Reminiscing About An Old Vision

I have always been a person of ambitious imagination, and I wanted to talk some about that today.  One of the earliest recollections of that was around the time I was 10 or 11 years old, when I basically had proposed founding a political movement and fantasized about setting up my own kingdom in eastern Brazil.  It sounds a little crazy now, but keep in mind I was still a young kid at that point and kids do have vivid imaginations.  As at the time I was actually in a situation where we were in abject poverty, my vivid imagination was also a sort of coping mechanism that helped motivate me to rise above my situation at the time and dream bigger in a sense.  Of course, obviously those were just fantasies, as last I have checked I am not a sovereign ruler over a vast part of a large South American nation, and realistically that will never happen.  But, it is still interesting that my "dreaming big" instinct continued into my adult years, and as a young college student in my early 20's some years ago, I had another grandiose dream as well that may never happen, but this time it had a difference - I believed it to be in service to others to whom I believed I was called.  The vocation to these particular people is real, I believe, but perhaps my ambitions at the time were a little over-the-top concerning them.  It is that vision I wanted to discuss today.

When I was around 17 years old, I began to develop an interest in Armenian people, and I began to read up on the Armenian Genocide and other acts of violence that were committed over the centuries against this predominantly Christian nation in their own homeland by what were often hostile Islamic powers that ruled the region (Ottoman Turks, Persians, and various Arab Muslim regimes).   Around about 1988, I received a large packet of booklets, brochures, and other literature from the Eastern Diocese of the Armenian Church in America, and one of the booklets was on the subject of the Armenian Genocide.  In it, I learned of another fascinating - and predominately Christian - minority called the Assyrians.  From the time I was a kid, I had had an interest in both the Bible and in world history, and I was very familiar with the Assyrian Empire of antiquity from a very young age.  However, like so many, I also was under the incorrect assumption that Assyrians as a people were extinct, and I didn't even know at that point that there were Christian communities dating back centuries in the Middle East - public education had taught a rather revisionist view of history that everyone that lived in the Middle East was either Arab or Turk, and no other minorities existed.  Then, in taking an interest in the Byzantine Empire and studying its history, I learned first of the Armenians and who they were in 1987, when I was still a junior in high school.  I have told this story in varying degrees over the years, so I am just summarily mentioning highlights here.  My exposure to the Armenians, and later receiving literature from their Church in the US, led me to the Assyrians, and eventually I took up a trail that led to a very articulate (albeit verbose) priest in Chicago named Charles (or Qasha) Klutz.  Fr. Klutz was an ordained priest in the Assyrian Church of the East, and at that time he served as Chancellor to the bishop of their Eastern Diocese, Mar Aprim, as well as a priest at Mar Gewargis Cathedral in Chicago.  Over the ensuing years, I became very close to Fr. Klutz, and still consider him a dear friend to this day.  Although he pastored an Assyrian parish, Fr. Klutz was actually of Portuguese Converso heritage, and later I found out we shared that in common (I am also of Converso heritage as well, although mine is French/Spanish).  On the initial contact with Fr. Klutz back around April of 1988, he sent me a large package filled with copies of their Church magazine, Voice of the East, as well as a booklet with some pretty basic history on the origins of the Assyrian Church - I actually still have all of that today.  Unfortunately, in December 2001, his parish he was pastoring at the time, St. John Assyrian in Chicago, was the target of a hate-crime act of vandalism and arson which incinerated the parish.  It happened after 9/11, and was part of the hysteria that many dumbass people had against any Middle Eastern people regardless of who they were (as well as a number of Sikhs, who are from India - Sikhs were targeted because of their red turbans.  Sikhs are NOT Muslims, and are a separate religion and are also generally peaceful people), and it was characteristic of some of the hysteria many ignorant people in this country had regarding anything to do with the Middle East.  As of today, I am aware that Fr. Klutz is now retired and is still living in Chicago - I would love to get in touch with him, as it has been a number of years, and hope he is doing well.  By now, I am sure he is in his late 80's or even early 90's, but I owe him a depth of appreciation for introducing me to a remarkable people in the Assyrians.  That was the beginnings, so now let's move onto my college years and my involvement with these unique people.

In my first year of college, I had gotten involved in the Pentecostal movement and had become part of the Foursquare denomination.  As Pentecostals place (or at least they used to) a great deal of emphasis on supernatural gifts including prophecy, I experienced something on a November night in 1989 while retiring to my dorm room to sleep.  The experience involved what I felt was a personal word the Holy Spirit was giving me, and essentially it was along these lines - I got an insight that my involvement with Assyrians was no accident, and that God had ordered it for a purpose, and that purpose was that a part of my calling was to serve these people.  Naturally, as a ministry major in college, I thought this meant to preach to them and do mission work, but at the time I was confused about that too.  Although in that day I was part of an Evangelical/Pentecostal tradition that emphasized personal evangelism, a lot of things about the way this was carried out was a bit unsettling to me - for one, I could not wrap my head around why Evangelicals wanted to "convert" people who were already identified as Christian.  I was bothered throughout my college years by the rampant anti-Catholicism I encountered among many of my classmates as well as those I met in different churches that I ministered in then, and I was also bothered as well when this "missionary" guy came to a Missions class I had at Southeastern University at the time who was trying to "save" the Amish and had a "mission" to the Amish communities;  I confronted this individual in class over it, and it created a bit of a buzz honestly.  What I found out later - and also one reason why American Evangelicalism turned me off - was that many Evangelical "evangelism" and "missionary" efforts were not so much to make disciples of Christ, but rather to Americanize and create cookie-cutter clones of themselves.   This essentially meant disrespect for other cultures, as well as even trampling the Christian heritage of some ethnic groups - this was particularly true if the ethnic group in question was identified as Catholic, Orthodox, or Amish/Mennonite.  I could not reconcile that honestly, and as a result I eventually left the Foursquare denomination and in time that road led me to full communion with the Catholic faith.  Over the years, as I have seen a decay of American Evangelicalism both theologically and morally, it seems that it is the American Evangelical population that may be in need of evangelization, especially among its younger members who have embraced a lot of post-modern ideology as well as even supporting things older Evangelicals would not have dreamed of, such as "same-sex marriage," abortion, and even their missionary efforts have gone from evangelization and discipleship to a sort of "social justice" emphasis - on one hand there are positives to that though, in that now there seems to be a move to a more holistic approach to ministry, but hopefully they won't lose focus of what is important.  My own struggles with the American Evangelical missionary enterprise - in particular, its aggressive prosyletism - led me to explore some things that hearkened back to my ambitious childhood imagination.  And, that is where this vision came into existence.

Around 1994 or so, as the Iraq War was a central focus of the news at the time (and would be again post-9/11), there began to be some awareness of "Christian Iraqi refugees" and their plight, but the secular press refused to use the name "Assyrian" in reference to these people.  The intensity of events taking place in their homeland compelled me to contemplate the idea of a self-governing Assyrian village, which I called the "Saint Isaac of Nineveh Village Project," named after a 10th-century Assyrian Christian ascetic and Church Father.  Over the course of several weeks I meditated on the possibility of this, and came up with the blueprint for a village that incorporated a lot of other old ideas of mine.  Below are a few pages of the proposal I drafted at the time:

These 24-year-old manuscript pages give you an idea of what I was thinking then, and somewhere I still have the originals with a LARGE mapped-out diagram of the proposed village as well.  The idea behind this was that it would be a village governed by the Assyrian refugees themselves, including having their own churches, businesses, and other things, and in the more ambitious plan I proposed later, I was actually going to place a huge ecumenical cathedral church in the middle of the community, as well as a Parliament house, and a series of multi-story office buildings that would house the headquarters of various organizations, etc.   The original plans also included a zoo, a large aquarium, a university, and an agricultural district as well.  Looking back on it, the whole thing was a beautiful idea but also very unfeasible - could you imagine the millions of dollars it would take to finance such an undertaking??  If I became independently wealthy today, I would still probably consider doing it, and the thought has crossed my mind over the years as to "what if?"  However, it is also far beyond my own limitations to come up with something like that myself, but it still is not a bad idea when I think about it, which is why over the years I have even had some interesting dreams about such a place, one of which I would like to share now.

Some years back, I had a dream in which I was walking the Stations of the Cross on a Good Friday in a village made up of all Assyrians, Armenians, and other persecuted minorities.  The Stations in the dream were totally ecumenical - there were many churches of many sects throughout the route, and each one served as a place along the route to pray one of the Stations.  When I woke up that morning from that dream, I pulled out those old St. Isaac of Nineveh Village plans I had drafted so many years ago, and I could envision on a major street a route of the Stations, starting at the great Cathedral in the middle and ending at a small church on the other side of the community.  I have thought a lot of that over the years, and today as I was messing around surfing on Google I came across something very interesting that inspired me to write this today, as it is almost in perfect alignment with that old dream of mine.  

