Treasured Artifacts

• In my family, there are important relics of days gone by that are venerated.
  • There’s an old plastic Santa head that came from my grandmother Bryant’s house. It’s arrival on my mom’s mantle is the first indication of the Christmas season
  • There’s Gently, an old stuffed animal of mine that I created a shrine for out of an old Bass Shoe box
  • And then there’s the tape
    • A VHS tape, believe it or not
    • Tarheels 1982 victory over the Georgetown Hoyas
  • Watching that always gave us hope
    • When the Tarheels would blow another shot, we’d watch that, remember the glory days of Michael Jordan and Sam Perkins and James Worthy.
  • Hallmark Movies
    • I confess a fascination for them
    • They’re comforting, you know there will be a happy ending waiting for you at the conclusion
  • Open ended things give our fears a chance to run wild.
    • Scrooged Movie
      • Promo for their Christmas special
        • Word War
        • Epidemics
        • Crime
          • YOU MUST WATCH THIS SHOW
        • Fears are employed to manipulate us
        • Hope is the antidote to fear

When we Most Thirst for Hope

When things seem hopeless

• For most people, things right now aren’t where we’d like them to be.
  • COVID
  • Orwellian world in which privacy a thing of the past
  • Civility is breaking down
    • A few years back, a gun man walked into a nightclub and shot fellow Americans
      • We argued about gun rights, gay rights, faith rights, you name it.
        • Didn’t grieve.
      • Ask most anyone about their hope for America right now.
        • Most are a little dubious in ways that haven’t been evident in my memory ever before
      • The Younger the generation the greater the worry
        • They’re going to be here
        • But in their fear, younger generations are turning to
          • Escapism
          • Sexual Immorality
          • Drugs
          • Cheating
        • The Church
          • More “nones” than any time ever before
          • Spiritual but not religious
            • But oftentimes what that spirituality boils down to is little more than whatever makes me happy, I do. Whatever brings me grief, I avoid
              • That’s not being spiritual, it’s being selfish
            • We need hope now more than ever but, with the world’s hope, we don’t have very much hope for things improving at all