In The Android’s Dream There is a minor but important character, named Sam, who’s gender is never identified. There are several readers, myself included, who were under the impression that there is a single passage where the masculine pronoun is used to refer to Sam. Since Sam is in a relationship with a less minor character named Harry McClellan (who is clearly identified as male), Sam’s gender could mean something about Harry. Is Harry gay?

In the end it doesn’t matter. Dream‘s author, John Scalzi, realized this and after writing an entire scene without once identifying Sam’s gender, he stopped and thought, “‘Hmmm, that’s interesting, I wonder what sex Sam is,’ and then I thought ‘Hey, I wonder if I can pull off not saying what sex Sam is all the way through the book’.” (This is all according to Scalzi’s blog, I’m not making his reactions up).

I bring this up because of the last thing Scalzi writes in that blog entry: “And then, when you’ve settled the question of ‘What Sex is Sam Berlant?’ to your personal satisfaction, you can ask yourself another question about The Android’s Dream: What color is its hero, Harry Creek?”

Good question. He never describes it. Yet no one even talks about it until Scalzi points it out to you.

Because his skin color is irrelevant.

There’s not issues of racism within the human species. There’s no cultural information important to character or plot or setting. It’s a non-issue.

So we come to what’s brought this up. There’s a lot of complaints going around the Internet (and by “around the Internet” i mean “my friends on Twitter” — I’m too insular to look further than that) about the “white-washing” (ie, the portrayal of characters of varying ethnicities with white actors) of The Last Airbender.

I’ve never watched Avatar, cartoon or movie. So I don’t know how egregious a crime this is.

I will say this. I assume, most of the time, that a character in an anime is Japanese until I’m given reason otherwise. They aren’t big on accurate portrayal of racial characteristics. Ichigo Kurosaki from Bleach has orange hair. It’s not just a visual convention, they refer to the color in dialog in the anime. But he’s clearly Japanese. So when someone wants to make a character with big eyes and blue hair, and someone adapts it for the screen and chooses a white actor. Are they really doing much to change the work?

I argue no, with certain obvious exceptions. If the ethnicity of the character comes into play, as a character driving factor, or an element of the plot, or a flavor for the setting. You are making changes to the main work just by changing the skin color of the actor you use, whether you are doing it on purpose or not.

But such is not the case every time it happens. Shakespeare is performed constantly with different colored actors in various roles. Most of the time it doesn’t matter. If you get a white guy to play Othello, on the other hand, you’ve got a play that doesn’t make a lot of sense.

My favorite case in point is Ursula LeGuin. She complained noisily when Sci-Fi made a movie of Wizard of Earthsea using a white actor in the lead role. In the Earthsea books, it’s a stated fact that most of the characters have dark skin. LeGuin takes umbrage and claims they make thematic changes to the story by this decision.

But she’s wrong.

Yes, she describes her characters with dark skin. But that’s where it ends. It’s a standard fantasy setting, plus islands. It has no overtones of Polynesian culture or plot. It has no themes of any other race either. In fact, they build castles, which is not something islanders I’ve heard of have ever done. Sure, there were fortresses built in the Caribbean, but they were built by white Europeans.

So what, exactly, is the damage done if a producer chooses a white actor to play Ged?

None, really.

So let me break it down. Am I claiming that “white washing” is a non issue? No. Far from it. The term itself bothers me on many levels for the implications it has. White Washing is especially bad when it is used to eliminate cultural information to make it more marketable. If you’re saying that about a producer, you should be careful. Accusing someone of intentional racism is a serious charge.

But is every time they change a skin color a case of rewriting a work and participating in the suppression of minorities? I don’t think so.

Because I am, apparently, a cynical person, I have to always first mention the specific things that distracted me. Don’t worry, I’ll leave aside things I’ve mentioned before.

It seems that Warren is advocating a bit of predestination here. Did God plan every choice I’ll make? And if so, do I really have any choices? And if not, then why does it matter if I’m obedient? This sort of question bothers me because it gets at the core of justice, mercy, and identity. If I don’t have freedom to choose, then how can God be just if I “choose” not to follow him and he punishes me for it? There’s a fine line Warren approaches here, and his lack of subtlety worries me that he teaches the wrong part.

