FRIENDSHIP - WOMEN AND MEN

"Friendship among Women:

A woman didn't come home one night.
The next morning she told her husband that she had slept over at a friend's house.
The man called his wife's ten best friends.
None of them knew anything about it.


Friendship among Men:

A man didn't come home one night.
The next morning he told his wife that he had slept over at a friend's house.
The woman called her husband's ten best friends.
Eight confirmed that he had slept over, and two said he was still there."


Cheers,
(and welcome back!)

Paul (A.)

I wouldn't swear an oath that I haven't posted this joke before, but if I have, enjoy again - or not, and don't blame me. Blame Paul (A.)

It IS good to be home. The journey was wonderful, but, it's true: There's no place like home.

LAST DAY TO PLANT YOUR VOTE FOR JERICHO ROAD EPISCOPAL HOUSING

Communities across the United States are ripe for renewal, ready to receive a complete fruit orchard provided by the Edy's Fruit Bars brand and the Fruit Tree Planting Foundation. Cast your vote for one of our Communities Take Root participants and help them reap the rewards of their own fresh fruit supply.

Help Jericho Road Episcopal Housing Initiative win by voting at Edy's Fruit Bars. Today is the last day to vote, so hurry on over.

Thanks to Ann for the link.

CAT CARTOONS

 

 

 

 

All you cat lovers, don't blame me. Blame Doug.

PS: I'm a cat lover, and I blame Doug.

THANK YOU, PETER TATCHELL

From Ekklesia:

The gay human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell has received a standing ovation at the Greenbelt Christian festival.

Speaking about “the struggle for queer freedom in Africa”, he attacked church leaders who condone homophobic abuse, but praised the “brave, heroic Christians who refuse to go along with the persecution of people who are gay, lesbian or bisexual”.

Greenbelt, one of Britain's largest Christian festivals, has drawn over 21,000 visitors over the weekend. Tatchell was speaking on Saturday evening (28 August).

Prior to the weekend, Tatchell had told Ekklesia that he was “looking forward” to the weekend and that, while not a Christian himself, “we have more in common than divides us”. The turnout suggests that few had heeded a call by the socially conservative group Anglican Mainstream, to boycott Greenbelt because of Tatchell's presence on the programme.

Tatchell drew enthusiastic applause from parts of the audience, and uncomfortable expressions from others, when he accused the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, of “colluding” with the persecution of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people in Africa.

“The Anglican Church and Archbishop Rowan Williams have a lot to answer for, because they have put church unity before human rights,” he said.

Perhaps those with "uncomfortable expressions" would do well to consider who follows the Gospel message, Peter Tatchell, who is no longer a Christian, or Archbishop Rowan Williams.

From Anglican Mainstream:

BOYCOTT GREENBELT if you want to safeguard vulnerable children, said an Anglican Mainstream consultant after her concerns over the presence of Peter Tatchell at this year’s festival were ignored.

Dr Lisa Nolland wrote an open letter to the festival organisers complaining about “the further gayification of Greenbelt,” following the invitation of the gay rights campaigner, which she saw as compounding damage done by inviting the Bishop of New Hampshire, the Rt Rev Gene Robinson, to speak last year.

Safeguard your children from gayification! Good grief! The pollution of the minds of the little ones from the presence of Bishop Gene Robinson at Greenbelt last year was bad enough.

Of course, the name Anglican Mainstream contains within itself the greatest of ironies.

Note to the ABC: Take lessons from Bishop Oscar Romero and Fr Roy Bourgeois.

“Let those who have a voice, speak out for the voiceless.”
Oscar Romero

Silence is the voice of complicity.
Fr. Roy Bourgeois

H/T to Timothy Kincaid at Box Turtle Bulletin for the photo and the link to Ekklesia.

WHERE WILL YOU PLANT YOUR VOTE?

Communities across the United States are ripe for renewal, ready to receive a complete fruit orchard provided by the Edy's Fruit Bars brand and the Fruit Tree Planting Foundation. Cast your vote for one of our Communities Take Root participants and help them reap the rewards of their own fresh fruit supply.

Help Jericho Road Episcopal Housing Initiative win by voting at Edy's Fruit Bars. You can vote once a day, but only two days are left after today to vote, so hurry on over.

Thanks to Ann for the link.

ALL AFRICA BISHOPS CONFERENCE

 

Archbishop Robert Duncan was included with the other Anglican primates during the opening Eucharist, and shared in the distribution of communion, as did the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams.

Oh me, oh my! At first, I thought the photo was not for real, but indeed it is.

From Lapin.

BOAT RIDE TO STAFFA AND TRESNISH ISLES

From the island of Mull, the mad three went by ferry to Ulva, where we took a boat ride to the Isle of Staffa and around Tresnish Isles. Below are a few of my pictures from the trip. As usual, click on the pictures to see the larger view.

 

The "Hoy Lass", our boat to the islands.

 

The sign in the loo, which I could not resist documenting for its cleverness and humor in strongly making its points.

