Fr. Randy Melton

I’ve been thinking a long time about how the common usage of the word “tolerance” doesn’t mean tolerance at all. To disagree with a position is considered intolerant in Politically Correct circles, when in fact, to disagree with a position and yet accept the validity of the person’s right to hold that position, seems to me to be what tolerance is really all about. If you can’t disagree, then there’s nothing to “tolerate” Does that make sense to anyone other than me?

Just a couple of weeks ago, a Gonzales family with three children had their house burn to the ground in an awful fire. They lost their home and possessions, but their lives were spared and no one was injured. This will be a Christmas they’ll never forget. But their plight will be ongoing for some time, and we dare not forget them. What did this Christmas mean for them?

Most of us over 15 years old remember exactly where we were the morning of September 11, 2001. The events of that gruesome day are seared in our memory. Those 9/11 acts of terrorism introduced 9 years of controversy regarding border security, travel security, immigration control, the Patriot Act, Guantanamo Bay and various other interpretations of constitutional law.

My son, Matthew, plays bass for a Christian singer named Brandon Heath. Last week I went to hear him at an outdoor concert in Dallas. Brandon composed a powerful song called “Give Me Your Eyes,” from the CD “What If We”. 

At the beginning of the year, Fr. Randy Melton gave a sermon to his parishioners at the Episcopal Church of the Messiah challenging them to live out the promise of God’s people to be a people of blessing. 
As a means of discovering creative ways to bless others in the community, they were implored to go into the community and ask someone in a context other than church, “How can I ask God to bless you today?”

In my last column I reflected on marriage by discussing the biblical definition of love, the reality that couples naturally irritate one another from time to time, and the necessity of not judging and practicing forgiveness. Now I want to focus on the unreliability of feelings as indicators for evaluating a marriage’s overall health. For instance, the euphoric feeling of romantic love is a great feeling, but as our President likes to say, it’s unsustainable. Even though this feel-good love has the power to bring us together, it can’t keep us together.

This past New Year’s Day, I was honored to officiate the marriage of my middle son, Matthew, and his lovely bride, Natalie. It was very emotional observing my son’s overwhelming joy as he watched his bride come down the aisle. While I gazed at them through moist eyes, my voice cracked a bit as I began the service. But the preacher held it together long enough to get them properly hitched!

Fox News analyst Brit Hume “caught hell” in past weeks over his suggestion that Tiger Woods turn to Christianity as the means of finding personal solace from his scandalous, adulterous affairs. “Tiger Woods will recover as a golfer. Whether he can recover as a person, I think is a very open question,” Hume said on the show Fox News Sunday. “The Tiger Woods that emerges once the news value dies out of this scandal, the extent to which he can recover, seems to me, depends on his faith. He’s said to be a Buddhist.

Ok, so Christmas is over now and what to we have to show for it?  As a kid, I’d look around after opening my last gift and innocently say, “Is that all there is?” 
Three trash cans full of wrapping paper and enough toys to play with for six months and not be bored, yet when the last one is opened, the question surfaces, “Oh, is that all there is?” 

Dear Editor:
I’m very excited to tell you that one of your readers responded to my article on “The Art of a Thankful Heart” by sending a check for $200 to sponsor the education of one of our Uganda Orphans for the next year.