Love to Haiti and A Dose of Castor Oil for Pat Robertson

First ... all thoughts, prayers and energy specifically to our family in Haiti. We are one with you in your suffering, we seek to bear it with you to help you withstand the pain. Sending love, hope, faith and tomorrow's sunrise to fill your spirits with joy and strength.

and now, the castor oil -- because sometimes soap isn't enough. If Pat Robertson's mother was still alive, no doubt, she would have a bar of Lava for the darkness her son increased in the world.

"I give you not a spirit of fear . . . " That's in the Bible somewhere.

I met Pat Robertson once. Ironically, like now, it was at a time of "crisis" -- a fire in the hotel hosting many of the representatives from the Full Gospel Businessmen Fellowship International convention happening in Anaheim, California. Our family (well, most of my family, me being the third eldest was not yet old enough to stay at home with my two sisters, so, I must have been no more than 11 or 12 at the time), traveled to Anaheim to attend the convention filled with evangelical christian superstars and their groupies (for lack of a better description).

I remember the early days of the "evangelical" christian "non-demoninational" movement, and the FGBMF, Pat Robertson, The 700 Club was a part of that birth that has resulted in things like the "Christian Coalition," among other things.

Today, unfortunately, I must reflect on the words of Pat Robertson in response to the extreme tragedy in Haiti. They echo the words of the pastor in the Dutch Orthodox Church where the services for my paternal grandmother was held. A god of hate. A god of punishment. A god so cruel and angry at his creation that surely we do not expect his grace because we are so undeserving. Basically, a god absent all the things I believe God is. And, because God is everything, I suppose that is a part of "God" too . . . but I prefer to keep that part of God as far away from me as possible.

Pat Robertson is "a Christian leader." LOL! Is he one of your's? Really? Still?!!!!!!!

Like when Katrina happened, God was punishing us for our love for all humanity and the knowledge that what all God created is good, equally deserving of our love and respect -- after all, it really couldn't be the gays that caused God to bring so much judgment on New Orleans, is it? But, truly, how ungodly are we as a nation because . . . not, of course, because we embark in violence and countless murders of innocent human beings in pre-emptive wars . . . but ungodly because we no longer stone gay men and women, and allow them to exist in some increasing level of personal respect, human dignity and equality in light of the prejudices they have faced for years and years and years.

Pat, really. Would God really do that?

Send the earthquake to Haiti because they fought for a found their independence before we did here in America? Or, did they really have to do a "deal with the devil" and now God is paying them back? It can't be possible that a people so filled with self-determination could have risen up and claimed their birthright as sovereign people -- in doing so, inspire some young minds here in a America to think that it really was possible. No -- of course not. They had to make a deal with the devil because they have a different way of living according to their own choice and destiny . . . their own journey within their own stone polisher that happens to be different then say the one Mr. Robertson is in here in America?

And, he and I are in the same stone polisher and he and I are rubbing together in this pot we call America. But, perhaps Mr. Robertson is not reading the same teachings I read in my Bible. I mean, could it be, that in this crazy world God created, the Earth has her cycles and they happen to hit places where human beings live . . . and tragedy strikes us equally based on our needs to learn, journey and grow?

Or maybe, just perhaps,
could it possible that these things happen
exclusively as a form of grace for wayward
wannabe "christians"?

Katrina and Haiti happen to be an act of God but not in deliberation of judgment for some obscure judgment that Pat Robertson seems to think in his egocentric and inhumane and NWJWD (not-what-jesus-would-do) manner, full of hate, judgment and disrespect. An act of grace and mercy exclusively for Mr. Robertson and his need to learn how to be a human being.

Oh, and about that time when I was a child and met Pat Robertson, I was all alone, well, my younger brother was with me, he was maybe 7 or 8 at the time. I was looking for my parents. We had come down to the lobby and were waiting on them when the alarms started going off. So, we were standing in the lobby, right in the middle with people frantically streaming toward the front doors to get out of the building, and I am standing there in the middle of them, grasping my brother's hand, looking for my parents. I kept scanning the people, hundreds of them at this point, and "boom!"

I was knocked to the ground, my brother falling with me. I look up and its Pat Robertson who has knocked me down and dropped something he was carrying. I quickly stood up and said, "Hi Mr. Robertson" (he was, after all, in our house, a bit of a 'superstar'), and I went down to help him pick up the books and papers he had dropped.

"Leave this stuff alone and get out of the way, don't you know there's a fire!" Was his reply. I stood up quickly, not sure how to react as he grabbed his last book and rather gently pushed me and my brother aside and said over his shoulder to the person following him, "this way, there's the door."

The person with him did not follow Mr. Robertson. I did not know the man, but he stopped and asked me in accented English, "Are you ok?" "Yes, but I cannot find my parents." I replied. "Stay with me, we'll find them." And as he turned around, of course, there were my parents coming right towards us. "There they are!" I exclaimed. And, so there they were and the Korean man went on his way with the rest of the crowd as we joined my parents and baby sister then also evacuated the hotel.

"What were you doing with Pastor Cho?" Asked my mom who recognized the stranger who helped us. "He was helping us find you," I replied. (Pastor David Cho is a mega-superstar pastor from Korea.)

Running in fear was Pat Robertson. Seizing an opportunity to serve was Paster Cho. No more than God sent that fire to "punish" those of us in Anaheim, California did God send an earthquake to "punish" our family in Haiti. Spewing hatred, untruths and fear mongering once again is Pat Robertson, again like Katrina, completely missing the amazing opportunity to serve that was packaged wrapped with a bow on top just for him courtesy of God's grace and Mother Nature.

Mr. Robertson still does not understand on the most basic human level the love of God, God's compassion and Jesus' calling to serve and serve and serve.

Shame on you, Pat Robertson. While you are a very distant, distant relative of mine as we are all children of God, but you most certainly are not close to the calling I find when I use the label description "christian." And, I request you stop using the Lord's name in vain.

peace & harmony,
elaine
'freedom must be exercised to stay in shape!'