod, or in love, and in the spirit of meekness?”(1 Corinthians 4:21; emphasis added)
And consider 1 John 3:17 (But whoso hath this world's good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?) Yeah, forget that Strong’s Concordance of the Bible translates the Greek word translated here as “brother” as “a brother (literally or figuratively) near or remote.” Does anybody think the mind of Christ was and is not set, finally, on the brotherhood of man?
And there is the matter of the unfulfilled prophesy of Jeremiah 31:34 (And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.) Perhaps giving the unwashed hordes daily bread will turn the hearts of the children to their parents, as well as the Holy One.
I must admit to being curious about the Churches’ income, but if enough parishes divert 10% of their income to appropriate charities (I think the World Food Programme is administered by the U.N., and believe it tries to put food in front of malnourished human beings. I know the church already supports many worthwhile projects, and this is maybe just a cry in the wilderness, but I bet there were some St. Thomas parishioners who found it sad that aged and infirm Catholic priests depend, at least in part, on the charity of fellow Catholics.
I think Jesus saying “You always have the poor with you,” in Matthew 26 and John 12 and then in Mark saying “You always have the poor with you, and whensoever you will you may do them good,” (emphais added) is an example of understating the importance of a thing by using it only once, in a single reference. And add the fact that “the poor you always have” appears in three of the Gospels and I think we see perhaps a truth the Apostles didn’t see fit to pass on to us directly. (For example, one of the two two-word English verses I know is “Jesus wept.” The thought that Jesus cried even a lot has crossed my mind; a prominent place on my former website Shelter And Feed Everybody [SAFE] is occupied by an image which has a large unbearable compassion equals the mind of Christ? on it.) “Attention is energy” is, I believe, a rather painful truth, thinking about all the negative energy that is in our universe. I think this points out the critical nature of free will, something I gather the Presbyterians in particular will argue.
I spoke earlier with Don about getting Father ****’s blessing before moving forward with this outrageous project and believe both Father **** and Father *******, who recently remarked in a homily to ask ourselves, when facing a decision (such as signing a petition) to ask, “What would Jesus do?” have given their blessing. And to ask more of them would make it look as though they were critical of the Church. At any rate, let me end with the notes I made, slightly edited, of Father ****’s New Year’s Day homily:

[As we begin a new year] let’s ask ourselves: “Are we pointed in the right direction?” (look at the big picture)
Who do we need to reach out to this year?
God will give us the grace and the courage to go forward. (people will call this
foolish)
Mary pondered things in her heart. (Ponder the petition)
Let God shine a light on us; work on a weakness.
We make course corrections as we go; expect ups and downs.
[God] doesn’t abandon you, He doesn’t abandon me; ask and He fills you with
hope. (“God hears the cry of the poor.” [recent Response])
It’s a beautiful gift–the gift to look back. (Look back on 30-33 A.D.)
Foster gratitude; Eucharist means thanksgiving. Are you grateful? Allow your heart to be filled with Him.
We can walk around in circles, keep doing the same thing and expect a different
result. (Let’s try something different.)
God wants you to grow. (Perhaps especially the fruit of the spirit.)
Mary was full of everything__what could change?__her heart! She allowed God
to expand His hope. (For humanity? [maybe I didn’t hear that right])
May your heart grow in faith, hope, and charity. (emphasis added)



(No idea how to do a petition:)
Your Holiness,
The majority of the members of  ** ****** ******** Catholic Parish 13 years of age and older have advanced this through our priests, Fr. **** ***** and Fr. ******* *****, and the Bishop and the Cardinal and do humbly ask your permission that we divert 10% of our weekly donations to charities devoted to eliminating abject poverty.
We believe every human being on the earth deserves daily bread, and simply reallocating some resources might make a difference.
Thank you for your time and attention.


Luke 12 King James Version (KJV)

