Saturday, December 15, 2007
FROM THE EMAILBOX
Spirit & Life®
"The words I spoke to you are spirit and life." (Jn 6:63)
Human Life International e-Newsletter
Volume 01, Number 96 | Friday, December 14, 2007
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www.hli.org
How Many Heisman Winners Has Abortion Killed?
The sports world recently greeted the news that this year's Heisman Trophy Winner, Tim Tebow from the University of Florida, was almost a casualty of abortion. Twenty-some years ago he was not the strapping 6'3", 235 lb. beloved sports hero that he is today. At that time he was a one-inch-long unborn child whose existence, because of an amoebic infection, was defined as threat to his mother's health. Pam Tebow, his mother, was told by a doctor that it would be in her best interests to abort this baby, and she refused. Her husband backed her up on that generous decision, and seven months later they gave birth to a perfectly healthy boy. Little did they know that twenty years later they would be standing on a national stage with a Heisman Trophy winner giving that magnificent witness to life. The world thanks you, Mr. and Mrs. Tebow! There cannot be a more touching Advent story than this.
I wonder if anyone has ever asked how many potential Heisman Trophy winners abortion has actually killed. The answer is, twelve. Reflect on that a bit as you read further because there is a larger lesson in the Tebows' witness.
Dr. Brian Clowes, HLI researcher, has examined the data from the 2007 Statistical Abstract of the United States (most recent census data) and extrapolated the numbers of the various professions and categories of Americans who have been eliminated in the wake of nearly 49 million legalized abortions, one third of all Americans conceived since 1973. The following numbers are based on the actual government estimates of the professions represented in America. So then, who have we lost to abortion?
2 US Presidents
7 Supreme Court Justices
102 US Senators and 589 Congressmen
8,123 Federal, district and local court judges
31 Nobel Prize laureates
328 Olympic medalists including 123 Gold medalists
6,092 professional athletes
134,841 physicians and surgeons
392,500 registered nurses
70,669 priests, ministers, rabbis and imams including
6,852 priests and 11,010 nuns (vocations "shortage"?)
1,102,443 teachers (K-12)
553,821 truck drivers
224,518 maids and housekeepers
336,939 janitors
134,028 farmers and ranchers
109,984 police officers and sheriff's deputies
39,477 firefighters
17,221 barbers, and
24,450,000... women (the gender of roughly half of all children aborted).
These numbers of course are only the tip of the iceberg. Keep in mind that we get our statistics about abortion from the abortion industry itself which has a vested interest in under-reporting the numbers. Likewise, these categories are only a few of the professions that Americans actually work in and are by no means a full portrayal of the total American workforce. What they represent, however, is the immense human toll that abortion takes on a society. Abortion-promoters present abortion as an exclusively private choice, but thirty-five years of abortion exposes the perniciousness of that lie. There is a social toll that comes from abortion which cannot easily be corrected.
For three and a half decades the feminists have reveled in a misleading "freedom to choose," and on the basis of that false "right" have eliminated their children and done immense damage to the family as the basic unit of society. Those who respect these sacred realities, on the other hand, have their wives and husbands to grow old with, their children to enjoy and their grandkids to play with and spoil. The love of life, marriage and family never leaves its adherents penniless, lonely or abandoned, and every now and then God throws in a Heisman Trophy just to show the rest of us that it's all worth it.
Sincerely Yours in Christ,
Rev. Thomas J. Euteneuer,
President, Human Life International
Friday, December 14, 2007
RESPONDING TO BISHOP CESIDIO TALLINI
His comments are in italics. My replies are in bold.
I don't pretend to be orthodox Roman Catholic clergy, unlike Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo and Co., but my Church is not of this world, even though it is a legally chartered church, and I'm a legally consecrated Bishop, and what's the problem with that?
Milingo has nothing to do with this conversation. Why bring him up? It's surely no compliment to compare yourself to him.
Please enlighten me to this, as I'm willing to listen if you can present a compelling argument. I'm a pretty open-minded person overall! Can I still be part of the baloney -- not bologna, that's the good stuff -- of this world and witness Salvation according to the Old and New Testament (pick any translation)?
The Catholic Church has been presenting compelling arguments for 2,000 years, and apparently you haven't listened to any of them. I won't waste my time.
Also, you should read your Catholic Church's own Code of Canon law in my view. I am indeed still a Christian according to the Catholic Church, having been baptized as a Catholic when I was a baby, and that is actually sound reasoning in Roman law terms, although admittedly a little antiquated in Cesidian law terms.
