Reorganizing

In a little more than an hour and a half, the First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints will be announced.  The Church will have a new President but, more importantly, there will be a new Prophet on the earth who is ordained to receive direction from God for all people.

Who do I believe will be the new First Presidency?  Thomas S. Monson as the President with Henry B. Eyring and Dieter F. Uchtdorf as counselors.  Am I right?  Am I wrong?  Does it matter?  I'll post a follow-up with thoughts later.

I was right

So, I was right.  Does it matter that I was right?  Maybe.  For me it is a witness that I listened well and that these three men are, indeed, called of God.  What if I had been wrong, would that then mean that they weren't called of God?  No, that would have meant that I had listened poorly.  There were eleven men seated to either side of the new First Presidency whose witness of the validity of this reorgantization is much more important, to the world at large, than mine is.  Those men are the members of the Quroum of the Twelve Apostles and their testimony that these men were called of God, expressed silently by their mere presence at the news conference, is a greater witness than mine to all the world.  My own witness is for me, however, stronger than the witness of those men.  Why?  Simply because it is my own personal witness.  My only regret is that I did not write I know that Thomas S. Monson will be the new Prophet with Henry B. Eyring and Dieter F. Uchtdorf as counselors.  If I hadn't known who had been called, I wouldn't have dared post earlier.

So, how did I know?  Who is my secret contact that passed along the information to me?  God.  As I've talked about the new First Presidency with family, we've reviewed all of the Apostles and those two men stood out in my mind to the point that I could easily see their faces and hear their voices.  Evenso, it wasn't until this morning at 09:30 that I simply knew it and the moment I knew it, I posted about it.

On a side note, I'm already seeing people saying things like, I didn't know there had ever been any native American leaders in the First Presidency.  Are people so intentionally ignorant or is this a prime exampel of political correctness taken to a ridiculous level?  Rather than belabor the point, allow me to ask just two questions of those making the snide comments:  Were you born in the United States of America?  If yes then what is your native country?  One last item on Native Americans verus American Indians, most American Indians actually prefer being called American Indians.  Some history on the term Native American.

Comments and Some Whine

As I mentioned in some previous entries I removed reader comments (14 Dec) from the Whinery because the comment SPAM (15 Dec) was unbearable.  Well, I have decided to reinstate reader comments.  One difference is that comments will now all be moderated, another is that I had to do a major rework on the commenting scripts to make the work but I've missed having comments so it was worth it.  All of the previous comments have been restored as well.

There are days when I just want to disappear from society.  I remember quite fondly when, as a boy, I wanted to grow up to be a hermit.  Some would say that I am a hermit but my somewhat reclusive nature is nothing compared to what I dreamed for myself as a child.  I seriously wanted to live in a wood hut with a dirt floor in the middle of some forest with no one around for miles.  There are frequently days when I still wish I had followed that childhood dream.  That feeling used to be followed by long bouts of depression but I have now learned that this is merely a symptom of spreading myself too thin.  The only real cure is to stop taking on new projects and finish up projects I already have in progress.

The Neverending Race

Racism will never die in this country, ever.  Until there are no more African Americans, Black Americans, Latinos Americans, Japanese Americans or whateverelse brand-x Americans we will never be free of racism.  Do not misunderstand me, I am not saying that so long as this group or that group is in America that America will remain racist, no.  What I am saying is this:  So long as we continue to distinguish people by their skin color or cultural background, racism will flourish.  The only way to stop racism is to stop using color and cultural based labels.  There are only three kinds of people in the United States of America:  Citizens, Legal Aliens and Illegal Aliens. 

Some will decry this suggestion as it will crush cultural diversity which is likely true but isn't that what the USA is about?  Isn't it the great melting pot?  It doesn't matter how many cheeses I throw into a fondue pot, they all melt together but the end result is, hopefully, much better than its individual parts.  Cultural diversity does not unite a country, it divides it.  The US is no longer the great melting pot but rather it is more and more the Segregated States of America.

I remember growing up with great friends named David, Olivia, Maria, Luis, Gordon, Morgan, Bill and Rita.  I had no idea that there was something different about these people until I was later told that they are Black/African/Latino Americans . . . huh?  I watched a show yesterday featuring the Cosby Show actors and actresses.  The commentator stated something about the start of the Cosby Show being a great day in Black American history and that it was so great to see a black family portrayed in such a good light.  What?  I had no idea it was about a black family, I always thought it was about a family from New York; silly me!

I am not the only one thinking this way.  Ask Morgan Freeman what he thinks about racism and you'll get an earful just like Mike Wallace did in December of 2005:

His social and political views are at times surprising and he pulls no punches.

He says he finds Black History Month ridiculous.

You're going to relegate my history to a month? asks Freeman. I don't want a Black History Month. Black history is American history, he says, noting that there are no white or Jewish history months.

How can we get rid of racism?

Stop talking about it. I'm going to stop calling you a white man, Freeman says to Wallace. And I'm going to ask you to stop calling me a black man. I know you as Mike Wallace. You know me as Morgan Freeman. You wouldn't say, 'Well, I know this white guy named Mike Wallace.' You know what I'm sayin’?