This morning I was reading an article talking about a 42-year-old Aramaic Christian in Israel by the name of Shadi Khalloul, and he is proposing a totally Aramaic Christian village in Israel.  Khalloul is the chairman of the Israeli Aramaic Christian Association, and was at one time a candidate for the Knesset in Israel.  Apparently Khalloul is of Maronite heritage, which would definitely place him as identity as an Aramaic Christian (although not Assyrian), and the village he proposes he wants to call "Aram Hiram," and the proposed location is on the site of an old village in Israel called Kafr Bir'im, which he asserts was originally a Syriac-Maronite village prior to a 1948 evacuation.  Khalloul is a man of vision too, and I love what he says in an interview when he is quoted as thus:  "We need to build bridges through a Christian positive attitude to ask for our rights in a way to lead towards coexistence with Jews and this can come by being positive citizens of the state, defending the state, and asking for our rights at the same time." (Kassy Dillon, "Meet the Christian Israeli Who is On a Mission to Create The First Aramaean Christian Town In Israel," published August 28, 2018 at https://www.dailywire.com/news/35162/meet-christian-israeli-who-mission-create-first-kassy-dillon - Accessed 8/28/2018).  I say that Khalloul is a man of vision, and he needs prayers for success in his efforts, as this could be a beacon for many persecuted Christians in the region.  I have said for many years that the Christians of the region and the state of Israel should be natural allies of each other, but at times this can be a touchy subject and I try not to emphasize it a lot as Middle Eastern Christians are a diverse group, and a significant percentage are not exactly fond of Israel (in some cases with good justification), so one has to tread lightly on those grounds.  I also plan on getting in touch with the Israeli Christian Aramaic Association myself, as I would love to maybe talk with Khalloul personally and tell him about my St. Isaac Village idea as it may inspire him as well.  It is definitely worth exploring more any way one looks at it. 

Aramaic-Maronite Christian leader Sadi Khalloul (right) with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. 

I have noticed in recent years a sort of revival of the Aramaic language in Israel, even among some Jewish populations.   The popular Israel musical group Nash Didan is a good example, as well as a renewed interest in the Aramaic dialect that the Samaritan sect uses there.  Also, with a huge population of Assyrian Christians and Syro-Maronites in nearby Lebanon, the possibilities of all of this are exciting.  If Israel were to finally recognize the Armenian Genocide, that would be the icing on the cake.  We truly live in exciting times, and perhaps it is time to take note, as we may be facing an Isaiah 19 moment if everything continues to come together.  Bottom line, I have a lot to think about and rack my brain concerning this, as after many years of stagnation on my part, I have just recently re-awakened my own convictions regarding the Assyrians and others, which at one time used to be more passionate.  

My own ambitious dreams from many years ago may not be feasible on my own, but I am beginning to see that others have similar ideas, and perhaps someone can do what I only dreamed of all those years ago when I was younger and more naive and idealistic.  If that is the case, I only hope I can be alive to see it come to full blossom, as that would be a momentous thing.   

Weighing In On DACA and Immigration

From the time I was a small kid, my mother drilled into me the importance of how to conduct yourself as a guest in someone else's house.  One thing was cardinal - you did not help yourself to your host's stuff, and you didn't demand that your host be your servant.  For many years, I even had a conviction to not even go into someone else's refrigerator, even if they gave permission, because it would be a form of disrespect.  It may seem like at outset that this was making your host wait on you hand and foot, but that is not how I saw it - I saw it as respecting their property enough as not to enter it, even with permission.  Over the years, I have softened up on that somewhat, as now it is not an issue to get something from someone else's refrigerator if they say it's OK.   But, it took many years to get past that stigma.  Despite the extremes I was taught to go to with this - and, my mother was a little extreme there! - at the same time it also embued into me a sense of respect for others and their property; you just don't help yourself to anyone's stuff arbitrarily, nor do you claim you have a right to do so.  You are a guest in their home, so it is your responsibility to respect them properly.  I still live by that today.   I tell that story to preface my position regarding a recent controversy that has embroiled our society, that being the issue of illegal immigration. 

To be honest, I have tried to stay clear of this issue, as it is a "hot button" thing and other than the news stories I am hearing, I have not been as informed on it as perhaps I should, but that has changed recently.  I have been watching various news reports and reading articles on this whole DACA, "Dreamers," and related issues, and the recent murder of Molly Tibbetts at the hands of an illegal immigrant has brought the issue close to home for many Americans.  Therefore, today, I want to just give my perspective on things and see where it goes.  I may tick off some people, as well as resonating with others, and that is to be expected.  However, it is an extremely important issue that cannot be just ignored.

Much like my upbringing where I was taught to respect other's homes when I am a guest, it must be understood that an illegal alien is just that - a guest, and in many cases, an uninvited guest in the very fact they are illegal.  There are a couple of up-front clarifications I want to establish first before I continue, so we will go ahead and do that.

First, most people who have issues with illegal immigration are not against immigrants at all.  As a matter of fact, if someone takes the effort to be naturalized officially as a citizen of our nation, they should be welcomed.   Many naturalized citizens are very important parts of our communities, and they often could teach those of us who are born and raised here an important lesson in regard to patriotism - they are very grateful to be in this country, they love and respect it, and interesting enough often they are the strongest opponents of illegal immigration because they know first-hand what it takes to be an American.  I have known many such people, and one in particular, a British ex-pat we used to go to church with by the name of Jean, said that she is no longer British but is American.   Some other friends of mine, a couple of beautiful Assyrian-American sisters named Christmas and Rebecca Simon, display a dedicated patriotism for our country that should shame many people who even fail to salute our flag during the Pledge of Allegiance.  People like Jean and the Simon Sisters are what this great nation is about - they represent a pride in their country of choice that many of us who are "natives" often take for granted, and we should maybe look at their example to remember how blessed we truly are to be here.  America started out as a nation of immigrants - even the American Indians came here from somewhere else actually - and hard-working immigrant ancestors are what built this nation and gave it the greatness she has.  However, many of those earlier (and current) immigrants have a couple of things that distinguish them.  First, they were not slaves to entitlement - many of them came here with just the shirts on their backs, yet they worked their butts off to get what they have and provide a good life for their families.  Second, they also complied to the legal process in obtaining their citizenship - they respected the laws, and followed them to become productive citizens of this nation.  And, for that, we should be proud of them.  Many of the people reading this have parents and grandparents who had that experience, and you are who you are because of those dedicated and hard-working people and should thank God for them every day.  Therefore, I too express appreciation for those people who came to our shores, respected the legal process, and put in the effort to being productive American citizens.  Those were some good people, and God bless them for it.

Another point I want to make is this - just because someone is Hispanic doesn't automatically make them an "illegal."   History testifies that much of what we call the American Southwest once belonged to Spain and later Mexico, and there are many people of Mexican descent in those regions whose ancestors may have settled there close to 300 or more years ago.  When those areas became part of the US, those people received automatic citizenship, and their descendants still are prominent in the region today.   Likewise, there is Puerto Rico - Puerto Rico is a part of the United States, and its residents are American citizens who happen to be predominantly Hispanic.  Their cultural heritage has contributed to the rich panorama of the American experience, and by all means they should celebrate it.  And, while it is important for them as American citizens to be conversant in English, at the same time I personally don't have a problem with them retaining a knowledge of the Spanish language either, as it is an integral part of who they are.  Therefore, it is important to understand that not all Spanish-speaking communities in the US are immigrants either - some are as native as I am.  However, for the illegals that cross the border, it creates problems particularly in the Southwest for long-established Mexican-American families who have lived there for generations and are citizens - the illegal immigrants drain the resources of the Mexican-American communities in those regions as well, and that is not right.  An American citizen of Mexican heritage should be given priority over those who cross the border illegally, and thus illegal immigration hurts Mexican-Americans too.

Now that we have established that, let's talk about DACA and "Dreamers."  DACA is defined as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, and essentially is an immigration policy that was implemented in large part by the Obama administration in 2012 that makes provision for those who were brought here illegally as children to be deferred (or even exempted) from deportation.  There are many problems with this which have caused opposition to it, and chief among those is who qualifies for this "deferred action?"   There are many undocumented adults who may or may not have come here as children who think they are entitled to DACA provisions, and they are even pushing to vote and do other things that are historic rights understood historically to be exclusive to citizens.  This broad and ambiguous implementation of DACA is what is causing many of the issues, and thus why it is opposed by many.  The term "Dreamer" has been applied to those who fall under these DACA ambiguities, and what has been happening is that criminal elements (MS-13 gang members, drug runners, Islamic terrorists, etc.) are taking advantages of the ambiguities of definition in order to carry out criminal activity, and there are some among those elements that say that because they are not given the right to vote, they are not subject to the laws, and thus can do what they want.  It is similar to "diplomatic immunity" abuse that some who are part of foreign embassy delegations use to get away with criminal behavior, and the problem is that often American citizens bear the brunt of this, as was the case with Mollie Tibbetts and others.  One of these "Dreamers" who claims to be an attorney but doesn't have citizenship even said that they were justified in this behavior - and, that attorney has an issue of his own.  If an attorney is practicing law in the US, but is an illegal himself, it begs the question - if you took time to get your law school degree, then why didn't you invest in getting legal citizenship then?   The attorney knows the law, but not only disobeys it himself but even empowers criminals who are illegals to perpetrate violence on American citizens, which to me would make this ambulance-chaser an accomplice in murders and other crimes his illegal alien buddies commit.  And, that leads to another important point.

Both of my parents served in Vietnam and are veterans of the Army, and in doing so they should have things better than what they do.  Many of our veterans - some of whom are disabled, still dealing with the traumas of war even 40 years after the fact, etc. - are living on the street and cannot get affordable housing or work.  Yet, what is weird is that they have to show an ID when they buy a bottle of Pabst Blue Ribbon in the local convenience store to "prove" that is who they are.   These are not just normal citizens, but veterans who fought for our country.   Yet, an illegal immigrant who shouldn't be here in the first place can come into a local welfare office, and they are handed thousands of dollars in benefits that you as a tax-paying citizen are financing while many of our veterans are living in cardboard boxes under bridges.  In my native West Virginia, as well as other states in the Appalachian region, children are going without decent meals while illegals are getting things handed to them on silver platters - if we can't take care of our own, we have a problem, seriously.  It would be like having a parent who locks their own biological child in a basement while lavishing gifts on a rich neighbor kid who doesn't need them, and indeed that is what many of our politicians have become, the equivalent of deadbeat parents who take our money, demand more, but fail to implement things that could benefit the common good of their citizens they claim to represent.  It is a scandal at best, but a lot of worse things could be named to describe it.  This, too, is why many informed Americans oppose DACA. 

