Louisiana classrooms now required by law to display the Ten Commandments

[claptonrocks]

Just now, T-Dub said:

 

I am surprised you would say "the government", if that's what you're suggesting?

Not at all..

Aside from that..

Who?

[T-Dub]

15 minutes ago, claptonrocks said:

Not at all..

Aside from that..

Who?

 

I don't think "teaching morals" is necessary.  Aside from the mentally ill everyone pretty well knows it's wrong to rob & kill.  People do it anyway because they feel hopeless or cornered. 

 

When people feel like they can make a decent living, are educated, aren't ill and suffering because they can't afford a doctor, don't feel victimized by those that are supposed to protect them..  Those people probably aren't going to rob or kill anyone.

 

But that would be socialism! 👻  So.. what, hang the 10 Commandments in public schools (because fuck the Constitution I guess) and call it a day?  It's just performative virtue-signaling from a state that consistently rates as one of the worst for public education & a laundry list of other bottom-5 stats - things that actually matter.

 

You know, New Orleans used to be a rowdy but reasonably safe city.  These days? Y'all want to talk about Chicago? NOLA is fuckin sketchy.

[|Montana Bengal|]

3 hours ago, claptonrocks said:

I'm with you on most of that ..

Truth-Trust and respect for anyone..

Break one they all fall.

 

Question and I'm dead serious in this Montana.

Who should teach morals to children?

Parents should be the major factor but so many have none of their own..

 

Who then???

Families and the communities they grow up.  The Ten Commandments isn’t necessarily teaching people morals.  How often do we see people within churches profess one thing  and then do another?  As a preachers kid I have see much of this hypocrisy.  There are tons of ways to crack the morals nut.  Some of the peop,le I learned the most from were teachers and the communities I grew up in.  It wasn’t liberal doctrinarian or anything like that.  I really think we’ll need to do better at actually being kind or supportive of others.  At the very least we shouldn’t be shitting on others.  It serves no purpose

[|Montana Bengal|]

I would add I know this isn’t easy.  We are in a sad state across the board.  There are fewer real discussions.  More demonization of the other side (evil, pedophiles, etc).  It is bullshit.  Yeah there are terrible people, but most of the chatter we hear is utter bullshit.  We have lost our communities.  Churches used to fill some of this space, but we both know that in many areas these churches are flat out dying.  It isn’t because people are suddenly godless or lack morals, rather people see the hypocrisy of the institutions.  I don’t know what fills that void, but being dogmatic about religion isn’t the answer.  We have forgotten how to be communities that can come together for a senior center spaghetti dinner.  We have forgotten how to have civilized dialogue.  We are fucking horrible to others for the dumbest reasons.

 

#RantDone

[claptonrocks]

1 hour ago, Montana Bengal said:

I would add I know this isn’t easy.  We are in a sad state across the board.  There are fewer real discussions.  More demonization of the other side (evil, pedophiles, etc).  It is bullshit.  Yeah there are terrible people, but most of the chatter we hear is utter bullshit.  We have lost our communities.  Churches used to fill some of this space, but we both know that in many areas these churches are flat out dying.  It isn’t because people are suddenly godless or lack morals, rather people see the hypocrisy of the institutions.  I don’t know what fills that void, but being dogmatic about religion isn’t the answer.  We have forgotten how to be communities that can come together for a senior center spaghetti dinner.  We have forgotten how to have civilized dialogue.  We are fucking horrible to others for the dumbest reasons.

 

#RantDone

Rant was effectively inspiring.

[Homer_Rice]

14 hours ago, Montana Bengal said:

I would add I know this isn’t easy.  We are in a sad state across the board.  There are fewer real discussions.  More demonization of the other side (evil, pedophiles, etc).  It is bullshit.  Yeah there are terrible people, but most of the chatter we hear is utter bullshit.  We have lost our communities.  Churches used to fill some of this space, but we both know that in many areas these churches are flat out dying.  It isn’t because people are suddenly godless or lack morals, rather people see the hypocrisy of the institutions.  I don’t know what fills that void, but being dogmatic about religion isn’t the answer.  We have forgotten how to be communities that can come together for a senior center spaghetti dinner.  We have forgotten how to have civilized dialogue.  We are fucking horrible to others for the dumbest reasons.

 

#RantDone

Excellently said, Montana. I've got two stories that speaks to this. First one:

 

 

One of the most famous songs of the 19th century. We still hears echoes of it today, about 200 years after it's composition.

 

I'm a student of the Civil War and of particular interest to me is the battle at Murfreeesboro/Stone's River in late December 1862. One of my ancestors was wounded and lost an arm at this battle. I've got a picture of him on the wall in my study.

