Randolph Harris II International Institute

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But the Flower-Fed Buffaloes of the Spring Left Us Long Ago!

ImagePlant the seeds of expectation in your mind; cultivate thoughts that anticipate achievement. Believe in yourself as being capable of overcoming all obstacle and weaknesses. There are high spots in all of our lives and most of them come about through encouragement from someone else. Encouragement is oxygen for the soul. There was a brief two-day seminar with Otto Rank, and I found his therapy (not in his theory) he was emphasizing some of the things I had begun to learn. I felt stimulated and confirmed. I employed a social worker, trained in Rankian “relationship therapy” at the Philadelphia School of Social Work, and learned much from her. So my views shifted more an more. At Ohio State University, I was greatly enriched as I presented my views of clinical work to bright and questioning graduate students. Here too, I began to realize that I was saying something new, perhaps even original, about counseling and psychotherapy. My dream of recording therapeutic interviews came true, helping to focus my interest on the effects of different responses in the interview. This led to a heavy emphasis on technique—the so-called nondirective technique. #RandolphHarris 1 of 24

ImageHowever, I was finding that this new-found trust in my client and this capacity for exploring and resolving his problems reached out uncomfortably into other areas. If I trusted my clients, why did I not trust my student? If this was fine for the individual in trouble, why not for a staff group facing problems? I found that I had embarked not on a new method of therapy, but a sharply different philosophy of living and relationships. Controversies over the multiculturalism have been bitter and divisive. Proponents claim that a multicultural curriculum, for example, can facilitate an appreciation for diversity, increase tolerance, and improve relations between and among racial and ethic groups. Opponents claim that multicularualists devalue or relativize core national values and beliefs, shamelessly promote “identity politics,” and unwittingly increase racial tensions. Multiculturalism is often posed as the celebration of “differences” and unique form of material culture expressed, for example, in music, food, dance, and holidays. Such an approach tends to level the important differences and contradictions within and among racial and ethnic groups. Different groups possess different forms of power—the power to control resources, the power to push political agenda, and the power to culturally represent themselves and other groups. #RandolphHarris 2 of 24

ImageDifferent groups also have distinct perceptions of group position, which are related to, and implicated, in the organization of power. Some scholars and activists have defined racism as “prejudice plus power.” Using this formula, they argue that people of colour cannot be racist because they do not have power. However, things are not that simple. In the post-Civil Rights era, some marginalized racial groups have carved out a degree of power in select urban areas—particularly with respect to administering social services and distributing economic resources. This has led, in cities like Oakland and Miami, to conflicts between different ethnic groups over educational programs, business opportunities, and political power. We need to acknowledge and examine the historical and contemporary differences in power that different groups possess. White Americans do not experience their ethnicity as a definitive aspect of their social identity. Rather, they perceive it dimly and irregularly, picking and choosing among its varied strands that allow them to exercise an “ethnic option.” Ethnicity is flexible, symbolic, and voluntary for most White respondents in ways that it is not for non-White. #RandolphHarris 3 of 24

ImageThe loose affiliation with specific European ethnicities does not necessarily suggest the demise of any coherent group consciousness and identity. In the twilight of ethnicity, White racial identity may increase in salience. Indeed, in an increasingly diverse workplace and society. Whites experience a profound racialization. The racialization process foe White is evident on many college/university campuses as White student encounter a heightened awareness of race, which calls their own identity into question as every culture in America tries to define what is the true American race. With national security debates and security measure being put in place, Latino are trying harder to assert their heritage as the true Americans. Some Whites are feeling isolated because they have been taught to be more accepting of other cultures, while they see their heritage being stripped away with antique statues being ripped down and destroyed. Other White see this as a time to ban together and assert their supremacy by joining law enforcement and targeting other ethnic groups to ensure their demise. Blacks feel they never had the choice to be American or not and have been used to support and build this country and are being replaced by preferred immigrants who get treated better and more government support than anyone else. #RandolphHarris 4 of 24

ImageFor many Blacks, they have always felt like an outside group, while they understand that Britney Spears is the American Dream. She represents the true American with her blonde hair, blue eyes and red blood. In fact, the colours of the flag establish White identity, the red is for their blood, the white for their blonde hair and the blue for the colour of their eyes. And due to the fact that Britney Spears is one of the most influential and noticeable Americans Worldwide, many believe this is why she has suffered so many hardships. People are mad at Americans and America and took their frustration out of her. However, it is not only because of her heritage, but also because she achieved the American Dream at a young age by working hard, while other face oppression they cannot seem to overcome. Asians are kind of an outlier because their test scores, incomes, and educational levels, on average, tend to the be the highest of any group and their families tend to support each other, which creates a level of envy and people blame them for disasters they may not be responsible for. However, Eastern Europeans are becoming known for appealing to Japan for their IT skills. While America borrows heavily from China, if we are so concerned about national security, would it not make more sense to print our own money and potentially face hyperinflation, than to sell out and give other countries influence in our government? #RandolphHarris 5 of 24

Image Focus group interviews with White students at the University of California, Berkeley, reveals many of the themes and dilemmas of White identity in the current period: the “absence” of a clear culture and identity, the perceived “disadvantages” of being White with respect to the distribution of resources, and the stigma of being perceived as the “oppressors of the nation.” Such comments underscore the new problematic meanings attached to “White,” and debates about the meaning will continue, and perhaps deepen, in the years to come, fueled by such social issues as affirmative action, English-only initiatives, and immigrations policies. President Trump is having such a hard time keep the nation together because democrats are playing the victim cards and trying to seem like they are the saviour or our nation by pretending to care about people who have illegally immigrated to America. When the only reason they are supporting people, who have illegally immigrated, is to get more votes and stay in office. It is the same reason American had its first “Black” president and why Joe Biden is running with a woman. These are gimmicks to appeal to marginalized groups to stay in power. #RandolphHarris 6 of 24

ImageRacial meanings are profoundly influenced by state definitions and discursive practices. They are also shaped by interaction with prevailing forms of gender and class formation. An examination of both these topics reveals the fundamental instability of racial categories, their historically contingent character, and the ways they articulate with other axes of stratification and “difference.” Extending this understanding, it is crucial to relate to racial categories and meanings to concepts of racism. The idea of “race” and its persistence as a social category is only given meaning in a social order structured by forms of inequality—economic, political, and cultural—that are organized, to a significant degree, along racial lines. We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. Power is not a means; it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object is persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Power is a collective. The individual only has power in so far as one ceases to be an individual. Alone—free—the human being is always defeated. However, if one can make a complete, utter submission, if one can escape from one’s identity, if one can merge oneself to a political party so one is that party, the one is all-powerful and immortal. #RandolphHarris 7 of 24

ImagePower is power over human beings. Over the body—but, above all, over the mind. Obedience is not enough. Unless one is suffering, how can you be sure he or she is obeying your will and not one’s own? Power is inflicting pain and humiliation. Power is in tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of your own choosing. Do you begin to see, then, what kind of World we are creating? It is the exact opposite of the Utopias that the old reformers imagined. It is a World of fear, social distance, treachery, and torment. A World of trampling and being trampled upon, a World which will grow not less but more merciless as it refines itself. Progress in our World will be progress toward more pain. The ancient civilizations were founded upon justice and love. Ours is founded upon hatred. In our World there will be no emotions except fear, rage, triumph, and self-abasement. Everything else we shall destroy—everything. Already we are breaking down the habits of thought which survived from before the Revolution. We have cut links between child and parent, and between man and man, and between man and woman. No one dares trust a wife or a child or a friend any longer. Are you beginning to realize what that World will be like? The fictional news media is already playing ticks with reality. #RandolphHarris 8 of 24

ImageThe process of creating an unreal reality is conscious, or else it would not be carried out with sufficient precision, but it also has to be unconscious, or it would bring with it a feeling of falsity and hence of guilt. The media and many politicians use conscious deception while retaining the firmness of purpose that goes with complete honesty. To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just so long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one denies—all this is indispensably necessary. The lie is always a leap ahead of the truth. All past oligarchies have fallen from power either because they ossified or because they grow soft. This is why democrats make illegal immigration seem like it is about helping innocent women and children, but with people coming into this nation without being screened, you have no idea what diseases or viruses they may be carrying nor what their true purposes are. And the same people that support illegal immigration and the same exact people that want to keep Americans locked in their homes to “flatten the curve,” of economic prosperity. #RandolphHarris 9 of 24

ImageGovernments fail because either they become stupid and arrogant or fail to adjust themselves to the changing circumstances, and were overthrown, or they became liberal and cowardly, made concessions when they should have used force, and once again were overthrown.  They fell, that is to say, either through consciousness or through unconsciousness. If one is to rule, and to continue ruling, one must be able to dislocate the sense of reality. For the secret of rulership is to combine a belief in one’s own infallibility with the power to learn from past mistakes. World-conquest is believed in most firmly by those who know it to be impossible. Manifest destiny tells us that the World will be one big American Dream, and do you want it to be a World with too many government restrictions and social policies or one of Capitalism, where people are allowed to have freedom, work, earn money and achieve success? Or do you want the government to limit your success and make you shared the fruits of your labour with people who sit around eating, sleeping, rolling around in the bed gossiping, and partying all night? Some of these issues I worked out while at Ohio State, and when I was given an opportunity to start a new Counseling Center at the University of Chicago, setting my own policies and selecting my own staff, I was ready to formulate and act on what was for me a new approach to human relationships. #RandolphHarris 10 of 24

ImageI have come to trust the capacity of persons to explore and understand themselves and their troubles, and to resolve those problems, in any close, continuing relationship where I can provide a climate of real warmth and understanding. I am going to venture to put the same kind of trust in a staff group, endeavouring to build an atmosphere in which each is responsible for the actions of the group as a whole, and where the group has a responsibility to each individual. Authority has been given to me, and I am going to give it completely to the group. I am going to experiment with putting trust in students, in class groups, to choose their own directions and to evaluate their progress in terms of their own choosing. The depth of thought is a part of the depth of life. Most of our life continues on the surface. We are enslaved by the routine of our daily lives, in work and pleasure, in business and recreation. We are conquered by innumerable hazards, both good and evil. We are more drive than driving. We do not stop to look at the height above us, or to the depth below us. We are always moving forward, although usually in a circle, which finally beings us back to the place from which we fist moved. #RandolphHarris 11 of 24

ImageWe are in constant motion and never stop to plunge into the depth. We talk and talk and never listen to the voices speaking to our depth and from our depth. We accept ourselves as we appear to ourselves, and do not care what we really are like. Like a tidal wave, we injure our souls by the speed with which we move on the surface; and then we rush away, leaving our bleeding souls alone. We miss, therefore, our depth and our true life. And it is only when the picture that we have of ourselves breaks down completely, only when we find ourselves acting against all the expectations we had derived from that picture, and only when an Earthquake shakes and disrupts the surface of our self-knowledge, that we are willing to look into a deeper level of our being. Rage at oneself is externalized in three main ways. Where giving vent to hostility is uninhibited, anger is easily thrust outward. It is turned then against others and appears either as irritability in general or as a specific irritation directed at the very faults in others that the person hates in oneself. An illustration may make this clear. A patient complained of her husband’s indecision. Since the indecision concerned a trivial matter, her vehemence was directly out of proportion. #RandolphHarris 12 of 24

ImageKnowing her own indecision, I suggested that she had revealed how mercilessly she condemned this in herself. Whereupon she suddenly felt an insane rage, with her impulse to tear herself to pieces. The fact that in her idealized image she was a tower of strength made it impossible for her to tolerate any weakness in herself. Characteristically enough, this reaction, in spite of its highly dramatic nature, was completely forgotten at the next interview. She had seen the externalization in a flash but was not yet ready to relinquish it. The second way takes the form of an incessant conscious or unconscious fear or expectation that the faults which are intolerable to oneself will infuriate others. A person may be so convinced that certain behaviour on one’s part will arouse profound hostility that one may be honestly bewildered if no hostile response is encountered. A patient, for instance, whose idealized image contained elements of wanting to be as good as Prince Lestat in Anne Rice’s Blood Canticle, was greatly astonished to find that whenever she took a firm stand or even expressed anger, people like her better than when she acted like a saint. As one would guess from this kind of idealized image, the patient’s predominant tend was compliance. Issuing originally from her need for closeness to others, it was greatly reinforced by her excitation of hostile response. #RandolphHarris 13 of 24

ImageIncreased compliance is in fact one of the major consequences of this form of externalization, and illustrates how neurotic trends continually augment each other in a vicious circle. Compulsive compliance is increased because the idealized image, containing in this configuration elements of saintliness, drives the person to greater self-effacement. The resulting hostile impulses then arouse rage against the self. And the externalization of the rage, leading to an increased fear of others, in turn reinforces compliance. The third way of externalizing rage is to focus on bodily disorders. Rage against the self, when not experienced as such, apparently created physical tensions of considerable severity, which may appear as intestinal maladies, headaches, fatigue, and so on. It is illuminating to see how all these symptoms disappear with the speed of lightening as soon as the rage itself is consciously felt. One may be in doubt whether to call these physical manifestations externalization or to regard them merely as physiological consequences of repressed rage. However, one can hardly separate the manifestations from the use patients make of them. As a rule they are more than eager to ascribe their psychic troubles to their bodily ailments and these in turn to some external provocation. #RandolphHarris 14 of 24

ImageThere is nothing psychically wrong with them, they are interested to prove; they just suffer from intestinal trouble due to wrong diet, or from fatigue due to overwork, or from rheumatism due to damp air, and so on. As to what the neurotic accomplishes by externalizing one’s rage, the same may be said here as in the case of self-contempt. One additional consideration should, however, be mentioned. The lengths to which such patients go will not be fully understood unless one is cognizant of the real danger attached to these self-destructive impulses. The patient cited in the first example had only a momentary impulse to hear herself to pieces, but psychotics may really carry it through and mutilate themselves. There is a self-destructive instinct. If not for externalization, it is probable that many more suicides would occur. It is understandable that Dr. Freud, being aware of the power of self-destructive impulses, should have postulated a self-destructive instinct (death instinct)—though by this concept he barred the way to a real understanding, and so to an effective therapy. The wisdom of all ages and of all continents speaks about the road to our depth, not the road to our death. It has been described in innumerably different ways. #RandolphHarris 15 of 24

ImageHowever, all those who have been concerned—mystic and priests, poets and philosophers, simple people and educated people—with that road through confession, lonely self-scrutiny, internal or external catastrophes, prayer, contemplation, have witnessed to the same experience. They have found that they were not what they believed themselves to be, even after a deeper level had appeared to them below the vanishing surface. That deeper level itself became surface, when a still deeper level was discovered, this happening again and again, as long as their very lives, as long as they kept on the road to their depth. All things are said to be seen in God and all things are judged in Him, because by the participation of His light, we know and judge all things; for the light of natural reason itself is participation of the divine light; as likewise we are said to see and judge of sensible things in the Sun, for example, by the Sun’s light. The lessons of instruction can only be seen as it were by their own Sun, namely God. As therefore in order to see a sensible object, it is not necessary to see the substance of the Sun, so in like manner to see any intelligible object, it is not necessary to see the essence of God. Intellectual vision is of the things which are in the soul by their essence, as intelligible things are in the intellect. #RandolphHarris 16 of 24

ImageAnd thus God is in the souls of the blessed; not this is He in our soul, but by presence, essence and power. Jacob recounts Jewish history: the Babylonian captivity and return; the ministry and crucifixion of the Holy One of Israel; the help received from the Gentiles; and the Jews’ latter0day restoration when they believe in the Messiah. About 559-545 Before Christ. “The words of Jacob, the brother of Nephi, which he spake unto the people of Nephi: Behold, my beloved brethren, I, Jacob, having been called of God and ordained after the manner of his holy order, and having been consecrated by my brother Nephi, unto whom ye look as a king or a protector, and on whom ye depend for safety, behold ye know that I have spoken unto you exceedingly many things. Nevertheless, I speak unto you again; for I am desirous for the welfare of your souls. Yea, mine anxiety is great for you; and ye yourselves know that it ever has been. For I have exhorted you will all diligence; and I have taught you the words of my father; and I have spoken unto you concerning all things which are written, from the creation of the World. And now, behold, I would speak unto you concerning things which are, and which are to come; wherefore, I will read you the words of Isaiah. #RandolphHarris 17 of 24

Image“And they are the words which my brother desired that I should speak unto you. And I speak unto you for your sakes, that ye may learn and glorify the name of your God. And now, the words which I shall read are they which Isaiah spake concerning all the house of Israel; wherefore, they may be likened unto you, for ye are of the house of Israel. And there are many things which have been spoke by Isaiah which may be likened unto you, because ye are of the house of Israel. And now, these are the words: Thus saith the Lord God: Behold, I will lift up mine hand to the Gentiles, and set up my standard to the people; and they shall bring thy sons in their arms, and thy daughters shall be carried upon their shoulders. And kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and their queens thy nursing mothers; they shall bow down to thee with their faces towards the Earth, and lick up the dust of thy feet; and thou shalt know that I am the Lord; for they shall not be ashamed that wait for me. And now I, Jacob, would speak somewhat concerning these words. For behold, the Lord has shown me that those who were at Jerusalem, from whence we came, have been slain and carried away captive. Nevertheless, the Lord has shown unto me that they should return again and again. #RandolphHarris 18 of 24

Image “And he also has shown unto me that the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel, should manifest himself unto them in the flesh; and after he should manifest himself they should scourge him and crucify him, according to the words of the Angel who spoke unto me. And after they have hardened their hearts and stiffened their necks against the Holy One of Israel, behold, the judgments of the Holy One of Israel shall come upon them. And the day cometh that they shall be smitten and afflicted. Wherefore, after they are driven to and fro, for thus saith the Angel, many shall be afflicted in the flesh, and shall not be suffered to perish, because of the prayers of the faithful; they shall be scattered, and smitten, and hated; nevertheless, the Lord will be merciful unto them that when they shall come to the knowledge of their Redeemer, they shall be gathered together again to the lands of their inheritance. And blessed are the Gentiles, they of whom the prophet has written; for behold, if it so be that they shall repent and fight not against Zion, and do not unite themselves to the great and abominable church, they shall be saved; for the Lord God will fulfill his covenants which he has made unto his children; and for this cause the prophet has written these things.  #RandolphHarris 19 of 24

Image“Wherefore, they that fight against Zion and the covenant people of the Lord shall lick of the dust of their feet; and the people of the Lord shall not be ashamed. For the people of the Lord are they who wait for him; for they still wait for the coming of the Messiah. And behold, according to the words of the prophet, the Messiah will set himself again the second time to recover them; wherefore, he will manifest himself unto them in power and great glory, unto the destruction of their enemies, when that day cometh when they shall believe in him; and none will he destroy that believe in him. And they that believe not in him shall be destroyed, both by fire, and by tempest, and by Earthquakes, and by bloodsheds, and by pestilence, and by famine. And they shall know that the Lord is God, the Holy One of Israel. For shall the prey be taken from the mighty, or the lawful captive delivered? However, thus saith the Lord: Even the captives of the might shall be taken away, and the prey of the terrible shall be delivered; for the Mighty God shall deliver his covenant people. #RandolphHarris 20 of 24

Image“For thus saith the Lord: I will content with them that contendeth with thee—and I will feed them that oppress thee, with their own flesh; and they shall be drunken with their own blood as with sweet wine; and all flesh shall know that I the Lord am thy Saviour and thy Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob,” reports 2 Nephi 6.1-18. Lord, have mercy upon your children. Christ, have mercy upon your people. Lord, have mercy upon humanity. O Christ, hear us. Be merciful, please Spare us, O Lord. Be merciful, Deliver us, O Lord. From all evil, O Lord, deliver us. From our sin; from unholy thoughts; from pain and anguish; from the snares of the devil; from the power of demons; from all tribulation at this time; from everlasting damnation; from Thine exceedingly dreadful wrath; by the mystery of Thy holy Incarnation; by Thine Advent; by Thy Nativity; by Thy Baptism; by Thy Passion and Cross; by Thy glorious Resurrection; by Thy wonderful Ascension; by the grace of the Holy Ghost the Comforter; in the hour of his departure; we sinners do beseech Thee to hear us; that Thou remove from us Thy wrath; We beseech Thee to hear us, O Lord. That it may please Thee to give us a humbled and contrite heart; that it may please Thee to give us a fountain of tears, that it may please Thee to give us perfect faith, hope, and love. #RandolphHarris 21 of 24

ImageWe beseech thee that Thou wouldest take away from us all murmuring and impatience; that it may please Thee mercifully to raise us from the bed of sickness; that it may please Thee to restore us in health and safety to Thy holy Church; that it may please Thee to give us pardon of all sins; that it may please Thee to give us Thy grace; that it may please Thee to give us eternal life; that it may please Thee to bless us with Thy holy right hand; Son of God; O lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the World; have mercy upon us, and upon the Earth, O Lord. O Lover of Thy people, Thou hast placed my whole being in the hands of Jesus, my redeemer, commander, husband, friend, and carest for me in Him. Keep me holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners; may I not know the voice of strangers, but go to Him where He is, and follow where He leads. Thou hast bathed me once for all in the sin-removing fountain, cleanse me now from this day’s defilement, from its faults, deficiencies of virtue, harmful extremes, that I may exhibit a perfect character in Jesus. O Master, who didst wash the disciples’ feet, please be very patient with me, be very condescending to my faults, go on with me till Thy great work in me is completed. #RandolphHarris 22 of 24

ImageI desire to conquer self in every respect, to overcome the body with its affections and lusts, to keep under my flesh, to guard my humahood from all grosser sins, to check the refined power of my natural mind, to live entirely to Thy glory, to be deaf to unmerited censure and the praise of humans. Nothing can hurt my new-born inner human, it cannot be smitten or die; nothing can mar the dominion of Thy Spirit within me; it is enough to have Thy approbation and that of my conscience. Keep me humble, dependent, supremely joyful, as calm and quiet as a nursing child, yet earnest and active. I wish not so much to do as to be, and I long to be like Jesus; if Thou dost make me right I shall be right; Lord, I belong to Thee, make me worthy of Thyself, please. Our natural knowledge begins from sense. Hence our natural know can go as far as it can be led by sensible things. However, our mind cannot be led by sense so far as to see the essence of God; because the sensible effects of God do not equal the power of God as their cause. Hence from the knowledge of sensible things the whole power of God cannot be known; nor therefor can His essence be seen. #RandolphHarris 23 of 24

ImageHowever, because they are His effect and depend on their cause, we can be led from them so far as to know of God, whether He exits, and to know of Him what must necessarily belong to Him, as first cause of all things, exceeding all things caused by Him. Hence we know that God’s relationship with creatures so far as to be the cause of them all; also that creatures differ from Him, inasmuch as He is not in any way part of what is caused by Him; and that creatures are not removed from God by reason of any defect on His part, but because He superexceeds them all. Reason cannot reach up to simple form, so as to know “what it is,” but it can know “whether it is.” God is known by natural knowledge through the images of his effects. As the knowledge of God’s essence is by grace, it belongs only to the good; but the knowledge of Hum by natural reason can belong both good and bad; and hence Augustine says, retracting what he had said before: “I do not approve what I said in prayer, ‘God who willest that only the pure should know truth.’ For it can be answered that many who are not pure can know many truths,” for example by natural reason. #RandolphHarris 24 of 24Image

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It is Warm Work and this Day May be the Last to Any of Us at a Moment—But I Would Not be Elsewhere for Thousands!

