"Beware the leaven of the Pharisees, which is a hollow hypocrisy."
Luke 12:1
“Sabbath, in the first instance, is not about worship. It is about withdrawal from the anxiety system of Pharaoh, the refusal to let one’s life be defined by production and consumption and the endless pursuit of private well-being. The celebration of Sabbath is an act of resistance because it is a visible insistence that our lives are not defined by the production and consumption of commodity goods.
It summons us to intent and conduct that defies the requirements of a society that specializes in control and entertainment, bread and circuses, along with anxiety and violence.
The way of mammon (capital, wealth) is the way of commodity that is the way of endless desire, and endless restlessness without any Sabbath."
Walter Brueggemann
"They live out their days in prosperity, and slide peacefully down into hell."
Job 21:13
"Kevin Kruse in his book 'One Nation Under God: How Corporate America Invented Christian America' details how industrialists in the 1930s and 1940s poured money and resources into an effort to silence the social witness of the mainstream church, which was home to many radicals, socialists and proponents of the New Deal. These corporatists promoted and funded a brand of Christianity—which is today dominant—that conflates faith with free enterprise and American exceptionalism.
The rich are rich, this creed goes, not because they are greedy or privileged, not because they use their power to their own advantage, not because they oppress the poor and the vulnerable, but because they are blessed. And if we have enough faith, this heretical form of Christianity claims, God will bless the rest of us too. It is an inversion of the central message of the Gospel. You don’t need to spend three years at Harvard Divinity School as I did to figure that out."
Chris Hedges, The Suicide of the Liberal Church, January 25, 2016
"They will be unloving and unforgiving; they will slander others and have no self-control. They will be cruel and hate what is good. They will betray their friends, be reckless, be puffed up with pride, and love pleasure rather than God. They will act religious, but they will refuse the grace that could make them righteous."
2 Timothy 3:3-5
There is probably no greater threat to the faithful than that of the sanctifying of success with worldly measures.
Invariably when a principled belief aligns itself with the state, and the wealthy and the powerful, it ends up as lost as if it was suffering persecution.
State oppression is external and easily seen. Internal corruption is much harder to correct since it can easily be glossed over by the blessings of mammon and material 'success'.
And of course the same applies to the secular character of a country. Internal corruption and the rise of an oligarchy is a slow but sure poison to all the principles of freedom, more pernicious and insidious than malign intent from another nation.
But external threats are a useful distraction from the evil within.
Stocks rebounded today after their stiff correction yesterday.
And so it was the same with gold and silver, which rallied sharply after the pounding they took yesterday.
Wash and rinse, the endless cycle of markets corrupted by crony capitalism.
The Dollar fell sharply, not holding on as it did yesterday.
VIX fell again. Our measures of risk have been twisted and smothered.
This too shall pass. For God is not mocked.
As a man sows, so shall he reap. In this life or the next.
Have a pleasant evening.
