Author: RJ Walters

I am an Independent thinking, highly functional person who is deaf and has some unique views and challenges in life. Like all of us, I am a person who is composed of all my life experiences and that is what I write about here.
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Hunt Out The Good….

RJ Walters

“Hunt out and talk about the good that is in the other fellow’s church, not the bad, and you will do away with all this religious hatred you hear so much nowadays.” – Will Rogers, 11 March 1923 This quote from Will definitely applies to the churches in the U.S. but it equally applies to many other things that are problematic in our country today.  As I commonly state on my other blog over at RedLetterLiving.net there are currently more than 39,000 different versions of the Christian church in the world. Most are the result of splits around different beliefs … Continue reading Hunt Out The Good….

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Early Christians and War….

RJ Walters

While Tertullian emphasized the negative aspects of the military to Christian discipleship, Origen pointed out the positive vision of a life of Christian peacemaking. He criticized the army as a society of “professional violence,” pointing out that Jesus forbids any kind of violence or vengeance against another. “We will not raise arms against any other nation, we will not practice the art of war,” he wrote, “because through Jesus Christ we have become the children of peace.” To him the spiritual life means rejecting all forms of violence, and “absolute pacifism.” A People’s History of Christianity: The Other Side of … Continue reading Early Christians and War….

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Replacing One Mediator With Another….

RJ Walters

Before I start on my study of the history of the church I want to do an “aside” post here on another topic. I just read a very thoughtful post over at Rachel Held Evan’s blog about mysticism and evangelicalism. In it she was commenting on a book by Tim Challis about how mysticism, which he defined at any experiences with God outside of the Bible, as not being valid. I am not going to get into his arguments to back up this belief nor Rachel’s counter to it. Click on the link above to see all that.  Instead I … Continue reading Replacing One Mediator With Another….

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Bigger Than….

RJ Walters

  “This country is a thousand times bigger than any two men in it, or any two parties in it.” – Will Rogers, 2 November 1932 I seem to often get ground down by the politics of the day. Especially with all the gridlock and bickering that is always there. Thanks Will for reminding me that the country is a thousand times bigger than all those ornery folks in Washington or the two parties that now occupy space there. Outside the Washington beltway and several State houses there is still a lot of good going on in this country and … Continue reading Bigger Than….

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A People’s History of Christianity….

RJ Walters

I have been studying the history of the church to try an understand how we got to where we are today. An important book in that investigation is entitled “A People’s History of Christianity, The Other Side of the Story” by Diana Butler Bass. This is not the first book I have read by this author and it certainly won’t be the last. With this post I am starting another book review series around this book. Here is a little about what Wikipedia says about her: Diana Butler Bass is a historian focusing on the history of Christianity and the … Continue reading A People’s History of Christianity….

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Burnout…..

RJ Walters

I know I am getting burned out on all this constant bickering in the U.S. I watch little or no news on TV now. All the news channels seem to be about inciting a riot among us. My internet news sites which I visit first thing every morning are now for the most part briefly scanned.  I am just tired of all this stuff. It may just be time for me to go “Walden” as Thoreau did and drop out for a while. I seem to only be able to see the dark side of life and I just can’t … Continue reading Burnout…..

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A Vow Of Poverty…

RJ Walters

When I was a kid in the Catholic church I remember that the priests and nuns took a vow of poverty. That is they put their obedience to God above monetary gain. That seemed like a noble thing to me. Of course I have come to realize that this vow of poverty did not mean that the Catholic clergy lived a lifestyle of the poor around them. They were provided a handsome house with a housekeeper/ cook to provide for them and when they retired there was a rather comfortable living arrangement for them to live out their lives. A … Continue reading A Vow Of Poverty…

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Secession…..

RJ Walters

Take an essay in The Daily Beast last week, in which Bronx-born culture critic Lee Siegel used the gun rights fight as one reason for the South to “Go ahead, secede already!” With secession, a “red-state nation, giddy with new mobility, could make the 1958 Chevy its official car … [and] it could arm all of its citizens, and thus relieve itself of the financial burden of maintaining law enforcement for its citizens,” he wrote. The North, he added, could be unshackled from its Bible-crazed, knuckle-dragger anchors, to venture forth to establish the America envisioned by the enlightened: “Universal health care. … Continue reading Secession…..

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Fertilizer plant that exploded in Texas carried $1M policy

RJ Walters

“The bottom line is, this lack of insurance coverage is just consistent with the overall lack of responsibility we’ve seen from the fertilizer plant, starting from the fact that from day one they have yet to acknowledge responsibility,” Roberts said. Roberts said he expects the plant’s owner to ask a judge to divide the $1 million in insurance money among the plaintiffs, several of whom he represents, and then file for bankruptcy. He said he wasn’t surprised that the plant was carrying such a small policy. “It’s rare for Texas to require insurance for any kind of hazardous activity,” he … Continue reading Fertilizer plant that exploded in Texas carried $1M policy

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Why God Is a ‘Mother,’ Too….

