Our Police – Always On Call, Not Always Respected

“Today, I will not answer the radio call that your boyfriend has come home drunk and is beating you again. Today I will not answer the radio call that your 16 year old daughter, who is very responsible, is four hours late coming home from school. Today I will not answer the radio call that your store has been robbed or your house has been burglarized. Today I will not stop a drunk driver from killing someone. I will not catch a rapist or a murderer or a car thief. Today I will not answer the radio call that a man has a gun or tried to abduct a child or that someone has been stabbed or has been in a terrible accident. Today I will not save your child that you locked in a car or the child you were to busy to watch who went outside and fell into the swimming pool, but that I revived. No, today I will not do that.
Why?

Because Today I was killed by a drunk driver while I was helping push a disabled car off the highway. Today I was shot and killed during a routine traffic stop to simply tell someone that they had a taillight out. Today I was killed in a traffic accident rushing to help a citizen. Today I was shot and killed serving a warrant on a known drug dealer. Today I was killed by a man when I came by to do a welfare check because his family was to busy.

Today I was killed trying to stop a bank robbery or a grocery store robbery. Today I was killed doing my job.

A chaplain and an officer will go to a house and tell a mom and dad or a wife or husband or a child that their son or daughter or husband or wife or father or mother won’t be coming home today.

The flags at many police stations were flown at half-mast today but most people won’t know why. There will be a funeral and my fellow officers will come, a twenty-one-gun salute will be given, and taps will be played as I am laid to rest. My name will be put on a plaque, on a wall, in a building, in a city somewhere. A folded flag will be placed on a mantel or a bookcase in a home somewhere and a family will mourn.

There will be no cries for justice. There will be no riots in the streets. There will be no officers marching, screaming “no justice, no peace.” No citizens will scream that something must be done. No windows will be smashed, no cars burned, no stones thrown, no names called. Only someone crying themselves to sleep tonight will be the only sign that I was cared about.
I was a police officer.”

Holocaust Remembrance Day

Entertaining Cats!

The kitten is too feisty for our older cat and wearing her out and her nerves have given way to  obsessively licking herself much to the dismay of her fur . . . She’s actually worn patches of it away!  Our solution? A ball pit which is actually supposed to be for babies but we have baby-sized cats, right? Marcella (with the purple collar) isn’t sure about it but Buster has claimed it as his own. See the ‘lip’ around the front of the entrance? It is supposed to keep the colorful balls within the confines of the ball put . . . Buster has proven this to not work.

 

Justice System in the US – Will It Apply to Everyone?

Priorities – Birds Or Babies?

Alphonsus Lambe

I ran across an interesting ‘saint in progress’, Alphonsus Lambe. Saint in Progress because he hasn’t been canonized, yet, and is known as Servant of God.

Alphonsus Lambe was born in Tullamore Ireland in 1932.  He spend some of his youth in the novitiate of the Irish Christian Brothers but, because of health issues, he had to leave. His  vocation, however, continued in the Legion Of Mary. He was appointed Envoy in 1953 and was sent to Bogota, Columbia on the Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. He worked there for almost six years promoting the Legion of Mary in Argentina, Ecuador, Uruguay, and Brazil in addition to Columbia.

His delicate health and strenuous work caught up with him and he died in Buenos Aires on the Feast of St. Agnes, January 21, 1959.

Alphonsus Lambe was blessed with wonderful natural gifts. He  has a personality that attracted souls to the service, a great love of God, enthusiasm, and a gift for learning languages. His facility for learning languages enabled him to quickly gain fluency in Spanish and Portuguese.

In his time in South American, he set up many branches of the Legion of Mary and trained many to the Apostolate of the Legion. He had an amazing devotion to the Blessed Mother and explained and urged the practice of the True Devotion to Our Lady.

Alphonsus Lambe is buried at the Irish Christian Brothers, in Recoleta Cemetery in Bueno Aries, Argentina. The Cause for his Beatification was introduced byt the Archdiocese of Buenos Aries in 1978.

Is Jesus YOUR Lord and Savior?

I’ve made friends from many religions other than my own over the years. Usually, we enjoy each other’s company and respect each other’s beliefs. One thing many of the Protestant faiths often bring up and ask is, “Have you accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior.” Since this was never expressed in any of my Catholic catechism lessons exactly like that, it always made me think for the moment and then mentally shrug, and go on with my day.

Recently, I viewed the movie, War Room, and in word and action, the theme was accepting Jesus Christ as the Lord and Savior. Although all Catholics do/should feel this way, we don’t often hear anyone exclaiming it to anyone that cares to listen. It does make sense, however, to add this thought or feeling to our prayer life and attitude towards life. Jesus came down to earth to be our Savior so we are accepting him as such. Why not say it? I don’t mean going around and unexpectedly bursting forth with this to strangers on the street but the thought of prayerfully stating this in our own daily prayers, could be a reminder we might have been overlooking a bit and not giving it the merit of joy it should constantly provide us.

I was talking a young friend, last week, and we were discussing this very thing and wondering why it wasn’t more ‘catching’ as it is a good confirmation of our Faith in God and a reminder that Jesus is our Brother by his human birth and the Son of God. As John Paul II stated so perfectly, “Jesus Christ, the human face of God and the divine face of Man.”

Another thought popped up in my friend’s and my impromptu conversation as we wondered how come it seemed that other religions put more thought in their attire in attending their Sunday services whereas way too many Catholics come in the clothing they could wear for shopping or a picnic in the park. My young friend thoughtfully said, “Perhaps, the Protestant faiths dress up because they constantly remind themselves that Jesus is their Lord and Savior and they want to worship Him in attire that is respectful of His presence in life especially during time of worship.

Facts . . .

In Memory of Martin Luther King, Jr.

It is too bad that more of our politicians don’t have this quote ingrained into their backbone.