ImageI have found that if you love life, life will love you back. I accept life unconditionally. Life holds so much—so much to be happy about always. And keep in mind, a pint of example is worth a gallon of advice. Have the courage to say no. Have the courage to face the truth. Do the right thing because it is right. These are the magic keys to living your life with integrity. Though the Philistines may jostle, you will rank as an apostle in the high aesthetic band, if you walk down Picadilly with a poppy or lily in your medieval hand. And everyone will say, as you walk your flowery way, “If he or she is content with a vegetable love which would certainly not suit me, why, what a most particularly pure young man or young woman this pure young person must be!” The confusion of moral values and artistic design found expression in the Aesthetic Movement, a credo of the late nineteenth century. At its heart was the belief that good design or beauty is elevating and that bad design or ugliness is corrupting. Followers of the Aesthetic Movement believed that Truth and Beauty were intertwined and that Falsehood and Ugliness were one. Aesthetics, then, had a moral implication, and good proportion, honesty, and harmony with natural laws were as much a characteristic of personal morality as of design. #RandolphHarris 1 of 23

ImageThis movement began in England and was Championed by the “Goths,” that is, the supporters of the Gothic Revival. In general, they wanted to restore the ritual and mystery of the medieval church and remove the more recent “low church” alterations which bring the congregation and the priest closer together. They came to believe in Gothic as the peculiarly English style (despite the Abbe Suger, Notre-Dame de Paris,Saint-Denis, and Chartres). Aesthetic Movement devotees generally fell into two camps. One camp led by John Ruskin (he celebrated the buildings of medieval Venice and believed that Gothic design was superb because it was the honest work of true crafts-people who worked anonymously and cared more for the glory of God than the glory of artistic fame), the great art critic of his time, felt that art must be inspired by nature to be true good, that no creation of compass and rule with mechanical repetition could ever hope to contain the spark of true art. Gothic Venice stood for an organic, communal way of life, and the beauty of its buildings reflects a wholesome social order. The most famous practitioner in this branch of the Aesthetic Movement was William Morris, whose plant-design wallpapers and carpets became very popular. #RandolphHarris 2 of 23

ImageThe Aesthetic Movement, was also known as “art for art’s sake,” and it permeated British culture during the latter part of the nineteenth century, as well as spreading to other countries such as the Untied States of America. The idea that beauty was the most important element in life, lead writers, artists, and designers to create works that were admired simply for their beauty rather than any narrative or moral function. The movement blossomed into a cult devoted to the creation of beauty in all avenues of life from art and literature, to home decorating, to fashion, and embracing a new ornate style. The other camps of aestheticians had a number of famous leaders. They believed that the direct imitation of nature in the applied arts was fakery. They deplored the use of perspective and modeling in wallpapers and carpet and insisted on flat, “conventionalized” forms for flat surfaces. Charles Locke Eastlake was a spokes-person for this camp. He wrote Hints on Household Taste and made the Aesthetic Movement popular in America. Another one of the most famous people in the Aesthetic Movement was Sarah Winchester with her World famous, marvelous, Gothic Queen Anne Victorian mansion. #RandolphHarris 3 of 23

ImageOwen Jones, the chronicler of ornament and cofounder of the South Kensington School (later part of the Victoria and Albert Museum) was a famous champion. Another, of many, noteworthy people, and later infamous, spokes-person for this group of aesthetes was the writer Oscar Wilde. It is through his persecution as a homosexual that the word “aesthetic” has come to have conflicting implications. As a result, the Aesthetic Movement came to be regarded as both a moral crusade and an “immoral effeminate” circle at the same time. To understand this movement, however, one must look at the World against which they were reacting. The middle of the nineteenth century saw the end of crafted home furnishings in America. Just as the Rococo Revival style became popular, it became possible to make everything by the carload. Curved parlor chairs with naturalistically carved roses at the crest became the rage. Wallpapers with roses and ribbons were printed in so many modulated colours that they seemed three-dimensional. Wall-to-wall, Aubusson, patterned carpets had more roses and arabesque. China was transfer-printed with French shepherdesses and more roses. All of this factory-made prettiness in the French tastes was cloying to English aesthetic tastes. Badly made furniture and lumpy vases with oddly placed roses made them cringe. #RandolphHarris 4 of 23

ImagePeople usually worked together to give the exteriors of Victorian houses a bright, elegant look and to highlight the carving and detail on the pillars and panels. Sometimes flowers on the houses might be painted a colour like navy blue on the capital as a lark. An element many Queen Anne’s have is a tower or a turret with a witches cap. Victorians were big on celebrating holidays, which is why one can find many religious and occult symbols and patterns on these estates. When we turn to the great tradition of Western political thought with questions about the justice of the treatment of the genders in mind, it is to little avail. Bold feminists like Mary Astell, Mary Wollstonecraft, William Thompson, Harriet Taylor, and George Bernard Shaw have occasionally challenged the tradition, often using its own premises and arguments to overturn its explicit or implicit justification of the equality of women. However, John Stuart Mills is a rare exception to the rule that those central position in the tradition almost never question the justice of the subordination of women. This phenomenon is undoubtedly due in part to the fact that Aristotle, whose theory of justice has been so influential, relegated women to a sphere of “household justice”—populated by person who are not fundamentally equal to the free men who participate in political justice, but inferiors whose natural function is to serve those who are more fully human. #RandolphHarris 5 of 23

ImageThe liberal tradition, despite its supposed foundation of individual rights and human equality, is more Aristotelian in this respect than is generally acknowledged. In one way or another, almost all liberal theorists have assumed that the “individual” who is the basic subject of the theories is the male head of the household. Thus they have not usually considered applying the principle of justice to women or to relations between the genders. When we turn to contemporary theories of justice, however, we expect to find more illuminating and beneficial contributions to the subject of gender and justice. As the mission of the family and the falseness of their gender-neutral language suggest, however, mainstream contemporary theories of justice do not address the subject any better than those of the past. Theories of justice that apply to only half of us simply will not do; the inclusiveness falsely implied by the current use of gender-neutral terms must become real. Theories of justice must apply to all of us, and to all of human life, instead of assuming silently that half of us take care of whole areas of life that are considered outside the scope of social justice. In a just society, the structure and practice of families must afford women the same opportunities as men to develop their capacities, to participate in political power, to influence social choices, and to be economically as well as physically secure. #RandolphHarris 6 of 23

ImageUnfortunately, much feminists intellectual energy in 2020 has gone into the claim that “justice” and “right” are masculinist ways of thinking about morality that feminists should eschew or radically revise, advocating a morality of care. The emphasis is misplaced, I think, for several reasons. First, what is by now a vast literature on the subject shows that the evidence for differences in women’s and men’s ways of thinking about moral issues is not (at least yet) very clear; neither is the evidence about the source of whatever differences there might be. It may well turn out that any differences can be readily explained in terms of roles, including female primary parenting, that are socially determined and therefore alterable. There is certainly no evidence—nor could there be, in such a gender-structured society—for concluding that women are somehow naturally more inclined toward contextuality and away from universalism in their moral thinking, a false concept that unfortunately reinforces the old stereotypes that justify separate spheres. The capacity of reactionary forces to capitalize on the “different moralities” strain in feminism is particularly evident in an Apostolic Letter from Pope John Paul II, “On The Dignity of Women,” in which he refers to woman’s special capacity to care for others in arguing for confining them to motherhood or celibacy. #RandolphHarris 7 of 23

ImageSecond, I think the distinction between an ethic of justice and an ethic of care has been overdrawn. The best theorizing about justice, I argue, has integral to it the notions of care and empathy, of thinking of the interests and well-being of others who may be very different from ourselves. It is, therefore, misleading to draw a dichotomy as though they were two contrasting ethics. The best theorizing about justice is not some abstract “view from nowhere,” but results from the carefully attentive consideration of everyone’s point of view. This means, of course, that the best theorizing about justice is not good enough if it does not, or cannot readily be adapted to, include women and their points of view as fully as men and their points of view. But what are the conditions that change the equilibrium and mobilize aggression? What are the causes of “innate” aggression in animals and humans? If we can figure this out, we can then start to understand why some people feel threated by the equality of women. In reviewing both the neurophysiological and the psychological literature on animals and human aggression, the conclusion seems unavoidable that aggressive behaviour of animals is a response to any king of threat to the survival. #RandolphHarris 8 of 23

ImageOr, as I would prefer to say more generally, to the vital interests of the animal—whether as an individual or as a member of its species. This general definition comprises many different situations. The most obvious are a direct threat to the life of the individual or a threat to one’s requirements for sex and food; a more complex form is that of “crowding,” which is a threat to the need for physical space and/or to the social structure of the group. However, what is common to all conditions for the arousal of aggressive behaviour is that they constitute a threat to vital interests. Mobilization of aggression is the corresponding brain areas occurs in the service of life, in response to threats to the survival of the individual or of the species; that is to say, phylogenetically programmed aggression, as it exists in animals and humans, is a biologically adaptive defense reaction. That this should be so is not surprising if we remember the Dr. Darwinian principle in regard to the evolution of the brain. Since it is the function of the brain to take care of survival, it would provide for immediate reactions to any threat to survival. Do men think they will be robbed of their roles as providers and be forced to submit and be subordinate? #RandolphHarris 9 of 23

ImageWell, some people also believe that the lessening of women’s dependence on their husbands is what is to blame for the weakening of the family stability. Some people believe that paid work is “men’s” and it is “fathers” who bequeath wealth or poverty on their children. Aggression is by no means the only form of reaction to threats. The animal reacts to threats to one’s existence either with rage and attack or with fear and flight. In fact, flight seems to be the more frequent form of reaction, except when the animal has no chance to flee and therefore fights—as the ultima ratio—the final argument and also the last resort. Dr. Hess was the first to discover that by the electrical stimulation of certain regions of the hypothalamus of a cat, the animal would react either by attack or by flight. As a consequence he subsumed these two kinds of behaviours under the category of “defense reactions,” indicating that both reactions are in defense of the animal’s life. So with the oppression of women, it may be a primitive function in the brains of some people, that is triggered as a response to make sure there will still be homemakers and someone to produce children. This urge to discriminate against women could be a subconscious behaviour that some are not aware of because they have not been made to go to therapy and unearth the issues they are having subconsciously. #RandolphHarris 10 of 23

ImageBy ignoring that people need help and not punishing those who are not acting righteously, we are producing and allowing a sick society to flourish. Any animal, regardless of it species, reacts to a life-threatening attack with one of two patterns of behaviour: either with flight, or with aggression and violence—that is, fight. The brain always acts as a unit in directing any behaviour; consequently, the mechanisms in the brain that initiate and limit these two dissimilar patterns of self-preservation are closely linked to one another, as well as to all other parts of the brain; and their proper functioning depends on the synchronization of many complex and delicately balanced subsystems. A further important impediment to criticism and accusation is directly linked up with the basic anxiety. If the outside World is felt to be hostile, if one feels helpless toward it, then taking any risk of annoying people seems sheer recklessness. For the neurotic the danger appears all the greater, and the more one’s feeling of safety is based on the affection of others the more one is afraid of losing that affection. For one annoying another person has an entirely different connotation from what it has for the normal person. #RandolphHarris 11 of 23

ImageSince one’s own relations to others are thin and fragile one cannot believe that others’ relations toward one are any better. Hence one feels that annoying them involves the danger of a final break; one expects to be dropped altogether, to be definitely spurned or hated. Besides, one assumes consciously or unconsciously that others are as much terrified as one is of being found out and criticized, and therefore one is inclined to treat them with as much delicacy as one would have them use toward one. One’s extreme fear of making or even feeling accusations put one in a special dilemma because, as we have seen, one is filled with pent-up resentment. In fact, as everyone knows who is acquainted with neurotic behaviour, plenty of accusations do find expression, sometimes in veiled, sometimes in open and most aggressive forms. Since I nevertheless asset that there is an essential meekness toward criticism and accusation it is worth while to discuss briefly the conditions under which such accusations will find expression. They may be expressed under the stress of despair, more specifically, when the neurotic feels one has nothing to lose by it, when one feels that one will be rejected in any cause, regardless of one’s behaviour. #RandolphHarris 12 of 23

ImageSuch an occasion arises, for example, if one’s special efforts to be kind and considerate are not returned right away or are rejected. Whether one’s accusations are discharged explosively in one scene, or whether they last for some time, depends on the duration of one’s despair. One may in a single crisis thrust upon others all one has ever held against them, or one’s accusations my extend over a longer period. One really means what one says, and expects the others to take it seriously—with the secret hope, however, that they will realize the depth of one’s despair and therefore condone one. Even with no despair a similar condition exists if the accusations concern person whom the neurotic consciously hates and from whom one expects nothing good. In another condition, which we shall discuss presently, the very element of sincerity is missing. If one feels that one is, or is in danger of being, found out and accused, the neurotic can also be accusatory with more or less vehemence. The danger of upsetting others may then appear as the lesser evil compared to the danger of being disapproved of. One feels oneself in an emergency and makes a counter-attack, like an animal which is apprehensive by nature and strikes out when in danger. #RandolphHarris 13 of 23

ImagePatients may thrust violent accusations upon the analyst (or wife, husband, child, and so forth) at the time when they are most afraid of something being uncovered, or when they have done something for which they anticipate disapproval. Unlike the accusations made under the stress of despair, attacks of this kind are made blindly. They are expressed without any conviction of being right about them, for they are born out of a sheer feeling of the need to ward off an immediate danger, regardless of what means are used. While they may incidentally contain reproaches which are felt to be real, in the main they are exaggerated and fantastic. Deep down the neurotic does not believe in them oneself, does not expect them to be take seriously and is greatly amazed if the others does so, if the other, for example, enters into a serious argument or shows signs of being hurt. When we realize the fear of accusation that is inherent in the neurotic structure, and when we realize furthermore the ways in which this fear is dealt with, then we can understand why on the surface the picture is often contradictory in this respect. A neurotic person is often unable to express a warranted criticism, even though one is full of intense accusations. #RandolphHarris 14 of 23

ImageEvery time one loses something one may be convinced that the maid or his wife has stolen it, but be quite unable to accuse her or even to object because she has not served dinner punctually. The accusations which one does express have often somehow a character of unreality, are not to the point, have a false colouring, are unwarranted or entirely fantastic. As a patient one may fling at the analyst wild accusations of ruining him, but be unable to express a sincere objection to the analyst’s taste in coffee. To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously two opinions which cancelled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them, to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to believe that democracy is impossible, to forget, whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it back into memory again at the moment when it is needed, and the promptly to forget it gain, and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself—that is the ultimate subtlety: consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, one again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you have just performed. Even to understand the word “doublethink” involves the use of doublethink. #RandolphHarris 15 of 23

ImageThese open expressions of accusations are not usually sufficient to discharge all the pent-up resentment that is present. In order to do that indirect ways are necessary, ways which allow the neurotic to express one’s resentment without being away that one does. Some of it comes out inadvertently, some is shifted from the person one really means to accuse to comparatively indifferent persons—a woman may scold her maid, for example, when she had a grudge against her husband—or to circumstances or fate in general. These are safety valves which in themselves are not specific for neuroses. The specifically neurotic method for expressing accusations indirectly and unconsciously is to use the medium of suffering. By suffering the neurotic may present oneself as a living reproach. A wife wo becomes ill because her husband comes home late expresses her grudge more effectively than by making a scene, and also reaps the advantage of appearing in her own eyes as an innocent martyr. The family is a crucial determinant of our opportunities in life, of what we “become.” It has frequently been acknowledged by those concerned with real equality of opportunity that the family presents a problem. However, though they have discerned a serious problem, these theorists have underestimated it because they have seen only half of it. #RandolphHarris 16 of 23

ImageThey have seen that the disparity among families in terms of the physical and emotional environment, motivation, and material advantage they can give their children has a tremendous effect upon children’s opportunities in life. We are not born as isolated, equal individuals in our society, but into family situations: some in the social middle, some poor and without homes, and some superaffluent; some to a single soon-to-be-separated parent, some to parents whose marriage is fraught with conflict, some to parents who will stay together in love and happiness. Any claims that equal opportunity exists are therefore completely unfounded. Decades of neglect of the poor, especially of poor African American and Hispanic House-holds, accentuated by the policies of the Reagen years, have brought us farther from the principles of equal opportunity. To come close to hem would require, for example, a high and uniform standard of public education and the provision of equal social services—including health care, employment training, job opportunities, drug rehabilitation, and decent housing—for all who need them. In the Book of Mormon, in 1 Nephi, Chapter 21, the Messiah will be a light to the gentiles and will free the prisoners—Israel will be gathered with power in the last days—Kings will be their nursing fathers—Compare Isaiah 49. About 588-570 Before Christ. #RandolphHarris 17 of 23

Image“And again: Hearken, O ye house of Israel, all ye that are broke off and are driven out because of the wickedness of the pastors of my people; yea, all ye that are broke off, that are scattered abroad, who are of my people, O house of Israel. Listen, O isles, unto me, and hearken ye people from far; the Lord hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath He made mention of my name. And He hath made my mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of his hand hath hid me, and made me a polished shaft; in his quiver hath he hid me; and said unto me: Thou art my servant, O Israel, in whom I will be glorified. Then I said, I have labored in vain, I have spent my strength for naught and in vain; surely my judgement is with the Lord, and my work with God. And now, saith the Lord—that formed me from the womb that I should be His servant, to bring Jacob again to him—through Israel be not gathered, yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord, and my God shall be my strength. And He said: It is a light thing that thou shouldst be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel. I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the ends of the Earth. Thus saith the Lord, the Redeemer of Israel, his Holy One, to Him who humans despiseth, to Him whom the nations abhorreth, to servant of rulers: Kings shall see and arise, princes also shall worship because of the Lord that is faithful. #RandolphHarris 18 of 23

Image“Thus saith the Lord: In an acceptable time have I heard thee, O isles of the sea, and in a day of salvation have I helped thee; and I will preserve thee, and give thee my servant for a covenant of the people, to establish the Earth, to cause to inherit the desolate heritages; that thou mayest say to the prisoners: Go forth; to them that sit in darkness: Show yourselves. They shall feed in the ways, and their pastures shall be in all high paces. They shall not hunger nor thirst, neither shall the heat nor the Sun smite them; for he that hath mercy on them shall lead them, even by the springs of water shall He guide them. And I will make all my mountains a way, and my highways shall be exalted. And then, O house of Israel, behold, these shall come from far; and lo, these from the north and the west; and these from the land of Sinim. Sing, O Heavens; and be joyful, O Earth; for the feet of those who are in the east shall be established; and break forth into singing, O mountains; for they shall be smitten no more; for the Lord hath comforted his people, and will have mercy upon his afflicted. However, behold, Zion hath said: The Lord hath forgotten me—but he will show that he hath not. For can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yes, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee, O house of Israel. #RandolphHarris 19 of 23

Image“Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me. Thy children shall make haste against thy destroyers; and they that made thee waste shall go forth of thee. Lift up thine eyes round about and behold; all these gather themselves together, and they shall come to thee. And as I live saith the Lord, thou shalt surely clothe thee with them all, as with an ornament, and bind them on even as a bride. For thy waste and thy desolate places, and the land of thy destruction, shall even now be too narrow by reason of the inhabitants; and they that swallowed thee up shall be far away. The children whom thou shalt have, after thou hast lost the first, shall again in thine ears say: The place is too strait for me; give place to me that I may dwell. Then shalt thou say in thine heart: Who hath begotten me these, seeing I have lost my children, and am desolate, a captive, and removing to and fro? And who hath brought up these? Behold, I was left alone; these, where have they been? Thus saith the Lord God: behold, I will lift up mine hand to the Gentiles, and set up my standard to the people; and they shall bring thy sons in their arms, and thy daughters shall be carried upon their shoulders. And kings shall by thy nursing fathers, and their queens thy nursing mothers; they shall bow down to thee with their face towards the Earth, and lick up the dust of thy feet; and thou shalt know that I am the Lord; for thy shall not be ashamed that wait for me. #RandolphHarris 20 of 23

Image“For shall the prey be taken from the mighty, or the lawful captives delivered? However, thus saith the Lord, even the captives of the mighty shall be take away, and the prey of the terrible shall be delivered; for I will contend with one that contendeth with thee, and I will save thy children. And I will feed them that oppress thee with their own flesh; they shall be drunken with their own blood as with sweet wine; and all flesh shall know that I, the Lord, am thy Saviour and thy Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob,” reports 1 Nephi 21.1-26. With the work of God in our sanctification, transforming work of progressive sanctification is the work of God’s Spirit. He is the One who changes us more and more into the likeness of Jesus Christ. This transformation is much more than merely a change of outward conduct. It is a renovation of our inner beings, or as someone has said, it is a transformation of the essential being. It means our motives as well as our motivations are being constantly changed, so that we can say with the psalmist, “Oh, how I love your law! I meditate on it all day long,” and “I rejoice in the following your statues as one rejoices in great riches,” reports Psalm 119.47 and 14. However, although the verb be transformed is in the passive voice, it is in the imperative mood; that is, it is a command to do something. #RandolphHarris 21 of 23

ImageThis indicates that we as believers are not passive in this transforming process. We are not like blocks of marble being transformed into a beautiful sculpture by a master sculptor. God has given us a mind and hearth with which to respond to and cooperate with the Spirit as He does His work in us. That thought leads naturally to the Scripture passage that is considered to be the classic statement of the working together of the believer with the Holy Spirit who is at work within him. “Therefore, my dream friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and act according to His good purpose,” reports Philippians 2.12-13. O God, Who ever governest Thy creatures with tender affection; incline Thine ear to our supplications, and graciously regard Thy servants, who are suffering from bodily sickness; and visit them with Thy salvation, and bestow the medicine of Heavenly grace; through Jesus Christ our Lord. O Lord, Length of days does not profit me except the days are passed in thy presence, in Thy service, to Thy glory. #RandolphHarris 22 of 23

ImageO God, Who hast vouchedsafe to humankind the remedies that bring salvation, and the gifts of eternal life; preserve to Thy servant the gifts of Thy power, and grant that not only in one’s body, but also in one’s soul, one may experience Thy healing; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Please give me a grace that precedes, follows, guides, sustains, sanctifies, assists every hour, that I may not be one moment apart from Thee, but may rely on Thy Spirit to supply every thought, speak in every word, direct every step, prosper every work, build up every mote of faith, and give me a desire to show forth Thy praise; testify Thy love, advance Thy kingdom. I launch my bark on the unknow waters of this year, with Thee, O Father, as my habour, Thee, O Son, at my helm, Thee, O Holy Spirit, filling my sails. Guide me to Heaven with my loins grit, my lamp burning, my ear open to Thy calls, my heart full of love, my soul free. Give me Thy grace to sanctify me, Thy comforts to cheer, thy wisdom to teach, Thy right hand to guide, Thy counsel to instruct, Thy law to judge, Thy presence to stabilize. May Thy fear by my awe, Thy triumph my joy. #RandolphHarris 23 of 23Image

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ImageAnd can I ever bid these joys farewell? Yes, I must pass them for a nobler life, where I may find the agonies, the strife of human hearts: for lo! I see afar, O’ersailing the blue cragginess, a car and steeds with streamy manes–the charioteer looks out upon the winds with glorious fear: and now the numerous tramplings quiver lightly along a huge cloud’s ridge; and now with springtly wheel downward come they into freshers skies, tipt round with silver from the Sun’s bright eyes. Still downward with with capacious whirl they glide; and now I see them on the green-hill’s side in breezy rest among the nodding stalks. The charioteer with wond’rous gesture talks to the trees and mountains; and there son appears shapes of delight, of mystery, and fear, passing along before a dusky space made by some mighty oaks: as they would chase some ever-fleeting music on they sweep.

Image “The poor and needy search for water, but there is none; their tongues are parched with thirst. However, I the LORD will answer them; I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them. I will make rivers flow on barren heights, and springs within the valleys. I will turn the desert into pools of water, and he parched ground into the springs,” reports Isaiah 41.17.18 Life is not about accomplishment; it is all about doing, participating, progressing, growing, learning. “I will give you hidden treasures, riches stored in secret places, so that you may know that I am the LORD, the God of Israel, who summons you by name,” reports Isaiah 45.3

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Faith and the World: Oh, Earth, You are too Wonderful for Anybody to Realize You!

