When Religion Becomes a Reason To Hate

I read an article yesterday that made me absolutely livid. It was about the Shooting in Connecticut last Friday, but it wasn't about the shooter or his family, the school, the victims, or the survivors. It was about Westboro Baptist Church and their planned picketing of the funerals of the victims of the Sandy Hook shooting.

Now, there are a lot of things that make me sad and upset in this world, and the shooting last Friday is definitely one of them. I cannot possibly begin to understand what would possess a human being to shoot 6 and 7 year olds dead, for no reason, and right before Christmas no less. I don't get it, and it infuriates me and fills me with grief. Yet, I can still say, as I have written before, that that man needed God's love and forgiveness as much as anyone else, and I am as devastated over the fact that he took his own life as I am over the fact that he took the lives of 26 others.

When Osama bin Laden was killed I was not gleeful and joyful. I didn't celebrate his death, despite the fact that he was responsible for the deaths of thousands.

In the shooting in Aurora earlier this year, I wrote that the shooter needs forgiveness, and we need to pray for him, just as we need to pray for the victims' families.

All of these men are/were evil and committed unthinkable atrocities, and yet, I find the picketing of the funerals of these victims, these children, to be almost worse.

In response to WBC's announcement, the hacker group Anonymous launched a campaign against WBC with the intention of bringing them down and destroying them. They hacked one of their Twitter accounts, hacked their website, and posted personal information, including phone numbers, email addresses, physical addresses, and SSNs. They even successfully filed a death certificate for the "church's" spokesman, Shirley Phelps-Roper.

Felix Kusi, Ghana

Yesterday Manda and I got a packet in the mail. It was our Sponsor packet from Compassion International. This packet contained all the info about the little boy, Felix Kusi, that we recently sponsored. This little guy lives in Ghana, and is about to turn 5 on April 30. He is super cute, as you can see in the picture, and we are so happy to be sponsoring him!
It's amazing the dual heartache and joy that comes in sponsoring a kid across the globe. As we initially searched for a kid to sponsor, it was almost overwhelming, the sheer number of kids who live in poverty and sickness, who need help and support. It was impossible to pick a kid. I mean, how can you pick one over another? So we just basically sponsored the kid who had been waiting the longest, and that was Kusi. Now after that heartache, there is an incredible joy in knowing that we are going to be contributing to helping this little boy, to providing education, food, clothing, shelter, and the love of Christ.

This is something that we have been talking about for a long time, but always put off for various reasons, usually something along the lines of "we can't afford it right now," but really, we can absolutely afford it, as can a lot of people in the world, and almost everyone in the US, and secondly, if God is telling us to do something we need to do it, regardless of whether or not we think we can.

I am looking forward to getting letters from Kusi and getting to know more about him, and looking forward to writing to him and letting him know about Manda, Mallory and I! Since his birthday is coming up soon here, if anyone wants to leave a short birthday message for him we will try and send those in a special birthday note to him as well. :)

I encourage you, if you are not already, go sponsor a child! It's extremely rewarding, and you are giving hope and needed supplies to kids around the world.

Two organizations that I know are good are:

Compassion International
Website: http://www.compassion.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/compassionintl
Twitter: http://twitter.com/compassion
Google+: https://plus.google.com/107104884705564139268#107104884705564139268/posts
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/CompassionIntl
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/compassioninternational

World Vision
Website: http://www.worldvision.org
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/worldvision?lpos=bot_img_facebook
Twitter: http://twitter.com/WorldVisionUSA
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/worldvisionusa

"Pure and undefiled religion before our God and Father is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself unstained by the world." - James 1:27 HCSB

"Isn’t the fast I choose:
To break the chains of wickedness,
to untie the ropes of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free,
and to tear off every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
to bring the poor and homeless into your house,
to clothe the naked when you see him,
and not to ignore your own flesh and blood?
Then your light will appear like the dawn,
and your recovery will come quickly.
Your righteousness will go before you,
and the LORD’s glory will be your rear guard." - Isaiah 58:6-8 HCSB