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Permalink Reply by Aimee Blankenship on 6th mo. 18, 2009 at 12:19am

I appreciate these thoughts. I am new (amybee was my account but I lost my login info.) and searching and must honestly admit I don't fully comprehend. I would be grateful for any assistance with learning about faith, humility, unity, and truth. But please, go easy on me.

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Permalink Reply by Forrest Curo on 6th mo. 18, 2009 at 4:49pm

Hello again, Aimee. You never sounded like a person I'd want to get rough & gruff with--Was I?

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Permalink Reply by Forrest Curo on 6th mo. 19, 2009 at 9:43am

I mean, I don't understand about this "Please go easy on me." (I assume Martin or someone else knowledgeable will be along with a message about getting your old info back! Right?)

I'm intimidated about trying to predict what's going to happen when.

I'm not intimidated by the pseudoscience I call "economism" (=quaint beliefs of "economists")-- but when I find somebody actually studying the phenomena of economics, it turns out too messy for anyone to predict when the branch is actually going to drop. (There's this story about Nasrudin; one day he walks by his neighbor's yard and sees his neighbor sitting in a tree, sawing on a branch. It's the branch he's sitting on. "If you keep doing that," Nasrudin says, "You're going to fall down!" The neighbor keeps sawing, "Who do you think you are?--some sort of a prophet?")

I predicted that Reagan would never get a second term--same for GW. So much for predicting. My political expertise is limited to knowing that whoever takes office, he might turn out worse than I could have imagined, but won't dare try the sort of reforms that Franklin Roosevelt was hated for (hated by everyone who was making money in the midst of the Depression. There were such people, and while Roosevelt's timid experiments may have saved them from an actual revolution, they didn't appreciate these.) And also limited to knowing that most people, most of the time, trust the respectable political authorities way too much.

Meanwhile, I was looking forward to getting my teeth fixed in a few months (when I turn 65) and my wife's dentist is sending her a note telling her to quick get her work done by June 30 because the State of California is about to stop funding such care. Worse things than that are happening to people who are actually poor--or working as teachers in poor school districts, etc. Lots of paper & electronic dollars are still spinning around in the financial casinos; there are people in my Meeting who actually expect to get back the 1/3 of our reserve funds we lost last year. But the government "can't" spend money for people's actual needs, and that's what we'd need to do for the system to work.

I mean, learning about "faith" seems to be about being repeatedly terrified that you aren't going to make it--over & over until you start recognizing that God does come through, that "all things work for good, to those who love God"--whatever "loving God" means (I guess God settles for what He gets from me!)

"Humility"? I dunno. An over-rated virtue, I think, except when I see (other) people assuming they know what's going on! Learning humility seems to take care of itself!

"Unity"? I know we're all in this together; I don't see enough people looking at things radically enough--"renewing their minds"--to deal with what looks to be happening; and so I'm mentally way out of unity with everybody "reasonable" I know! It hardly seems fair to expect them to be "in unity" with me (though it might be nice!)

"Truth"? We're in a paradox, the sort of thing it takes a Biblical sort of perspective to appreciate! "Plagues" (social, economic, military) keep raining down on us all, & will likely continue until we're able & willing to "get out of Egypt" (ie all the idolatrous habits of mind that keep virtually everyone enslaved.) & God's mercy keeps arriving as well! We get looked after--That's my experience so far--but a whole lot of people are stuck in that "learning faith" spin cycle, and likely to need more help than I have to offer!

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Permalink Reply by marv ostberg on 6th mo. 20, 2009 at 11:55pm

this is from bbc news. what would you do if you could answer this appeal for help???

Somali appeal for foreign troops
The speaker of Somalia's parliament has called for neighbouring states to send troops to the country within 24 hours.

Sheikh Aden Mohamed Nur made the appeal as fierce fighting that has spread to the north of the Somali capital, Mogadishu, continued for a second day.

Islamist forces battling the country's transitional government briefly took over a police station and other key buildings in Karan district.

Thousands are fleeing the area, previously a refuge for the displaced.

"The government is weakened by the rebel forces," AFP news agency quoted Sheikh Aden Mohamed Nur as saying.

"We ask neighbouring countries - including Kenya, Djibouti, Ethiopia and Yemen - to send troops to Somalia within 24 hours."

Somalia has been without an effective government since 1991. Its UN-backed, transitional government controls only parts of Mogadishu, and little of the rest of the country.

High-profile killings

Several thousand Ethiopian troops left Somalia in January after a two-year intervention in support of the transitional government.

There are some 4,300 African Union troops deployed in Mogadishu, but they lack any mandate to pursue the insurgents.

Reuters news agency quoted a spokesman for militant Islamist group al-Shabab as warning Kenya not to intervene.

"If it tries to, we will attack Kenya and destroy the tall buildings of Nairobi," Sheik Hasan Yacqub told reporters in southern Somalia.

Kenya had said it would not stand by and let the situation in Somalia deteriorate further because it would destabilise the region, Reuters reported.

Pro-government forces have been fighting radical Islamist guerrillas in the capital since 7 May.

On Friday, gunmen killed Mohamed Hussein Addow, a politician who represented Karan.

It was the third killing of a high-profile public figure in as many days.

Somalia's security minister - an outspoken critic of the militant Islamist group al-Shabab - was killed in a suicide attack in the northern town of Beledweyne, and Mogadishu's police commander was also killed this week.

Militant groups including al-Shabab, which is accused of links to al-Qaeda, have been trying to topple Somalia's government for three years.

A moderate Islamist president took office in Somalia in January but even his introduction of Sharia law to the strongly Muslim country has not appeased the guerrillas.

Some four million people in Somalia - or about one-third of the population - need food aid, according to aid agencies.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/africa/8110685.stm

Published: 2009/06/20 11:07:38 GMT

© BBC MMIX

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Permalink Reply by Forrest Curo on 6th mo. 21, 2009 at 4:50pm

1) Unilaterally stop whatever arms supplies we've been selling-to/aiding-with any nation, anywhere in the world. Ask others to do the same.

2) Help with deliveries of food & other necessities so far as possible.

3) Outlaw, as a matter of national policy, any involvement of US-chartered corporations in, or any US government military support of, the sort of exploitive "investment" practices that have left this part of the world (and others) in a condition of violent desperation.

4) Try to fix our own considerable national problems before we meddle-in/exploit anyone else's

5) Repent (as in renouncing our customary ways of conceiving-of/reacting-to problems--external or internal) sufficiently to allow God to lead us towards overcoming the myriad obstacles preventing 1-4 above.

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