1 In the mean time, when there were gathered together an innumerable multitude of people, insomuch that they trode one upon another, he began to say unto his disciples first of all, Beware ye of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.
2 For there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; neither hid, that shall not be known.
3 Therefore whatsoever ye have spoken in darkness shall be heard in the light; and that which ye have spoken in the ear in closets shall be proclaimed upon the housetops.
4 And I say unto you my friends, Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do.
5 But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear: Fear him, which after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say unto you, Fear him.
6 Are not five sparrows sold for two farthings, and not one of them is forgotten before God?
7 But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not therefore: ye are of more value than many sparrows.
8 Also I say unto you, Whosoever shall confess me before men, him shall the Son of man also confess before the angels of God:
9 But he that denieth me before men shall be denied before the angels of God.
10 And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but unto him that blasphemeth against the Holy Ghost it shall not be forgiven.
11 And when they bring you unto the synagogues, and unto magistrates, and powers, take ye no thought how or what thing ye shall answer, or what ye shall say:
12 For the Holy Ghost shall teach you in the same hour what ye ought to say.
13 And one of the company said unto him, Master, speak to my brother, that he divide the inheritance with me.
14 And he said unto him, Man, who made me a judge or a divider over you?
15 And he said unto them, Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth.
16 And he spake a parable unto them, saying, The ground of a certain rich man brought forth plentifully:
17 And he thought within himself, saying, What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?
18 And he said, This will I do: I will pull down my barns, and build greater; and there will I bestow all my fruits and my goods.
19 And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry.
20 But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?
21 So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.
22 And he said unto his disciples, Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat; neither for the body, what ye shall put on.
23 The life is more than meat, and the body is more than raiment.
24 Consider the ravens: for they neither sow nor reap; which neither have storehouse nor barn; and God feedeth them: how much more are ye better than the fowls?
25 And which of you with taking thought can add to his stature one cubit?
26 If ye then be not able to do that thing which is least, why take ye thought for the rest?
27 Consider the lilies how they grow: they toil not, they spin not; and yet I say unto you, that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
28 If then God so clothe the grass, which is to day in the field, and to morrow is cast into the oven; how much more will he clothe you, O ye of little faith?
29 And seek not ye what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink, neither be ye of doubtful mind.
30 For all these things do the nations of the world seek after: and your Father knoweth that ye have need of these things.
31 But rather seek ye the kingdom of God; and all these things shall be added unto you.
32 Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.
33 Sell that ye have, and give alms; provide yourselves bags which wax not old, a treasure in the heavens that faileth not, where no thief approacheth, neither moth corrupteth.
34 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
35 Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning;
36 And ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their lord, when he will return from the wedding; that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open unto him immediately.
37 Blessed are those servants, whom the lord when he cometh shall find watching: verily I say unto you, that he shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meat, and will come forth and serve them. (Notice the huge departure from the parable of the servant coming in from working in the field and having to wait on his master [Luke 17:7-10].)
38 And if he shall come in the second watch, or come in the third watch, and find them so, blessed are those servants. (Suppose it’s the last watch.)
39 And this know, that if the goodman of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched, and not have suffered his house to be broken through.
40 Be ye therefore ready also: for the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not.
41 Then Peter said unto him, Lord, speakest thou this parable unto us, or even to all?
42 And the Lord said, Who then is that faithful and wise steward, whom his lord shall make ruler over his household, to give them their portion of meat in due season?
43 Blessed is that servant, whom his lord when he cometh shall find so doing.
44 Of a truth I say unto you, that he will make him ruler over all that he hath.
45 But and if that servant say in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming; and shall begin to beat the menservants and maidens, and to eat and drink, and to be drunken;
46 The lord of that servant will come in a day when he looketh not for him, and at an hour when he is not aware, and will cut him in sunder, and will appoint him his portion with the unbelievers.
47 And that servant, which knew his lord's will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes.
48 But he that knew not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required: and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more.
49 I am come to send fire on the earth; and what will I, if it be already kindled? (The Bible at USCCB.org used to say “how I wish it were already blazing.”)
50 But I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened till it be accomplished!
51 Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division:
52 For from henceforth there shall be five in one house divided, three against two, and two against three.
53 The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against the father; the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother; the mother in law against her daughter in law, and the daughter in law against her mother in law.
54 And he said also to the people, When ye see a cloud rise out of the west, straightway ye say, There cometh a shower; and so it is.
55 And when ye see the south wind blow, ye say, There will be heat; and it cometh to pass.
56 Ye hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky and of the earth; but how is it that ye do not discern this time?
57 Yea, and why even of yourselves judge ye not what is right?
58 When thou goest with thine adversary to the magistrate, as thou art in the way, give diligence that thou mayest be delivered from him; lest he hale thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and the officer cast thee into prison.
59 I tell thee, thou shalt not depart thence, till thou hast paid the very last mite. (Emphasis added.)

*************

Yeah, that's what i disseminated to i'm not sure how many people.
Perhaps more disconcerting ('stranger' might be the operative word) was my reply to a "homework" assignment, the question being "Why does evil exist in the world?" i said it reminded me of the scripture found in Matthew, Mark, and Luke about "the powers of heaven will be shaken."
"Perhaps God really is a spirit," i said, "and perhaps what we are faced with is the 'benign indifference of the universe,' as Camus wrote."  Or words to that effect.
But i shall leave on an upbeat: if two of us agree, we can change the world, for with men it is impossible, but all things are possible with God.
Oh yeah, there was a hand-out i gave to about six or seven people at my table one morning that went like this (not knowing if they got my e-mail):

_to Change It All's very lame home page