My opinion of DACA is that it should be repealed.   While we should always welcome those who seek legal channels to obtain citizenship, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that, at the same time we should not be empowering illegal aliens to be illegal.   Illegal aliens should be encouraged to make it right by going through the proper channels to become citizens, and not exploit a system that they are not entitled to benefit from in the first place.  Until we get our priorities straight on this, we are headed for big trouble, especially as terrorists and violent gangs take advantage of the stupidity of elected officials in this nation to run amok and terrorize our citizens.  It needs to stop, and as immediately as possible.   That is my word on the subject for today. 

Why At Times Self-Appreciation May Be More Vital Than Unwarranted Opposition

There is a lot to reflect on, but often when that happens there are just no words to express it.  Since moving back a couple of years ago close to the area where I grew up as a kid, I have been reflecting on a lot honestly.  After 27 years in Florida, where I originally went to attend college but then ended up getting married and being stuck there, it is actually good to be home.  Being back in this area is not without its challenges though, and in contrast to the 19-year-old kid who left home in 1989 to go off to college, I am now a lot older and even different in outlook in many respects.  And, I not only brought myself back, but with me now is my wife too, and Maryland especially is a new experience for her as well.  I am not sure what the direction of this discussion is going to take today, but I am sure that as I ramble off I will get a structure to these thoughts. 

One thing of a more serious note I wanted to touch on is something that has been in the back of my mind for some time, and just needed to come out.  Over the 48 years (soon to be 49) of my existence, I have kind of gotten use to not being taken seriously, ignored, and even outright opposed by even family members.  If something happens to me that is good, or I reach a major achievement in my life, more often than not I will have some relative who belittles it, attacks it, or just plain ignores it totally - it always feels good to have a bubble burst for an achievement you have worked so hard for by those who actually should be sharing the joy with you.   That is why - and now I am getting my bearings! - it is time to give a bit of a life lesson to those who read this who may be in the same situation, in that there are a few things you need to understand in order to move forward.  This will necessarily mean a retitling of this piece from the original generic title I was going to give it, as we now have direction to write.  Bear with me though, as this is a little intense as a subject, and it is getting some things on the table I have hesitated to say but need to. 

Many reading this have had those moments where you have felt a sense of accomplishment - you got that promotion at your job, you landed that "dream job" you had been fighting for many years to get, or you earned that degree you have worked your butt off to get for four years.   You have just conquered a major mountain in your life, and you did it not just for you, but for the pride of your family and you have done something many of them couldn't do.  Now, this is an occasion to celebrate if any, right?  Of course!  And, in many cases, many families are proud of you for that great achievement you have just made and they will have a celebration or something for you.  It's really a blessing too when that happens.  However, although in an ideal world that should be the case, in real life many families are so fragmented and so divided this day and age that frankly, to use Clark Gable's iconic line from Gone With the Wind, they just don't give a damn.  When that comes across to you, after all the hard work and effort you made, it is like a slap in the face, isn't it?   That is what I want to direct my conversation to now, and it is not going to be easy for some on the receiving end of it to swallow at all, but there is a reason why it must be said.  That is what we'll talk about now.

The first part of this whole issue is an important principle to grasp - not everyone is going to appreciate what you do, and they will be critical and find fault with you despite your best efforts.  To be fair, you are not expecting them to understand your motivation and efforts, but just to appreciate them, but they fail to do either or even try.  Being faced with that is not pleasant, and especially when you want these people you call your family to share in the blessing with you, but this is where some important realizations need to be emphasized.  Despite what benefit and blessing your great accomplishment is supposed to be to your family, honestly you need to really grasp that you didn't do this just to get their accolades; no, you did it for your own growth and achievement, and that is what is important.  I have learned to use a two-word phrase that is a bit blunt yet effective in those situations with such people - "screw you."   After all, think about it - did they put in the effort you did to get where you are, and did they stand with you even when you had some difficult hurdles to overcome in gaining that milestone in your life?  Ninety-nine percent of the time that answer is no.  Yet, for some reason, those who invested the least (if anything) in your success are often the ones who are quick to condemn, criticize, and gossip about you behind your back.  I know of which I speak, as I have a family full of those deadweights.  Let me tell you a personal story about that if I could.

A few years back, after almost a 16-year hiatus, I was finally able to pursue the graduate degree that I wanted to earn for many years.  Due to life circumstances over the previous years, I was unable to pursue it earlier, so I was in my early 40's before I even started my Master's.  As I was getting ready to finish up the degree, I talked one night on the phone to a close relative - one who has a reputation for gossip and negativity, I might add, as this particular family member always has to put someone down - and mentioned my pursuits.  Instead of "I am so proud of you" or "way to go," all I got out of this individual was a nosy and inappropriate comment about my student loans (which is none of this person's business, being they have not contributed in any way to my education at all).  In the back of my mind, I was thinking "seriously??" and that conversation ended abruptly.  And, it is not the first time - I have caught a lot of flak over the years (even when I was younger) about pursuing my education, and many of the people who have done this were either blood relatives or in-laws.  This is why the "screw you" approach has been my coping mechanism, and as I mention that, I have also learned to limit my contact with such people too, even if they are family.  You can't choose your kin, it is true, but you can choose not to deal with them when they spread negativity and condemnation in your life.  So, I have learned to move forward with life despite the parasites that are family in many cases, and I have better things to do than to subject myself to their "scrutiny."  I have also learned an important lesson from the Bible about this too - in Matthew 7:6 a parable of Christ tells us to not cast our pearls before swine.  In the context of that verse, it means that precious things such as the proclamation of the Gospel as well as other holy things are not to be shared with those who will reject them and defile them, as it is just like a pig crapping on and trampling an heirloom pearl necklace.  Although that is the correct application of that passage in Scripture, it equally applies to us as well - there are many things we hold dear and even sacred ourselves, and they should not be shared with those who would make fun of them and not fully appreciate them - in other words, it is better not to even try to explain something good to a jerk in that case.  And, that leads me to another personal reflection that doesn't encompass one event, but rather several incidences in my lifetime.

Have you ever had one of those moments where you have experienced something that has touched you or really gotten you "fired up" about something in a good way, and you just wanted to share it?  It could be a dream you have had, an idea, or even a church service, concert, or some other event that impacted you profoundly.   The impact of whatever the situation is was so permeating that it was all you could think or talk about.  Yet, when you try to share it with people, they laugh at you, say you're "crazy," or even worse, they give you that apathetic look like "who cares?" and that tends to dampen the mood considerably.   I have always hated that when it happened, and to be honest it makes you want to take a baseball bat and crack some heads of these apathetic jerks who dismiss you.  Those apathetic jerks are like the pigs in Jesus's parable, and what you have done by telling them your life-changing experience is cast your pearls before them to trample to death, and therefore it cheapened and destroyed a good thing in your life, right?   While it is fair to accept that not everyone will have the same reaction you did to whatever it was that fired you up, at the same time the - forgive the pejorative term here - dumbasses could at least be happy for you; I mean, what if it was reversed and they had the good experience - would they like it if you dismissed them like that??   In recent years (meaning about 20 honestly) there have been some good movies that have captured this perfectly, and I want to talk about two of them now.

The first movie featured the little guy above in the title role, and for those who were around at that time, it is 1998's Simon Birch.  The title character of that film was a sickly dwarf pre-teen boy who was misunderstood by many in his town, and his parents were so deadbeat they could care less about him.  So, he befriended another boy (Joe) who was the child of a single parent who was equally shunned, and as it turns out, the parish church vicar ended up being that boy's father, as it was revealed later.  Despite being put-down and ostracized by even his own parents, one thing notable during the course of the film was that little Simon Birch had two things going for him - for one, he had a positive attitude despite his adversity, and he also had a sense of destiny.  Later, thanks to the heroic action of little Simon in giving his life to rescue a busload of scared young kids who had careened into a river, his destiny was realized.  Both Simon and his friend Joe illustrate that often greatness is underappreciated and condemned, until often it is too late.  Simon had to die in serving others in order to be taken seriously, which is tragic. 

The second movie, 1996's Matilda, featured young actress Mara Wilson (pictured above) in the title role of the film.  Matilda Wormwood is basically an unwanted daughter of two deadbeat parents who basically ignore her, and in her lonliness she begins to read voraciously and achieves an intelligence beyond her years, which of course is dismissed and denigrated by her jackass family.  But, in the end a dedicated teacher (thank God for those too!) sees the treasure this little girl really was, and she takes her as her own.  Matilda achieved a lot, but she also had little support or love from those who are supposed to be her family.  She shared that in common with Simon Birch.

A third film I want to mention came out around 2003 and was called Second-Hand Lions, and it featured a teenage Haley Joel Osment as Walter, a young boy whose golddigger mother was so self-absorbed that she didn't give a care about her son and therefore sought to dump him off on her two eccentric elderly uncles (played by Michael Caine and Robert Duval, who did an excellent job) in Texas who lived in a rickety old house, despite having a fortune assumed to be in the billions they had amassed in their younger days as mercenary guns-for-hire in Europe and North Africa.  The kid is really insecure, but he grows on the uncles who eventually give the boy a home in which he is able to live a good life free of his selfish mother, and he goes on to become a successful cartoonist as an adult.  This movie is a good illustration as to why in some cases adoption is preferable to bad biological parents, in that the boy's uncles really took an interest in him and raised him to be a fine young man, something his mother would have failed at doing.  Again, like Simon Birch and Matilda Wormwood, Walter was an underappreciated treasure to his biological parents, and they lost out, yet they didn't seem to care.  However, at least fate assisted them to be the people they were destined to be, and that is the beauty of those movies. 

