What is the Amercian Dream?  Are we living in an age where a new fairness Dream is being thrust upon us?  Is this the Dream I have believed all my life?  Is this the Dream I wish for my children and grand children?  What is the Dream your encountering in your neighborhood?  Is this the one we want?  Is this the one we would die for?  Or are we just dreaming?  Is this dream real?  Are we awake?  Pinch me!

Conservatism, socialism, welfare and the common good are words tossed about in the wind, especially politically.  Who is the decider of the Common Good? 

The Common Good must overide conservatism and socialism, but how do we know when the term the common good is being exploted by agendas willing to compromise the common good ofr power and control?

Any definition of the Common Good should not support corruption of the rich or the poor.  The difficulty is not in conservatism or socialism but in humans willingness to use corruption rather than seek the truth which is the objective of the common good.  Both sides can articulate legitimate arguments. 

The use of God given talents and the associated blessings enable one to prosper which is a fundamental Gosple value not to be overlooked.  It is when becomes selffish and self centered that one can go astry.  Likewise the social concept of redistribution that discouarges the use of ones talents especially is treatened with removal of the talents another Gospel value.  When redistribution is used to gain power and control selfishness  and corruption begins to trump Gospel values.

The poor indeed will always be with us for one simple reason.  God gave humanity free will.  To chose good or evil.  To use one talents or to waste them.

The purest Amercian Dream lies hidden in Truth and the Gospel reveals the truth to the spirit while the world reamins blind.  Values where one freely choses to make full use of every God given talents and when excess richs oveflow to recognise the cries of the poor who for reasons they can not control become poor.

However the gosple message of the use of talents should not also be overlooked.  Remembering the one who freely choses to bury their talents must be allowed the difinity of failure and the suuffering which offers hopes of conversion.

Do we know our History?  It wasn’t so long ago!  After freeing the slaves, the government and the land owners needed a way to get the freemen (previously) slaves back into the cotton and other fields to plow, harrow, plant, and harvest the crop.

For decades after Reconstruction tenancy and sharecropping became the way of life in the Cotton Belt.  Imagine as late as 1930 there were 1,831,470 tenant farmers in the South. What began as a device to get former slaves back to work became a pernicious system that entrapped white as well as black farmers. 

http://digital.library.okstate.edu/encyclopedia/entries/T/TE009.html

How does Pernicious measure up against the Common Good and Gospel values?  A very descriptive word – I wonder does this social justice language go over the heads of many?   Perhaps those who are free but entrapped in a system of tenancy and sharecropping are least able to discern the truth.  This system altough better than slavery offered some hope of overcoming poverty but very few realized that hope.  It often resulted in a kind of jumping out of the fire into the frying pan depending upon health, weather and the success of the harvest. 

In it’s favor however was hope and the reality success or failure was directly connected and related to ones efforts or work.  When a system is establsihed without a connection to the use of talents, the self investment one makes through works – well then it becomes a deformation of work and undermines the creativity and dignity of the human soul.  

In the case of tenancy and sharecropping the land owners and political rule makers have the upper hand.  The ability to create an image of freedom and success based upon ones own effort served to encouarge many folks to sign up.  Only later many would find themselves in gut wrenching situations and losing everything they had invested. 

Has tenancy and sharecropping mutated in 2011?  Do we have a system where people are rewarded for making no investment of time, the use of talents or the investment of treasure?  And is the reward they recieve based upon their individual creativety and work yet being insuffcient for them to escape from the grasp of the rule makers.

Could we be experiencing a new more severve case welfare corruption in 2011.  The image of fulfilling the dream, freedom and opportunity to chose without almost no self investment was created.  The housing crises that literally exploded in 2007 followed the image of tenancy.  Little or no investment on the part of the land owner or the tenant was required.  The criteria, regulation and oversight were sacrificed by people of power who were far removed from suffering any consequences – the political elite and money changers have not suffered any consequences.

A new class of people has been on the rise for many generations in this nation.  A new ruling class exists in the USA, unlike the founding fathers they have worked to establsih an image, vision and version of a new gosple that seeks government power and control.  It is stealthy and seeks to establsih a tenancy and sharecropping system unlike any before in the history of this nation. 

Slick talking image making leaders used ideas and words to create the image of being freed all the while laying the foundation and snares necessary to entrap and enslave generations to be the new poor by appealing to their thrist for hope and change they could believe in without definitions realted to Gospel values.

What is the common good?  Does it favor the rich or the poor?  Or is it about providing each citizen the freedom and opportunity to choose to use their god given talents to the fullest?  God gave each of us complete freedom to choose.  He also told us we would gain the rewards and/or the suffer the consequences of our free choices.

Do we humans know better than God?  Is it the governments job to chose who succeeds or fails?  Or is it the governments job to create an environment where each person has an opportunity to succeed or fail and gain from the experience?

Charity and Justice are the twin children that reveal the truth!  But what is charity and justice?  Further through whose eyes are we looking at these abstract human concepts?

Seems that many think it is the federal governments job to control the people so that the so called redistributive nature of Christianity can be applied.  And what the heck is political redistributive social justice of Christianity?

