The Unsung Tragedy of the Boston Bombing

So, last week was a crazy week! Explosions, bombings, shootings, earthquakes, tons of people hurt, lots of people dead/missing. It was a tragic week for us in America, but America wasn't the only place where tragic things happened, they happened all over the world, and last week wasn't the only week that tragic things happened, they happen every day. If you really watch the news and monitor world events constantly it would be pretty depressing because there is tragedy/violence/loss of life/insanity every day, all over. Sadly, a lot of these tragedies go completely unnoticed except for those directly involved in them.

Join the #EndItMovement to Stamp out Slavery

Today, February 27, 2013, many people are going silent in regards to social media in order to garner awareness for the 27,000,000 humans who are in slavery today. We all learned about slavery in our history classes, but the fact of the matter is that there are more human slaves today than there have been in any other point in history. It's absolutely terrible and sickening, if you think about it, but how many of us actually think about it? Truth is, I didn't have any idea until this past week. I knew human trafficking and sex slaves were rising problems, but was totally unaware of the magnitude of the issue.

The End It Movement is seeking to change this. This movement is seeking to not only free those who are currently trapped in slavery , but to offer them help and to ensure that no one else has to face it.

The Medium may Change, The Message Stays the Same

I have heard this phrase, or something similar, a lot in a lot of different situations, usually talking about how how the church introduces new methods and mechanisms of sharing God's Word. However, I was thinking about it the other day in a different light. If you look at the news today you will be assaulted with story after story of violence, murder, hatred, immorality, sexuality, destruction, darkness, evil... It's crazy and overwhelming and it can feel like the world is falling very rapidly towards its destruction and death. It is easy to look at the world today and say we are getting so much worse day after day, year after year. I've made this assertion, I believe. While it may be true that our society is on a downfall, or that certain countries or groups are "getting worse," the more I think about it it seems that in the grand scheme of things, we are no worse than any other time.

I was thinking about the world in the time of Christ and something dawned on me. Society during that time was full of all of the same things that we are full of today. There was widespread hatred and racism permeating society. Destruction, sensless violence and murder were normal occurances. Homosexuality, sexual promescuity, adultry and prostitution were commonplace and widely accepted. Drunkenness, drug use, theft, pride, and idolatry: every single one of these were rampant in society. People participated in them. This is obvious from reading history and from the fact that the Bible addresses them all. People during that time faced the same struggles and participated in the same evils that we do today. People during that time looked at their world and talked about how it was on the downfall and how things were really bad, just as we do today.

#EndOfTheWorldConfession

So today marks the long awaited day that the world is supposed to end, or at least so says some people who apparently misunderstood the Mayan calendar. Anyways, it's been a highly anticipated day for a long time, and guess what...Nothing seems to be happening. Is anyone surprised? Hopefully not really. I know that for me personally I didn't really believe that anything was going to happen today, but I must admit, there is a part of me that was kinda hoping for something.

I've said it before, "I want to live in a post-apocalyptic world. I want there to be some sort of societal collapse, and humanity to have to 'start over' in a sense." I think this is why I like the shows Revolution and Falling Skies. And, that is why I was slightly hoping that something happen today.

Here's my questions though:

1. Does anyone else secretly hope for something like this, or am I the only crazy one?
2. Why would I want something like this?

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.