The lesson one should get out of these movies is that regardless of circumstance, and even dead wood in one's family, one can rise above and beyond the crap-pile of negativity, criticism, and ignorance that families tend to foster.  I am a testimony of that myself - neither of my parents were real prizes by any measure, and the rest of my relatives didn't even care that I existed throughout most of my younger life, yet I beat the odds and accomplished a lot despite those circumstances.  I overcame poverty, isolation, and even condemnation and criticism of others to be the person I am today, and no one can take that from me and no one has a right to condemn, gossip, judge, or make sport of it either.  I have learned - and yes, it sounds selfish, but in this context it is fine - that I need to take care of what is in my best interests first, although I have never been adverse to good mentorship when offered.  In taking care of my best interests, I am in a better position then to serve others who maybe need that encouragement, so if any good fruit comes from out of this, it would be the ability to tell people that they need to stay away from negativity-spreaders (even, and especially, if they are family) and stay on course with what they are supposed to be doing.  That way, you keep focused, and the word-vomit of deadbeat family and others won't derail your pursuits.  If more people would learn that, I think a lot of nonsense we face would be easily eliminated.  Any rate, that is my lesson for today, and hopefully it reaches someone.  Also, like a minister named Mark Chironna said once, and I take as words to live by, it is good to remember that your present position doesn't determine your future potential.  And, that includes the present mouth-vomit of deadbeat family members too.  So long until next time.

Quirks, Enigmas, and Other Personal Anomalies I Possess

Note - This comes from a hand-written manuscript I wrote out some years back as part of my life story project I have been working on for several years.  I am adding some things to it as I document it here, as this is over ten years old and I have come a long way on some things since that time.  I hope you enjoy it!

As a part of my personal life story, it is something I do judiciously being one's quirks and idiosyncrasies can offer the risk of vulnerability when openly discussed.  Furthermore, in my case some of these quirks have become the substance of family legend, although they are at times either exaggerated by some family members but are still a favorite topic of conversation at family get-togethers.  When I refer to "quirks" though, it is with a broad brush in my case, as some of these things are stuff I haven't really discussed at length - not because anything would be wrong with it, but rather that I never really thought of a way to articulate it.  It also entails my personal likes and dislikes I possess as part of my identity as well, as they play a role in why I am quirky on some things.  Personal preference and idiosyncrasies on an individual basis often are intertwined with each other, and they are endowments of God himself that make us who he intended us to be. 

A good place to start this discussion is with the subject of food.  Anyone who knows me knows I am probably one of the most finicky eaters around, and I have been since my youngest recollections.  Almost everyone obviously has their own likes and dislikes when it comes to food, and the reality is that not everyone likes every kind of food.  However - and maybe it is just me - I take my personal culinary likes and dislikes to a whole new level, and my food preferences could actually set up a therapist for life just hearing about them.   I want to digress from my notes on this now and address some issues with this over the years in lieu of certain foods I personally not only hate but hate with a passion.  As I discuss this, I know that I have cousins and other relatives who may read this and may get their toes stepped on, because this relates to some of their behavior toward me over the years, which to them may not seem like a big deal but to me it is.  It is where quirk intertwines with pet-peeve as a matter of fact, and other than perhaps with God and my own wife Barbara, I have not really expressed what I am about to talk about in detail, but perhaps it is time I do. 

Although I am fairly finicky about a lot of things when it comes to my own food preferences, like anyone there are certain foods I just hate, so much so that even seeing or smelling them makes me nauseous.  In particular, these involve foods in which the integral ingredient is vinegar, and in particular pickles - I despise those honestly.   There are many foods I dislike but have no issue tolerating - for instance, beans.  I don't like beans, but they don't repulse me either.   However, when it comes to pickles, there is a serious reason I probably despise them more than maybe others would, and it has to do with conditioning.  When I was very young - say, around 2 or 3 years of age - I more or less affirmed that I didn't really have a real affinity for cucumber pickles.  Unfortunately, on my mother's side of the family, there tends to be a real insensitivity on the part of some who tend to take something like this and bludgeon it to death, and that is what some uncles, aunts, and cousins did to me.  To be honest, had I not been teased or tormented about what originally was just a normal dislike, I may not have the hatred of pickles and other vinegary foods I have today.  But, seizing on a dislike, my family just picked, and picked, and picked, and at my expense and also my discomfort they aggravated a normal dislike for a certain food and turned it into an outright hatred.  As a result, today I cannot even stand a pickle on a dish as a garnish, as it taints the entire plate - many thanks to insensitive cousins and uncles for that!  If I had it to do over again honestly, there would have been some relatives who would have been unable to bear children after attempting those hijinks, because I would have kicked them in their crotch for aggravating me like that, and they would have deserved it.  At this point I am going to soapbox, because honestly this is a cruel thing to do to kids when they are young, and if you are doing it, you should be ashamed of yourselves and stop NOW.  The damage you do to kids with that crap is something they have to live with the rest of their lives just so a jackass like you - blood may be thicker than water, but let's face facts that some people are jackasses despite being related to you - can get a moment of amusement.  To some who perpetrate these actions toward those of your family, you may think it's no big deal, but you fail to understand the impact that has on others.  Like I said, if one of my cousins even tried that today, I would kick them so hard in the gonads that they'd be blowing their bollocks out their noses.  And, if any of my relatives are reading this now, you know who you are, so be warned.  And parents, don't let your relatives do this to your kids either, because by you tolerating such nonsense, you are no better.  Anyway, intermediate rant is over.

Related to my like or dislike of foods, I also associate foods I hate or love with other things I like or dislike.  For example, I hate mayonnaise - somehow my hatred of mayonnaise is associated with white socks, denim clothes, and rock music;  I dislike those equally.  My hatred of mayonnaise, though not quite as bad as my hatred of pickles, is still intense - even the word makes me cringe, honestly.   On the other hand, what is equally weird is how I associate other things with food I like - for instance, the smell of a good pizza for some weird reason makes me think of Christmas;  don't ask me why, as it just does.  Also, the smell of things such as blueberries gives me a fond memory of my great-grandmother's house in Hendricks, WV, where I spent a good part of my childhood.  I know this all may sound a little bizarre, but I warned you that my quirks may be a little different! 

Oddly, despite a rabid hatred of pickles, a fresh cucumber doesn't bother me at all - I have no real ill will concerning cukes;  I don't really care for them, except when they are dredged in flour and deep-fried (those are delicious too - I share the affinity for those with my cousin Buzz and with my mother)
I did at one time like raw cukes too, but just grew out of the taste of them for some reason.  A cuke to me is about as harmless as any other raw vegetable until you corrupt it by pickling it, and then it becomes something nasty to me.  I don't know who came up with the idea that vinegar was fit for human consumption, but as a base ingredient to many recipes it is one of the nastiest things in existence, both in taste and smell.  Although its nastiest manifestation is in the form of a pickle, vinegar is also the reason I will not eat salads or sandwiches even today.  Both of those have one thing in common - they are often loaded with condiments (mayonnaise, ketchup, prepared mustard, steak sauce, barbecue sauce, salad dressings, etc.) which in turn are loaded with - you guessed it! - vinegar.  Over the years, I have given vinegar my own nickname - "apple piss" or "Satan's nectar."  It does bear an uncanny resemblance (especially apple cider vinegar) to urine, and to me, it is almost as nasty.  While it is certainly true that vinegar may even have some beneficial qualities - it has been noted as an effective glass cleaner and disinfectant (if you can stand the smell of it!), and some nutritionists swear by its beneficial properties in regard to the blood when it is consumed.  However, I am sure there are other things which are just as beneficial and effective and much less repugnant, and I have made it a personal quest as a culinary aficionado to find out what those are.  In the past few years, for instance, I have often utilized a pleasant alternative to vinegar called verjus, which is the tart juice of either crabapples or unripe grapes, and it provides the zing without the nastiness of vinegar.  Also, I am a big fan of using lemon juice in recipes too with the same effect.  With it, I have come up with my own versions of barbecue marinades, and even salad alternatives - such as microgreens, edible flowers, watercress, and stuff like fresh berries and pignoli nuts spritzed with lemon and olive oil.  I have more information on that available on my culinary page if you are interested.  It was my ambition to eventually come up with a cookbook of this stuff, and in a sense, my food blog has been an important step toward that over the past ten years or so.  I have also been encouraged by others who have the same rabid dislike for vinegar, and oddly we even have a Facebook page as a sort of support network.   Also, perhaps a positive that has come out of my own aversion to vinegar is a knack for gourmet cooking, which I have learned to put who I am on a plate and therefore I have my own unique culinary identity now as well.  I am going to visit that briefly before I move on next.