Not that I’m advocating any lack of omniscience in God. He certainly knows what choices we will make, because he does know us better than we know ourselves. He did plan our identities. He planned our spirits and planned the bodies we would inhabit. He knew what our capabilities would be and planned to put us in situations that would best teach us and let us use those abilities to further his work.

Again delving into my own religion and not general Christian beliefs, I believe in a pre-earth life. God created our spirits and we lived with Him for a time before we were sent to live in our physical bodies. In that time, He chose some of us as prophets, as leaders, and so on. How detailed was this foreordination? I’m not sure. It was not something forced upon us, but a calling, and it is something we could then and still now can reject by our choices. If we choose not to follow Christ, then we lose the privilege of the blessings he set before us.

When I was 18 I received a patriarchal blessing. (Don’t worry, I’ll bring this all back again). A patriarch in the LDS church is a priesthood holder set apart to give blessings of instruction and insight. These blessings are much like those given by Adam to his seed, or by Isaac to Jacob, or by Jacob (Israel) to his sons. Anyway, in mind I was told that God knew me in the pre-earth life, and that He “observed my humility and diligence.”

It’s ok, you can laugh now. Knowing me you know that I am neither humble nor particularly diligent.

I had a discussion once with a mission companion. He was struggling with obeying the rules strictly. He said “that’s just not me.” And that’s when it all came clear to me. Maybe I wasn’t living life in a particularly humble or diligent manner. But God knows me better than I know myself. Inside, my spirit, my core, I had a humble nature. I just have lived on Earth in a way to bury it.

God knows what we’re capable of, and He has set us so that our strengths, and even our weaknesses, can be used for His work.

So the point of the chapter is that we’re not an accident. God knew, planned on, in fact, the adverse circumstances we would be in. Out sorrows and disadvantages are not punishments. They are the things God knew would be able to pull our best selves out.

So:

Point to Ponder: I am not an Accident.
My compulsive tendencies, my ADHD, these are not curses. These are the things God gave to test and try me. And given those traits, which God planned in me, I am suited for the purposes he has for me. I’m not unwanted, no matter how the world around me makes me feel. In fact, I am needed.

Verse to Remember: Isaiah 44:2 (KJV version): “Thus saith the Lord that made thee, and formed thee from the womb.”
God planned me before I was even born. Before I was even conceived in fact.

Question to Consider: I know that God uniquely created me. What arezas of my personality, background, and phsyical appearance am I struggling to accept?
Well, as I mentioned before, I have personality disorders: Depression, ADHD, compulsive tendencies. These are not just things that I’ve developed, they are a part of my genetic makeup. Do thy cause unhappiness? Sometimes. But part of the plan God has is learning to cope with these things, or even use them. I have become largely at peace with a lot of them, at least in terms of how I think of myself. I still struggle with adjusting my life to live with them appropriately.

I had a discussion recently about the temptations of Christ. Not the movie. But the temptations we actually have recorded in scripture.

Christ is the example. He’s shown us the way in all things. It’s a nice principle to think of, but it’s also one we need to study for it to be of any worth. It is one thing to say He leads us; it’s another entirely to understand enough to use it.

Christ spent forty days in the desert fasting (Matthew 4:1-2). At the close of this spiritual preparation, Satan appeared and tempted him three times. The first temptation used his mortal frailties against him – he told Jesus to prove he was the Son of God by turning the rocks to bread (v. 3). Christ responded by quoting scripture (v. 4). Then Satan told Jesus to prove he was the Son of God by jumping from the pinnacle of the temple (v. 6). Again Jesus quoted scripture (v. 7). Finally, Satan told Jesus he would give all the kingdoms and riches of the world if he, Jesus, would worship him (v. 9). Jesus told him to go away, and backed it up with scripture (v. 10).

The first, rather obvious, example that comes to us here is to read the scriptures. In all three instances He quotes scripture as part of his rebuttal. That alone is a way to counteract the temptations of the devil. When we read scripture we can feel the presence of the Holy Ghost. The Holy Spirit’s presence can go a long way to removing the feelings of temptation and replacing them with better feelings.

