Elf Sternberg

Chuck Colson is one of those men who writes weekly columns for God picked up by hundreds of mainstream newspapers around the country, apparently because God himself never writes. He's probably managed to make himself more famous for being to the right of Pat Robertson than he ever was for being one of the Watergate Seven and going to jail for Nixon.

Colson has written an apalling column which has appeared in Newsweek, the Washington Post and all his other outlets calling for the dismissal of chaplains from the military who serve Wiccan or other "pagan" religions, writing

It is debatable whether paganism is a religion, per say [sic]. It is generally defined as a pre-Christian state, but it takes a wide variety of forms-- all the way from relatively benign New Age-style nature worship, to pantheism, to witchcraft, and even human sacrifice.

Those who publicly identify themselves as pagans are at best a marginal number and are basically no different from dozens of other cults. I see no reason why Wiccans or pagans generally should have the services of taxpayer-paid chaplains. It is perfectly appropriate, if a group meets court tests for religion, that outside priest/ministers be allowed to come into federal facilities and minister.

By the way, that [sic] in there is mine; I have to believe that the editors of the column allowed it to go through only to show that Colson's writing barely reaches the level of a rabid D-list blogger and is not the work of an intellect firing on all cylinders.

You will probably be heartened by the comments section. They're overwhelmingly opposed to Colson's proposal that the courts should be the ones to determine whose religions get promulgated on federal property.

Quick, contact ASCAP! Yamaarashi-chan is singing Puff, The Magic Dragon, and I'm damn sure she hasn't paid her license for it this week!

One of the things I forgot to blog about yesterday is that I burned my left foot, badly. When we had been grilling the salmon, I had taken the lid off the grill and put it on the ground, then accidentally brushed up against it with the side of my foot. This morning, when I ran to the dry cleaners to drop off our winter bedclothes for preparation and storage, I stopped by the drugstore to pick up bandages after Omaha mentioned we were out. So many to choose from! I must have wasted ten minutes just trying to find a plain ol' set of inch-wide strips. I did find some nice blister management patches, which are working really well on the burn.

After a quiet morning where I got to do some meditative housekeeping, changing the bedsheets and mopping the floors (I like housekeeping; there's something pleasant about knowing you're making your house into a home, keeping yourself and your family clean and healthy), Omaha assembled peanut butter & jelly sandwiches for the family and we headed out to Oloteas for a day of sun, swimming, and pagan ritual. Yay, pagan rituals! There were so many wonderful people there, I've lost count of them: shemayazi, damiana_swan, Leith, Kaeli, hermesinbattle, and I'm sure the Goddess knows many, many more that I'm spacing on right now.

While I was swimming, I kicked off the side of the pool and my right leg seized up in a terrible spasm that rippled all the way up my body to the small of back. The pain was excrutiating, and I must have panicked some people the way I surfaced, screaming. But I managed to get to shallow water and stand, massaging the leg. I had a terrible limp for the rest of the day, although I found that it was mostly up-and-down motions that bothered it. I had no trouble spinning the girls dizzy. They climbed trees and climbed around the small mound next to the swimming pool, having as much fun as children can. I like this picture of Yamaarashi-chan; it makes her look a bit like her older sister.

Somehow, I got roped into helping make the salad for the potluck, mostly by providing a rhythmic motion with my right hand (working the salt and pepper grinders). Apparently, someone thought I had experience. The food was absolutely delicious, although most of the girls didn't seem to agree. They ate mostly the fruit, a bit of the rice, and then dove into the cookies.

I wanted to go to the ritual, but it started late and one of the children was having an exhaustion meltdown (not Kouryou or Yamaarashi, though), so I had to sit out with her and a few others and watch from a distance. They were fine; they let me write this post.