When I was around nine or ten years old, my late step-grandmother died and I was able to "inherit" by default her gourmet cookbooks she had.  One of those cookbooks in particular, which oddly I can no longer find anywhere, was a book entitled Cooking for Everyday Life, and I recall reading through that so much that eventually the book fell apart.  I loved to read anyway as a kid, and that led me to read some unique and odd stuff - people I went to elementary school with still kid me about reading the whole set of World Book Encyclopedias we had in our classroom through so many times I memorized them.  I also had a Bible story book that belonged originally to Mom, and I also had an affinity for atlases and maps (I can still sit even today and study a map for hours).  The cookbook in particular though was something that really caught my attention, in that I could read through it and it expressed several of my own passions - a love of miniature things (especially in regard to hors d'oevres), the sense of accomplishment and enjoying seeing something you create yourself come together, as well as my own aforementioned peculiarities in appetite.  Something too about reading that cookbook from cover to cover also alleviated the situation I was growing up in at around the time I was nine or ten years old - we lived in abject poverty then, and in addition to my own mother having alcohol issues at the time we had a neighborhood that was rife with poverty and dysfunction, and if you couldn't rise above it the whole thing could be dreary and depressing.  Many years ago, an independent Pentecostal minister by the name of Mark Chironna said something that changed my outlook for good - the quote he had was "your present position doesn't determine your future potential."  I have lived by that as a part of my personal manifesto since, and in doing so I realized that my way of living that back then was in self-education - reading was a nice escape from the adversity that surrounded me, and it was also my ticket to rising above my circumstance and striving toward something better.  And, it wasn't just the cookbook - I read very widely as a kid, and things I read ranged from classic children's books such as Robert Newton Peck's Soup books to more controversial material - Mom had a collection of books I read at a young age that many would not think a kid of that age would read, such as Vincent Bugliosi's covering of the Manson murders in his book Helter Skelter, as well as the Jonestown tragedy in a book entitled People's Temple, People's Tomb, written by a survivor of that cult by the name of Phil Kerns.  As a result, I often amazed my teachers in school with knowing things far beyond my years, and that has stuck with me since - today, it is not unusual for me to read as many as ten books within a week.   Reading then also instilled in me a propensity to express myself in writing and drawing, and today I still have an extensive portfolio of things I have created in both areas over the years.  I got made fun of a lot by less-intelligent relatives for my abilities here as well, and I also endured patronizing and assumptions that I could help this one or that one out with homework, etc.  Just because one is an avid reader though doesn't make one omniscent, although a person who is widely read will certainly be more informed and intelligent.  And, in this day and age, ignorance is often touted as a virtue, as is seen by people in California and elsewhere who actually think that Jesus was assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald (the guy who assassinated JFK) in the year 1300!  If more kids were encouraged to read and expand their horizons a little instead of tinkering with gadgetry, our nation might be in better shape. 

My affinity for reading cookbooks, along with my own unique tastes, likes, and dislikes, led me to also get into wildcrafting.  In case you are not familiar, wildcrafting is the gathering of wild plants for medicinal and culinary purposes, and along the way I had help from my late step-grandfather Lonnie, who taught me how to harvest poke, mushrooms, and other things in trips to the woods.  These interests also led me to earn a culinary certificate in 1992 while being part of a paid JTPA program in Dothan, AL.   That all being said, I also have other seemingly weird culinary practices - for instance, if I eat a stick of pepperoni, I don't want it pre-sliced, but would rather slice it myself.  And, although I like pepperoni, and I like pizza, I don't have a taste for pepperoni pizzas.  I also don't like ground beef and onions together, nor can I eat a lot of potatoes or other starches - one serving usually of a baked potato or fries, or one or two pancakes, will suffice, and even then I won't always finish them.  And, these days a large bag of potato chips can last me for weeks.  I also don't like mixing food together - I may actually like a couple of things individually, but don't like them touching on my plate.  These constitute a few of my culinary quirks, but I also have quirks in other areas as well.

Anyone who either has known me a long time or has kept up with my articles over the past ten years or so also knows I am a music aficionado.  My biggest passion in that context is vintage dance bands, and I have been collecting recordings of those for about 36 years now as of this writing.  One thing about my passions is that I can get obsessive about them, and over the years I have probably invested more into my huge music library than I probably should have - that now encompasses approximately 1230 CD recordings, and around a thousand vinyl LP's which I have housed in two huge cabinets in my office.  There is no need to chronicle that story, as it has been well-documented already, but the point is my musical tastes, much like my culinary preferences, would be considered by some to be pretty eccentric - I am probably one of the few people my age, for instance, who is a huge fan of big bandleader Freddy Martin, and I am a pretty regular viewer almost every week of both the old Lawrence Welk Shows on PBS and Molly B Polka Party on the RFD-TV network.  As a teen in the mid-1980's, this was not lost on my peers either, as at that time many of them were into Madonna and Michael Jackson, neither of which I could stomach.  I honestly could never get into rock music, despite my growing up in a generation that worshipped at its altars.  I caught a lot of flak and endured a lot of persecution concerning that when I was in middle school, although ironically some of those who gave me a rough time all those years ago now like Michael Buble (go figure on that one, as he sings a lot of the same stuff I used to collect!), but I stuck to my guns and still love that great music today.  As the story has been told before, you know that the Rio Mall in Rio, WV, as well as Henry Boggan's Sunday night radio show on WBT-AM in Charlotte, NC (later replaced by Chuck Cecil's "Swingin' Years," which was a better program) were my genesis as far as collecting that great music was concerned, but we've moved far past that in recent years - with CD's coming into popularity, I have now switched venues to buying new stuff from Amazon.  I also owe that interest to God himself, in that I have come to believe that he gave me the taste for good music based on his transcendental properties (truth, beauty, goodness) of which the big bands were one of the last popular music forms to utilize, and I feel like I was set apart in that regard for my own protection.  Granted, I was not perfect in cultivating that interest - on occasion I spent a lot of money and made dumb decisions to buy CD's rather than taking care of something more important, which I regret.  Also, good music doesn't always equal exemplary lives in the ones who create it - the big bands had their share of those addicted to alcohol and drugs obviously (which was a shame, as a lot of great talent was lost to those vices), and some personalities were involved in other things that were morally questionable too ("Jelly Roll" Morton being a pimp in New Orleans, for instance, as well as arrangers Ralph Burns and Billy Strayhorn being openly homosexual), but the challenge comes in separating the talents and the music created by such individuals from their personal shortcomings, which can be hard given the tendency of human beings to hold up people they like as role models and then finding out when they do something questionable in such a way that it can be devastating.  The lesson I have learned from that over the years is this - never put a fallible human being on a pedestal, because you can be easily disappointed if they don't measure up to some preconceived standard.  I have learned to appreciate good talent without always accepting or agreeing with people who possess it because despite their own personal choices God still endowed them with the talent they have.  The huge difference though with today's standards is that often among celebrities vice and lack of talent are both held up as idolatry, and as a result you have tone-deaf jackasses such as Simon Cowell determining what constitutes "talent" rather than real talent actually being cultivated and encouraged.  Good music that expresses creativity and real talent is sadly in short supply these days, as a bygone generation that understood those things is largely passed on now.  Therefore, when I am asked (as I often am) the question "how does someone your age come to appreciate vintage dance bands (or big bands)?" I honestly have been at a loss for words as to how to answer:  simply, I just like it, and it more adequately represents my own identity as a person.  Music like that has a sophistication and aesthetic variety that draws me to it - a group of diverse instruments playing together is uplifting and inspiring, but I cannot articulate how.  I will go further to say that my eccentric interests are also reflected in my religious faith - I have never been one to "go with the crowd," I value and treasure tradition, and my faith reaches beyond myself to something that transcends me - again, this is expressed in the attributes of beauty, truth, and goodness.  And, it also doesn't just encompass big bands either; I like the works of Stravinsky, Shostakovich, and Prokofiev, as well as Strauss waltzes, for the same reasons.  When I hear them, it strikes a chord within me (no pun intended, BTW!) and I am taken to different places and my imagination is awakened - whether it is listening to Katchaturian's Valse Masquerade, Stravinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps, or Shostakovich's Seventh Symphony, or I could add Komitas' Little Partridge, Copland's Appalachian Spring, or Strauss's Emperor Waltz.  Something in those great works of music captivates me, and I can be enraptured for different reasons (depending on the circumstance) for hours as those sounds play over in my mind.  It is important to remember that just because "everybody's doing it" doesn't mean you have to, and if you don't like what your peers listen to and are drawn to other sounds, embrace that, as there may be a reason for it.  I have learned not to be ashamed, despite how you may be dismissed are derided for it, of what you like.  People who belittle you for that have their own issues, and you are not the problem.   Same holds true in other areas of life as well. 

I have other quirks and habits as well, and one relates to music.  For years, I had thought I was weird because I could "hear" colors in a piece of music - honest to God, some music "sounds" yellow, red, white, or orange to me!  When I looked into it though, I actually found out I was not alone, and that it is actually more common, and it has a name - chromesthesia.  Basically, the dictionary definition of chromesthesia is when "heard sounds evoke involuntarily an experience of color," and it is part of a wider trait called synesthesia.  I have never shared that experience with anyone, as in the past I would have probably been fitted with a sleeveless jacket and stuck in a padded cell had I mentioned it, but it is how my mind actually operates.  When I hear a certain sound, for instance, I immediately associate it with a color.  Oddly, if the song has a color in the name - let's say, "Red Sails in the Sunset" - the color I experience in the tune of the song may not reflect the title of the song.  For instance, when I hear "Red Sails in the Sunset," I associate it with the color orange rather than red.  If I were to associate a tune with the color red, one that immediately comes to mind for me is Charlie Barnet's 1939 recording of "Cherokee."  Oddly too, although Duke Ellington's 1932 recording of "Mood Indigo" is about a dark shade of the color blue, when I hear it I "see red."  That is probably going to sound so bizarre to some of you, but that is OK too.  I am sure you have some bizarre traits of your own, and no one thinks you are crazy for those, so don't judge! 

