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This was e-mailed to me and is worth reading.

Subject: Something to think about

In light of the many perversions and jokes we send to one another for a laugh, this is a little different: This is not intended to be a joke, it's not funny, it's intended to get you thinking.

Billy Graham's daughter was interviewed on the Early Show and Jane Clayson asked her "How could God let something like this happen?" (regarding the attacks on Sept. 11).

Anne Graham gave an extremely profound and insightful response. She said "I believe God is deeply saddened by this, just as we are, but for years we've been telling God to get out of our schools, to get out of our government and to get out of our lives.

And being the gentleman He is, I believe He has calmly backed out. How can we expect God to give us His blessing and His protection if we demand He leave us alone?"

In light of recent events...terrorists attack, school shootings, etc. I think it started when Madeleine Murray O'Hare (she was murdered, her body found recently) complained she didn't want prayer in our schools, and we said OK.

Then someone said you better not read the Bible in school ... the Bible says Thou Shalt not kill, Thou Shalt not steal, and love your neighbor as yourself. And we said OK.

Then Dr. Benjamin Spock said we shouldn't spank our children when they misbehave because their little personalities would be warped and we might damage their self-esteem (Dr. Spock's son committed suicide). We said an expert should know what he's talking about. And we said OK.

Then someone said teachers and principals better not discipline our children when they misbehave. The school administrators said no faculty member in this school better touch a student when they misbehave because we don't want any bad publicity, and we surely don't want to be sued (there's a big difference between disciplining, touching, beating, smacking, humiliating, kicking, etc.). And we said OK.

Then someone said, let's let our daughters have abortions if they want, and they won't even have to tell their parents. And we said OK.

Then some wise school board member said, since boys will be boys and they're going to do it anyway, let's give our sons all the condoms they want so they can have all the fun they desire, and we won't have to tell their parents they got them at school. And we said OK.

Then some of our top elected officials said it doesn't matter what we do in private as long as we do our jobs. Agreeing with them, we said it doesn't matter to me what anyone, including the President, does in private as long as I have a job and the economy is good.

Then someone said let's print magazines with pictures of nude women and call it wholesome, down-to-earth appreciation for the beauty of the female body. And we said OK.

And then someone else took that appreciation a step further and published pictures of nude children and then further again by making them available on the Internet. And we said OK, they're entitled to free speech.

Then the entertainment industry said, let's make TV shows and movies that promote profanity, violence, and illicit sex. Let's record music that encourages rape, drugs, murder, suicide, and satanic themes. And we said it's just entertainment, it has no adverse effect, nobody takes it seriously anyway, so go right ahead.

Now we're asking ourselves why our children have no conscience, why they don't know right from wrong, and why it doesn't bother them to kill strangers, their classmates, and themselves.

Probably, if we think about it long and hard enough, we can figure it out. I think it has a great deal to do with "WE REAP WHAT WE SOW."

Funny how simple it is for people to trash God and then wonder why the world's going to hell. Funny how we believe what the newspapers say, but question what the Bible says.

Funny how you can send 'jokes' through e-mail and they spread like wildfire but when you start sending messages regarding the Lord, people think twice about sharing.

Funny how lewd, crude, vulgar and obscene articles pass freely through cyberspace, but public discussion of God is suppressed in the school and workplace.

Are you laughing?

Funny how when you forward this message, you will not send it to many on your address list because you're not sure what they believe, or what they WILL think of you for sending it. Funny how we can be more worried about what other people think of us than what God thinks of us.

Pass it on if you think it has merit. If not then just discard it ... no one will know you did. But, if you discard this thought process, don't sit back and complain about what bad shape the world is in!

Mag

Funny how people can think that if "we" hadn't let "god" out of our lives all of these atrocities wouldn't have taken place, very naive!! There have been far worse occurrences in human history, many of them due to differences in religious conviction, and yet I'm sure there was someone who pissed god off, so he just let it happen. Like the 6 million jews who were massacred, or the russians who were murdered under stalin and his predecessors, or the barbarians that the romans wiped out, I'm sure there was justification for god to allow this to happen.

Nowhere in here do I say that god doesn't exist, because I feel that's a separate argument. But to suppose that these horrendous things were brought on simply because "we" had pushed "god" out are lives is preposterous, and naive beyond belief!

Mag I completely agree that it is man who has screwed up, but where we disapree is when people say that the divergence from god has created these recent events by supposing that god is not protecting people anymore. I read your post, I was comparing these recent events to those from history and asserting that atrocities happen, wheter there is a god or not, and wheter people beleive there is a god or not.

I believe the moral to the story(or post)is that, if Gods moral values or the equivelent, were instilled into youngsters and others these days, people would have made more peaceful and thoughtful decisions in life.

In this way God protects, by example, not by magic or whatever you think Gods power may be called.

One thing is certain in my mind. If you teach children and others the ways of God, you cant possibly hurt anybody. It can only help. In my opinion.

Mag

Thats why I said the equivelent. It doesnt necessarily have to be religious, but must have moral values to work.

Mag

I tend to agree with what CWilhelmi is saying ...

If you think about the perspective that a divine creator must have and look at worldly events, you gotta think that if God is paying any attention to us at all, he's doing so with about the same degree of interest that we'd take in an ant farm ...

My view is that it's on US to make things work in this world and that if we don't get the job done well, we have to live with the problems that result ...

Think about it ... from his perspective, our lifetimes aren't even a small blip on his eternal radar screen and however things play out here, it's really pretty insignificant .... except to us. Our growth, our learning, our being able to develop ourselves is what it's all about if this life isn't just an evolutionary accident, but is part of a divine plan ...