GAY-RIGHTS/GAY-MARRIAGE AND BLACK PEOPLE

CALLING THE QUESTION ON GAY RIGHTS, GAY-MARRIAGE AND US Once certain "liberal", so-called, African American leaders had allowed, indeed solicited, "gay rights and gay marriage groups and money," to assume the same status, stature of legal equivalence to that of the blacks' who had long labored almost alone; who had been too-long-denied any citizenship rights, they had not only betrayed our rich legacy, that is rooted in African American history, creativity, struggle, faith, courage, sacrifice; but, they had also enrolled, enriched, emboldened as our so-called "allies," those discrete groups of homosexual persons who had brought black struggle too-little of anything to be of consequence to our equation. Having solicited those who brought little more than atheism, hedonism, corruption, all stumbling blocks, to the hard-fought, centuries-long battle fight for our citizenship rights, that dates back to African barracoons, slaveships, plantations, auction blocks, "Jim Crow," mis-education, mass incarceration, that has costed us uncounted lives! Our many sacrifices have costed them nothing! Such so-called "leaders" are actually mis-leaders! Mixing the good with bad; the fair and the foul, for what, for whom? Our authentic historical leaders have been men and women who have been disproportionately Christian, Bible-reading, ethical, opponents of all kinds of homosexuality. Thus, the social tail now wags the dog, polluting, diluting our divine imagination that has empowered our participation in the fight for freedom, justice, equality; now, on a final thrust to victory in year 2019 and beyond! This is not condemnation of any particular group of persons' sexual preferences, lifestyle changes, nor gender choices. People will do as they may or desire, anyway. This is strictly limited to what is written above about the unnecessary, unwarranted, commingling, aggregation of the long, historic black struggle with the twenty-first century political celebration of gay-anyway/gay-anything. All of our forebears (gay or straight) were, and are, surely descendants of heterosexual beings, whatever their choice may later be.

REMEMBERING

REMEMBERING OLD FRIENDS Several years ago, I learned of the deaths of three of my friends from Howard University and Cook Hall: Buddy Smallwood , Sly, & Maatum . We were tight, socializing together as we brothers were wont to do back in the day, around the way. I had not seen them since the 1970s. Imagine my surprise, when, in the early 2000s in a seminar at the National Bar Association annual convention, there was a lawyer from Rahway , New Jersey, who knew me; who informed me that they were dead. We had spent one night at Buddy's parents' home there on one occasion. His mother had barbecued a fish for us guys to eat, I shall never forget. It was very tasty, delicious, despite nutritional novelty, to one more accustomed to ribs , tips, or other cuts of pork. Reading tonight about "Maat" the ancient Egyptians' ethical credo of justice, balance , beauty, fairness, and order, my mind drifted back to my friend Maatum from Philadelphia. He was a ladies' man, suave, quiet, erect. My mind flashed to him on sight of that word, thence to Buddy & Sly. Funny how that happens. Peace ✌🏿

MISSOURI "APPLES" REFLECTIONS

MISSOURI APPLES 🍎 Crisp early-fall mornings like this one remind me of apples. Crisp red, green, yellow apples of our mid-Missouri locale, come along with our annual harvests of its as nice pumpkins, corn, watermelon. Back in the early 1990s, while convalescing from life-changing surgery, I used to drive aimlessly alone down Hwy 24 into the heart of apple country, to clear my soul. It ran roughly east-west northerly of and somewhat parallel to, the Missouri River, through what I later learned was termed "Little Dixie," owing to the dense concentration of African slaves in this part of the state. I learned these demographic facts a few years later, when I was assigned the Brooks Chapel AME Church ministry as pastor in Butler, Missouri, 60 miles south of Kansas City, in Bates County, Missouri, in 1995. That was where I began my serious study of our state's and our nation's dramatic Civil War history. Getting back to apples, this may be a good time to make an apple pie.

FEMALE EQUALITY IN KEMET

WOMEN WERE EQUAL TO MEN IN ANCIENT EGYPT UNDER THE LAW "Uniquely for the ancient world, women in pharaonic Egypt enjoyed a legal status equal to that of men. Wives could testify against their husbands in a court of law. Women maintained control over their own property even after marrying (property acquired jointly by a married couple belonged one-third to the wife and two-thirds to the husband). And women were free to dispose of their wealth as they wished. "The last point is amply demonstrated in the last will and testament of Naunakht, a woman of modest means, who lived in the mid Twentieth Dynasty, at the end of the New Kingdom. A remarkable and fascinating survival, the papyrus document was drawn up in the presence of fourteen named witnesses in the third year of the reign of Ramses V; it can be dated with remarkable precision to November 1147 B.C. In it, Naunakht sets forth how she wants her property to be divided after her death." P. 133, "The Will of Naunakht," WRITINGS OF ANCIENT EGYPT, translated and edited by Toby Wilkinson (2006)  [image is of "Homreheb," the law-giver of the 18th Dynasty of Kemet. He was Preceptor of the boy-king, Tutankhamen, who later, after "Ay," became Pharaoh himself @ 1200 BC, when he added strength to the much more ancient law of MAAT, to expel corruption and lucre out of his country by reforming officials and/or punished or banished them]