I have often read Canon Law. If you were baptised a Catholic, you are indeed still a Catholic, so why are you messing around reinventing the wheel--or in your case the faith?
It is also not correct I'm polytheistic. A polytheist not only believes there are many Gods, but also holds no favorites. In reality I am a monolater (from monolatry, the belief that there may be more than one deity, but only one should be worshipped). That is a Kosher belief if you still appreciate things like the 10 Commandments, by the way.
No, actually anyone who adheres to the Ten Commandments is not a monolater. We really do believe He is the only one. But you didn't happen to mention which god you believe in. Have you made a choice yet? Are you still sampling the varieity? Are you your own god? You would be more likely to gain followers if you could make up your mind.
Regarding the Ten Commandments, my appreciation of them is apparently greater than yours given that I subscribe to them while you have created your own.
I am also a theist (one who believes that gods exist and interact with the universe), but not a deist (a person who believes that gods created the universe and then abandoned it), while you seem to hold deist beliefs, because you seem to think God abandoned me, and I can show evidence to the contrary. It was God, and God only really, not any church, who made me a Cesidian Bishop. No man had that power, only God does, perhaps working through holy and decent men.
I am certainly not a Deist since I believe that God answers prayer. Do you believe that? Or do you expect your god to operate only under your direction?
While my Church truly doesn't have too many members, so it is a small church compared to the Roman Catholic behemoth, Jesus also said that his church would be a small one too.
Jesus said, "Enter in by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many are those who enter in by it. How narrow is the gate, and restricted is the way that leads to life! Few are those who find it." (Matthew 7:13,14)
Christians today either state that Salvation is granted to those who follow the Bishop of Rome, and there are over a BILLION people who would qualify for Salvation if this were the way, and/or place Salvation in a book called the Bible, which has been translated in its entirety into only 429 languages so far (New Testaments alone are available in at least 1,573 languages). Even if most people were illiterate, which is no longer the case today, since less that 20% of the world's people are illiterate, the Original "JESUS" film is now available in 1,004 of the world's 6,912 spoken languages!
Is this the "Narrow Gate", the one of people who follow an 'infallible' Pope (not even Jesus lead us to believe he was infallible)?
Is the "Narrow Gate", the one of people who trust the Bible to be the 'in
It appears that Haloscan snipped part of your comment. In any case, check out Matthew 28:19. I doubt a church of one was quite what Christ had in mind.
Stop your current foolishness and come back to your true spiritual home. Christ is calling you. Listen to Him.
"MERRY CHRISTMAS"
Are you hearing it this year? Here in Akron when I went shopping yesterday, I heard it several times. Not a single sound of "Happy Holidays" to be had, either from the store employees or the shoppers.
ALLEGED SHOOTER BELONGED TO O.T.O. GROUP
Matthew Murray, the alleged 24-year-old shooter who carried out attacks at two religious organizations, killing four and injuring several, posted on the web using the screen names DyingChild_65 and nghtmrchld26. The Denver Post writers Jeremy P. Meyer, David Migoya and Christopher N. Osher have explored his internet activity, including his Sunday posting between shooting incidents.
Among the other facts revealed is the following:
Steve Mariner, the president of Denver's occult group Ad Astra Oasis, says Murray attended group meetings for about a year before being asked to leave in September.
Ad Astra Oasis is an officially chartered body of the Ordo Templi Orientis, a ceremonial magic order based on the teachings of English poet and mystic Aleister Crowley.
Read the whole article here.
Thanks to a reader for the link.
JUST WHEN YOU THINK YOU'VE SEEN IT ALL...
Friday morning began with a really good laugh. I've posted links to some bizarre websites in Running Off, but today's has got to take the crown!
The Cesidian Church has canonized Rene Descartes. "Cesidian Church?" you ask. Yes, there is a Cesidian Church, though it's probably web based and appears to have only one member. It is the wonderwork of the Most Rev. Dr. Cesidio Tallini. There is even a picture of him at this link and he isn't smiling.
Dr. Tallini assures us that he may be excommunicated but he is still a Christian according to the Catholic Church. Baptism may be indelible, but in this case somebody must have used Kool Aid. Dr. Tellini got his ordination through the interdenominational Rose Ministries. The City of New York thought he is rational enough to be a "Registered Marriage Officiant", certainly a debatable conclusion. He is also the church's sole and only bishop.