But He doesn’t just quote random scriptures. He quoted scriptures that were relevant to the situation and the deeper situation. When tempted to turn stones to bread, he quoted what is now Deuteronomy 8:3 “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.” This is, at the very least, a witty response, to quote a scripture about bread when tempted to abuse his godly power to create bread. It shows a deep familiarity with the scriptures. But even more so, the passage in Deuteronomy is talking about when God created manna for the Israelites ─ when bread was miraculously created for them in the desert. Christ knew, this of course. He was showing that he understood why this would be an abuse of his power. He was aware of the context and the similarities, and He knew when it was appropriate and when it wouldn’t be to use his power. Clearly, He was able of surviving without having bread right at the moment. Yet after forty days without food, can we really argue that He didn’t have a need? At the very least, a compelling want.

Throughout these temptations, the challenge is very explicitly to the faith Jesus had in his calling. Was He truly the Son of God, Savior of the world? If so, prove it! Satan is casting doubt, much in the way a child would on the playground. When they are at the pinnacle of the temple, he says “If you’re the Son of God, then God won’t let you get hurt. Jump off and angels will catch you.” He even quotes scripture to back it up ─ a passage from the ninety-first Psalm, which is a prophecy about Christ.

Christ is equally sly in his response, however. He quotes a passage from Deuteronomy again: Thou shalt not tempt the Lord they God (6:16). The passage refers to when the people made a golden idol to worship while Moses was receiving the ten commandments. They “tempted” the Lord in that they were testing the boundaries. How far could they go before there was some sort of punishment. In Deuteronomy the Lord tells them not to do that sort of thing. Don’t test where the line is, just stay well within it. Would angels have caught Him? Well, sure. But Christ didn’t need to prove his divinity, least of all to Satan. Not even to Himself. He knew who He was and didn’t need a miracle to prove it. Some say that faith precedes the miracle, but in some cases, faith might preclude the need for a miracle.

Last is the temptation that I, personally, understand least. Satan offers Christ, literally, the world. Now, I have no doubt that Satan was capable of delivering. At least in the immediate sense. If he couldn’t, that would have been the most incredible bluff ─ which hardly disqualifies the possibility. Satan is, after all, the father of lies. But it was a question of patience. Christ framed the world. It was all his anyway. All the rulers in the world reigned at his sufferance. I think that this temptation was more than just a test of patience. It centered on the Atonement itself.

In his mortal life, Christ descended below them all, and as a result, He was crowned with glory, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. But in order to return to His Father and receive His reward, He had to fulfill His mission. He had to suffer more than any mortal man could bear. Satan was hoping that by offering Jesus the kingdoms and riches of the world, he could make Jesus think he would bypass that suffering and receive the reward.

Christ is better than that. And this time, he doesn’t just quote scripture. And when he does it’s more abrupt ─ no clever explanations, simply “Thou shalt worship the Lord they God, and him only shalt thou serve.” Straight up, one of the ten commandments. A simple “That would be wrong.” But He preludes the scripture with “Get thee hence.” No more indulging the temptation. “Go away!”

I confess that I think a little of Smeagol when I think of this. “Go away, and never come back.” But it’s a useful comparison. Too often do we indulge the temptations that beset us, and then bemoan the fact that we succumbed. And then we often even have the gall to wonder why we succumb to temptation. We succumb because we let it stay on our mind!

Well could we learn from the example of the Savior and say to our temptation “Get thee hence!”

Being LDS, this chapter grates a little. Not a lot, but the feeling is probably why I didn’t get further than the first chapter the last time I tried this.

Not that I disagree with any doctrinal point I can indicate here, at least, none which comes to mine. It’s the tone it strikes. (Also, I have a strong preference for the King James Version of the Bible — it’s what I’m comfortable with and I think it sounds better than any of the modern versions, which sound silly to me.)

No, I think the biggest thing that gets to me is this string of six words: “It’s far greater than your family.” And on the surface, that’s true. Ultimately, the Plan of God is much greater than my family. But what that sentence connotes is pretty disagreeable.

God’s purpose for me is inextricably intertwined with my family. Whatever ultimate plan He has for me, what He wants me to do, will have to do with my family. Yeah, it’s not just my family. But starting off with saying that it’s far greater than my family seems to turn my attention too far away from my family.

