everything is NOT ok…

How do you wake up from a nightmare
when you’re not asleep?
Unknown

“Lives that Matter Are Made with Positive Purpose.”
(OK Cafe sign during Atlanta’s unrest)

(The OK Cafe, an Atlanta instituion)

On Saturday, I received an interesting email.
At first, I wasn’t certain what it was about.
I wasn’t certain what Liberty House Restaurant Corp. was until I read a bit into the email.
I realized that it’s actually the name of the group that owns two of Atlanta’s
iconic restaurants.

The OK Cafe and Blue Ridge Grill.

(Blue Ridge Grill interior)

Both of these restaurants are two that my family has enjoyed visiting during the past
30 years or so…
despite the fact that they’ve been going strong for a good 41 years.

I can remember when our son was little, driving over to Atlanta on Sunday mornings
just to take him to the OK Cafe for breakfast—some of the best pancakes.

The Mayor and Sheriff now enjoy that same simple pleasure.

We’ve also celebrated many memorable events at the Blue Ridge Grill.
With the last being last year’s Father’s Day lunch.

And so when I read the following email, I was incensed.

We all know that many restaurants across this country have suffered grievously during
this pandemic.
Some have been unable to rally back following the shutdowns.

People have suffered the loss of work, the loss of income, the loss of camaraderie
and for many, the loss of a lifetime of work, hopes, and dreams.

And so just when folks were trying to kickstart their businesses and livelihoods,
here come the rioters, looters, vandals, antagonists, anarchists and racial extremists
who have decided our lives need to all go in another sort of direction.

A direction of violence, fear, and intimidation rather than emergence, renewed health
and hope.

These two restaurants did not ask to be in the crosshairs of the current
wave of civil unrest.
When the protesters commandeered the main street and parking lot to these restaurants,
both restaurants offered the protestors free tea and lemonade…
that’s the Southern way of hospitality.

They did have a couple of banners up hoping to showcase their support to
“all” people as well as keeping the peace during a peace-filled protest…
they also expressed their simple love of America,.

And it was that very notion of hospitality and peace that went terribly
wrong for this group of would-be do-gooders.

So now Homeland Security is monitoring their restaurants.
They have received death threats and a barrage of hate-filled
social media threats and attacks.

All because of a sense of hospitality, a hope for peace and the notion that
all lives do matter and in turn, can be a cause for the positive…

May those of us who believe in the same sense of kindness, caring, hospitality
and hope support those businesses who are simply trying to make
a living by serving us and making us happy.

Maynard Jackson (1938-2003) was the first black mayor of Atlanta.
He was the same Mayor who worked to bring the Summer Olympics to Atlanta in 1996.

He famously proclaimed that “Atlanta is the city too busy to hate”
I always believed that…until now.

Dear Liberty House Restaurant Friends,

It seems that we have found our company in an unusual – and perhaps dangerous – situation.
Richard & I have been under police protection and OK Café is being monitored by Homeland Security.

Wow! How did it get to this?

For those who know us, you’ll know that we are not here just to make money.
For 41 years we’ve served up Southern hospitality and helped showcase and identify our Southern culture.
Our aim was – and is – to make Atlanta a world-class city.
Liberty House is part of the fabric of Atlanta.

Since we’ve never been attacked before, I’d like to make our position clear:

On June 7th, a few days after the destructive riots in our city center and
throughout Buckhead, some people felt it right to organize a march down
West Paces Ferry Road to “bring the people of Buckhead out from behind their screens”
(the Marcher’s cry).

By June 7th, OK Café and Blue Ridge Grill had only reopened 4 days before and
like all others in the shopping center,
we weighed the dangers of looting or harm to our staff and customers, so we closed again.
The marchers took over our parking lot anyways, so no customers could have parked.
The marchers were mostly peaceful – that day.

For our part, we put up two signs at OK Café and served tea.
As is our 1st amendment right to do.
The banner read:
“Lives that Matter Are Made with Positive Purpose.”

Blue Ridge Grill had a tent and served lemonade.
Their sign read:
“Law & Order = Peace”

And Marvin Gaye’s lyrics;
“Picket lines and picket signs
Don’t punish me with brutality
Talk to me
So you can see
What’s going on.”

And lastly a red, white, and blue sign draped the front of OK Café on Northside Parkway.
Loud and proud it read:
“OK Café LOVES America.”

Since then we have received hundreds of negative reviews online.
We have been told, kneel or go out of business.

If loving America is wrong – I don’t wanna be right.
And our great and mighty team stands with us on this point.

Susan DeRose
President
Liberty House Restaurant Corp.

Strive for peace with everyone,
and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.
Hebrews 12:14

(I’ll be on a bit of a hiatus for the remainder of the week)

‘let the chips fall where they may, I’m at peace with my decision”

“If we do not risk anything for God we will never do anything great for Him.”
St. Louis De Montfort

(Susan Collins, Senator from Maine, during the Senate vote on Brett Kavanaugh
for Supreme Court Justice 2018)

I must confess that by the time Senator Susan Collins spoke on the Senate floor
regarding her vote for Brett Kavanaugh as Supreme Court Justice nominee,
I wasn’t watching.

