A Pilgrim’s Odyssey

When People Don't Want To Work

Lately, there have been many articles written about a workforce that doesn’t want to work. Especially, small local businesses can’t find labor. Our local newspaper did a long feature on all the local business limiting their hours because they couldn’t find workers.

One reason, the incredible unemployment benefits offered to people, encouraging them to stay home. Another reason, in a culture where the employer gets portrayed as the enemy, people feel entitled. When government then provides them all they need to live, and technology provides cheap escapist fantasies, you have created an environment that easily allows people to enter a sort of Matrix.

To fix this will take tough love. But do we have it in us as a country? We are so PC, the President in his National Day of Prayer message today didn’t use the word God. No doubt, he didn’t want to offend. It’s the opposite of tough. We are at risk.

Standing Up For Rolling Thuder

As reported yesterday, Rolling to Remember, formerly known as Rolling Thunder has been shut down:

“You may remember the veteran biker group known as Rolling Thunder. They have since changed their name to Rolling to Remember.

They were planning to ride into Washington, DC on Memorial Day and end their ride at the Pentagon, as they have done for years.

The Biden administration denied event permits for the Rolling to Remember motorcycle ride held every year for the past 30 years in Washington, D.C., prompting outrage in Congress.

The charity event, formerly known as Rolling Thunder, is a Memorial Day hallmark in the city, bringing scores of veterans and others to the area to commemorate war veterans, including prisoners of war and those missing in action.

The Pentagon approved the permit in March and then rescinded the decision this week without any explanation, according to Issa and Rep. Ken Calvert (R., Calif.), who also criticized the Biden administration’s decision.”

This decision is hurtful to me because I love veterans and I love motorcycles. Motorcycles represent freedom, the open road, charting a course to somewhere over the horizon. Shutting it down is fear at best, partisan politics at worse. Either reason is a slap in the face to veterans who were willing to die for us.

If I were them, I’d ride anyway. Shut down the streets, fly your flags, gun your engines. Live free or die!

Blind Eyes And Cheap Labor

You might have heard about a police discovery in Houston of 90 illegal immigrants confined to a 2,300 sq. foot home.

It is estimated drug cartels make $14 million dollars a day smuggling people.

Why do we put up with it? Politics and money. Some people benefit from the votes, some people benefit from the cheap labor.

It’s the same for China. Why do we put up with them? Politics and money. They are in the pockets of our politicians, and we are addicted to cheap goods.

Our nation turns a blind eye to it all. How can we not ultimately suffer?

How do you respond? You speak up and you talk with your wallet.

Living In A World Of Cults

Read an article today on Apple News about how some popular fitness trends fit the definition of a cult – Crossfit, Soulcycle, Power Yoga, etc.

Now “cult” is a broad word that can mean anything from devotion to someone who thinks they are Jesus to undying loyalty to a sports figure.

Let me suggest one definition today from Merriam-Webster and share a couple experiences I had this weekend:

“great devotion to a person, idea, object, movement, or work ”

A Great Friday Of Hope And Despair

On Great Friday, we remember Christ dying on the cross and his last words, “It is finished.” It is a solemn day. God became man in order to die for us. To show us a way to life.

Yet, it is this death and day of despair, that brings us hope. A sacrifice that shows us what real life is. On the 3^rd day he will rise from the dead and the trajectory of mankind will be changed.

It is a tough lesson, but whatever despair you may be facing, you can use it to find hope by turning to God.

As we are told in Mark 8:35 “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it.”

It’s hard to give up a life where we cling to temporal things, just ask the rich man. But when we’ve been broken, in our despair, we might just find it’s the place we find real hope.

Ephraim's Prayer of Real Hope

This prayer can be said anytime, but during Lent and our preparation for celebrating the resurrection of Christ, it takes on a special meaning. We prepare in humility, on our knees, being willing to see ourselves truthfully and our need for Christ soberly.

While this prayer of Saint Ephraim the Syrian dates back to the 300s, it is as timely to our human condition today as it was then.

“O Lord and Master of my life, take from me the spirit of sloth, despair, lust of power, and idle talk.

But give rather the spirit of chastity, humility, patience, and love to Thy servant.

Yea, O Lord and King, grant me to see my own transgressions, and not to judge my brother, for blessed art Thou, unto ages of ages. Amen.”

The Best Way To Share Your Faith

In a divisive world where your beliefs can get you ridiculed or worse, and the desire to point fingers and blame others is so easy to do, and terribly destructive, what can you do to change yourself and change others?

A Christian who spent at least 25 years of his life alone in the woods praying, and then after a severe injury he spent another 1000 nights on a rock praying might have some good advice for you. Our humble Seraphim lived from 1754 to 1833.

"Acquire a peaceful spirit, and around you thousands will be saved." Saint Seraphim of Sarov

What is a peaceful spirit and how do you acquire it?

John 16:33 – “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”

Love Is Letting Those We Love Perfectly Be Themselves

I was reminded in a conversation the other day with a friend, that if we open our eyes and hearts, we always have something to learn from other people, even, and maybe especially, those of other faiths, beliefs, and creeds. In fact, if you aren’t willing to listen and learn, how strong is your own faith?

One such person I learned from, Thomas Merton, the great Roman Catholic monk and author.

“The beginning of love is the will to let those we love be perfectly themselves, the resolution not to twist them to fit our own image. If in loving them we do not love what they are, but only their potential likeness to ourselves, then we do not love them: we only love the reflection of ourselves we find in them”

― Thomas Merton, No Man Is an Island

Walking On Thin Ice To Solid Ground

My wife made the mistake of trying to pass a pickup truck on the way home from church on a slow country road. She was met with lane blocking, crazy looks, and a middle finger. All for a van full of kids to witness. Later that night as we discussed her day, it brought up a lot of questions:

How thin is the line between civilization and anarchy? What historically has kept us “civilized” and what is happening to those barriers today? Family, Faith, and Community have been our historical strength and our historical barricade to chaos. What now?

In a world where meaning is found in labels and on bright screens, what happens when people don’t gain meaning from relationships with other people?

When you are walking on thin ice, how do you find solid ground?

What Happens When You Sell Your Soul

The wise commentator on police use of force, Lebron James, got me thinking: almost nothing is scarier than when a celebrity or wealthy person describes the greatest country on earth as being on a fast take to Nazi Germany then bows at the feet of Communist China. If they can play this kind of mental gymnastics to justify selling their souls to evil while trying to burn down the greatest country on earth, what wouldn’t they do for their own self-interests?

As I’ve talked about on earlier Pilgrim’s Odyssey podcasts, we all are complicit in a way to the rise of Red China. We buy their goods, we encourage their slave labor, we elect politicians who get fat off of their lobbyists and contributions.

We are reminded by the good book often on what happens when you sell your soul for riches:

Matthew 16:26 - For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?

Hebrews 13:5 - Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.

Matthew 6:24 - No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.

What happens when your master is China? You eventually love that master and hate those who stand against it. Now look at what you buy on Amazon, the things that fill your home. Who is your master? Or maybe it is food, or technology, or TV, or the Internet, consider what you love? What is your precious? And what should it be?