"We are safer now than we were in the fifties." – lady on a Facebook thread

DON'T START WITH ME, MA'AM. I can count about a dozen neighbors and brethren who have been murdered in recent decades, and I've lived in the country almost all my life. Jefferson County, Wisconsin didn't have one homicide in the decade of the 50s. Didn't you hear about 55 people getting shot in Chicago alone over Labor day, ma'am?

No one is saying that the olden days were perfect, but there are factual statistics on divorce, births out of wedlock, fatherless, and all types of crime. Those stats do not lie: Society has declined and decayed since 1960.

The Left cannot confess that their anything-goes morality has destroyed a once great country, so they are in de Nile, going down for the third time. We are over the cliff already, hanging on by our fingertips. "Is there anyone up there?"

During the 1940s, our county did suffer one kidnapping murder, a little girl who was never found. One of her sisters married the farmer next door to us. When we moved to another farm, we could see her farm from our hill. But the Weckler case was probably the only serious crime in the 40s. "Human services" consisted of the sheriff and one volunteer who worked with juvenile delinquents. Today it has its own multimillion dollar building. What is wrong with this picture?

We kicked God out of the schools and the Ten Commandments out of the courthouse in the name of "progress." We lead the world in pornography and drug addiction. That makes you feel safe? "Is there anyone else up there?", as the joke goes.

P.S. In view of the season, I don't want to end on a low note. Speaking of fatherhood, I'm reading "Ted Williams, My Father" by Claudia Williams, who was born after his baseball career was over. She only knew him as a great fisherman. Twenty-two years after he played his last game, she saw him in a baseball uniform for the first time, at an Old-Timers' game:

"It was May 1, 1982 . . . with the stands packed . . . . The announcer's voice echoed through the stadium. He introduced each player as he took the field . . . . Finally, he started highlighting a player whose career had big numbers, records that still stood, and how this player had served two hitches in the Marines . . . .

"The crowd came alive . . . . The claps and the cheers were so loud I could feel the vibration of the whole stadium . . . . My skin tingled . . . . I strained to see him . . . . It was then that my mom said, "That's Daddy."

"My mom picked me up. I saw my dad. My dad is something else, I thought."

Wouldn't anyone like to have a father like that? Or even a brother? YOU CAN. I'm talking about a father who will have a reception even greater than the one the crowd gave Ted Williams at Fenway Park. And a brother?

The latter will be greeted by 144,000 and songs that only angels can sing. There will be a great "innumerable multitude" to greet Him. A thousand years later or so, His Father will make this His home and bring a new Jerusalem, a new heaven, and a new Earth. The multitude will be even greater.

P.S. For more information, maybe you can Google it. Maybe there's an app for that.

PPS: As someone said, "I'm no longer watching for signs. I'm listening for the TRUMPETS." Shalom!