Putting Terrorism in Perspective

Columnist Leonard Pitts puts terrorism in perspective, saying that terrorists are only powerful if we pay attention to them.

Death threats over the Internet?

Death threats by Facebook? By Twitter? By e-mail? By comments on blogs and videos? Unfortunately, yes. Fortunately, they haven't come to me -- yet.

Leonard Pitts, a fine newspaper columnist, points out, in one of his many good pieces of writing, that there have been at least four cases of death threats, delivered by the Internet, to people who should have had no fear of such, within the last couple of weeks.

The newest technology, he eloquently reminds us, doesn't necessarily make communication any better. Instead, it brings out the worst in some of us. What we need to do is to use wisdom. And, as he says, "There is no app for that."

Thanks for reading. Read Pitts.

How insignificant humans are!

Leonard Pitts, columnist for the Miami Herald, has written a splendid column about, of all things, the Titanic. Yes, the ship that sunk. There is a re-make of a movie about it, showing in theaters now.

His point? We thought the Titanic was unsinkable. Even God could not sink it, they said. We thought we had it made. But we were wrong, 100 years ago, and we'd better not get to feeling too proud now. Even the Titanic was just a dot in an enormous ocean, an ocean so much older than the Titanic that we can scarcely imagine it.

Pitts doesn't mention it, but the building of the tower of Babel comes to mind. According to the story in Genesis, the builders had far too much appreciation for their own ability. Disaster struck. Pitts doesn't mention climate change, either, but that's just one place that the next disaster we aren't prepared for may come from. Or it may come from our dependence on the all-too-vulnerable North American power grid, from the European (and US) debt crisis, from Iran or North Korea starting a nuclear war, from disease germs becoming resistant to antibiotics, or from any one of a number of things I haven't thought of, or, of course, from the Second Coming. But a disaster will come. And we won't be ready, no matter how smart and well off we think we are.

We are recently evolved (or created, or both) inhabitants of a small planet around an ordinary sun in an ordinary galaxy, a very small spot, in time and space, in the grand scheme of things, and we forget that at our peril.

Thanks for reading!

Breaking down doors: how to REALLY measure commitment

Leonard Pitts, syndicated columnist, and a good one, muses about the recent Black Friday stampedes. I'm linking, for the first time, to Moscow News, which has an article about the incident. (It really is a small world, isn't it?) This news article speaks of a Wal-Mart employee who died in a stampede as a "sacrificial victim to the pagan gods of consumerism."

Mr. Pitts uses the lining-up-early-and-pushing-against-the-door test to measure our priorities. He points out that he hasn't seen people lining up early and breaking the glass in libraries, schools, or churches, but we do this for bargains. Which, as he says, tells us something about ourselves. Something not so good, I guess.

As John put it: 1 John 2:15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions—is not from the Father but is from the world. 17 And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever. (ESV)

I wasn't at any retail store, pushing on the door, on Black Friday. But I wasn't storming the gates of heaven, either.

Thanks for reading.