Bishop Tellini preaches a novel gospel of self-salvation through attitude while proposing home schooling as evidence that jobs and vocations are not the same thing. One hopes that he doesn't test this theory any time soon!
Cesidians adhere to fourteen commandments as a "Recipe for Perfect Government." Most have something to do with economic concerns. No. 1 on the list is a God's right to a universal currency. Eleven refer to "a God", while one addresses the rights of "a Family of Gods". Cesidians are polytheistic though they may not actually know that.
They pray a rosary. Catholic or Buddhist beads will do since Bishop Cesidia hasn't invented his own yet. The same prayers are used on either set. The Buddhist Rosary looks like it was invented in a McDonald's variety of speed prayer.
I Googled "Cesidio Tallini" and got 1,660 hits, among them "Why I'm My Own King" by Cesidio Tallini, the man's "scholarly paper" for his "Skills for Professional Development" class at the University of Phoenix Online, where you can discover the true nature of diploma mills apparently.
Either this is a chaos magician with lots of time on his hands, or this is an example of the state of deterioration that internet education represents for humanity. Eris has my vote!
Thursday, December 13, 2007
"THE GOLDEN COMPASS" TRAILER
See it over at the Baltimore Sun website along with an article announcing that the USCCB has removed its review of the movie from their website.
Isn't that a "Vatican" simulation complete with "Swiss Guards" in the opening scene of the trailer?
The last sentence in the article reveals that one of the characters in the movie is named "Pan", and Pan would appear to be one of the good guys or beasts.
DEVELOPMENTS NOT TO BE MISSED...
From links at New Oxford Review:
'Gay' School Plot Unveiled at WorldNetDaily
Bishops and Archbishops opposing "Golden Compass" at LifeSite News
Archbishop Weakland's personal secretary for more than a decade has been charged with misdemeanor possession of cocain as reported by JS Online
ACTIONS HAVE CONSEQUENCES
Remember the recent Roman Catholic Womenpriests ordination ceremony that was held at the synagogue of Central Reform Congregation in St. Louis? Remember that Archbishop Burke said he would have nothing more to do with this congregation? Well, he is as good as his word. The joint advent prayer service between Rabbi Susan Talve's Central Reform Congregation and the progressive Roman Catholic community of St. Cronan's had to move to a tent when Archbishop Burke made a telephone call. You can read about it here.
It is wonderful to see him standing firmly for the faith!
Hat tip to New Oxford Review.
MOVING THE FAMILY MATRIARCH
It went smoothly if you are willing to allow a certain amount of relativism in the word smoothly. She spent last night in her new apartment. We were able to get most of the things she loves in there and arranged in a pleasing way. It looked pretty good by the time we left around 8 p.m. last night, and she had already met two ladies who are Catholic and told her about their rosary group on Tuesday and going together to Mass on Sunday at 9. (This senior community has its own van for transportation.)
She also ate dinner with the residents and liked the food, and today she has a hair appointment in the community salon. Wonder of wonders, we all got a sincere "thank you" as we said goodbye last night. I've got my fingers and toes crossed and my plea into heaven that this transition will go smoothly and be a good one for her. It has all the right elements, but she has to supply the cooperation.
Today there is some shopping to be done for things we hadn't thought of, and the second phone to hook up, and a few more loose ends to tie. Then, probably after Christmas, we can start on getting her house ready to sell.
Anyway, so far, so good. Thanks for the prayers!
RESEARCH TOOL - BIBLIA CLERUS
Check out the apparently new website. A link to a Freeper post sent in by a reader announced it, indicating that it comes straight from the Vatican.
Vatican, Dec. 12, 2007 (CWNews.com) - The Vatican Congregation for the Clergy has unveiled a powerful new web site, linking Bible texts with commentary from the Church fathers, doctors of the Church, councils, catechisms, and other magisterial documents.
The Biblia Clerus site links each passage of the Bible-- Old and New Testaments-- with commentary taken from a rich variety of sources. In an introductory note Cardinal Claudio Hummes, the prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy, explains that the site provides "Sacred Scripture, its interpretation in light of Sacred Tradition and the teachings of the Magisterium, with appropriate theological commentary and exegesis."
