Good morning, Digital Neighbors! Happy Monday Friends & Refugees, Early Birds & Later Dayers, Conversants & Lurkers, Misfits & PHAM, Awakening Wonders & Curious Questioners, ADD Irregulars, WSN Contributors and the Curmudgeon Quorum.
I recently rediscovered a quote often attributed to F. Scott Fitzgerald but there seems to be some disputation of that on the interwebs. Whoever said it or wrote it had some good insight into this pilgrimage we are all sharing.
For what it’s worth … it’s never too late, or in my case too early, to be whoever you want to be. There’s no time limit. Start whenever you want. You can change or stay the same. There are no rules to this thing. We can make the best or the worst of it. I hope you make the best of it. I hope you see things that startle you. I hope you feel things you never felt before. I hope you meet people who have a different point of view. I hope you live a life you’re proud of, and if you’re not, I hope you have the courage to start all over again.
We had a longer Coffee Talk discussion on The Gift of Fear by Gavin de Becker. It is on the reading list now, but it may be a while before I get to it. In the meantime, if fear is one of our default settings, few things are more important than courage. I tend to favor humility as the mother of all virtues, but in these days of fear (thank you 2020 and covid-mania) courage may be more important in filtering through all the lies, distortions and manipulations of the CABAL of the Enemedia, Landfill Academia, Perma-statists & government careerist, Hollywoke, Big Tech & Big Pharma. I am sure there are others to add to that list, but those are the ones I have ranted about for a good eight years or longer.
Assessment of actual fears is essential to not letting our lives become little more than the puppet at the end of a marionette’s strings. Actual fears should be wisely avoided or secured against, false fears near to be exposed and dismissed. Sometimes we do not possess the luxury of time to discern and analyze the degree of danger in a perceived threat and must trust our gut. It is not an easy process and there is a good chance that friends, family or coworkers may get lost along the way when they accept the fear and accuse you of being part of it when you reject their submission to it. 2020 was ripe with examples of people being accused, harassed and persecuted because they didn’t uncritically swallow the lies of the Cabal.
I hope you live a life you’re proud of, and if you’re not, I hope you have the courage to start all over again.
Many do not, I hope the free and questioning souls that Local’s tends to attract are among those who question and possess courage. Happy Monday Digital Neighbors!
Today marks the three hundred and thirtieth birthday of the Frenchman François-Marie Arouet, better known by his nom de plume, Voltaire (1694-1778).
Born into a bourgeois family during the reign of Louis XIV, the “Sun King” (r. 1643-1715), Voltaire suffered tragedy at a young age when his mother died. Never close with his father or brother, Voltaire exhibited a rebellious attitude toward authority from his youth. His brilliant mind was fostered in the care of the Society of Jesus, who introduced him to the joys of literature and theater. Despite his later criticisms against the Church, Voltaire, throughout his life, fondly recalled his dedicated Jesuit teachers.
Although he spent time as a civil servant in the French embassy to the Hague, Voltaire’s main love was writing—an endeavor where he excelled in various genres, including poetry, which led to his appointment as the royal court poet for King Louis XV. Widely recognized as one of the greatest French writers, and even hyperbolically referred to by ...
Padre - Tom Miller invites you to a Coffee Talk, Speakeasies, Schmoozes, Tea Times, Afterhours and other gatherings.
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2026 Coffee Talk with the ADD Irregulars
Thursday, January 1, 2026
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Occurs every day starting 1/1 until 12/31/2027
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XIII
The Proud Minister
One day there came into the Garden a man in torn clothes badly bruised and cut, who said to the Lover, “In the name of the Beloved I demand your help.”
So the Lover and the Disciple let him in and dressed his wounds and prepared the best of the vegetables from the Garden for him to eat. When his wounds had been dressed and he had eaten and rested the Lover asked him how he had fallen into this plight, to which the man replied, “I was Minister of the Beloved in a city near this place, where I preached His gospel and expounded His doctrine to the people. I pointed out to them how their sins had made them wholly hateful to the Beloved and how therefore they were utterly beyond the range of His love and He would condemn them to eternal torments, whereon some fell into despair and wept bitterly but many were angry. One day the magistrates called me before them and begged me to leave the city and preach elsewhere for they said I had made many people so angry and desperate that they feared there might be a riot and they might not be able to protect me but that I might suffer some injury. I, however, very zealous for the Beloved and believing that the magistrates only feared that their own sins might be proclaimed, preached the more vehemently, denounced the magistrates and made it abundantly clear that the whole wicked city was foredoomed to eternal punishment by the just provision of the Beloved. Whereon a mob, stirred up no doubt by the corrupt and venal magistrates, fell upon me with sticks and stones, nearly killing me and driving me out of the city in the state in which I came to you.”
“My friend,” said the Lover, “this was not a good deed of yours, for besides denying the unfathomable compassion of the Beloved, you have by your obstinacy caused these people to commit a grievous sin, and this cannot be pleasing to the Beloved, that through you who profess to be His minister the people should become worse. Surely you remember that He Himself said, ‘If they persecute you in one city flee to another.’”
Therefore the man was very angry, and cursing the Lover, said, “I see that I have had a very false report of you and I do not believe that you are a servant of the Beloved at all. When I came to you so injured for the Beloved’s sake you set before me only herbs and fruits although the garden is full of birds which you could have killed to make me a worthy meal. I shall proclaim everywhere that you are no true servant of the Beloved but a mere falterer who dares not suffer in the cause of the Beloved. Be sure that you are foreordained to eternal torments who suffer nothing here.”
For the man was so blinded by his own pride that he could not perceive the scars on the hands and feet and the brows of the Lover nor how the cloth beneath the armpits of his tunic was dyed with a red dye. So he went out of the Garden cursing and shouting.
But the Lover looked sad and said, “A man like this does much harm to the cause of the Beloved, for by thus speaking falsely about the Beloved he may bring men to fear Him but none to love Him, and by love alone can any man approach the Beloved.”