Also, our desires and interests are involved with the purpose God has for us. Our talents and abilities and passions can be used for God’s work, and there’s hardly a reason why he wouldn’t use that. Certainly we are required to align our will with the Lord’s, not the other way around. And if our values don’t match His, we have the wrong values. But when our hobbies, interests, and skills do not contradict His commandments, why wouldn’t an omnipotent Creator seek to use those abilities rather than have us ignore them? They’re part of the spiritual gifts He has given to us, after all.

However, a lot of that can seem like picking at nits. The main thrust of the chapter is to find our purpose from God. Just because I take issue with the feeling of his tone doesn’t mean that Warren is wrong in his meaning.

He’s right of course that unless the help is grounded in God’s plan, self-actualization isn’t going to get you to your purpose. He’s right that focusing on our own plan and will isn’t going to get us to fulfillment. If they are saying “I think” or “I believe” it’s not really coming from God’s word. And, in the end, his point to ponder is a good one. “It’s not about me.” It really isn’t.

Maybe I’m just a cynic, but the reasoning in the chapter is weak. The examples, while sometimes illustrative, aren’t very meaningful. And that’s irritating, because this chapter could have been so powerful. “There is an alternative to speculation about the meaning and purpose of life. It’s revelation.” That’s very strong. The word of God is powerful and sharper than any sword. Using it would be a lot more helpful than the simplistic examples I see here. Instead of telling us a story about being lost on a mountain to introduce a cliché phrase — skip the cliché and just tell us. Also: go light on the exclamation points. Putting one in doesn’t add power to your writing. It makes us think you wanted to add power, and if we don’t feel that power from the words themselves, we’ll be disappointed.

This is my problem. I read everything from a good writing analysis. And Warren is, honestly, not the best writer. And it’s hard for me (personally) to ignore when the flaws with his writing are so intimately connected with his message.

So now that this is out of the way, what about actual response to the message of this chapter?

The message is that it is futile to begin your search for meaning in any place but with God. You can achieve success, but not fulfill your purpose by looking elsewhere.

And I agree. I’m not sure that I’ve been the best practitioner of this concept however. I am very self absorbed. I look at my fulfillment primarily in my writing. This might not be the worst thing, but it doesn’t start with God, and it’s short lived. If I’m looking for long lasting change in how I feel about myself, I probably need to look more specifically at how God wants me to use this talent. What can I do to learn more about it.

Point to Ponder: “It’s not about me.”
Clearly, my attitude in the past has been, consciously or unconsciously, that it is about me. After all, it is me. I don’t expect anyone else to think it’s about me, but for me, it has been me. I’m going to make a conscious choice to try and look outside of me for purpose. Maybe it will make working easier, since I do that primarily for my wife and kids. But then, that’s still not thinking about starting in God, completely. It’s just a step closer than where I am. I’m hoping that the next 39 chapters will help me look to find other ways to make it less about me.

Verse to Remember: Colossians 1:16 – “all things were created by him, and for him.”
Note, I’m rendering these in the KJV, for my own reasons
Well, for Him, but didn’t He create the earth as a place for us to learn and grow? It’s to fulfill His plan for us, to save all His children. I guess I should see it as He didn’t create the earth just for me, but for all of us. And he has created so much more than just this earth. He cares for me, but as a specimen of His children, I’m a very small part of it all. He wants me to be there, but He wants my function to be about more than just me.

Question to Consider: “In spite of all the advertising around me, how can I remind myself that life is really about living for God, not myself?”
It’s a good question, and I don’t have an immediate answer. Prayer, however, is always an obvious answer. Praying as an act in itself should be a reminder of God’s presence in my life, and if I’m praying about His will, that should be a constant reminder that it’s not about me.

I started this partially to work with a friend, who needs some purpose and direction. I reckoned, I do too. I don’t feel at liberty to quote the letter, and I’m editing what I wrote for this blog.

One of my favorite hymns (my father’s as well) is “Lead, Kindly Light”:

Lead, kindly Light, amid th’encircling gloom;
Lead thou me on!
The night is dark, and I am far from home;
Lead thou me on!
Keep thou my feet; I do not ask to see
The distant scene—one step enough for me.

