This is Viewpoints for Friday, September 2, 2016

Best principles?

On Thursday, John Ricks said that Donald Trump is leading the Republican Party away from its best principles. I have to ask, what principles? Putting America and Americans first? Protecting American jobs and workers? Securing the border? Controlling immigration? Ha! Yeah right!

Here in Georgia, you and I have to take our birth certificates and a list of other documents as proof of residency and citizenship to get a driver’s license. But I bet you didn’t know that illegals can get driver’s licenses just handed to them in Georgia with no questions asked. Thanks, Republicans.

The Republican Party is working hard to keep the border open, to keep outsourcing American jobs overseas, and to bring in more cheap H1B slave labor to replace American workers. If that is what Trump is trying to lead them away from, more power to him.

Mini vacations

We moved to Macon-Bibb 50 years ago this month and bought a new VW beetle with a radio and window air-conditioning for the drive-out price of $1,864. The old Citizens & Southern Bank graciously chopped that amount into 12 equal payments at 7 percent interest, and the beetle stayed in our family for 18 years. It was painted turquoise blue and the 60 HP engine would go forever on a gallon of 32-cents a gallon gasoline.

The next summer we put the back seat down and made a bed for our three children where they slept as we took them on our first beach vacation. They were 8, 6 and 3, and we had learned such trips should be made in the wee hours of night.

The beetle glided along back roads and past small towns on the way to Jekyll because Interstate 16 wasn’t yet on a blueprint in some engineer’s office. By the time we reached the causeway the sun was climbing out of the ocean.

At that time there was a physician in Macon-Bibb that prescribed for all his patients, and anyone else within earshot, an elixir he called “mini-vacations.” I cannot remember his name but I do recall the remedy he ordered because I have used it often during the last half-century.

The good doctor described his treatment as follows: anytime you happen upon a thing of beauty simply pause, take a deep breath and exhale, and enjoy it for a minute.

Examples he offered was a flower, a child waiting for a school bus, a faraway bell tower as its clock strikes, rain falling on an umbrella, a policeman directing traffic, a train passing with loaded boxcars or the pigtails of a young girl as they wave in the wind while she pedals a bicycle in the park. Anything of interest, he would say, just use one minute from your busy day to relax and observe a precious snapshots of life that will quickly pass.

Late this evening while placing a few grocery items in the back of our SUV, I happened to glance into the western sky just as the sun dropped out of view, and I realized it was twilight. Those few minutes between the disappearing of the sun and arrival of the dark; the time when sunsets are born and fade away, never to return.

Today’s panoramic sunset was awesome and had a painter stood and looked into it with brushes and paints in hand she could not have splashed it on a canvass in a year of Wednesdays. There were colors of red and blue, orange and white, yellow and black arranged in a pattern of....of ... A novice writer can’t describe it on a ream paper.

Suffice to say, I over indulged in the good doctor’s elixir during my “mini-vacation” this evening and before I knew it, twilight was gone and darkness was preparing the sky for a moon and stars so others can take nocturnal one-minute trips while I sleep.

Measure of faith?

On the last night of the Republican National Convention, Donald Trump praised the audience for its applause toward one of the speakers before him who said he was proud of being gay.

When God calls homosexuality an abomination, how is voting for Trump any different than voting for someone who believes in abortion? When we vote for him because he will appoint conservative justices to the Supreme Court, what is the ultimate cost of our vote?

One of those costs is this new leadership. Will it try to assimilate this sinful lifestyle more and more into the American mainstream. Also, a vote for “the lesser of two evils” is still a vote for evil. So if that is our choice, can we blame God when his people are oppressed by a spiritually destitute government?

Ted Cruz has a record of putting God first. A write-in vote for him would require this election to be viewed by faith, because as the party is divided, the tyranny of Clinton is a much greater threat. Yes, that would be most unfortunate indeed, but isn’t that part and parcel of what faith is all about — making difficult choices, the right choice — that may end up being costly to us, and not end up being costly to God?

Yes, that seems to fit the definition. So before we cast our ballot this November, we should consider that a good measure of our own faith can be seen in who it is we are voting for.

Labor Day

In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of dust thou art are taken so at death to dust we are surely bound. Labor is the burden of our being, a weight that weds us firmly to the earth. Blessed servitude that serves a common meaning, giving each a sense of worth.

So remember then the beauty of a calling, demanding both integrity and skill, for to each it is his duty to labor to feed your family, for it is our Father’ will. Labor Day celebrates those who have contributed to our country’s prosperity and her fight for peace, harmony and freedom has brought to us love and solidarity.