Morgan Freeman Defies Labels, page 3
Video of Morgan Freeman's comments

Of course, not everone agrees with this view.  Paul Halley wrote an article, Who Needs Black History Month?, that appeared in wiretap dated 2 February 2006 that attempts to put down this horrible idea that we should abolish racism by ignoring race.  Just one quick quote from the article:

Prior to even thinking about what Freeman was saying, I had to first get over my continued outrage at white people asking black actors, athletes, and entertainers what they think about issues that are outside of their areas of expertise. Publicizing the opinions of Morgan Freeman doesn't make him a spokesman for the black race.

Who Needs Black History Month? by Paul Halley

I have this immense desire to go on about the hypocrisy ladened into that one statement; instead I'll just ask you, dear reader, to read the article for yourself.  Personally I found it to be one of the most race centric pieces of literature I have ever read.

The Great Move

It's that time again, time to move.  My work PC is at that stage where it simply must be replaced for me to keep working and so I am spending the day moving data and reinstalling software.  Allow me to explain how badly I hate doing this:  Most machines here at CSI are replaced every three to four years to prevent having to deal with hundreds of fiddly support issues due to old hardware.  I've had mine for five and a half years without any major overhaul.  So I have been moving data from the old machine to a new one all morning long.  Hopefully, I'll have all the data moved by the time I go home today—yes, I have that much data.  Then, with any luck, I'll have all my programs reinstalled and configured—at least the major ones—by the end of the week.

Free Your Mind

Let me just take a moment to sing the praises of FreeMind.  It's a Java based mind mapping tool.  If you aren't familiar with mind mapping, it's essentially brainstorming.  Take a thought and write it down, then write down the thoughts that come to you that are related to the first thought and then the thoughts related to those thoughts until you've thought about everything you need or at least think you need.  The nice thing about Freemind—besides being free—is that, unlike paper, you can rearrange your thoughts so they make more sense.  It's an absolutely marvelous tool!

“We seem to be made to suffer.  It's our lot in life.”—C3PO

Sickness, financial woes, emotional distress; some of these come of our own actions which are often deliberate sin.  Yes, that is such an unpopular view but when one sins against the laws of God, there are always dire consequences.  Sexual sin carries with it a host of possible illnesses.  Lying and stealing often are the harbingers of terrible life-long financial problems.  All sin carries with it guilt and feelings of worthlessnes.  It is not that God wishes to punish us when we sin; rather, He has warned us to not do things which naturally have terrible consequences.  Is a burned hand punishment for disobeying a mother's rule to not touch the hot iron?  No, of course not!  Mother did not inflict that pain upon her young child, it was merely the natural consequence of the child touching a hot iron.  It is the same with God, He does not punish us with illness nor addictions nor broken homes; rather He has given us commandments to help us avoid actions whose natural consequences are illness or addictions or broken homes or any number of other unpleasant things.

Of course, not all suffering is the result of sin.  Often times the troubles of the world simply come with the territory.  Illness can spread through a simple hand shake.  Unwise business decisions often precede financial troubles but even the wisest decsions can be unfruitful as the economy fluctuates.  Just as the sun shines equally upon the righteous and the wicked, so too do natural disasters strike without regard to one's personal worthiness.  Let us not forget that the most terrible destroyer of lives, both among the innocent and the not so innocent, has always been our fellow man.  Why doesn't God stop these seemingly meaningless forms of suffering?  Will a child ever learn to walk if he is, from the day he is born until the day he dies, always carried about from place to place?  Would such a man ever be a fit father himself?

Discussing the reasons why suffering exists is not the point of this entry.  Suffice it to say that for this reason or that, there is great suffering around us on every hand.  How are we to know who deserves their suffering as a consequence of sin and who is merely an innocent victim of circumstance and so worthy of our help?  What a terribly foolish question!  All who need our help are worthy of it!  The Lord did not say Love thy good neighbor as thyself, indeed He did not!  He commanded that we love all!  As I see the many burdens that my own neighbors carry, my soul is laden with a terrible weight so heavy that I feel it must crush me to the ground; yet, I am only seeing the burdens, I am not actually carrying them myself.  My heart breaks knowing, even just in some small part, the heavy loads carried by so many.  My mind staggers trying to comprehend the magnitude of the Atonement.  Christ saw not just the small glimpse of those burdens that I have seen, He has seen them, every whit.  More than this, He has actually suffered those burdens Himself, all of them.  Even more, He has borne the pain and suffering of all of the burndens of mankind throughout all the ages.  Even just the glimpse I have seen threatens to crush me by its weight and to drown me in sorrow.  The Savior has born this and so much more, I can only marvel as I watch Him tremble beneath such a terrible load, the weight crushing Him—the Son of God—to the very earth.

He is not here to walk among us, healing the sick, lifting the down trodden, feeding the hungry, giving love and comfort to the needy.  He has called upon each of us to reach out to our neighbors, to lift their spirits, to heal their wounded hearts, to ease their sufferings.  Such a simple thing as taking a loaf of bread to a neighbor or being kind to a stranger on the bus.  How much more joy, how much less suffering there will be as we each take just a moment of our time to ease another's load!