Taking Back our NEIGHBORHOODS!

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caring, faith, faith-based, generous, help, Holiday Season, needy, neighborhoods, Neighborly, neighbors, Pray for America, prayer, Presidential Prayer Team, sharing

How ’bout a Holiday Block Party?

As we come into the Holiday Season, we must understand that many of our neighbors are financially and/or emotionally stretched beyond their means. Others will run up extravagant credit card bills to lavish their loved ones with “stuff” that will be trashed or discarded within a month. Across the nation, food banks are struggling to keep their shelves stocked for the genuinely needy. Homeless shelters see the weather turning colder and more desperate people in need of shelter. Of course, there are those among us who abuse the system and drain our resources, but that doesn’t negate the true need that exists.

It is my contention that we are ALL people of faith … the question is in what or Whom do we put our faith? It is not up to me to decide, nor is it up to me to sit in judgment! It is up to you and me to CARE about our neighbors! Can we DO this, or are we too ruined by fear and suspicion?

caring …

Years ago, before 9/11 … before the nation went crazy, we knew our neighbors. Our children played together. We got to know different family and cultural traditions through people we lived next to and worked with. It made us richer human beings. Jews, Christians, and Catholics all living together, sharing “American Life!” Germans, Irish, Ethiopian, Chinese, Argentinian, Ukraine, Nigerian, Cuban … it didn’t matter where we came from. We were all AMERICANS. We still are!!!

Listed below is a short list of some of my favorite organizations that help our NEIGHBORS. Maybe if we all added our NEIGHBORS to our Christmas/Chanakah list, we’d appreciate the season more?

• CITY MISSION
• MERCURY ONE
• SALVATION ARMY
• CARE.org
• CATHOLIC CHARITIES

Share Your Holiday Spirit with Your NEIGHBOR!

Be creative! Get acquainted with NEIGHBORS. We don’t have to be best friends, but we all have something to share with one another!
DONATE to one of the organizations listed above, or one of your choice, and help bridge the gap for those in need.

Why BHO’s “Fair Distribution” Policies are NOT Fair or Good!

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Neighborly

BHO USED HIS PERSONAL RELIGIOUS BELIEFS to manipulate his followers to support his notion that the RICH pay “their fair share” in taxes. Give Me Your Money in the Name of Jesus! The “rich” as he defines them, are those making an income of $250,000 or more annually. Let’s examine this idea a little more closely.

What is the REASON, the justification, he uses for this increase in taxes on the so called rich? The ever-multiplying national debt seems to be of no account to him:

• Because he has yet to produce a rational budget able to garnish votes, and
• he continues to spend – to give away our tax dollars in extravagant measure – to both foreign governments that support Hezbollah, al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood, and private corporations like GE & SOLYNDRA et al, so the increased tax revenue isn’t for debt management.

Meanwhile, he continues to undercut our manufacturing interests with extravagant regulations designed to cripple, for example, the fossil fuel industries ( coal & natural gas,) He shot down the Keystone pipeline with bogus excuses while preaching to his hypnotized followers about jobs being his top concern!

Some suppose Jesus was a communist. Absolutely, without a doubt, UN-TRUE! Jesus, if you study his life & ministry, was (and continues to be) all about empowering the individual to reach for and run toward their individual dream. The only thing Jesus ever said about government was to “render unto Caesar what belongs to Caesar!” (Mk 12: 13-17) Jesus stated the poor would always be with us (John 12: 1-7), and he encouraged individual believers to cloth the naked, feed the hungary, and the like (Mt 25: 34-40). Jesus understood the function of government, and he placed the duty or responsibility of tending the needs of the poor squarely on the CHURCH (James 1:21-27)!

Jesus taught “sharing” of personal wealth, not as a mandated government action, but as a personal demonstration of faith-in-action! “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.” (Gal 6: 2) Raising taxes on our wealthiest Americans will not solve our homeless problem or our national debt problem. It merely SOUNDS like compassion, but is a ploy to elevate the ruling political elite over the multitude of people. It is a POWER play, my friends.

Let me leave you with this thought. As much as none of us relishes hard times and struggles, still we KNOW good comes from our struggles. Character is born and nourished in the furnace of affliction! Everyone had dark times, but they do NOT last forever! This too shall pass! In the meantime, it is time for us to re-learn what being “Neighborly” is about, and practice it!

I just had a great idea! I’m going to send out invitations to my neighbors to bring a covered dish to my yard on one day in June for a Neighbors’ Day Celebration! What do you think? You can come, too! If WE learn how to be neighbors again, we can release the government from that obligation. The government won’t NEED to take care of us any more. WE will take care of one another!