In Which Rick Warren tells his followers to emulate Hitler Youth

Oh Yes He Did!

And he'll be speaking at you're inauguration...

Friday Five- Five Things

To get your own obamicon go to obamicon.me

"Whether it's new friends or new loves or new employers, what are five things people should know about you?"

1. I'm a counselor, Licensed Mental Health Counselor and Certified Rehabilitation Counselor, but I'm an introvert. Somehow it never comes into play at work. I'm able to listen intently and take it all in, to 'talk the angry people down'-I'm a senior counselor in my office so I often, like several times a week, see the angry and dissatisfied clients of the counselors in my unit. But when I get home, I'm exhausted.

2. I'm from Ohio, so though I've lived in NYC well over half of my life-1972- people keep saying "where are you from?" (Yes, they use bad grammar.)

3. Did I say I'm an introvert? How did I ever end up living in a 500 sq ft. apt. with Beloved? We should have kept looking...

4. I live across the street from the General Theological Seminary. Also upstairs from Billy's Bakery, but my favorite place is LiLac Chocolate, IMHO the best chocolate in NYC. And I do love my chocolate, milk please, with nuts. Sometimes you feel like a nut.

5.I'm still on my spiritual path and my church search. Searching, searching, searching...

To Brighten up your Monday Morning

What do bored NYers do when the weather's cold? They take the subway without their pants...

A Horrible Case of Driving While Black-Robby Tolan

I was not surprised when I heard this on the morning news. Any more than I was surprised when I heard about he murder of two hispanic men who were hugging to keep warm and beaten to death because the thugs that killed them thought they were gay. 

Watch and weep:

Friday Five-Pancakes

Sophia gives us this Friday Five: "Last week Sally gave us a beautiful, spiritually reflective Friday Five, so it's time for something light and fluffy (literally). It's inspired by the fact that as I write this my dear spouse TechnoGuy, with the assistance of daughter Ladybug, is making a batch of chocolate chip pancakes with two Christmas presents. One is the Knott's Berry Farm mix which came along with jam, boysenberry syrup, and biscuit mix from my aunt (we ended up with two sets, since my parents passed theirs on to avoid sweet and carb-y temptation). The other is the large size Black and Decker electric skillet he was thrilled that I got him online -- our trusty wedding present normal size one still works at going on 20 years, but the Teflon is getting worn, and he wanted more cooking space. So pull up a chair to the kitchen table and tell us all about your pancake preferences."

Point of information. In NYC, a lot, ok most of the diners are run by Greek people, like a lot of green markets are run by Korean people. FYI. The food is regular food, not particularly Greek, although there may be some Spanikopita, or Moussakas on the menu...there is always spaghetti, too! It's just the way the city developed. Like the shoe stores are run by Albanians like Kevin Cole...just kidding!

1. Scratch or mix? Buttermilk or plain?
I usually only let myself have pancakes at Good Stuff, the Greek Diner the the Catholic Lesbians go to after mass, and only during fresh blueberry season. So many calories ( yes I said it!) But I love them, those blueberryed brown and buttery salty sweet with real maple syrup yumminess drippy Pancakes!

2. Pure and simple, or with additions cooked in?
Yup, blueberries.

3. For breakfast or for dinner?
Breakfast or brunch.

4. Preferred syrup or other topping? How about the best side dish?
Maple and Bacon-throw on some more calories and some cholesterol, too.

5. Favorite pancake restaurant?
Could be Good Stuff on 14th St. or it could be Chelsea Square or any of a number of Greek Diners in the City that never sleeps!

She was discriminated against and well then it happened again

Admired Lesbian Fired by Detroit Catholic School
(Bloomfield Hills; 18 October 2006----) A dedicated and much-loved employee of a Detroit-area high school was fired last week following the publication of her book which detailed the harassment she endured for being a lesbian on the Detroit Police force.

Charlene Genther was fired on 13 October from her position of Campus Safety Officer at Marian High School, a position she held since 2001. Genther says the president of the school, Lenore Pochelski, told her that she had to leave because, as an out lesbian, her "lifestyle did not go along with the teachings of the Catholic Church." Marian, a Catholic, college preparatory high school for young women, is under the jurisdiction of the Archdiocese of Detroit.

Genther left the Detroit Police Department after nearly 15 years. She was one of the "first 100" female police officers assigned to patrol duty in 1975.

Since her firing last Friday, hundreds of former and current Marian students and families have expressed outrage and sorrow that Genther had been fired. Many students have begun a petition to bring her back.

"Your kind, caring and watchful eye over out daughters for these many years has been greatly appreciated," said the mother of a former student.

"[With Genther gone] it makes me sad to know what future generations of students will be missing" at Marian, said a former student.

Because Michigan law does not protect gays and lesbians from workplace discrimination, Genther has little legal recourse.
"Unfortunately, Charlene is suffering a second round of anti-gay discrimination," said Jeffrey Montgomery, Executive Director of Triangle Foundation. "It's a horrible lesson to be teaching those girls: that being honest will cost you your job. It's also hypocritical, because even the Church says job discrimination against gays and lesbians is wrong. She was a role model and mentor and they cast her out."

"To think they preached about respect for all, we are all children of God and that we not judge people..." said another student. "I personally feel that they are wrong to be teaching something that they are not practicing." She concluded.

In further tribute, another mother of Marian students wrote a note to Genther and said, "There is one very important thing I have never said but mean it very much. Thank you very much for loving my daughters. They are better young women for having you in their life."