NARRATIVE OF SOJOURNER TRUTH

I tremble as I finished re-reading the saga of how the newly freed "Isabella" of New York was able to retrieve her son who had been sold into slavery, contrary to state law; the law that should have freed him, her, all in New York on July 4, 1827. Being illiterate and obviously quite ignorant of the judicial mechanisms of retrieval of her stolen son, she nevertheless set out to do just that. First, an unnamed person directed her to the home of some Quakers, the one sect with any sympathy for the plight of the formerly enslaved. They helped her; put her up for the night in a bed that was "nice, high, clean, white, and beautiful." The bed intimidated her. She was used to the "floor as her bedstead." But she slept in it, so as not to offend her kind, true-Christian hosts, who took her to the Court the next morning. She was told to ask for the grand jury to tell her complaint. Not knowing what a grand jury was , she walked up to the most auspicious -looking man she saw, and asked him if he was the grand jury? He told her to seek it upstairs. After several similar encounters, she eventually found where the grand jury was sitting and related her grievance about her son's sale. They had her to swear out that what she was saying was true on a book. She swore on it with her lips. She was instructed to raise her hand, and a writ was sealed; given to her with instructions to give it to the constabulary for service on the offending party for law-breaking. Regrettably, the constable served the brother of the true criminal who escaped across the North River and laid low, till he could arrange to travel to Alabama to bring back the boy of Isabella, his former slave. He sailed in the fall and returned with the boy in the spring. Upon being told that she would have to wait for several months, before the Court could adjudicate the child's custody, she cried out in grief, wailing and walking about until a "perfect stranger " appeared from nowhere to ask about her pursuit of her son. She told him all. In turn he told her to go to the house of Lawyer Demain and beseech his assistance . She did. He required $5.00 to help her, but said he could get her son for her within 24 hours of receiving payment . She explained that she had no means of getting $5.00, as she had never had a dollar in her life. He told her to get the $5.00 from the Quakers, who had first shown her to the Court. She did. They gave her substantially more than $5.00. She hurried back the 10 miles to Lawyer Demain's house and gave him all the money that they had given her. He then renewed his promise of 24 hours later to have her son. He used bail bonds men, since $600 bail bond was posted by the wrongful seller to be free. "The famous Matty Styles," was used, who would have "the boy and his master on hand, in due season, either dead or alive." Meanwhile , she was told to rest up at a designated place and he would come for her, which he did. Sure enough, the boy was procured but a hearing in Court was needed as the boy was denying that he even had a mother and instead was craving his master who had brought him back from Alabama . The boy had been beaten on the trip back . Brainwashed and trained what to say, the judge sensed what was afoot. He told the boy to look only to him not the master. After hearing from Lawyer Demain and Isabella, the judge finally awarded her son to her. But the poor child was still terrified of its own mother. Eventually with quiet words and bon-bons they quieted his fears. The mother inspected his body and found horrendous scars and bruises, which he described as "nothing," compared to what his older sister had received. He said that she had had a baby and was beaten so badly that blood and milk ran out of her together. She was "scary !" He said not him . [The foregoing recitation is but an abbreviation of the truthful account that is set forth in NARRATIVE OF SOJOURNER TRUTH, "The Hour Is Darkest Before Dawn " 2007), p. 47-52, was told to Olive Gilbert, by Sojourner Truth, her companion ] Image may contain: 1 person

READING PARITY?

People who do not read are in the same spot as people who cannot read .

THE LIFE, YOUR LIFE, MY LIFE

THE LIFE, YOUR LIFE, MY LIFE The greatest mystery of life is the mere fact of the existence life itself. How can it be? What is it? What is its Source? Where does it go after Death, if anyplace. Is it elsewhere? These life questions are thoughts that drive mankind's communities, philosophies, religions, sciences, mathematics, arts/crafts, music, agriculture, navigation, literature, government, culture, medicine. The end and means of all human things is life. Towards life's embellishment and/or enrichment they are aimed. Inside all the above life questions, more narrowly, more particularly, more powerfully, more persistently, more selfishly, are the "why-what-whence-hence-whither" questions embodied in "me-my-I" at its roots. There I must leave you to your own ideas, thoughts, reflections, on life and on your own life, as I do mine. "The life is more than meat and the body is more than raiment." Lk 12:23. https://www.google.com/…/%3fsearch=Luke+12%253A23&version=K…

BABIES REMEMBER

I remember standing in my crib when a jar of molasses exploded on the iron stove on the farm. Scared the dickens out of me. I remember bouncing in the bed, when my sister, Schleria, was a baby and she bounced onto the floor and began crying. I remember getting my hand slammed in a car door, as we were leaving church one night. I have other memories too. In each of those described, I was no older than 3, if that.