I was not ever thus, nor pray’d that thou
Shouldst lead me on.
I loved to choose and see my path; but now,
Lead thou me on!
I loved the garish day, and, spite of fears,
Pride ruled my will. Remember not past years.

So long thy pow’r hath blest me, sure it still
Will lead me on
O’er moor and fen, o’er crag and torrent, till
The night is gone.
And with the morn those angel faces smile,
Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile!

Sometimes, you can’t see the next step. You just have to trust and put your foot forward. We don’t know all God’s plans for us, even when we understand our purpose. I prayed to ask if I should marry Kirsti, and I received an answer that I have never ever been more sure of in my life. And then, a couple weeks later we broke up. I never doubted that answer, but one night, I was pretty despondent about it. I just told God in my prayer that I didn’t understand what what going on or how to reconcile my answer with what was going on, but that I was going to trust him. Well, it worked out in the end. But even if Kirsti and I hadn’t reconciled, I was finally at peace with it in that moment. Even when I didn’t understand what was going on, and it didn’t seem to make sense, I had chosen to trust God. I think that was my moment of Abrahamic trial. It was hardly my first born son, let alone one I’d been promised for decades, but it was pretty important to me, and I don’t think I have the faith of Abraham anyway.

I’m sure your familiar with the scripture where Paul says “faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (I prefer the KJV, though I suppose if you prefer NIV there’s “faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” There’s a Book of Mormon prophet, Alma, who says “faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things; therefore if ye have faith ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true.” Very similar sentiments. Using those as the basis for understanding, I want to look at what you said. “I really do believe and have faith.” You accept that God lives, you don’t doubt it. You accept, as well, that Jesus is your Savior (I’m inferring that, but it’s true, correct?).

That’s pretty much where I stand, myself. I have never wavered in my acceptance in the reality of God, nor in the Atonement of Jesus Christ. A lot like Joseph Smith said, “I knew it, and I knew that God knew it, and I could not deny it, neither dared I do it.”

Have I always trusted him? Not really. Rather than trust a relationship with God, I have in the past sought out one of the more insidiously deceitful forms of false intimacy. While doing that, I wasn’t hearing anything from God. I’m sure He tried to speak with me, through others and through the Holy Spirit, but I was beyond hearing it.

When I finally made the choice to let Him lead me back to him, things changed dramatically in a short amount of time. I’m amazed at how I was able to become so resistant to the whispers of the Holy Ghost. Amazed at how awesome listening to God’s guidance can be. I’ve still got a long way to go, but those first few steps were very impressive.

There’s a book that’s popular among LDS people called Believing Christ. I’ve never read it, myself, but I bring it up because it draws a distinction. See, there’s also an LDS hymn called “I Believe in Christ.” Very stirring. But there’s a difference in those two titles. They both seem to be declarations of faith, but there’s a big meaning shift from believing in Christ, to believing Him, believing what He said and what He’ll do for you. Another Book of Mormon scripture comes to mind. When Christ was crucified, there were terrible storms, earthquakes, and destruction in the New World, which were followed by 3 days of darkness. During the darkness, the survivors heard the voice of God speaking to them: “And again, how oft would I have gathered you as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, yea, O ye people of the house of Israel, who have fallen; yea, O ye people of the house of Israel, ye that dwell at Jerusalem, as ye that have fallen; yea, how oft would I have gathered you as a hen gathereth her chickens, and ye would not.” He wants to protect us, to hold us close. But He waits for us to choose to do so.

There’s a lesson in the Old Testament about this. When the Israelites wandered the desert, there came a plague of poisonous snakes. The venom was deadly and many were dying. The Lord told Moses to raise a staff with a brass serpent on top of it. Any Israelite who looked to the serpent lived. Those who did not died. (That’s in Numbers 21). And because it was so easy to do, or for whatever stubbornness, many didn’t look. But those who looked, not knowing how that would work, they lived.

I think there’s more to faith than just believing. There’s an element of trust in it as well.

