One of the lowlights of an otherwise pleasant Thanksgiving was when one of my relatives, in whose home we were all staying for a couple of nights, decided to read to us the list of 45 goals of the Communist party as stated in the book The Naked Communist, “written in 1958 by conservative United States author and faith-based political theorist Cleon Skousen.” The goals were read into the Congressional Record in 1963. There are also YouTube videos about this, but I won’t link to them.
The point of the recent recitation, I’m guessing, was to show how much of a Communist/socialist country the United States has become. For instance, 7. Grant recognition of Red China. Admission of Red China to the U.N. has happened – aha! There are those who have argued that 15 – Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States – has taken place, and you can guess which party. Likewise, the so-called liberal press (20), social welfare program (32), et al. Add to that some items that many people might agree with has happened to some degree (25 – changes in morality) and you have an apparently prescient document that lives a half-century later in some circles.
Here’s the thing: I KNEW there would be some religious/political provocation that would take place before we got there. I had previously vowed: “Don’t engage. Don’t engage.” But it was tough, really tough; the hole in my lower lip, where I had been biting it, has only recently begun to heal. Not sure that it was the right decision either; if/when it comes up again, and it surely will, I’ll have to decide then.
I was most pleased, though, by my mother-in-law, who, in response to a comment about how difficult it is to follow God’s law perfectly, noted an American Indian tradition to put deliberate imperfections in their crafts because only God is perfect. Suggesting that a Native American deity is somehow equivalent to THE God was quite an…interesting response in this setting.