Many of my other idiosyncrasies are also unique to me.  One in particular I have is that I will not go barefoot in public - it is a very huge challenge for me, for instance, when I visit one of those houses where people make you take off your shoes, and it just feels weird to me. Even just wearing socks with no shoes is weird (to me there is no difference between socks and going barefoot anyway).  I also do not wear t-shirts in public either  - a t-shirt to me is either an undergarment or a nightshirt, and I just feel inappropriate with wearing one outside of those contexts.  I also don't wear denim and haven't even worn a pair of jeans since I was 11 or thereabouts.  Additionally, I don't wear shorts in public either - even wearing a pair of swim trunks to the beach is a rarity, and it took my wife a lot of effort to convince me to even do that.  Additionally, I am also highly possessive of my belongings - I have to know where everything is, and even my wife cannot have one of my books to read without my own close monitoring of it.   These are my own unique quirks, but I have a couple of final ones before closing the discussion.

For many, a driver's license is a big deal, and for most, it is a routine thing to drive a car.  However, it is probably going to shock most people to learn I have never had a driver's license, and to be honest I have a fear of driving on busy highways.  I do know how to drive a car though, as I did take and successfully passed driver's ed in high school.  But, prior to being married, and for a number of years after, I never had a car of my own, and living in the city at the time I managed by using public transportation and just never had the chance to take the test and get a license.  It is a bit embarrassing to me honestly - here I am with a graduate degree and almost 50 years old, and never had a driver's license of my own.  I am, however, in the process of getting one, so that is a soon-to-be past challenge.  I also have never learned to swim, and actually, have a morbid fear of water that comes up past my knees.  Much like I was teased with pickles when I was a kid, I was also teased with water too, and therefore never learned to swim.  Again, a bunch of jackass family members contributed to that (thanks, cousins and uncles!).  Again, to soapbox, some of you who have family members that struggle with swimming and such need to not make such a big joke out of it, and if it were you, how would you like it??  Many a time I wanted to stick firecrackers down the pants of certain relatives for acting like complete jackasses, and it still irks me to this day.  Oddly though, I love visiting aquariums and observing underwater life - it is actually quite therapeutic to have a fish tank in an office, as something about it just is calming.  There are probably other things I didn't touch on either, but these are definitive as far as my personality is concerned.

Quirks and idiosyncrasies are unique to all of us - often people misunderstand why many of us are as we are, yet they fail to see their own quirkiness.  God gave each of us certain attributes of our personalities that are unique to us, and it is what makes each of us an individual and a person who is whole in ourselves, an end in ourselves, and also subject to the basic rights fundamental to all human persons.  Therefore, if you find you have a unique quirk that is all you, and you face criticism for it, just ignore it and remember that God doesn't make junk.  Your "weirdness" makes you, well, you - you are not required to conform to the standards of others in those areas, and anyone who forces you is violating you.  God created you as you are, so don't be afraid to be yourself.  Also, don't fear your limitations or imperfections either - no one has arrived yet anyway, so you are in good company.  The more you accept who and what you are, the better you can fulfill your vocation in life.  Now, that does not mean we don't have room for improvement, and we should always strive to strengthen those areas we are weak in, but even our weaknesses can be a reflection of God's continual work in us.  Also, a quirk is not synonymous with a fault either - faults are those things we have that maybe are negative and need work, and they reflect our fallen nature as human beings.  The best remedy for faults is simply one thing - supernatural grace.  Supernatural grace heals faults, enhances "quirks" to make them more in line with what God intended, and it also perfects us, strengthening the best in us and buttressing those areas where we may be weak.  Too many people are quick to confuse faults and quirks and thus condemn others for the latter, which is why it is important to know better.  If someone refuses to do that, they are not needed in your life, even if they are blood relatives; the less condemnation you have, the more you can focus on what you need to focus on without being burdened with the jeers, criticism, and persecution of others (including relatives sometimes).  And, that is the word of wisdom for the day. 

The Epidemic of Elitism

I wanted to reflect on a few things today.  One of my daily indulgences is listening to a conservative commentator on YouTube by the name of Mark Dice.   Mark is not what you would call a typical "journalist," and to be honest, I don't think that is his aspiration.  However, his insights on contemporary issues are insightful as well as humorous - his impressions of CNN talking-head Brian Stelter (who looks like the fictional George Costanza from Seinfeld and talks like Mickey Mouse) have me almost rolling on the floor cracking up in laughter to be honest, and I could watch those over and over.  Being I don't watch CNN (as Dice aptly calls them, the "Clown News Network"), the snippets that Mark shows on his webcasts are my way of keeping up with what goes on.  Last week, at a Trump rally in Tampa, one of their "reporters" (using that term loosely), Jim Acosta, was heckled off the stage when he was trying to cover the event with chants of "CNN Sucks!" as well as people flipping him off.  Of course, being the liberal he is, Acosta was mortified at how "dangerous" the situation was and of course cried about it all over the internet.  This, of course, got him more derision.  What happened in Tampa last week, as well as President Trump's crackdown on this whole "fake news" cabal, indicates that the "average Joe" on the street is a bit fed-up with the bias the media has.  However, the media's response is not to reflect and evaluate where it went wrong - oh no, they can't do that!  Instead, they are seeking to blame someone for tarnishing their reputation, and of course the usual suspects - President Trump, the "alt-right," and of course those pesky "Russian bots" - are all being bandied about.   However, the problem is actually staring them in the face, and they fail to see that it is themselves who must bear responsibility for the negative opinions the American public has of them.  And, what we see here is a manifestation of a bigger problem, which is the subject of my commentary today.

The real issue at stake is neither the sitting President, Russia, nor an exaggerated threat of the "alt-right," but rather it rests in one word - elitism.   Over the years, I have observed that elitism tends to be a hallmark of at least four classes of people in this nation (and even worldwide) and those four classes are as follows:

1.  Academic elites
2.  Career politicians
3.  Hollywood, musical, and sports celebrities
4.  The "Mainstream" media enterprise

A fifth - corporate moguls - could also be added, but theirs is more subtle in that they bankroll the other four.  The elitism displayed by these classes of people manifests itself in several ways, and here are a few of them:

1.  A delusion of infallibility
2.  An attitude of superiority due to status
3.  A tendency toward revisionism of narrative
4.  A demonization of anyone who disagrees with them

Regarding the fourth, the elitist typically will play the "victim" and claim that the disagreement against them somehow translates as "hate speech," and thus the one who disagrees is labeled often in defamatory ways.   Regarding the second, those of these "priveleged" classes often feel as if they have this quasi-religious and overly-patronizing "mission" to "enlighten" those they feel are inferior to them.   After all, their status (at least in their eyes) makes them "right" about everything (see #1 above) and thus they need to "correct" anything that conflicts with their narrative (see #3 above).  And, anyone who sees otherwise is thus thought of as inferior (the elitist will look down their noses at their detractors to communicate "how dare you!" to them) and if the detractor is seen as gaining too much clout with "the masses," then a propaganda campaign must be implemented to discredit them, or "damage control measures" are to be implemented.   The general attitude then of such people can be summarized as follows:  "WE know what is best for YOU, and therefore how dare YOU question US, and YOU will be destroyed!"   As can be seen though, they fail miserably in this regard due to the fact they underestimate the fact that the normal guy on the street may actually have the good common sense to know better, and that is seen as abominable to the elitist.  However, thankfully many are waking up to the deceptions of the elitist mentality, and the recent backlash against CNN and other media elitists is evidence that there is hope for America, as the "little guy" is now in a position to assert that he isn't a mindless moron and can think for himself or herself. 

I personally have seen one of these elitist classes in action in recent years, as the college where I earned my undergraduate degree in 1996 has all of a sudden become a bastion of academic elitism, and I took on the establishment back in 2014.  At that time, I was interviewed by a conservative organization, the Institute for Religion and Democracy, regarding the rise of liberal theology at my alma mater.  Once the article hit the internet, I caught some serious backlash from the elitists on the campus of that same institution, as I hit a sensitive nerve.   As a result, I was subject to some nasty and defamatory remarks from both faculty and some former classmates alike, and was called names such as "Fundamentalist nut," "archaic relic," and my own intelligence was even attacked by these people, many of whom supposedly were my "brethren" in faith.   Many of the faculty of this institution in question were also members of a certain academic society which, in recent years, has become more about political activism rather than scholarship, and in recent years they have been introducing some things that many laypeople in the religious tradition these elitists represent would find contrary to their convictions.  Yet, in response to that, and in typical elitist fashion, the offending academic elitist was defended by the president of this society, who then turned around and asserted their own "spiritual superiority" over the millions of faithful churchgoers in their own religious tradition, even defaming them as "ignorant."  The term I have for these elitists is not the most charitable, but it does embody what they are - pompous ass.  The pomposity of such individuals makes the fictional Major Charles Emerson Winchester III of the old sitcom M.A.S.H.  look humble.  And, it vividly illustrates what these elitists are capable of.  Let me now contrast another example.

