Senator Ted Kennedy *sigh*

The *sigh* is because this just isn't a topic I want to blog about. It's the type of thing I'd more like to discuss in person with small groups, perhaps while having tea. But I know that people will wonder what I think, so here it is.

First of all, people are saved by grace (through faith) not works. So you can forget all the fund raising, the caring nice guy, etc regarding whether he achieves heaven or not. Being a good charitable Christian is expected of a Christian, not a check off list for salvation. Faith and God given grace are required for entry to heaven.

For those who do not understand the faith vs. works issue, here's a simple analogy. Millions of believers have achieved heaven who have never had the financial means to perform "good deeds" as people refer to them today. It's only the modern mindset that thinks that donations and legislation for "good causes" issues a "get in heaven easy pass." Millions and millions of people who have lived during the past thousand years by scratching the fields with a stick and keeping their families from starving have achieved heaven without "good deeds" because they had belief and faith in the one God, through Jesus Christ. I hope that helps you to understand that if you really honor the poor, you recognize that entry into heaven is for the poor who believe but who are unable to "perform good deeds," "fund raise" or "lobby for good causes."

Having said that, as I've repeatedly said, God has provided a means for genuine confession and repentance for sins. Only the Senator's confessor knows the status of his completeness in availing himself of that process, instituted and promised by Jesus Christ himself. Denying him a church funeral Mass would be churlish and wrong, assuming a knowledge that one simply does not possess, which is between him and God, and witnessed by his confessor priest.

My far greater worry is that many men and women of influence, in politics, government and law enforcement, have accepted assistance in their office from providers of false idols (money) and those who practice occult beliefs (influence). If Senator Kennedy has tainted his Roman Catholic beliefs with either idolatry or occult beliefs, even if he did "only a little of it," that would, of course, put him in a very precarious position with God. I really hope that he neither did this, but frankly, so many do and are in dire peril of their souls, and thus I also hope that if he did that he genuinely repented and confessed before his passing.

RIP.

Prayers needed for permanent Uganda peace

This is a good article about the current status of trying to bring to final peace Uganda's LRA headed by Kony. One of my longest standing prayer intentions is that Kony will return to sanity, realizing he is not Jesus Christ (no one is Jesus but the one Jesus who is in heaven), repent, and I'd like even more than punishment that he join a mainstream Christian church and work as a civilian volunteer to rebuild the society he has destroyed and the lives he has shattered.


http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080321.wuganda21/BNStory/International/home

Forgiveness of egregious sin not mandatory

There is a common misunderstanding about the forgiveness of sins. People who smoke dope while quoting Jesus are particularly prone to this misunderstanding, but others have drifted into unorthodox understanding of the forgiveness of sins.

If the person you have wronged dies, or has something irretrievably harmful done to them, you may very well be screwed no matter how "sorry" you say you are, if you waited so long that you either missed the chance or the person has suffered in a way that cannot be re-mediated. In the first case the person has died and so cannot forgive you, and in the second case, they are not obligated to forgive you. You cannot quote the "Our Father" to them and force them to forgive you; God will not stand for that. The Our Father refers to a pattern of a forgiving mind set; it is not a mechanism to force a good Christian who has been grievously wronged to forgive you. There is much in what Jesus said and also in the older scriptures about the need for prompt and thorough remediation of the wrong performed by your sin, and it is only after penance and remediation that forgiveness might take place, both by the person wronged and by God. If you have waited so long that the person has suffered grievously, or God forbid, has died before you repent, there is no Christian obligation to forgive and you may well not be forgiven. If the person who refuses to forgive has led an otherwise forgiving life, then God will not judge them as unforgiving and instead, God will render justice on the wronged person's behalf.