A great leveling should occur - NOW!
I have just been reading about the scuffling that took place somewhere in Australia during the last few hours. It seems that the Prime Minister lost her shoe. Pity!
It seems the Aborginal peoples there were "rumbling" about their loss of a whole continent - a great deal more than a mere shoe! I, of course, sympathize with them. Europeans (and others) swiped land - just as Europeans (and others) swiped land from the native peoples of the North American continent. This has gone on since the earliest of times on planet Earth.
This is what is going on in the so-called Holy Land. Palestinians were "robbed" of their land by the Zionist Israelis when the State of Israel was created at the end of World War II.
Which brings to my mind the Republican contest for who will be the nominee of their party in the 2012 U.S. Presidential election. I read where Mitt Romney is a very wealthy man who pays less taxes on his income than the average U.S. citizen. Hmmmmmm!
I'm for a great leveling. There is an old saying: "Behind every fortune is a crime!" I believe that.
Anyone who is gaining much should be giving much to those around him or her. It's that simple. It's biblical. "Those who have gathered much should share with others so that ALL have enough!" Look it up!
I'm thinking about some of my relatives who were made wealthy by the sheer good luck (and maybe a little criminality) of the discovery of oil upon land over which they had or gained control.
That ain't fair! It's like what is making the native peoples mad in what is now called Australia.
I think it is time for a great leveling! Call it what you like, but it is time for a great re-distribution of wealth across the face of the planet. NO ONE should have more than another. If you have MORE gumption, then, thank the Creator for your talent or your industry. But sharing is what life should be about!
Tuesday, January 24: This from the Internet: "POPE TO THE WORLD: QUIET DOWN."
From Phoebe NATANSON and the AP: Pope Benedict XVI is asking everyone to quiet down. In his annual “communications message”, Benedict extolled the sounds of silence. He said a little bit of quiet makes people better listeners and better communicators by giving them more time to reflect on what they’re hearing and saying. And in a world inundated by Tweets and 24-hour news coverage, that precious time to think gives words greater value, the pontiff said. “Joy, anxiety and suffering can all be communicated in silence — indeed it provides them with a particularly powerful mode of expression,” he said in his written message.
Benedict has in recent years used this message to comment on social media, urging priests to blog and Catholics who spread the faith on Facebook and other social networks to be respectful. This year, his attention turned to the need to tune out the social media information overload. “By remaining silent, we allow the other person to speak, to express him or herself, and we avoid being tied simply to our own words and ideas without them being adequately tested.” And he noted that sometimes the most authentic communication takes place in utter silence, “between people who are in love: gestures, facial expressions and body language are signs by which they reveal themselves to each other.”
Sunday, January 22: This morning I awoke to begin meditating upon the interaction of the spiritual with the material. Hmmmmmm!
How the spiritual and the material live, side by side, is a VERY interesting topic. Think about it!
I will only mention one aspect: let's hope your spiritual "forces" are in line with the HOLY Spiritual forces, and that those have the deeper influence in your life.
I will also mention the prayer Our Blessed Lord, Jesus, taught us to pray: "Let us NOT be led into temptation, and deliver us from evil." Just praying that part of His prayer will keep a soul busy!
Saturday, January 21:
Friday, January 20:
Wednesday, January 18:
Tuesday, January 17: All the latest technological devices and navigational safeguards cannot protect passengers who ship out on a boat guided by a captain who decides to sail on uncharted waters.
Monday, January 16: Those members of the United States military who were videotaped urinating upon the dead bodies of Afghans should be dishonorably discharged, in accordance with standard military procedures, as swiftly as possible.
The United States has a code of acceptable behavior for its soldiers. When that code starts slipping, the United States military will crumble soon afterward, and with that, so will the nation.
Sunday, January 15: I shouldn't joke about the tragedy that happened to those who were on the Mediterranean cruise. It is a very serious occurrence, and that it happened on the first day of the cruise, a Friday, the 13th day of January, is another matter.
A full investigation is underway and every detail of the cruise - the ship running aground, the evacuation procedures, etc., the conduct of the ship's captain and crew, etc., - will be examined minutely.