“The Common Good is achieved by Balancing Corruption”

Our founding fathers had great wisdom and divine providence lead them.  We see this  clearly in come into play when this nation was founded upon Christian Judeo principles which recognize the corruptibility of human nature as documented throughout Holy Scripture.  This nations system of government was designed to balance human natures ancient desire to gain power which historically lead to to corruption of the Truth.  Our founding fathers were open to the spirit of truth which lead to discern wisdom from the study of scripture and and history.

Our founding fathers were drawn into the study of history which resulted in as  clear a grasp of history as any people who desired to form a government which would best enable the people to govern themselves.  They knew both the church and the state where susceptable to being corrupted when their power was combined which lead to absolute and complete authority .  So they forbade the federal government from forming a religion.  Hence they empowered the voices of the people to confront corruption from either the church or the state.   It was the principle of truth which comes from a creator and not humanity itself.

It is the people who serve as the last resort to balance power.  They have been delegated the right and duty to take action to balance power when it gets out of control of the people.

Now those who advocate the relinquishment of their individual responsibility to a federal government which repeatedly demonstrates a propensity to make decisions based upon a human concept of political correctness which  serves as an affront to the truth must bury their heads in the sand to the reality the federal government lusts for power and control over the people.

Charity calls one to confront the truth and recognize the imperfection that lives and breaths in our political system and in the hearts of humans.  Seeking truth through charity requires courage.  We don’t have to look beyond the life of Jesus Christ himself who confronted the religious and civil powers of His day for which he was crucified.

Simply put, the truth has the potential to piss off the leaders of the church and the state who cling and lust for power and control over the people!  Every nation and every church has fallen to this corruption of the soul.  Better one man die than for the truth to prevail!

It has been and will always be the job of the people to call those in authority back to the truth while realizing such action could well cost them their life!  We call these folks saints.  And out nation is in desperate need of saints to call the government and even the church to the truth.

Christ taught and the church teaches the whole of scripture must be considered when discerning the truth.

Those who support redistributive wealth should be careful not to violate the parable of talents as is written in the Gospel of Matthew 25: 14-30.  Seems that the good Lord’s plan  rewarded those who worked to use their talents.  The two who used their talents were rewarded with a doubling of talents.  The one who buried his talent had it taken away.

This is the Lord’s justice and charity and I believe summarizes the concept of “the pursuit of happiness” referred to in the Declaration of Independence.

Seems this scenario is being played out in our nation today.  Is the federal government encouraging the corruption of it’s people to use their talents by sitting at home and living off those who choose to work everyday?  Is the federal government using redistribution to purchase power and control over the people by buying votes?  This is a legitimate question we are confronted with today.  It is a question that requires courage to seek the truth buried in charity, social justice and the truth!

Is the commo9n good is being sacrificed to create class warfare.  Is this nation demonizing the “Little Red Hen”.  Everyone wants to eat her cake but how many are willing to work to help?  The rich (those who use their talents) are condemned seemingly without regard to the sacrifices they make their freedom of choice in regard to the dignity of the human person to chose to be charitable is denied by a political correct power often more interested in obtaining power than doing what is in the best interest or common good for the whole people.

The corruption our founding fathers feared has invaded our land could well lead this nation to worship at the altar of a humanistic progressive god that can not save while leading it’s people into bondage and slavery this people can not imagine.  The langauge of faith and salvation is being used to justify lust for human power and control.

The founding fathers knew, this nation must protect the freedom of religion so that it’s people would have a voice independent of the government to confront the ever present corruptible human nature they knew would surely attack the principles laid out in the Declaration of Independence.

The rights of the people come from a higher authority than the federal government.  The first among these is life.  When life is no longer held sacred by the people of this nation none of the rights that follow are sacred.

The polarization that impedes the common good within this nation, is driven by the war between the human secular progressive god and the one true god.  It is an ancient war to determine who is your god?  One could say it is a continuation of the war between good and evil that took place in the Garden of Eden.

Polarization will not cease until the sacredness of life is restored in this nation because we return to believe Almighty God is the one and only Creator of Life.

More to come …

John 18: 38, NAB – Pilate said to Him, “What is truth?” And when he had said this, he went out again to the Jews and said to them, “I find no guilt in Him.

Perhaps Pilot said it best for many who have great difficulty mustering the courage to embrace the truth or even begin to wrap ones arms around the truth.  Truth What is truth?

Who was it that came to testify to the truth?  The Truth will set us free.  Where do we look for the truth?

The Truth is, the truth surrounds itself with other abstract words.  Charity and Justice are two of the twin children of the truth.  When charity and justice are applied properly they hyelp point to and reveal the truth.

Do we kill a man to avoid torturing him and justify our actions based upon our values.  Woops, there’s another abstract word = values?  Well where our do values come from and who decides what they are or are not???

As we grow older we discover our individual values clash with other folks we encounter.  So what do we do?  Charity perhaps, one of the twin children of the truth helps us find our way through the smoke and clouds that exist to hide the truth.

Did you know when humans reach the age of 11, their values have been set for life.  Wow – for life?  Imagine looking at the world through the eyes of an 11 year old and one has reached middle age?

To be continued …..

All of this is to say these are abstract words which are founded upon revealed spiritual truth which is communicated through