RJ Walters

  Long before I became familiar with the academic debates concerning calling God “Mother,” debates that I am now currently a part of as a professor at Princeton Theological Seminary, I was being raised in a household where I instinctively understood that the divine presence was manifest in the loving hands and arms of mothers, and most especially in the life of my grandmother who raised me. My grandmother’s kitchen was a theological laboratory where she taught me how to love people just as naturally as she taught me to make peach cobbler and buttermilk biscuits. I watched and listened … Continue reading Why God Is a ‘Mother,’ Too….

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About The Bread…

RJ Walters

Let’s continue on with our brief study of the Gospel of Mark. This time it will be about people’s faith and the Bread. I know that seems like two different things but let me try to tie them together. During those days another large crowd gathered. Since they had nothing to eat, Jesus called his disciples to him and said,  “I have compassion for these people; they have already been with me three days and have nothing to eat.  If I send them home hungry, they will collapse on the way, because some of them have come a long distance.”… … Continue reading About The Bread…

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F-35 Bookkeeping…

RJ Walters

As defense secretary, Robert Gates withheld $614 million from Lockheed Martin in 2010 for its lackluster work on the $400 billion F-35 fighter program, the most costly weapon system ever bought. Source: F-35 Bookkeeping | TIME.com. A few hundred million here a few hundred million there and before long you are talking about real money. It is totally unfathomable to me how we could spend $400 billion on one plane design!  But it seems that the $614 million that Gates took away was actually just delayed. He planed on giving it back at a later date. I can only hope that … Continue reading F-35 Bookkeeping…

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A Maturing Jesus??

RJ Walters

Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers. When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.” “Why were you searching for me?” he asked.“Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?” But they did not understand what he was saying to them. Then he went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them. But his mother treasured all these things in her heart. And Jesus grew in wisdom … Continue reading A Maturing Jesus??

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Just Another Obsession???

RJ Walters

ob⋅ses⋅sion /əbseʃən/  —  noun an unhealthy and compulsive preoccupation with something or someone syn: fixation Storyline: The gun was small and light, the training wheels of firearms. The .22-caliber, single-shot Crickett rifle turned deadly on Tuesday, officials in Kentucky said, when a 5-year-old Cumberland County boy shot and killed his 2-year-old sister in what the coroner described to a local paper as “just one of those crazy accidents.” Source: Guns made for kids: How young is too young to shoot? – U.S. News. The above definition of obsession is a pretty simple yet accurate one. Are guns an unhealthy and compulsive … Continue reading Just Another Obsession???

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Religiously Powerful…

RJ Walters

As mentioned a few posts ago Jesus had some very stinging words about the religiously powerful of his day. The Gospel of Mark 7 is one of those places.  Lets study some of those words. He replied, “Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written:” ‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules.’ You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions.” And he continued, “You have a fine way of setting aside … Continue reading Religiously Powerful…

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Growing consensus” in Senate for U.S. action in Syria

RJ Walters

With evidence indicating that Syrian President Bashar Assad’s regime has used chemical weapons in Syria, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said Sunday on “Face the Nation” that “there’s a growing consensus in the U.S. Senate that the United States should get involved.” Source: Graham: “Growing consensus” in Senate for U.S. action in Syria – CBS News. It is interesting that Senator Graham is able to find a “growing consensus” in the Senate but what about a consensus of the people who elected them? Do any of these guys actually listen to their constituents anymore?  Everyone knows that Senator Graham is a war … Continue reading Growing consensus” in Senate for U.S. action in Syria

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More Diagnoses of Hyperactivity…

RJ Walters

  Those are astronomical numbers. I’m floored,” said Dr. William Graf, a pediatric neurologist in New Haven and a professor at the Yale School of Medicine. He added, “Mild symptoms are being diagnosed so readily, which goes well beyond the disorder and beyond the zone of ambiguity to pure enhancement of children who are otherwise healthy.” And even more teenagers are likely to be prescribed medication in the near future because the American Psychological Association plans to change the definition of A.D.H.D. to allow more people to receive the diagnosis and treatment. A.D.H.D. is described by most experts as resulting … Continue reading More Diagnoses of Hyperactivity…

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Brainwashed???

RJ Walters

I just read a news article about a woman who says she is going to convert to Islam. Her family shouts that she has been brainwashed and needs an intervention to prevent that from happening. Just what does it really mean to be brainwashed? Brainwashing like many other words and conditions has a myriad of definitions depending on the speaker. Here is what Wikipedia says about brainwashing: Mind control (also known as brainwashing) refers to a process in which a group or individual “systematically uses unethically manipulative methods to persuade others to conform to the wishes of the manipulator(s), often to the detriment of … Continue reading Brainwashed???

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Hiding The Light….

RJ Walters

Let’s get back to a study of the Red Letter to learn how we are to live.  He said to them, “Do you bring in a lamp to put it under a bowl or a bed? Instead, don’t you put it on its stand?  For whatever is hidden is meant to be disclosed, and whatever is concealed is meant to be brought out into the open. If anyone has ears to hear, let them hear.”  “Consider carefully what you hear,” he continued.”With the measure you use, it will be measured to you—and even more.  Whoever has will be given more; … Continue reading Hiding The Light….