In order to generate some extra income, I edit and type articles and papers for a graduate student at Catholic University in Washington, DC, by the name of Pete.  Pete is a good guy, and in typing a lot of his manuscripts over the past year, I have learned a thing or two that has enriched me personally as well as financially.  One of the major focuses of Pete's research is on the life of Edith Stein, or St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross.  In his research of this great saint and martyr of the Church, Pete has extensively read about her academic background, and that is something I want to focus on here for the moment.   Edith Stein (1891-1942) was a Carmelite nun of Jewish heritage who converted to the Catholic faith when she was a young college student, and she is noted as a philosopher as well as a spiritual giant of the Church.   The type of philosophy that Edith studied was something called phenomenology, which has to do with the structures of experience and consciousness, and the major aspect of this is a reflection upon the phenomena that appear in acts of conscience.  The main proponent of this school of thought was a German-Jewish philosopher, Edmund Husserl (1859-1938).  Husserl had two main proteges who went different directions - one became a martyr, while the other an academic elitist.  Those two people, respectively, were Edith Stein and Martin Heidegger (1889-1976).  Both of Husserl's proteges were as different as night from day, and whereas Edith Stein was a deeply religious (or would be) person of humility and piety who was eventually murdered in Auschwitz, Heidegger was a Nazi collaborator who eventually unseated Husserl at the University of Freiberg and succeeded him.   Heidegger, in contrast to Stein, was the quintessential elitist - he curried favor with the authorities to advance his own position, and he viewed even his mentors (such as Husserl) as "inferior."  Unfortunately, Heidegger would have undue and destructive influence in theology as well, being that later people such as Jurgen Moltmann and Stanley Hauerwas would be influenced by him, as well as others such as Paul van Buren and Biblical hermeneutic "experts" such as philosopher Merrold Westphal and others.  Heidegger's influence on postmodern revisionism is so pervasive, as a matter of fact, that some people I have read even say he "Nazified" Biblical scholarship and theology.  And, in doing so, Heidegger was being a true academic elitist to the core. 

The attitudes of the elitists today are in stark contrast to the virtues in the past demanded of authorities, in particular the clergy and nobility, that are evident.  In his book Nobility and Analogous Traditional Elites, the Brazilian philosopher Plinio Correa de Oliviera notes something that sort of defines what the essence of nobility embodies, and that is Christian virtue.  As he explains on page 67 of the text, Christian virtue and the Christian ideal are part of the very essence of nobility.  This virtue is driven by the cardinal virtue of charity, which means therefore the dignity of personhood is extended to all social classes, while at the same time respecting an established hierarchy.     Looking at it from that perspective, the long-discarded code of noblesse oblige would come into play, in that those in authority or having a certain status should act accordingly.  So, when media elitists promote "fake news," are they doing this?   Not at all - if anything, they embody the sin of lying and "bearing false witness" (meaning gossip and defamation on baseless grounds) and thus forfeit their respect; in short, Jim Acosta has no right to cry "foul" when a fed-up average American at a Trump rally flips him the bird and says his network "sucks."  It also means that the elitists of today are not truly elites, in that the latter understand the responsibilities of their position and should have the humility to act decently and in order.  Many academics, press people, celebrities, and politicians fail miserably when it comes to this aspect, and therefore they are mere elitists rather than elites in that they inflate their own self-importance and delusion of power rather than exercising their position and its roles responsibly.  That will therefore lead to the concluding thought to this discourse now.

In all of the four groups mention who are guilty of the cardinal offense of elitism, there are distinctions to be made.  For one, if one is an academic, the focus should be on scholarship.   If one is a politician, the focus should be on responsible leadership.  If one is in the media, the focus should be on responsible and objective journalism.  And, if one is in entertainment and sports, the focus should be on using talent to entertain and also aesthetic quality, rather than cheap marketing and no-talent soapboxing.  There are those in these four classes who do exemplify the true virtues of their professions, and those people are to be commended - it is what will make them legends and ensure a place in the annals of history.  But, that caliber of professional in these classes is becoming more and more rare these days, and hence the problem.   When we get back to academic elites being actual scholars, career politicians being real leaders, celebrities being genuine artists, and media elites being true journalists, I believe society will have a surge of healing and reparation to that will correct much of its damage.  Of course, at the central core of all this is a return to faith, for in faith do we find the true transcendental properties of truth (dealing with leaders and journalists), goodness (dealing with academics), and beauty (dealing with the celebrities among us).  And, ultimately, that is centered on the proper place of God as the center of our society, but it starts first with God being at the center of our own lives - change inwardly manifests outwardly eventually.  Any rate, those are today's thoughts. 

Commemorating The Victims of a Great Tragedy - Assyrian Martyr's Day

Many of the stories I write here are reflections of my own story, as they mirror different aspects of my own life experience.   This one is more somber in tone due to the fact it deals with an issue that is close to my own heart and has been for the past 30 years - the Assyrian people and their history, which has been baptized in the blood of many innocent martyrs from among them.  Collectively, these martyrs are officially commemorated on August 7, which is Assyrian Martyr's Day, and thus I felt the need to say something about it. 

Over the past 30 or so years, I have gotten to know the Assyrians as my friends - I have many dear and close friends among them, including author/actress/activist Rosie Malek-Yonan, singer Linda George, Assyrian nationalist Sargon Dadesho, a couple of beautiful and intelligent Assyrian sisters by the name of Christmas and Rebecca Simon,  Assyrian-American pastor John Booko, and Assyrian author/activist Fred Aprim.  I will even be referencing some of the material as I write this today that they themselves have authored, and it is my hope that I can inform as many non-Assyrians as possible about these remarkable people and their great nation.  I also have another closeness to them as well - being a blood descendant of two prominent Byzantine-era Armenian families on my father's side of the family tree, I now identify as Armenian, and thus share a level of solidarity with my Assyrian friends, as in many cases they and the Armenians suffered many of the same atrocities at the same period of time.  The recognition of this tragedy needs to be made official, as it would be a great tribute to the many innocent martyrs of these atrocities over the past century.  And, that is why I make a point to commemorate Assyrian martyrs of all tragedies every year on August 7th myself. 

At this point, it is also worth mentioning (as well as I have recently learned myself) that as I write this it is Friday, August 3rd.  Another commemoration of a neighboring community is observed today, and that is of the Yezidi community.  The Yezidis are often lumped together with the Kurds, but are a religious community that pre-dates Islam by centuries.  The religion they practice has its roots in pre-Islamic Medo-Persian beliefs similar (but not quite synonymous) with the Zoroastrian religion.  Over the centuries, the Yezidis have appropriated some practices from both Christians and Muslims, but they are still a distinct religion not connected to either.  Although not Christians, the Yezidis have always lived peacefully among Armenians and Assyrians, and oftentimes suffered the same persecution with them, which has cemented a significant level of solidarity between the communities.  I have also gotten to know some Yezidis as well over the years, and the ones I have come to know as friends are wonderful people.  Therefore, today we remember their families who still are suffering under Islamic terrorism, as this day commemorates a major massacre against their community committed by the demonic hordes of ISIS in 2014. 

It is imperative that those of us who are Catholic Christians in particular always work to help communities like the Yezidis, Assyrians, and Armenians, and despite how "rosy" fake news networks such as CNN paint things (CNN is a vehicle for liberal bias as well as promoting the radical Islamist agenda, so they should not be taken seriously as actual news), much of this persecution still goes on even today - as recently as a few years ago, for instance, Armenians were targeted by Azerbaijani mobs and many were killed by those some mobs, and of course it doesn't need to be a reminder of how demonic and evil the beasts of ISIS were (and possibly still are).   Even in the US, the supposed land of "free speech," the Armenian Genocide is still denied while those who glorify it - notably a show called "The Young Turks" hosted by a Turkish-American blowhard named Cenk Uygur (whose name sounds like "Chunk Yogurt," and with his fat rear, it fits him well) as well as many of our own Congressional leadership (Steve Cohen, Sheila Jackson Lee, Eddie Bernice Johnson, and some others come to mind - they need to be voted out honestly) - have free reign to spread their anti-Armenian and anti-Christian propaganda on the "mainstream" airwaves.  That being said, let's now look at why the observance of Assyrian Martyr's Day is important, as well as what it commemorates.

Assyrian Martyr's Day is a day in which the Assyrian people commemorate the memories of all Assyrians who died as martyrs, including the Sayfo of 1915, committed by the godless Ottomans simultaneously with the massacre of a million and a half Armenians (commemorated April 24th) as well as an untold number of Anatolian Greeks (they have a commemoration day as well, although the date escapes me).   However, the date August 7th was chosen because of a specific incident that occurred 18 years later in 1933 in an Iraqi village called Simele, and it goes down in the history books as the notorious Simele Massacre.  Sargon Dadesho, in his book The Assyrian National Question (Modesto. CA:  Bet Nahrain, 1987) gives a summary description on page 134 as to what happened.  According to Dadesho's text, a Kurd who was given rank in the Iraqi forces by the name of Bakr Sidqi led a group of brigands to massacre over 3,000 Assyrians, and some of the atrocities were so heinous that those who witnessed them had to have a lot of intestinal fortitude to document them.  One such account, authored by Col. R.S. Stafford in his seminal 1935 work The Tragedy of the Assyrians (London:  George Allen and Unwin, 1935), is documented from testimonies he gleaned from female survivors.  The women he interviewed said that the Assyrians were rounded up in batches of 8-10 in trucks, driven outside the village, and then gunned down with machine guns by the "soldiers."  If the gunfire didn't work, the dead and dying were flattened by being ran over with trucks.  Although the Kurd Bakr Sidqi was the main perpetrator in this case, he had another willing accomplice in the person of Hikmet Beg Suleiman, the Iraqi Minister of the Interior who was a Turk by ethnicity, as well as being a sibling to Shevket Bey, one of the "Young Turks" who had years previous been involved in the execution of the Armenian Genocide.  Note here something else - like the Armenian and Assyrian Genocides in 1915, it is evident that the major perpetrators in the crimes were Turks and Kurds.  The assassination of the Assyrian Patriarch Mar Benyamin in 1918, as a matter of fact, was also carried out by a Kurd named Simkoo who acted as a hatchet-man for his "Young Turk" overlords.  This in no way implicates all Turks and Kurds, as many good souls among both also aided and helped victims of these genocides.  However, it is interesting that although the Simele Massacre was carried out by an Arab government, it was Turk and Kurd perpetrators who carried out the orders of their masters.  Simkoo and Bakr Sidqi were both Kurds, and both were immortalized as "heroes" by their respective regimes, yet both were also murderous and opportunistic butchers who are, I believe, burning in hell for their acts.  Simko and Sidqi are no better than Adolf Hitler, in other words.    However, the bigger issue here is also an injustice that was suffered by the Kurds as a people too - the Kurds were often used by both the Ottomans as well as successive Arab governments to do their "dirty work" for them, but those same governments would turn on the Kurds just as quickly when they had outlived their usefulness.  However, on the other side of that, you would think the Kurds would learn after all these years, and that makes an interesting question to ask on its own.   An example of this in fairly recent history was Saddam Hussein's dealings with the Kurds.  That would surely be a whole other subject at another time, as a lot of time could be spent on that. 