ILLITERACY? NO PROBLEM!

Earlier today, September 26, 2017, I wrote on Facebook the following: https://wordsmith.org/words/illiterati.html "ILLITERACY IS NOT INCOMPETENCY, BUT IS AN INADEQUACY IN ONE RESPECT. MANY AFRICAN AMERICAN SLAVES WERE ILLITERATE, BUT THEY MANAGED TO FIND FREEDOM FOR THEMSELVES AND FOR US; AND TO CREATE OUR CULTURE." Proof of my premise is found in the life of Harriet Tubman. In the book, WORTH FIGHTING FOR by Agnes McCarthy and Lawrence Reddick (1965) they have written : "One of the greatest conductors was Harriet Tubman. She had to do a lot of talking before the leaders of the Railroad would let her become a conductor. Not only was she a woman, but she was a sickly one at that. She had been struck on the head when she was a little girl, and suffered terrible dizzy spells ever after. In addition , she did not know how to read and write. So how could she write and read codes and maps? How could such a person bring others safely out of the South? "But Harriet knew what slavery was. She had made up her mind that she was going to bring as many Negroes as she could out of that miserable life. She finally convinced the leaders of the Railroad to give her a chance. "Harriet was the best of conductors, as it turned out. Slave-owners certainly thought so. They offered a $40,000 reward for her, dead or alive. Between 1850 and 1860, she went into the South nineteen times, and brought three hundred passengers out . Among them were her sister, her parents, and her two children.... "Harriet proved that a blow for freedom can be struck without education. And, while she was working in her way, Negroes with education were working in theirs." P.24-25, "The Underground Railroad "

ILLITERACY IS NOT INCOMPETENCY

https://wordsmith.org/words/illiterati.html ILLITERACY IS NOT INCOMPETENCY, BUT IS AN INADEQUACY IN ONE RESPECT. MANY AFRICAN AMERICAN SLAVES WERE ILLITERATE, BUT THEY MANAGED TO FIND FREEDOM FOR THEMSELVES AND FOR US; AND TO CREATE OUR CULTURE.

TAKE A KNEE, AMERICA!

The irony is that Colin KAEPERNICK is not even on the football field. Others are. Yet, the spirit of protest that he has come to symbolize has acquired a life of its own away from him. It has reconnected us to the knee-taking of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and of Ralph David Abernathy and their as yet unfinished work of spiritual, economic redemption for black and poor people.

FRIENDSHIP

FRIENDSHIP "What a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear. What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer." "When you're down and you're troubled; when you need some loving care care; when nothing, oh nothing, is going right. Close your eyes and think of me..." The first verse is from a church song, "What A Friend We Have in Jesus." The second verse is from a secular song "You've Got A Friend," by Donnie Hathaway and Roberta Flack. Each is representative of the many evidences of proportional parallels that have been found, that are to be found, in everyday life. "Friends" or "angels unawares" seem to have come out of nowhere, just in the nick of time, either to help us, or to prevent us from somehow harming ourselves . Who cannot look back and give praise for such people, whose Intercessory interventions enabled us to be here today? I dare say no one . Not one! "Friendship" is called grace. God's grace. God's grace is what gives you the victory.

TRUTH-VESTED

GOING DOWN WITH THE TRUTH, AT THE RISK OF DROWNING...

SPEAK TRUTH TO CHILDREN

I get so flummoxed by the "what shall I tell my children," questions. Tell them the TRUTH. Just the truth and be done! https://youtu.be/XDM1bZz3gQk?t=418

BUFFALO SOLDIERS QUANDARY?

This statue is from the Buffalo Soldiers memorial at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, (near KC). It is part of a major military tribute to the valor of former Civil War black soldiers, who were removed from the South to facilitate their own people's political and economic repression and to defeat and pacify the Indians in the Western United States ' territory for settlement by white pioneers. The 9th and 10th Cavalry, whom the Indians named "Buffalo Soldiers," due to their strength , bravery, hair and color, were disbanded in the 1890s after the Spanish American War that was fought in the Caribbean Sea and in the South Pacific (Philippines) where these soldiers also fought for the United States.

NEBULI

NEBULOUS NEIGHBORS  Words, no matter how beautiful, are merely vibrating sound waves, until they are reified, materialized, concretized, into condign deeds. Deeds are thoughts, words, energy that is extruded into, or, upon, this materialist realm of being from the spiritual-ethereal realms of being. Where these realms overlap is life; are we; is all else that cohabits this plane, planet, place with us in time and space; in thought, word, deed.

AMENDING 'PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE'?

What if the Pledge of Allegiance were amended from "with liberty and justice for all," to "seeking liberty and justice for all"? That would be more realistic, and possibly less antagonistic to us!

ESSENCES

ESSENCES Some seek for essence in the stars. Some seek it on or within the earth. But, I search my spirit, mind, heart, for essences from and of them all. Essences are divine gifts of God.

