Gadfly

Weeping and wailing about wealth

January 18th, 2017

A most unpopular Bible verse

I have been listening to religious sermons for almost 78 years since I passed to my “age of reason” at seven, so I have “analyzed” about 4,000 sermons give or take, 20 years worth delivered by Roman Catholic priests and 58 years by Lutheran ministers. I think I have a sharp ear for the turn of a phrase or a potent verse.

I swear on a stack of King James’s I had never heard James 5:1-6; this eye-and-ear catching bible verse about the subject of…

Gender myths and beliefs

January 11th, 2017

Sex chromosomes XX and XY just don’t cut it anymore

In my last column of December, I wrote that the January 2017 special issue of National Geographic would be totally devoted to the issue of gender around the world. I have received my copy, so I have spent hours marking up the 152 pages that have explored the science of homosexuality and its effect on social systems in civilized and not-so-civilized areas of the world.

I think this effort is the most important document published in at…

From Lucy to Ellen

December 21st, 2016

What kinds of freedom do you want with your religion?

Here we go again. The Telescope Media Group in St. Cloud, Minn. wants to get into the wedding photography business—but does not want to video, film, or photograph same-sex weddings.

In other words, they want to have the religious freedom to discriminate against their fellow human beings. They claim they are Bible-believing Christians who do not want to be forced “to produce a conception of marriage that directly contradicts their…

Deportation might be one answer

December 14th, 2016

Firearms kill one and wound two Minnesotans every day

When 23-year-old law clerk Chase Passauer was killed in April of 2016 in the St. Paul law office of North Star Criminal Defense, someone finally kept track of how much his death cost.

The eight bullets fired into his body cost about $3.00, but the crime committed by an ex-felon who should not have had a firearm in the first place ended up costing society about $7 million. That sum included the costs of the investigation,…

A long way to go

December 7th, 2016

Things to consider

In this age of the disappearing middle-class and the greatest income inequality in our history, I see the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History is sponsoring a fund drive called KeepThem Ruby, to repair and preserve Minnesota’s own Judy Garland’s leather, sequined, and glass-beaded slippers from that epic “The Wizard of Oz.” Holy Toto, they think it will take $300,000 to fix the 80-year-old shoes, so donors will receive tote bags by a Tony…

Southern whites voted as they had shot during the Civil War

November 30th, 2016

Is the white god creating a mighty white fortress?

Six weeks and six days after Abraham Lincoln gave his second inaugural address on March 4, 1865 he was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth, a Confederate sympathizer.

His speech was a plea to end the division of the states that had cost the lives of over 600,000 troops and 400,000 civilians: “With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we…

Triggers and unintended consequences

November 22nd, 2016

Chaos and the American empire

Harper’s Magazine in the last edition published a long list of items that were mistaken for guns in the hands of people killed by police in the United States since 2001.

People were shot to death because they held hairbrushes, bottles of cologne, beer, and pills; toys and underwear.

Among the hundreds of items handheld, one seemed to stand out: a Bible. Maybe the victim got a break later when he approached the pearly gate. I wonder if the police shooter…

When the falcon cannot hear the falconer

November 16th, 2016

The longest civil war in history

Our American Civil War, brought on by white supremacists and the enslavement of millions of blacks, started in 1860, killed 620,000 of the Blue and Grey over five years of intensive fighting, and really hasn’t been concluded yet.

The military part of the war was deadly, almost matching the 644,000 we have lost in all of our other wars. We have gone through Reconstruction days, 40 acres and a mule, hundreds of Jim Crow laws, the so-called separate but…

The times they are a-changin’

November 9th, 2016

Our Nobel Prize winner for literature recognizes change

I have to write this column a day before the election in order to make a publishing date, so it will be interesting on November 10 to see whether Americans voted for “change” or not. Both politicians were running to make changes in our society, believe it or not.

Republicans wanted to go back to a time before same-sex marriages, Rose v. Wade, affirmative action, income tax, ObamaCare, Social Security, OSHA, EPA, FDA, Brown v.…

The Book of Revelation and the 2016 election

November 2nd, 2016

The four major elements in this election

The last book of the New Testament of the Bible, called the Book of Revelation, describes the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, the messengers bringing a vision of the Last Judgment. The white horse brings conquest and pestilence, the red horse brings war, the black horse brings famine, and the pale horse brings death.

There are other interpretations, one being a description of the decline of the Roman Empire. Theologians over the centuries have…