Over the past couple of weeks, we have seen multiple reports coming out regarding Alligator Alcatraz. These reports are perhaps not surprising to those who have been following ICE detention for any amount of time. They are still, however, horrifying.

Today is July 4th, but I'm having difficulty finding anything to celebrate other than a day off work. We are living in a time when our freedoms and our services are disappearing... and our neighbors are disappearing, too. They're going to foreign torture prisons and hostile countries, or some are being detained in detention (concentration) camps where their holders joke about feeding them to alligators. Yesterday, they announced that children will be sent to the cages we saw on the news in Alligator Auschwitz, too. My heart is shattered.

"God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him while we are walking in darkness, we lie and do not do what is true; but if we walk in the light as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin." - 1 John 1:5b-7

"Consider this remarkable fact: in the Sermon on the Mount, there is not a single word about what to believe, only words about what to do and how to be." - Robin R MeyersIn my World Religions class, we’ve been talking a lot about what constitutes a religion. The dictionary defines religion as a complex set of beliefs and practices often revolving around something which is considered sacred or spiritual. Yet many of the adherents to the "religions" we are studying don't consider their beliefs and practices as a religion, per se, so then, should we? For example, the Diné people and many other indigenous groups don't use the word "religion" at all, rather calling their beliefs and practices "the way of life."

The politically motivated killings of a democratic politician and her husband over the weekend put a serious damper on what was otherwise an encouraging day – 13.14 million people showing up to unequivocally pronounce, “No kings in America”. The alleged murderer was arrested Sunday night. He’s been identified as a Trump supporter and an Evangelical pastor, which of course has caused ripples throughout the country.

Today at work, we had an emergency preparedness planning meeting. We don’t have earthquakes or tornadoes here, but there is certainly always the danger of a fire, so that was the first thing we discussed. Then, because this is now the normal, we discussed what we would do in case of an active shooter or an ICE raid.

There's this guy online, I don't know his name, who runs a landscaping company. He has posted a bunch of videos where he goes up to a random house in the neighborhood with an overgrown yard and offers to clean it up for free. A good deed, and also, free advertising, right? Many times when he cleans up these yards, he finds sidewalks or driveways underneath all the dirt and the weeds and the overgrown grass and bushes. The path to the home was there, but no longer visible or usable until he cleaned things up.  

Sometimes I wish I didn't feel so much.

I remember learning the ABCs as a child. Not the alphabet, the gospel ABCs: Accept that you are a sinner and you cannot earn salvation on your own. Believe in Jesus, the son of God, who paid for your salvation through His death on the cross. Confess He is Lord over your life. And you shall be saved!

I’m very excited to see the new Superman movie coming out this June. I'm a Superman fan.

"Well, no one really cares about other people. We only care about ourselves."

I was out driving today on my way to work, and I saw a car that was completely wrapped in a giant ad. I immediately assumed that the driver worked for the company that was so colorfully displayed all over his vehicle. Then I remembered a few years ago seeing ads where big businesses were hiring people who were willing to wrap their vehicles like that. Basically, it turned their cars into mobile billboards in order to attract more customers. I don't know if they still do that. If they do, I suppose then it’s possible that he wasn’t actually an official representative of the company, even though he was advertising their business nonetheless.