DIG AND BE DUG

"To dig and to be dug in return" is the essence of giving and receiving in nature and in human relations. Thus, I love that lyrical line from Joplin, Missouri-born poet, Lawrence, Kansas-reared, Langston Hughes, another of whose immortal poems, "The Negro Speaks of Rivers," reciprocates the same man and nature dyadic rhythm as 'dig' does.

ALL

ALL IN ALL Thanking God for "a reasonable portion of health and strength" is as good as it gets, our elders know. One cannot have it all! All was here before we got here; all will be here when we are gone. We come from all. All has us! Produced, sustains us. We cannot even imagine it all. Therefore in learning to be content with but some of it all, a reasonable portion of it all is profound wisdom. God is our All in All. Our All in All.

UNCLE TOM'S CABIN, EXCERPT

"The scenes of this story, as its title indicates, lie among a race hitherto ignored by associations of polite and refined society, an exotic race, whose ancestors, born beneath a tropic sun, brought with them, and perpetuated to their descendants, a character so essentially unlike the hard and dominant Anglo-Saxon race as for many years to have won from it only misunderstanding and contempt. "But another and better day is dawning. Every influence of literature, of poetry and art in our time is becoming more and more in unison with the great master chord of Christianity, 'good-will to man.'... "In this general movement unhappy Africa at last is remembered; Africa who began the race of civilization and human progress in the dim gray dawn of early time, but who, for centuries, has lain bound and bleeding at the foot of civilized and Christianized humanity, imploring compassion in vain. "But the heart of the dominant race who have been her conquerors, her hard masters, has at length been turned toward her in mercy; and it has seen how far nobler it is in nations to protect the feeble than to oppress them. Thanks be to God, the world has at last outlined the slave trade.... "When an enlightened and Christianized community shall have, on the shores of Africa, laws, language and literature, drawn from among us, may then the scenes of the house of bondage be to them like the remembrance of Egypt to the Israelites--a motive for thankfulness to Him who hath redeemed them! "For while politicians contend, and men are swerved this way and that by conflicting tides of interest and passion, the great cause of human liberty is in the hands of the One of whom it is said: "'He shall not fail nor be discouraged Till He have set judgment in the earth . He shall deliver the needy when he crieth, The poor, and him that hath no helper . He shall redeem their soul from deceit and violence And precious shall be their blood in His sight.'" P. XXXV-XXXVI, "Author 's Preface," UNCLE TOM'S CABIN (1852, 1987) by Harriet Beecher Stowe [Wordsworth Edition]

SYMBOL AN SUBSTANCE

AMERICAN POLITICAL SYMBOL AND SUBSTANCE In the strangely symbiotic world of American political symbolism ,the American flag, as does, the "Star Spangled Banner," even the pledge of allegiance, have exited the arbor of symbols, into the realm of faux-substance. Even more strangely this political novation, or, transformation, is wrought by an unlikely "dotard" President who is himself being investigated for possible treason and alleged collusion with the Russians for stealing the 2016 election. Yet, he would wrap himself up in the same red-white-blue flag, in Alabama, which had earlier sought to secede under its own rebel, Confederate flag; even as the faux-President calls a "son-of-a-b***h," a black man, whose formerly enslaved black male ancestors saved the very substance that the flag, anthem, an pledge claim to represent, the nation! This NFL quarterback who kneels when the symbols are raised at NFL games, to decry and protest, is showing himself to be more noble and true to the proclaimed substance of the nation that his forebears saved from destruction, than is the apocryphal President, son of immigrants!

MALCOLM X READ VORACIOUSLY

YEARS AGO, IN THE "AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MALCOLM X," BY ALEX HALEY, I READ THAT MALCOLM X'S IMPRISONMENT WAS HIS REDEMPTION FROM A LIFE OF CRIME: PIMPING, BURGLARY, ARMED ROBBERY, ETC. IN PRISON, HE CAME TO REALIZE THAT HE WAS WASTING HIS LIFE AND APTITUDE . HE WAS DISGRACING THE MEMORY OF HIS GARVEYITE FATHER, WHO WAS MURDERED IN OMAHA, NEBRASKA, FOR HIS PRO-BLACK MINISTRY AND TEACHING AND OF HIS WEST-INDIAN MOTHER, WHO WENT INSANE UNDER HER SOLITARY BURDEN OF CHILD-REARING AND HOME-MAKING, ALONE. AN ABLE STUDENT WHILE EARLY N SCHOOL, HE HAD NOT READ TO IMPROVE HIMSELF; BUT, RATHER, IN BOSTON AND LATER IN DETROIT LIVING WITH RELATIVES, HE FELL AMONG THIEVES AND CRIMINALS, LOOKING FOR AN EASY WAY OUT OF WORK. HE EASILY FOUND HIMSELF IN JAIL, DISSOCIATED WITH ANYONE WHO KNEW OF OR CARED ABOUT "DETROIT RED" AS HE WAS FORMERLY KNOWN IN THE STREET. THEN, ONE DAY, HIS BROTHER, REGINALD, WROTE HIM A LETTER ABOUT A MAN NAMED "HONORABLE ELIJAH MUHAMMAD." THAT LETTER, A LATER VISIT BY HIS BROTHER, GAVE THIS LONG-LOST BROTHER A SHAFT OF LIGHT AMID DARKNESS. HE BEGAN TO READ, SLOWLY AT FIRST, THEN MORE LATER, HUNGRILY, INSATIABLY, ENTIRE DICTIONARIES, THE BIBLE, THE QU'RAN, MAGAZINES, ENCYCLOPEDIAS, EVERYTHING! FOR HE WHO READS THIS IS MEANT AS ENCOURAGEMENT.