If I may be permitted to draw on the Book of Mormon again, The prophet Alma (the same one I mentioned above) made a comparison between faith and a seed (yes, the Savior did too, but this was a more detailed explanation than what we have in the New Testament). He says you plant the seed. You take care of it. Then it grows. and then it stops being faith. It grows, so you know it’s a true principle. It’s not faith anymore because you know. Takes a long time to get to that point. How do you develop faith into knowledge when you don’t have the faith to start with? Alma asks us to “exercise a particle of faith, yea, even if ye can no more than desire to believe, let this desire work in you.” That’s all it takes. A “mustard seed” of faith indeed. You don’t have to have faith to part the Red Sea. You just have to have enough to take a step.

But the Lord does require us to take that step, spiritually. We don’t have to change everything. We just have to open a little to see if something will come inside. The rest comes latter.

I guess, to shorten it up, what I’m saying is that you don’t have to be a spiritual equivalent of Superman to let God in and begin a relationship. And you can’t have a deep relationship without starting one first. So just open up and be ready to shake God’s hand. God actually arriving in your life is what He will do, you don’t have to get him a ride. Just crack the door.

I don’t make these names up.

And not that I’m in a position to take advantage if I happened to win, but I reckoned I’d spread the word. I have writer friends (who don’t read this) who could use it:

half a million and counting!
Ed Ass got its 500,000th hit today. This makes me feel old and venerable.

Naturally, I wanted to celebrate. I mean, with you guys, since you made it happen. But how?! No one has yet invented a giant internet pie.

Jamie Harrington, clever thing, had the idea that I have a giveaway contest, the prize being a first 20 pages crit. So that’s what it is! I’ll give away one crit of a book’s first 20 pages (size 12 font, double spaced, .5 margins for you sneaky sneakies out there).

You’ll be automatically entered to win if you do any or all of the following things:

1) repost this on your blog

OR

2) retweet my Twitter announcement

OR

3) link to this post on Facebook (make sure you include @Moonrat in the post so I’m notified of it)

I’ll close the contest at 11 pm EST tomorrow (March 31). The Rally Monkey will randomly select one winner without my input (as if I could make him listen to me, anyway).

Yay! I’m really excited now.

Bad puns aside, there’s two ways to tackle this subject. I’ma try both.

Does Iran think the rest of the world are idiots? “Yeah, we got a higher voter turn out than anyone has ever. And they all voted for the guy who’s been oppressing them! And you know it’s legitimate because our council beholden to the oppressive leader and the religious dictator not interested in reform both say it is! Never mind that we say we counted 42 million hand written votes in under three hours.”

That’s even ignoring details about the 25% of the votes missing id numbers, and voter turnout of over 100% in several territories. It’s like the Simpsons episode where Lisa finally gets mad because Sideshow Bob’s people had their deceased cat vote for him.

How can we say this is not proof? It’s not just evidence. Most of what happened in that election was impossible.

Of course, we’re making it easy for them to get away with it. “We obviously hope that the outcome reflects the genuine will and desire of the Iranian people,” says our very decisive Secretary of State on behalf of our beloved president.

What she should be doing is saying “Stop it you lying sacks of crap. We know you’re lying, and you’re bad at it.” Iran is assuming we have the intelligence of slugs, and we’re letting them.

Even if you think we shouldn’t make accusations of election fraud, (though how anyone can think there isn’t fraud mystifies me), we need to come down very clearly on what are known wrongs. We need to force them to answer why they won’t allow media coverage, why they won’t let their people speak with the outside world, and why armored men are beating helpless civilians to death. None of it makes any sense, and by standing by, our government is enabling. There’s no excuse for this. We’re very happy to tell them to stop making clean running power stations because we think they might be using the byproduct for more nefarious purposes (oh yes, I’m sure they are, but we hardly have any proof of it). But when we can see them doing something clearly abusive of human rights, we just sit on our hands.

I encourage everyone to do what they can to help the people of Iran be heard. If you have twitter, do the green avatar thing; set your location as Tehran and your time zone as GMT +3.30. If you have a facebook or blog account, say something about it. If you have a computer under enough control, use these instructions to set up a proxy for Iranian bloggers and tweeters. This is the ONLY media coverage we’re getting of what’s going inside, and our own media, usually more than happy to take a side when it comes to abortion, global warming, or same-sex marriage, it’s nancing around trying to say that the coverage we have isn’t legitimate (a fourth hand vetted news story is apparently better news than a first hand account now). The Iranian is punishing these correspondents, and we can actively protect some of them by doing these things.

