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In Favor of Contemplation

If one hopes to create something of everlasting worth, one must take deep moments to pause and contemplate the idea in time, space, and proximity to an eternal truth.

Contemplation leads to questions and answers that may not be readily provided.

It is in that chasm between the wondering and the answering that gives us context for caution against living and dying and we too often wage death over the sin of life.

Memes of Belonging

Are we required to join? Are we made to create? It is necessary for us to belong to someone other than ourselves?
What happens when we are carved from each other and caved in a culture from which there is no escape?

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Crimes of Birth: Dying Black in the Urban Core

It has always been treacherous to be Black in America — and if you’re a Black Man in America — your chances for even average survival are slimmer than your White peers.

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Gangland in Newark: Murder at Ivy Hill

Handguns are made to kill people. We know this in our bones because of murders in Far Rockaway and Fulham and Orange and now, once again, in Newark. The bloodshed in New Jersey, spewed Gangland style, killed three kids and injured another on an abandoned schoolyard in a tonier part of Newark — where this sort of thing doesn’t happen — called Ivy Hill.

The Mark of Cain and the Mountain Meadows Massacre

As an avowed atheist — I prefer to worship art and nature — it may seem strange that I have a long list of religious friends. Of my many Mormon friends, I have discovered there are two topics that, when mentioned, will cause them to give you the stink eye and turn away from the conversation. If you press the matter, they will refer you to the LDS website for official commentary.

The first verboten topic is colloquially known as “The Mark of Cain” and it is an interesting and undeniable stain on the Mormon church where Blacks — men of African descent — were denied the priesthood because of their “mark”… their skin color.

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Salome in Antiquity: To Cure To Kill Today

We are fast moving into the world of quick curing so we may better kill and that is a strange disconnect in a society where we are required to claim our care for each other.

Like Salome in antiquity — who was rewarded for her dance with the granting of any wish from King Herod — chose a false cure for a certain death and a killing from her own curse. John the Baptist never saw his beheading coming until he appeared on a silver platter.

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Celebrity Semiotic: The Bad Parenting of Paris Hilton

As a cogent and mindful people we are faced, once again, with the inappropriate disparity between rich and famous and the poor and unknown. I call this disconnect: The Celebrity Semiotic.

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