DIVERSITY

DELIGHTED BY DIVERSITY A diversity of different tongues is undoubtedly a gift of God to the same extent that any profusion of flowers, of fish , of stars, lives, and all things existent are gifts of God. There is a sad sonorous aspect to sameness that deadens, that dulls, as its opposite diversity enlivens, freshens, renews. I relish a diversity of gifts, of friends, of foods, drinks , climates, relations, children, books, faiths , seasons, experiences, and others' ideas. I delight in my diversity of days, and in their assorted diversity of delights; each moment thereof being fraught with grace, meaning, mystery, power, purpose, work, joy, love, woe, opportunity, sorrow, perils, rewards, tests. puzzles, a diverse infinity of imponderables. I delight in the diversity of ideas, that are imagined by people, who are the propagators of ideas. For ideas are gifts of God to people. Without the diversity people there could not be a diversity of ideas, in which each is diversely endowed at birth. Each person's existence is a work product of a diversity of ideas compounding before birth, as were all parents' diversity of divine ideas before them, forever, into darkness.

"CONSERVATIVES IN POWER"

"Conservatives" in power are white supremacists-fascists, whose warped contrarian views of man and God are rancid, racist. To them conservation means destruction, as equality means discrimination. They are white power maniacal, for and to whom inversion is perversion; faith is evil and wrong is right! They are the sandpaper of man!

READERS ARE RARELY PRISONERS

To reduce the prison population, increase the reading population! Said Malcolm X.

APPRECIATING AFRICAN AMERICAN POWER

OUR AFRICAN AMERICAN "POWER" Yesterday, I shared a video clip by a young African man in Sierra Leone. In his encomium of us, he extolled the appreciable "power" of African American "people" repeatedly; as our "power" was perceived by him and his fellow native Africans. He began by saying that African Americans were the only national sub-grouping of blacks on Earth with the term "African" attached as their formal name and identity symbol. He said that our compound name readily distinguished us from other black people in Britain or in Brazil, who were not so-honored, thus not so "powerful," as we. He mentioned how we African Americans were more believable, credible than were other black people to Africans. He said that native Africans were enamored of African American movies, music, mannerisms, which they copied as the best globally. He mentioned all of these, and others, with a wonderful wistful sincerity and love. I was greatly moved by his video of us, in honor of our "power." Too often, growing up, we had heard that Africans did not "like" African Americans, by persons who had never been to Africa; by persons who were liars and dimwits for being credulous repeaters of lies. We had also been told that we had no "power," another lie! Power has many forms, has many friends. Our power can be measured by the amount of power that it displaces in our nation's history, in order to thwart it, to keep it in check. "Give a nigger an inch and he will take a mile!" many white oppressors used to joke and quip about our "power." The Civil War is evidence, is proof positive of our displacement power. The Civil Rights Movement of the 1950-60s; the Black Power Movement of the 1960s-1970s, is more evidence of our displacement power. The election of Barack Hussein Obama twice as President of the United States of America is more evidence of our displacement power. All other heroic and unknown acts that were required to produce, to sustain, and to protect us, by our forebears from 1619 unto to 2017 is evidence of our African American displacement power! Our oppressors have long quipped, joked, commented, in their indirectly oblique tributes to our amazing "power " to make something big out of practically nothing! Terms like "nigger-rigged" ironically reflect this fact. American state and federal laws, indeed our United States Constitution are all based upon an idea of arresting our development, but, still, harnessing our power, to develop their power, institutions, businesses, wealth, government! Laws, police, courts, judges, juries, media, education, culture, trade, mythology, lies, lynching, brutality, financial chicanery, discrimination, racism, literature, religion, military, movies, music, have all been used attempting to thwart our lawful complete empowerment, our complete national and personal fruition as African American people, an rightful citizens. We are still seeking, still, in 2017, our natal well-earned, full, complete citizenship rights at home in the United States of America! I thank God for using this young man to make us, to help us, finally realize our power!

