During the Texas hurricane (Harvey), Pope Francis called attention to national disasters going on around the world at the same time. I think it was in part his way of saying, “don’t just look at the problems going on around you at an arms reach.” I stopped reading the local newspaper where I used to live when I learned that it was run by a Corporate conglomerate (local newspaper bought out and the history went with the sale apparently). The news I was clearly getting was to satisfy their interests rather than mine. Before my divorce, that was something my ex-wife and I disagreed on. I cared about famines in Africa while she cared about the fire in the city next door. A while back I already learned why those fires happen. Cronyism in hiring firefighters, more cronyism on building code enforcement, and you get fires year-round. They ran an article to confirm my suspicion by putting a GPS tracker in the “highly decorated guy” who moved up to code enforcement and the results were like something you would see in Detroit. But, the problem persisted even if he finally got caught. In the military, preventative maintenance is a MUST and saves lives, those fires just mess with my head because I am tired of civilians in uniform ruining and even losing lives annually by not paying attention to “code.” Being a left-wing printing press, they were unlikely to put much more emphasis where it belonged (big government supporters).
The point is, there are people who evolve from local news and some who don’t. As a Catholic, we are called to understand Saints that come from far and wide. Why not meditate on the hot conditions the Desert fathers were living with in Egypt for an hour instead of pushing your mind into the extremities of a fire? Take a break my friend, the world is far more than what programming is in front of you and if you study “why” it is either A. Going to make you mad or B. Allow you to see new horizons. Life is much better when you can view the world and think about troubleshooting it. If you get to the point where your assessments are really solid and accurate, teach them and you will quickly notice who is like you, and not. Example? So many NGO’s for Africa and places where people can’t even drink water. For $50 in materials a desalianizer called the “Eliodomestico” can provide a gallon a day from the ocean. So I went from local fire public safety critic to NGO lack of water critic. Some people care, some don’t. But it’s helping me grow as a person and I can now read parts of the bible where someone thirsty was provided with a drink with almost absolute clarity. It’s virtually “monk vision” and spiritually, I’m evolving like crazy. So, if you want to change your horizons feel free to take my advice and set yourself free. Message me if you want to chat too and God bless.