ImageAn aim in life is the only fortune worth finding. Mistakes are part of the dues one pays for a full life. Drugs make people susceptible to ideas, and that is why propaganda is so effective. Gaslighting is a manipulation tactic used to gain power, and it works too well. In order to gain more power, gaslighting makes a victim question their reality by putting them through situation that are prohibited by law and thought to not be practiced in modern society. Gaslighters tell blatant lies, and they deny they said something even though one may have blatant proof that they did. These aggressors often use what is near and dear to one as ammunition to upset you. They may assault you, steal vandalize your property, break and enter into your home, cyberstalk you and spy on you. The goal is to try and wear a person down over time, usually by a variation of a violation of your rights and physical and mental attacks. Gaslighters often use law enforcement as tools to act as intimidators. Often times people who use these tactics display actions that do not match their words, and sometimes what they say means nothing when the real issue is their actions. Another tactic is they try to make a person schizophrenic by praising them and then cutting them down so an individual is always questing their own thought process and self-value. #RandolphHarris 1 of 21

ImagePeople who try to use mind control also project their own problems and insecurities onto a victim, as gaslighters are masters at manipulation. They will often tell people you are crazy because dismissing your credibility is one of the main ways to make sure no one believes what one is saying. Legal subordination between members of the same gender or opposite gender is wrong in itself, and now is one of the chief hindrances to human improvements; and it ought to be replaced by a principle of perfect equality, admitting no power or privilege on the one side, nor disability on the other. So long as an opinion is strongly rooted in the feelings, it gains rather than loses in stability by having a prepondering weight of argument against it. For if it were accepted as a result of argument, the refutation of the argument might shake the solidity of the conviction; but when it rests solely on feeling, the worse it fares in argumentative contest, the more persuaded its adherents are that their feeling must have some deeper grounds, which the arguments to not reach; and while the feeling remains, it is always throwing up fresh intrenchments of argument to repair any breach made in the old. #RandolphHarris 2 of 21

ImageAnd there are so many causes tending to make the feelings connected with this subject the most intense and most deeply rooted of all those which gather round and protect old institutions and customs, that we need not wonder to find them as yet less undermined and loosened than any of the rest by the rest by the progress of the great modern spiritual and social transition; nor suppose that the barbarism to which people cling longest must be less barbarism than those which they shake off. The study of objected image that preconscious perception grew out of the observation that subjects dreamed about parts of a projected image that were not immediately recalled. In fact, people seem to record subconsciously a lot more than they consciously relate. Further, what they record subconsciously does not lie passive but works actively on the mind. Subliminal projection uses this phenomenon by planting sensations in minds that are not aware of the process. Although no conclusive evidence exists to confirm the effectiveness of subliminal projection in practical situations such as buying popcorn, the possibility itself is suggestive. #RandolphHarris 3 of 21

ImageEducation is a foundation of facts and values, and the aim of education is to make people free. The biological principle upon which humanistic education rests is that humans are all different. Unfortunately for humankind, the opinion in favour of the present system, which entirely subordinates women as a weaker gender to men, who are viewed as the stronger gender, rests upon theory only; for there never has been trial made of any other; so that experience, in the sense in which it is vulgarly opposed to theory, cannot be pretended to have pronounced any verdict. And in the second place, the adoption of this system of inequality never was the result of deliberation, or forethought, or any social ideas, or any notion whatever of what conduced to the benefit of humanity or the good order of society. It arose simply from the fact that from the very earliest twilight of human society, every women (owing to the value attached to her by men, combined with her inferiority in muscular strength) was found in a state of bondage to some man. Laws and systems of polity always begin by recognising the relations they find already existing between individuals. They convert what was a mere physical fact into a legal right, give it the sanction of society, and principally aim at the substitution of public and organized means of asserting and protecting the sights, instead of the irregular and lawless conflict of physical strength. #RandolphHarris 4 of 21

ImageTo avoid the tyranny that seems inevitable, education is the great equalizers for the masses and will greatly contribute to the freedom of humanity. This program should include environmental studies, the facts of individual diversity and genetic uniqueness and the values of freedom, tolerance and mutual charity. The forces of evil propaganda must be combatted by a critical study of language, which should include a full study of the devices that are used against freedom. Those who have already been compelled to obedience by the masses have become in this manner legally bound to it. Slavery, from being a mere affair of force between the master and the slave, become regularized and a matter of compact among the masters, who, bind themselves to one another for common protection guaranteed by their collective strength the private possessions of each, including the people they enslave mentally and/or physically. In early times, the great majority of the male gender were slaves, as well as the whole of the female. And many ages elapsed, some of the ages of high cultivation, before any thinker was bold enough to question the rightfulness and absolute social necessity, either of the one slavery or of the others. We must find a willing to help society and yet make them aware of the wiles of mind-manipulators. #RandolphHarris 5 of 21

ImageAbove all, values need to be taught—individual freedom, charity and compassion, and intelligence. With these values, humans should be able to pierce through the veil of propaganda, and they would be able to remain free. Those who wish to control humankind want to believe that all people are easily categorized and easily manipulated, that all are essentially the same, and that individuals are not very important in the historical process. We do not want to see demagogues and charlatans abusing humankind, the environment, nor animals or other living being—animate or inanimate. We must refrain from creating a nation of Mary’s sheep. It is important that value is placed on genetic differences and on environmental differences, and people are taught respect for human differences. At the same time, respect for the integrity of the social order, which allows freedom to be exercised has to be preserved, without making it a dictatorship masquerading as a free society. Less than two hundred and fifty-four years ago, people might still by law hold human beings in bondage as saleable property; within the present century they might kidnap them and carry them off, and work them literally to death. #RandolphHarris 6 of 21

ImageThis absolutely extreme case of the law of force, condemned by those who can tolerate almost every other form of arbitrary power, and which, of all others, presents features the most revolting to the feelings of all who look at it from an impartial position, is the law of civilized and the Christian World within the memory of persons now living: and not only in the past did slavery exist, but the slave trade, and the breeding of slaves expressly for it, was a general practice between slave states. Yet not only was there a greater strength of sentiment against it, but it was also considered the customer abuse of force: for its motive was the love of gain, unmixed and undisguised; and those who profited by it were a very small numerical fraction of the country, while the natural feeling of all who were not personally interested in it, was unmitigated abhorrence. The possessor of the undue power, the person directly interested in it, only one person, while those who are subject to it and suffer form it is literally all the ret. The yoke is naturally and necessarily humiliating to all persons, expect the one who is on the throne, together with, at most, the one who expects to succeed to it. How different are these cases from that of the power of men over women! I am not now prejudging the question of its justifiableness. I am showing how vastly more permanent it could not but be, even if not justifiable, than those other dominations which have nevertheless lasted down to our own time. #RandolphHarris 7 of 21

ImageWhatever gratification of pride there is in the possession of power, and whatever person interest in its exercise, is in this case not confined to a limited class, but common to the whole male gender. Instead of being, to most of its supporters, a thing desirable chiefly in the abstract, or, like the political ends usually contended for by factions, of little private importance to any but the leaders, it comes home to the person and hearth of every male head of family, and of every one who looks forward to being so. The clodhoppers exercise, or is to exercise, one’s share of the power equally with the highest noble person. And the case is that in which the desire of power is the strongest: for everyone who desires power, desires it most over those who are nearest to one with whom one’s life is passed, with whom one has most concerns in common, and it who any independence of one’s authority is oftenest likely to interfere with one’s individual preferences. If, in the other cases specified, power manifestly grounded only on force, and having so much less to support them, are so slowly and with so much difficulty got rid of, much more must it be so with this, even if it rests on no better foundation than those. We must consider, too, that the possessors of the power have facilities in this case, greater than in any other, to prevent any uprising against it. #RandolphHarris 8 of 21

ImageIn struggles for political emancipation, everybody knows how often its champions are bought off by bribes, or daunted by terrors. In the case of women, each individual of the subject-class is in a chronic state of bribery and intimidation combined. In setting up the standard of resistance, a large number of the leaders, and still more of the followers, must make an almost complete sacrifice of the pleasures of the alleviations of their own individual lt. If ever any system of privilege and enforced subjection had it yoke tightly riveted on the necks of those who are kept down by it, this has. All causes, social and natural, combine to make it unlikely that women should be collectively rebellious to the power of men. They are so far in a position different from all other subject classes, that their masters require something more from them than actual service. People do not want solely the obedience of women, they want their sentiments. All me, expect the brutish, desire to have in the woman most nearly connected with them, not a forced slave but a willing one, not a slave merely, but a favourite. They have therefore put everything in practice to enslave their minds. The masters of all other slaves rely, for maintaining obedience, on fear; either fear of themselves, or religious fears. #RandolphHarris 9 of 21

ImageThe masters of women wanted more than simple obedience, and they turned the whole force of education to effect their purpose. All women are bought up from the very earliest years in the belief that their ideal of character is the very opposite to the of men; not self-will, and government by self-control, but submission, and yielding to the control of others. All the moralities tell them that it is the duty of women, and all the current sentimentalities that it is their nature, to live for others; to make complete abnegation of themselves, and to have no life but in their affections. And by their affections are meant the only ones they are allowed to have—those to the men with whom they are connected, or to the children who constitute an additional and indefeasible bond between them and a man. When we put together three things—first, the natural attraction between opposite genders; secondly, the wife’s entire dependence on the husband, every privilege or pleasure she has being either his gift, or depending entirely on his will; and lastly, that the principal object of human pursuit, consideration, and all objects of social ambition, can in general be sough or obtained by her only through him, it would be a miracle if the object of being attractive to men had not become the polar star of feminine education and formation of character. #RandolphHarris 10 of 21

ImageAnd, this great avail themselves of it to the utmost as a means of holding women in subjection, by representing to them meekness, submissiveness, and resignation of all individual will into the hands of a man, as an essential part of attractiveness in pleasures of the flesh. Can it be doubted that any other yokes which humankind have succeeded in breaking, would have subsisted till now if the same means had existed, and had been as sedulously used to bow down their minds to it? If it had been made the object of the life of every young plebeian to find with one, and a share of one’s personal affection, had been held out as the prize which they all should look out for, the most gifted and aspiring being able to reckon on the most desirable prizes; and if, when this prize had been obtained, they had been shut out by a wall of brass from all interests not centering in him, all feelings and desires but those which he shared or inculcated; would not serfs and seigneurs, plebeians and patricians, have been as broadly distinguished at the day as men and women are? And would not all but a thinker here and there, have believed the distinction to be a fundamental and unalterable fact in human nature? #RandolphHarris 11 of 21

ImageTo deal with overpopulation, the birth rate must be reduced so that it does not exceed the death rate, and natural resources managed to increase food and fuel. In the absence of a Pill for birth control, some way must be found to reduce the birth rate—and problems of all sorts are involved here. And how soon can the industrial and social potential of underdeveloped nations be enhanced? Both food and raw materials will be in short supply by the end of the century. Does humankind really want to solve the problems they have? The urge towards freedom diminishes as long as people are well fed, but if conditions change, they will rise up in their chains. If youth does not value freedom, the future will surely be slavery. And not only do the young fail to see the value of freedom, they also wish for some form of benign totalitarian control. Overpopulation and overorganization may be inevitable even if people rise to the banner of freedom now, but the freedom fighters are few and time is short. The dodo, now extinct, is what humankind will become if we do not think about freedom now. We will no longer be able to fly, through we may wish to fly to escape our captor later. Humans will sacrifice their wings of freedom to become flightless like the dodo, and regret the act latter, when the game is up. #RandolphHarris 12 of 21

ImageSometimes when people finally achieve the social status they desire, they will no longer mock or hold disdain for people they could not stand when they were not able to achieve the social status they wanted. Nonetheless, personal liberty is absolutely essential to human dignity and happiness. When people kill, they kill the Bible: those who senselessly kill, kill God’s image; but one who destroys a good book kills reason itself, kills the image of God, as it were, in the eye. Realizing that suffer and frustration are necessary for creation, some accept voluntary exile in preference to stability and conformity. The World structure has changed, human nature has not improved: people are still petty, hypocritical, malicious, dishonest, emotionally sterile and quite capable of revenging themselves on others for their own lapses of accepted “good taste.” For, what is the peculiar character of the modern World—the difference which chiefly distinguishes modern institutions, modern social ideas, modern life itself, from those of times long past? It is, that human beings are no longer born to their place in life, and chained down by an inexorable bond to the place they are born to, but are free to employ their faculties, and such favourable chances as offer, to achieve the lost which may appear to them most desirable. #RandolphHarris 13 of 21

ImageHuman society of one was constituted on a very different principle. All were born to a fixed social position, were mostly kept in it by law, or interdicted from any means by which they could emerge from it. Nobody things it necessary, still, to this day, to throw each operation into the hands of those who are best qualified for it. Nobody thinks in necessary to make a law that only a strong-armed person shall be a blacksmith. Freedom and competition suffice to make blacksmiths strong0armed people, because the weak-armed can earn more by engaging in occupations for which they are more fit. In consonance with this doctrine, it is felt to be an overstepping of the proper bounds of authority fit beforehand, on some general presumption, that certain persons are not fit to do certain things. It is now thoroughly known and admitted that is some such presumptions exist, no such presumption is infallible. Even if it be well grounded in a majority of cases, which it is very likely not to be, there will be a minority of exceptional cases in which it does not hold; and in those it is both an injustice to the individuals, and a detriment to society, to place barriers in the way of their using their faculties for their own benefit and for that of others. #RandolphHarris 14 of 21

ImageIn the cases, on the other hand, in which the unfitness is real, the ordinary motives of human conduct will on the whole suffice to prevent the incompetent person from making, or from persisting in, the attempt. Nephi is commanded to build a ship—his brethren oppose him—e exhorts them by recounting this history of God’s dealings with Israel—Nephi is filled with the power of God—his brethren are forbidden to touch him lest they wither as a dried reed. About 591-591 Before Christ. “And it came to pass that we did again take our journey in the wilderness; and we did travel nearly eastward from that time forth. And we did travel and wade through much affliction in the wilderness and our women did bear children in the wilderness. And so great were the blessings of the Lord upon us, that while we did live upon raw meat in the wilderness, our women did give plenty of suck for their children, and were strong, yea, even like uno the men; and they began to bear their journeyings without murmurings. And thus we see that the commandments of God must be fulfilled. And if it so be that the children of humans keep the commandments of God he doth nourish them, and strengthen them, and provide means whereby they can accomplish the things which he has commanded them; wherefore, he did provide means for us while we did sojourn in the wilderness. #RandolphHarris 15 of 21

Image“And we did sojourn for the space of many years, yes, even eight years in the wilderness. And we did come to the land which we called Bountiful, because of its much fruit and also wild honey; and all these things were prepared of the Lord hat we might not perish. And we beheld the sea, which we called Irreantum, which being interpreted, is many waters. And it cam to pass that we did pitch our tents by the seashore; and notwithstanding we had suffered many afflictions and much difficulty, yea, even so much that we cannot write them all, we were exceedingly rejoiced when we came to the seashore; and we called the place Bountiful, because of is much fruit. And it came to pass that after I, Nephi, had been in the land of Bountiful for the space of many days, the voice of the Lord came unto me, saying: Arise, and get thee into the mountain. And it came to pass that I arose and went up into the mountain, and cried unto the Lord. And it came to pass that the Lord spake unto me, saying: Thou shalt construct a ship, after the manner which I shall show thee, that I may carry thy people across these waters. And I said: Lord, whither shall I go that I may find ore to molten, that I may make tools to construct the ship after the manner which thou hast shown unto me? And it came to pass that the Lord told me whither I should go to find ore, that I might make tools. #RandolphHarris 16 of 21

Image“And it came to pass that I, Nephi, did make a bellows wherewith to blow the fire, of the skins of beast; and after I had made a bellows, that I might have wherewith to blow the fire, I did smite two stones together that I might make fire. For the Lord had not hitherto suffered that we should make much fire, as we journeyed in the wilderness; for he said: I will make thy food become sweet, that ye cook it not; and I will also be your light in the wilderness; and I will prepare the way before you, if it so be that ye shall keep my commandments; wherefore, inasmuch as ye shall keep my commandments ye shall be led towards the promised land; and ye shall know that it is by me that ye are led. Yea, and the Lord said also that: After ye have arrived in the promised land, ye shall know that I, the Lord, did deliver you from destruction: yea, that I did bring you out of the land of Jerusalem. Wherefore, I, Nephi, did strive to keep the commandments of the Lord, and I did exhort my brethren to faithfulness and diligence. And it came to pass that I did make tools of the ore which I did molten out of the rock. And when my brethren aw that I was about to build a ship, they began to murmur against me, saying: Our brother is a fool, for he thinketh that he can build a ship; yea, and he also thinketh that he can cross these great waters. #RandolphHarris 17 of 21

Image“And thus my brethren did complain against me, and were desirous that they might not labour, for the did not believe that I could build a ship; neither would they believe that I was instructed of the Lord. And now it came to pass that I, Nephi, was exceedingly sorrowful because of the hardness of their hearts; and now when they saw that I began to be sorrowful they were glad in their hearts, insomuch that they did rejoice over me saying: We knew that ye could not construct a ship, for we knew that ye were lacking in judgment; wherefore, thou canst not accomplish so great work. And thou art like unto our father, ed away by the foolish imaginations of his heart; yea, he hath led us out of the land of Jerusalem, and we have wandered in the wilderness for these many years; and our women have toiled, being big with child; and they have borne children in the wilderness and suffered all things, save it were death; and it would have been better that they had died before they came out of Jerusalem than to have suffered these afflictions. Behold, these may years we have suffered in the wilderness, which time we might have enjoyed our possessions and the land of our inheritance; yea, and we might have been happy. #RandolphHarris 18 of 21

Image“And we know that the people who ere in the land of Jerusalem were a righteous people; for they have kept that statutes and judgments of the Lord, and all his commandments, according to the law of Moses; wherefore, we know that they are a righteous people; and our father hath judged them, and hath led us away because we would hearken unto his words; yea, and our brother is like unto him. And after this manner of language did my brethren murmur and complain against us. And it came to pass that I, Nephi, spake unto them, saying: Do ye believe that our fathers, who the children of Israel, would have been led away out of the hands of the Egyptians if they had not hearkened unto the words of the Lord? Yea, do you suppose that they would have been led out of bondage, if the Lord hand not commanded Moses the he should lead them out of bondage? Now ye know that the children of Israel were in bondage; and ye know that they were laden with tasks, which were grievous to be borne; wherefore, ye know that it must need be a good thing for them, that they should be brought out of bondage. Now ye know that Moses was commanded of the Lord to do that great work; and ye know that by his word the waters of the Red Sea were divided hither and thither, and hey passed through on dry grounds. #RandolphHarris 19 of 21

Image“But ye know that the Egyptians were drowned in the Red Sea, who were the armies of Pharaoh. And ye also know that they were fed with manna in the wilderness. Yea, and ye also know that Moses, by his word according to the power of God which was in him smote the rock, and there came forth water, that the children of Israel might quench their thirst. And notwithstanding they being led, the Lord their God, their Redeemer, going before them, leading them by day and giving them light unto them by night, and doing all things for them which were expedient for humans to receive, they hardened their hears and blinded their minds, and reviled against Moses and against the true and living God,” reports 1 Nephi 17.1-30. I urge that requests, prayers, intercessions and thanksgiving be made for everyone. Varied prayer grows out of what we have learned about continual prayer, because it we pray continually, the various situation we encounter will demand a variety of prayers. Think of the variety of appropriate to life’s situations—prayer to resist temptation, prayer for wisdom, for power, for self-restraint, for protection of others, for growth, for conviction. On all occasion with all kinds of prayer request will we learn to survive. I always pray before I drive. #RandolphHarris 20 of 21

ImageWe must have a vibrant inner spiritual reality which emanates with all kinds of prayer requests. Grant Thy servants whom Thou hast united to us by the intimacy of holy affection, or by the bonds of blood, or hast associated with us in the unity of faith, to be subject to Thee with their whole heart; that being filled with the Spirit of Thy love, they may be cleansed from Earthly desires, and be made worthy, by Thy grace, of Heavenly blessedness. O Lord, the World is artful to entrap, approaches in fascinating guise, extends many a gilded bait, presents many a charming face. Let my faith scan every painted babuble, and escape every bewitching snare in a victory that overcomes all things. In my duties give me firmness, energy, zeal, devotion to Thy cause, courage in Thy name, love as a working grace, and all commensurate with my trust. Let faith stride forth in giant power, and love respond with energy in every act. I often mourn the absence of my beloved Lord whose smile makes Earth a paradise, whose voice is sweetest music, whose presence gives all graces strength. However, by unbelief I often keep Him outside my door. Let faith give entrance that he may abide with me forever. Thy word is full of promises, flowers of sweet fragrance, fruit of refreshing flavour when culled by faith. May I be made rich in its riches, be strong in its power, be happy in its joy, abide in its sweetness, feast on its preciousness, draw vigour from its manna. Lord, please increase my faith. #RandolphHarris 21 of 21Image

 

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ImageO God, Who bestowest Thy mercy at all times on them that love Thee, and in no place art distant from those that serve Thee; direct the way of Thy Children in Thy will, that having Thee for their Protector and Guide, they may walk without stumbling in the paths of righteousness; through Jesus Christ our Lord!

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The Universe is Not Hostile, Nor Yet is it Friendly—it is Simply Indifferent!

ImageI still believe that Joseph Barbera and William Hanna made the best cartoons ever when they formed Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc. Charlotte’s Web, The Flintstones, The Snorks, The Jetsons, The Smurfs, Scooby-Doo, Yogi Bear, Casper’s First Christmas, Richie Rich, Jonny Quest, and many more wonderful cartoons I enjoyed as a kid. One has achieved success who has lived well, laughed often, worked hard, and loved much; who has gained the respect of intelligent beings and the love of all kinds of people; who has filled one’s niche and accomplished one’s task; who leaves the World better than one found it, whether by an improved garden, a perfect poem, or a rescued soul; who never lacked appreciation of Earth’s beauty or failed to express it; who looked for the best in others and gave them the best one had; whose life was an inspiration; whose memory a benediction. But we ask—how can we possess such wisdom? In the book of Proverbs, Wisdom says—“I was…rejoicing before Him always, rejoicing in His inhabited World and delighting in the sons of men…and now, my sons, listen to me…one who finds me, find life…but all who hate me love death.” To aspire to wisdom, or to despise it, is a matter of life and death. This could never be said of knowledge in the ordinary sense of the word. Those who know much and do not have life because of their knowledge, and those who know little; and do not try to learn much, do not prove that they love death. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20

ImageWisdom is a matter of life and death because it is more than knowledge. It can be united with knowledge, but it can also stand alone. It belongs to a dimension which cannot be reached by scholarly endeavour. Wisdom is insight into the meaning of one’s life, into its conflicts and dangers, into its creative and destructive powers, and into the ground out of which it comes and to which it must return. Therefore, the preachers of wisdom tell us that the first step in acquiring it is the fear of God and the awareness of the holy. Such words can easily be misunderstood. They do not command subjection to a god who arouses fear. Nor do they advise us to accept doctrines about him. Suh a command and such advice would lead us straight away from wisdom and not towards it. However, our text says that there cannot be wisdom without an encounter with the holy, with that which creates awe, and shake the ordinary way of life and thought. Without the experience of awe in face of the mystery of life, there is no wisdom. Most removed from wisdom are not those who are driven by desire for pleasure or power, but those brilliant minds who have never encountered the holy, who are without awe and know nothing sacred, but who are able to conceal their ultimate emptiness by the brilliant performances of their intellect. No wisdom shines through knowledge of many people who play a great role in our academic and non-academic society. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20

ImageThe wisdom at which God looks in the creation of the World, the eternal wisdom, calls them fools. There is a distortion of the 1 Corinthians 1-2. Two frequently cited but misunderstood texts relevant to the Christian mind are 1 Corinthians 1-2 and Colossians 2.8.  In 1 Corinthians 1 and 2, Paul argues against the wisdom of the World and reminds his readers that he did not visit them with persuasive words of wisdom. Some conclude from this that human reasoning and argument are futile, especially when applied to evangelism. There are several problems with this understanding of the passage. For one thing, if it is in fact an indictment against argumentation and reasoning, then it contradicts Paul’s own practice in Acts and his explicit appeal to the argument and evidence on behalf of the Resurrection in the very same epistle (1 Corinthians 15). Second, this passage is more accurately seen as a condemnation of the false, prideful use of reason, not of reason itself. It is hubris (pride) that is in view, not nous (mind). God chose foolish (moria) things that were offensive to human pride, not to reason properly used. For example, the idea of God being crucified was so offensive that the Greek spirit would have judged it to be morally disgusting. The passage may also be a condemnation of Greek rhetoric. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20

ImageGreek orators prided themselves in possessing persuasive words of wisdom, and it was their practice to persuade a crowd of any side of an issue for the right price. They did not base their persuasion on rational considerations but on speaking ability, thus bypassing issues of substance. Paul is most likely contrasting himself with Greek rhetoricians. If so, then Paul is arguing against evangelists who spend all of their time working on their speaking techniques yet fail to address the minds of unbelievers in their gospel presentations! Paul could also be making the claim that the content of the gospel cannot be deduced by pure reason from some set of first principles. No one could start off with an abstract concept of a first mover and deduce that a crucifixion would happen from this information alone. Thus, the gospel could never have been discovered by pure deductive reason from self-evident first principles, but had to be revealed by the biblical God who acts in history. Paul was insistent that the intellect could assess whether nor not there was sufficient evidence to judge that God had so acted (1 Corinthians 15). So we cannot conclude from this passage that using reason is futile. The distortion of Colossians 2.8—in this passage, Paul says, “See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this World rather than on Christ.” #RandolphHarris 4 of 20

ImageSome take the distortion of Colossians 2.8 to be a command to avoid secular studies, especially philosophy. However, upon close inspection of the structure of the verse, it become clear that philosophy in general was not the focus. Rather, it is a certain sort of philosophy—hollow and deceptive philosophy. In the context of Colossians, Paul was warning the church not to form and base doctrinal views according to a philosophical system hostile to orthodoxy. His remarks were a simple waring not to embrace heresy; in context, they were not meant to represent his views of philosophy as a discipline of study. In fact, one of the best ways to avoid hollow and deceptive philosophy is to study philosophy itself, so you can learn to recognize truth from error, using Scripture and right reason as a guide. His is exactly what Paul himself did. Colossians reveals an apostle who was entirely familiar with the type of proto-Gnostic philosophy threatening Colossians believers, who possessed a thorough knowledge of that philosophical system and an ability to point out its inadequacy. And remember, Paul himself cited pagan philosophers approvingly in Acts 17.28. “’For in him we live and move and have our own being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring,’” reports Acts 17.28. Neither of these texts should dampen our enthusiasm to cultivate a Christian mind or use reason in our Christian walk. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20

ImageOne who has encountered the mystery of life has reached the source of wisdom. In encountering it with awe and longing, one experiences the infinite distance of one’s being from that which is the ground of one’s being. One experiences the limits of one’s being, one’s finitude in the face of the infinite. One learns that acceptance of one’s limits is the decisive step towards wisdom. The fool rebels against the limits set by one’s finitude. One wants to be unlimited in power and knowledge. One who is wise accepts one’s finitude. One knows that one is not God. There is an area of my learning in interpersonal relationships—one that has been slow and painful for me. When I can let in the fac, or permit myself to feel that someone cares for, accepts, admires, or prizes me, I feel warmed and fulfilled. Because of elements in my past history, I suppose, it has been very difficult for me to do this. For a long time I tended almost automatically to brush aside any optimistic feelings aimed in my direction. My reaction was, “Who, me? You could not possibly care for me. You might like what I have done, or my achievements, but not me.” This is one respect in which my own therapy helped me very much. I am not always able even not to let in such warm and loving feelings from others, but I find it very releasing when I can do so. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20

ImageI know that some people flatter me in order to gain something for themselves; some people praise me because they are afraid to be hostile. However, I have come to recognize the fact that some people genuinely appreciate me, like me, love me, and I want to sense that fact and let it in. I think I have become less aloof as I have been able to take in and soak up those loving feelings. I feel enriched when I can truly prize or care for or love another person and when I can let that feeling flow out to the person. Like many others, I used to fear being trapped by letting my feelings show. “If I care for him, he can control me.” “If I love her, I am trying to control her.” I think that I have moved a long way toward being less fearful in this respect. Like my clients, I too have slowly learned that tender, beneficial feelings are not dangerous either to give or to receive. To illustrate what I mean, I would like again to draw an example from a recent basic encounter group. A woman who described herself as “an out spoken, sensitive, hyperactive individual” whose marriage was on the rocks, and who felt that life was just not worth living said, “I had really buried under a layer of concrete many feelings I was afraid people were going to laugh at or stomp on which, needless to say, was working all kinds of hell on my family and me. I had been looking forward to the workshops with my last few crumbs of hope—it was really a needle of trust in a huge haystack of despair.” #RandolphHarris 7 of 20

ImageShe spoke of some of her experiences in the group and added, “The real turning point for me was a simple gesture on your part of putting your arm around my shoulder, one afternoon when I had made some crack about you not really being a member of the group—that no one could cry on your shoulder. In my notes I had written, the night before, “My God, there is no man in the World who love me.” You seemed so genuinely concerned the day I fell apart, I was overwhelmed…I received the gesture as one of the first feelings of acceptance—of me, just the unenlightened way I am, sensitivities and all—that I had ever experienced. I have felt needed, loving, competent, furious, frantic, anything and everything but just plain loved. You can imagine the flood of gratitude, humility, almost release, that swept over me. I wrote, with considerable joy, “I actually felt love. I doubt that I should soon forget it.” This woman, of course, was speaking to me, and yet in some deep sense she was also speaking for me. I too have had similar feelings. Those of one’s followers who expect one to behave with impeccable propriety and are ready to leave and follow someone else if one does not will either be victims of, or gainers by their own judgment. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20