And if you’re the praying type, PRAY for them. I don’t care if you pray to YHWH, Buddha, the Goddess, Allah, Jesus, spirits, ancestors, or the stain in your bathroom sink. If you believe there is an omnipotent being out there watching over at least some of us, pray to that being that he or she will protect the people fighting to have the rights every human being deserves. Pray that those people will be able to determine their own destiny.

Marriage & the gospel are essentially selfish: they are things we enter into to make ourselves happy — what I’ve missed for so long is that for my marriage to make me happy, I have to strive to make my wife happy. For so long, maybe because of what I thought I saw in the world, I thought that just “being together” should be enough for any person in a relationship. But what you are entering into when you marry is a covenant to try to make the other person fulfilled. Yes, we need it to fulfill ourselves, and that’s a lot of what drives us to it. But the way that marriage fulfills us isn’t by proximity, or even the suddenly allowed physical intimacy. It’s because it gives us the opportunity for a very personal and intense experience of focusing on what can make someone else happy and fulfilled.

Does this mean there is no room for ourselves in a relationship? I ask this thinking of how single persons will react to the ideas in the previous paragraph. Admittedly, partially this is to justify myself. But it is a valid question. Especially for a person who isn’t married. Certainly I do not want to suggest that there is no value in an individual — after all, every soul is precious in the eyes of God. Every soul. There’s a lot of talk of love making one soul out of two, and I think there’s a lot of validity to the conceptualization. But one needs to remember that before the ONE soul is made, there were TWO, COMPLETE souls.

And that’s why I began with saying that these thoughts apply both marriage specifically and the gospel writ large. Personally, I need to work out things pertaining to my marriage, but I think I’m saying very little that can’t be absorbed in that context.

Again I point out that this is a path to personal fulfillment. Christ says “he that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.” And he also says, “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” The first seems to be about subverting the ego. Losing ourselves in the work. But losing yourself, according to this scripture isn’t about losing identity completely. By focusing away from ourselves, and into the better part, we find out who we really are. Who WE are. The second points out that true love doesn’t focus on ourselves.

We can’t be completely unaware of the irony here. That’s the point of the idea, after all. While we are striving to fulfill the other, the other is, if she’s working on the same, working to fulfill us. We achieve our happiness both through performing service and through the service rendered by the other. The two together are what make the whole. And that is the plan of happiness.

Shia had no sense of time. She neither knew how long she had been lying in the mud nor how long she’d been walking. Having a companion made no difference to the situation. It seemed they walked forever, but the night didn’t grow any lighter. If anything, the forest seemed to be darker and there was no way to tell where they were headed. She was grateful that Sylfania held her hand, because she was sure she would feel even more lost without that human contact. The dryads hand was rough, yet still feminine. They were hands clearly familiar with the earth.

At first Sylfania tried to talk. But all she had were questions about the world. She claimed she had not seen much of it beyond her own tree and the nearby forest. The forest was vast, she knew that much from talking with the trees an the animals. But she knew almost nothing of the world beyond it, and that only made her curiosity greater. Most trees were not interested in learning more about the world beyond their own.

But Shia had no answers for the Dryad. She didn’t know the world like she felt she should. She knew nothing of customs or of people or cities or creatures. She knew almost nothing. So after a time, the Dryad fell silent. From time to time she would turn to face Shia and give a friendly smile, but she didn’t stop walking.

At last Shia could see a dim light through the trees. “There,” she said, pointing with her free hand. “Someone must be there.”

Sylfania cocked her head to the side. “I’m not sure what that is. I thought we would have found the road by now.” She shrugged and then continued, dragging Shia with her.

The dryad clearly had not lied about her unfamiliarity with the world. Shia had slight misgivings about charging toward the light, not knowing what was there, but she had to finally admit that she didn’t know what would be anywhere. And even if Sylfania didn’t know what this was, she at least lived in this region.

