Archive for the ‘Morality/Values’ Category
Dr. Tiller – the murderer is murdered
Dr. George Tiller was shot and killed last week while serving as an usher in his church. Is this a fitting end for the man who performed over 60,000 abortions and arrogantly performed “late term” abortions?
Remembering good days
I watched a movie about a young couple trying to figure out how to get along with one another. As they talked, the man asked the woman to describe a day she remembered as a good day. She did not describe what I expected.
The intolerant demand tolerance
During the Miss Universe pageant, judge Perez Hilton asked Miss California, Carrie Prejean, if all states should legalize same sex marriage. She responded that people should have the right to live as they choose but she personally believes marriage should be between a man and a woman. She lost the crown, followed by a degrading, childish personal attack from Hilton.
Who decides right and wrong?
Recently, my wife and I went to Mexico with some friends who have a timeshare in Los Cabos, arriving the day the community started celebrating its annual Fiesta. It was much like our state fair, with carnival rides, food areas, and booths with items for sale. But, one “attraction” was decidedly different. Each evening they had cockfighting.
Responsibility and self-respect
George Bernard Shaw said, “Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.” Are we willing to abandon self-respect for a handout? Are we willing to surrender risk and reward for indentured servitude to the government? Are we willing to exchange freedom and opportunity for a welfare state?
You’re Beulah’s son, aren’t you?
Several years ago my wife and I were in Arrick’s Fly Shop in West Yellowstone, Montana. She was wearing a sweatshirt from the Bolder Boulder 10k Memorial Day Road Race, which my brother founded in Boulder, Colorado, in 1978. An older man working in the shop came over to my wife and asked about her sweatshirt saying he used to live in Boulder. When he learned that Steve Bosley was my brother he wanted to tell me a story about his mother and the Bank of Boulder, where Steve was president for over 25 years before his retirement. The story reminded me of why I admire my “big” brother and some of the things he’s done that are absolutely one-of-a-kind, like the Bolder Boulder race.
Sand and stone – NEW YEAR’S
There is a story about two merchants in ancient Persia, Mussah and Nagib. They were traveling together in a caravan and one evening set up camp near a river’s edge. Nagib accidentally fell into the river and Mussah, without hesitation, jumped in and saved his friend. Nagib immediately had his servant carve on the face of a nearby stone, “Traveler, in this place did Mussah heroically save the life of his friend Nagib.”
Finding your way home – CHRISTMAS
Several years ago, I wanted to find more trails for mountain biking near our cabin because they are scarce in Targhee National Forest. I remembered seeing game trails while riding the few available trails and decided to ride game trails and also cross-country to connect trails, creating longer bike trails. But doing this would require something I had not done before, riding cross-country from one trail to another.
Has marriage outlived its usefulness?
A few weeks ago, I discussed cohabitation and the problems associated with it. Is marriage necessarily better? What if the problems associated with marriages are as bad as, or worse than, the problems associated with cohabitation? Maybe cohabitation is the lesser of two evils.
Cohabitation – still just shacking up
It’s called cohabitation, the progressive, enlightened, and politically correct term for old-fashioned shacking up. The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development reports that “cohabitation, once rare, is now the norm.” Roughly 10% of couples living together are not married. It used to be wrong, discussed in whispers. Our mothers would point to those who “lived together,” explaining in hushed tones they were not married. What changed? Were our mothers wrong?
Of elephants, prisons, and fathers – FATHER’S DAY
Several years ago, our pastor told a story about a men’s prison that provided free Mother’s Day cards to inmates who wanted to send cards to their moms. Nearly all the inmates asked for a card and sent to someone they identified as “mom.” It may have been their mom, someone else’s mom, their grandmother, etc. Even so, they sent it to a woman they saw as the woman who cared for them, raised them, stayed with them, and was there for them.
Mother’s Day was so successful, the prison administration decided to build on that success, offering free Father’s Day cards. They were shocked when hardly any inmates showed up to get a free card to send to their father. Sadly, this confirmed what statistics had shown – 90 percent of incarcerated men lacked a loving relationship with their father or someone they could identify as their father figure.
As our pastor pointed out, you need look no further than this story to understand the cause of many, if not most, of the ills in our society.
This story suggests how critically important fathers are in the family, how critically important they are to the health and growth of their children. Are we dads doing our job? No, we run away, we disappear, we leave single moms scattered all over the country. The reality – mom odes the best she can, alone. Moms are paying our dues as well as their own.
Isn’t it time we pay our own dues and do our job?