ImageIf the teacher is really unified with God, any judging of one done by external standards will be only partly applicable. There is a point where neither one’s character nor one’s motives can be correctly measured by such standards, and beyond which they may be quite misleading. The mystical and cultist circles which talk much about these matters use the name “Master” to trail such an accumulation behind it of falsified facts, superstitious ntions, and nonsensical thinking, that it is needful to be on guard for semantic definitions whenever this term is heard. The mistake that some followers make is to fail to see that their demigod is recognizably human. The mistake that most non-followers make is to fail to see that one is, in one’s best moments, superhuman. The excessively critical attitude which seeks to find a flaw in a holy being and soon succeeds is as foolish as the excessively devout attitude which pronounces one perfect and continuously faultless. This hostility of the one leads to imbalance; the naivete of the other leads to expectancy. The holy being is still a human subject to limitations of one’s species. In order to minimize the risks, experiential confrontation must be done carefully, artfully, and with deep sensitivity to its effects. Use of the first person singular, for example, can minimize unwarranted overtones of accusation or punishment. The statements “I believe you can do more,” or “I do not but what you are saying” serve to illustrate this contention. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20

ImagePosing confrontations in the form of questions or descriptions can also enhance their impact. “You are scared out of your wits,” may reflect how a “hail-fellow-well-met” client felt! Alternatively, I often challenge clients to differentiate between cannot and will not at given junctures. “You mean you will not respond to that job offer,” I suggested to a client invested in her inadequacy; “You mean you will not make time in your day for a lunch break,” I remarked to another client invested in his invincibility. It is sometime useful, finally, to appraise clients of the difficulty of confronting their resistances, especially when those resistance are threatened with extinction. “A part of you is doing everything it can to keep you where you were,” I tell clients in such circumstances. “The most you can do is realize this and look at what is suggests.” To this, all humankind’s literature about wisdom is a witness. Wisdom is the acknowledgment of limits; it is the awareness of the right measure in all relations of life. However, in saying this, one must protect wisdom against a dangerous distortion of its meaning—the confusion of wisdom with philistine avoidance of radical decisions, with clever compromises and shrewd calculations of usefulness, all of which is far removed from the wisdom that comes upon us in the awe-inspiring encounter with the holy. #RandolphHarris 10 of 20

ImageWe need only look at the great figures in whom people of all periods and cultures recognized wisdom, the people who gave new laws to their nations, the teachers of new ways of life for continents, the people who withdrew to the deserts of nature and the deserts of the soul to return with abundance. None of them kept to the middle of the road; they had to find new roads in the wilderness. You cannot find wisdom in those who always avoid radical decisions and adjust themselves to the given situation, the conformists who have decided to accept the accepted opinion of society. Wisdom love the children of men, but she prefers those whom come through foolishness to wisdom, and dislike those who keep themselves equally distant from foolishness and from wisdom. They are the real fools, she would say, because they were never shaken by an encounter with the mystery of life, and therefore never able to see the unity of creation and destruction in the working of the divine wisdom. In those, however, who have recognized this working of wisdom, and become wise by it, artificial limits are broken down, often with great pain, and the real limits, the true measures, are found. When wisdom comes to humans, that is what happens. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20

ImageTherefore, wisdom comes to all humans, and not only to those who are learned. You can find quiet and often great wisdom among very simple people. There may be wise ones among those with who you live, and those with whom you work, and those whom you encounter as strangers in crowded streets. There is wisdom in mothers and lonely women, in children and adolescents, in shepherds and cabdrivers; and sometimes there is wisdom all in those who can have much learning. They all prove their wisdom by creatively accepting their limits and their finitude. However, who can accept one’s finitude? Who can accept that one is threatened by the vicissitudes of life, by infirmary, by death? Who can take into oneself the deep anxiety of being alive without covering it up with pleasure and activity? In the book of Job, which powerfully expresses the mystery of life, the question is asked and an answer given that is not an answer in the ordinary sense of the word. Only in the confrontation with eternal wisdom in all its darkness and inexhaustible death can humans accept the misery of one’s finitude, even if it is as extreme as Job’s. In our encounter with the holy, facing with awe the ultimate mystery of life, we experience a dimension of life that gives us the courage and the strength to accept our limits and to become wise through this acceptance. #RandolphHarris 12 of 20

ImageThe created light is necessary to see the essence of God, not in order to make the essence of God inteligible, which is off itself intelligible, but in order to enable the intellect to understand in the same way as a habit makes a power abler to act. Even so corporeal light is necessary as regards external sight, inasmuch as it makes the medium actually transparent, and susceptible of colour. Nephi sees the Spirit of the Lord and is shown in vision the tree of life—he sees the mother of the Son of God and learn the condescension of God—he sees the baptism, ministry, and crucifixion of the Lamb of God—he sees also the call and ministry of the Twelve Apostles of the Lamb About 600-592 Before Christ. “For it came to pass after I had desired to know the things that my father had seen, and believing that the Lord was able to make them known unto me, as I sat pondering in mine heart I was caught away in the Spirit of the Lord, yea, into an exceedingly high mountain, which I have never before set foot. And the Spirit said unto me: Behold, what desirest thou? And I said; I desire to behold the things which my father saw. And the spirit said unto me: Believest thou that thy father saw the tree of which he hath spoken? And I said: Yea, thou knowest that I believe all the words of my father,” reports Nephi 11.1-5. This light is required to see the divine essence, not as a similitude in which God is seen, but as a perfection of the intellect, strengthening to see God. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20

ImageTherefore it may be said that this light is to be described not as a medium in which God is seen, but as one by which He is seen; and such a medium does not take away the immediate vision of God. “And when I have spoken these words, the Spirit cried with a loud voice, saying: Hosanna to the Lord, the most high God; for he is God over all the Earth, yea, even above all. And blessed thou believest in the Son of the most high God; wherefore, thou shalt behold the things which thou hast desired. And behold this thing shall be given unto three for a sign, that after thou hast beheld the tree which bore the fruit which they father tasted, thou shalt also behold a man descending out of Heaven, and him shall ye witness; and after ye have witnessed him ye shall bear record that it is the Son of God. And it came to pass that the Spirit said unto me: Look! And I looked and beheld a tree; and it was like unto the tree which my father had seen; and the beauty thereof was far beyond, yea, exceeding of all beauty and the whiteness thereof did exceed the whiteness of the driven snow. And it came to pass after I had seen the tree, I said unto the Spirit: I behold thou hast shown up me the three which is precious above all. And he said unto me: What desirest thou?” reports 1 Nephi 11.6-10. #RandolphHarris 14 of 20

ImageThe disposition to the form of fire can be natural only to the subject of that from. Hence the light of glory cannot be natural to a creature unless the creature has a divine nature; which is imposible. However, by this light the rational creature is made deiform. “And I said unto him: To know the interpretation thereof—for I spake unto him as a man speaketh; for I beheld that he was in the form of a man; yet nevertheless, I knew that it was the Spirit of the Lord; and he spake unto me as a man speaketh with another. And it came to pass that he said unto me: Look! And I looked as if to look upon him, and I saw him not; for he had gone from before my presence. And it came to pass that I saw the Heavens open; and an Angel came down and stood before me; and he said unto me: Nephi, what beholdest thou? And I said unto him: A virgin, most beautiful and fair above all other virgins. And he said unto me: Knowest thou the condescension of God? And I said unto him: I know that he loveth his children; nevertheless, I do not know the meaning of all things. And he said unto me: Behold, the virgin whom thou seest is the mother of the Son of God, after the manner of the flesh. And it came to pass that I beheld that she was carried away in the Spirit; and after she had been carried away in the Spirit for the space of time the Angel spake unto me saying: Look! #RandolphHarris 15 of 20

Image“And I looked and behold the virgin again bearing a child in her arms. And the Angel said unto me: Behold the Lamb of God, yea, even the Son of the Eternal Father! Knowest thou the meaning of this tree which thy father saw? And I answered him, saying: Yea, it is the love of God, which sheddeth itself abroad in the hearts of the children of men; wherefore it is the most desirable above all things. And he spake unto me, saying: Yea, and the most joyous to the soul, reports 1 Nephi 11.11-23. “In Thy light we shall see light,” reports Psalms 35.10. Everything which is raised up to what exceeds its nature, must be prepared by some disposition above its nature. However, when any created intellect sees the essence of God, the essence of God itself become the intelligible form of the intellect. Hence it is necessary that some supernatural disposition should be added to the intellect in order that it may be raised up to such a great and sublime height. It is necessary that the power of understanding should be added by divine grace. Now this increase of the intellectual powers is called the illumination of the intellect, as we also call the intelligible object itself by the name of light of illumination. And this is the light spoken of in the Apocalypse (Apoc. 21.23): “The glory of God hath enlightened it; the society of the blessed who see God. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20

ImageBy this light the blessed are made “deiform”—id est like to God, according to saying: “When He shall appear we shall be like to Him, and because we shall see Him as He is,” reports 1 Jon 3.2. “And fater he had said these words, he said unto me: Look! And I looked, and I beheld the Son of God going forth among the children of men; and I saw many fall down at his feet and worship him. And it came to pass that I beheld that the rod of iron, which my father had seen, was the word of God, which led to the fountain of living waters, or to the tree of life; which waters are a representation of the love of God. And the Angel said unto me again; Look and behold the condescension of God! And I looked and beheld the Redeemer of the Redeemer of the World, of whom my father had spoken; and I also beheld the prophet who should prepare the way before him. And the Lamb of God went forth and was baptized of him; and after he was baptized, I beheld the Heavens open, and the Holy Ghost come down out of Heaven and abide upon him in the form of a dove. And I beheld that he went forth ministering unto the people, in power and great glory; and the multitudes were gathered together to hear him; and I beheld that they cast him out from among them. And I also beheld twelve others following him. And it came to pass that the Angel spake unto me again, saying: Look! #RandolphHarris 17 of 20

Image“And I looked, and I beheld the Heavens open again, and I saw Angels descending upon the children of men; and they did minister unto them. And he spake unto me again, saying: Look! And I looked, and I beheld the Lamb of God going forth among the children of men. And I beheld multitudes of people who were sick, and who were afflicted with all manner of diseases, and with devils and unclean spirits; and the Angel spake and showed all these things unto me. And they were healed by the power of the Lamb f God; and the devils and the unclean spirits were cast out. And it came to pass that the Angel spake unto me again, saying: Look! And I looked and beheld the Lamb of God, that he was taken by the people; yea, the Son of the everlasting God was judged of the World; and I saw and bear record. And I, Nephi, saw that he was lifted upon the cross and slain for the sins of the World. And after he was slain I saw the multitudes of the Earth, that they were gathered together to fight against the apostles of the Lamb; for thus were the twelve called by the Angel of the Lord. And the multitude of the Earth was gathered together; and I behold that they were in a large and spacious building, like unto the building which my father saw. And the Angel of the Lord sapke unto me again, saying: Behold the World and the wisdom thereof; yea, behold the house of Israel hath gathered together to fight against the twelve apostles of the Lamb. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20

Image“And it came to pass that I saw and bear record, that the great and spacious building was the pride of the World; and it fell, and the fall thereof was exceedingly great. And the Angel of the Lord spake unto me again, saying: Thus shall be the destruction of all nations, kindreds, tongues, and people, that shall fight against the twelve apostles of the Lamb,” reports 1 Nephi 11.23-36. We beseech Thee, O Lord, to guide Thy Church with Thy perpetual governance; that it may walk warily in times of quiet, and boldly in times of trouble; through our Lord. O Lord, Thou knowest my great unfitness for service, my present deadness, my inability to do anything for Thy glory, my distressing coldness of heart. I am weak, ignorant, unprofitable, and loathe and abhor myself. I am at a loss to know what thou wouldest have me do, for I feel amazingly deserted by thee, and sense thy presence so little; Thou makest me possess the sins of my youth, and the dreadful sin of my nature, so that I feel all sin, I cannot think or act but every motion is sin. Return again with showers of converting grace to a poor gospel-abusing sinner. Help my soul to breathe after holiness, after a constant devotedness to Thee, after growth in grace more abundantly every day. The great masses of the people will more easily fall victims to a great lie than to a small one.  #RandolphHarris 19 of 20

Image O Lord, I am lost in the pursuit of this blessedness, and am ready to sink because I fall short of my desire; help me to hold out a little longer, until the happy hour of deliverance comes, for I cannot lift my soul to Thee if Thou of Thy goodness bring me not nigh. Help me to be diffident, watchful, tender, lest I offend my blessed Friend in thought and behaviour; I confide in Thee and lean upon Thee, and need Thee at all times to assist and lead me. O that all my distresses and apprehensions might prove but Christ’s school to make me fit for greater service by teaching me the great lesson of humility. May Thy Word, O Lord, Which endureth for ever in Heaven, abide continually in the Temple of Thy Church; that the presence of the Inhabitant may be an unfailing glory to the habitation; through Thy mercy and love. Remember Thy congregation, O Lord, which Thou hast created from the beginning; forget not the Church of old time Thou hast predestinated in Christ; be mindful of Thy mercy, look upon Thy covenant, and bless us continually with the promised freedom. The Dodo never had a chance. He seems to have been invented for the sole purpose of becoming extinct and that was all he was good for. There is no greater grief than to recall a time of happiness when in misery. However, the marines have landed, and the situation is well in hand. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20Image

 

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When He Had Opened the Seventh Seal, there Was Silence in Heaven About the Space of Half an Hour!

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Precision of communication is important, more important than ever, in our era of balances that are liable to change suddenly, when a false or misunderstood word may create as much disaster as a sudden thoughtless act. People love to talk but hate to listen. Listening is not merely not talking, though even that is beyond most of our powers; it means taking a vigorous, human interest in what is being told us. One can listen like a brick wall or like a splendid auditorium where every sound comes back fuller and richer. The greatest git one can give another is the purity of one’s attention. It would seem that the soul is a body. For the soul is the moving principle of the body. Nor does it move unless it is moved. First, because seemingly nothing can move unless it is itself moved, since nothing gives what it has not; for instance, what is not hot does not give heat. Secondly, because if there by anything that moves and is not moved, it must be the cause of eternal, unchanging movement; and this does not appear to be the case in the movement of an animal, which is caused by the soul. Therefore the soul is a mover moved. However, every mover moved is a body. Therefore the soul is a body. #RandolphHarris 1 of 19

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Further, all knowledge is caused by means of a likeness. However, there can be no likeness of a body to an incorporeal thing. If, therefore, the soul were not a body, it could not have knowledge of corporeal things. Further, between the mover and the moved there must be contact. However, contact is only between bodies. Since, therefore, the soul moves the body, it seems that the soul must be a body. On the contrary, the soul is simple in comparison with the body, in as much as it does not occupy space by its bulk. To seek the nature of the soul, we must premise that the soul is defined as the first principle of life of those things which live: for we call living things “animate,” [is est having a soul] and those things which have no life, “inanimate.” Now life is shown principally by two actions, knowledge and movement. The philosophers of old, not being able to rise above their imagination, supposed that the principle of these actions was something corporeal: for they asserted that only bodies were real things; and that what is not corporeal is nothing: hence they maintained that the soul is something corporeal. This opinion can be proved to be false in many ways; but we shall make use of only one proof, based on universal and certain principles, which shows clearly that the soul is not a body. #RandolphHarris 2 of 19

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It is manifest that not every principle of vital action is a soul, for then the eye would be a soul, as it is a principle of vision; and the same might be applied to the other instruments of the soul; but it is the first principle of life, which we call the soul. Now, though a body maybe a principle of life, as the heart is a principle of life in an animal, yet nothing corporeal can be the first principle of life. For it is clear that to be a principle of life, or to be a living thing, does not belong to a body as such; since, if that were the case, every body would be a living thing, or a principle of life. Therefore a body is competent to be a living thing or even a principle of life, as “such” a body. Now that it is actually such a body, it owes to some principle which is called its act. Therefore the soul, which is the first principle of life, is not a body, but the act of a body; thus heat, which is the principle of calefaction, is not a body, but an act of a body. As everything which is in motion must be moved by something else, a process which cannot be prolonged indefinitely, we must allow that not every mover is moved. For, since to be moved is to pass from potentiality to actuality, the mover gives what it has to the thing moved, inasmuch as it cases it to be in act. #RandolphHarris 3 of 19

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However, there is such a mover which is altogether immovable, and not moved either essentially, or accidentally; and such a mover can cause an invariable movement. There is, however, another kind of mover, which, though not moved essentially, is moved accidentally; and for this reason it does not cause invariable movement; such a mover, is the soul. There is, again, another mover, which is moved essentially—namely, the body. And because the philosophers of the old believed that nothing existed but bodies, they maintained that every mover is moved; and that the soul is moved directly, and is a body. The likeness of a thing known is not necessity actually in nature of the knower; but given a thing which knows potentially, and afterwards knows actually, the likeness of the thing known must be in the nature of the knower, not actually, but only potentially; thus colour is not actually in the pupil of the eye, but only potentially. Hence it is necessary, not that the likeness of corporeal things should be actually in the nature of the soul, but that there be a potentiality in the soul for such a likeness. However, the ancient philosophers omitted to distinguish between actuality and potentiality; and so they held that the soul must be a body in order to have knowledge of a body; and that it must be composed of the principles of which all bodies are formed in order to know all bodies. #RandolphHarris 4 of 19

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There are two kinds of contact; of “quantity,” and of “power.” By the former a body can be touched only by a body; by the latter a body can be touched by an incorporeal thing, which moves that body. Scripture repeatedly acknowledges the existence of natural moral law: true moral principles rooted in the way God made things, addressed to humans as humans (instead of to humans as a believing member of the kingdom of God) and knowable by all people independently of Bible (Job 31.13-15, Romans 1-2). Among other things, what this means is that believers need not appeal to Scripture in arguing for certain ethical positions, say, in legal debates. Indeed, in my own view, the church is to work for a just state, not a Christian state of theocracy. We are not to place the state under Scripture. However, if this is true, where is the source of moral guidance for the state to be just and to punish wrongdoers as Romans 13.1-7 teachers? The answer is the natural moral law. God has revealed enough of His moral law in the creation for the state to do its job. The church preach to unbelievers what Scriptures says about some topic, but when believer argue for their views in the public square of defend them against those who do not accept the Scripture, they should use general principles of moral argument and reasoning. #RandolphHarris 5 of 19

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This is precisely what the prophet Amos did. In chapters 1 and 2 of the Book of Amos, he denounced the moral behaviour of several people-groups outside of Israel, and he never once appealed to Scripture. Instead, he was content to rest his case with an appeal to self-evident moral principles in the natural law, which he assumed were known by those without Scripture. However, when he turned to rebuke the people f Israel, for the first time he said that they had violated the “law of the LORD” as reported in Amos 2.4, knowing that they had a familiarity with Holy Scripture. Amos appeared to common ground in all these cases, just as Jesus did in reasoning with he Sadducees, as reported in Matthew 22.23-33 and Paul in evangelizing the Greeks, as reported in Acts 17.16-31. The second aspect of scriptural teaching about extrabiblical knowledge is, Scripture shows people qualified to minister in God’s name in situations that required them to have intellectual skills in extrabiblical knowledge. In Daniel 1.3-4, 2.12-13, 5.7, we see Danial and his friends in a position to influence Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, only because they showed “intelligence in every branch of wisdom.” These men had studied and learned Babylonian science, geometry, and literature. And because of this, they were prepared to serve when the occasion presented itself. #RandolphHarris 6 of 19

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I remembering being in a meeting with Dr. Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade for Christ, shortly after Ronald Reagan had been elected president. Dr. Bright came into the meeting late because President Reagan had called to ask him to confer with other evangelical leaders in order to suggest a list of qualified evangelicals to serve in his presidential cabinet. With sadness in his heart, Dr. Bright said that after numerous phone conversations with other evangelical leaders, they had concluded that there simply were not many evangelicals with the intellectual and professional excellence for such a high post. C. Everett Koop was all they could think of and, as we know, Mr. Koop got the position of surgeon general. Had evangelicals valued the study of extrabiblical knowledge the way Daniel and his friends did, things may have turned out quite differently. How, then, should this attitude toward extrabiblical intellectual training inform parents and youth groups when they prepare Christian teenagers to go to college and tell teens why college is important? According to various studies, increasing numbers of college freshmen, on the advice of parents, say their primary goal in going to college is to get a good job and ensure a secure financial future for themselves. #RandolphHarris 7 of 19

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The goal of higher education for career advancement and a successful future, this parallels a trend in the same students toward valuing a good job more than developing a meaningful philosophy of life. Given this view of a college education, it is clear why the humanities have fallen on hard times. It is equally clear why the level of our public discourse on topics central to the culture wars is so shallow, since it is precisely the humanities that train people to thin carefully about these topics. What is not so clear is why Christians, with a confidence in the providential care and provision of God, would follow the secular culture in adopting this approach to college. How different this approach is compared to the value of a college education embraced by earlier generations of Christians: A Christian goes to college to discover one’s vocation—the area of service to which God has called one—and to develop the skills necessary to occupy a section of the cultural, intellectual domain in a manner worthy of the kingdom of God. A believer also goes to college to gain general information and the habits of thought necessary for developing a well-structured soul suitable for a well-informed, good citizen of both Earthly and Heavenly kingdoms. If the public square is naked, it may be because Christians have abandoned the humanities due to a sub-biblical appreciation for extrabiblical knowledge. #RandolphHarris 8 of 19

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Some people pledge themselves to the spiritual service of ignorant unawakened humankind. For this ideal one sacrifices oneself to the point of stopping one’s own liberation just when it is about to be realized. One who is delivered from sin and free from illusion, who is emancipated from suffering for all time because the flesh can catch one no more, has earned the right to infinite rest in the eternal life. However, one has also the power to choose otherwise. One may stop at its very threshold and renounce the reward it offers. Since the phenomenal World has nothing to offer one, the only reason for such a choice can be compassionate thought for the benighted creatures one is about to leave behind. If one refrains from the final mergence into the kingdom of Heaven, it is not only because one wants to be available for the enlightenment of one’s more hapless fellows, but also because one knows that one has been in a Heavenly state from the beginning and has never left it. Among those who have attained this higher life, who feel its power and sense its peace, there are some who wish that others shall attain it too. We say some for the very powerful reason that not all are able to find it in their hearts to return to this bleak Earth of ours, with its unwellness and morbidity, its sins and sufferings, its evil and ignorance, when there stretches invitingly before them the portals of a diviner World, with its sublime harmony and beauty, its burden-free peace and goodness. #RandolphHarris 9 of 19

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The greatest sacrifice a being can offer is that of wisdom, which means simply that the enlightened person should give oneself and use one’s wisdom for the benefit of others. This is also why the greatest charity is to give the truth to humankind. Therefore, the noblest self-actualized beings give themselves secretly and concentratively to a few or openly and widely to the many to enlighten, guide, and inspire them. They know that this twofold way is the one in which to help humankind, that public work is not enough, that those who wish to do not only the most widespread good in the time open to them but also the most enduring good, must work deeply and secretly amongst a few who have dedicated themselves to immediate or eventual service in their own turn. Thus, compassion is rendered more effective through being guided by intelligence. To the few in the inner circle, the self-actualized transmits one’s best thought, one’s hidden knowledge, one’s special grace, one’s most mystical power. How grand is the service such a sage can render all those who accept the light of one’s knowledge! Then indeed is one, in Shakespeare’s phrase, “The star to every wandering barque.” Do not fall into the error of believing that, if one speaks openly these doctrines to others, or writes of them publicly, one is seeking to make proselytes. #RandolphHarris 10 of 19

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The religious missionary eagerly seeks to proselytize, but the philosophic expounder cannot. This is because one is not governed by the emotional desire to witness a large number of conversations but by the clear understanding of evolutionary operations—an understanding which enables one to see what is and is not possible, what is and is not suitable, at each stage of those operations. One is not, like the missionary, seeking any personal satisfaction by making an emotional or intellectual conquest. The illuminate has a cosmic outlook. One thinks and feels for all creatures no less than for oneself. So you think that these ancient illuminati, full of high intimations and carrying great lights in their hands, appeared before the World out of their silence and solitude to suffer its ridicule and contempt because they wished to brag about themselves or to amaze them? They came because they dared not disobey compassion’s call save at the pain of being false to all that they knew to be true. The self-actualized makes the highest conceivable sacrifice in willing to return to Earthly life for times without end solely for the benefit of all creatures. People sometimes ask why anyone should give up even a part of one’s time to unpaid service. #RandolphHarris 11 of 19

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However, the truth is that the self-actualized is always paid by the friendship and gratitude, the trust and affection, which those one has helped return one. And if it be further said that these are mere intangibles which do not pay for the time and energy one gives, the answer is that they often are convertible into the most tangible of things. For if one is in real need of a home, a machine, a piece of domestic furniture, or a form of personal service, one has only to express that need and those whom one has helped will provide it. Nay, there are times when one need not even express it, when the silent magic of thought will prompt someone to offer the provision quite spontaneously and voluntarily. Anyway, the self-actualized does not give one’s service with any thought about the getting or non-getting of rewards. One gives it because one thinks it right to do so and because one enjoys the satisfaction of giving a helping hand to the spiritually needy. One is doing what one likes. Now we have to take a closer look at what we mean by specifically human aggression. The first is, biologically programmed type, the same defensive mechanism that in animals. The latter type takes the form of human cruelty on the one hand and, on the other, of that passionate enmity toward life, that hatred of life what we call necrophilia. #RandolphHarris 12 of 19