 

Cormorants and one sea gull on a rock.

 

The fin of a basking shark.

 

Gorgeous scenery along the way.

 

The view from on high on the Isle of Staffa.



Fingal's Cave from Cathy's Facebook pictures. I did not make the descent to the cave, because the way looked tricky for an old lady. Cathy and MadChauffeur went and said it was wonderful. Now I wish I had gone.

If you are a Facebook friend of Cathy, you can see several sets of great pictures from our travels posted there.

 

A rock pool near Staffa, which I found enchanting.



The wake of the boat as we made our way back to Ulva.

All arrangements for the excursion were made by MadChauffeur. He seemed to thoroughly enjoy being IN CHARGE throughout the entire time he traveled with Cathy and me.

ARE TEA PARTIERS GRASS-ROOTS? I THINK NOT!

The must-read item for today is Frank Rich's column in the New York Times. Rich tells the fairly well-kept secret of just who incites, organizes, and funds the Tea Partiers.

ANOTHER weekend, another grass-roots demonstration starring Real Americans who are mad as hell and want to take back their country from you-know-who. Last Sunday the site was Lower Manhattan, where they jeered the “ground zero mosque.” This weekend, the scene shifted to Washington, where the avatars of oppressed white Tea Party America, Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin, were slated to “reclaim the civil rights movement” (Beck’s words) on the same spot where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. had his dream exactly 47 years earlier.

Vive la révolution!

There’s just one element missing from these snapshots of America’s ostensibly spontaneous and leaderless populist uprising: the sugar daddies who are bankrolling it, and have been doing so since well before the “death panel” warm-up acts of last summer. Three heavy hitters rule. You’ve heard of one of them, Rupert Murdoch. The other two, the brothers David and Charles Koch, are even richer, with a combined wealth exceeded only by that of Bill Gates and Warren Buffett among Americans. But even those carrying the Kochs’ banner may not know who these brothers are.

You've surely heard of Rupert Murdoch, but have you heard of the Koch brothers? I had not until I returned from Scotland a few days ago and read Jane Mayer's excellent and revealing profile of the two in The New Yorker, to which Rich links in his piece. To think that the Tea Partiers are saps enough to think that billionaires many times over have their interests at heart.

If you read Mayer's article, you learn that the Koch businesses are some of the worst polluters, and, of course, they spend millions lobbying against such regulatory agencies as the EPA.

Rich says:

When David Koch ran to the right of Reagan as vice president on the 1980 Libertarian ticket (it polled 1 percent), his campaign called for the abolition not just of Social Security, federal regulatory agencies and welfare but also of the F.B.I., the C.I.A., and public schools — in other words, any government enterprise that would either inhibit his business profits or increase his taxes. He hasn’t changed. As Mayer details, Koch-supported lobbyists, foundations and political operatives are at the center of climate-science denial — a cause that forestalls threats to Koch Industries’ vast fossil fuel business.

That's the Koch agenda. Tea Partiers, for heaven's sake, wake up! The Kochs and their ilk are playing you for fools.

JESUS AND MO

From Jesus and Mo.

OUR LADY OF THE DRIVEWAY - I REMEMBER KATRINA

Thanks to Athenae at First Draft for the photo and the title. She took this picture when she was in New Orleans at the end of March, when a group of us led by FD bloggers, Athenae and Scout Prime, gathered to gut a house, view the destruction, and squeeze in a little fun.

The statue of the Virgin Mary stood in a driveway with the head broken off, lying on the ground, but a kind person put the head back in place. The photo and the title struck me with such force when I first saw it that I have never forgotten it. The image of the statue of Mary in the driveway - "Mary, full of grace" as Athenae calls her - was the symbol of my destroyed and broken home town, my abandoned city, my beloved New Orleans - always full of grace to me.

Our Lady Of The Driveway

O Mary of the Driveway,
Broken like your city,
Your head lies on the ground.
A sorry sight, a sign,
A sign of devastation
Wrought by wind and water,
Angry blow and raging flow.

A passer-by, one of tender heart,
Sees and stops and mourns your head
Lying there apart,
And gently, gently takes it
And replaces it.
There. Our Lady's whole again.
Or so it seems. Or is it so?

(June Butler - 5-13-07)

I posted the picture, the commentary, and the poem first on May 13, 2007 and then again on the anniversary of Katrina in the years that followed. Until I change my mind, I will post the picture and the poem every year on the anniversary of Katrina and THE FEDERAL FLOOD, which, in New Orleans, was not a natural disaster but an ENGINEERING DISASTER. I remember the 1500 people who died in New Orleans and all those who loved them. I remember the 275,000 who lost their homes. I remember those who survived, but suffered through horrendous conditions in the days after Katrina. I remember those who have not returned to their home towns, and who want to, but can't find affordable housing. I remember those in Louisiana and Mississippi still struggling to recover and rebuild their homes and their lives.

Katrina - August 29, 2005