What I am concerned about - a total un-expert on the subject of pleasure cruises - is the size of these luxury cruise ships. My lord! Talk about tempting fate!
I worry about riding an elevator with more than two persons on board. Even riding a passenger bus with others besides the driver makes me nervous. The idea of vacationing with thousands on a cruise ship is my idea of Hell itself!
I could not be paid enough to ship out on one of those crowded cruise ships! I won't even think of flying in one of those Boeing "Dreamliners." Maybe I'll take an Amtrak somewhere. Maybe!
Meanwhile, I am praying for the captain of the Costa Concordia, Master Francesco Schettino. I'll bet he has an opinion about Friday, the 13th.
Saturday, January 14: Now I know why I felt the urge not to go on that Mediterranean cruise! My sixth sense told me to stay home! Stay on land and say your prayers, Tony!
Just to think of all that aggravation, and how much money I saved.
Friday, January 13: I think I will opt out of writing an entry for today.
Thursday, January 12: Another sign of aging is watching what's familiar disappearing. You know you are old when two things happen. The first is when you realize the pope is a contemporary. The second is when buildings you saw being constructed begin to be torn down as outdated.
One such building is being demolished in Huntsville, Texas. It's the site of what was the famous Texas Prison Rodeo. This arena was built in the early '50s late in the prison rodeo's years.
I actually wrote the biography of the man who came up with the idea of the prison rodeo. His name was W. Albert Lee. Lee was a native of Lavaca County, Texas, but he moved with his family to Houston as a boy. He sold newspapers on the streets, but he died much wealthier. He and my maternal grandfather, William Robertson, Sr., were business partners for a time.
I wrote the biography of Mr. Lee as my thesis for the Master's Degree at the University of Texas at Austin in 1971. The title was "W. Albert Lee, Pioneer of Houston Television."
Mr. Lee built the first television station in Houston and almost in Texas. The station, KLEE-TV, began broadcasting within days after another station in Fort Worth. Mr. Lee was famous for his rodeos down in Houston. He also created the rodeo feature of the Houston Fat Stock Show which was going under financially in the 30s. He always led the rodeo parade, riding down Houston's Main Street on a white horse bearing a saddle loaded down with silver.
Mr. Lee was also politically active in state government and was appointed to the Texas Prison board by either Governor O'Daniel or Coke Stevenson. It was while he was heading the prison board that he conceived of the rodeo at the prison - to give the inmates something to improve their sad condition.
I remember reading a document in Mr. Lee's papers in his daughter's possession while researching his life. It was a letter from the pastor of Bering Memorial Methodist Church of Harold Street in Houston. Brother Slater, the pastor, was taking Mr. Lee to task for "profaning the Lord's Day." Sundays should not be used for anything entertaining, the Methodist pastor wrote. That comment, in itself, is from another age. My, how times have changed.
I might add Mr. Lee's daughter, Mary Alice Lee, lived in LaGrange, Texas, where I went a number of times to view the documents and photographs in her collection. I always told my then wife, Rosemary: "If anything happens to me on my way to or from LaGrange, whatever you say, don't mention I was on my way to LaGrange!" That was in the days before radio talk show commentator Marvin Zindler saw to it that the Chicken Ranch was closed down and ultimately destroyed.
Mr. Lee was a great Texan. He, of course, would share my embarrassment over the likes of the recent and current state governors: New Haven, Connecticut-born George W. Bush and, certainly, of that small-town cowboy and motorcycle-rider Rick Perry.
Read about the Texas Prison Rodeo arena finally torn down.
Tuesday, January 10:
Monday, January 09: Make plans to go to the event to honor the late Gloria Rodriguez tomorrow (Tuesday, January 10, at 4:30 p.m.) at the street corner in front of the Crockett Hotel. She died last week while working there as a housekeeper, falling six floors in a freight elevator shaft.
Gloria is an example of the women I said yesterday should be adored by men. She was a mother, too! All men, especially, should take time to honor Gloria tomorrow at the Crockett Hotel behind the historic Alamo.
