Wouldn't it be wonderful

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
July 16, 2023

If you hear someone serving as an elected official or seeking a position and they do not give a speech like this, then consider what they are not saying before you give them the power to decide how you will have to live your own life.

Wouldn't it be wonderful to live in a country where people of faith were free to praise God out loud as they believe, as much as others are free to choose not to? Free to be able to choose the faith they want and be equally protected under the law because no one group has been given authority to enforce their own beliefs on anyone else?

To live in a country where everyone was able to decide to have a family and how to raise them, as much as others can decide when to have a family or even to not have one.

To live in a country where the law applied to all people living here without regard to power, wealth, or position. Where people are entrusted with fulfilling the laws and valuing the laws for everyone. Where we never had to be concerned with a return to the darkest times of persecution without evidence.

Where we are all free to read and write the books we want to and never have to accept the masquerade of books being promoted as factual, when in fact, they are fiction. Where history books were not banned simply because they made some people uncomfortable because of what others were allowed to do.

Where people were not judged by their physical appearance but by how they treated others.

Where freedom meant that all people are free to make their own choices while it may offend some because they claim to be opposed to their own religious beliefs. 

After all, when they claim to be people of faith, then they know that God granted all souls to be free to decide for themselves and make their own choices. The Founding Fathers understood this. The 1st Amendment proclaimed the premise that no one religion would be established as the law of this country. 

If they are trying to get your vote, consider what you will be rendering unto them before you give it to them. If they are not fighting for everyone to have the power of freedom, then they are only fighting for their power to rule over everyone!

Today is no cause to celebrate independence

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
July 4, 2023

No one should be forced to surrender what they believe simply because I believe they are wrong! That was the premise of this nation. So how have we arrived, yet again, in a time and place where so many decided their religious freedom is the only one that the rest of us must live by?
 

"But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god." Thomas Jefferson

That is what Thomas Jefferson thought about the freedom of religion. Most of what was behind the 1st Amendment against establishing religion had a history lesson behind it. What happened when one group of "believers" was able to use what they believed to control those that believed differently was uncontrollable, they wanted to prevent it from happening again. That history lesson came from the Salem Witch Trials.

By the time the people of Salem came to their senses and issued a decree for a day of atonement on January 14, 1697,  200 had been arrested, tortured, and had everything taken from them. 19 of the accused were hung and one was crushed to death. Some died in jail before their trial. Some were exonerated and some simply escaped.

None of the accusers had to suffer anything other than accountability to God and the wrath of their neighbors.

“But our rulers can have authority over such natural rights only as we have submitted to them. The rights of conscience we never submitted, we could not submit. We are answerable for them to our God. The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg. If it be said, his testimony in a court of justice cannot be relied on, reject it then, and be the stigma on him. Constraint may make him worse by making him a hypocrite, but it will never make him a truer man. It may fix him obstinately in his errors, but will not cure them. Reason and free enquiry are the only effectual agents against error.” ― Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia (GoodReads)

What your neighbor believes or does not believe is none of your business. That is what has made this country great. No one religious group was to have the power to rule over others ever again. 

In January 1693, the newly created Superior Court of Judicature began hearing the remaining witch trials. The judges could not accept spectral evidence and most of the remaining trials ended in acquittal. Phips pardoned the rest.

Enduring Lessons
In 1957, Massachusetts formally apologized for the events of 1692: “The General Court of Massachusetts declares its belief that such proceedings, even if lawful under the Province Charter and the law of Massachusetts as it then was, were and are shocking, and the result of a wave of popular hysterical fear of the Devil in the community…” The Massachusetts state legislature was still exonerating accused witches as recently as the early 2000s.

Today, the Salem Witch Trials continue to capture popular imagination. Less than 20 miles from Boston, Salem has turned its dark history into a thriving tourism industry, with witchcraft-themed shops, eateries, tours, and several museums.

The town commemorates the tragedy of that era with the Salem Witch Trial Memorial and has preserved many buildings and other historic sites associated with the trials, so future generations—and jurists—can learn how mass hysteria can lead to mass injustice. (New England Law)

What we are seeing today is people with the same attitude decided they should have the right to control everyone else because they claim to be "defending their rights" while at the same time, they seek to remove the rights of all others to enjoy the same freedom.

They seek to kill the religious freedom of all the people to believe as they see fit or choose to not believe at all. If we do nothing, we should never again celebrate July 4th with fireworks, parades, and festivities but should visit the graves of all those who paid the price for the freedoms we let die. Not just those that served in the military but those who died because they were persecuted because of what some believed. Civil rights leaders were murdered for standing up for freedom.

The freedom to choose if you worship and how you worship. 

The freedom to vote according to your choice instead of where you live because of some bizarre boundary line designed to control who you can vote for. 

The freedom to love, who you love and marry or don't marry. The right to live according to who you are inside instead of being judged as going against what "God created." It must have escaped their thoughts that God is spirit and not flesh and bones, meaning He created the souls and not bodies. It also must have escaped their thoughts that some people do not believe in God at all.

The freedom to choose to become parents and raise your children according to what you believe in. The freedom to choose to not become parents. The freedom to be able to get the reproductive healthcare that you need without having a politician decide if and when you get it because they don't want to protect your right to receive it.

The freedom to learn from history and not be controlled by those feeling uncomfortable with what actually happened. The freedom to read what books you want and the freedom to write what books you want, expressing your thoughts because you are free to do so.

The freedom to know you can go out in public, attend worship services, go shopping, see a movie or even drive your car without fear you are subjecting yourself to being shot. Freedom to send your children to school without fearing you may not see your child at the end of the day alive because someone was able to obtain a weapon designed to kill as many as possible as fast as possible.

When we allow one freedom to be taken from the majority by the minority, more will fall and we will fail to be the land of the free. 

 

Don't let a politician turn your faith into their business!

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
April 28, 2023

What you believe on a religious basis, is what you were free to choose. Would you want someone else passing laws based on what they believe if it went against your own?

Which church do you belong to among the Christian houses on this list? If you chose to be Catholic, which of the 24 different ones did you choose? If you chose to be Protestant, which one of these did you choose? If you chose to be Orthodox, which one did you become? Do you think that everyone else has chosen the wrong one because you are so sure your choice was the only right one? Would you want someone else to be able to take away what you chose was right for you? Then why would you, or anyone else be allowed to do it to others? Should you have the right to take away the choices of non-denominationalism? Should you have the right to force spiritual but not religious believers to pick something you find acceptable? What about the other faiths in the country, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, and others among the people of this country? What about atheist people? Shouldn't they also have the same right to know they are protected as well as everyone else?

That is what people get wrong all the time. Sure, when a politician agrees with what you believe it can make you feel as if you won something. It also means someone else lost their ability to believe something else. You may not have noticed that your approval of this step gave politicians the authority to go against what you believe, because they believe otherwise. That's how all this works. If you call yourself pro-life, you may feel empowered to seek to control all other matters of faith, but the thought you should invalidate the free will choices of others has just invalidated your own. It puts you on the wrong side of the tomb and the womb, along with the Constitution.

Why? I was listening to a man this morning, claiming he was evangelical and pro-life. He also talked about Catholics. Nowhere in his words did he express the fact that everyone else in this country, and frankly, the entire world, are free to believe as they choose. It doesn't matter how their government operates or what laws they pass to control others. No one can ever take away what people believe. That is why matters of faith have always, and will always be used as a weapon to control the people.

If you live in America, your faith, no matter what it is, is protected under the law. At least it used to be. If you are Christian, then your choice of where to worship is supposed to be equally protected as all other houses of worship, including non-Christian ones. Trying to take control over them is claiming your faith is the only right one and everyone else must abide by what you believe.