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The biologically programmed human aggressiveness, which is identical to animal aggression is relatable because the animal’s neurophysiological organization, which is the same in humans, makes it react aggressively if its vital interests are threatened. A human being responds the same way. However, in humans the reaction, this reactive or defensive aggressiveness, is much more extensive. There are three reasons. One is that the animal experiences only present threats. All it knows is: “At this moment I am threatened.” The human being, with their mental powers, can imagine the future. Consequently, one can experience a threat that may not exist now but may well exist in the future. One therefore reacts aggressively not only to threats existing at the moment but also to one’s future. That provides the reactive aggression with a much larger field in which to function, for the number of human beings is very large, as is the number of situations in which a threat to them may exist in the future. Another reason why reactive aggression has a larger playground in humans is that humans are subject to suggestion while animals are not. You can convince a human being that one’s life or one’s freedom is threatened. You use words and symbols to do that. An animal cannot have its “brain washed,” because it lacks the symbols, the words, essential to brainwashing. It makes no difference to one’s reactions that one only believes oneself threated. #RandolphHarris 13 of 19

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I do not have to speak at any length about the many cases in which wars were made possible because people had been made to believe they were threatened. The power of suggestion had created the aggressiveness needed to drive people into battle. Then there is still a third and final reason. A human being has special interests that are closely linked to the values, ideals, and institutions which one identifies. An attack on the ideals or persons central to one’s life, on the institutions that are scared to one, can be as threatening to one as an attack on one’s life or on one’s source of food. Any number of things can be so precious to one: the idea of freedom, the idea of honour, one’s parents, one’s father, one’s mother, in some cultures one’s ancestors, the state, the flag, the government, religion, God. Any of those values, institutions, or ideals may be as important to one as one’s own physical existence. If they are threatened, one reacts with hostility. If we put all three factors together, we can understand why defensive hostility in humans is so much more extensive than it is in animals, even through the mechanism in which it is based is identical in human and animal. Humans experience many more threats, or experiences more things as threats, than the animal possibly can. #RandolphHarris 14 of 19

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If we have put off admitting our sins to God, confession may need to come first in our devotional time. There is also the probability that during Scriptural meditation, or even during adoration, further hidden sins will come to light. So our moments of devotion may be filled with repeated confession. It is instructive to notice that Psalm 139, which systematically contemplate God’s omnipotence and omniscience, ends with a prayer for divine investigation of the Psalmist’s soul: “Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting,” reports Psalm 139.23, 24. Likewise, as Isaiah was worshipped he cried out in confession, “Woe to me! I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live along a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty,” reports Isaiah 6.5. If you are concerned about our own spiritual formation of that of others, this vision of the kingdom is the place we must start. Remember, it is the place where Jesus started. It was the gospel he preached. He came announcing, manifesting, and teaching the availability and nature of the kingdom of the Heavens. “For I was sent for this purpose,” reported in Luke 4.43. That is simply a fact, and if we are faithful to it, do justice to it in full devotion, we will find our feet firmly planted on the path of Christian spiritual formation. #RandolphHarris 15 of 19

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Scripture speaks both of holiness we already possess in Christ before God and a holiness in which we are to grow more and more. The first is the result of the work of Christ for us; the second is the result of the work of the Holy Spirit in us. The first is perfect and complete and is ours the moment we trust Christ; the second is progressive and incomplete as long as we are in this life. The objective holiness we have in Christ and the subjective holiness produced by the Holy Spirit are both gifts of God’s grace and are both appropriated by faith. However, the perfect holiness we have in Christ is the answer to our dilemma of how we can appear daily before a perfectly holy God, when even our best deeds are stained and polluted. Our lack of understanding of the distinction between the holiness we do have in Christ and the holiness we want to find in ourselves caused some to say that we mistakenly hope to find in ourselves something that can be found in Christ alone. The kingdom of God is the range of God Himself, from everlasting to everlasting (Psalm 103.17; see also Psalm 93.1-2; Daniel 4,3; 7.14; and so on). The planet Earth and its immediate surroundings seem to be the only place in creation where God permits His will to be not done. #RandolphHarris 16 of 19

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Therefore we pray, “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven,” and hope for the time when that kingdom will be completely fulfilled even on Earth (Luke 21.31; 22.18)—where in fact it is already present (Luke 17.21; John 18.36-37) and available to those who seek it with all their hearts (Matthew 6.13; 11.12; Luke 16.16). For those who do so seek it, it is true even now that “all thing work together for their good,” reports Romans 8.28, and that nothing can cut them off from God’s inseparable love and effective care (Romans 8.35-39). That is the nature of a life in the kingdom of the Heavens now. “And behold, it is wisdom in God that we should obtain these records, that we may preserve unto our children the language of our fathers; and also that we may preserve unto them the word which have been spoken by the mouth of all the holy prophets, which have been delivered unto them by the Spirit and power of God, since the World began, even down unto this present time. And it came to pass that after this manner of language did I persuade my brethren, that they might be faithful in keeping the commandments of God. And it came to pass that we went down to the land of our inheritance, and we did gather together our gold, and our silver, and our precious things. #RandolphHarris 17 of 19

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“And after we had gathered these things together, we went up again unto the house of Laban. And it came to pass that we went into Laban, and desired him that he would give unto us the records which were engraven upon the plates of brass, for which we would give him our gold, and our sliver, and all our precious things. And it came to pass that when Laban saw our property, and that it was exceedingly great, de did lust after it, insomuch that he thrust us out, and sent his servants to slay us, that he might obtain our property. And it came to pass that we did flee before the servants of Laban, and were obliged to leave behind our property, and it fell into the hands of Laban. And it came to pass that we fled into the wilderness, and the servants of Laban did not overtake us, and we hid ourselves in the cavity of a rock,” reports 1 Nephi 3.19-28. O God, Who in Thy loving-kindness dost both begin and finish all good things; grant that as we glory in the beginnings of Thy grace, so we may rejoice in its completion; through Jesus Christ our Lord. O Lord, when the World’s unbelievers reject thee, and are so forsaken by thee that thou calls them no more, it is to Thine own Thou does turn, for in such seasons of general apostasy they in some measure backslide with the World. O how free is Thy grace that reminds them of the danger that confronts them and urges them to persevere in adherence to Thyself! #RandolphHarris 18 of 19

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I bless thee that those who turn aside may return to thee immediately, and be welcomed without anything to commend them, notwithstanding all their former backslidings. I confess that this is suited to my case, for of late I have found great want, and lack of apprehension of divine grace; I have been greatly distressed of soul because I did not suitably come to the fountain that purges away all sin; I have labored too much for spiritual life, peace of conscience, progressive holiness, in my own strength. I beg thee, show me the arm of all might; give me to believe that Thou can do for me more than I ask or think, and that, though I backslide, Thy love will never let me go, but will draw me back to Thee with everlasting cords; that Thou does provide grace in the wilderness, and can bring me out, leaning on the arm of my Beloved; that Thou can cause me to talk with Him by the rivers of waters in a straight way, wherein I shall not stumble. Keep me solemn, devout, faithful, resting of free grace for assistance, acceptance, and peace of conscience. Almighty and everlasting God, Whose paths are always mercy and truth, grant, we beseech Thee, that we who are fostered by Thy tenderness may also grow up with an increase of piety; through Jesus Christ our Lord. #RandolphHarris 19 of 19

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When You Become Weary and Feel Like Quitting, Wait on the Lord and He Will Renew Your Strength!

ImageStrange, when you come to think of it, that of all the countless folk who have lived before our time on this planet not one is known in history or legend as having died of laughter. The rung of a ladder was never meant to rest upon, but only to hold a person’s foot long enough to enable one to put the other somewhat higher. Do not compromise yourself. You are all you have got. If you have the will to win, you have achieved half your success. If you do not, you have achieved half your failure. If you have made mistakes, there is always another chance for you. You may have a fresh start any moment you choose, for this thing we call “failure” is not falling down, but the staying down. “Treasure the pain; treasure what you have, including fear. Treasure it because if we do not live this life, if we do not live it to the fullest year after year and century after century, well, then we die,” (Page 32, The Wolves of Midwinter by Anne Rice). To understand each faculty is to grasp first the nature of the faculties in general, and their relationship to each other and the divisions of knowledge. The fundamental relationship among the faculties is that of knowledge to action. Understanding, reason, and imagination yield contemplative knowledge and memory recorded and recalled it. Knowledge is a state or condition of the human being that constitutes a potential for action. #RandolphHarris 1 of 19

ImageIn any instance of rational behaviour, action came about when an individual, confronted with the need to choose among alternatives, brought one’s knowledge to bear in ways that controlled appetite and directed one’s will. Rational conduct is thus knowledge actualized. Practical knowledge, on the other hand, is a state or condition built up chiefly through experience. It becomes rational to the extent that knowledge affected experience. The best division of human learning is that derived from the three faculties of the rational soul, which is the seat of learning. History is properly concerned with individuals, which are circumscribed by place and time. For though Natural History may seem to deal with species, yet this is only because of the general resemblance which in most cases natural objects of the same species bear to one another; so that when you know one, you know all. All this relates to the Memory. Philosophy discards individuals; neither does it deal with the impressions immediately received from them, but with abstract notions derived from these impressions; in the composition and division whereof according to the law of nature and fact its business lies. And this is the office of work of reason. #RandolphHarris 2 of 19

ImageThe sense, which is he door of intellect, is affected by individuals only. The images of those individuals—that is, the impression they make on the sense—fix themselves in the memory. These the human mind proceeds to review and ruminate; and thereupon either simply rehearses them, or makes fanciful imitations of them, or analyses and classifies them. Wherefore from these three fountains, Memory, Imagination, and Reason, flow these three emanations, History, Poesy, and Philosophy. I consider history and experience to be the same things, as also philosophy and the sciences. These faculties or powers had as their vehicle the motions of spirits. Each faculty modulated, shaped, and figured spirit movement in ways peculiar to it: some of the ancients, who in too eagerly fixing their eyes and thoughts on the memory, imagination, and reason, have neglected the faculty of thinking [or cogitation], which holds first place in the work of contemplating and considering [id est, in the work of conception]. For one who remembers and also one who recollects, is thinking; one who imagines, is thinking; one who reasons, is thinking; and in a word the spirit of a human, whether prompted by sense of left to itself, whether in the functions of the understanding, or of the will and affections, dances to the measure of thoughts. #RandolphHarris 3 of 19

ImageThe context of the passage makes clear that by nature the souls of all living creatures are in infinite and endless motion, the human soul having its own mode of motion That which is in motion is spirit. It seems evident, then, that thinking is a general mode of spirit activity in the rational soul and that the faculties designate distinctive types of motion. Thinking is like a radio carrier wave which is modulated according to the tasks it does. The faculties are types of modulation. Although we speculate much about the spirit, the physical basis of mental life, very speak very little about the anatomical location of mental activity. We are aware of the medical lore which locates the faculties in the ventricles of the brain. That arrangement of the intellectual faculties (imagination, reason, and memory) according to the respective ventricles of the brain is not entirely destitute of error. Yet, it is known that the cognition of humans is in their head, but we also know the heart and the gut seem to have intellectual abilities as well. Primary learning is the acquisition of rather simple connections between events, based largely on sensory input and simple messages from other parts of the body. The simpler the organism, the more simply and easily these connections are made—the faster, too, and the more enduringly. #RandolphHarris 4 of 19

ImageMature learning, on the other hand, depends a great deal on meaning, that is on relating the current sensory input to what is already known. And what is already known is stored in the association areas in very complex ways. So, the more complex the organism, the slower the incorporation of new sensory input into the existing frame or context. We know this from other forms of organization. How hard it is to get some change introduced into bureaucracy, and how hard it is for us outsiders to talk to those inside—insiders like to talk to each other. Only the higher beings have the capacity to learn through the use of concepts and symbols. The first learning of primates is extremely slow, and very different from that at maturity. Human meticulousness in the learning process is due to the very complexity of which our thinking is ultimately capable: primitive animals learn fast; complex, patterned, configurational learning comes later and takes longer. To appreciate the nature of more central functioning, it now becomes important to distinguish between two parts of the cortex (the surface of the brain). Some cells here are connected directly with the sensory nerve-cells bringing messages about the environment or the state of the body; other cells are mainly connected with each other; this is the distinction between the sensory cortex and the association cortex, respectively. #RandolphHarris 5 of 19

ImageThis distinction between sensory and association cortex enables us to speculate about how environmental, peripheral, sensory control over behaviour differs from the higher achievements of some animals: more central controls over behaviour, even amounting to purposive behaviour. Verbal and nonverbal feedback are strategies thar are most rudimentary forms of vivification. First, let us consider the verbal modality. There are two basic ways to provide verbal feedback—noting and tagging. Noting alerts clients to initial experiences of resistance; tagging acquaints them with those that follow. Some examples of noting are observations such as, “This issue seems really difficult for you,” and “You appear to be distracted right now.” Some examples of tagging are, “Whenever we discuss this topic, you seem to want to change it,” and “There you go again, preferring to argue rather than face your life.” Because I am trying to alert rather than shock, I sometimes find I necessary to temper my appraisals. For example, I might say to a client just beginning treatment: “I wonder if I am pushing too hard right now. Maybe you can begin again where you feel comfortable.” #RandolphHarris 6 of 19

Image I also try to acknowledge the potential fallibility of my feedback; this helps clients to direct themselves to the relevant issues. “My observation my have been off base here,” I might remark. Or I might say, “I wonder if we could suspend my observation for a bit, see how it feels to us at a later time.” I find that use of nonverbal feedback to be particularly elucidating to clients. Whereas verbal feedback appears to animate predominately conscious domains of clients’ resistance, nonverbal feedback seems to clarify primarily subliminal barriers and domains. By mirroring a client’s crossed arms, for example, unless they are posing for a studio picture, I am able to help one see how unexpectedly guarded one has been about a particular topic; by echoing a client’s sense of being “choked up,” I am able to appraise one of one’s “suffocating” relationship. Resistances sometimes seem like broken records to clients, endlessly duplicating a theme. While the vivification process can often amplify that sense of repetitiveness, it can also provide fresh opportunities to transcend it. I try to alert clients to these possibilities and to subtle changes in their patterns of defensiveness. For example, I might refer an intellectualized client to one’s sudden use of the pronoun “I,” or direct a client who chronically suppresses one’s sadness to an abruptly formed teardrop. #RandolphHarris 7 of 19

ImageThe idealized image might be called a fictitious or illusory self, but that would be only a half truth and hence misleading. The wishful thinking operating in its creation is certainly striking, particularly since it occurs in persons who otherwise stand on a ground of firm reality. However, this does not make it wholly fictitious. It is an imaginative creation interwoven with and determined by very realistic factors. It usually contains traces of the persons genuine ideals. While the grandiose achievements are illusory, the potentialities underlying them are often real. More relevant, it is born of very real inner necessities, it fulfills very real functions, and it has a very real influence on its creator. The process of operating in its creation are determined by such definite laws that a knowledge of its specific features permits us to make accurate inferences as to the true character structure of the particular person. However, regardless of how much fantasy is woven into the idealized image, for the neurotic oneself it has the value of reality. The more firmly it is established the more one is one’s idealized image, while one’s real self is proportionately dimmed out. This reversal of the actual picture is bound to come about because of the very nature of the functions the image performs. Every one of them is aimed at effacing the real personality and turning the spotlight on itself. #RandolphHarris 8 of 19

ImageLooking back over the history of many patients we are led to believe that its establishment has often been literally lifesaving, and that is why the resistance a patient puts up if one’s image is attacked is entirely justified, or at least logical. As long as one’s image remains real to one and is intact, one can feel significant, superior, and harmonious, in spite of the illusory nature of those feelings. One can consider oneself entitled to raise all kinds of demands and claims on the basis of one’s assumed superiority. However, if one allows it to be undermined one is immediately threatened with the prospect of facing all one’s weaknesses, with no title to special claims, a comparatively insignificant figure or even—in one’s own eyes—a contemptible one. More terrifying still, one is faced with one’s conflicts and the hideous fear of being torn to pieces. That this may give one a chance of becoming a much better human being worth more than all the glory of one’s idealized image, is a gospel one hears but for a long time means nothing to one. It is a leap in the dark of which one is afraid. With so great a subjective value to recommend it, the position of the image would be unassailable if it were not for the huge drawbacks inseparable from it. #RandolphHarris 9 of 19

ImageThe whole edifice is in the first place extremely rickety by reason of the fictitious elements involved. A treasure house loaded with dynamite, it makes the individual highly vulnerable. Any questioning or criticism from outside, any awareness of one’s own failure to measure up to the image, any real insight into the forces operating within one can make it explode or crumble. One must restrict one’s life lest one be exposed to such dangers. One must avoid situations in which one would not be admired or recognized. One must avoid tasks that one is not certain to master. One may even develop an intense aversion to effort of any kind. To one, the gifted one, the mere vision of a picture one might paint is already the master painting. Any mediocre person can get somewhere by hard work; for one to apply oneself like very Tom, Dick, and Harry would be an admission that one is not the mastermind, and so humiliating. Since nothing can actually be achieved without work, one defeats by one’s attitude the very ends one is driven to attain. And the gap between one’s idealized image and one’s real self widens. One is dependent upon endless affirmations from others in the form of approval, admiration, flattery—none of which, however, can give one any more than temporary reassurance. #RandolphHarris 10 of 19

ImageOne may unconsciously hate everyone who is overbearing or who, being better than one in any way—more assertive, more evenly balanced, better formed—threatens to undermine one’s own notions of oneself. The more desperately one clings to the belief that one is one’s idealized image, the more violent the hatred. Or, if one’s own arrogance is repressed, one may blindly admire persons who are openly convinced of their importance and show it by arrogant behaviour. One loves in them one’s own image and inevitably runs into severe disappointment when one becomes aware, as one must at some time or other, that the gods one so admires are interested only in themselves, and as far as one is concerned care only for the incense one burns at alters. Tracing out and enabling helps clients to trace out the consequences of their resistances and enabling them to be resistant are two other ways to catalyze productive change. I have often found it helpful for client invested in smallness, for example, to detail the dullness, routine, and oppressiveness that they foresee in their lives. I have found it equally useful for inflated clients to peer into their unsettling futures. While such strategies may acutely frustrate certain clients, they can also alert them to present opportunities, which can head off their nightmarish fantasies. #RandolphHarris 11 of 19

ImageAmbivalent clients can also benefit from the strategy of tracing out. Experientially detailing the pros and cons of a situation or anticipating the meaning of remaining ambivalent have all helped my clients to substantively reassess their predicaments. One of the most interesting and ironic features of vivification is that when all else fails, just allowing the client to resist can be the most salient remedy. When I worked with highly resistive (nonviolent) children, for example, I found that divesting of a given treatment plan was more effective, frequently, than pressing for a particular strategy. Highly resistive adult clients also respond favourably to such divestitures. When such clients are allowed to simply be their withdrawn, grandiose, or intractable selves, they will frequently begin to relinquish those dispositions. For example, I suggested to one intransigent client that she just “be that way,” and that she could use her time as she wished. At first she agreed and diverted us to another topic. As time went on, however, it became clear that she felt uncomfortable with this arrangement. When I worked with her to stay present to that discomfort, she acknowledged how infuriated she had become with herself and how tired she had become of treating herself like an invalid. It was then that she recommitted to change. #RandolphHarris 12 of 19

ImageVivifying or modeling desired behaviour is another way to catalyze resistant clients. By forming an alliance with the part of a client that could be, the therapist can tacitly underscore who that client is; the contrast between the two can invigorate the client to transform. I once told a client who was about to give up on herself, for example, that I was not about to give up on her, and that I would form an alliance with the part of her that believed. Although little changed at first, she gradually realized how absurd her hopelessness had been. As long as I can be of help to you, I will work with you. You not only have permission without condemnation to express your struggle to be; you have prior experiences, from the greatest authority (God), of your own rights and your own being. You are a person with your own rights. To make covenant with God, is impossible, but by deep prayer of such as God speaks to, either by revelation supernatural, or by his lieutenants that govern under Him, and in His Name; for otherwise we know not whether our covenants be accepted, or not. And therefore they that vow anything contrary to any law of nature, vow in vain; as being a thing unjust to pay such a vow. And if it be a thing commanded by the law of nature, it is not the vow, but the law that binds them. #RandolphHarris 13 of 19

ImageChristianity is holding that human beings are somehow good apart from God and therefore capable of saving themselves, even saving themselves by merit. The fear of many is that if you do not hold human beings to be, essentially and as such “rotten,” and forever so, you are thereby committed to the view that they are, as such, essentially good and therefore righteous and meritorious. This is a field of battle fought over by Pelagius and Augustine many centuries ago and repeatedly revisited through Christian history. It involves many important issues, which cannot be fully dealt with here. We must keep clear, however, that it is the worth of the human beings, not their righteousness, which is tied to their nature. Things of great value can still be lost and often are; and to be of great values does not mean one is not lost, but is saved and safe. “Depravity” does not, properly, refer to the inability to act, but to the unwillingness to act and clearly the inability to earn. Everyone must be active in the process of their salvation and transformation to Christlikeness. This is an inescapable fact. However, the initiative in the process is always God’s, and we would in fact do nothing without His initiative. Yet, that initiative is not something we are waiting upon. The ball is, as it were, in our court. #RandolphHarris 14 of 19

ImageGod has invaded human history and reality. Jesus Christ has died on our behalf, is risen, and is now supervising events on Earth toward an end that He will certainly bring to pass, to the glory of God. The issue now concerns what we will do. The idea that we can do noting is an unfortunate confusion, and those who sponsor it never practice it, thank goodness. If we—though well-directed and unrelenting action—effectually receive the grace of God in salvation and transformation, we certainly will be incrementally changed toward inward Christlikeness. The transformation of the outer life, especially of our behaviour, will follow suit. That too is an inescapable fact. “No good tree produced bad fruit,” reports Luke 6.43. However, this means both goodness and ability in union with God, not apart from Him—not independently, on our own. The transformation of the inner being is as much or more a gift of grace as is our justification before God. Of course neither one is wholly passive. (To be forever lost you need only do nothing. Just stay your course.) However, with reference to both justification and transformation, “boasting is excluded” by the law of grace through faith (Romans 3.27-31; Ephesians 2.1-10). #RandolphHarris 15 of 19

ImageIn fact, we consume the most grace by leading a holy life, in which we must be constantly upheld by grace, not by continuing to sin and being repeatedly forgiven. The interpretation of grace as having only to do with guilt is utterly false to biblical teaching and renders spiritual life in Christ unintelligible. Hopefully, it will now be clear that our inner (and therefore outer) being can be transformed is not only possible, but has actually occurred to a significant degree in the lives of many human beings; and it is necessary if our life as a whole is to manifest one’s goodness and power, and if we as individuals are to grow into the eternal calling that God places upon each life. God is the only who has no beginning. Now whatever has a beginning, is not eternal. Therefore God is the only one eternal. Eternity truly and properly so called is in God lone, because eternity follows on immutability. However, God alone is altogether immutable. Accordingly, however, as some receive immutability from Him, they share in His eternity. Thus some receive immutability from God in the way of never ceasing to exist; in that sense it is said of the Earth, “it shall stand forever,” as reported in Ecclesiastics 1.4. Again, some things are called eternal in Scripture because of the length of their duration, although they are in nature corruptible things; thus Psalms 75.5 the hills are called “eternal” and we read “of the fruits of the eternal hills.” Deuteronomy 33.15. #RandolphHarris 16 of 19

ImageSome again share more fully than others in the nature of eternity, inasmuch as they possess unchangeableness either in being or further still in operation; like the Angels, and the blessed, who enjoy the Word, because “as regards that vision of the Word, no changing thoughts exist in the Saints,” as Augustine says. Hence those who see God are said to have eternal life; according to that text, “This is eternal life, that they may know Thee the only true God,” excreta (Jn. 17.3). There are said to be many eternities, accordingly as many share in eternity, by the contemplation of God. The fire of Hell is called eternal, only because it never ends. Still, there is change in the pains of the lost, according to the words “To extreme heat they will pass from snowy Psalm “Their time will be forever,” reports Psalms 80.16. Necessary means a certain mode of truth; and truth, according to the Philosopher, is in the mind. Therefore, in this sense the true and necessary are eternal, because they are in the eternal mind, which is the divine intellect alone; hence it does not follow that anything is eternal besides God. Be present, O Lord, to Thy suppliants, and graciously protect those who place their whole trust in Thy mercy; that being cleansed from the stain of sin, they may continue in holy living, and being sufficiently supplied with temporal blessings, may attain the inheritance of Thy promises; though Jesus Christ our Lord. #RandolphHarris 17 of 19

ImageGrant us, O Lord, we beseech Thee, always to seek Thy kingdom and righteousness; and of whatsoever Thou seest us to stand in need, mercifully grant us an abundant portion; through Jesus Christ our Lord. “For behold, it came to pass that the Lord spoke unto my father (Lehi), yea; even in a dream, and said unto him: Blessed art thou Lehi, because the things which thou has done; and because thou hast been faithful and declared unto this people the things which I commanded thee, behold, they seek to take away thy life. And it came to pass that the Lord commanded my father, even in a dream, that he should take his family and depart into the wilderness. And it came to pass that he was obedient unto the word of the Lord, wherefore he did as the Lord commanded him. And it came to pass that he departed into the wilderness. And he left his house, and the land of his inheritance, and his gold, and his silver, and his precious things, and took nothing with him, save it were his family, and provisions, and tents, and departed into the wilderness. And he came down by the borders near the shore of the Red Sea; and he traveled in the wilderness in the borders which are nearer the Red Sea; and he did travel in the wilderness with his family, which consisted of my mother, Sariah, and my elder brothers, who were Leman, Lemuel, and Sam,” reports 1 Nephi 2.1-5. #RandolphHarris 18 of 19

ImageSovereign Lord, when clouds of darkness, atheism, and unbelief come to me, I see thy purpose of love in withdrawing the Spirit that I might prize him more, in chastening me for my confidence in past successes, that my wound of secret godlessness might be cured. Help me to humble myself before Thee by seeing the vanity of honour as a conceit of human’s minds, as standing between me and thee; by seeing that thy will must be done, as much in denying as in giving spiritual enjoyments; by seeing that my heart is nothing but evil, mind, mouth, life void of thee; by seeing that sin and Satan are allowed power in me that I might know my sin, be humbled, and gain strength thereby; by seeing that unbelief shuts thee from me, so that I sense not thy majesty, power, mercy, or love. Then possess me, for thou only art good and worthy. Thou dost not play in convincing me of sin, Satan did not play in tempting me to it, I do not play when I sink in deep mire, for sin is no game, no toy, no bauble; let me never forget that the heinousness of sin lies not so much in the nature of the sin committed, as in the greatness of the Person sinned against. When I am afraid of evils to come, comfort me, by showing me that in myself I am a dying, condemned wretch, but that in Christ I am reconciled, made alive, and satisfied; that I am feeble and unable to do any good, but that in Hum I can do all things; that what I now have in Christ is mine in part, but shortly I shall have it perfectly in Heaven. #RandolphHarris 19 of 19Image

BRIGHTON STATION AT CRESLEIGH RANCH

Rancho Cordova, CA |

Now Selling!