The sources of the commentary-- many of them provided in full on the site-- include the works of the apostolic fathers, saints, Popes, and councils. The site also provides links to the Code of Canon Law (and the Code for the Eastern Church), and to the catechisms of the Council of Trent, St. Pius X, and the 1997 edition of the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
Although designed for priests, the Biblia Clerus site is available to the general public. The entire contents of the site can be downloaded.
This promises to be awesome! So far for me the Church Fathers are a reportedly rich source of Catholic theology that I've found mostly impenetrable, making me a curious kid who runs from door to door knocking but never finding one open. If this website is searchable, as it appears to be, the key may at last be placed in the hands of the curious Catholic in the pew.
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
BRING ON THE CANDLES
Tony Sachs, graduate of a posh New York Jewish prep school, asks the rhetorical question "Who Won the War on Christmas?" and answers it with "It Was the Druids" which he describes at length in an amusing commentary at The Huffington Post.
REVIEW DISAPPEARS
Catholic News Service reports the bishop's review of "Golden Compass" has been withdrawn from the USCCB website.
Hat tip to Spirit Daily.
PRIEST OPPOSES HEALTHY ENVIRONMENT FOR RESTAURANT WORKERS
As each customer walked into Mort's Cigar Bar in Old Town on Monday night, the Rev. H Setter quickly opened a wooden box and held out a Chateau Real cigar.
"Are you here for the rally?" he'd asked each patron, dampened from the rain.
If the answer was "yes," he'd hand out a free cigar.
The priest at All Saints Catholic Church, Setter held to his promise to advocate for smokers' rights by holding a rally at Mort's. He plans to be there next Monday, too.
Read it all...
If you read the entire article, you will see that it is the priest's concern for his own event that is the primary fuel for his fire on this topic.
In all of the discussion about smoke-free environments, no one ever discusses the facility's employees and their right to a healthy workspace. It's as though they have no stake in the debate. Many restaurant workers are doing the job because it is the only job they can get that will pay enough to meet their bills. Many are college students who need tuition money. Most are not there because of a love for the work.
If our culture can insist on smoke-free air for other occupations, the same principle should apply to restaurant workers.
WITH FRIENDS LIKE THIS...
The conservative Catholic League and its head, William Donahue, may be apoplectic about The Golden Compass and wish that people would avoid seeing it, but the more-mainstream Catholic News Service isn't siding with his boycott.
In a very positive review, CNS critics Harry Forbes and John Mulderig called the film "lavish, well-acted and fast-paced," and later labelled it "intelligent and well-crafted entertainment."
Continue reading...
So let's see...an enemy of the Church makes an open declaration of war with the objective to destroy her, and Catholic News Service hollers "Come on down!" Nice.
SISTER STUFFS A SOCK IN IT
Sister Kathy Avery of Grosse Pointe Park, Michigan, will not allow cursing on the playground of St. Clare of Montefalco Catholic School. Just in case the 5th through 8th graders didn't know exactly what she meant, she read them a list of banned words.
Some parents who heard her were shocked, but some applauded. Let me add my applause to theirs. How I longed for my daughter's Catholic school to issue such a ban back in the eighties when I was playground monitor. I tried to get the kids to clean up the language, but without official backing, I didn't get very far.
Read the story here.
Monday, December 10, 2007
SCRAP THAT NOTION THAT GOD CREATED THE WORLD
Glasgow, Dec. 6, 2007 (CWNews.com) - A Jesuit astronomer from the Vatican Observatory has said that scientific creationism is a form of superstition.
Speaking in Glasgow this week, Brother Guy Consolmagno said that scientists should protect against the tendency of religion to slide into superstition. In turn, he said, science needs religion "in order to have a conscience." In the case of creationism, he said, believers have constructed a theory that is not supported by scientific facts.
Read the rest...
THE ROOTS OF EVANGELICALISM
Mysticism. The Kabbalah. Alchemy. Paracelsianism. These aren't subjects that one usually associates with evangelicalism. But according to W. R. Ward, emeritus professor of Modern History at Durham, historians will have to master a new vocabulary if they want to understand the rise of the global evangelical movement in the 17th century. In his pathbreaking book Early Evangelicalism: A Global Intellectual History, 1670-1789, Ward offers a bold new genealogy of evangelicalism that transforms our understanding of its intellectual roots. Although he modestly describes his book as a "set of compass-bearings" rather than a full, textured history, it is one of the most ambitious books about evangelicalism ever written. Surveying the 17th- and 18th-century history of evangelicalism across the globe, he proposes a new framework for understanding the early movement.
