Motivation or Flaunting It Over Others?

        I became aware of an extreme example of those who have; and, those who have not.  The nation of Swaziland celebrated it’s 40th independence day as well as the King of Swazi’s 40th birthday in an ostentatious way.  The King Mswati was driven around in a convertible BMW flaunting his weath in a country that is overwhelmed with extreme poverty.  The nation has been devastated by the AIDS epidemic; it has the world’s highest AIDs rate.  This means that many households are not able to earn enough money to provide for their families; because many households are headed up by children because of the plague of AIDs.  Those homes that are affected by AIDS may not be healthy enough to work.  Many individuals only get enough food to eat because of international food aid.  This is a terribly sad event.

        This lack of basic necessities limits the average person’s ability to influence powerful changes, in a country that desperately needs to improve it’s quality of life.  In my mind, if the country has that kind of money…i have to wonder, why is the international community forced to provide food aid in the first place?  Those people should be coming first, in my mind, to the King of that country… he and his family should not be living a lifestyle that feeds off of riches…while his own subjects are forced to accept help from outside countries!  That should be considered shameful to the King of Swaziland and it’s officials.  It is, to me, a failure to fulfill his duties to provide care for the people under his rule.

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Pregnant Pause

       The principal at Gloucester High School, John Sullivan, has resigned his position; if you remember he was the principal that made news headlines a few months back by allegedly, claiming that there was a pregnancy pact at his school when pregnancy rates climbed to four times the norm, in his school…17 young women were pregnant, during the school year.  To the best of my knowledge the idea of a “pact” has not been proven; in fact, some of the girls actually denied the claim.  The former principal says that he often relied on information gathered through his staff and from monitoring student chatter which when put together was generally reliable and he chooses to keep that information confidential. 

        John Sullivan appears to feel somehat betrayed by the mayor of the town because when all of this hit the media…he made some statements that criticized the principals ability to “remember” who told him about the alleged plan to become pregnant.  He also says that the superintendent remained silent in the rush of public opinion to condemn him for alluding to the girls deciding to become pregnant.   He feels that both the mayor and the superintendent allowed him to take the brunt of the news reports without standing up for him. 

         He says he does not remember using the word pact…however, he still is convinced that the young woman became pregnant on purpose.  He resigned he said because he does not feel that he has the confidence or support of the leadership in his community.  John Sullivan was at a place where he could have retired, so he did.  However, he did so while at the same time encouraging the students “to continually check their moral compass and do what is right even when swimming against the tide”.

           Regardless of whether the young women became pregnant by choice or not…the school system and community leaders would do well to increase it’s preventative educational programs.  This trend is one that we all pay a price for…with our taxes, with our young people, with social services, and in the short and long term with our families.   The school system is review it’s policy to ban distributing contraception in school. 

          In my opinion, the school system should work closely with parents groups, clergy, health care professionals, school counselors, and the students themselves while drafting a plan to combat the increased numbers sexually active students and occurances of teen pregnancies. 

           With the recent culture of movies that tend to gloss over teen pregnancy and all of the complications that go along with it; we need to examine how our environment/culture encourages our young people to engage in sexual activity, and begin to discuss ways to educate and combat all of the mixed signals that our youth are exposed to in this area of life.  Exposure to STD’s is rising in certain parts of our population, the AIDS numbers are climbing; and with the difficulties in the economy, and cut backs in programs that help to educate and help prevent exposure for our young people; we are waging a war for the health and well being of our children. 

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Poisoned Piercings

       For those of you considering piercing your body parts…it would be wise to heed the words of a young man who is now hospitalized with a MRSA infection.  A Missouri teen pierced his lip with an un-sterilized needle that he found in a medicine cabinet.

       A few days later he found sores on his body and was achy all over.  He has been diagnosed with an MRSA infection that is resistant to antibiotics.  The doctors have said that the infection has spread thoughout his whole body.  He wants to get the message out to others not to do what he did because of the consequences.

       Fitting in with your peers by piercing your body parts without proper medical guidance can cause more than one problem.  Unsterilized utensils can cause hepatitis, aids, or antibiotic resistent infections that can jepardize your life and your health.  Be informed and make smart decisions…if you still desire to be pierced talk to your doctor first.

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A Political Judas?

        I am not, by and large, a political person in the way of trying to convert anyone to my way of thinking when it comes to voting; that is not my intention here.  In fact…i have not made up my mind about who I am voting for, in the coming presidential election.  But, I am somewhat disturbed by the goings on with the media’s illumiation of the whole inflamatory words of Sen. Barack Obama’s recently retired pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright.

        Reverend Wright has been preaching sermons, until his recent retirement, that have allegedly been making statements that have an accusatory tone about AIDS being a racist plot, about concerns about his sermons and statements…calling those concerns an attack on the black church amongst other highly provacative statments.  This, as you can imagine, has caused multiple problems for Sen. Barack Obama’s campaign.

       Rev. Wright was Sen. Barack Obama’s pastor for almost 20 years..and he married Obama and his wife.  They have had a spirtual relationship for quite some time. 

       I don’t know about you…but…I have been in a church situation where i was in a spiritual disagreement with someone who was head of the church; and, was preaching what i thought was violent, ill informed, and inflammatory comments from the pulpit.  My husband and I made the painful decision to leave that church because of the influence it was having on our spiritual well being. 

           I think that was the proper thing to do.  We still cared deeply for the person making the statements…but…in all honesty, that person was wrong to be saying the things they said from a pulpit.  It is a sacred, powerful place to guide and direct people in their daily living.  It is no less so, for Barack Obama and his family…or, anyone else finding themselves in such a position.  This requires discernment about who you let influence your thoughts and decisions.

       I do have some questions personally…but, because I was not in that church to hear such things being said…i have to give Mr. Obama credit and say…i would hope that he would have better judgement than to sit under that sort of spiritual leadership if it was ongoing situation with Rev. Wright. 

        On the other hand, who is betraying who in this ongoing debate about what has been being preached in that church.  If Rev Wright was saying such explosive and devisive things from the pulpit and Mr. Obama continued under that tuteledge…then, maybe his judgement has been impaired. 

        It has been alleged by a politician recently, that perhaps, Rev. Wright was deliberately sabotaging Mr. Obama’s bid for delegates.  If so, why would he be acting as a political Judas? 

        Now that Barack Obama has distanced himself further from Rev. Wright on Monday evening by saying…that the person who made such a “spectacle” at the National Press Club “is not the person I met 20 years ago”; are there persons out there who will think that he is the political Judas for distancing himself from Rev. Wright, at this point in time?

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