From our pastor:

The soul of the United States of America is sick, malnourished - starving, if I refer to my sermon of yesterday. We are not feeding and nurturing the soul of our nation. Our values are being shredded, life is diminished, and humanity is ignored. From our nation’s top leadership the concepts of white supremacy, increased weaponry, bigotry, fear and hatred are being fed. It is not hard to see through the masquerade that money and power are the underlying values - money and power for the few. From the disgrace at our southern border, to our nation’s refusal to join in environmental protections, to the racist rants and actions, there is little to be proud of. And now, yet again, with this series of mass shootings in just the last few days, our sickened soul is fully revealed.

We have become a nation so immersed in our own individual interests, we ignore the sickness that has taken over. “The right to own a gun” is professed to be the reason we cannot pass common sense gun violence prevention laws, but I believe the sickness comes from something even more evil. The bottom line is our nation is investing in the bottom line - corporations that deal in weaponry are being fed, along with political leaders and their cronies that carry the message of fear and hate. The NRA is just a puppet of that force of evil that convinces leadership nationally and in many states, including Oregon, to turn their backs on humanity, on safety, on putting our children first.

The soul of our nation is sick. The killings in Gilroy, El Paso and Dayton are just the latest in an epidemic of violence that demonstrates we do not have soul enough to say that lives matter more than guns, that children matter more than money, that our safety does not rest with weapons, but with humanity. America must turn away from the evils of hatred, white supremacy, gun violence, cowardice and greed before we become totally soulless.

We must feed our soul by stepping forward courageously, making laws to save lives, standing up against racism, against hate and fear mongering. All of us have a part; we need to hold our elected leaders accountable for showing leadership in passing strong laws to prevent gun violence, we need to reach out to our families, connections nationally, and we need to make our voices heard before it is too late.

From the webmaster: Remembering Daniel's words to Belshazzar after the writing appeared on the wall at his great feast.

Daniel 5, 26-28

²⁶ This is the interpretation of the thing: Mene; God hath numbered thy kingdom, and finished it. ²⁷ Tekel; Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting. ²⁸ Peres; Thy kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians.