Feb 29, 2008

Mutatismutandis and Racism In America Updated; The Necessary Changes Have Been Made - The Close of Black History Month Part I

Proposition:
Many Americans believe that the changes that were required to correct government-sanctioned racial injustice and discrimination (of the kind that would have permitted black Americans to succeed in the American system of apartheid) have already been made. These Americans believe that it is up to black Americans to decide now whether they intend to succeed or not, and that nothing else needs to be done!

Introduction: Recently, Robert D. Novak the often controversial syndicated columnist, Washington D.C. journalist and editor of the Evans-Novak Political Report said, 'all that blacks need to hope for is that the economy improves'. He made these dismissive comments in order to debunk the positions that some black Americans were taking at the time.

They held that certain measures still needed to be taken in order to eliminate the remaining structural barriers and imbalances that they believed still existed (of the kind that still hindered the progress of black Americans). Those barriers and imbalances, more than anything else - hinders or prevents the seemingly permanent black underclass from attaining full citizen access and participation in the opportunity structures of this country.

Whether or not that is true or not still remains to be proven. I have observed myself from coast to coast, from north to the south that a spirit of nihilism and hopelessness that is pervasive in many of America's black urban and rural neighborhoods persists. Perhaps the restoration of hope, to replace despair is the real solution that should be sought after! And how do you restore hope?

Chapter 1. Robert Novak like many Americans, believes that given numerous rulings by the Supreme Court over the past half-century, and the rectifying voter's rights acts that were begrudgingly passed by Congress and written into law - coupled with the improved racial atmosphere in America (reflective of the change of heart by many whites), that the rest is up to black Americans.

And he is not alone in that regard. Bob and many Americans believe that blacks need to simply take advantage of the purported indiscriminate American economic system , and that the American economic system will address any of the remaining social ills or structural barriers that may or may not exist! Americans like Bob, feel that the other problems that black Americans refer to are nothing more than excuses to perform! Bob has given blacks 90 days to stand up or else!

And who knows, perhaps Bob and the individuals who believe as he does are correct, at least as far as some Americans are concerned! Having said that, I still wonder if Bob remembers the words of the song, Money Can't Buy Me Love? Bob like many black Americans, believes that the solution to the problem is apparently an economic one! So isn't Bob contradicting himself when he says that on one hand the economy is the solution, and on the other hand an economic shot in the arm is not the solution that blacks need?

The following also appears to be true, with regard to racism in America, as far as this writer is concerned:

Racism in America, in its most recent permutation, has mutated into classism, often economic classism, of the kind that Hagel referred to as, "the ownership of property and the pursuit of power through class struggle". Even some black Americans who have made it have joined in the denigration of those blacks who have not made it yet, Shelby Steele and Thomas Sowell notwithstanding.

Today's modern-day class conscious American racists, who mostly still control the American economy and own most of America's wealth, will defend their positions by saying that I cannot be a racist because blacks live in my neighborhood or building, I have black friends, I attend a multicultural church, I am black or better yet I am married to a person of another race. He or she will then ask, so how can I be racist?

Now keep in mind that there are several terms in the American lexicon that are anathema, in other words you don't just utter these terms to an American for most Americans do not take kindly to either being called 'a sinner or a racist'. And all too often there are many Americans who remain both sinners and racists! My answer to those who ask, how can I be a racist?

My response to male members in that group would be as follows:
a). Just as you can also have a mother, a sister, a daughter, a wife or girlfriend.
b). And you live with or take care of your mother, sleep everyday with your wife, drive your daughter back and forth to school and you are kind to your sister.
c). You can still be a sexist or misogynist in the same manner that you can be married to a person of another race, have persons of another race at the church where you attend, or have people of other races living in your neighborhood, and still be a racist.

And if you don't believe me, simply ask the wife, mother, daughter, or sister whether or not their husband, son, brother, father or brother is either a sexist or misogynist (in spite of his beliefs to the contrary)? And, don't be surprised when the answer that comes back is an unequivocal yes!

Is Bob Novak a racist? I don't know whether he is or not, however, based on what usually comes from his mouth and pen, he is definitely flippant, arrogant, insensitive, uncaring, paternalistic and typically a condescending snob!

The battle cry for many anti-black American racists (not members of organized hate groups only) is mutatismutandis, i.e., the necessary changes have been made and nothing else should be done - it is up to them now. How convenient? These individuals ignore the General Assistance hand out and support that they received from the government for over 200 years.

They also ignore the free capital that benefited them which was derived from the forced labor of black Americans - the latter lasted them for over 200 years. White Americans did not succeed in America simply because of their hard work as they would have you believe. Let's face it, they were smart enough and evil enough to steal, kill and force others to work in order to reap all of the profits.

It is ironic that these beneficiaries of government largess (200 years of Government Assistance and protections), at the expense of non-white Americans, still cannot understand why blacks are entitled to retribution. Any people who were immoral enough to take over a country the size of America with all of its resources, and to force millions of people to work gratis while they kept 100% of the profits, would fare well, wouldn't you think?

General Sherman, bless his naive heart, before and after the surrender and ratification of the treaty between the north and south that ended the American Civil War had a different idea. He proposed that blacks each be given capital, land and a mule. He knew that black Americans certainly had earned that over and over again. However, the government felt that the available land that could have been given to blacks in payment for their years of hard labor, should inure to the benefit of white railroad barons.

Now just think about what difference could have been made, if blacks had their stolen capital returned in one form or another by the majority culture? We would more than likely not be having these discussions today. Furthermore, if blacks had been paid for their labor, we wouldn't be having these discussions today. On the other hand, those who were the beneficiaries of inherited wealth and the capital that caused the American economy to burgeon, wouldn't have the capital and wealth that they enjoy today! Having said that, they still would have been well off!

Blacks would have built comparable towns and schools and enterprises, assuming that whites would not have gone in to destroy those black towns, schools and enterprises which would have likely thrived. Well, in fact many black settlements that thrived anyway, without the support of the government, were summarily destroyed by members of the majority cultures anyway. It wasn't enough that the majority culture kept all of the wealth for themselves, these ignorant souls simply did not want blacks, or Negroes as they were called at the time to have anything!

The very mention of the term reparations today to be given to black Americans to repair the damage, to return some of what was stolen, to provide redress given the complicity of the American government in systematic racism, stirs up an incendiary feeling of hostility among many selfish Americans. Any form of retribution that would compensate black Americans for their setbacks, and for the failure of the government to have done its job is anathema to them.

The Honorable Representative John Conyers of Michigan tried for two decades to have the matter of reparations for black Americans, brought to the floor of the house where it could be voted on. Sadly, he could never get a bill out of Committee that could be brought to the floor. This same Representative also brought now deceased mother of the Civil Rights movement to Michigan so that she could pursue a livelihood.

Why? White Americans in the South were angry with her, given that blacks were given equal access to public accommodations as a result of her inspiring of the Montgomery bus boycott. And what was her reward for correcting an egregious American problem and forcing the government to do its job, she could not get hired anywhere in the south. The fact is she should have been retired, and the salaries of all of the government officials who failed to do their jobs should have been handed over to her.

Now, why haven't blacks attempted to seek reparations through the courts? They did, however, black Americans ran into a roadblock in the American judicial system. We discussed this roadblock at length during several sessions at the Legislative Conference of the Congressional Black Caucus in Washington DC. Since black Americans tied reparations to slavery, the courts insisted that blacks be able to show a 'documented class', to prove that were damaged by and descendants of slaves.

The problem is that the records that were kept were substandard. The slaves couldn't read or write or keep records, and massa' retained records that were sufficient enough to protect, sell or buy new human collateral. Blacks were often moved from plantation to plantation, and it was not uncommon for them to be given the surname of the indigenous slave owner that they were sold to. As a matter of fact there are a variety of last names that most of us were known by. My last name could just as easily have been Woodfork, MacMillian or Nixon, and not just Solomon.

Black civil rights workers have pretty much abandoned the idea of pursuing reparations through the court system. The consensus among black leaders is that the best way to pursue reparations-redress is through Congress. And by the way, during the last Legislative Conference that I attended, approximately 9 prominent black Representatives were against reparations themselves.

The truth is, black Americans should not have had to pursue reparations in the first place - the Government should have automatically reimbursed black Americans - given its failures alone to protect their rights and given its participation in the willful discrimination against blacks during and post-slavery!

Again, white Americans to put it succinctly, would not be where they are today had it not been for the uncompensated for and grueling labor of black Americans. Given the American system of retributive jurisprudence, one would think that white Americans would be only too happy to compensate for, and return that which was not rightfully there's in the first place. The majority of whites however, fail to see a connection. Bob Novak certainly does not see one!

Sorry Daughters of the American Revolution, George Washington's Mount Vernon plantation should be turned over to black America. Monticello, Thomas Jefferson's slave plantation should be turned over to blacks. The states of South Carolina, Mississippi, Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, Louisiana, Alabama for starts ought to be given to black America.

And for that matter Washington D.C. should be turned over to black America, the majority of its 600,000 citizens are black anyway. Did I mention that those 600,000 citizens who pay taxes, and are sent to fight in America's wars, do not have congressional representatives. U.S. Representative Tom Davis of Virginia, admitted how embarrassed he was when he scolded the Chinese in Bejing a few years ago.

As he attempted to scold the Chinese officials about voter's rights in China, they confronted him with the internationally known fact that the black citizens of the District of Columbia, seat of the U.S. Government do not have the right to vote for congressional representatives either. oops!

BTW, thank God for Benjamin Bannekar's contribution to the nation's capitol. I learned firsthand about his contribution by spending a day at the Benjamin Banneker Museum in Ellicot Maryland.

To my way of thinking and I repeat, not only should blacks receive reparations for the injustices of slavery, the United States government also needs to compensate all black Americans for its failures. The United States' Federal, State and local governments were derelict in their duties given their failures for two centuries to uphold the Constitutional right of all Americans, especially the thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth amendment rights of black Americans.

Federal, State and local American government, officially sanctioned the preferential treatment of 'one class of America's citizens' over and above the other. I suppose that the Federal Judiciary or District Courts would want black Americans to prove that too! Can anyone see why white Americans are where they are today given an over 300 year boost, and some blacks are still struggling.

The fact is that slave capital at one time in America, exceeded the combined capital wealth of all of American industry combined. The civil rights movement was born as a result of the government's failure (Federal, State and Local), to protect the rights of black Americans, and for its complicity in system-wide discrimination against non-white American citizens. The government joined in on the conspiracy against non-whites!

The modern civil rights movement that preceded by centuries the Montgomery bus boycott, Dr. Martin Luther, SNCC, CORE, SCLC and Rosa Parks was active long before these individuals were even heard of. Why? Because the government historically failed to do its job where non-whites were concerned. The oaths that many of these men and women took over the years meant nothing.

And factually, each one of them should have been tried and imprisoned given their egregious derelict of duty, and in many instances breach of oath.

With respect to the real or imagined barriers that still exist and persist in America, a white TV Show Host in upscale Great Falls Virginia (the home of many Washington DC officials, ambassadors and Washington's elite) told me that with respect to the racial divide in America, he was 'tired of hearing about it'. Why wouldn't he be tired of hearing about it? He is a long-time resident of Great Falls Virginia, he wasn't hurt by it economically - he has it made.

The fact is he was one of the beneficiaries of systematic racial discrimination against black Americans, and receiving a hand and leg-up from the government. He was stunned to learn that I was looking at properties in consideration of moving into Great Falls Virginia myself while I was on an assignment in the Washington DC-metro region. Great Falls Virginia sits adjacent to Langley Virginia where black luminaries like General Colin Powell and others reside. The median cost of a home in Great Falls is approximately 2 million dollars.

John, the TV host considered having me as a guest on his television show at first, but he later opted out. I wonder why? As he explained it, he was not sure that we could have a 'civil' discussion. Despite the implication and his choice of words that I was somehow uncivilized, he knew that I would have spoken the truth. And the truth was not something that his viewers wanted to hear! John is the perfect example of too many twisted Americans.

Oftentimes when driving through Great Falls or hanging out down at River Park on River Road, I sense the spirit of all of the slaves and black laborers post-slavery, who worked their whole lives to make Great Falls what it is today. And what did they get for their labor, typically a plot of land elsewhere usually about 3 feet wide, and 6 feet long. The bodies of 98 slaves are buried at Mt. Vernon, that was their reward for all of their labor.

Great Falls is not too far away from Suitland or Oxxon Hill Maryland. Do you suppose the good folks of Great Falls feel any responsibility for the conditions of minorities in these municipalities, or even in nearby Washington DC? Why are some greedy Americans so selfish, and incapable of self-reflection. Frankly, I'm pretty sure that Bob lives in Great Falls. Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld are also residents of Maryland, both have super large and palatial homes!

The question that remains, is whether or not enough has been done to remove the institutionalized structural barriers that prevented the rise of too many black Americans in the American capitalist economic system. The question also remains is, shouldn't America compensate those that it has aggrieved, particularly if it can compensate other nations in this country who were far less aggrieved?

Chapter 2. If Blacks Would Only Let Go of the Past
Have you ever been misused or abused by someone, only to have that same individual turn around and tell you, without apologizing for their behavior or comments, that you should get over that? That is essentially what the majority culture has said over and over to black Americans.

Folks, even if blacks could or would simply forget the past as their antagonists have often suggested that they ought to do, the painful reminders of the past are still present each and every day. In many respects the same conditions that were here during the first centuries, are still with us today. Should black Americans or any individuals hold a grudge? Is that healthy?

Even in scripture, believers are taught that if they have been offended by someone, they should first go to that individual and tell them, and blacks have done that, but only to be rebuffed. I find that most aggrieved non-white individuals in America today are not so much aggrieved by the past, as they are by the present. And to those who tell them, you need to get over the past, they are saying that it is not the past that bothers, it is what you are doing in the present that botthers me.

It is amazing how cavalier some individuals can be about their mistreatment of other people. The fact of the matter is that the other side was provided with 200years of government assistance - the real government welfare program. And that is by and large the reason why the other side is where it is today (while many blacks still remain a part of America's permanent underclass). The fact of the matter is that the other side are beneficiaries of something that does not belong to them.

The inherited land and other wealth that should have been passed down through the families of black Americans, is still being held by the other side. I can recall when a decade ago when one of the buzzwords in America was tokenism. Tokenism referred to the adjustments that were being made that was to atone for the years that black Americans had been systematically violated by the white majority culture in America.

Hurrah, well at least for a while. Why? Well, because it appeared for awhile as if Americans had found their conscience. However, it did not last. Whites, who were the beneficiaries in many instances of the victimization of black people, past and present, cried foul. I thought about it at the time, wondering whether or not blacks, many that I knew, should have taken advantage of affirmative action. Then it came to me, affirmative action was only an attempt to restore what had wrongly been taken away.

Blacks were not tokens, because they accepted jobs under a quota system. Why not? It was a quota system that prevented blacks from being hired with pay in the first place. The quota system that the majority cultured preferred and still prefers in too many instances is for the best paid occupations to be reserved for the white majority. The white majority never had a problem with black Americans working, they simply wanted them to work in the most menial positions - jobs that they did not want to do.

They also wanted black Americans to work for free, or for a mere pittance. The government conspired with the majority in their racist hiring practices in order to either keep blacks out or in the lowest paying jobs following slavery. That the government was forced to turn around and correct its own complicity in helping to cripple the black race in American was simply the right thing to do. The only thing the government did wrong then was to stop short of compensating black Americans for their sustained losses.

Can you imagine what would it would be like today had blacks been paid a fair wage for their labor? Can you imagine what it would be like today if the inherited wealth including real or personal property had been passed on from generation to generation. Instead, the inherited wealth that should have been passed on from generation to generation in the black community, had been kept and passed on from generation to generation to families in the majority culture.

And today, the majority culture would prefer that blacks simply forget about that reality. Just imagine the difference it would have made today, it is more than likely that where we see ghettoes in today's urban black centers, we would see prosperous communites. These communities would own their own businesses. In America today, blacks own less than 1% of American businesses.

Instead of a high percentage of black males ending up in prison (usually tied to unemployment), these same young men would be home with their wives, and raising their children. Let's face it, in most instances there is no need to steal if you have something already. Well, that is true in most instances, however, we are witnessing today that the ones in this nation who have the most wealth, continue to steal from those have not given their insatiable need (similar to their forbearers) to be wealthy, in deference to those who labor but have nothing.

Also imagine the impact that it would have on the economy if the rightful wealth of the black American, real and personal property that he or she never received, had been passed along. Would black Americans be receiving government subsistences in the form of AFDC, General Welfare or even SSI or SSD? There is a direct correlation between past precedents and the number of black Americans (again not the majority by any standard) who rely on government assistance.

It is also a well known fact that individuals who do not have adequate income or resources are unable to address their healthcare needs, they survive on an unhealthy diet, their general welfare (stress and other related social pressures) affect their general overall general well-being. How can black Americans forget the past, when the past is staring them in the face everyday in its more subtle forms, but nevertheless it comes from the same source.

Could of, should of, would of you say? Just imagine where this nation would be today if the errors of the past and present were corrected today. The government essentially provided one class of Americans with land, markets, credits, financing, police and military protections. On the other hand the government assisted in taking land, markets, financing, police and military protections away from the other black caste.

Why won't the same government act in-kind to assist in lifting the chronic poor members of America's permanent black underclass up to where they should be once and for all. For every black American on welfare, involved in the criminal justice or mental health system, living in an American ghetto, working at a grueling underpaid postion, each one of them that I talk to has or had a dream.

Sadly, these individuals do not have a government or anyone else to help subsidize or finance their dreams. And most of these individuals lacked the resources that they need and needed to get their ideas off of the ground. Why? Because what should have remained in their families and what should have been passed along, was stolen, and is still being retained in order to finance someone elses dreams.

Thank God for our black athletes and entertainers who have made some headway. However, when you compare the number of black athletes to America's overall black population of nearly 40 million, there are too many more black Americans who will never likely realize their dreams of even moving out of the ghettoes. Others find it hard to escape the prescribed life sentence for blacks to either die as a result of hypertension, diabetes, murder or a broken heart.

Has enough been done to help lift many blacks from their sense of nihilism and despair that resulted from having their livelihoods stolen away for so many decades? Are modern day tergiversator's and beneficiaries of government largess right, or are they wrong when they say, enough has been done? And finally, is the problem today merely a black and white post-reconstruction problem that simply won't go away?

Remember, the Jews were commanded to accept reparations upon their departure from Egypt under Moses's command, not to simply forgive and forget what they experienced while they were in bondage? Why would God command them to take 'reparations' with them? Could it have been because it took capital to operate, and that Pharaoh had retained the majority of the capital that the Hebrews rightfully earned given their 400 years of bondage (roughly the same amount of time as black Americans experienced government supported servitude and discrimination in America)?

Blacks not only provided the nation with free capital as a consequence of slavery, blacks continued to be the beneficiaries to American white capitalists during the post-slavery periods. During slavery and after slavery ended blacks were egregiously underpaid in the labor market in the military, in government and in every other aspect of the American society during the post-slavery period.

Isn't it amazing that black Americans who fought in most of America's major wars, were paid based a lower wage than members of their white counterparts? Some blacks were never paid for their service in the military. It was as if the majority culture was saving that your life simply is not worth as much as ours in life or in death.

Having said that, no matter how hard the majority culture may seek to have the past suppressed as well as the harsh economic realities and disparities of the present, they continue to fail. Why? Because everyday it seems, the truth is revealed in some story from the past or even from one in the present. Even President George H. Bush explained to the world, in the aftermath of the Katrina Hurricane in New Orleans Lousiana, that racism had ledto the poor conditions of black New Orleans. Why would an American President admit such a stark reality?

The whole world witnessed the decrepid conditions of black Americans in the most prosperous nations of the world (those who lived mostly in the lower wards of New Orleans). It was a throwback to the days when the world witnessed via the media, black Americans being bitten by police dogs and hosed down by America's finest in Birmingham Alabama. President Bush tried to do damage control, and to save his own reputation by blaming the conditions of blacks in Katrina on previous racism.

Did he do enough to clear his own name. Not likely, for in deference to the past, the question remained, but would did you do to reverse the conditions of American blacks on your watch. His explanation also failed to explain why the Federal Government had been so slow to react in a national catastrophe, where black Americans were the center of focus. The world knows that it took the Federal Government four days to begin to mobilize into action.

America, the purported democratic land of the free remains a nation where two societies co-exist, the haves and the have nots. It was embarrassing what the world was witnessing George Bush's watch, the depraved conditions that a reflective portion of America's permanent underclass continued to live under. Now the cover had been pulled off of not only what the majority culture wanted blacks to forget, but what the United States government and the majority culture wanted the world to forget - that American remains a bifurcated societies.

Rather than debunk the president's position, why don't we just agree with him and thank him for being one of the first American Presidents to confirm that what I have been writing about, and what others have said and written about is true! And what is the truth? The President said that the poor social conditions that members of America's black permanent underclass were living under in New Orleans, resulted from the egregious and systematic racism that previously existed in America.

And what will be done about that sad fact, given the President's own admission? The answer is simple, nothing will be done about it. His father, President George H.W. Bush once made the mistake of referring to black Americans who who were fighting for their rights at the time, as freedom fighters. On another occasion, he spoke out about the senseless beating of Rodney King in Los Angeles California. On both occasions, he was rebuked by his mostly white majority political party.

Thank God that the courts saw things differently, well at least after the second trial concluded. The first time, in all-white Simi Valley California, a bastion of white conservative Republicans, an anomaly in California - the jury held that the police acted appropriately and that Rodney King was not aggrieved. The Justice Department stepped in (after 200 years of doing nothing without being forced to) and said 'no mas'. The world witnessed the beating of Rodney King, just as it had the beating of Birminghamians - America had to do something.

The second trial was moved to downtown Los Angeles, where a fair and balanced jury was selected to hear the trial. And the outcome was completely different. The jury ruled in favor of Rodney King and against the cops who clearly overreacted. Los Angeles is usual considered to be liberal according to conservatives. However, not many Americans know that as late as the 1960's that many of LAPD's officers were members of the Ku Klux Klan

And the majority culture asks again, why won't they just forget the past? It is incidents like these, the Rodney King beating, the Katrina Hurricane and what most black Americans still experience today, that reminds black Americans that the so-called past is still a current reality. The real question is how come the majority culture won't stop denying the truth and to return what was stolen and to stop its current racist practices. Then and only then will the majority of black Americans forgive not only the past but current racial imbalaces and double-standards.

A few short weeks ago, the grand pubar of the Ku Klux Klan announced that if a black man were to become President of the United States, that they would kill him. Again, why won't black Americans forget the past, because it stares them in the face everyday, in the form of painful reminders. Several months ago, likely a prank, hanging nooses began to be displayed on the campuses of schools and colleges of America. Was their an overreaction? It was certainly not an overreaction to those who recalled just what those nooses represented!

What are the chances of blacks being compensated for the injustices that were done to their ancestors, as well as to them? Well, if simply asking the federal government to issue an apology is a true barometer of whether or not blacks will be compensated or not, don't hold your breath. The Congress of the United States under former House Speaker Newt Gingrich refused to apologize for Congresses part in the historical racial conspiracy to uplift whites.

Newt and the majority Newtonians concluded that if they were to apologize, that Congress would be admitting that America had aggrieved its black citizens. And an apology, Newt surmised, would be followed by a demand for restitution. Neither Newt or any of the other beneficiaries of black servitude and exploitation have any intention of ever re-compensating blacks for the wrongs that have been and are still being done to non-white Americans today.

And what does that say about Newt and the Newtonians? Well, what is so sad about it is that not only are these er herm gentleman representatives of the people, they are all mostly lawyers. These, er herm, gentleman know how the American system of Jurisprudence works, i.e., that Americans are abused they have the right to seek redress when they have been aggrieved. Also, in the American system of Jurisprudence, financial remuneration is often considered the appropirate means of redress.

Newt and the boyz, the same individuals who have constantly fought for corporations and other individual white interests to be compensated when they have been aggrieved, insist that black Americans (one of the most aggrieved groups in this nation's history), never be compensated for the manner and method in which they were aggrieved. What a double-standard, given that lawyers who know the law refuse to uphold the law when it comes to black Americans.

All is not lost for keep in mind that white Americans will be the minority in this country in another decade or so, and I suspect that the combined majority, along with reasonable whites will act in favor of America's aggrieved citizens. I personally hope that there will be a redistribution of wealth in this nation - yes, take the wealth from the selfish, and redistribute it among the masses.

Some Americans need to have taken from them what was stolen, and the aggrieved including America's native populations ought to be the recipients of the stolen bounty.

And in answer to the question again, why did and does America have civil rights workers? The answer simply put is because they are needed. The majority culture had and has all 3 branches of the federal government to see to their needs. The goverment sees to it that their civil rights are never violated and that their needs are always met. Anything that the majority culture needs wants and needs, 'their government civil rights organization' will see to it that they have it.

Consider the recent proactive action taken by the Bush Administration to create a stimulus package in order to jumpstart the economy. He did not have to be asked to take action, given that the problem has had a deleterious effect on the majority culture. Blacks Americans never had a government federal, state or local that they would be proactive, or one that they could turn to for help.

And as a result black Americans had to come up with their own leaders to march, fight and advocate for their civil rights, and to seek after stimulus packages (which never came) to jumpstart the black economy. Should black America have to have disparate groups to advocate for their civil rights? The answer is no, however, the fact remains, if they don't do it, who will? Will Newt? Will George Bush? Will the United States government advocate for blacks? Has the United States government ever advocated for its black citizen?

Someday, we will have to talk about what the explorers to the new world did to luminaries like Quetzcoatal and the Aztecs, the Incas of Peru and the other American inhabitants of Central and South America! Black Americans should not forget the past, on the other hand white Americans should remember the past and do something about its effects in the present. Today's American prisons who have been incarcerated for doing far less than their white counterparts did.

The Constitutional Congress, the United States Government, the American Constitution, the majority of America's presidents, representatives, justices, governors, mayors, police officers and ministers have been failures since the inception of this nation.

The majority of these individuals were not only racists, many of them were also rapists, murderers, pedophiles, child molesters, homebreakers, kidnappers, landgrabbers and slave traders. And how many of these criminals who were made officials in this nation ever spent one day in jail for their misdeeds? I anger many people when I say this, but the Americans that most Americans view as heroes, even many of its founders, presidents, judges and ministers were nothing more in character but pimps, perverts, thieves, child-molesters, satan worshipers, adulterers, murderers, and liars.

My elder brother once responded when he heard me say this was, well that was the way that it was back then. I corrected his misappropriation of the facts and informed him that no, that was not the way that it was for the majority of Americans at the time. Only a group of whites believed in the slave trade. There were many whites who cried foul from the onset! For some reason the bad ones assumed the power and control of the nation!

Those luminaries who stood up for social justice like John Brown, President Abe Lincoln and others were rewarded usually with a bullet to the head or back! Why is it that some Americans want black Americans to forget the past? Have you ever heard that saying before, that if you don't learn from your history, you are abound to repeat it.

Some Americans want black Americans to continue to live in the past. In other words, some non-white Americans always want to maintain an advantage so that they can continue to exploit black Americans. I was watching a townhall meeting on television one evening, Chris Matthews may have hosted it. The question was raised, why won't black Americans simply forget the past.

A Jewish gentleman in the audience provided the best answer. He asked white Americans why is it that you never ask Jews to forget our past, however, you always want black Americans to forget there past. He went on to explain how white Americans join in and help Jews to reflect given their horrid past.

America is in denial about what was done to black Americans. No other nation or people have been told in America to forget about their history. In fact, I know of no other people in history who were victims in any nation that tried to erase their history or make them forget their past. Black Americans in the USA appear to be unique in that regard.

If anything, all black Americans need to be taught more about their history, both the positive and the negative aspects of their history. Most black Americans know little about Africa, or African history. I asked a young man what was taught at his inner city school during Black History Month. He answered, well every year they talk briefly about Dr. Martin Luther King and that's about it.

Well folks, there is more to African American history than Dr. Martin Luther King. Certainly his life is to be analyzed and celebrated, however, black youngsters need to know about a time in history when their forefathers were kings and queens. Too much has been done and is being done to erase the history of the African, and the history of his homeland - the apparent 'cradle of civilization.

Perhaps if black Americans were exposed to more of their proud history, they would overlook the aberration of life in the Americas over the past 4 centuries, or perhaps it might make them angrier. I wonder, have the same Americans asked white southerners and the white confederate states to get rid of the Confederate flag?

Peace & Grace
Reverend C. Solomon

sealofabraham.blogspot.com

to be continued...,

Feb 26, 2008

America's Exclusive Enemy in the World Is Truth and Therefore God - and in the end Truth Will Prevail!

Lucifer was the first and most beautiful being that was ever created. Every precious stone was his covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold.

And America has been the first among nations, most beautiful for the past 232 years, however, it is beginning to slide!

2 Corinthian 11:14: And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.

How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!
Isaiah 14:12


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Introduction: It occurred to me when responding to the Washington Post blog today, that America has only one sworn enemy in the world.

And, that enemy is not another nation, it is not a so-called group of enemy combatants and it is not any confederation of nations; furthermore it is not the Muslims, the Arabs, the Koreans, the Afghans, the Pakistanis, the Colombians, the Cubans, the Nicaraguans, the Russians or the Chinese.

1). The true 'enemy nations' of America, are those nations that America has chosen to make its enemies, and not the other way around. For as a nation, we often draw 'First Blood'!

2). Having said that the overarching enemy of the U.S.A. is truth. And the other name for truth is God! And America fights against God and discards truth on a daily basis, even truth that comes from those nations who point out American falsehoods, malapropisms and missteps in both its domestic and international affairs! If our cause was noble, and if God was with us in our crusades, there would not be a reason to lie as has often been done!

3). How long do we have I wonder, for God's spirit will not strive forever? The fear of most Americans, including Christian Americans is that they will no longer be able to draw from the crucible of American largess. And that largess comes at the expense of other nations and nationals who have had their lands, resources and lives stripped away. They are the ones who have suffered, died and been sacrificed in that 'crucible' so that Americans could enjoy an upscale standard of living at their expense, and pursue more wealth!

4). Americans are no longer content with a proportionate amount of food, shelter, clothing, land, wealth, protection or power! And as a result of the acquisition of wealth and the desire to pursue, to sustain and then to acquire more wealth - too many Americans including Christian Americans have oftentimes been too willing to overlook America's indiscretions, malfeasance and mistreatment of other nations and individuals of the world.

5). Too many Americans have often looked the other way just as the East Germans and Austrians did (including their Christians) during the era of the Third Reich, as America's leaders have stripped away land and resources from other nations and disparate people of the world. They have also looked the other way as America has threatened, interfered with the internal affairs of other nations, destabilized, attacked, invaded and occupied other once free nations of the world!

6). The advantages that America and Americans have enjoyed for the past two centuries, has come at the expense of a lot of other nations and human beings in the world, domestically and abroad!

7). Who are America's leader's loyal to? Let's face it, many of America's leaders have admitted of late to belonging to secret organizations, organizations to whom they have also pledged their loyalties. So, who are and have they been loyal to? Was it, and is it to God as some purport? Were and are there loyalties to American citizens or to their respective political parties? Or were, and are their displaced loyalties given to some international racial, economic or demonic secret or other world order?

I. The Enemy of Truth:
At some point Americans are going to have to admit that the American experiment went off course from the onset, and the course has still not been corrected. During America's colonial period, human beings were enslaved, systematic genocide was carried out against the native people of this vast land, and others were forced to work on lands that were stolen away from them. The latter were neither compensated for the stolen lands nor for the work that they were forced to do on the confiscated land.

And what was the driving force behind the theft of a nation, that resulted in the abdication of the Laws of God, and everything that is civil? Christopher Columbus inadvertently ended up in America, as he searched search for trade routes to India for the Spanish Crown. He may have actually gotten lost twice! For one, he had not reached India, and his quest for wealth for the Spanish crown was satisfied in the newly and soon to be appropriated United States of America.

Soon after, carpetbaggers if you will, from all over this world came to the new world (a few to practice religious freedom), however, the majority came in order to acquire wealth by any means necessary! The greedy motivations of America's founders, and many of the individuals who came to America to acquire wealth - were skewed and misplaced from the onset.

They forgot about, 'Seek ye the Kingdom and its righteousness, and the rest will be added unto you', as they launched forward, full steam ahead into their get rich schemes and enterprises!

II. Why has America Thrived Then?
Because many Americans were too willing to look the other way while injustice prevailed. And why were they willing to look the other way? As the young people often say, the early American colonists, just like Americans today were seeking 'to get paid'.

Just over a year ago, I cannot recall the ongoing political event of that day, I found myself in a discussion with a fellow American in Tyson's Corner Virginia. He explained (as he walked away from our discussion), that as long as he was making money he really did not care about what else was going on in the world or America!

And folks, that is the problem with most Americans and with the American motif, the love of money in a consumer capitalist economy has eroded the sensibilities of too many Americans. The love of money may not be the root of all evil, however, the love of money certainly is the source of many an evil, particularly when you factor in the greed component! Did I just contradict the scriptures?

Well yes, however, I did so and do so by employing other scriptures which tell me that the root of all evil is not the love of money, rather the root of evil is pride, lust of the eye and of the flesh! The majority of the people of the world then, like the majority of people today did not have wealth or money, and the world was full of evil!

Pride was found in Satan, which led to Satan's revolt in heaven. And afterwards, Satan (along with his spirit of pride and his supporters) was cast down to the Earth. Evil came into the human race as a result of Eve's desire which much like Satan's desire, was to be like the Most High! Many individuals and nations have faltered because they want to be like a god and to have all of the accoutrement that goes along with being a god. The United States of America and its citizens have that problem!

III. The American Idol - How Have Thy Fallen O Lucifer?
The real American Idol is not the syndicated TV show that features Randy, Simon, Paula and Ryan. The real American idol is the 'United States of the World Greed Empire'. The American Idol is not just an idol to its indigenous people, it is an idol to many people and nations in the rest of the world.

Too many people of the world envy America and oftentimes they seek to emulate it. Why? Because of its apparent prosperity and its freedom to seemingly do anything that it or its citizens wants to, including disobeying God. There are many individuals in the world who want to duplicate the practices of the United States, in order to get their hands on their slice of the pie. They not only marvel at American success and excesses, they long to cash-in on and to emulate the deified American-enterprise machine in their respective nations.

They have little respect for the dissociative qualities that thrive in America which drives some Americans to seek after fortune, and at the same time ignore the social injustices and inequities that persist within the American multiplex between the haves and the have nots.

And sadly, while other nations of the world are envious of American successes and excesses, they ignore the fact that America's financial success has come even at their expense, and at the expense of other people and nations of the world. America's wealth has resulted from its having exploited the once indigenous people of this land, as well as people from all over the world. Some markets, America helped to create in order to exploit their resources and in order to garner wealth.

Many nations have found that they have not benefited from trading with America, and only recently have some nations benefited, and unintended consequences, as a result of NAFTA, CAFTA and GATT. Having said that NAFTA, CAFTA and GATT were put into place to benefit the United States not to correct any economic imbalances between the United States and other nations of the world. With regard to some of the recent trade imbalances with China, Japan and other nations (an anomaly), America seeks to ameliorate!

IV. America's Perceived Enemies
America's enemies are nations and people that are in any way perceived to be a threat to the American Idol's power, and to America's bottom line. The United States has been on an scorched earth policy-crusade for the past 75 years. Its objective has been to preserve the world-wide American global economic empire regardless of the costs to other nations and human beings of the world.

The American Enterprise machine has boasted of its wealth and superiority over all other nations in the world combined, for a century and a half. The U.S.A. operates as a large economic enterprise, one that has to make a profit each year in order to appease its board of directors, the American people.

As long as the American people prosper or profit on one end, they permit their government officials to get away with any form of duplicity, exploitation, murder and injustice around the world, and to exploit the members of the American subculture, America's permanent underclass - typically the lower class and the chronic poor!

The driving force behind what we are witnessing in America today, is similar to what Hagel wrote about: He said that it is, "...the ownership of property, and the pursuit of power through class struggle...", that drives man's inhumanity to man. And I would argue that the manner in which America behaved at its inception even down unto today, had and has almost everything to do with the pursuit of power through class struggle, and the ownership of property (both land and people).

Today, America continues to thrive by building alliances with and demanding the support of nations that it considers to be in its class (like the nations of NATO, and its allies) as opposed to the Third World class of nations. America persists in its predatory trade practices, and in its economic strangulation of third world class-nations, nations which it continue to exploits. Just consider the half-century old embargo of Cuba by America, which has resulted in the shortages of food, medicines and economic growth for the people of Cuba.

Why? Because America have never like the dictator in Cuba, yet America has supported other nations of the world with dictators, e.g., Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iran (When the Shah was alive), shall I go on and name others?

America gets what it wants, one way or the other! If another nation is not in league with America, it will see to it that that said nation is isolated and prevented from participating in fair trade practices with the rest of the world! In other words other nations of the world be informed that unless you dance with America, it will strangle you economically, commercially or through economic embargo, or ultimately America will attack you or occupy you!

Other nations and confederations of nations like the Soviet Union, the Warsaw Pact nations who opposed America.., have been neutralized. Other nations and other confederations of nations or organizations like the Arab League, and nations like Iraq, Iran, Syria..., and leaders like Castro, Hugo Chavez and others, have been systematically undermined, particularly those nations or leaders who represent a perceived threat to the American Empire's way of exploitative thinking and in spite of its malapropisms!

I can still recall the day when former Premier Gorbachev, then Secretary General of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics visited our campus, Stanford University. In spite of Glasnost, Perestroika and his personal desires to improve relations with the West, the West had one thing in mind, and that was to destroy the Soviet Union!
O Lucifer, son of the morning! How art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! Isaiah 14:12

V. What is Truth - Who is Truth?:
The truth is that there are other disparate people and other nations who share this planet, nations that may not see eye to eye with the viewpoints of the American Idol. These people have organized their own communities, states and nations, and they have the right to exist and to pursue their own lifestyles without interference from the United States of America. And that includes countries with dictatorships.

The U.S.A. purportedly does not believe in dictators (depending on the dictator), however, no other nation in the world 'dictates' as much to other nations or people of the world than the United States of America and its leaders have done. Consider Iraq today, America has set up a puppet governing body in Iraq which it dictates to, that is bolstered with by the looming presence of the America Military, currently 150,000 troops strong that is still occupying the once sovereign nation of Iraq.

Other nations have the right to possess weapons in order to protect themselves, just as America maintains the most lethal arsenal in the world, in order to protect itself to maintain its superiority and to attack any other nations of the world whenever it cares to do so. The heavily armed United States with 7000 nuclear warheads that can be fired immediately from silos, warships and submarines (soon space platforms), and its many more nuclear warheads (not to mention 50,000 conventional nuclear weapons) in tow that can be ready to fire within a few days, insists that certain enemy nations remain completely unarmed.

Why? So America can march into those nations anytime that it wants to, just as it did recently in Iraq, and take down its government with minimal American casualties! Was it just for oil, is that why America took over Iraq? I agree with Representative Charles Rangel from New York, the attitude of most Americans is that 'Iraq has our oil under its sand'!

America's leaders are the worst prevaricators of falsehoods. It is commonplace for its leaders to lie to the American people as well as to the world. In fact, it is not only verifiable, that the leaders of this nation lies to its citizens; being lied to by America's leaders has become an accepted reality by most Americans. And as long as it does not hurt the earning power of most Americans who harbor a sense of entitlement when it comes to prosperity, or their earning power, most Americans accept it.

It is only when economic disturbances that hit the pocketbooks of individual Americans, that Americans demand an accounting from their leaders.

America's political leaders have even invented a phrase that is called plausible deniability. This phrase was invented in order to cover up America's illicit covert actions, as well as American subterfuge in and around the world. However, the phrase has entered into the everyday lexicon of most Americans, specifically where America's leadership is concerned. Everything that say is plausibly deniable! Someone once quipped, how do you know when a politician is lying? Answer: Whenever he opens his mouth!

President Bush recently admitted, that on at least one occasion he lied to the American people; all of us know that he has done so on more than one occasion. As he explained it (he used a euphemism to sanitize his behavior), he said that he 'misled the American people'. The unadulterated word (the Canon) for most Americans, reads that Satan is the Father of lies! The scriptures also teach us that God hates a liar, as well as those who shed innocent blood! America is guilty of both, and where and when will it end?

The United States controls the world financial markets. The United States controls and manipulates worldwide commerce, banking and trade; and in turn most nations of the world are being forced to submit to the will of the American enterprise machine. And in order to secure its position of economic manipulation of the world's economy, America possesses a destructive military force that it often uses to threaten, or to force its will upon other nations who do not comply.

Did I fail to mention that the U.S.A. has a known military presence, in one capacity or another, in over 90 nations of the world. There are at present 198 member nations of the United Nations. The United States controls over half of the nations that makes up the U.N.'s General Assembly, and the United States holds a permanent seat in the 5-permanent member security council.

Therefore is it any wonder that the U.S.A. is able to get away the same behaviors that it condemns other nations for engaging in, given its control over half of the member nations of the United Nations?

That type of power and influence gave the U.S. the power that it needed to force resolutions against Iraq, while the United States itself ignored and violated the will of the U.N. itself, when it attacked the once sovereign nation of Iraq, had its leader murdered, and the Baathist government destroyed. U.N. Secretary Kofi Anan quietly condemned the actions of the United States, however, there were never any sanctions made against the United States!

Will God's justice sleep forever Thomas Jefferson? Does anyone recall that it was Tom Jefferson who warned America from the onset about interfering in the internal affairs of disparate nations around the world. In fact were you aware that some of the nations that America has been most critical of like France of late and even Russia, supported America in the America Revolutionary and Spanish Wars?

President Hugo Chavez is not an enemy of the United States, and neither was or is Fidel Castro an enemy of the United States. And many other world leaders fall into the same category, they have never been our enemies. We have made them our nation's enemies! Why? Oftentimes, they have been guilty of doing nothing more than telling the truth about the United States of America and its evil foreign practices.

Many World leaders who have resisted the United States, and the ones who were and are still willing to fight back were and are simply put - those world leaders who tired then and are tired now of United States interference in their internal affairs. Even America's allies have cautioned the U.S.A. to back away from the practice of constantly interfering in the internal affairs of other nations.

Those nations that the United States labels as enemy nations, are nations who simply are resistant to American totalitarianism, something that they hoped had been eliminated when Hitler and the Third Reich were destroyed!

Again, who is the Father of Lies? Satan is, of course. So what principality or power is operating behind the scenes that drives a greed-driven nation, a hostile war-like nation, a nation that serves God's with its words while its heart is far from God? It sounds to me as if Satan is the driving force behind America.

And if you consider Biblical eschatology, ask yourself, what nation is currently occupying the land of Babylon? If you believe that the love of money is the root of all evil, what nation and what people rise everyday with one thought in mind - HOW DO I MAKE MORE MONEY?

The answer is America and the American people, no other nation of the world has as its singular purpose, the acquisition of wealth. Satan has transformed itself into an Angel of light in America. Some nations even refer to America as the Great Satan! This is not a political comment, but rather a spiritual one - I believe that Dick Cheney is possessed by the devil! And I believe that contrary to President Bushes claims of being 'born again', that he is also nothing more than a tool in Satan's hands, while he claims to be a servant of God!

VI. All Nations of the World Live In Fear of the U.S.A.!
The United States is currently operating in 3-separate military fronts, in Iraq, Pakistan and in Afghanistan (and secretly in Iran if you want to consider it a fourth front). Are the motives of the United States noble in any way? Are we in these nations in order to lift the people from their social conditions?

There is no noblese oblege involved on the part of the United States, in any of these fronts! Our leaders boast that we are there because of American interests! Perfect love casts out all fear? The majority of nations of the world, over 200 of them are more concerned about the U.S.A. and that number includes America's allies.

Combined, they are more concerned about us than those nations that the U.S.A. refers to as being hostile nations. Our allies were more concerned about the U.S.A. and many have spoken out with regard to America's behavior in Iraq. Our allies have spoken out about the United States's policies of interventionism in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, and its behaviors towards the DPRK, Iran (and Cuba for over the past half decade)!

The United States once loved Cuba, especially Havanna - where America officials often partied, golfed, smoke Cuban cigars and had sex with Cuban women. Cuba was good when America had influence in Cuba! Only when Castro's forces had enough, and excised the American controlled leader from Cuba, did the United States turn its back on Cuba - just 90 miles offshore.

The American presence in Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan was put there in order to force these nations to submit to the will of the United States. America also seeks to exploit in some instances their resources, to demand obedience and compliance, and yes to protect the United States from people who are willing to retaliate against American interventionism and exploitation. Those nations and individuals consist of nations and individuals that the U.S.A. has interfered with from the onset, including Cuba for over a half-decade now.

The other word for what America is doing is called, HEGEMONY!
When will God's people that are called by his name wake up and say to their own despotic government officals, that it is enough? How dare we criticize former luminaries like Hitler, Stalin, Lenin, Tito, Pol Pot and others, when the U.S.A. leadership is behaving in like manner. We are a Republic; they represent us and we must hold them accountable, just as held other despots accountable for their behaviors!

The United States is fighting against truth in order to preserve its preferred standard and manner of living. And any people or nations that will not submit, 'not to God mind you', but to America have found themselves more and more under attack, either politically or military by the American religious-economic-military complex. The people of Iraq, Iran, Syria, Pakistan,Cuba, Nicaragua, Bolivia, China and Russia are not America's enemies, instead America is their enemy.

And America has made itself an enemy of God, because of its falsehoods, greed, usurpation of power, duplicity and exploitation of God's creation!

Peace & grace
Rev. C. Solomon


Addenda: Man looks on the outward appearance; God looks upon the heart. How does God view the America that most individuals look upon as a success? I suspect that God recognizes the true heart of America, God knows what drives America. God likely views America as Satan was once portrayed, as an entity that fell, and has been a failure in spite of all of its beauty! God knows that America in its pursuit of wealth, turned its back on Truth a long-time ago - in spite of all of its religious illusions to the contrary!

To wax apocryphal and apocalyptic at the same time, I wonder how much longer God
will tolerate American malfeasance and misbehavior under false pretense, and
its dominance over the other people and nations of earth! I say let
righteousness prevail, and may Americans return to sensibility,
and abandon their desires for power, greed and wealth!

America is at war with divine truth, we are breaking every rule
of civility that is known to man, and that causes us to be at
odds with the Universe!

American altruism is usually based upon, how will it benefit me in the end. In other words American aid is not given to other nations and people out of love by our government, neither it is given out of love, or a true sense of altruism. It is done so with an expectation that in the end that the
so-called benefactor will reap a benefit, another phrase for
that is 'American interest'! Our officials will often
say, it is in America's interest to do so!

Satan has truly set itself up to appear as an angel of light in America, however, in fact it has turned into an angel of darkness. In no other country in the world
is greed, debauchery, crime,pride, impudence, lust...more prevalent than
it is here in our nation! Having said that, other nations are
more and more beginning to emulate the practices and
behaviors of the United States.

And sadly, many of those ministers who were placed here to preach against it are
on the bandwagon and looking for their share of the proverbialpie, including
several of our noteworthy television capitalist ministers!

Do I hate America? That's what I always hear when I write or speak in these terms? Answer: Did God hate individuals or nations when he spake only what I have
repeated? Where do you suppose that I learned them? Paracletos
guides us into all truth, regardless of
national, family or personal
origin!

Feb 25, 2008

The Rev Under Attack In the Washington Post Blog : 2/25/08

Anonymous said:

The Rev is a loud-mouthed idiot! He says with exclamation marks what most people wouldn't mutter to their dogs! He is drowning out more enlightened discourse! He is like a shining beacon of ignorance and stupidity!

The Rev said:

Clearly, your dog has to be more erudite than you are! Bow wow!!
Posted by: | February 25, 2008 05:43 PM


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hey Rev:
If you had been watching the stock market over the last few months...

Posted by: Plainfacto

Rev Said:

Why would you assume that I have not been watching the stock market, in addition to keeping an eye on the actions of the Fed to lower interest rates. Has Libor followed suit?

For the reasons that you mentioned and more that is why the world needs a global economy that is is not tethered to the rise or fall of the U.S. economy, and greedy American capitalists.

Come on Plainfacto, you know that America manipulates the world economy, even the WTO has chastised America for some of its cannibalistic economic practices.

The U.S.A. ought to focus on helping to build a genuine world economy, not the one that is in place now that is there to benefit the U.S.A. at everyone else's expense.

Study your history and you will find that America actually built economies in other nations of the world with one purpose in mind, to create markets for the U.S.A. Its extending of trade, aid, credits and markets were not as altruistic as they seemed on the surface.

We didn't give a darn about the impact of building strip mining economies in other nations and what impact it would have upon other incumbent nations of the world.

For years business ethics were not taught in American institutions of higher learning, and when it was taught, it was a watered down version. Ergo, we have continued in our current predatory, me first, practices.

Americans are selfish, and that is why the majority of the world is p'd all at the U.S.A.! Greed, greed, greed... is the problem!

Posted by: The Rev | February 25, 2008 05:41 PM

Fighting the Good Fight!
Rev. C. Solomon


Addenda: Unlike Sally Field at the Academy Award Show a couple of
decades ago, not everyone likes the Rev!

"Shame on You Barack Obama" The Rev's Response to the Faith In Action Blog

Faith in Action Topic: “ “Shame on You Barack Obama!”


Rev. C. Solomon Says:
February 25th, 2008 at 11:58 am

It wasn’t too many years ago when the late Dr. Martin Luther King was accused of plagiarism. Who is right, or who is wrong in this particular scenario with respect to parroting or plagiarizing what someone else has said, I don’t know?

However, I am concerned that nationwide too many black Americans, based upon recent voting trends, have already forgotten all that both Hillary and Bill Clinton have done for not only the black community, but for the entire world. It seems to me that as a community we owe them some respect, it seems to me that Obama owes them some respect!

Relating back to a recent topic on this blog, Hillary is an example of a white American who has done more for the black community, than many blacks have done for our community en toto.

I am not accusing the author of this blog of doing so, however, I suspect that many black Americans are going to rue the day when they glibbly tossed aside and turned their backs on the Clintons. Once the community slays the most powerful white family in the nation or the world that supports us 100%, then where will we or Obama be at that time?

If Obama wins at the Democratic Convention, but loses the general election all he will have succeeded at doing is helping the Republicans. How? He will have destroyed the venal Right’s most powerful opposition, and diminished our most powerful supporters. I hope that I turn out to be wrong and that none of this occurs!

And as proud as most black Americans are to see an accomplished black man rise to the top (we have had many others both male and female). However, what is frightening is that many in white America accept this one (Obama), because he does not carry any civil rights baggage (that they know about). At least some of them have explained it in those terms. Civil libertarians take umbrage at that kind of remark!

Black Americans, in my opinion ought to be appalled with those who have taken that position or who make ‘those kind of statements’. I for one am rather proud of those who carry so-called ‘civil rights’ baggage. Why? Because like Jesus and Dr. MLK, they got out there and marched , risked life and limb, endangered their families, fought and sullied themselves, as they pursued the cause of righteousness and social justice for all people.

And had it not been for them, and the efforts of the Clintons over the past decade and a half, we would not be as far along as we are today! Some of us are like the lepers that Jesus healed, only one returned to say thanks!

Is Hillary’s campaign guilty of double-speak, I don’t know. If they are, they should stop it - all campaigners should!

Peace & Grace
Rev. C. Solomon

Feb 22, 2008

Ministers & Churches Who Give The People What They Want...! Addenda

Psalms 11:3 & 4
If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?

The LORD is in his holy temple, the LORD's throne is in heaven: his eyes behold, his eyelids try, the children of men.

Ecclesiastes 5:1 KEEP YOUR foot [give your mind to what you are doing] when you go [as Jacob to sacred Bethel] to the house of God. For to draw near to hear and obey is better than to give the sacrifice of fools [carelessly, irreverently] too ignorant to know that they are doing evil.(Amplified version)

Genesis 4:4 6 And Abel brought of the firstborn of his flock and of the fat portions. And the Lord had respect and regard for Abel and for his offering
5But for Cain and his offering He had no respect or regard. So Cain was exceedingly angry and indignant, and he looked sad and depressed.
6And the Lord said to Cain, Why are you angry? And why do you look sad and depressed and dejected?
7If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well!
But instead, Cain who had just finished his own form of worship went out and killed his brother, his religion notwithstanding!

Romans 10:1-3 BRETHREN, [with all] my heart's desire and goodwill for [Israel], I long and pray to God that they may be saved.
2 I bear them witness that they have a [certain] zeal and enthusiasm for God, but it is not enlightened and according to [correct and vital] knowledge.
3For being ignorant of the righteousness that God ascribes [which makes one acceptable to Him in word, thought, and deed] and seeking to establish a righteousness (a means of salvation) of their own, they did not obey or submit themselves to God's righteousness.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It has been decades since Ed Sullivan began his television show with these words, folks, 'we have a very good show for you tonight'!

However, many of today's churches have picked up where he left off, they
have a very good show for you too, day or night!

Not only are these people putting on a very good show when they present pageants at their churches particularly during the Sunday Services; most of what they have been doing lately amounts to nothing more than putting on a a very good show. And, what many of our churches and ministers have been doing lately is a very poor imitation of what God intended!

My House shall be a house of prayer for All people!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

One Sunday, several years ago, I stopped by the Capital Christian Center which is just outside of Sacramento California to worship. I was so impressed that I went back again and again. The service, not the devotional service, began with altar prayer. And it was not just a 2-minute scripted prayer, these folks opened with old fashioned altar prayer, and it didn't seem to matter to the thousands who were there how long the prayer service lasted.

Individuals were invited down to the altar for laying on of hands, individual counseling and prayer in this I estimate to be about 2 to 3-thousand seat church. Individuals from the floor and balconies came down and knelt, while teams of 2 to 3individuals gathered around and prayed with them. They were not ushered off to side rooms like cattle, as if they were an interruption of the service rather than the reason for it!

Again, does the Bible say that God's house shall be called a house of prayer for all people or not? In most churches today, the aggregate amount of time spent in prayer is about 10 minutes or less. I couldn't believe what I was witnessing, so I went back again and again, and each time it was the same. Why weren't these folks in a rush? Didn't they have a second service? How come the pastor wasn't anxious to get up and put on his show?

And not only that, guess what the Choir sang? They sang songs like, Great is thy Faithfulness. Now where did they get an idea like that? There weren't any hip-hopping, booty-shaky, do the electric slide, half-naked dancing girls there either. In fact this massive, I estimate around 150 voice choir, brought tears to your eyes as they led you into a glorious spirit of worship!

In fact, if the church had not been 120 miles from home, I would have joined. I even considered relocating to the Sacramento/El Dorado Hills area at one time; and for sure this is where I would have joined and hopefully become a part of the ministerial team. The minister preached the word, the fellowship was genuine and people came down in order to give their lives to the Lord, as opposed to what is being done in 'imitation and entertainment church incorporated' today, in order to become a member!

In the olden days you were required to get saved before you could become a member of the local church; today, anyone can join. And as a result, not since the problem of incest at the Corinthian church that Paul once wrote about, have we heard of so much sexual impropriety and other scandals taking places at the church. Why? Because churches today are taking everyone into the church, particularly high-profile athletes, physicians, politicians, celebrities - the latter gives the church some prestige.

At the same time, churches are taking in pot-smokers, cocaine users, prostitutes, male and female ho's, and anyone else who wants to join. And to boot, individuals from either group quickly ascend leadership roles in the church! These individuals are permitted to form church policy in spite of the fact that they have never been converted, or given their inchoate knowledge.

One church in another part of California embarrassed itself roughly one decade ago when it insisted on having ex-boxing champ Evander Holyfield to sit in the pulpit. The minister even tried to get Evander to come down and lay hands on folks who came to the altar. Now don't misunderstand me, Evander was and still is one of my favorite boxers. However, sit in the pulpit or lay hands on people?

Evander declined the minister's laying on of hands request over and over again. And, he did so to his credit I might add. That is not the end of the story. The following week it was confirmed in the press that Evander has just birthed two other out of wedlock babies. His poor wife! And how about the poor wife of former wide-receiver of the Dallas Cowboys, Michael Irving, who faithfully sat in church while he played the field.

Her faithfulness paid off, but can you imagine the attention that he received at the church, in spite of the debauched lifestyle that he was living outside of church!
He was one of my favorite football players, however, individuals like him should not have been treated, nor should they be treated like celebrities in the house of God.

The woman pastor who brought Smokey Robinson to the Lord with the help of celebrity Leon Kennedy in Los Angeles California, didn't know who he was when he showed up one day at her storefront church. She ministered to the man and not to the celebrity, and as a result his drug addiction was broken. Some individuals will never get saved as long as they are being treated as royalty in the church! Why should they?

What is the imitation entertainment church comprised of today. The Apostle wrote about the imitations in his day and what their motivations were in Romans Chapter 10. He wrote:

1 Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved.

2 For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge.

3 For they being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God


The imitation church, is often more prosperous than the authentic church, and it is comprised of the following:

1). Fake Preachers:
The entertainment preacher goes to school, garners a religious education and repeats to his congregation what someone else taught or wrote. Or he simply repeats a sermon from a book. He has never received an unction from the Holy Spirit to preach, he has never received a word from God, he knows only what he has read, and only preaches what he has heard someone else say or what he has read.

And sadly, some of the professors at American Theological Schools, Bible Colleges and Seminaries do not believe in the Resurrection themselves! Can an imitation preacher, most of the time the imitation preachers preach better than the genuine article. Why? They have to put on a good show. However, the scriptures warns God's people to beware of 'false prophets'. Just like false prophets, false ministers can be very convincing!

These self-identified motivational preachers will preach feel-good sermons. Some of them even identify themselves as 'motivational speakers'. Pastor Osteen, pastor of one of the largest congregations in the country, about the size of Gideon's army to be exact, seems like a wonderful person to me. However, I wonder, just how many in his 'Gideon's Army' are really saved?

Is the information that these ministers provide good information? Many times it is good information. However, preachers of God are commanded to preach the word, and not an imitation feel good copy of someone else's sermon or a simple motivational feel good sermon. Many of today's ministers are well-trained, however, they are operating in rote, instead of by the word or spirit of God.

2). An Imitation Choir, Musicians and Singers:
Unlike Nehemiah's chorus choirs, many of today's chorus, praise teams and choir members are not dedicated full time singers of the Lord. Many times they are not worshipping the Lord in many instances in their singing. Some are simply singing and gyrating to worldly beats and tunes that have been appropriated by the church from the world.

Some of these individuals double back and forth between worldly and religious singing. Would Nehemiah's or Asaph's singers have performed in secular and religious venues? Folks, we have fake choir singing going on in churches today. Religious mogul Kirk Franklin, admits that he has appropriated much of his material from worldly singing groups. God's singers ought to be dedicated to God!

I was a guest a church service one day where I witnessed a young man who was inebriated, fall all the way down the steps from the top of the choirstand where he had been seated. He landed in the middle of the floor in front of the Congregation, stood up and wiped his mouth 'slosh slosh', to sing the song "God Has Smiled On me". This took place in a service held in Richmond California. And brother had a melodious voice, even under the influence. I wonder where he sang at the night before?

3). Today's Professional Liturgical Music Teams:The professional music teams that play for our church services and choirs today, often with their 'showtime tunes' are professionals. Back in the day musicians in most churches were fair at best, there were some exceptions. The difference being, in the former churches the musicians may not have been as good as today's trained, having trained at the observatory musicians, but they were saved.

And that means that the spirit of God was in the music. And don't be surprised today if the musicians that played at the club until the wee hours of Sunday morning, are not playing in your Sunday morning service.

4. The Fake Altar Call:
It is rare when anyone gets healed or saved anymore. As has become the habit, when someone comes up to get healed or saved, they are immediately ushered off into some side room or to the secretary's office where they are given paperwork to complete and/or a quick prayer is made over them. This proves my point that at entertainment churches where everything is staged, the altar call is also a staged event.

An altar song is customarily sung, however, the invitation, represents an invitation to join that parish. It is not being done in order for someone to get saved, or to join the body of Christ. Churches don't have time for that anymore. What some refer to as the Altar Call, should be called instead 'the call to membership call'! For after all, that is what is truly taking place.

The individuals who come down for the most part do not becomes members of God's Kingdom, instead they become members of that parish! At the St. Mary's Episcopal Church in San Francisco, the minister thanked the gay community at the end of the service for providing the morning oblation! Hmm? I plan to do a writing soon on Inter-sex, gay, homosexual, lesbian individuals and eunuchs from a Christian and a clinical perspective!

5) The Fake Eucharist:
Someone else brought this to my attention. During Eucharist, he understood that for sanitary reasons that churches were utilizing the technologically advanced plastic thimble cups with the little wafer on top, however, he wanted the real thing. Kudos to Pastor Junius Dotson in San Jose California, this pastor would break out whole loves of bread.

You would actually be served bread and wine substantiation by the pastor. Back in the day, intimate footwashing and communion services were common place in most churches. 'Big Church' today - no have time for that anymore. I was visiting a church in Columbia Maryland during a 6-year stay over in the Washington DC metro region of the country.

One Sunday during Eucharist, a fine shapely young woman in tight painted on pants, and an equally tight form-fitted halter top that exposed her perfectly endowed cleavage, served the Eucharist. Ah don't get mad at me, other women commented on her before I did.

One woman went to the church's staff and complained. My answer to the woman who went to the church staff was, yes I saw it! I also saw the tight-fitted form-fitted pants that she must have painted on that morning. Hey it wasn't my church, but come on Rev, is there anything sacred anymore! A church in nearby San Francisco decided to simply scrap the wafer and grape juice, instead they decided to use beer and pretzels or crackers, I forget which, as transubstation elements.

And instead of having the dinner before, of the kind that Paul discouraged, they had a dance!

6) Fake Members/Disciples:
Paul found disciples at Ephesus (read about it in Acts chapter 19). Paul asked these disciples, have you received the Holy Spirit since you believed. They had not, so Paul baptized them again and stayed with them until they received the spirit.
Today, we don't call them disciples, we call them members!

If Paul visited one of today's churches and asked that same question, he would likely have to spend 3 years at that church if he intended to get the 'members' of the church - other than baptized.

7) Fake Spirit
If you don't have it just act like you do! Wave your hands in the air just like you don't care, and rock with the music in the church. And you are not alone, for many members in the church today, believe as they are being taught that this is what constitutes being spiritual.

Man everybody's church is rocking today, some call it moving to syncopated African beats. Churches who used to laugh at the 'Holy Rollers Churches' (where I came from) are rolling too. Man people are dancing and speaking in tongues, jumping and hollering in every denomination today. The Catholics even have their charismatic Catholics.

However, one question remains, have you been born anothen, or are you simply imitating what you have witnessed the crowd doing? Elijah learned that the Spirit can show up in a 'still small voice'!

8) Fake Salvation
Did you ever get saved, or did you simply repeat the magic words that you were told to say at someone's altar call. Folks, its not that simple. Unless your heart was fully prepared for God to come into it, you didn't get saved because you repeated the magic words at someone's altar call.

Why is your minister telling you that you are saved? Well because in most instances he or she believes it or they simply don't know any better. Many of the Simon ministers and ministries (read Acts Chapter 8) of today, like Simon the Sorcerer attempted to do, went out and purchased the power to be ministers, and they aren't saved themselves!

I know ministers personally, who have flown around the country in order to acquire 'a plan', to attend a seminar, to work with a church consultant in order to learn how to grow their churches. I reminded one that God would add unto the church daily those that would be saved! Many individuals have been unwittingly brought into the church, because a minister purchased someone else's membership growth plan.

The question is, was the plan he used God's plan? Perhaps that will explain why the churches today are filled with what the Apostle Paul referred to when speaking to the Elders at Miletus; churches today are filled with goats, wolves and usurpation ministers.

9) Fake Love
You will know them by their love. The love at most churches is fake. One easy way to prove it is simple. Look around at your church and ask yourself, how many people in your church have languished in poverty, while some members dress, eat and have the best of everything? Loving spirits would have eliminated the spirit of poverty in their churches, if not in the nation and the world!

There is both a spiritual as well a social dimension to our faith. The church was put in place in order to attend to both the social, as well as the spiritual dimension. Jesus talked about 'neighbor in conjunction with God'. Love God, then love your neighbor! And and who is my neighbor, he was often heard to say?

Paul again, when speaking about Israel said in Romans the 10th chapter wrote, "..my earnest prayer and heart's desire for Israel is that they might be saved. Did you know that the majority of citizens in Israel today are secularists? Could it be that way because the majority of the people in the nation of Israel never submitted to came to God. You don't need a census tract to know that, just read your Bibles.

The Bible makes it clear that the secularists (that America) is so intent on defending, are people who never fully submitted to the Lord. America is following the same trend. Ninety percent of Americans may say that they believe in God, however, the number that attend church or submit to God rather, is significantly smaller. And trust me, more and more I understand why some individuals are not attending imitation churches.

Conclusion: To those who are going to church, and the ones who are having church, well, couldn't you at least be real about what you are doing? When the curtain closes on many church services this Sunday and throughout next week, the imitation leaders can go home knowing that they put on 'a very good show'.

God's ministers on the other hand, can go home with the satisfaction of knowing that they preached the word (without imitation), and when it was not in season to do so - and that is our job and what we have been tasked to do! And, whether the people responded or not to the service that you led (Remember what God told Ezekiel), you will know that you obeyed God in every way.

I encourage you to not give in and to never compromise, whether you minister to five, ten or one hundred. Noah's church had only eight members, however, all 100% of them saved! And remember that when Jesus started off and was performing miracles, thousands followed him, however, by the time that he reached the cross there were only a few faithful women who stood by!

peace & grace
Rev. C. Solomon

Feb 19, 2008

Ministers & Churches Who Give The People What They Want - A Good Show: The Worldwide Church Entertainment Business!

Is coming Sunday to a church near you - All Aboard!

Are any of you going on your church sponsored trip to
the Bahamas or the Caribbean this year?

If you are going, don't forget to heed the instructions
that were given during 'church announcements' -

Bring Your Bikinis!

And who will provide the entertainment aboard the cruise
ship? It will not be the entertainer who never curses,
or the one who is born again - you will be entertained
by a salacious worldly entertainer, who won't get saved
-and one who has one of the filthiest mouths in America!


This year's drinking, dancing, partying, joke-telling,
girl watching cruise will be sponsored by the Worldwide
Christian Holy Sanctified Church and with the full
backing of your church's ministerial team!

I wonder what would Jesus have to say about that?

