True Friendship

Thomas Williams - Facebook

Do you have a moment of pure friendship with someone else besides yourself? And when you feel the affection from them touching you through their spirit, alive in a spiritual nature feeling, how do they touch you in a way that has nothing to do with sex? Affection without sex?

We seem to know all about sex and struggle to learn about the affectionate and spiritual nature of friendship instead. The words of faith, hope, and charity become better understood and touch you affectionately without sex.

For some reason, it is hard for me to pull out of my vocabulary what I want to say about a simple subject like spiritual affection and the marvel of friendship becoming a magical ability in people, and that effort for me to do that is not easy. I keep blaming myself for skipping English class, paying the price now that I am older, wanting to have a better vocabulary and ability to say what I know about the friendship and affection I feel with the spirit of Jesus meeting with me at 7 years old out of nowhere, walking beside me in spirit. I am still talking about that moment that happened to me on a Sunday morning in 1947, in New Orleans. I am still trying to put into words because Jesus' friendship should be put into words that everyone else can understand. He helped me. Jesus is always helping me.

See this small black stone with a gold-scribed fish and cross, a sign of Jesus' friendship. A very sick middle-aged Lady wanted her turn getting radiation treatment for 4th-stage throat cancer, for me to finish my treatment with 2-stage bladder cancer. Giving me this after my last treatment, she still had more treatments left and wanted to give me something of good luck, knowing she was not likely to meet with me again. I was so touched I could hardly speak, saying "I will keep this," in that fleeting moment of her caring enough to do that for me, parting from one another forever. I have been cancer-free since my treatment back then, 3 years ago.

The Dubs - Could this be Magic

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNFvZLnUr-M

Craig James Shilow - Facebook

A Daily Dose of History  

The American Founders recognized that the success of the new republic depended upon civic virtue, or what would have then been called “republican virtue.” Taken from classical thought, the concept included public service as a duty or sacrifice. That is, citizens did not seek public office in order to obtain power, influence, or status, but rather to serve their nation, as a matter of patriotic duty. Virtuous citizens, when able, were expected to sacrifice income and leisure in holding public office and they were to put the interests of the nation above their own. Persons did not “run” for office, therefore. Instead, they “stood” for office. They would at least pretend not to desire the office, but rather to be willing to make the sacrifice to take it if their fellow citizens asked them to.

George Washington attempted to model this “republican virtue” by his conduct and example. As soon as he believed the army no longer required his service, he stepped down. He later accepted, but did not campaign for, the presidency.

When Washington saw his cabinet (and the country as a whole) splitting into competing factions, he was distressed. He decried the emergence of political parties, declaring in his Farewell Address that the “spirit of party…serves always to distract the public councils and enfeeble the public administration. It agitates the community with ill-founded jealousies and false alarms, kindles the animosity of one part against another, foments occasionally riot and insurrection. It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which find a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party passions.”

Because Washington believed so strongly in republican virtue and so adamantly opposed the emergence of political parties, historians have wondered why he didn’t step in and forcefully use his immense influence and authority to try to stamp them out. Some conclude that Washington’s refusal to attack the partisanship aggressively was in fact just another manifestation of his belief in republican virtue. It seems likely that he believed that the best way to combat the rise of parties and divisive partisanship was to behave as he had while commanding the army; that is, to model moderation and non-partisanship in his own conduct, trusting that his virtuous example would carry the day.

Perhaps the Founders’ reliance on republican virtue was naïve. Washington acknowledged in his Farewell Address that some believed political parties “are useful checks upon the administration of the government and serve to keep alive the spirit of liberty.” But he insisted that while that may be true in a monarchy, in republics “it is a spirit not to be encouraged…there being constant danger of excess.” He called upon the force of public opinion to keep political partisanship under control. “A fire not to be quenched, it demands a uniform vigilance to prevent its bursting into a flame, lest instead of warming it should consume.”

The painting is John Trumbull’s “General George Washington Resigning His Commission.”

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