Bakr Sidqi (1890-1937)

The justice in this though was that in 1937, four years after he perpetrated the atrocities on the Assyrians of Simele, Sidqi was assassinated by Arab nationalists who seized power while he was standing in the garden of an air force base near Mosul.  As Sidqi had sown, so did he reap - he sowed violence and destruction, but was also taken down by it by his own "allies," who themselves were radical Arab nationalists who couldn't bear the thought of an "inferior" Kurd holding such power in their state.   Again, it proves my earlier premise - the Kurds were useful until they were arbitrarily deemed unuseful, and then they were disposed of.  Such was the case with Bakr Sidqi.  

As Fred Aprim notes in his book, Assyrians:  From Badr Khan to Saddam Hussein (Verdugo City, CA:  Pearlida Publishing, 2006) on page 166, Simele was premeditated, and he noted that the massacre that evolved at Simele was stage-set on three fronts, which were as follows:

1.  A flood of negative press sanctioned by the Iraqi government against Assyrians.

2.  A marginalization of prominent Assyrian nationalists such as the Patriarch Mar Eshai Shimun, Malik Yacu, and others.  Some years ago, I saw some of this nonsense (not unlike the way the American "fake news" paints conservatives today) in a book where the prominent Assyrian legend Agha Petros was demonized by a pro-Arabist author. 

3.  The manipulation and deception of certain Assyrian leaders (Aprim points out Malik Khoshaba in particular) to buy into the agenda they had - in other words, the old "divide and conquer" strategy of fragmenting a community.  

As Aprim also points out later, this also had the British diplomatic enterprise puppet-stringing in the background (it still happens with US diplomacy today too - Bill Clinton is a glaring example of that), in that Britain sought to denigrate and immobilize the Assyrian Levies (their militia at the time) in favor of the Arab armies of the Iraqi state.  However, the British were also quick to use the Assyrians where it benefitted British ambitions, such as several years later when the Levies were re-deployed to defend against Axis meddling among Arab nationalists (of which the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin Husseini, was instrumental - he was a radical Islamist and a Hitler ally).  In looking at how both the Brits and Americans (and to a lesser degree the French) have handled international relations over the years, a lot of culpability needs to be assigned to Western governments for aiding and abetting oppressive regimes to commit genocides.  We still see it today in the way Washington kisses Ankara's butt by refusing to recognize the Armenian Genocide.  We also see it even among noted conservative authorities in the US, who think that the Kurds are our best chance for alliances against ISIS and other groups - one conservative authority who is a noted author and commentator, and whom I know personally having once gone to the same church with him, even said the Assyrians were not worth considering and that the Kurds should be given priority in negotiations.  However, while US policy is cowtowing to the Kurds, Kurdish brigands are still terrorizing Armenian and Assyrian villages and homes in the region.  This fact has not gone unnoticed in my conversations with Assyrian and Armenian friends - they are dumbfounded at how stupid our leadership in the West really is, and they also feel like they have been betrayed, and rightly so.   Of course, given the secularist (and increasingly anti-Christian) direction much of the West has been heading, this should come as no surprise;  like in Sudan for instance, the racism of "mainstream" American secularists is evident in a quote from South Sudanese activist Dr. Dominic Mohammed, who rightly observed this Western bias with the following question he posed in 1999:  "Are White Muslims of more value than Black Christians?"  Good question to ask, and it does get to the point.  It is the reason, I believe, that the US and Britain fail in recognizing the Armenian Genocide, as Turkey has a lot of money and the Armenians don't, so to the American politician Armenians mean little, even when they are being harassed and even killed by Islamic extremists.  And, the Kurds have more power, so why worry about the Assyrians - after all, my conservative acquaintance actually said that the Assyrians were "too fractured" to take seriously (he is wrong, of course) and that the Kurds may be a "better option" for alliances.  What my friend didn't say is that the Kurds have more access to certain resources the US finds valuable, so that is why our leadership kisses their butts.  Any rate, enough about that.  

Getting back to the Simele Massacre, the events are marked as beginning on August 7, 1933, but the worst atrocities actually took place four days later, starting on the 11th, which is the general consensus of most of the writers I have referenced.  Some of these atrocities are so vile, and so disgusting, that it is a challenge to even mention them.  For instance, priests were savagely mutilated even after they had been murdered, and some Iraqi "soldiers" even ripped open the wombs of pregnant Assyrian women with bayonet points (William Warda, Assyrians Beyond the Fall of Nineveh.  self-published, 2013. p. 272), effectively aborting the babies in a way that would make Margaret Sanger proud.  For their "efforts," Warda notes, the butchers were made heroes and even had monuments erected in their honor in Baghdad and Mosul, and the decapitated heads of slain Assyrians were put on display as trophies.  Sick, wretched, and horrid, and I imagine for some it was like living the nightmare of the 1915 Sayfo, which many of them had survived, all over again.  Ironically, at around the same time some 2000 miles away, a maniac named Hitler had assumed power in Germany, and was enacting the Nuremburg Laws which would culminate in the death camps of Auschwitz, where many of the Assyrians' cousins the Jews would be slaughtered in similar fashion.  Ironically, Hitler also used the same tactics and fronts that Aprim noted earlier that the Iraqi regime used against the Assyrians to desensitize the German people against the Jews, and it is believed that the Ottomans and their "Young Turk" successors used similar tactics to villify Armenians, Greeks, and Assyrians many years earlier.  And, that leads to a discussion on that subject.

The main ingredient in cooking up a genocide against a group of people is dehumanization.  Spreading propaganda against a community is a sure way to stir up hatred against that community, and the worst perpetrators of genocide in history (the Young Turks, the Nazis, the 1930's Arab nationalists who ruled Iraq, and the Sudanese government in recent times) all utilized the same tactics.  By stripping people of the dignity of their God-endowed personhood, it makes the job of exterminating them easier.  Many former Nazis who operated the gas chambers at places like Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen have testified that to them, killing Jews was like exterminating rats or cockroaches, which resulted by the conditioning and constant propaganda the Nazis pumped on a continual basis at the German people.  In other words, genocide becomes a moral imperative and nothing is seen about it that is bad.  When a society reaches that level of callousness, it is doomed for destruction.  It is one reason why today the Islamic world is still so backward, and also why Germany was pretty much destroyed during the Second World War.  We have people in the US today (Antifa, Black Lives Matter, and others) who spout similar rhetoric - they paint their opponents as "evil" and encourage violence to silence or even destroy those who oppose their agendas.  Antifa in the US is, therefore, no different than murderers like Bakr Sidqi or Adolf Hitler, and this is why we as a nation need to be vigilant.  It is also why we should really take seriously what happened to many innocent Assyrians at Simele, or Armenians during the Genocide, or Jews in the Holocaust, because if we don't watch and learn from such events, they could end up happening outside our own door.  As Christians, it is even more of an imperative, in that we believe that humanity is the pinnacle of God's creation and therefore the sanctity of human life is a cardinal virtue we must uphold.  I have preached enough for today, so now let's have some concluding thoughts.

The burning of Assyrian bodies after the massacres

Decapitated heads of murdered Assyrians on display as trophies in Mosul in 1933.

The carnage of Simele, 1933.

The Assyrians are a fascinating and ancient people with a rich past, but it is also a past which has been stained with a lot of the blood of their people.  It is important to commemorate the memories of those innocent victims of injustice, and to remember that these are also our brethren - Assyrians are fellow Christians, and as part of the extended Christian family they need us too.  Policies of bureaucracies like the US be damned - we need to start acting on a higher law rather than being so damned pragmatic about what "we can benefit," and it is time we stop promoting our selfish interests in the international arena and instead stand up for the common good, which is the preservation and protection of those who are oppressed as Assyrians and others are in the Middle East.  As August 7th approaches this coming Tuesday, let us please keep that in mind.  By standing up for the Assyrians and others, we do ultimately do what is best for us as well, because those who oppress and persecute Assyrians today may become our oppressors tomorrow, and then what will we do?  May we remember all those martyrs - Assyrian, Armenian, Yezidi, and others - and may their rest be eternal and may Light Perpetual shine upon them.  Thank you, and will see you again soon. 

"The rest of the story is pointless. I said so long to the young Assyrian and left the shop. I walked across town, four miles, to my room on Carl Street. I thought about the whole business: Assyria and this Assyrian, Theodore Badal, learning to be a barber, the sadness of his voice, the hopelessness of his attitude. This was months ago, in August, but ever since I have been thinking about Assyria, and I have been wanting to say something about Theodore Badal, a son of an ancient race, himself youthful and alert, yet hopeless. Seventy thousand Assyrians, a mere seventy thousand of that great people, and all the others quiet in death and all the greatness crumbled and ignored, and a young man in America learning to be a barber, and a young man lamenting bitterly the course of history."  - William Saroyan, "Seventy Thousand Assyrians"