I find many claims from other Christians appalling but I believe they have the right to believe what they want even though many of them think they have the right to take mine away from me. Scriptures in the New Testament support the God-given right to free will, just as the Old Testament does.

Decide if You Can Follow Me
25 Many people were traveling with Jesus. He said to them, 26 “If you come to me but will not leave your family, you cannot be my follower. You must love me more than your father, mother, wife, children, brothers, and sisters—even more than your own life! 27 Whoever will not carry the cross that is given to them when they follow me cannot be my follower.

Jesus reminded them they are free to make the choice to do or not do and what the outcome would be based on the choices they made of their own free will. Yet somehow we arrived yet again with a group of people trying to take away the free will choice of others, much like during the Salem Witchcraft Trials when faith was used to control others, seek revenge and intimidate others into conforming or find themselves accused of witchcraft facing torture, loss of all they had and death.

The 1st Amendment to the Constitution protects matters of faith/religion because of what happened in Salem. Why can't people see what is going on is putting them on the wrong side of what this country was built on? We are all free to make our own choices or none of us are.

If you claim to follow Jesus as a Christian, trying to force someone else, goes against what He taught as well as what He sacrificed His life for. It goes against God after He gave Adam and Eve the free will to listen to His warning or not in the Garden of Eden. It puts you on the wrong side of His Son's tomb.

If you call yourself pro-life because of your religious beliefs, you are on the wrong side of the womb as well. Scriptures tell us that God is God on the living and Jesus taught everyone claiming to follow Him how they should treat others living in the world. If you only care about the unborn, and what others do then, while you have the right to decide for your own house, you are trying to usurp the rights of others. Passing judgment on others grants the authority of others to pass judgment on you. Should you be forced to do what Jesus said and feed the poor, give them clothes, and housing, visit the prisoners, or do anything else He said you should do because you claim to value and follow Him? Or should it be left up to what you choose to do and can afford to do?

Your rights begin and end with what you choose for yourself and if you seek to control others, remove their right because you think your faith and what you believe is the only right way, you have opened the door for your own rights to be taken from you. Don't let a politician turn your faith into their business!

UPDATE:
It is stories like the following that should cause all of us to question these self-appointed-anointed demigods the idea they should control everyone else. To this "lawmaker" if you did not give birth to chichildren, you are not a mother!
Marjorie Taylor Greene faces criticism after saying a stepmother is 'not a mother' USA Today

Greene asked her during the hearing whether she is a mother, and Weingarten replied that she’s a “mother by marriage.”

The Georgia lawmaker called her “not a biological mother” and later told the union leader, “The problem is, people like you need to admit that you’re just a political activist, not a teacher, not a mother and not a medical doctor.”

And then there is this one.
A Montana lawmaker suggested she’d rather risk her child’s suicide than let her transition NBC News

State Rep. Kerri Seekins-Crowe said in a floor debate in March that her daughter "was suicidal for three years" and when asked if she'd do anything to save her, her answer was "no."

A recent comment by a Montana state lawmaker who sponsored legislation to ban gender-affirming medical care for transgender minors has gone viral and drawn backlash online.

State Rep. Kerri Seekins-Crowe, a Republican, suggested during a floor debate that she would rather risk her daughter dying by suicide than allow her to transition. Seekins-Crowe did not say that her daughter identified as transgender, but said she was “one of those parents who lived with a daughter who was suicidal for three years.”

She is in the same state where this is what lawmakers have focused on. Bills Dictating Religion, Prayer and Sex Ed in Schools Advance Ahead of Key Deadline

Salem Witch Trials, apparently, some people learned nothing from history!

Wounded Times

Kathie Costos

April 24, 2023

We may have thought the religious battle ended with the Salem Witch Trials but apparently, some people learned nothing from history!

Ex-Marine calls for action after GOP rep grills VA official on 'faith-based' PTSD partnerships

Van Orden said Campbell's response suggested the department is not actively working with "wildly successful" programs "because they are faith-based – which according to you guys are 'non-evidence-based'."

That is a bunch of bull! For 40 years I've seen it all and if you go to the National Center For PTSD, which, by the way, addresses PTSD for all Americans, you'll see clearly how they provide a Clergy Tool so that veterans can make their own choices as to their personal faith. The evidence is clear that when the mind-body and spiritual needs are addressed, based on their own beliefs, there is greater healing. To fund or push one faith-based group over another would go against the First Amendment.

The First Amendment

This is what people get wrong all the time. Everyone wants the ability to make their own choices and have their rights protected. The problem comes when some want their rights protected by removing the rights of others. The Founding Fathers understood human nature enough they saw a time coming when some people would want to control others using the government to do it. Considering that the Salem Witchcraft Trials were the basis for this Amendment, they wanted to make sure it never happened again.

The Salem Witch Trials

Many people in Puritanical Salem Massachusetts died because they were different, and the Puritans were afraid they could not control them easily.

Many people in Puritanical Salem did not conform to the societal beliefs and ended up losing their lives as a result. There were many rules and if citizens did not follow all of those rules, they were cast out. The religion of the Puritans was very strict and “the Puritan community rewarded conformity-you were expected to fit in and do what everybody else did” (Mills 15). The Puritans desire for conformity was so strong that they wanted to get rid of anyone that was different. The trials were an excuse for the people of Salem to expunge of all those people who were different. Witches were thought to be able to harm people and therefore were feared greatly. The Puritans feared the Devil and God equally and “they believed the Devil was real, and had the intent to influence and harm."

Today we see people just like the Puritans. They seek to control others and when they are met with people standing up for their own rights, they claim that their religious freedom is being taken away from them. WOW! This is why so many people have lost faith in the government's ability and willingness to stand up for all of our rights.

Their beliefs are their own and should remain that way but they cannot see that power ends with them so that everyone else retains the same right.

Spending all these years helping people on a spiritual basis, no matter what they personally believed, with mutual respect, worked wonders! They saw their own power to reach out to God or whatever Higher Power they believed in directly and to see whatever caused their PTSD was not sent by God as some sort of punishment. It got them to understand the difference between stupid things they heard, such as "God only give us what we can handle," meaning they were told God did it to them. It was more beneficial for them to hear, "God is there to get them through it," so they know they are not fighting the survivor battle alone. It was not up to me to try to convert them to accept what I believed but to empower them to decide on their own to explore faith through a spiritual lens.

Scriptures support this and are there to be found. If those seeking to control others spent more time reading them and less time trying to corrupt the God-given gift of free will, they would be filled instead of emptying their own souls. He did not seek to control anyone, so why is it they think they can? What we see today, just as in Salem, is not a matter of faith but a matter of control.

What makes all this worse is when reporters fail to understand this. No matter what the topic is on social issues, they lump Christians together. The fact is there are many Christian houses of worship with different viewpoints. There are many different faiths in this country and they are left out of the discussion. While the claim this is a Christian nation is a valid one, the truth is the majority do believe in Jesus but do not agree on everything. This is why there are "Estimations show there are more than 200 Christian denominations in the U.S. and a staggering 45,000 globally, according to the Center for the Study of Global Christianity."

When most people hear something about Christianity being attacked, and God taken out of schools, they get upset no matter which denomination they belong to. Yet, when they think past the word and remember why they chose their affiliation, they acknowledge there are many different faiths in this country. When they hear a term such as "pro-life" used to defend the desire to control what others do in their own lives, they condemn them. Yet when they think past what their church deems right and wrong, acknowledging other religious groups do not hold the same view or need to be in control, they become repulsed enough to stand up for everyone needing to make the decision and condemn the attackers.

When we allow one group to take control over all others, we go against the God we claim to believe in and the foundation of the country we claim to love!