In his opening pages, Ward argues that the scholarship on the evangelical movement has been marked by three shortcomings: it does not date the origins of evangelicalism early enough; it focuses on England and America to the exclusion of the rest of the world; and it does not offer a coherent picture of "evangelical identity." Building on his earlier work,1 he argues that evangelicalism was a global intellectual movement whose influence extended from Germany to Great Britain, Silesia, Switzerland, the Netherlands, and the American colonies. In contrast to historians who have equated the birth of evangelicalism with 18th-century revivalism, he argues that the roots of the evangelical movement extend all the way back to the 1670s, when Lutherans in Germany and Reformed Protestants in Switzerland, Germany, and the Netherlands struggled to replace a dry, rational orthodoxy with a more vital, heart-centered religion. In his most original contribution, Ward argues that the earliest evangelicals drew on an eclectic assortment of religious ideas in order to offer answers to the most pressing religious problems of their day. Early evangelicals, he argues, were linked not only by their hostility to systematic theology but by their interest in Paracelsian thought, their organization of small groups, their postponement of the apocalypse to the "middle distance," their mysticism, and their fascination with the Jewish Kabbalah.
Continue reading...
KABBALAH BY COMPUTER
From a PR website:
Swetha Lodha of Mystic Board takes pride and pleasure to announce the official launch of MB Free Kabbalah Numerology (http://www.KabbalahNumerology.com) -- an advanced yet handy application which enables a person to calculate his/ her Health Numbers, Money Number, Lucky Number and Lucky Color. On the occasion of the launch of this new software Swetha opines, "I believe that the introduction of MB Free Kabbalah Numerology has been successful in filling up the gap that existed in the Numerology Forum of Mystic Board."
Speaking about the features of the software, Swetha Lodha says, "MB Free Kabbalah Numerology (http://www.KabbalahNumerology.com) is a simple and easy to use numerology software. It helps you analyze the numerological influence upon your health, wealth and overall personality based on the Kabbalah system of Numerology." She says further, "All that you need to do is enter your personal details i.e. your name, date and time of birth and the software does the rest for you."
Kabbalah Numerology is the Jewish form of Numerology, which means knowledge and wisdom. Events and not the characters hold the position of prime importance in this form of Numerology. The first and foremost knowledge of the Kabbalah is to understand the underlying meaning of each of the numbers, their properties and virtues.
Read more...
METAL AND ITS SYMBOLISM
In recounting the basics of the First Degree Masonic ritual, William J. Whalen, in his book CHRISTIANITY AND AMERICAN FREEMASONRY, tells us that after the opening of the First Degree Lodge and the questioning of the candidate for initiation,
The candidate is now prepared for the first degree. He is instructed to remove his coat, shoes and stockings, and trousers and is divested of all metal articles: coins, watch, rings, etc. The Junior Deacon gives him a pair of trousers furnished by the lodge and asks him to put his left arm through the front of his shirt, exposing a bare arm and left breast. The Deacon then puts a blindfold (called a hoodwink) on the candidate, places a slipper on his right foot and loops a blue silk rope, called a cabletow, around his neck.(p. 24-25, emphasis mine)
Why the concern about metal?
The Grand Lodge of British Columbia explains the symbolism this way:
The requirement that a Candidate have no metal or money on his person has several layers of meaning. One is to emphasize the nature of Freemasonry as being opposed to violence and that the Candidate has nothing offensive or defensive on his person. Another is a reference to the building of the first Temple of Solomon, where no metallic tool was used. Yet another is that money cannot be used to purchase membership in Freemasonry. Metal was considered in ancient times to be the gifts of the Gods of the Underworld, useful, but limited and inherently dangerous. Metal and money are also associated with material possessions. Therefore, to be deprived of them is to symbolize the discarding of a materialistic paradigm before embracing one based on more spiritual values. It is, of course, also reminiscent of physical birth, when the infant had nothing, and was totally dependent on his mother for sustenance.
It was this ceremony that immediately came to mind when I read certain passages in Joshua Trachtenberg's JEWISH MAGIC AND SUPERSTITION, Chapter 11, "War with the Spirits". From Trachtenberg...