COSMOS

WONDROUSNESS OF COSMOS To impute emotions, ergo, sensate sensibilities to divinity is the height of human presumption or apostasy; or, so it may seem to be, if this act of imputation is exclusively viewed through the dark lens of casuistry . "Casuistry" is the use of clever but unsound reasoning, especially on moral questions like divinity. In fact we exist in a vast, unending world. The African philosopher, Plotinus in his 3rd Century classic treatise, THE ENNEADS, writes movingly on this most vital of human subjects, as follows: "To make the existence and the coherent structure of this Universe depend upon automatic activity and upon chance is against all good sense.... "But there is still the question as to the process by which individual things in this sphere have come into being, how they were made... "This matter must be examined through and through from the very first principles.... "The authentic and primal Cosmos is the Being of the Intellectual Principle and of the Veritable Existent. This contains within itself no spatial distinction, and has none of the feebleness of division, and even in its parts bring no incompleteness to it since here the individual is not severed from the entire. In this nature inheres all life and all intellect, a life living and having intellection, as one act within a unity ; every part that it gives forth is a whole; all its content is its very own, for there is here no separation of thing from thing, no part standing in isolated existence estranged from the rest, and therefore nowhere is there is any wronging of any other, even among contraries. Everywhere one and complete, it is at rest throughout and invites difference at no point; it does not make over any of its content into any new form; there can be no reason for changing what is everywhere perfect.... "Those whose nature is blessedness have no more to do than repose in themselves and be their being. "A widespread activity is dangerous to those who must go out from themselves to act. But such is the blessedness of this Being that in its very non-action it magnificently operates and in its self-dwelling it produces mightily." P. 135-137, "Providence : First Treatise, THE ENNEADS by Plotinus (1991) Sayings like "God is not pleased, not playing, is angry, was grieved with mankind," or even "so loved the world as to give his only begotten son," are but mere figures of speech, rhetorical devices of writers to humanize to the common people the infinite, eternal, mystery of our undeniable affinity-divinity. It imputes human characteristics to God to show that our God may be petitioned, entreated, accessed by us, even though we are so far away. "It rains on the just and the unjust and the sun shines on good and evil." Moreover, death does not discriminate; nor does wealth, by itself, incriminate, since Solomon was the wealthiest man and the wisest, according to Bible stories. What better ways exist to explain our affinity to divinity than kinship ? Indeed we are "joint heirs with Christ." Romans 8:16-17 states: "The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children. Now if we are children, we are heirs--heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory." By any means necessary please get to know God! Get to know the Creator! By works, by story, study, meditation, charity, by procreation ; by any means necessary whatever!

REINTEGRATION OF AGE GROUPS

REINTEGRATION OF AGE GROUPS That rushing rashness that typifies impetuous youth may be tempered and mediated best by timely, calm interjections of aged experience. It is more commonly known simply as seasoned, adult, practical wisdom . Blessed are those who are careful enough to seek it out from those elders who are blessed to give it . To improve the conduct of today's pubescent youth, therefore, who have been, far too often, raised up isolated from such elders well into physical maturity, while segregated into peer group pods, ever away from the rich, practical wisdom of their elders, I would now urge our immediate integration of isolated age/peer groups pods in as many normal daily activities as is feasible: whether it is work, play, social, planning, religious, educational, or business! In that way, vital social, moral, ethical skills are transferred from one generation to the next and respect for time and place are reestablished by natural accretion. This joy of reintegration works both ways. Elders are easily reinfused with the dynamics of youthful adventurism and audacity, while our youth are sedulously insinuated into the precious ways and means of appropriate entire group values , interaction, wisdom, conducive to their futures as parents and elders!

IMMEASURABLE WE

MEASURING IMMEASURABLE WE We are the true units of measure for our earthly prosperity, freedom, education, happiness. You and your family are its energetic units. After you, then, every one else's is. The same fact is true for me and mine. So the indices that are released by reason of general studies that are done to measure satisfaction and wealth, and other indicia of comfort or achievement are only relevant to you and me, as they reflect you and me, or as they affect or effect us in particular. If they do not reflect us, then, they are not relevant to us . We are energy, refractive energy, passing through time and space. I write these words as I recall, yet another story reflecting the broad disparity between black and white people living in the United States of America having a 68-1 wealth disparity. Wealth is love, joy, feeling. But, these temporal studies are released daily, it seems, measuring anything that can be materially measured. The fact and that act of measurement just alters energetic equivalence. It is ever immeasurable . Ignore these studies ! They assay to measure material things. They cannot measure spiritual things. No need for you to inquire: "How lays the land relative to you and yours" How falls the light upon that land ? Your land, light. lives, were always there, already lain in preexistence! We too are basics unit of measure. We count greatly unto ourselves . We are matter unto our family and friends. If the basic unit of measure is untrue, then, no general unit can be true ! Therefore, because we count and because we matter, all of these other indices that do not count nor cannot measure us, are immaterial to us. At our quantum energy level of life where we are entangled, we are it! We are God's measure and means . If observers in physics are wrong , all other observers are also wrong! In short, we are immeasurable and incomparable. Divine sublime light! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Observer_effect_(physics)

MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN?

MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN? Tuesday, September 19, 2017 By Rev. Dr. Larry Delano Coleman The President Donald Trump campaign mantra “Make America Great Again,” raises the unanswerable question: ‘Compared to what?’ 1619? 1776? 1865? 1965? The question may also elicit “Compared to Whom?” England? France? Germany? Canada? Russia? Spain? Japan? Holland? Italy? South Africa? Rome? Ethiopia? To some America has always been great; to some others, it has never been great. Thus, the mantra without a comparative, affords an open narrative to/for anyone. It certainly stands for nothing by itself, except an open blank for a hearer to fill at will. The ambiguities abound, enabling anyone to peck on it, peculate, speculate on it. So, what does the mantra mean? Answer: What does it mean to you and to yours?

OUR QUANTUM ENTANGLEMENT

OUR QUANTUM ENTANGLEMENT We are the true unit of measure for our prosperity, freedom, education, happiness. You and your family are. After you, then, every one else's is. The same is true for me and mine. So the indices that are released by reason of general studies that are done to measure satisfaction and wealth, and other indicia of comfort or achievement are only relevant to you and me, as they reflect you and me, or as they affect or effect us in particular. If they do not reflect us, then, they are not relevant to us . I write these words as I recall, yet another story reflecting the broad disparity between black and white people living in the United States of America that are released daily, it seems, measuring anything that can be measured. The fact and act of measurement alters equivalence. Ignore these ! Ask, rather, how lays the land relative to you and yours? We too are basics unit of measure. We count to and unto ourselves . We matter to, unto our family and friends. If the basic unit is untrue, then, the general cannot be true ! Therefore, because we count and because we matter, all of these other indices that do not count nor measure us, are immaterial to us. At our quantum energy level of life where we are entangled, we are it! We are life's measure and means . If an observer in physics is wrong , any other observer is also wrong! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Observer_effect_(physics)

BEAR YOUR OWN WEIGHT

Bearing another's burden is too onerous. Well enough is it to bear one's own weight.

BE BOTH

It is better to be both a hammer and a nail than just to be either a hammer or a nail. Whole is better than piecemeal. Perfect is better than partial.

THIS NONVIOLENT STUFF..., EXCERPT

"Mississippi in 1962 was a totally repressive state, the most repressive in the country. It was a 'closed society,' choking in its grip of white supremacy. And what helped keep white supremacy so powerfully in place was not only simple violence but also old habits of thought. Black people had been taught to believe in their own inferiority and to accept that white power determined their rights and could not be dislodged or challenged. Organizers going from door to door to encourage voter registration attempts often heard in response to their efforts, 'That's white folks business' . 'Ain't fooling around with that mess.' "In this context, Joe McDonald's decision to use a book to assert his gun rights was a critical breakthrough. Mr. Joe could neither read nor write, noted Charles McLaurin, and had also never stood up to white authority in the way he did that day. Joe McDonald had never looked a white man in his face and demanded anything in his life,' said McLaurin years later: "'And now here he was, this seventy-six year old black guy who can't read and write inspired enough by these young Negroes to go down to City Hall and challenge the mayor with his book. Think about it! The mayor was known to carry a pistol ; he'd pulled a gun on any black person who challenged him. He pulled a gun on us! But Joe went down there. We gave Mr. Joe the ammunition he needed to face the [white] man. And I think the mayor gave Mr. Joe his gun back to try to keep down 'trouble '--folks in Ruleville responding to us. He probably said to himself, 'Let me give Joe his gun back 'cause I don't want no more trouble from these boys. We empowered Mr. Joe and that helped our work in the community.'... "Yet most blacks were not organizing paramilitary units or much self-defense beyond that which protected their own homes and immediate community , which helps to explain why the mayor of Ruleville returned McDonald's shotgun to him. Dorrough obviously thought it unlikely that Joe McDonald would use his gun in any type of aggressive or retaliatory violence. Like denim overalls, shotguns and pistols were an ordinary part of everyday southern life. Indeed, Mississippi 's gun control culture proved so powerful that in 1954, when state legislator Edwin White expressed alarm that too many blacks were buying firearms and introduced a bill requiring gun registration '[to protect] us from those likely to cause trouble,' the bill never made it out of committee. "Like many in the generally impoverished rural South--impoverished for many whites as well as black people--Joe McDonald mainly used his gun to put food on the table. Mayor Durrough surely knew that. Guns were undeniably possessed for self-defense too, but to a lesser extent, and blacks exercised caution when it came to this, and the mayor certainly knew that as well. Moreover, Joe McDonald was seventy-six years of age and known to be a man of great dignity and probity; his having a gun posed no danger of aggressive violence to anyone in the black or white community. He was not going to climb into his pickup truck and drive through town shooting into the homes of his neighbors or lead a posse of black vigilantes into the white community. Dorrough, his racial prejudices notwithstanding, had to have known this too." P. 121-122, 125-126, "I Wasn't Being Nonviolent," THIS NONVIOLENT STUFF'LL GET YOU KILLED: HOW GUNS MADE THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT POSSIBLE by Charles E. Cobb, Jr. (2016) 