Now, how do elephants fit into a column about Father’s Day? It starts with the murdering of rhinoceroses in Africa. Interestingly, whoever was killing the rhinos was not killing them for their horns because the horns were still present when the carcasses were discovered. Equally confusing, there were no bullet holes in the rhinos. Instead, the rangers found several large wounds they could not identify. If poachers were not killing the rhinos, then who was? The loss of rhinos was becoming critical, with an average of one white rhino murdered each month in the Pilanesberg national Park in northern South Africa. The rangers learned the exact same thing was occurring in another African park, Hluhluwe-Umfolozi Park. The rangers at both parks were baffled, unable to determine who was killing the rhinos and how they were killing them. In all, nearly 10 percent of their prized rhinoceros population was dead, a population they had brought back from near extinction.
It took some time to solve the murders. To everyone’s astonishment, the rangers discovered it was a gang of local juvenile delinquents murdering the rhinos. Moreover, they were doing it for sport, killing just for the fun of killing.
These juvenile delinquents hunted the rhinos and indiscriminately murdered them. But these juvenile delinquents were not humans. They were teenage bull elephants.
This problem had its origins in another South African park, Kruger National Park, which was dealing with the overpopulation of its elephant herd. Rather than culling the herd, killing the excess elephants, they decided to relocate young, orphaned elephants to other parks wanting to establish elephant herds. This seemed like a reasonable, even progressive idea. Moreover, it was rather uncomplicated to do because young elephants were reasonably easy to transport and relocate because of their smaller size.
These orphaned elephants suffered two major traumas, the first from the loss of their parents and the second with relocation to unfamiliar territory. These young bulls and cows grew up without “adult” supervision and, as they grew into their “teenage” years, the murdering of rhinos started.
What do you do? You have out of control teenagers with out of control hormones, murdering for sport. How do you rehabilitate an elephant? How do you place a teenage bull elephant in a juvenile detention center? How do we teach an animal values when we cannot even teach values to fellow human beings?
Following lengthy debates and deliberation, an older ranger proposed a unique, unproven, never tried idea. He suggested getting a truck large enough to haul a full-grown old bull elephant, something that up to that time had never been done. Not wanting to kill these young bull elephants, the parks reluctantly agreed to the experiment.
What happened when they transplanted the old bull in with the young bulls? The old bull immediately established a new hierarchy and from the day the old bull arrived, all rhino murdering stopped.
Dad was home. Dad was in charge. Dad would teach you how to behave. Dad would make sure you grew into a good adult.
We have a profound responsibility as fathers. We have a profound impact on the adults our children become. We have a solemn responsibility to our wives, the mother of our children, and to our children. They deserve our best. Remember the prison inmates and the elephants – bother are in need of dads.
A thank-you to mom for all she did – MOTHER’S DAY
The Sunday is Mother’s Day. I would like to remember my mom, the woman dad often referred to as ‘Mother,’ rather than by her name, Alice. He used the term ‘Mother’ when he was referring to her with admiration and respect.
“A brother’s a brother”
I recently made each of my three brothers a gift, an irregularly shaped piece of three-quarter inch thick walnut about seven inches square, with a two-inch by six-inch brass plaque. In front of the plaque sits a metal scale model 1996 John Deere riding lawn mower and four small sticks tied in a bundle. I worried these were a bit too ‘hokey’ and each one might end up in the back of a closet. Instead, each brother has theirs sitting out. Well, at least they’re sitting out when I visit.
Perspective – NEW YEAR’S
We are facing another new year, the time to reflect on the past while anticipating the future. This is the time of promises of changes we wish for the next year. This is the time to remember the good and the bad of yesterday. This is the time to remember the successes and failures of the past while maintaining optimism for the future. How wonderful was yesterday? How great may tomorrow be?
Birth control for eleven-year-olds?
The Portland, Maine school board is allowing school personnel to dispense birth control to girls as young as eleven without the knowledge or consent of their parents. Is this reasonable or unacceptable? Would you want your eleven year old daughter using birth control without your knowledge? Does availability of birth control promote sexual activity in teenagers? Does the school system have the right to get involved in this issue or are they interfering with the family?
Is the Hippocratic Oath no longer relevant?
The Hippocratic Oath has endured for more than 2,400 years, penned 400 years before the birth of Christ.
G.E.R. Lloyd described the Hippocratic Oath as “an ideal gold ethics standard representing a clear dividing line separating healers and killers, a commitment that physicians make to protect life, and never to deliberately take life.”