I was blessedly out of the country.

My cousin had even text me, “I’m sorry you are not here…missing all of this!!”
She was being totally serious as she takes the things that happen in our Nation
very seriously.

My response was simple, “I am glad I am out of the country”

I also told her that despite not being physically present in the US, I was nonetheless
seeing and hearing plenty in the way of the fiasco back home.

If you’ve ever traveled outside of the country, your English speaking channels are
limited to CNN International and the BBC International.
Two news outlets not known for their conservative take on world happenings.

I also confess I was not up to speed on Senator Susan Collins.
I just knew she was a senator from Maine and that I like Maine.

I’ve about had my bate of politics and politicians in our country.
I’ve had my bate of swamps.
I’ve had my bate of elections.
I’ve had my bate of the caustic rhetoric, of angry hate-filled demonstrations,
my bate of the endless sea of obstructionists, liberals, progressives, feminists, atheists,
Satanists, Communists, Socialists, Antifa folks, Left-wingers, Right-wingers,
Klan members,Supremacists, Militants, and anyone else causing trouble while rattling my chains.

However, I did very much want to hear the latest interview with Susan Collins.
She was to do a sit-down interview with journalist Martha Maccallum as she would recall
the lead-up, as well as the aftermath, of her vote and her address to the Senate…
an address that has been hailed as one of the greatest speeches on the Senate floor.

She cast the pivotal vote following the circus-like hearings that lead up to the vote
which would be sending Brett Kavanaugh to the highest bench in the land or would either
send him back home to private life.

And following the vile display of our lowest lows, I’m not
so certain I wouldn’t have simply wanted to just go find an island someplace far away from
the madness and spend my remaining days mindlessly fishing…

Susan Collins was viciously and verbally threatened prior to the vote as well as after
the vote.
Her family was viciously threatened.
Her very life was threatened.

I’m sorry, but where did we say we lived?

Is this America???
Home of the Brave, land of the free and thriving with the lovers of all things Democracy?

Or are we living in some remote tribal area of the globe rife with ambushes
and battles to the death?

It’s just that after all of this latest assinine behavior by our Nation regarding
the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh, I couldn’t quite tell…again, I’m just saying.

Susan Collins shared with Martha MacCallum that an envelope containing white powder
was mailed to her home in Maine with a note that said “Anthrax, HA HA”
Another arrived supposedly containing ricin.

Her husband and dog had to be immediately quarantined while the folks in the bio-hazmat
suits invaded her home.

Martha then ran a few of the voicemails and emails that flooded Senator Collins
office and home.
Crude, vile and foul sums them up rather succinctly.

Again, where are we actually living?
Is this America or rather some alterego Scifi surreal land of all things Orwellian?

She recalled an evening just prior to the vote that she had been working late.
She drove herself home but there was nowhere to park near her DC home so she had
to park about a block away.
It was late and dark.
She stepped out of her car to find a lone man standing on the sidewalk as if he had been
waiting on her.
She began walking and he began following her.

As she approached her house this man quickly moved between her and her door,
getting right up in her face, brandishing a flashlight and
waving it wildly at her face as he verbally attacked and berated her.

She said the only humorous moment of an otherwise frighteningly life or death situation
was when she yelled at him, demanding that he leave her alone…
as she just as quickly thought to ask, “and by the way, what is your name?”
Of which he actually gave to her.
Needless to say, the authorities quickly found him and detained him.

She told Martha that despite these “scary” moments,
these threats and attempts to sway her vote away from the favorable, she was
not going to be intimidated.

I admire her for digging in and for holding her own.
And yet at the same time, I found myself,
as I listened and watched this woman explaining why she voted the way she did and why she did,
feeling very sad listening as her interview continued.

I no longer recognize this place I’ve known and called home for near 60 years.
Who are these people who live now to persecute those who they disagree with?
I just don’t get it…it is absolutely tragically surreal.

Senator Collins explained that she had listened to the days of hearings, the witnesses,
the recounting of events 40 years prior…
she, in turn, weighed the words, the reactions, the records, and the lives now lived as adults…
and concluded she could and would vote in favor of sending Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court.

The funny thing in all of this is that Susan Collins is, well, obviously a woman.

She is a smart woman.
A woman who didn’t marry until late in life.
An independent woman.
She is neither naive nor gullible.

Her former college, St Lawrence University, a school that she loved attending and a school
she has carried a deep affinity for throughout her adult life has recently rescinded two
honorary degrees it bestowed on her in the wake of her being that same very independent
woman that they once loved and embraced—
so since they no longer find her independence something they care for, as she is independently
voting with a mindset they helped to instill in her, yet now runs counter to their own thinking
…sadly so….they find that they can no longer claim her as a former student.

Toward the end of the interview, Martha asked Senator Collins if she could live with the
idea that in 2020 she could actually lose her seat due to this single vote.
In essence ending her long political career, of which could come to a screeching halt
all because of a single vote…

Without batting an eye, Senator Collins said “yes, let the chips fall where they may,
I’m at peace with my decision.”