Ecclesiastes 5:1 KEEP YOUR foot [give your mind to what you are doing] when you go [as Jacob to sacred Bethel] to the house of God. For to draw near to hear and obey is better than to give the sacrifice of fools [carelessly, irreverently] too ignorant to know that they are doing evil.(Amplified version)

2 Corinthians 4:1 Therefore seeing we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we faint not;
2 But have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully; but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God.
3 But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost:
4 In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
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Kudos to Bishop Carlton Pearson who once confessed that his now defunct mega-church had been co opted, and was being run by members of his church from the mass-media market. They were running the church Rev Pearson confessed, not God! When will the rest of America's church-entertainment ministers wake up?
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Introduction: I was previously asked to be the keynote speaker at a black-tie dinner that was to be held at a luxurious hotel just south of the San Francisco International Airport. The affair was being held to announce ground-breaking ceremonies for a new facility that was to be built for a church in California.

Many of the members of the church who were backing this building project were All-stars from a nearby championship football team, and the number one rapper in the country at the time. The church was awash in money and the architectural plan had been completed. The Lord informed me a year before that 'nothing was going on the foundation that had been laid down by this church full of millionaires'.

I explained to the pastor in private, why I did not want to speak at the elegant affair, however, after hearing what God told me - he said, go ahead and speak what God gave you! I held back that night, not wanting to disparage the guests or members of the church, however, God's word came to pass. In spite of all of the planning, the work that had been done beforehand and the money that was on hand and in the hands of all of these successful and wealthy entertainers, nothing was ever built upon the foundation that was lain.

How could the plan fail, given all of the money and the planning that was available? The pastor conceded that he knew that he had stepped away from the plan of God, and that God had told him to return to the plan that he set for the church that he pastored. Today that church is a successful church and it is operating in another venue. I suspect that it is a successful church because of the nature of that self-deprecating pastor who cared more for the things of God than giving in to the will of the people!

Section I: What Has Been Transpiring In Our Churches Lately!
1). In America of late, anyone who goes to church and either sits through or participates in one of today's religious services, in many churches, has become a part of the church entertainment business. For either he or she is an entertainer themselves, or they are they one of the entertained audience members.

2). Oftentimes, because these programmed entertainment church services are televised, the audience members receive the same warm up instructions that one would expect to receive in a worldly entertainment venue. Audience members are being told where to sit, no spaces are to be left vacant for example, because it doesn't look good on television when there are empty seats. Audience members are told, you may not leave to go to the bathroom 'while the show goes on'.

Infants must not be brought into the audience 'while the show goes on', or they might cry or disturb the comedic atmosphere and the show that is being put on by the minister (or the high-flying choir act).

3. And in between weekly services, the church entertainment teams work feverishly to come up with new material before the following week's service including writing and practising skits, acquiring props, acquiring music and preparing dance steps for the dancers! Have you noticed how some of these choirs dance and gyrate in our churches lately? Folks who are we kidding? Is this church appropriate behavior, or club behavior?

4). Many of our preachers, my fellow men and women of the cloth, are more like entertainers today, than preachers. The music has become more worldly, in fact I have been in services where the church announcements were read or given with worldly sounds and songs playing in the background by Smokey, the Shi-lites or Temptations! And our praise teams dance and sway just like the worldly singing groups of today often do! And no one appears to be concerned about what is taking place.

5). I have also visited several churches who have decided, why just play the music of worldly entertainers (especially the ones who double-back and forth between church and worldly venues), for there ain't nothing like the real thing baby is there? Entertainers who were on the live stage on Saturday night, might be singing at your church on Sunday morning. It could be Howard Hewitt, Faith Evans, Patti Labelle and others.

Sitting among the ministers, in some pulpits that I have visited were luminaries like Smokey Robinson, Chris Tucker, Randall Cunningham, Evander Holyfield, Donna Douglas (Ellie Mae) Clampett or professional football players, rappers like (Kanye West who charged a $35 per person admission fee at the mega AME church near Oxon Hill in Maryland), professional golfers and many more.

And at some services that I missed, appearances were made by Patti Labelle or other worldly entertainers who were the highlight of the worship service. Why are these churches pushing back faithful spirit-filled singers in their churches, and instead having worldly singers come in to sing. That doesn't make any sense! Where is the motivation for the worldly singer that wants to use his or her gift for God to ever get saved?

6). The ministers today pepper their sermons with modern day street patois, double entendres and off the cuff or borderline jokes. The ministers encourage the congregation to 'turnaround and give 3 people a high-five. Sermons are often replaced with or accompanied by pageants, and every church it would seem is trying to come up with a new gimmick, in order to entertain the audience and increase its membership.

A congregation in North Carolina, actually went to the local bars and provided the barhoppers with wine glasses. One minister recently quipped while preaching, 'my congregation drove me so crazy that I started to go and smoke a joint one day'. And by the way when the church puts on a pageant at Easter or Christmas, they are second to none.

And some of the more contemporary Christmas or Easter pageants make you wonder, now what was the message that we were supposed to be getting from that play?


7). I witnessed the church announcements being read at one church that almost made me laugh, if it were not so pitiful. The announcements were about the church's basketball team that had won its divisional playoff game. As the announcer proceeded we also heard about the white-water rafting trip, the singles night out, the Friday night fish fry, soccer practice and the like.

And nothing was ever read about any biblical or historical religious activity that was to be held at the church. Oops! At the Jericho City of Praise in Maryland, placards were handed out to athletes at the church's morning service, following the altar call of course!

8). The pastor at the Jubilee Christian Center in San Jose California (notice that it is not called a church similar to many other of these quasi-chuch forms) reminds me a lot of the televised Tonight Show program. This pastor in his night-show framed pulpit struts peripatetically around the stage telling one joke after another.

And given his white locks, he bears a striking resemblance at times to David Letterman; he also behaves like David Letterman. One would have to wonder where he gets his material from, the American Writer's Guild? How many of you know that pastors actually purchase resources or go on the web to garner jokes, anecdotes and other stories that they can insert into their sermons?

9). The entertainment audience is just as culpable, if not as guilty. Why are church memberships growing astronomically in the entertainment churches? Why are the lines to get into the entertainment church theaters so long? At times the lines of cars, vans and SUV's can stretch as much as a half a mile away from some of these church entertainment meccas, while passengers eagerly wait for their hour or so of Sunday morning church entertainment.

Matthew the 7th chapter comes to mind: Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: 14 Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. 15Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves.

16 Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?

Is it because people are more interested in being entertained than they are in hearing the word, singing church appropriate songs or behaving in a church appropriate manner, that these venues are filling up? Again, why are all of these cars and SUVs filled with families no less, passing by smaller churches where the word of God is being preached and people are being saved?

10). Entertainment churches actually allow secular dancing in the church, often times it takes place right on the church rostrum during service. One church that I mentioned before, in another thread, the Evangel Theater church in Maryland, applied for a liquor license for its Family Life Center.

11). And where better to play basketball or to stretch than at the churches gym? Haven't these churches actually misplaced their priorities? Are the people heeding the message? Or, on the other hand are they simply coming 'to the theatre' in order to be entertained?

12). In one setting I had to shutdown my engine that tried to engage when the female dancers whirled across the stage in their white linen see-through hip, leg and thigh exposed garb! Burlesque show, strip show or what? A young man sat through a service where the sexy tightly-vestured minister, strutted around the pulpit while tossing her hips to and fro, he said, she turned me on! He wasn't talking about being turned on to Jesus folks!

13). How often have you observed that the pulpit furniture has been removed from the pulpit at your church lately, or the pews or chairs have been removed from the sanctuary in order to make way for the church dance? I was shocked when as an invited guest at a church affair that I attended a few years back, all of the sanctuary furniture had been removed so that the church-members and guests could engage in a 'square dance'!

Many church's sanctuaries today are doubling as religious sanctuaries and dance halls! And what of Jay Moss and his dancers, Cece Winans and her dancers and other singing dance teams? Their dancers dance their hind ends off at churches all around the country. And the kids get up and dance with them!

14). And what are the ministers and the people doing or saying while all of this is going on at the church? They laugh, dance and high-five themselves through the carnal and theatrical entertainment services!

15). Some of the ministers are boasting about the number of people that they are taking in each Sunday. They remind me of King David's numbering of the people, and Gideon's belief in his 32,000 mega army. God showed Gideon that he had only 300 warriors, not even 10 percent of his army were true warriors. Now what does that tell you about the mega ministries of today, some with 32,000, 18,000, 15,000 or even 2000 members?

And guess what, some of the smaller ministries today are beginning to emulate the larger ones - they want to get in on the illusion? The phrase 'take in' is apropos, for the people are truly being taken. This type of minister is often thinking, 'ching ching', he sees dollar signs. His annual raise is dependent upon him or her reaching their quotas in terms of offerings raised and new additions to the church.

One minister told the audience that many of the individuals that were there that Sunday, who were not full participants in the church, were sent by God in order to bring money. He didn't care a whole lot about their souls did he? Would God send individuals to bring money to a church where there aren't any individuals getting saved?

16). I wonder, what will Jesus do when he comes down from off of the mountain? Many of these ministers remind me of what Jesus said to the Pharisees before, 'you have heaven shut up, you are not going into the Kingdom, and you are keeping others from going into the kingdom'. Frankly, many individuals will never enter the Kingdom, because they are caught up into one of these 'everyone is okay' religious entertainment venues!

These ministers and ministries are but tools in Satan's hands! By practising 'a form of godliness', they confuse and prevent those who would do so from ever finding the real thing, when they instead drive by the entrance ways of churches where God's spirit is working and travel to the religious imitation churches in order to be entertained!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Section II. Is this phenomenon new? It is not new at all, let's read the following:
Ezekiel 33:30-33 New Life Version:
The Words Of The Watchman

30 "As for you, son of man, your people are talking to each other about you by the walls and at the doors of the houses. They are saying, 'Come and hear the word that has come from the Lord.'

31 They come and sit in front of you as My people, and listen to the words you say. But they do not do them. With their mouth they speak of love, but their hearts are full of sinful desire.

32 They think of you as nothing more than one who sings love songs with a beautiful voice and plays music well. For they hear what you say, but they will not do it.

33 When all this comes true, and it will, then they will know that a man of God has been among them."

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I am not in any way putting the prophet Ezekiel in the same class as today's entertainment preacher, for Ezekiel brought a serious message to the people of God who were captives. However, during their captivity the Jews would go to hear Ezekiel speak the words of God, however they did so strictly for entertainment purposes.

These captives who were taken by Nebuchadnezzar to Babylon in 597BC and placed in the ghettos by the River Chebar, had become very cynical. Going to hear the prophet, the precursor of today's preacher, on a weekly basis was no more than an exercise and distraction from their weekly grind. Can you hear them saying, 'I wonder what old crazy Ezekiel will be talking about or demonstrating today'.

Did you know that some have said that today Ezekiel would be considered a paranoid schiz? Elisha was referred to in his time by the children as 'baldy'. The Jews would go and listen to Ezekiel, in a similar manner that many individuals go to church today. They did not go in order to hear God's word and to make any changes in their lives.

Like today's parishioners many of whom go to church for entertainment purposes, they went to be sung to, to sing and dance and 'wave their hands in the air like they just don't care', to high-five each other or to participate in church entertainment activities or so-called ministries; the Jews went in order to laugh at Ezekiel and his prophecies and his God sent 'demonstrations'.

The true messenger of God has been set aside by God as well as sent by God, and the words that he or she speaks ought to be from God. The church service ought to exemplify God in every way. I heard a man say some years ago that I really don't believe in God, however, I enjoy going to church for the pageantry, and most of all I love looking at the beautiful stained glasses and watching all of the ceremonies.