Men, and women, too, should unite behind the cause of hotel housekeepers everywhere as they struggle for living wages and safe circumstances on the job. It's hard enough to do the house work in a hotel; having to put up with the bad behavior of some hotel "guests" is beyond what should be required of anyone.
Read about the housekeepers' union at "Unite Here".
Sunday, January 08: Let's be honest. Let's not be like the ex-auxiliary bishop of San Diego. He was a father of two daughters in secret while he collected the pay of a celibate priest and even a hierarch of the Roman Catholic Church for a decade. How dishonest! How tragic! How sick! How probably typical!
Every morning I re-light a votive candle before an image of Our Lady of Guadalupe - which I look upon throughout the hours of every day. It is on the wall of my bedroom/study - I extinguish it every night before I go to sleep - since that very recent nighttime tragic fire in Connecticut which claimed the lives of twin girls and their sister and their grandparents. I'm forcing myself to become more honest as I come closer and closer to my own time of departure from this mortal body. The flame of a candle has probably caused more deaths over the ages than even weapons of war!
So I am trying to become honest - to prepare for the moment when I stand, or rather kneel, before the Judgment Seat of Eternity.
Let me be perfectly honest. I will no longer light a candle before the "virgin" mother of Jesus. I will light a fire before the "Blessed Mother" of Jesus. I WILL ALWAYS CALL THE MOTHER OF JESUS BLESSED! Jesus did have a mother, after all. Not much else is actually known about him - except that he was hung and died upon a cross. Some doubt that.
Now I light a candle to pay much more respect to the Blesséd Mother - that she has endured gossip about the nature of her motherhood. AND I pay her much more respect BECAUSE I consider her THE representative of motherhood AND womanhood throughout the ages of the religion called Christianity.
Women deserve absolute ADORATION from all members of the opposite gender! Men (and boys) should kneel in total honor before every woman (and girl) every time they (women and girls) are encountered. The very idea that men (and boys) have "ordered" women (and girls) to wait upon them as servants to them WILL CALL DOWN UPON MANKIND millions of years of utmost penitence in Purgatory BEFORE they might be granted mercifully a second-place behind WOMANKIND in heaven.
So I am waking up to honesty, at least, to my sins and transgressions against the fairer gender. I won't use the s-word. Too many connotations to that word!
All Hail to the Blesséd Mother, and members of her gender! Let humanity pay homage to Motherhood every moment of every day and night. Let every man bring a cup of coffee, or stronger liquid, to serve humbly to the next maid or matron he encounters. And wait patiently, with his eyes fixed upon her hands, until he is dismissed! So be it! Ame- - err - A-women!
Saturday, January 07: Zbigniew Brzezinsk, a former national security adviser to a U.S. President, has written some disturbing analysis of reasons to WINCE at the direction in world affairs.
Looks like an agenda for some heavy-duty international intercession.
I urge you to read carefully what Mr. Brzezinsk has written and published in the Washington Post and around the nation.
Analysis by Zbigniew Brzezinsk
Friday, January 06:
All Life! Hmmmmmm! All life? Every living thing? Hmmmmmm! Now wait a minute, Spirit! I don't know if I can handle this. All LIFE? What about those MEAN beings out there - those beings who want to eat me, or, at the least, to rush in front of me to the head of the line for lunch? I'm supposed to love ALL LIFE?
OH! I understand. I'm to love them, not necessarily to like them. That's the meaning of "tough love." I get it: it's tough for me to love 'em even though I do not like 'em.
I'm beginning to get the drift of the NURTURE the Blesséd Mother is talking about. "Mother Love embraces ALL the children - Mother Love NURTURES even the difficult ones!"
So NOW I understand. I'm to be a blesséd mother to every living being - nice or not - and to nurture every living being - in ways that help "normal" development.
"Can I spank the 'mean' children though?"
Oh! Only wince! To give them the idea that I don't enjoy what he or she or it has done. I'm catching on! This is going to be hard - to follow the example you are setting. You mean I can't organize an army to destroy them and their tanks and, even, their WMD. I can only WINCE!
This is going to take a lot of practice: wincing - wincing - WINCING!
Hmmmmmm. Being a member of the Community of the Blesséd Mother will NOT be easy! I'm going to have to practice wincing.