In describing the wedding ceremony and its "gift-offerings to the spirits", he writes:
- The presence of the gold coin, which may be viewed either as bribes, or as an anti-demonic use of metal, and of salt, which certainly was intended to drive away the demons, emphasizes the general nature of these customs. (p. 173)
- In some places the groom carried a piece of iron in his pocket during the ceremony. (p. 174)
In describing burial ceremonies:
- The rules for preparing the corpse for burial were compiled in early post-Talmudic times, and comprise practices wuch as closing the eyes, placing metal or salt on the body, setting a light at its head, etc., which were undoubtedly originaly intended to confound the spirits... (p. 175)
In Chapter 13 on "Medicine", speaking of medical practices during the Middle Ages:
- A favorite antidote...was to encircle the diseased part...with the finger or with some object, such as a ring, while reciting a charm. Where the object was of metal its anti-demonic virtues were relied upon to dispel the pain, though the commentators rationalized a Talmudic reference to such a cure with the explanation that it was intended to cool a fevered area, or to prevent it from spreading... (p. 203)
In Chapter 16 on "Astrology", speaking of ways to preserve water from demonic influence:
- Since the evil spirits were generally held responsible [for spoiling water], it was possible to adopt certain preventive measures, which were first mentioned in Western Germany in the thirteenth century, and from there spread throughout the Jewish communities of Europe. These entailed the suspension of a piece of iron in the water... (p. 258)
Symbols, of course, can have more than one meaning, yet a Jewish influence on Freemasonry is undeniable. It was, then, with interest that I discovered this Jewish practice of using metal to ward off evil spirits, and compared it to the careful Masonic practice of insuring that the candidate for the First Degree of Freemasonry be stripped of all metal, which would, in the Jewish magical idiom make him vulnerable to diabolical influence.
ENDURING THE CHRISTMAS SEASON
Among the more difficult tasks that each of us face in life is the moment that comes when parents are no longer capable of caring for themselves independently. Ours may not be typical, but on both sides of our family there has been a member who fought tooth and nail against changes in living arrangements.
My mother had Alzheimers and was determined to remain in her home until she died. She could no longer hear the phone when it rang, nor could she dial a phone number to seek help in an emergency. The neighbors had to call the police to get her smoke detector siren shut off. She couldn't hear it. She claimed she had written the combination to the back door lock on the house siding so that she wouldn't forget it and be locked out (though I never did find it written there). Social Services interviewed her to see if I could have her declared incompetent and force changes in her living arrangements, and concluded it would not pass muster with the judge. Her doctor didn't want her to live alone. Finally, with the help of her doctor I was able to have her admitted to the hospital, and transported from there to a nursing home. Then for two years she begged me at every visit as well as over the phone to take her home, and threatened to walk home (though she didn't try it). I cried so much over this transition to the nursing home that I had no tears left for her funeral. It was an experience I would not wish on my worst enemy. She died in 2001 at age 92.
Another 95-year-old family member who has no children of her own, who has been close to our family over the years, who is age 95, and who also resisted the move, fell at home, broke her hip, and was transported from the hospital to the nursing home. Over last summer we spent hours cleaning out her house so that it can be sold. The house is now on the market along with all of the countless other houses that are not selling. It was an emotional trip for my husband and sister-in-law to clear out that house, as we all remember only too well the fun we had in that house in days gone by.
Now the time has come to make the transition for my 89-year-old mother-in-law. She, too, has resisted the move, saying several times that we would have to "take her out of her house feet first". Since she is no longer able to drive, has no close friends or neighbors nearby, and since she lives an hour or more away from us depending upon the time of day and the traffic, helping her there is not reasonable. We need to move her closer to us, and found a retirement facility that provides independent living and assisted living on the same campus, which looks like a good fit for her. But of course we are the enemies for forcing this move, and she is angry and resistant to all we try to do to make the move go smoothly. If we beg her not to pack boxes, she packs them anyway and then forgets what is in them. If we make a floor plan of her new apartment and show her which furniture can be taken, she laments that which must be left behind. She is constantly losing things we have told her not to move. Though she knows full-well the things which she can no longer handle, yet she tells us we think she is stupid because we don't let her do it, and hints that we are trying to mishandle her money. And the list goes on... She has always been in charge, and she is not about to change now. So there are arguments, and angry children. Having this drag on into the Christmas season means that none of us have any spirit this year. Christmas is merely a chore...we are going through the motions.
The move is scheduled to take place this week, so this blog is going to suffer. I spent yesterday helping to pack and there is still more to do. I'm posting this not in an effort to complain, but rather to let you know why you are looking here for new posts and not finding any.