ImageSince it does not cost a dime to dream, you will never shortchange yourself when you stretch your imagination. NOW SELLING! Brighton Station at Cresleigh Ranch is Rancho Cordova’s newest home community! This charming neighborhood offers an array of home types with eye catching architecture styles such as Mid-Century Modern, California Modern, Prairie, and Contemporary Farmhouse.

ImageLocated off Douglas Road and Rancho Cordova Parkway, the residents of Cresleigh Ranch will enjoy, being just minutes from shopping, dining, and entertainment, and quick access to Highway 50 and Grant Line Road providing a direct route into Folsom. Residents here also benefit from no HOA fees, two community parks and the benefits of being a part of the highly-rated Elk Grove Unified School District. Winners make goals! https://cresleigh.com/brighton-station/

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Do I Not Have the Right to do What I Want with My Own Money? Or are You Envious Because I am Generous?

ImageAn optimist goes to the window every morning and says, “Good morning, God.” The pessimist goes to the window every morning and says, “Good God! Morning!” If A equals success, then the formula is A = X + Y + Z. X is work. Y is play. Z is keep your mouth shut. “And to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: You should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody,” reports 1 Thessalonians 4.11-12. If you wish to glimpse inside a human soul and get to know a person, do not bother analyzing one’s ways of being silent, of talking, of weeping, or seeing how much one is moved by noble ideas; if you watch one just laugh, you will get better results. If one laughs well, one is a good being. My strength is as the strength of ten, because my heart is pure. To understand political power right, and derive it from its original, we must consider, what state all people are naturally in, and that is, a state of perfect freedom to order their actions, and dispose of their possessions and persons, as they think fit, within the bounds of the law of nature, without asking leave or depending upon the will of any other person. #RandolphHarris 1 of 19

ImageA state also of equality, wherein in the power and jurisdiction is reciprocal, no one having more than another; there being nothing more evident, than that creatures of the same species and rank, promiscuously born to all the same advantages of nature, and the use of the same faculties, should also be equal one amongst another without  subordination or subjection, unless the lord and master of them all should, by any manifest declaration of one’s will, set one above another, and confer on one, by an evident and clear appoint, an undoubted right to dominion and sovereignty. This equality of humans by nature must be built on the foundation of an obligation to mutual love amongst humans, on which one builds the duties they owe one another, and from whence one derives the great maxims of justice and charity. The like natural inducement hath brought people to know that it is no less their duty, to love others than themselves; for seeing those things which are equal, must needs all one measure; if I cannot but wish to receive good, even as much at every human’s hands, as any human can wish unto one’s own soul, how should I look to have any part of my desire herein satisfied, unless myself be careful to satisfy the desire, which is undoubtedly in other beings, being of one and the same nature? #RandolphHarris 2 of 19

ImageTo have anything offered them repugnant to this desire, must needs in all respects grieve them as much as me; so that if I do harm, I must look to suffer, there being no reason that others should shew greater measure of love to me, than they have by me shewed unto them: my desire therefore to be loved of my equals in nature as much as possible may be, imposeth upon me a natural duty of bearing to them-ward fully like the affection; from which relation of equality between ourselves and them that are as ourselves, what several rules and canons natural reason hath drawn, for direction of life, no being is ignorant. However, though this be a state of liberty, yet it is not a state of licence: though humans in that state have an uncontroulable liberty to dispose of one’s person or possessions, yet one has not liberty to destroy oneself, or so much as nay creature in one’s possession, but where some nobler use than its bare preservation calls for it. The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one: and reason, which is that law, teaches all humankind, who will but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in one’s life, health, liberty, or possession: for humans being all the workmanship of one omnipotent, and infinitely wise maker. #RandolphHarris 3 of 19

ImageAll the servants of one sovereign master, sent into the World by his order, not another’s pleasure: and being furnished with like faculties, sharing all in one community of nature, there cannot be supposed any such subordination among us, that may authorize us to destroy one another, as if we were made for one another’s uses, as the inferior ranks of creatures are for our’s. Every one, as one is bound to preserve oneself, and not to quit one’s station willfully, so by the like reason, when one’s own preservation comes not in competition, ought one, as much as one can, to preserve the rest of humankind, and may not, unless it be to do justice on an offender, take away, or impair the life, or what tends to the preservation of life, the liberty, health, limb, or goods of another. And that all humans may be restrained from invading others rights, and from doing hurt to one execution of the law of nature is, in that state, put into every human’s hands, where every one has a right to punish the transgressors of that laws to such a degree, as may hinder its violations: for the law of nature would, as all other laws that concern humans in the World be in vain, if there were no body that in the state of nature may punish another for any evil one has done, every one may do so: for in that state of perfect equality, where naturally there is no superiority or jurisdiction of one over another, what any may do in prosecution of that law, every one must needs have a right to do. #RandolphHarris 4 of 19

ImageNot only does God sovereignly determine how and to what extent He will bless us, He often blesses those who, in our opinion, seem most unworthy. We see this demonstrated rather forcefully in Jesus’s recounting of two Old Testament incidents as recorded in Luke 4.25-27: “I assure you that there were many windows in Israel in Elijah’s time, when the sky was shut for three and a half years and there was a severe famine throughout the land. Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a window in Zarephath in the region of Sidon. And there were many in Israel with leprosy in the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed—only Naaman the Syrian.” Luke recorded that “all the people in the synagogue were furious when they heard this.” Why were these Jewish people who heard Jesus so enraged that, as verse 29 tells us, they wanted to kill Him? It was because the widow and Naaman were despised Gentiles. In the opinion of the Jewry, these people were most unworthy. The reaction was, “How could God bless those Gentiles instead of more deserving Jewish people?” The fact is, God did bless those two Gentiles while passing right by His own chose people. Were in the widow of Zarephath and Naaman the Syrian more “deserving” than anyone in Israel? Not all. #RandolphHarris 5 of 19

ImageThe Old Testament record of one’s healing indicates that Naaman, by his anger and haughtiness, was very undeserving. God often does bless people who seem to us to be quite unworthy. However, that is what grace is all about, because we are all unworthy. We rejoice in the generosity of God’s grace as it is directed toward us, or toward our family or friends. However, how do we feel wen someone whom we think does not deserve it is blessed by God? Are we envious because of the generosity of God toward that person? Do we feel, as did the workers in the parable, who got paid as much for one hour of work as did those who slaved away in the hot Sun for twelve hours, that we have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day, and yet that other person has been blessed more than we have? The workers who labored all day did not grumble because they received too little pay, but because less deserving workers received the same as they. The “A” students in the modern version of the parable were not outraged because they received only an “A,” but because some obviously undeserving students received the same grade. The reality of the Christian life, though, is that there is no “A” students in God’s Kingdom. Some are more obedient than others, some have labored more and sacrificed more than others, but none of us measures up to an “A.” #RandolphHarris 6 of 19

ImageNone of us wants to get what we actually deserve. We all want God’s grace, but we cannot enjoy God’s grace when there is an attitude of comparing. See the two groups of labourers as they severally wend their way home that evening. As to amount of money in their pockets, they are all equal: but as to amount of content in their spirits there is a great difference. The last go home each with a penny [a denarius] in one’s pocket, and astonished glad gratitude in one’s heart: their reward accordingly is a penny, and more. The first, on the contrary, go home, each with a penny in one’s pocket, and corroding discontent in one’s soul: their reward accordingly is less than a penny. Arnot believed it was in this sense that “the last will be first, and first will be last,” reports Matthew 20.16. That is, the last workers hired ended up “first” because they had a day’s wages plus contentment, whereas the first workers hired ended up “last” because of their discontentment. While that is certainly a helpful observation about life, I understand Jesus’ two statements in Matthew 19.30 and 20.16 somewhat differently than Arnot does. I believe Jesus is asserting the sovereign prerogative of God to dispense His favours as He pleases. I do not think His statement, “So the last will be the first, and the first will be last,” is to be taken in absolute sense as if this would always be the case. #RandolphHarris 7 of 19

ImageRather, I think there is often no apparent correlation between what one seemingly “deserves” and what he or she receives. Remember, the whole point of the parable is to respond to Peter’s attitude as expressed in this statement: “The more we do, the more we earn, and the more God owes us.” If we are to succeed in living by grace, we must some to terms with the fact that God is sovereign in dispensing His gracious favours, and He owes us no explanation when His actions do not correspond with out system of merits. Indeed, as Paul said, “How unsearchable His decisions, and how mysterious His methods! For who has ever understood the thoughts of the Lord, or has even been His advisor?” reports Romans 11.33-34. We are left without any grounds for grumbling about the treatment we receive from God. God never becomes obligated to us, so He can always say to us, “Friend, I am not being unfair to you,” reports Matthew 20.13. At the same time God reserves the right to treat each of us differently, bestowing blessings as He sovereignly chooses. In the words of the landowner, God says to us, “Do I not have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?” reports Matthew 20.15. Doing what you want—God’s way. What does that mean? It means that they will then for the first time be able to do what they want to do. #RandolphHarris 8 of 19

ImageOf course they will be able to steal, lie, and murder all they want—which will be none at all. However, they will also be able to be truthful and transparent and helpful and sacrificially loving, with joy—and they will want to be. Their life will be in this way caught up in God’s life. They will want the good and be able to do it, the only true human freedom. The mind set on the spiritual is in that sense “life and peace,” reports Romans 8.6, because it lives from God and, “sowing into the spirit, out of the spirit reaps the eternal kind of life,” reports Galatians 6.8. So—and this is of utmost importance to those who would enter Christian spiritual formation—life as normally understood, where the object is securing myself, promoting myself, indulging myself, is to be set aside. “Can I still think about such things?” you may ask. Yes, you can. However, you increasingly will not. And when you do, as formation in Christlikeness progresses, they simply will not matter. In fact, they will seem ridiculous and uninteresting. Jesus’ words on not being anxious about what will happen to you and his admonitions to consider the flowers and birds, as reported in Luke 12.13-34, will seem obviously sane and right, whereas they previously sounded obviously crazy and wrong, or “out of touch with reality.” #RandolphHarris 9 of 19

ImageFrom the perspective of interpersonal politics, this element of the relationship—congruence—gives a maximum space to be—for the client and for the therapist. The therapist is saying, in effect, “Here I am, as I am.” There is no hint of any kind of control over the client’s responses to one’s way of being. To the contrary, finding that the therapist is permitting oneself to be as one is, the client tends to discover that same freedom. The second attitude of importance in creating a climate for change is acceptance, or caring or prizing—unconditional beneficial regard. It means that when the therapist is experiencing an optimistic attitude, acceptant attitude toward whatever the client is at that moment, therapeutic movement r change is more likely. It involves the therapist’s willingness for the client to be whatever feeling is going on at that moment—confusion, resentment, fear, anger, courage, love, or pride. It is a nonpossessive caring. The therapist prizes the client in a total rather tan a conditional way. This resembles the love the parent sometimes feels toward the infant. Research indicates that the more this attitude is experienced by the therapist, the greater the probability that therapy will be successful. It is not, of course, possible to feel such an unconditional caring all of the time. #RandolphHarris 10 of 19

Image A therapist who is real will often have very different feelings, negative feelings toward the client. Hence it is not to be regarded as a “should,” that the therapist should have an unconditional optimistic regard for the client. It is simply a fact that unless this is a reasonably frequent ingredient in the relationship, constructive client change is less likely. What of the interpersonal politics of such an attitude? It is a powerful factor, but it is in no way manipulative or controlling in the relationship. There is no judgment or evaluation involved. Power over one’s own life is left completely in the hands of the client. It provides a nurturant atmosphere but not a forcing one. Another facilitative aspect of the relationship is empathic understanding. This means that the therapist senses accurately the feelings and personal meanings that are being experienced by the client and communicates this understanding to the client. At its best the therapist is so much inside the private World of the other that one can clarify not only the meanings of which the client is aware but even those just below the level of awareness. When the therapist responds at such a level of level the client’s reaction is of this sort: “Perhaps that is what I have been trying to say. I have not realized it, but yes, that is how I do feel!” This element of the relationship is perhaps the most easily improved through even brief training. #RandolphHarris 11 of 19

ImageTherapists can learn, quite quickly, to be better, more sensitive listeners, more empathic. It is in part a skill as well as an attitude. To become more genuine or more caring, however, the therapist must change experientially, and this is slower and more complex process. Being empathic involves a choice on the part of the therapist as to what one will pay attention to, namely the inner World of the client as that individual perceives it. Thus it does change the interpersonal politics of the relationship. It in no way, however, exercises control over the client. On the contrary it assists the client in gaining a clearer understanding of, and hence a greater control over, one’s own World and one’s own behaviour. You may well ask why a person seeking help changes for the better when one is involved in a relationship with a therapist that contains these elements. Over the years I have come to see more and more clearly that the process of change in the client is a reciprocal of the attitudes of the therapist. As the client finds the therapist listening acceptingly to one’s feelings, one becomes able to listen acceptingly to oneself—to hear and accept the anger, the fear, the tenderness, the courage that is being experienced. As the client finds that therapist prizing and valuing even the hidden and awful aspects which have been expressed, one experiences a prizing and liking of oneself. #RandolphHarris 12 of 19

ImageAs the therapist is experienced as being real, the client is able to drop facades, to more openly be the experiencing within. Politically, by listening to the feelings within, the client reduces the power others have had in inculcating guilts and fears and inhibitions, and is slowly extending the understanding of, and control over, self. As the client is more acceptant of self, the possibility of being in command of self becomes greater and greater. The client possesses oneself to a degree that has never occurred before. The sense of power is growing. As the client becomes more self-aware, more self-acceptant, less defensive and more open, one finds at last some of the freedom to grow and change in the directions natural to the human organism. Life is not in one’s hands, to be lived as an individual. If there ever was a “man’s man,” it was Jonathan; and if there ever was a man who felt the need of a friend, I was Jonathan. The Philistines’ domination of Israel in that day was so complete that they allowed no blacksmiths in the land for fear they would make swords and spears for the Israelites. In fact, there were only two swords in the entire nation, those of King Saul and his son Jonathan. All Israel was in a dark storm of depression and despair—all, that is, expect Jonathan. Jonathan saw matters differently. He believed that if God willed it, Israel could be saved, even by a few. #RandolphHarris 13 of 19

ImageWhile others looked down, Jonathan looked up and saw a great and glorious God who could deliver hum anything He saw Fit. Armed with this conviction and his sword, Jonathan and his armour-bearer attacked a Philistine detachment alone. His sallying words say it all: “Come, let us go over to the outpost of those uncircumcised fellows. Perhaps the Lord will act in our behalf. Nothing can hinder the Lord from saving, whether by many or by few,” reports 1 Samuel 14.6. Assured that God would deliver them into his hand, Jonathan launched a horrifying single-handed attack. It was a mano a mano, hand-to-hand, man-to-man. Blood ran to the dust and white bone gleamed in the Sun as Jonathan sliced and hacked attacker after attacker, until twenty Philistine lay spread over a terrible half-acre. Blood-covered Jonathan was one tough Golden State Warrior! Jonathan’s heroics put some steel into his people, and a rebellion followed—and some good days for Israel. However, with Saul’s subsequent sin and rejection, Israel fell to even darker days than before (chapters 15-17), and Jonathan was more alone than ever. Even his greater heart was affected, as he too trembled before Goliath. There was no one of like mind, he thought—until he encountered David. #RandolphHarris 14 of 19

ImageJonathan could not believe his ears as David called out to the giant: “You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the Lord Almighty, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This day the Lord will hand you over to me, and I will strike you down and cut off your head…and the whole World will know that there is a God in Israel. All those gathered here will know that it is not by sword or spear that the Lord saves; for the battle is the Lord’s, and he will give all of you into our hands.” (17.45-47). Then David ran full-speed at Goliath and nailed him right between the eyes! Blood-smeared David stood holding the great gory head, talking calmly with Jonathan’s father, Saul. At last Jonathan had found someone whose heart was in tune with his—a friend. What followed was the flowering of a deep male friendship, one of the most celebrated friendships in all of literature. As such, it provides the essential elements and wisdom for all genuine friendships. “Little children cannot repent; wherefore, it is awful wickedness to deny the pure mercies of God unto them, for they are all alive in him because of his mercy. And one that saith that little children need baptism denieth the mercies of Christ, and setteth at naught the atonement of one and the power of one’s redemption. Wo unto such, for they are in danger of death, hell, and an endless torment. I speak it boldly; God hath commanded me. Listen unto them and give heed, or they stand against you at the judgment-seat of Christ,” Moroni 8.19-21. #RandolpHarris 15 of 19

ImageAnd thus, in the state of nature, one being comes by a power over another; but yet no absolute or arbitrary power, to use a criminal, when one has got one in one’s hands, according to the passionate heats, or boundless extravagancy of one’s own will; but only to retribute to one, so far as calm reason and conscience dictate, what is proportionate to one’s transgression, which is so much as may serve for reparation and restraint: for these two are the only reasons, why one being may lawfully do harm to another, which is that we call punishment. In transgressing the law of nature, the offender declares oneself to live by another rule than that of reason and common equity, which is that measure God has set to the actions of humans, for their mutual security; and so one becomes dangerous to humankind, the Simon clasp, which is to secure them from injury and violence, being slighted and broke by one. Which being a trespass against the whole species, and the peace and safety of it, provided for by the law of nature, every being upon this score, by the right one hath to preserve humankind in general, may restrain, or where it is necessary, destroy things noxious to them, and so may bring such evil on anyone, who hath transgressed that law, as many make one repent the doing of it, and thereby deter one, and by one’s example of others, from doing the like mischief. And in the case, and upon this ground, EVERY PERSON HATH A RIGHT TO PUNISH THE OFFENDER, AND BE EXECUTIONER OF THE LAW OF NATURE. #RandolphHarris 16 of 19

ImageI doubt not but this will seem a very strange doctrine to some people: but before they condemn it, I desire them to resolve me, by what right any prince or state can put to death, or punish an alien, for any crimes one commits in their country. It is certain their laws, by virtue of any sanction they receive from the promulgated will of the legislative, reach not a stranger: they speak not to one, nor, if they did, is one bound to hearken to them. The legislative authority, by which they are in force over the subjects of that commonwealth, hath no power over one. Those who have the supreme power of making laws in England, France, or Holland, are to an Indian, but like the rest of the World, beings without authority: and therefore, if by the law of nature every being hath not a power to punish offenses against it, as one soberly judges the case to require, I see not how the magistrates of any community can punish an alien of another country; since, in reference to one, they can have no more power than what every being naturally may have over another. “Remember that The Maker knows all things, all that is past and present, all that has happened and will happen, and what might happen as well. Remember there is no past of future where The Maker is but only the vast present of all things living,” reports Anne Rice, Angel Time, page 132. #RandolphHarris 17 of 19

Image Besides the crime which consists in violating the law, and varying from the right rule of reason, whereby a being so far becomes degenerate, and declares oneself to quit the principles of human nature, and to be a noxious creature, there is commonly injury done to some person or other, and some other being receives damages by one’s transgression: in which case one who hath received any damages, has, besides the right of punishment common to one with other people, a particular right to seek reparation from one that has done it: and other person, who finds it just, may also join with one that is injured, and assist one in recovering from the offender so much as may make satisfaction for the harm one has suffered. We beseech Thee, O Lord, in Thy compassion to increase Thy faith in us; because Thou wilt not deny the assistance of Thy loving-kindness to those whom Thou bestowest a stedfast belief in Thee; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Grant us, O Lord, we pray Thee, to trust in Thee will our heart; seeing that as Thou dost always resist the proud who confide in their own strength, so Thou does not forsake those who make their boast of Thy mercy; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Confirm, O Lord, in our minds the mysteries of the true faith, that as we confess Him Who was conceived by the Virgin to be Very God and Man, so by the power of His saving Resurrection we may be enabled to attain eternal joy; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord. #RandolphHarris 18 of 19

ImageO Divine Redeemer, great was thy goodness in undertaking my redemption, in consenting to be made sin for me, in conquering all my foes; great was thy strength in enduring the extremities of divine wrath, in taking away the load of my inequities; great was thy love in manifesting thyself alive, in showing thy sacred wounds, that every fear might vanish, and every doubt be removed; great was thy mercy in ascending to Heaven in being crowned and enthroned there to intercede for me, there to succour me in temptation, there to open the eternal book, there to receive me finally to thyself; great was thy wisdom in devising this means of salvation; bathe my soul in rich consolations of thy resurrection life; great was thy grace in commanding me to come hand in hand with thee to the Father, to be knit to Him eternally, to discover in him my rest, to find in him my peace, to behold His glory, to honour Him who is alone worthy; in giving me the Spirit as teacher, guide, power, that I may live repenting of sin, conquer Satan, find victory in life. When thou art absent all sorrows are here, when thou art present all blessings are mine. Be gracious to our prayers, O merciful God, and guard Thy people with loving protection; that they who confess Thine Only-begotten Son as God born in our bodily flesh, may never be corrupted by the deceits of the devil; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord. #RandolphHarris 19 of 19Image

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ImageFools makes complaint that the Prophet brings to then this old message of the eternal Deity that wait to light all human heart and brings nothing new or fit for this age and hour. We may make a preamble to our answer with the statement that one indubitabtly gives such scientific and practical turn to one’s teachings as the time demands, but we must admi that one’s first and last words remain ever the same as the first and last words of all the illustrious divine teachers. For what other message can one give? When the soul hungers for a happiness it has hitherto been unable to find in its mudpits of sensuality or in its marketplaces of barter, is one to offer it a stone of some economic doctrine and not the bread of spiritual nourishment? Is one to come to confirm our self-deceptions and our self-govellings and to give the lie to the divine bliss one enjoys in the moment? One’s continual serenity, one’s unemotional manner may draw the admiration of the discerning few, but it will also provoke the exasperation of the undiscerning many.

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I Used to think Love was Something I Could Take or Leave Alone but Now I Could Not do without My Supply!