WINCE! WINCE!
Thursday, January 05:
Furthermore, Jack Gerard needs to wake up to realize there's more to life than petroleum: there's the oil of human kindness.
Read what I've written below to understand what I'm writing about now.
I know something about how oil has ruined the lives of many people, including some of my close relatives.
Thank God I have been protected from being corrupted by "oil money."
I grew up in Houston and I know all about the Glenn McCarthys of this world, and the Hugh Roy Cullens and his family. And I know about George H. W. Bush and his simpleton son, George W., who led America into a senseless war in Iraq.
I know about Halliburton and its idiots. And I know how John D. Rockefeller and his sons and their heirs, Nelson and David, further corrupted American life.
What this world needs now is another Ida Tarbell to blow the whistle on Jack Gerard and his American Petroleum Institute's nonsense about the Canada to Texas pipeline.
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Someone needs to warn Jack Gerard he is making a "huge mistake" to try to rush President Obama to approve the Canada-to-Texas pipeline.
Obama is looking out for the welfare of Americans FIRST, oil interests last!
Oil interests are concerned ONLY for how much money they can wrest from the environment regardless of safety!
Jack Gerard needs to go soak his head in a bucket of crude! He needs to be "oil-boarded" until he joins with environmentalists to be absolutely certain the pipeline is safe!
According to the AP, "Jack Gerard, president of the American Petroleum Institute, said it would be a "huge mistake" for President Barack Obama to reject the 1,700-mile, Canada-to-Texas pipeline. Obama faces a Feb. 21 deadline to decide whether the $7 billion pipeline is in the national interest."
Read more: Oil Pipeline
I am tired of sleazy oil types trying to ramrod their industry programs through our government to get rich quicker!
Slow down, you oilers! You're nothing but a bunch of grease monkeys!
Wednesday, January 04:
WORKER SAFETY, WORKER SECURITY! This is what 2012 should be all about!
Ultimately, 2012 should be about safety and security for all people - regardless of their economic status, regardless of where they are on this celestial planet. People matter - as do all beings - including all life, vegetables, and even what are called weeds.
Tragically, last week a worker fell to her death in an elevator shaft in a downtown San Antonio hotel. How awful! Sixty-five-year-old Gloria Rodriguez was dragging a cart full of clean linens into a freight elevator which wasn't there. The door opened. She expected the usual. She fell six floors to the bottom of the shaft at the Crockett Hotel on the east side of the Alamo.
I have sent the following letter to San Antonio mayor Julian Castro who has not been quoted by the local media. He needs to make some sort of statement - about the sacredness of human life - about all life.
Here is the text of my letter to Mayor Castro:
Dear Mayor Castro,
May you use your office as Mayor of San Antonio to declare PEACE and SAFETY for all workers in this city.
It is well and good that San Antonio offers peace and safety for visitors and tourists! How nice for our visitors to be safe while in our fair city.
HOWEVER, your honor, it is ESSENTIAL that you MUST require all owners and managers of places of hospitality to operate their establishments by the utmost standards of safety for workers!
NO MORE ACCIDENTS in the workplace - as the one that took the life of 65-year-old housekeeper Gloria Rodriguez at the Crockett Hotel this past week.
An official investigation may prove that the Crockett management was derelict in having the freight elevator timely and properly inspected, as per state requirements.
I also recall that a worker fell many floors to his death while the Grand Hyatt Hotel was under construction.
Too many workers are being deprived of their lives while laboring to ensure the pleasure of visitors to this city.
YOU, SIR, are mayor of the workers you invite to support you as you seek reelection.
Make certain, Mr. Mayor, those who control our businesses do their jobs!
I hope you are able to attend the meeting to honor Gloria Rodriguez in front of the Crockett Hotel - where she died as an innocent worker - on Tuesday, January 10, at 4 p.m.
I would like to shake your hand, Mr. Mayor, as you promise all of us you will campaign for a safe and peaceful city in EVERY workplace! Sir, also see to it that owners and managers promise to provide jobs paying a living wage!
End of letter.
I am looking forward to a positive response from Mayor Castro.