 

Now remember, Antietam was an inconclusive battle, but it was "victory" enough to prompt Lincoln to announce his Emancipation Proclamation. But matters were still very dire for the Union and Lincoln, et al. were pressing General Rosecrans, who had taken over the Army of the Cumberland from Don Buell, to move from Nashville and engage the Army of Tennessee led by General Braxton Bragg. Rosecrans set out towards Bragg in the last week of December. It was cold, lots of rain and sleet and mud--a very unpleasant time for such an important fight--for both sides. The Union needed to take Tennessee and the Confederates need to hold it, especially after being chased out of Kentucky earlier in the year.

 

The armies were camped near each other, on December 30th,  1862. They could see each other's campfires, and as happened frequently during that war, in the evening the unit bands from both sides would play to boost morale. Sometimes it was a cacophony, bands playing over each other, sometimes bands held informal competitions, trying to outplay the other bands one song at a time.

 

But on this night, sometime quite remarkable happened. One band started playing "Home, Sweet Home" and and another joined in. And then many of the bands pitched in. And all this while, soldiers, thousands and thousand of them, from both armies, began to sing. On that cold, cold night, and knowing that battle on the morrow was certain, they sang. A couple of armies full of men who had just celebrated Christmas, away from home, got purely sentimental for a few minutes and sang their lungs out. And you know that many of them knew that a lot of them would not see the New Year.

 

Over the next three days, almost 80,000 men fought like devils, suffering almost 30% causalities, over 26,000 men. It was the highest casualty rate of the entire war, by percentage.

 

Things may seem bad now, and they really are, and it'll take people with the sentiments akin to Montana's to keep this country from falling completely apart. But it isn;t going to be pretty. It wasn't then, and it won;t be in our near future.

[Homer_Rice]

Second story. I think I've mentioned this here before, but it's probably been 10 or 15 years.

 

Not quite 40 years ago, I was a volunteer for a fellow running for Governor in Pennsylvania. He didn't make it past the primary, but I have carried this particular encounter in my memory all these years, I've always found it to be significant. On this occasion I was his driver and we were in Harrisburg at a dinner for bigwigs. One of the attendees was a delegate/representative from the Vatican. I don't know his specific title, but he was an impressive dude. After the formal part of dinner was over, he and my candidate had a pretty thoughtful conversation which I overheard, as my job was to be silent and available if my guy needed anything.

 

The conversation was theological and drifted towards a discussion of the filioque. The chat then turned towards the secular implications of the always controversial filioque doctrine, going back to the Nicene Creed. I believe that around this time the Episcopalians were considering dropping the filioque from their version of the Nicene Creed. The orthodox Church pretty much has never accepted this aspect of the Nicene Creed--except for a brief dalliance with Catholicism during the Conciliar movement. This stuff is important, but a little arcane, so I mention it because it was the backdrop to what I found enlightening about this conversation.

 

The two guys, both bright fellows, began to discuss the apparent decline in Western Civilization. My guy said, essentially, "Things look very bleak from a spiritual context for the future." And Vatican dude replied, and this is what amazed me, dropping all pretense of optimism: "It's worse than you think. Back when the Roman Empire was at it's most evil heights, the prospect of Jesus and the new dispensation was something that people could look towards for salvation, it was something to have faith in and to fight for. There is nothing like that on our horizon now."

 

And here we are 40 years later, and subsequent events have proven him right. Now, I'm not speaking about the fundamentalist nuts, be they Christian, Jewish, or Muslim. They all were, and always have been, fucking out of their minds and a disgrace to the precepts of their self-claimed doctrines. Collectively, they are responsible for millions and millions of dead people throughout centuries. I'm referring to, and this is what bothered the Vatican dude so much, the lack of a fresh, new philosophy that sensible people find attractive enough to endure and overcome the evil we face all over the place, the which is very similar to those Roman days of old.

 

As has been mentioned, the shinplaster-like posters of the Ten Commandments are mere performative art. And not very good art at that. If folks were really serious about the virtues of Western Civilization, morality, etc... then they'd add St. Augustine and Thomas a Kempis to the curriculum, they'd add Maimonides, they'd add Ibn Sina. And as we are slowly but surely entering a period in which Asia will once again become the center of the world over the next century or two, we'd add Confucius and Mencius, and Buddha to the mix as well.

 

It's truly great and unique to be a human being--a co-participant in Creation with the Creator--and we don't teach our children any of this stuff. So, in that sense, we are fucked until that changes. You want something to fight for, there you go.