Section III: The Word of The Messenger Ought To Be:
Ezekiel's message and Commission -The Words Of The Watchman
Ezekiel 33:1-20

1 The Word of the Lord came to me saying,
2 "Son of man, speak to the children of your people. Say to them, 'If I bring a sword upon a land, and the people of the land choose one of their men to keep watch for them,
3 and he sees the sword coming upon the land and sounds the horn to tell the people of the danger,
4 then if anyone hears the horn and does not take care, and a sword comes and kills him, he will be to blame for his own death.
5 He heard the sound of the horn, but did not worry about the danger. He will be to blame for his own death. If he had been careful, he would have saved his life.
6 But if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the horn, and the people are not told of the danger, and a sword comes and kills one of them, that man will be taken away because of his sin. But the blood of the watchman must be given.'
7 "Son of man, I have chosen you as a watchman for the people of Israel. So when I give you the word, you must tell them of the danger.
8 When I tell a sinful man that he will die for sure, and you do not speak to him about the danger of his way, that sinful man will die in his sin. But your blood must be given.
9 But if you tell a sinful man to turn from his way, and he does not turn from his way, he will die in his sin. But you have saved your life.


Similar to the ancient watchman, or as in America today where we have an elaborate defense system that was put into place to warn us of an impending attack (it didn't work on 9/11), today's watchmen and watchmwomen aren't 'working' to warn the people either. Many have taught the people to 'lighten up', don't be so serious, take your guards down, and have some fun. Then these ministers provide them with entertainment!

11 Say to them, 'As I live,' says the Lord God, 'I am not pleased when sinful people die. But I am pleased when the sinful turn from their way and live. Turn! Turn from your sinful ways! Why will you die, O people of Israel?'
12 Now, son of man, tell the children of your people, 'If a man does what is right and good, it will not save him when he sins.' And the sins of a sinful man will not make him fall when he turns from his sinful way. But the man who is right and good will not be able to live by his good ways when he sins.
13 When I tell the man who is right and good that he will live, and he trusts in his good ways so much that he sins, none of his good works will be remembered. He will die for the sin he has done.
14 But when I tell the sinful man that he will die, and he turns from his sin and does what is right and good,
15 if he gives back what a person gave him as trust for a promise, pays back what he had stolen, follows the Laws that give life and does not sin, he will live for sure. He will not die.
16 None of the sins he has done will be remembered against him. He has done what is right and good, and he will live for sure.
17 "Yet the children of your people say, 'The way of the Lord is not right.' But it is their way that is not right.
18 When the right and good man turns from his good way and sins, he will die for it. 19 But when the sinful man turns from his sin and does what is right and good, he will live because of it.
20 Yet you say, 'The way of the Lord is not right.' O people of Israel, I will judge each of you by his ways."

Section IV: The People Have Established Their Own Church Forms, Liturgies & Methods and Hired Entertainment Preachers: See Exodus 32:1-10 the Golden Calf.

The captive church in today's modern wilderness has lost its focus and forgotten its purpose, and instead it has gone about and established its own contemporary method of worship and its own self-serving form of righteousness. When we were kids, having been raised in a spirited Christian church and a Christian home, many times we would imitate at home, what we witnessed or participated in at church.

You could refer to it as playing church I suppose, but on the other hand most of the time we were not in the true since of the word playing - we were imitating. Today's churches too often are both 'play churches and imitations of the real thing'. For the most part they are simply places where people can go to and imitate, or play church!

Spoiled 'baby boomers', and the 'X-generations kids are adults now. They are willing to go to church and imitate in some form what their parents did before them. The problem is that these 'highly-educated' baby boom X-generation kids, want to keep one foot inside of the church, and the other in the world! And as a result they have created churches that will provide them with both a religious and a secular atmosphere at the time! Today's parishioners are also more likely to go to church in order to 'network', as opposed to giving their lives to God!

Too many of today's carnal individuals go to carnal churches, Paul talked about carnality and carnal Christians in his writings, in order to play. I mean literally to be in a play, to play in one of the churches athletic activities or at the Family Life Center. Some play in church as they sing and gyrate, and the minister plays from the pulpit as he tells jokes, warms up the audience or occasionally throws in a James Brown 'foot slide of his own'!

Many of today's youth spend more time at the Family Life Center playing ball, or with video games than they spend in church service, teaching or training. I suspect that it is time to stop playing! Today's minister and many of the ministries in today's churches remind me of Aaron and the people of the Exodus, the post-exilic Jews.

When Moses the prophet was summoned to come up and be with God, as Jesus has been summoned today, the people of God had Aaron to form another god, and they began to entertain themselves with that God or as the old King James version read, they rose up to play. As in our churches today they danced, they swayed, they had fun, they even worshipped. And, except for the mercy of God they were almost destroyed.

Just over a decade ago, while the church was at play and its members were trying to figure out how to get rich, do well and enlarge their individual territories (as they were being taught by prosperity ministers to simply take up the prayer of Jabezz), what happened in this nation?

America was attacked while the church was at play! The church no longer watches and prays, and there are a lack of watchmen and watchwomen to truly watch over the sheep. Had the church been 'praying insteading of playing', 9/11 would not have snuck up on America as it did; its watchmen would have warned the church ahead of time. The children of Israel missed the warning of God that was oftentime sent through his prophets, because they were busy at play!

Get your commentary out if you will, and conduct a word study. You will be likely surprised what the term 'play' referred to in scripture. Isn't it time for the church of God to be jolted out of its sleep, and hopefully its ministers as well?

Count the number of jokes your pastor or speaker tells this Sabbath day or Sunday for the 1st day churches. Observe how much of the world has been brought into your church when you listen to your church announcements. Observe the audience and its attirement. Is the audience dressed as if it is going to church, or are the members of the audience dressed as if they were on the way to a nightclub or a rock concert?

And how about the churches rock, blues or hip hop band? Every once in a while you will likely have to remind yourself that you are at church, when you are carried away by the sounds of worldly music. What kind of music will be played at your church this weekend? I witnessed a propfessional basketball player from the Golden State Warriors, at a church service that I attended, run his hands over his girlfriend's hips while standing during service.

The service that I was attending had gotten so worldly, and the minister was encouraging the spirit of the world in the church that the 7 foot basketball player seemingly forgot where he was for a moment. His girlfriend slapped his hands off of her buttocks! A pastor in the mid-west was desposed some years ago because he used his church as a bully pulpit for politicians to come in and use on an almost weekly basis.

His parishioners cried foul to their district Prelate, and eventually this pastor who would not be disuaded from his practices, was summarily removed. I was ministering to a man at an outdoor church service some years ago at the St. James Park in San Jose California. I agreed to participate in the service along with a group that was known at the time as Teen Challenge.

The man asked me, while the 'Christian rock band' rocked on, why are you ministering to me here, this is not a church event? I told him, that believe it or not, it was a church event! You couldn't blame him, one would never known by the music that was being played, and he was drinking.

Summary: Church business is church business and worldly business is worldly business, and there is church appropriate music and behavior, and there is appropriate behavior to be engaged in when you are not at church. When we go to church it ought to be to hear the word, to worship and to reverence God and things that are holy. Some ought to come to church in order to be converted, and others in order to seek growth in God.

If you want to party, dance, play basketball and video games, or sing worldly songs, gyrate or be entertained with jokes or dance, then there are places where you can do that, however, it should never be done at the church! The word teaches us to come out from among them and be seperate. The word also teaches us that "...we are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light".

The point is, one ought to be able to tell the difference and God's people ought to be different from the world! The people of the world and many in the church are actually laughing at the ministers in today's churches, they see you as a joke, they feel comfortable with you because you are just like them, carnal.

One woman saw her pastor out a dance one night and she commented, the pastor could dance better than anyone on the floor. Church rappers make more money than worldly rappers. The church dancers can outstep the worldly dancers, and the worldly dancers, their singers and their audiences are watching the so-called church folks!

Is Faith Evans former wife of the Notoroious BIG, in the church or not? Is Kirk Franklin of, I got the song 'Stomp' and lyrics of other of his hits from worldly singer George Clinton and other worldly entertainers, in the church or not?

Going back years ago, was Aretha Franklin, whose dad Rev. C. L. Franklin proclaimed that 'Aretha never left the church', in or out of the church? Why was there any question about whether or not Aretha was in the church?

Conclusion: A television pastor who was on one of the local television stations in the Los Angeles California area, went into the dealership in order to purchase a new car one day. Apparently his credit was not up to snuff, and he was almost turned away, when the owner of the dealership and his wife recognized him. They asked, aren't you the little funny man that comes on television every Sunday night.

The dealership's owner went on to say that my wife and I watch your show every Sunday night from bed, and we laugh! The minister looked at them and thought, well you folks looks pretty funny to me. How did the story end? Well, because they found the minister and his church service to be so hillarious, particularly when he danced, the dealer told his staff to give the minister any car on the lot that he desired on his okay! Hmm!!

Ministers, the people are talking about you today, and what I have been hearing from some is neither complimentary or flattering! Having said that, I imagine that the SHOW WILL GO ON - at least until God has had enough! And whose blood, will be required at the hands of the failed watchmen and watch women who failed to warn the people of the end that is to come, because they were too busy entertaining them?

Peace & Grace
Rev. C. Solomon


Addenda: Am I crazy? Yes, I know that when the church community desists from these practices that the people will stop coming, however, as God spoke
to Ezekiel, when you speak what I have told you to speak, they
will know that there has been a prophet in Israel. Today's
church members, many of them do not know that there has
been a prophet at the church because there hasn't
been one.

Sadly, some ministries knew beforehand what they were getting when they hired the minister that they hired. And, that is the reason that they hired the
minister that they hired in the first place. They wanted an
Aaron minister who would play ball, in other words
someone that they could dictate to - someone
who would play games. These congregations
never wanted to hear from God!

Folks, God did not send Jesus or his ministers to the earth to entertain the people. Jesus was sent and the ministers that he sent were sent in order that we might be saved. It really isn't time to play church.
And if you must play at all, and all of us enjoy a periodic respite or some recreation, do so on your time time. And at the very least, allow
all of the recreational activities of your church to be
placed under a seperate umbrella, and run out of a
seperate office at your church, then
let the spiritual aspects of
the church be directed by
by those who are
spiritual.

And with respect to the entertainment ministers particularly the males, order your
specially tailored suits, get your manicure and your pedicures. Then, have your
hair set, put on your make-up and put on a good show. But remember one
thing, GOD IS WATCHING THE SHOW and He is watching you TOO.
And God is not pleased!

Okay, I am preacher and here is my FINAL close. Imagine if you were still 'in the world', and one night you and your friends went to a club or a house party.
Imagine after arriving there if there were no drinks or drugs, no
party music and no salacious behavior. Now imagine if instead
someone brought out the bible and began to play authentic
church music. Would you stay? Conversely, the
churches have to ask themselves how come
people 'still in the world' are so
comfortable, when they come
to church - and when they
are finished, they still
go back to the club
or to the Party?

Why are the party people so comfortable
at the church today, as they dance,
sing and sway right along with
the music and modern hip
liturgies? Something
is wrong!

Question: Was John being judgmental when he wrote about the state of the 6 churches in Asia? And neither am I. Somethng is clearly broken in many of our churches in America today - and churches in other countries are beginning to follow the American church models!