ImageFinish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could; some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; you should begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense. Though no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new end. We should be lenient in our judgment, because often the mistakes of others would have been ours had we had the opportunity to make them. What is food to one being is bitter poison to others. Every negative development in a person is to be understood as the result of damaging influences in early childhood. This has led sometimes to irrational self-accusation on the part of parents who feel guilty for every undesirable or pathological trait that appears in a child after birth, and to a tendency of people in analysis to put the blame for all their trouble on their parents, and to avoid confronting themselves with the problem of their own responsibility. Good intentions mean noting if they cover up the unconscious intentions; “honest” dishonesty demonstrates that it is not enough to have “meant” well consciously. Forces operate in beings of which one is not aware and rationalization protects one from awareness; unconscious forces are integrated in a system to which we call character. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20

ImageCharacter syndromes are rooted and nourished in the particular forms of relatedness of the individual to the outside World and oneself; furthermore, inasmuch as the social group shares a common character structure (“social character”) the socioeconomic conditions shared by all members of a group mold the social character. That is where the saying, “birds of a feather flock together” comes from. Love, tenderness, sadism, masochism, ambition, curiosity, anxiety, rivalry—these and many other drives are no longer each attributed to a special instinct, but to the influence of the environment (essentially the significant persons in early childhood) via the psyche. The description given thus far suggest that character determines, the character trait, whether loving or destroying, drives a person to behave in a certain way, and the person is acting according to one’s character feels satisfied. Indeed, the character traits tells us how a person would like to behave. However, we must add an important qualification: if one could. The conflict between what we would like to do and the demands of self-interest remains crucial. We cannot always behave as we are driven to by our passions, because we have to modify our behavior to some extent in order to remain alive. The average person tries to find a compromise between what one’s character would make one want to do and what one must do in order not to suffer more or less harmful consequences. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20

ImageThe degree to which a person follows the dictates of self-preservation (ego interest) varies, of course. At one extreme the weight of the ego interest is zero; this holds true for the martyr and a certain type person who targets and terminates prominent people. At the other extreme is the opportunist for who self-interest includes everything that could make one more successful, popular, or comfortable. Between these two extremes all people can be arranged, characterized by a specific blend of self-interest and character-rooted passions. How much a person represses one’s passionate desires depends not only on factors within oneself but on the situations; if the situation changes, repressed desires become conscious and are acted out. This holds true, for instance, for the person with a sadistic-masochistic character. Everybody knows the type of person who is submissive to one’s boss and sadistically domineering to one’s wife and children. Another case in point is the change that occurs in character when the total social situation changes. The sadistic character who may have posed as a meek or even friendly individual may become a fiend in a terroristic society in which sadism is valued rather than deplored. Another may suppress sadistic behavior in all visible actions, while showing it in a subtle expression of the face or in seemingly harmless and marginal remarks. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20

ImageRepression of character traits also occurs with regard to the most noble impulses. In spite of the fact that the teachings of Jesus are still part of our moral ideology, a being acting in accordance with them is generally considered a fool or a neurotic; hence many people still rationalize their generous impulses as being motivated by self-interests. These considerations show that the motivating power of character traits is influenced by self-interest in varying degrees. They imply that character constitutes the main motivation of human behavior, but restricted and modified by the demands of self-interest under varying conditions. Here is possessed the fundamental difference between behaviorism and psychoanalytic characterology. Conditioning works through its appeal to self-interest, such as the desire for food, security, praise, avoidance of pain. In animals, self-interest proves to be so strong that by repeated and optimally spaced reinforcements that interest for self-preservation proves to be stronger than other instincts like pleasures of the flesh or aggression. Humans of course also behave in accordance with one’s self-interest; but not always, and not necessarily so. One often acts according to one’s passions, one’s meanest and one’s noblest, and is often willing—and able—to risk one’s self-interest, one’s fortune, one’s freedom, and one’s life in the pursuit of love, truth, and integrity—or for hate, greed, sadism, and destructiveness. In this very difference is possessed the reason conditioning cannot be a sufficient explanation for human behavior. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20

ImageThe discovery of unconscious processes and of the dynamic concept of character were radical because they went to the roots of human behavior; they were disquieting because nobody can hide any longer behind one’s good intentions; they were dangerous, because if everybody were to know what one could know about oneself and others, society would be shaken to its very foundations. Psychoanalysts is essentially a theory of unconscious strivings, of resistance, of falsification of reality according to one’s subjective needs and expectations (transference), of character, and of conflicts between passionate strivings embodied in character traits and the demands for self-preservation. Thus far, feelings of inferiority have nothing to do with any factual inferiority, but have been discussed only as the effects of a tendency to recoil from competition. Do they then have nothing to do with existing shortcomings, with a realization of actual flaws? They are in fact the result of both actual and imagined inadequacies: feelings of inferiority are a combination of anxiety-motivated belittling tendencies and a realization of existing defects. As I have emphasized several times, we cannot ultimately fool ourselves, though we may be successful in shutting certain impulses out of awareness. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20

Image And therefore a neurotic person of the character we have been discussing will know, deep down, that one has anti-social tendencies which one must conceal, that one is far from genuine in one’s attitudes, that one’s pretenses are quite different from the undercurrents below the surface.  One’s registering of all these discrepancies is an important cause for one’s feelings of inferiority, even though one never recognizes clearly the source of the discrepancies because they arise from repressed drives. Not recognizing their source, one gives to oneself reasons for feeling inferior which are rarely the real reasons, but only a renationalization. There is another reason why one feels that one’s inferiority feelings are the direct expression of an existing deficiency. On the basis of one’s ambition one has built up fantastic notions of one’s own value and importance. One cannot help measuring one’s realistic accomplishments against one’s notions of being a genius or a perfect human being, and in this comparison one’s real acts or one’s real possibilities appear inferior. The total result of all these recoiling tendencies is that the neurotic incurs real failures, or at most does not get on as well as one should, considering one’s opportunities and one’s gifts. Others who started with one get ahead of one, have better careers, greater success. This lagging behind does not concern only external success. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20

ImageThe older one becomes the more one feels the discrepancy between one’s potentialities and one’s achievements. One feels keenly that one’s gifts, whatever they may be, are going to waste, that one is blocked in the development of one’s personality, that one does not mature as time goes on. The problem of persons around the age of forty is that they become blocked in their development. However, one has not recognized the conditions leading up to such a situation, and therefore has not found any satisfactory solution. And one reacts to the realization of this discrepancy with a vague discontent, a discontent which is not masochistic but real and proportionate. A discrepancy between potentialities and achievement may be due, as I have already pointed out, to external circumstances. However, the discrepancy which develops in a neurotic person, and which is a never-failing character of neuroses, is due to one’s internal conflicts. One’s actual failures and the consequent increasing discrepancy between potentialities and achievements inevitably give even greater force to one’s existing inferiority feelings. Thus one not only believes oneself to be, but actually is inferior to what one might be. The impact of this development is all the greater since it puts the inferiority feelings on a realistic basis. Meanwhile the other discrepancy which I have mentioned—that between high-flown ambitions and the comparatively poor reality—becomes so unbearable that it demands a remedy. As such a remedy fantasy offer itself. #RandolphHarris 7 of 20

ImageMore and more the neurotic substitutes grandiose ideas for attainable goals. The value they have for one is obvious: they cover up one’s unendurable feelings of nothingness; they allow one to feel important without entering into any competition and thus without incurring the risk of failure or success; they allow one to build up a fiction of grandeur far beyond attainable goal. It is this blind-alley value of grandiose fantasies that makes them dangerous, because the blind alley has a definite advantage for the neurotic when compared with the straightforward road. These neurotic ideas of grandeur should be distinguished from those of the normal person and those of the psychotic. Even the normal person will at times think oneself wonderful, attribute undue importance to what one is doing, or indulge in fantasies of what one might do. However, these fantasies and ideas remain decorative arabesques and one does not take them too seriously. They psychotic person with ideas of grandeur is at the other end of the line. One is convinced that one is a genius, the Emperor of Japan, Napoleon, Christ, and will reject all evidence of reality which tends to disprove one’s conviction; one will be wholly unable to comprehend any reminder that one is actually a less affluent doorman, or  patient in an asylum or the object of disrespect and ridicule. If one become aware of the discrepancy at all one will decide in favor of one’s grandiose ideas, and will believe that the others do not know any better, or that they are deliberately treating one with disrespect in order to hurt one. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20

ImageHowever, if therapy enables the individual to reorient one’s pattern of life and to reduce the tension and anxiety one feels regarding one’s personal problems, then the reactions of one’s automatic nervous system in, for example, a situation of stress, should also be altered. Essentially, if a change in life pattern and in internal tension occurred in therapy, this should show up in organismic changes in autonomic functioning, an area over which the individual has no conscious control. Individual who have experienced therapy develop a higher frustration threshold during their series of therapeutic contacts, and are able to recover their homeostatic balance more rapidly following frustration. After therapy, the individual is able to meet, with more tolerance and less disturbance, situations of emotional stress and frustration or stress was never considered in therapy; the more effective meeting of frustration is not a surface phenomenon but is evident in autonomic reactions which the individual cannot consciously control and of which one is completely unaware. Thus, it is predicted that if therapy enabled the individual to better handle stress at the psychological level, then this should be evident also in one’s autonomic functioning. Therefore, do not major in the minors. Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes. Remember to breathe not weak, snatched gasps, but deep riveting drafts. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20

ImageAnother point in which the impossibility of the theory of addition of love and justice becomes visible is the relation of love and justice to the concrete situation. Justice is expressed in principles and laws none of which can ever reach the uniqueness of the concrete situation. Every decision which is based on the abstract formulation of justice alone is essentially and inescapably unjust. Justice can be reached only if both the demand of the universal law and the demand of the particular situation are accepted and made effective for the concrete situation. However, it is love which created participation in the concrete situation. It would be completely wrong to say that love must be added to justice if the uniqueness of the situation is to be reached. For this would mean that justice as such is impossible. Actually the situation shows that justice is just because of the love which is implicit in it. However, this can e understood fully only in the context of an ontological analysis of the root meanings of both love and justice. The weight of the problems and the dangerous character of the confusions is equally obvious when we finally confront power and justice. It is in this realm of problems that the relation of law and order to justice and of all of them to power is discussed and more often confused than illuminated. The first questions is: Who gives the law in which justice is supposed to be expressed? #RandolphHarris 10 of 20

ImageTo give a law is the basic manifestation of power. However, if a group which has power gives laws, how are they related to justice? Are they not simply the expression of the will to power of this group? The Marxist theory of the State asserts that the laws of the State are tools which give social control to a ruling group. The origin of its power may be military invasion or it may be socioeconomic stratification. In both cases justice is possible only if the State has withered away and has been replaced by an administration without political power. The justice of the ruling class is injustice and, if defended, ideology. The laws it gives preserve a social order, and as long as there is no alternative social order, the laws of the ruling classes are better than chaos. The more cynical representatives of this theory interpret justice exclusively as a function of power and in no way as its judge. They accept the Marxist analysis without the Marxist expectation, and reduce justice completely to a function of power. In reaction against this removal of justice as an ultimate principle a theory has been developed which tries to separate justice from power and completely and to establish it as a self-contained system of valid judgements. Justice is an absolute, without any relation to structures of power. The absolute law, derived from the principles of the natural or rational law, does not express wat is, but it demands what should be. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20

ImageIrrespective of power it commands and expects obedience because of its intrinsic validity. It does not express but it judges power. The contrast of these two theories about the relation of power to justice reveals the difficulty of the problem and the necessity of an ontological research into the rot meanings of power and justice. As announced before, I have led you into a jungle of problems and confusions, and, at every point, I have indicated the way out; namely, the ontological analysis of love, power, and justice. When the God we love chose to reveal Himself, He did so in creation itself and in more specific, special ways—most importantly, in the Scriptures and Jesus Christ. When we affirm that the Bible is a revelation from God, we do not simply assert that God as a person is known in and through it. We also mean that God has revealed understandable, objectively true propositions. The Lord’s Word is not only practically useful, it is also theoretically true (John 17.17). God has revealed truth to us and not just Himself. This truth is addressed to our minds and requires an intellectual grasp to understand and then apply. Because of the Bible’s nature, serious study is needed to grasp what it says. Of course, the Scripture contains easily grasped portions that are fairly straightforward. However, some of it is very difficult, intellectually speaking. In fact, Peter one said that some of Paul’s writings were intellectually challenging, hard to understand, and easily distorted (that is, uneducated in Christian theology) and unstable people (2 Peter 3.16). #RandolphHarris 12 of 20

ImageThe more a person develops the mind and the understanding of hermeneutics (the science of interpreting the Scriptures), the more one will be able to understand the meaning and significance of the Scriptures. Unfortunately, many today apparently think that hard intellectual work is not needed to understand God’s propositional revelation to us. Instead, they believe that the Holy spirit will simply make know the meaning of a text if it is implored to do so. Tragically, this represents a misunderstanding of the Spirit’s role in understanding the Scriptures. In my view, the Spirit does not help the believer understand the meaning of Scripture. Rather, He speaks to the believer’s soul, convicting, comforting, opening up applications of His truths through His promptings. On the evening Christ gave Himself up for us, John 17 tells us, He prayed in succession for Himself, for His twelve disciples, and for all of us who would later believe. When He finished praying for His future bride, He went to the cross. Then came Hos death, His resurrection, His ascension, and His enthronement at the right hand of the Father, where He constantly makes intercession for us. Thus we understand that giving ourselves for our brides involves prayerful intercession. Men, do you pray for your wives with something more than, “Bless good Meghan in all she does”? If not, you are sinning against her and against God. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20

ImageMost Christian men who claim to love their wives never offer more than a perfunctory nod to their wives’ needs before God. Men, you ought to have a list of her needs, spoken and unspoken, which you passionately hold up to God out of love for her. Praying is the material work of a Christian husband! The most basic command is, “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave up himself for her.” Men, we are divinely called to die for our brides, to take on her sufferings as our own, and to make intercession for her. You are supposed to be her ride or die man. When it is said that the readiness of the seeker determines the appearance of the master, this applies to the first fundamental initiation of one’s spiritual life. It does not mean that a master will come into one’s own town and seek one out, but that one will come into one’s life. And this may be brought about in various ways—as by the seeker oneself being led, either by Worldly circumstances or by one’s own seeking, out of one’s own town to the town or country where the master is living. The location of one’s spiritual guide will in part be the accident of one’s own geographical situation, for one will obviously be limited in one’s selection to possibilities and reputations in one’s own country or nation or race. The sheer physical and financial difficulties of traveling throughout the World—not to mention the obstacles of personal circumstance, family obligations, and ignorance of where to search and whom to approach in foreign lands, combine to set this limitation upon one’s inquiry and hence upon one’s opportunity. #RandolphHarris 14 of 20

ImageIt is foolish to seek holiness geographically or holy beings in particular places. I have found that one being may live in a Himalayan abode and be a scoundrel and another being may live in a Bowery slum and be a saint. Wherever the live, people always carry their own thoughts and their own selves with them. The Soul, which is the object of our quest, is within us. The Master, who is to guide us upon our quest, will appear whenever we are ready for one and wherever we happen to live—or else we will be led to one. There are beings in the New World and the Old World, not less wise and noble than each other. If we have not met them, “the fault, Dear Brutus is…in ourselves,” primarily in our unworthiness, and secondarily in our incapacity to recognize what is beneath the surface. All speculation upon the motives and the methods of the illuminate will avail little. The light by which one works is denied to ordinary beings. We should not try to bind one down to qualities which fit only those who grope in the dark or move in twilight. We should trust where we cannot see and wait patiently for the day of revilement, when we will find all made clear and all riddle solved to our satisfaction. It is an old truism in the Old World that it takes an adept to understand an adept, but the New World will have to learn this truth by bitter experiences with pseudo-adepts. #RandolphHarris 15 of 20

ImageThere are many signs of one’s spiritual status in the dignity and composure of one’s bearing, the deliberateness and truthfulness of one’s speech, and the impressiveness of one’s tension-free face. Helter Skelter is a phrase taken from a song performed by a well-known rock music group. Charles Manson used it to characterize that state of confusion in which he kept his followers, and himself as well. In the state of helter-skelter nothing makes sense, and everything makes as much sense as anything else. Manson was able to use this ideology to brainwash his followers and make them believe they were not responsible for their actions and they were not doing anything wrong when the ended the life of an individual. He taught them they if harm came to a person by means of his follower’s hands, then it was meant to be, it was in divine order and they did no really harm the individual and the individual was still alive on a different plane of existence. Aldous Huxley, in one of his retrospective writings, commented on how, among the associates of his youth, the endless talk of meaninglessness—the meaninglessness of life and therefore of everything in it—was merely an excuse to permit them to do whatever they wanted. Their life was organized (or, more properly, disorganized) around their feelings and wayward thoughts, with their will in two. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20

ImageHowever, resolute action for the good requires that things make sense. You would not want someone caught up in helter-skelter to work on your lawn mower, do your gastrointestinal examination, nor work on your computer. Life makes sense only if you understand its basic components and how they interrelate to form the whole. Evil, on the other hand, thrives on confusion. God is not the author of confusion (1 Corinthians 14.33). Frankly, our visible Christian World is not too far from helter-skelter with reference to its understanding of the makeup of the person and therefore of the spiritual life and spiritual formation. We need to access the fullness of biblical teachings on these matters. We suffer far too much from the influence of a surrounding culture that thrives on confusions. (And therefore its denial that human beings have a nature.) This may seem like a harsh thing to say about our “Christian World,” and I am sorry to day it; but the issues here are too important to mince words. Accordingly, much of what we do in Christian circles with very good intentions—hoping, we say, to see steady, significant growth in Christlikeness—simply makes no sense and lead nowhere so far as substantive spiritual formation is concerned. What a brutal thing to say! However, we need to recognize this, or show why it is not the case. I hope we have taken significant first steps toward a clarity that can serve as a foundation for the effectual practice of Christian spiritual formation. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20

ImageYou live longer once you realize that any time spent being unhappy is wasted. “As far as the East is from the West, so far has he removed our transgression from us,” reports Psalm 103.12. How far is the East from the West? If you start due north at any point on Earth, you would eventually cross over the North Pole and start going south, but that is not true when you go East or West. If you start West and continue in that direction you will always be going West. North and South meet at the North Pole, but East and West never meet. In a sense, they are an infinite distance apart. So when God says He removes our transgressions from us as far as the East is from the West, He is saying they have been removed an infinite distance from us. However, how can we get a handle on this rather abstract truth in such a way that it becomes meaningful in our lives? When God uses this metaphorical expression describing the extent of His forgiveness of our sin, He is saying His forgiveness is total, complete, and unconditional. God is saying He is not keeping score with regard to our sins. “He does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities,” reports Psalm 103.10. Yes, God actually says that! I know it seems too good to be true. I confess I almost hesitate to write those words because they are so foreign to our innate concepts of reward and punishment. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20

ImageHowever, those gracious words are right in the Bible, and they are God’s words. How can God possibly do this? How can He so completely disregard our transgressions as to say He removes them an infinite distance from us? The answer is by His grace through Jesus Christ. God laid our sins on Christ and He bore the penalty we should have borne. Because of Christ’s death in our place, God’s justice is now completely satisfied. God can now, without violating His justice or His moral law, forgive us freely, completely and absolutely. He can now extend His grace to us; He can show favor to those who, in themselves, deserve only wrath. O Loving Wisdom of the living God, O living everlasting Word and everlasting Power of God the eternal Father—for everlasting is Thy birth, Who art the everlasting Son of God the everlasting Father, and art God; without Whom is nothing, by Whom are all things; in Whom consisteth whatever is; Who art God above us, and Man for our sakes; for Thou hast willed for us to be what we are: grant us what Thou hast promised; give to us, although unworthy, what Thou hast offered to all alike; that is, that Thy Passion may be our deliverance, and Thy Death our life, and Thy cross our redemption, and Thy Wound our healing; that being crucified with Thee, we may by Thy gift be lifted up on high to Thy Father, with Whom in bliss Thou livest and reignest. “And it is by faith that my fathers have obtained the promise that these things should come unto their brethren through the Gentiles; therefore the Lord hath commanded me, yea, even Jesus Christ,” reports Ether 12.22. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20

ImageO Source of All Good, what shall I render to three for the gift of gifts, then own dear Son, begotten, not created, my redeemer, proxy, surety, substitute, his self-emptying incomprehensible, his infinity of love beyond the heart’s grasp. Herein is wonder of wonders: he came below to rise me above, was born like me that I might become like him. Herein is love; when I cannot rise to him he draws near on wings of grace, to raise me to himself. Herein is power; when Deity and humanity were infinitely apart he untied them in indissoluble unity, the uncreated and the created. Herein is wisdom; when I was undone, with no will to return to him, and no intellect to devise recovery, he came, God-incarnate, to save me to the uttermost as man to die my death, to shed satisfying blood on my behalf, to work out a perfect righteousness for me. O God, take me in spirit to the watchful shepherds, and enlarge my mind; let me hear good tidings of great joy, and hearing, believe, rejoice, praise, adore, my conscience bathed in an ocean of repose, my eyes uplifted to reconcile Father; place me with ox, mule, camel, goat, to look with them upon my redeemer’s face, and in him account myself delivered from sin; let me with Simeon clasp the new-born child to my heart, embrace him with undying faith, exulting that he is mine and I am his. In him thou hast given me so much that Heaven can give no more. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20Image

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Please Plant this Heart of Mine Underneath the Lonesome Pine on the Hill When it is Twilight on the Trail!

ImageAlmost one hundred years ago, in October and November of 1929, the stock market crashed and the World entered the Great Depression. The Roaring Twenties came to an end. Wealthy people everywhere lost their fortunes. Multimillionaires jumped out of windows. My grandparents told me they even cut back on eating meat. So, why does Paul in the Bible attack conformism? Why does he not call the Christian the perfectly adjusted being? Why does he not describe the Christian way as the way to a complete acceptance of the moral and religious standards of society? His thought is far from this, and according to the certain criteria of adjustment, certainly he could not have been called a good educator. However, he knew why he rejected conformism. He knew that all conformism is a state of being conformed to this eon. So let us try to understand the meaning of this strange assertion. This eon means the state of things in which we are living, which is, according to Paul, a state of corruption. Being conformed to it, therefore, means to participate in its corruptedness. Where there is conformism there is acceptance of corruption, subject to the present questionable state of things. In our English Bibles, the Greek word for eon is translated “World.” This is somehow misleading. #RandolphHarris 1 of 16

ImageWhen we speak of World we think of the Universe. However, the Universe, including our Earth and everything in it, is the product of incessant divine creativity here and now. It is good in its created form, and it is the place to which the kingdom of God shall come, as we pray in the Lord’s Prayer. It is one of those most dangerous misunderstandings of the Christian message to deny this World and its created glory, and to direct our eyes to a Superworld, unrelated to the original creation. The Bible speak of a new Heaven and a New Earth in contrast to the Old Heaven and the Old Earth. And now we understand what Paul means when he speaks of conformity to this eon: he means the untransformed Old Earth and the untransformed Old Heaven. He means the corrupted state of the Universe, and especially of our Universe—the Universe of beings—when he warns us not to become conformed to it. The attitude towards this eon, toward ourselves, and towards our World that the apostle demands is threefold: judgment, resistance, and transformation. However, one may ask—must I judge, must I resist, must I transform everything I encounter? Ought we not to adjust to that which is borne out of the wisdom of the ages, bestowed upon us by the generations before us through their experience and insights? #RandolphHarris 2 of 16

ImageCould one not say—be conformed to what has been proved to be good and noble and in conformity with the spirit of love? We must ask this question with great seriousness and self-criticism. However, we must not forget that we are living in this eon, under the control of its forms and ways, where the uncorrupted is mixed with corruption, and the acceptable with the unacceptable, and good with evil. This is what makes conformity so dangerous. If the corruption of this eon were obvious, very few would be tempted to be conformed to it. Not many people, in reality or in literature, make a pact with the devil. However, there are many who are lured by elements of goodness, indeed of real goodness, into a pact with this eon, into the state of being conformed to it. And certainly, there are strong arguments for accepting conformity. We all are conformed to the family into which we are born whether we want to be or not. Shall we try to be non-conformists in our family because conformism would mean adjustment to this eon, to the corrupted state of things? Would that not bring much suffering to the other members of the family, and deprive us of the many blessings that an intimate and ordered family life can provide? How can the commandment to honor father and mother be combined with the warning of the apostle not to be conformed to this eon? #RandolphHarris 3 of 16

ImageJesus says—“I have come to set a man against his father and a daughter against her mother and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and a man’s foes will be those of his own household. One who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and one who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me,” reports Matthew 10.35-37. There are the most radical statements of non-conformity. And even Paul’s radicalism sounds conservative in comparison with them. It is astonishing that a faith based on words like these has been used throughout its history as a most successful instrument of conformity inside and outside family relations. How did this happen? Why is it the predominant attitude within Western culture even today, in spite of all the forces of disintegration? It is because it is infinitely difficult to find the point where the state of being conformed contradicts love as it is manifest in the Christ. It would be easy to notice the point where separation becomes unavoidable, if our family, as often was the case in early Christianity, tried to make us reject the Christ and what he stands for. However, this is not so today. Instead of it, the question of conforming or not conforming arises in innumerable small moments of our daily life. And in each moment, our answer is a risk, burdened with struggles within our own conscience. #RandolphHarris 4 of 16

ImageWe do not know with certainty whether our non-conformity is based on a wrong conformity to ourselves or whether it is our awareness of corruption that drives us to non-conformity. And we do not know with certainty whether our non-resistance is based on a wrong surrender or whether it is an element of love and wisdom that keeps us conformed to the family group. We do not know these things with certainty, and we can act only at the risk of being wrong. However, act we must. Most people try to avoid the risk by being conformed to the state of things into which they have been thrown by destiny. However, those who have transformed our World risked wrong decisions. And the greater beings they were, the more conscious were they of the risk. They did not cease to doubt in spite of the depth and the passion of their faith. For when they refused to be conformed to themselves, but were renewed in their own being and could thus renew other things. And precisely for this reason they never became self-assured—they took upon themselves the risk of not being conformed and the anxiety and doubt and glory of this risk. Paul demands this of every Christian. Every Christian must be strong enough to risk non-conformity, even in the radical sense that Jesus describes with respect to one’s family. #RandolphHarris 5 of 16

ImageThe situation in the family is an example, and more than an example. For all conformity is rooted in it. And resistance to conformity is first of all resistance to the family. However, there are other larger groups in which we breathe the air of conformity day and night, and where the resistance is sometimes easier, yet often more difficult, than in the family. I am thinking of educational, social, political, and religious groups. Let us look at each of them in the light of the apostolic word. It seems that an educational group is least exposed to conformity. Those who are learning are usually more inclined to resist than to accept their teachers and what they are taught by them. And the teachers are chosen on the basis of the independence of their judgments and the freedom of their scholarly questioning. This seems to make the institutions of higher learning the representative places of non-conformity. I do not think that this is so, however. One needs to ask the students two questions: Do not you often build, out of your resistance to what you are taught, a new conformity of rebellion? And do you resist the group or gang to which you belong as strongly as you resist your teachers, or are you conquered by gang conformity and all the elements of this eon, and the corruption implied in such conformity? How would you answer? #RandolphHarris 6 of 16

ImageAs we read some of the passages from the prophets, we might easily imagine that we were reading the reports of eye-witnesses from Warsaw or Hiroshima, Tokyo (2011) Sri Lanka, Berlin, San Francisco (1906), Oakland (1989) on New York (11 September 2001). Isaiah says: “Behold, the Lord maketh the Earth empty and maketh it waste, and turneth it upside down and scattereth its inhabitants…Towns fall to pieces; each being bolts one’s door; gladness has gone from the Earth and pleasure is no more. The cities are left desolate; their gates are battered down; and few are left. For Earth has been polluted by the dwellers on its face…breaking the Eternal Covenant. Therefore, a curse is crushing the Earth, and the guilty people must atone.” Every one of these words describes the experience of the peoples of Europe and Asia. The most primitive and most essential foundations of life have been shaken. The destruction is such that we, who have not experienced it, cannot even imagine it. We have not experienced it; we cannot believe that we could be caught in such a destruction and see busses dancing, bridges collapsing, oceans swallowing up 200,000 people and entire cities. And yet, I see American soldiers walking through the ruins of these cities, thinking their own country, and seeing with visionary clarity the doom of its towns and cities. I know that this has happened, and still is happening. #RandolphHarris 7 of 16