They tramped through the light undergrowth toward the light. As they approached Shia finally felt at least a little relieved to have a specific goal she could recognize. But compared to her journey up to that point,t he trip seemed to take no time at all. Seemingly in a few seconds they arrived at a stone building, two stories high, and quite large in width and length. A sign hung over the door announcing it was the Stone Heart Inn. The stone was quite old, moss growing on bits of it, but it seemed altogether a solid structure from the ground to the wooden shingles of the roof.

The light came from several windows to the left of the door as well as one or two of the upstairs rooms. The Inn apparently was doing well for business this night. As she stepped up to the door Shia suddenly noticed there was no path. She hadn’t been on one at all as she approached, but there wasn’t any path that led to the door. Nor was there any signs of a nearby road. She paused and turned to mention it to Sylfania.

The dryad was on her toes, her hands grasping the outside sill and peering intently through a window. “There’s people in there!” she was saying. “What kind of a thing is this? How did they get in there? It’s made of stone, so it’s not a tree. Is this… a…” She turned and looked to Shia, her brow furrowed in concentration till she remembered the word. “A house!” she shouted finally. “That’s what blood humans live in, right?” She turned back to the window and studied the occupents again.

Shia felt a smile grow on her face. The lack of road didn’t make sense. How did they all get here, after all? “Blood humans” didn’t fly. But she noticed that she was no longer uneasy. She didn’t have the sense of apprehension that had bothered her earlier. In fact, she felt as if the inn itself were inviting her. She was suddenly eager to go in.

“Come,” she called to Sylfania. “Let’s go meet them,” she said, as she opened the front door.

Tomorrow is Memorial Day.

I never gave any thought to Memorial Day as a child. Never even really realized what it is. But now as an adult I understand it is the time we honor those who have given their lives in service to our country. It should be a time for patriotism at least as strongly as the Fourth of July, because Memorial Day not only commemorates the founding of our country (although it certainly includes that); it commemorates the people who made this country possible and preserved it.

It honors the people.

This is what is important for us to remember. The people are what this country is founded on, for and by, right? “Government of the people, for the people, and by the people.” Like it or not, this country is its Constitution — its government — and the government is the people. So we’ve dedicated a minor holiday in May to a select group who gave every bit of themselves for the rest of the people, both present and future.

The concern here is that the country, meaning the people who make it up, has changed. That’s to be expected, but it is what the country has changed into that is so concerning. A World War II veteran once discussed this. He pointed out that in World War II, men fled to Canada in order to enlist because they couldn’t get in the military here in this nation. Only 25 years later they were running to Canada in order to avoid being drafted over another war.

Politics aside, this still illustrates a vital difference in attitudes. It is around the 1960′s when our country started undergoing some startling, debilitating changes.

Only forty years ago the office of the president was nearly unilaterally respected and revered. Today it is the subject of mockery and almost universally associated with corruption, graft, and self-serving tricksters. What brought about this change of perception is not important, but there is a point about this that most people overlook. Remember the government is of, for, and by the people? The president, along with all the other elected officials so heavily criticized today, represents the people. When we look at our elected officials and see corruption, disreputable character, and vice, we should recognize that those qualities are in ourselves, as the people. We chose them. We put them there. They are what we wanted our leaders to be like.

There’s a mathematical process that shows this: corrupt elected officials = the government. The government = the people. The people = corruption. It’s not a nameless bureaucracy that is the problem in this country.

It is the people.

If we want to change the situation our country, our government, our people are in. We need to change ourselves. Until we accept personal responsibility and accountability, nothing will change in this society. More cops, bigger jails, metal detectors at schools, anti-abortion laws, teen pregnancy education, drug education, curfews, and all the legislation in the world don’t mean anything if the people are not willing to abide by lawful government and act responsibly. Ezra Taft Benson, former Secretary of Agriculture, said, “decaying cities are simply a delayed reflection of decaying individuals . . . improvement of the individual [is] the only real way to bring about the real improvement of society.” In other words, the cities in this country are such a problem because the individuals who live in the are problems.

Tomorrow is Memorial Day. If we truly honor and respect those who gave everything to allow me the privilege to even write this, and for you to read the same, than we will do more than place a few flowers on gravestones at the local cemetery, or watch another showing of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, or listen to a few Sousa marches. We will do something to improve ourselves and act to improve someone else. This is the duty we owe to those we commemorate, ourselves, our society, and our posterity.