Tuesday, January 03:
PERRY, Iowa (AP) — A funny thing happened recently in the presidential campaign in Iowa: The last Republican president's name actually surfaced.
"We've had, in the past, a couple of presidents from Texas that said they weren't interested in wars ... like George W. Bush," a voter said to Ron Paul, the Texas congressman who has been sharply critical of U.S. military entanglements overseas. "My question is: How can we trust another Texan?"
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Oh well! I'm going to have to work harder at keeping my New Year's resolutions. I'm not being very good today! I keep breaking several. I'm an old dog, and I'm not learning new ways. I think I am lost!
Monday, January 02:
Brother Tony's Top Ten New Year's Resolutions
I. Smile more! Set firmly on my face a pleasant smile while adjusting my collar in my morning mirror. Get rid of that customary conceited and arrogant Anglo smirk!
II. Especially be nicer to persons I do not like! Always allow them the right-of-way in elevators, hallways, sidewalks, and to be first in line - on the plank or to the gallows!
III. ALWAYS adopt a pleasantly POSITIVE position on ALL topics, regardless. Even give hearty thanks there are not too many more Republicans!
IV. Cease being such a knee-jerk critic; stop being so judgmental of stupid people, especially low-class riders of public transportation and those who play noise at excessive decibel levels in parks and plazas thinking they are disseminating music.
V. Do my own laundry by hand - wash my own socks and unmentionables in my kitchen sink - rather than use a slavish machine. Avoid all machines when possible!
VI. With all due respect to President Barack Obama and the entrepreneurial spirit, AVOID spending money - especially on myself and on the machinations of my inner devilishly-prone fallen fleshy nature.
VII. Embrace a philanthropic approach to those in less fortunate circumstances than myself. Share! Do not hoard goodies! Absolutely!
VIII Think (and pray) globally! Get beyond the local mindset (and let San Antonio hang by its own noose, you goose!)
IX. Stay home more - enjoy the confines of my providentially provided cell. Learn to luxuriate where I am.
X. Send many fewer emails - always suggest to a recipient of my drivel to punch the "DELETE" key rather than "OPEN."
(and many more resolutions which keep popping
into my tormented mind)
Sunday, January 01:
The beginning of a new year: "Hello! 2012! Be good to humanity and all created beings, Please!"
At the Stroke of Midnight
Let me begin my comments for this new day and this new month and this new year with an appeal to everyone: "Think PEACE for Jerusalem, and, particularly, for those who are being persecuted by the Zionists of Israel - by those who are a special criminal element - who are ruining the reputation of the Jewish people who I have always held in high regard."
I urge you to read the material linked to below AND to become involved in the campaign to free the Palestinian people from the tyranny of the Zionists.
Become involved for true Peace in Jerusalem and all of the Holy Land and become involved in the forthcoming Global March to Jerusalem which is being planned for early in 2012!
Global March to Jerusalem
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If my readers will permit me, I am repeating my greetings for the First of December, 2011. I am still praying for this birthday wish.
Thursday, December 01:
Welcome to December! This is my birthday month. I will be 77 years old on the 27th day of December. My! My!
I'm going to reveal, ahead of time, before I blow out the candles on my birthday cake, my birthday wish!
Ready? My wish is for the Contemplative Community of the Blessed Mother to gain members, besides myself.
"Lord, only two or three need gather in Your Name to give birth to the community to honor your mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Blesséd Mother. Let it happen! Amen!"
The Contemplative Community of the Blesséd Mother, in addition to intercessory prayer, also has as its intention and 'calling' to maintain the 'Ralph Ransom Reading Room, for the development of higher consciousness.'
I know this is quite a wish! But it is backed up by the double SEVEN. SEVEN is a special, holy number.
"So, Lord: Seventy times seven on the twenty-seventh! I ask this special wish! Amen!"
Anyone can read at the link below about the concept of
The Contemplative Community
of the Blesséd Mother
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Brother Tony Hearn CBM
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(Link To Comments from December 2011)
Return to Tony's Journal
Email To Brother Tony Hearn CBM
© 2012 by Brother Tony Hearn CBM
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