ImageThere are soldiers who have become prophets, and their message is not very different from the message of the ancient Hebrew prophets. It is the message of the shaking of the foundations, and not those of their enemies, but rather those of their own country. For the prophetic spirit has not disappeared from the Earth. Decades before the World wars, people judged the European civilization and prophesied its end in speech and print. There are among us people like these. They are like the refined instruments which register the shaking of the Earth on far-removed sections of its surface. These people register the shaking of their civilization, its self-destructive trends, and its disintegration and fall, decades before the final catastrophe occurs. They have an invisible and almost infallible sensorium in their souls; and they have an irresistible urge to pronounce what they have registered, perhaps against their own wills. For no true prophet has ever prophesied voluntarily. It has been forced upon the by a Divine Voice to which they have not been able to close one’s ears. No being with a prophetic spirit likes to foresee and foreasy the doom of one’s own period. It exposes them to a terrible anxiety within oneself, to serve and often deadly attacks from others, and to the change of pessimism and defeatism on the part of the majority of the people. #RandolphHarris 8 of 16

ImagePeople desire to hear good tidings; and the masses listen to those who bring them. All the prophets of the Old and New Testaments, and others during the history of the Church had the same experiences. They all were contradicted by the false prophets, who announced salvation when there was no salvation. “The prophets prophesy falsely, and my people love to have it so,” cries Jeremiah in despair. They called him a defeatist and accused him of being an enemy of his country. However, is it a sign of patriotism or of confidence in one’s people, its institutions and its way of life, to be silent when the foundations are shaking? Is the expression of optimism, whether or not it is justified, so much more valuable than the expression of truth, even if the truth is deep and dark? Most human beings, of course, are not able to stand the message of the shaking of the foundations. They reject and attack the prophetic minds, not because they really disagree with them, but because they sense the truth of their words and cannot receive it. They repress it in themselves; and they transform it into mockery or fury against those who know and dare to say that which they know. In which of these two groups do you consider yourselves to be? Among those who respond to the prophetic spirit, or among those who close their ears and hearts against it? #RandolphHarris 9 of 16

ImageI have always felt that there might be few who are able to register the shaking of the foundations of the Earth as such, but God Who laid the foundations and would shake them; and that they did not speak of the doom of the nation as such, but of God Who brings doom for the sake of His eternal justice and salvation. As the 102nd Psalm says: “Thy years are foundations of the Earth, and the Heavens are the work of thy hands. They vanish, but thou shalt endure; they wear out like a robe, thou changest them like garments. However, thou art the same and thy years shall have no end.” When the Earth grows old and wears out, when nations and cultures die, the Eternal changes the garments of God’s infinite being. God is the foundation on which all foundations are laid; and this foundation cannot be shaken. There is something immovable, unchangeable, unshakeable, eternal, which becomes manifest in our passing and in the crumbling of our World. On the boundaries of the finite the infinite becomes visible; in the light of the Eternal the transitoriness of the temporal appears. The Greeks called themselves “the mortals” because they experienced that which is immortal. This is why the prophets were able to face the shaking of the foundations. It is the only way to look at the shaking without recoiling from it. Or is it possible to be conscious of the approaching doom, and yet to regard it with indifference and cynicism? Is it humanly possible to face the end cynically? #RandolphHarris 10 of 16

ImageThere are certainly some among us who are cynical toward most of that which beings create and praise. There are some among us who are cynical about the present situation of the World and the leaders of the World. We may be cynical, of course, about the true motives behind all human action; we may be cynical about ourselves, our inner growth and our outer achievements. We ay be cynical about religion and about our Churches, their doctrines, their symbols and their representatives. There is scarcely one thing about which we may not be cynical. However, we cannot be cynical about the shaking of the foundations of everything! I have never encountered anyone who seriously was cynical about that. I have seen much cynicism, particularly among the younger people in Europe before the war. However, I know from abundant witness that this cynicism vanished when the foundations of the World began to shake at the beginning of the European catastrophe. We can be cynical about the end only so long as we do not have to see it, only so long as we feel safety in the place in which our cynicism can be exercised. However, if the foundations of this place and all places begin to crumble, cynicism itself crumbles with them. #RandolphHarris 11 of 16

ImageAnd only two alternatives remain—despair, which is the certainty of eternal destruction, or faith, which is the certainty of eternal salvation. “The World itself shall crumble, but my salvation knows no end,” says the Lord. This is the alternative for which the prophets stood. This is what we should call religion, or more precisely, the religious ground for all religion. How could the prophets speak as they did? How could they paint these most terrible pictures of doom and destruction without cynicism or despair? It was because, beyond the sphere of destruction, they saw the sphere of salvation; because, in the doom of the temporal, they saw the manifestation of the Eternal. It was because they saw the manifestation of the Eternal. It was because they were certain that they belonged within the two spheres, the changeable and the unchangeable, bot bound within it alone, can face the end. All others compelled to escape, to turn away. How much of our lives consist in nothing but attempts to look away from the end! We often succeed in forgetting the end. However, ultimately we fail; for we always carry the end with us in our bodies and our souls. And often whole nations and cultures succeed in forgetting the end. However, ultimately they fail too, for in their lives and growth they always carry the end with them. #RandolphHarris 12 of 16

ImageOften the whole Earth succeeds in making its creatures forget its end, but sometimes these creatures feel that their Earth is beginning to grow old, and that its foundations are beginning to shake. For the Earth always carries its ends within it. We happen to live in a time when very few of us, very few nations, very few sections of the Earth, will succeed in forgetting the end. For in these days the foundations of the Earth do shake. May we not turn our eyes away; may we not close our ears and our mouths! However, may we rather see, through the crumbling of a World, the rock of eternity and the salvation which as no end! Music, the greatest good that mortals know, and all of Heaven we have below. “And in the mouth of three witnesses shall these things be established; and the testimony of three, and this work, in the which shall be shown forth the power of God and also his word, of which the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost bear record—and all this shall stand as a testimony against the World at the last day. And if it so be that they repent and come unto the Father in the name of Jesus, they shall be received into the kingdom of God. And now, if I have no authority for these things, judge ye’ for ye shall know that I have authority when ye shall see me, and we shall stand before God at the last day. Amen,” reports Ether 5.4-6. #RandolphHarris 13 of 16

ImageReceive my confession, O my only Hope of Salvation, Jesus Christ, my Lord and God. For in the mortal World I am lost, and altogether in thought, word, and deed, and in all evils, I am overwhelmed. Thou Who justifiest the ungodly and quickenest the dead, Lord my God, justify me and revive me. Save me, O Lord, King of eternal glory, Who canst save. Grant me to will and to do, and to accomplish, what is pleasing to Thee, and profitable to myself; give me assistance in distress, consolation in persecution, and strength in all temptation; vouchsafe me pardon for past evils, amendment of present evils, and be pleased to send me protection against evils to come. Thine it is to give the sinner a stricken heart and a fountain of tears. It is mine, if Thou shalt vouchsafe it, to weep for my sins; it is Thine to efface them speedily, as a cloud. I beseech Thee, O Lord, to forget my sins, and to remember Thy mercies. O Christ, spare me, pity me, not according to Thy word, that I may live, and not be disappointed of my hope. Give me a fountain of tears, O Fountain of life. My hope of salvation is in no works of mine; but my soul hangs simply on the boundlessness of Thy love, and confides in the multitude of Thy mercy. Hear our Prayer, O Lord, and listen to our groanings, for we acknowledge our iniquities, and lay open our sins before Thee. #RandolphHarris 14 of 16

ImageAgainst Thee, O God, have we sinned; to Thee we make our confession, and implore forgiveness. Turn Thy face again, O Lord, upon Thy servants whom Thou hast redeemed with Thine own Blood. Spare us, we pray Thee, and vouchsafe pardon to our sins, and be pleased to extend to us Thy loving-kindness and Thy mercy. Thou eternal God, thine is surpassing greatness, unspeakable goodness, super-abundant grace; I can as soon count the sands of ocean’s ‘lip’ as number thy favours towards me; I know but a part, but that part exceeds all praise. I thank thee for personal mercies, a measure of health, preservation of body, comforts of house and home, sufficiency of food and clothing, continuance of mental powers, my family, their mutual help and support, the delights of domestic harmony and peace, the seats now filled that might have been vacant, my country, church Bible, faith. However, O, how I mourn my sin, ingratitude, vileness, the days that to my guilt, the scenes that witness my offending tongue; all things in Heaven, Earth, around, within, without, condemn me—the Sun which sees my misdeeds, the darkness which is light to thee, the cruel accuser who justly charges me, the good Angels who have been provoked to leave me, thy countenance which scans my secret sins, thy righteous law, thy holy word, my sin-soiled conscience, my private and public life, my neighbours, myself—all write dark things against me. #RandolphHarris 15 of 16

ImageI deny them not, frame no excuse, but confess, Father, I have sinned; yet still I live, and fly repenting to thy outstretched arms; thou wilt not cast me off, for Jesus brings me near, thou wilt not cast me off, for Jesus brings me near, thou wilt not condemn me, for he died in my stead, thou wilt not mark my mountains of sin, for he levelled all, and his beauty covers my deformities. O my God, I bid farewell to sin by clinging to his cross, hiding in his wounds, and sheltering in his side. O Good Jesus, Who didst enable Lazarus at the sound of Thy voice to rise from the tomb, grant us to hear Thy voice in our souls, and to rise through grace from the depth of our own sin. Cleanse, O Lord, our consciences by the sincere confession of the Catholic Faith, and by continual contrition of heart; that we may always be heard by Thee in Heaven, when we call to Thee for pardon of sins on Earth! Let us live then and be glad, while young life is before us. “Though I speak with the tongues of humans and of Angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal,” reports 1 Corinthians 13.1. “And if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand,” reports St. Mark 3.25. I am in earnest—I will not equivocate—I will not excuse—I will not retreat a single inch—and I will be heard! I will be as harsh as truth and as uncompromising as justice. Our country is the World; our country people are all humankind. #RandolphHarris 16 of 16Image

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ImageCresleigh Meadowsis coming soon! Found just north of Feather River Boulevard, Cresleigh Meadows is home of the largest neighborhood in Plumas Ranch as well as the popular Bear River Park. With four floor plans available, ranging from approximately 2,000 – 3,500 square feet offering, three to five bedrooms, we are certain you will find the home that fits your needs and lifestyle.

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They Even Carry You to Your Bed Here!

ImageThere were always stories in those ancient days of wise men and healers who came out of the sea. I spoke to many a teller of tales in this or that city of such legends. And there were tales of a great kingdom that had been swallowed by the ocean in more places than one. These wise men and women were survivors of that great kingdom, or so some thought. I used to put hope in such legends. I used to think I could one day find one of these wise men or women and discover from that person some great and salvific truth. When an individual plays a part one implicitly requests one’s observers to take seriously the impression that is fostered before them. They are asked to believe that the character they see actually possesses the attributes one appears to possess, that the task one performs will have the consequences that are implicitly claimed for it, and that, in general, matters are what they appear to be. It is probably no mere historical accident that the word person, in its first meaning, is a mask. It is rather a recognition of the fact that everyone is always and everywhere, more or less consciously, playing a role. It is in these roles that we know each other; it is in these roles that we know ourselves. In a sense, and in so far as this mask represents the conception we have formed of ourselves—the role we are striving to live up to—this mask is our truer self, the self we would like to be. #RandolphHarris 1 of 14

ImageIn the end, our conception of our role becomes second nature and an integral part of our personality. We come into the World as individuals, achieve character, and become persons. Derek, when we began our work with him, was a mechanical boy. He functioned as if by remote control, run by machines of his own powerfully creative fantasy. No only did he himself believe that he was a machine but, more remarkable, he created this impression in others. Even while he performed actions that are intrinsically human, they never appeared to be other than machines-started and executed. On the other hand, when the machine was not working we had to concentrate on recollecting his presence, for he seemed not to exist. The performance is a front which regularly functions in a general and fixed fashion to define the situation for those who observe the routine. Not every child who possesses a fantasy World is possessed by it. Normal children may retreat into realms of imaginary glory or magic powers, but they are easily recalled from these excursions. Disturbed children are not always able to make the return trip; they remain withdrawn, prisoners of the inner World of delusion and fantasy. In many ways Derek presented a classic example of this state of infantile autism. #RandolphHarris 2 of 14

ImageAt one extreme, one finds that the performer can be fully take in by one’s own act; one can be sincerely convinced that the impression of reality which one stages is the real reality. When one’s audience is also convinced in this way about the show one puts on—and this seems to be the typical case—then for the moment at least, only the sociologist or the socially disgruntled will have any doubts about the realness of what is presented. At the other extreme, we find that the performer may not be taken in at all by one’s own routine. This possibility is understandable, since no one is in quite as good an observational position to see through the act as the person who puts in on. Coupled with this, the performer may be moved to guide the conviction of one’s audience only as a means to other ends, having no ultimate concern in the conception that they have of one or the situation. When the individual has no belief in one’s own act and no ultimate concern with the beliefs of one’s audience, we may call one cynical, reserving the term “sincere” for individuals who believe in the impression fostered by their own performance. It should be understood that the cynic, with all one’s professional disinvolvement, may obtain unprofessional pleasures from one’s masquerade, experiencing a kind of gleeful spiritual aggression from the fact that one can toy at will with something one’s audience must take seriously. #RandolphHarris 3 of 14

ImageDerek’s delusion is no uncommon among schizophrenic children today. He wanted to be rid of his unbearable humanity, to become completely automatic. He so nearly succeeded in attaining this goal that he could almost convince others, as well as himself, of his mechanical character. The descriptions of autistic children in the literature take for their point of departure and comparison the normal or abnormal human being. To do justice to Derek I would have to compare him simultaneously to a most inept infant and a highly complex piece of machinery. Often we had to force ourselves by a conscious act of will to realize that Derek was a child. Again and again his acting-out of his delusions froze our own ability to respond as human beings. During Derek’s first weeks with us we would watch absorbedly as this at once fragile-looking and imperious nine-year-old went about his mechanical existence. Entering the dining room, for example, he would string an imaginary wire from his energy source—an imaginary electric outlet—to the table. There he insulated himself wit paper napkins and finally plugged himself in. Only then could Joey eat, for he firmly believed that the current ran his ingestive apparatus. So skillful was the pantomime that one had to look twice to be sure there was neither wire nor outlet nor plug. Children and members of our staff spontaneously avoided stepping on the “wires” for fear of interrupting what seemed the source of his normal life. #RandolphHarris 4 of 14

ImageIt is not assumed, of course, that all cynical performers are interested in deluding their audiences for purposes of what is called “self-interest” or private gain. A cynical individual may delude one’s audience for what one considers to be their own good, or for the good of the community, and so forth. One may be tactfully attempting to put the superior at ease by simulating the kind of World the superior is thought to take for granted. For long periods of time, when Derek’s “machinery” was idle, he would sit so quietly that he would disappear from the focus of the most conscientious observation. Yet in the next moment he might be “working” and the center of our captivated attention. Many times a day he would turn himself on and shift noisily through a sequence of higher and higher gears until he “exploded,” screaming “Crash, crash!” and hurling itself for his ever present apparatus—radio tubes, light bulbs, even motors or, lacking these, any handy breakable object. (Derek had an astonishing knack for snatching bulbs and tubes unobserved.) as soon as the object thrown had shattered, he would cease his screaming and wild jumping and retire to mute, motionless nonexistence. While we can expect to find natural movement back and forth between cynicism and sincerity, still we must not rule out the kind of transitional point that can be sustained on the strength of a little self-illusion. #RandolphHarris 5 of 14

ImageWe find that the individual may attempt to induce the audience to judge one and the situation in a particular way, and one may seek this judgment as an ultimate end in itself, and yet one may not completely believe that one deserves the valuation of self which one asks for or that the impression of reality which one fosters is valid. Our maids, inured to difficult child, were exceptionally attentive to Derek; they were apparently moved by his extreme infantile fragility, so strangely coupled with megalomaniacal superiority. Occasionally some of the apparatus he fixed to his bed to “live him” during his sleep would fall down in disarray. This machinery he contrived from masking tape, cardboard, wire and other paraphernalia. Usually the maids would pick up such things and leave them on a table for the children to find, or disregard them entirely. But Derek’s machine they carefully restored: “Derek must have the carburetor so he can breathe.” Similarly they were on the alert to pick up and preserve the motors that ran him during the day and the exhaust pipes through which he exhaled. This expressive equipment, one may take the term “personal front” to refer to other items of expressive equipment, the items that we most intimately identify with the performer himself and that we naturally expect will follow the performer wherever he goes. #RandolphHarris 6 of 14

ImageThese stimuli also tell us of the individual’s temporary ritual state, that is, whether he is engaging in formational social activity, work, or informal recreation, whether or not he is celebrating a new phase in the season cycle or his life-cycle. “Manner may be taken to refer to those stimuli which function at the time to warn us of the interaction role the performer will expect to play in the oncoming situation. Thus a haughty, aggressive manner may give the impression that the performer expects to be the one who will initiate the verbal interaction and direct its course. A meek, apologetic manner may give the impression that the performer expects to follow the lead of pression that the performer expects to follow the lead of others, or at least that he can be led to do so. How had Derek become a human machine? From intensive interviews with his parents we learned that the process had begun even before birth. Schizophrenia often results from parental rejection, sometimes combined ambivalently with love. Derek, on the other hand, had been completely ignored. “I never knew I was pregnant,” his mother said, meaning that she had already excluded Derek from her consciousness. His birth, she said, “did not make any difference.” Derek’s father, a rootless draftee in the wartime civilian army, was equally unready for parenthood. So, of course, are many young couples. #RandolphHarris 7 of 14

ImageFortunately, must such parents lose their indifference upon the baby’s birth. However, not Derek’s parents. “I did not want to see or nurse him,” his mother declared. “I had no feeling of actual dislike—I simple did not want to take care of him.” For the first three months of his life Derek “cried most of the time.” A colicky baby, he was kept on a rigid four-hour feeding schedule, was not touched unless necessary and was never cuddled or played with. The mother, preoccupied with herself, usually left Derek alone in the crib or playpen during the day. The father discharged his frustrations by pushing Derek when the child cried. Soon the father left for overseas duty, and the mother took Derek, now a year and a half old, to live with her at her parents’ home. On his arrival the grandparents noticed that ominous changed had occurred in the child. Strong and healthy at birth, he had become frail and irritable; a responsive baby, he had become remote and inaccessible. When he began to master speech, he talked only to himself. At an early date he become preoccupied with machinery, including an old electric fan which he could take apart and put together again with surprising deftness. Derek’s mother impressed us with a fey quality that expressed her insecurity, her detachment from the World and her low physical vitality. #RandolphHarris 8 of 14

ImageWe were struck especially be her total indifference as she talked about Derek. This seemed much more remarkable than the actual mistakes she made in handling him. Certainly he was left to cry for hours when hungry, because she fed him on a rigid schedule; he was toilet-trained with great rigidity so that he would give no trouble. These things happen to many children. However, Derek’s existence never registered with his mother. In her recollections he was fused at one moment with one event or person; at another, with something or somebody else. When she told us about his birth and infancy, it was as is she were talking about some vague acquaintance and soon her thought would wander off to another person or to herself. When Derek was not yet four, his nursery school suggested that he enter a special school for disturbed children. At the new school his autism was immediately recognized. During his three years there he experienced a slow improvement. Unfortunately a subsequent two years in a parochial school destroyed this progress. He began to develop compulsive defenses, which he called “preventions.” He could not drink, for example, expect through elaborate piping systems built of straws. Liquids had to be “pumped” into him, in his fantasy, or he could not suck. Eventually his behavior become so upsetting that he could not be kept in parochial school. At home thing did not improve. Three months before entering the Orthogenic School he made a serious attempt at suicide. #RandolphHarris 9 of 14

ImageTo us Derek’s pathological behavior seemed the external expression of an overwhelming effort to remain almost nonexistent as a person. For weeks Derek’s only reply when addressed was “Bam.” Unless he thus neutralized whatever we said, there would be an explosion, for Derek plainly wished to close off every form of contact not mediated by machinery. Even when he was bathed he rocked back and forth with mute, engine-like regularity, flooding the bathroom. If he stopped rocking, he did this like a machine too; suddenly he went completely rigid. Only once, after months of being lifted from his bath and carried to bed, did a small expression of puzzled pleasure appear on his face as he said very softly: “They even carry you to your bed here.” For a long time after he began to talk he would never refer to anyone by name, but only as “that person” or “the little person” or “the big person.” He was unable to designate by its true name anything to which he attached feelings. Nor could he name his anxieties expect through neologisms or word contaminations. For a long time he spoke about “master paintings” and “master painting room” (i.e., masturbating and masturbating room). One of his machines, the “criticizer,” prevented him from “saying words which have unpleasant feelings.” Yet he gave personal names to the tubes and motors in his collection of machinery. Moreover, these dead things had feelings; the tubes bled when hurt and sometimes got sick. He consistently maintained this reversal between animate and inanimate objects. #RandolphHarris 10 of 14

ImageMany people wonder, how can we get people to open up about what they are experiencing and want to engage in therapy so there can be a break through. We can begin to change the status of the subject from that of an anonymous object of our study to that status of a person, a fellow seeker, a collaborator in our enterprise. We can let one tell the story of one’s experience in our studies in a variety of idioms. We can let one show what our stimuli have meant to one by one’s manipulations of our gadgetry; by responses to questionnaires; wit drawings; with words. We can invite one to reveal one’s being. We can prepare ourselves so that one will want to produce a multifaceted record of one’s experiencing in our laboratories. We can show one how we have recorded one’s responding and tell one what we have thought one’s responses mean. We can ask one to examine and then authenticate or revise our recorded version of the meaning-for-one of one’s experience. We can let one cross-examine us to get to know and trust us to find out what we are up to and to decide if one wishes to take part. Heaven knows what we might find. We might well emerge with richer images of beings. However, the problem is not everyone is looking to help. Many just simply want to apply their analytical assumptions to a patient and get paid. Those in helping position need to actually help people and not just assertive themselves to a position so they can feel superior. #RandolphHarris 11 of 14

ImageIn Derek’s machine World everything, on pain of distant destruction, obeyed inhibitory laws much more stringent than those of physics. When we came to know him better, it was plain that in his moments of silent withdrawal, with his machine switched off, Derek was absorbed in pondering the compulsive laws of his private Universe. His preoccupation with machinery made it difficult to establish even practical contacts with him. If he wanted to do something with a counselor, such as play with a toy that had caught his vague attention, he could not do so: “I would like this very much, but first I have to turn off the machine.” But by the time he had fulfilled all the requirements of his preventions, he has lost interest. When a toy was offered to him, he could not touch it because his motors and his tubes did no leave him hand free. Even certain colors were dangerous and had to be strictly avoided in toys and clothing, because “some colors turn off the current, and I cannot touch them because I cannot live without the current.” Derek was convinced that machines were better than people. Once when he bumped into one of the pipes on our jungle gym he kicked it so violently that his teacher had to restrain him to keep him from injuring himself. When she explained that the pipe was much harder than his foots, Derek replied: “That proves it. Machines are better than the body. They do not break; they are much harder and stronger.” #RandolphHarris 12 of 14

ImageIf Derek lost or forgot something, to him, it merely proved that his brain ought to be thrown away and replaced by machinery. If he spilled something, his arm should be broken and twisted off because it did not work properly. When his head or arm failed to work as it should, he tried to punish it by hitting it. Even Derek’s feelings were mechanical. Much later in his therapy, when he had formed a timid attachment to another child and had been rebuffed, Derek cried: “He broke my feelings.” Gradually we began to understand what had seemed to be contradictory in Derek’s behavior—why he held on to the motor and tubes, then suddenly destroyed them in a fury, then set out immediately and urgently to equip oneself with new and larger tubes. Derek had created these machines to run his body and mind because it was too painful to be human. However, again and again, he became dissatisfied with their failure to meet his need and rebellious at the way they frustrated his will. In a recurrent frenzy he “exploded” his light bulbs and tubes, and for a moment became a human being—for one crowning instant he came alive. But as soon as he had asserted his dominance through the self-created explosion, he felt his life ebbing away. To keep on existing he had immediately to restore his machines and replenish the electricity that suppled his life energy. #RandolphHarris 13 of 14

ImageA being’s philosophic attitude is determined by the balance in one. A completed theoretic philosophy can thus never be anything more than a completed classification of the World’s ingredients; and its results must always be abstract, since the basis of every classification is the abstract essence embedded in the living fact, the rest of the living fact being for the time ignored by the classifier. This means that none of our explanations are complete. Hey subsume things under heads wider or more familiar; but the last heads, whether of things or of their connections, are mere abstract genera, data which we just find in things and write down. A single explanation of a fact only explains it from a single point of view. The entire fact is not accounted for until each and all of its characters have been classed with their likes elsewhere. The most one can say is that them elements of the World are such and such, and that each is identical with itself wherever found; but the question Where is it Found? the practical being is left to answer by one’s own wit. Which, of all the essences, shall here and now be held the essence of this concrete thing, the fundamental philosophy never attempts to decide. We are thus led to the conclusion that the simple classification of things is, on the one hand, the best possible theoretic philosophy, but is, on the other, a most miserable and inadequate substitute for the fulness of truth. #RandolphHarris 14 of 14

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