Now here is a woman who knows her mind.
Isn’t that what our society keeps clamoring about??
Empowered women?
And yet we seem to have a woman who is taking her stand and still, there is no
pleasing of the masses…

Here is a link to the full interview…

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/susan-collins-reveals-critics-personal-attacks-over-kavanaugh-vote

I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers,
intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people—–
for kings and all those in authority,
that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness.
1 Timothy 2:1-2

irrational ideology vs logos

“Meanwhile I will continue to use your platform to undermine your hateful
and irrational ideology.
And I will do it by using logic and love – the love of the Logos.
We don’t need Twitter (or Facebook, or government or the media) to be able to speak of Christ.
And you will never silence us.
Though you kill us the very rocks would cry out!
David Roberston

(detail of Christ from Michaelangelo’s Final Judgement / The Sistine Chapel)

λόγος
Logos

According to Writingexplained.org, the Greek word Logos is a rhetorical device that includes
any content in an argument that is meant to appeal to logic.

In other words, Logos equates to a logical discourse when opposing sides engage in conversation
regarding the difference of opinions.

The explanation goes on…
Logos is one of the three Aristotelian appeals.
A writer utilizes the three appeals in order to convince his audience of his argument.
The other two appeals are ethos (ethics) and pathos (emotion).

Appeals to logos are those that involve or influence the logical reasons an audience
should believe an argument.

Logos often shows up in an argument in the form of facts and statistics.
However, any logical statement could be an appeal to logos.

According to Wikipedia…

Ancient Greek philosophers used the term in different ways.
The sophists used the term to mean discourse;
Aristotle applied the term to refer to “reasoned discourse “or “the argument”
in the field of rhetoric,
and considered it one of the three modes of persuasion alongside ethos and pathos.
Stoic philosophers identified the term with the divine animating principle pervading
the Universe. Within Hellenistic Judaism, Philo of Alexandria (c. 20 BC – c. 50 AD)
adopted the term into Jewish philosophy.
The Gospel of John identifies the Logos,
through which all things are made, as divine (theos),
and further identifies Jesus Christ as the incarnate Logos.
The term is also used in Sufism, and the analytical psychology of Carl Jung.

There was a time in the educating of children when the classics were the common line
of curriculum.

According to ARISTOI Classical Academy, a classical education consisted of the following:

Truth –
Classical education values knowledge for its own sake,
which is to say that the body of knowledge under study itself helps students to
discern that which is true and good and beautiful,
rather than having an external definition of these things imposed upon it.

Guidance for Modern Life –
Classical education holds that the study of the liberal arts should yield the
perspectives that ought to inform and provide direction to the sciences and to
social constructs, not vice versa.

Western Civilization –
Recognizing that “American Civilization” is the product of the
millennia-long project known as Western Civilization,
classical education teaches the standards of moral virtue and character that
created Western culture, and which allow students to assess and understand other cultures.

Civic-Minded –
Classical education upholds the value of responsible contribution
toward family, community, and governments.
Students are able to connect the civic life and political experiences of historical
societies to present-day cultures.

Eloquence –
Classical education teaches standards of excellence in communication
that are embodied in the great literary works of the Western canon.
For generations, these works have exemplified greatness in that they present important
events and persons, and interpret these events and persons through abiding values and concepts
in language marked by precision, beauty, and power.

Unity of Knowledge –
Classical education trains students to recognize the relationships between the various fields
of inquiry and knowledge (such as history, science, and literature)
and to organize these varied fields into an integrated,
logical and systematic framework.

And as a former Art teacher, it should be noted that the Arts…be that music,
the visual arts, drama, as well as classical languages such as Latin and Greek
which were also included in a well rounded “classical” education.

Then at some point during the educational course of children, something happened…
we dumbed down the curriculum while we convinced ourselves it was greater, broader
and grander.

Yet in this fallacy, which we sold ourselves, over the expansion and re-do of education,
we actually dumbed down our curriculum which in turn lessened the learning and in turn
shortchanged our kids.

And in so doing we now have a culture that has no idea how to converse regarding their
thoughts or ideas…nor do they even have the whereto all to have original thoughts let
alone the knowledge of how to defend them with logic versus their go to brute force of
bullying and intimidation.

I say all of this after having read the latest offering by our friend the Wee Flea,
the Scottish pastor David Robertson and of his being recently banned by Twitter.

My other favorite across the pond, tell it like it is cleric, the former Church of England
Bishop Gavin Ashenden has also been banned from Twitter…
each for their Christian hate-speak.
Did you read that…Chrisitan hate speak…
If ever there was an oxymoron that is it…Christian + Hate + Speak…

Oh those Christians…they’ll get you every time.

As I am not one to tweet nor foray out into social media other than this little blog,
I say be glad and don’t look back…
brush the dust from your feet as you press forward fighting the good fight.

As David reminds us in his open letter to Twitter…
he will go forward…forward in both love and logic—and the love of Logos…

Dear Twitter – Why Have You Banned Me?