Personal space, and lack thereof

I don't think I'm a cold fish.  If someone wants a hug, I'll generally oblige.  But, ever since I  became a public minister of the church, I've noticed that people, including perfect strangers, possess a license, or think they do, the existence of which I was previously unaware, to reach out and touch me. 

What the flake?!

This was our weekend: the picture on the left was taken from my front stoop on Saturday morning.  The picture on the right was taken from the same spot on Sunday morning.  In between it snowed most of Saturday.  That's on April 27th.  I realize that for readers in Florida, or Alaska, accumulating snow in late April may not make much of an impression, but take it from me: in the southern Great Lakes region of the snow belt, it's not the norm.  I grocery shopped on Saturday morning in a futile attempt to beat the snow.  The grocery store scene was roughly what I'm given to understand grocery shopping is in Myrtle Beach on the eve of a hurricane landfall.  On Sunday morning at church, I wished I had a nickel for every parishioner who slapped me on the shoulder, grinned and said some variation of, "Merry Christmas!"  Good old climate change.  But at least we're not doing anything about it.

Colors of the holsters should match the season

  Another Sabbath, another synagogue shooting. Makeshift memorial with candles, balloons, teddy bears and flowers. The usual. Plus more than usual talk about arming churches and synagogues. After all, the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. Yee-haw!

 The state that was home to the Parkland school shooting and the aroused students who bothered our beloved lawmakers still bans guns in schools. But that is about to change in response to Parkland. Our beloved lawmakers are on the verge of OK-ing armed teachers to go with the armed security guards it has already thoroughly and enthusiastically endorsed.

 Now that we have to talk about churches, I suppose the solution will be weapons training for priests and deacons.

 The good guys in the congregation have guns already.

Taking risks

This is the text of the homily I preached today.  Today's readings, the 2nd Sunday of Easter, are here.  If some of this feels like deja vu, it's because I based this content on a post from yesterday - if I'm not mistaken, that's the first time I've posted something here at NewGathering and then had it turn into a homily.

Thoughts on Divine Mercy Sunday

The first Sunday after Easter was officially designated as Divine Mercy Sunday in 2000, the same year that St. Faustina Kowalska, the Divine Mercy visionary, was canonized.

Risk-taking quiz whiz

While looking in the NY Times online edition for something else, I came upon this interview with the man who is setting "Jeopardy!" records, James Holzhauer.

Bernie Organizing Day Today

Bernie's Campaign Predicts His Own Blue Wave in 2020

I just returned from the local (Mentor, Ohio) organizing kick off meeting for  Bernie Sanders, the content of which is described in the above link.

We had about 20 people, roughly evenly divided between the elderly and the young, men and women. The meeting was organized by a young woman of college age. She did a good job of dividing us up into a groups that did not know each other, and left our discussions develop over sufficient time that they were productive without becoming boring. 

The video that featured Bernie was targeted on the Bern app which will allow people to be their own organizers and recruiters feeding into a system that will track people to be sure that they are registered and then vote. It is like opening more that 4700 field offices today. Obama made a great deal about organizing his campaign. For the second term he built a large computerized get out the vote effort.

As presently scheduled Ohio's presidential primary will take place on Tuesday, March 10, one week after Super Tuesday.  However, it may be moved back to May where it is in non-presidential elections. 

Ohio Will Consider Moving its Primary Back to May

I brought up the issue of our incumbent Republican Representative with the young organizer. She agreed with me that it was just as important that we replace him as getting Bernie elected. She noted my name and said that she would be in contract with me as things develop. So maybe we will have a grass roots organization that makes a blue wave.