"Clearly the Catholic hierarchy continues to get the gay question all wrong," Montgomery said. "In the process they waste and destroy their most precious human resources, whether they are in the pulpits or laypeople. It's a bad habit that must be broken."

Charlene Genther will be reading from her book, "Badge 3483," on Saturday 28 October at St. Andrews Church in Clawson (340 North Main Street), beginning at 1:30pm.

Code and not in the nose

OW

I work for a large government agency which will go unnamed, ok, it's NY State. I'm a Senior Counselor which means middle management and dealing with my staffs problem clients and dealing with my problem staff (actually I have a wonderful staff, and and...)
Yesterday at the end of the day, and my day starts at 7:30, the 4 seniors were called into the Directors office about some computer work that had to be done post haste-by seniors because we're the only ones that have permission to do this particular function. Well I was the first to try the first of about 25-my share. Error message, So, I called Steve, another senior, same problem. Error. We went to the Director. He told me to call the help desk. After some futzing, and calling in the head futzer and computer geek, she said she wrote some bad code. So we all gathered in the Directors office and had a '5 minute meeting-35- to discuss how we would all do the work wrong today, then send it to the state capitol where they would change it before 4:00 today. 

All for a little bad code. Achoo.

An interesting story about two young pastors in Brooklyn

From the New York Times:

"Ann Kansfield — Pastor Ann, as she is known to some parishioners — has come up with a game to keep the children's attention during services at Greenpoint Reformed Church in Brooklyn. Calling the youngsters to the front of the church, where they sit on steps facing the congregation, she asks if any of them has an object that she can use in the sermon she will deliver to them.

One Sunday in March, a young parishioner produced a stuffed Winnie the Pooh, which Ms. Kansfield worked into the story of Noah's ark. Mission accomplished, she turned around and gave a big thumbs-up to the adults in the audience.

But Ms. Kansfield, 30, who has cropped hair, round glasses and a soothing manner, is no ordinary leader of a parish. She found herself at the center of a controversy after marrying her partner, Jennifer Aull, 32, in June 2004 in a ceremony in Northampton, Mass., in which her father, Norman Kansfield, officiated.

At the time, Dr. Kansfield was the president of the New Brunswick Theological Seminary and a minister of the Reformed Church of America. He was suspended as a minister and lost his post at the seminary after a jury of ministers from North America ruled that he violated his ordination vows and went against Reformed Church doctrine when he married the couple.

Ms. Kansfield, herself a graduate of the New Brunswick Theological Seminary, is not ordained, but she said she would have been had she not made a public issue of being a lesbian. "If nobody found out and I had kept quiet," she said, "they were going to ordain me in a matter of months."

After a divinity student receives an invitation from a parish to act as pastor, which is how Ms. Kansfield ended up at Greenpoint, the ordination process is administered by the classis, or local governing body of the church. "It could happen in a few months if there aren't any complications," said Jon Norton, executive minister of the Synod of New York, a governing body.

Asked whether Ms. Kansfield's openness about her relationship with her partner was keeping her from ordination, Mr. Norton said, "I think that's at the heart of why she hasn't been ordained yet." He emphasized that he was speaking as an individual, not as a representative of the church as a whole.

Ed note: Ms. Kanfield's father lost his job at Union for marrying his daughter and her spouse.

Ms. Kansfield and Ms. Aull, who is studying at Union Theological Seminary in Morningside Heights, live in a parsonage above the parish church. Since Ms. Kansfield took over in August 2003, membership has grown from around a dozen regular churchgoers to 50, a third of them children. "There is new blood in the community, and she is attracting this new blood, which is adding a new vibrancy," said Ann Akers, a psychoanalyst who was the church's part-time minister before Ms. Kansfield's arrival.

Ms. Kansfield tries not to dwell on what she calls the "brouhaha" surrounding her father's suspension. Her time is split between her pastoral work and her job as a writer for United Church Foundation, a nonprofit organization that provides financial services to churches.

But she contends that being a member of a minority group is an advantage in her work. "It's a rare person who is in the majority nowadays," she said. "When people see me, they know they are welcome."

Lesbian video from AfterEllen.com

Friday Five Remembering 2008 Looking forward to 2009

Sally posted this Friday Five:

Actually, It turns out it's a Friday Ten, thanks Sally!
First list five things that you remember/ treasure from 2008

1. Starting in January, surviving Pancreatitis and Surgery.

2.Returning to my new job in February-after 3 months-to find I was still welcome and had passed probation.

3. Traveling to Toronto in May to marry my Beloved-tired of waiting for New York to allow marriage for the gays.

4.. Celebrated my aunt's 90th birthday with a grand party!

5. Started looking for a house/condo for weekends and sometimes during the week-on Long Island.

Then list five things that you are looking forward to in 2009

1. Not sure if I'm exactly looking forward to this, exactly, but turning 60 on July 25th.

2. Planning a cruise to the Caribbean in early March.

3. Continuing my church search while still attending my Catholic Lesbian Group at Saint Francis Xavier Church and sometimes attending services.

4. Planning some swell vacation for my birthday this summer

4. Looking forward to the unknown pleasures of the coming year.

I think a big birthday like this should be celebrated all year, don't you?

Happy New Year

(picture of snowy Brooklyn rooftops taken yesterday from the state government office building where I work- with my iphone.)

 
Thank you for all of your wise advice, your comments and commentary's, your posts in your blogs, pictures, photographs and Friday Fives, which I really enjoy reading and responding to. I wish all you a happy, healthy and blessed new year!