LEGAL WHNTE SUPREMACY

LEGAL WHITE SUPREMACY "White" supremacy in America is legal. It and its concomitants--blacks' and others' inferiority--have been kept in place, primarily by carefully codified rules of "law." This law consists of : white-supremacy-supporting, judge-made common-law; federal, state, and local statutory law and regulatory law. These laws make a great pretense of being objectively and facially neutral. But, in fact, are nothing but pretexts to perpetuate enforcement of white supremacy. There are, as importantly, multiple overlapping layers of taxpayers'-funded political regimes of legal enforcement. These include local police, state national guards, and the federal military itself as a final enforcement resort. These feed a judicial system which claims to be fair and unbiased, but which is not, but which is designed to further effectuate its white supremacy. There is also a type of terrorism, historically, whereby permissive extraordinary "white deputies'" citizenship rights of paramilitary enforcement, were implicitly (and explicitly) sanctioned, whom the law tacitly shielded and protected , to the maximum extent possible, without appearing to do so, to support the legal infrastructure of apical American white supremacy.

HEART BRAIN VAGUS GANGLIA

HEART-BRAIN-VAGUS GANGLIA COMPLEX A processing core, our experiential lattice network of enemy-matter is the mysterious heart-brain-vagus nerve complex of flesh, fiber, force that so smoothly-efficiently quietly as living soul perceives-conceives, corral-codes, compares-contrasts, consumes-stores-assimilates bits of sensory and extrasensory inputs for use, growth. health, enjoyment . Encyclopedia.com | Free Online Encyclopedia Encyclopedia.com – Online dictionary and encyclopedia with pictures, facts, and videos. Get information and homework help with millions of articles in our FREE, online library. ENCYCLOPEDIA.COM

INITIATIVE BALLOT PROCEURE IN MISSOURI

https://www.sos.mo.gov/CMSImages/ElectionPetitions/MakingYourVoiceHeard.pdf An initiative petition should be registered with the Missouri Secretary of State to to enable voters to enact legislation to require police, prosecutors, judges, legislators, and state administrators to undergo annual racial sensitivity training and psychological testing to ferret out racially biased state government officials.

ORIGIN OF KNOWLEDGE

"Another kind of poison was met with on Lake Nyassa, which was said to be used exclusively for killing men. It was put on small wooden arrowheads, and carefully protected by a piece of maize-leaf tied round it. It caused numbness of the tongue when the smallest particle was tasted. The Bushmen of the northern part of the Kalahari were seen applying the entrails of a small caterpillar which they termed 'Nga' to their arrows. This venom was declared to be so powerful in producing delirium that a man in dying returned in imagination to a state of infancy, and would call for his mother's breast. Lions when shot with it are said to perish in agonies. The poisonous ingredient in this case may be derived from the plant on which the caterpillar feeds . It is difficult to conceive by what sort of experiment the properties of these poisons, known for generations, were proven . Probably the animal instincts, which have become so obtuse by civilization....were in the early uncivilized state much more keen. In some points instinct is still retained among savages...[T]he earlier portions of the human family may have had their instincts as to plants, more highly developed than any of their descendants --if indeed much more knowledge than we usually suppose be not the effect of direct revelation from above." P. 369-370, "The Expedition is Recalled," NARRATIVE OF AN EXPEDITION TO THE ZAMBESI by David and Charles Livingstone (1865) [Is earliest human knowledge derived from 1)direct revelation 2) instinct 3)experiments 4)all of the above 5)combination of above 6)none of above?]

BLACK RACIAL CALUMNY

http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/39/ RACIAL CALUMNY IS NOT CONFINED TO WHITES AGAINST BLACKS. IN FACT, AS NEARLY AS OFTEN, BLACKS ARE SLANDERED AND LIBELED BY OTHER BLACKS. BOOKER T. WASHINGTON'S PROPHETIC 1895 ADDRESS LATER BECAME "POPULARLY" KNOWN AS THE "ATLANTA COMPROMISE" BY REASON OF ITS LATER VILIFICATION BY DR. W.E.B. DUBOIS. DR. DUBOIS, HAD FIRST SUPPORTED WASHINGTON'S SPEECH, IN HIS 1897 ESSAY, "CONSERVATION OF RACES," BUT, LATER DUBOIS AN OTHERS, RELENTLESSLY LAMPOONED IT, IN HIS OWN "SOULS OF BLACK FOLKS." THIS SCURRILOUS SLANDER OF THIS GREAT MESSAGE HAS HELD FAST. TODAY, AS A CONSEQUENCE OF A LARGELY NON-READING (OR FICTION-ONLY READING) POPULATION OF BLACKS, MUCH PERTINENT WISDOM AND KNOWLEDGE OF WASHINGTON IS LOST, AND NOW MUST BE RE-FOUND.