Zacchaeus was a rich government worker who had cheated people financially. Then he met Jesus Christ, entered into a relationship with Christ and restored by four times the things he had stole as a chief tax collector. Luke 19:1-10 Amplified Bible says, "And [Jesus] entered Jericho and was passing through it. And there was a man called Zacchaeus, a chief tax collector, and [he was] rich. And he was trying to see Jesus, which One He was, but he could not on account of the crowd, because he was small in stature. So he ran on ahead and climbed up in a sycamore tree in order to see Him, for He was about to pass that way. And when Jesus reached the place, He looked up and said to him, Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today. So he hurried and came down, and he received and welcomed Him joyfully. And when the people saw it, they all muttered among themselves and indignantly complained, He has gone in to be the guest of and lodge with a man who is devoted to sin and preeminently a sinner. So then Zacchaeus stood up and solemnly declared to the Lord, See, Lord, the half of my goods I [now] give [by way of restoration] to the poor, and if I have cheated anyone out of anything, I [now] restore four times as much. And Jesus said to him, Today is [Messianic and spiritual] salvation come to [all the members of] this household, since Zacchaeus too is a [real spiritual] son of Abraham; For the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost."
America has benefited greatly from the labor of voluntary and involuntary immigrants without always treating them well. Now is a good time to begin to right the wrongs. Immigrants shouldn't have to pay to become citizens nor should they be denied tax benefits available to others.
God wants all people to be treated well no matter where they live or who they are. Desmond Tutu of South Africa said in a sermon delivered in Norway, "At home in South Africa I have sometimes said in big meetings where you have black and white together: "Raise your hands!" Then I've said, "Move your hands," and I've said, "Look at your hands--different colors representing different people. You are the rainbow people of God."
And you remember the rainbow in the Bible is the sign of peace. The rainbow is the sign of prosperity. We want peace, prosperity and justice and we can have it when all the people of God, the rainbow people of God, work together."
Jesus Christ wants us to have spiritual, psychological, physical and financial prosperity.
The Chinese invented paper money. God teaches us in the Bible book of Deuteronomy chapter 28 that when we do right money comes. Let's make a new corrido (a ballad) about America doing spiritually, psychologically, physically and financially right by immigrants.
Showing posts with label Economic Justice. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Economic Justice. Show all posts
Monday, June 10, 2013
Friday, April 12, 2013
An Inescapable Network of Mutuality
"We must all learn to live together as brothers or we will all perish together as fools. We are tied together in the single garment of destiny, caught in an inescapable network of mutuality. And whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly. For some strange reason I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. And you can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be. This is the way God's universe is made; this is the way it is structured.
John Donne caught it years ago and placed it in graphic terms: "No man is an island entire of itself. Every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main." And he goes on toward the end to say, "Any man's death diminishes me because I am involved in mankind; therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee." We must see this, believe this, and live by it if we are to remain awake through a great revolution," says Christian Minister and Civil Rights Activist Martin Luther King, Jr., in his Remaining Awake Through A Great Revolution speech.
In America we are being diminished by the deaths through abortion of a baby boy or a baby girl every 30 seconds. Since 1973 when abortion was legalized in America, more than 55 million babies have been killed. Since China's one-child policy was implemented in the 1970s more than 336 million babies have been killed by abortion; that's more Chinese baby boys and baby girls have lost their lives to abortion than the combined total population of the United States of America and Australia.
Chen Guangcheng, a blind lawyer who in April 2012 escaped from house arrest in China, is now in the United States studying, writing a book and engaging in human rights activism. Guangcheng played a key role in exposing forced abortions and forced sterilizations in China. On Tuesday he testified before a subcommittee of the U.S. House Committee On Foreign Affairs about his family's persecution in China and other ongoing human rights abuses in China. Guangcheng gave Congress a list of 130,000 Chinese officials involved in forced abortions and forced sterilizations.
"If you have the feeling that something is wrong, don't be afraid to speak up," says Japanese Fred Korematsu who resisted the forced detention of Japanese Americans during World War II.
The fight for Japanese-American justice took from the 1940s until 1988 when Congress passed and former President Ronald Reagan signed legislation which apologized for the internment and said that the government's actions were based on "race prejudice, war hysteria, and a failure of political leadership." The US government eventually dispersed more than $1.6 billion in reparations to Japanese Americans interned and their heirs. Each citizen who had been interned was awarded $20,000.
Should African Americans receive reparations because of African American slavery in the US? What about the unborn once Roe v. Wade legalizing abortion in America is overturned and China's one-child policy is stopped?
Martin Luther King, Jr., taught personal, social and economic freedom and justice. In his Remaining Awake Through A Great Revolution speech he says, "In 1863 the Negro was told that he was free as a result of the Emancipation Proclamation being signed by Abraham Lincoln. But he was not given any land to make that freedom meaningful....
Every court of jurisprudence would rise up against this, and yet this is the very thing that our nation did to the black man. It simply said, "You're free," and it left him there penniless, illiterate, not knowing what to do. And the irony of it all is that at the same time the nation failed to do anything for the black man, though...Congress was giving away millions of acres of land in the West and the Midwest. Which meant that it was willing to undergird its white peasants from Europe with an economic floor."
Everyone needs the right to live, survive and thrive. Proverbios 31:8 Biblia Bilingue Version Reina-Valera 1960 dice, "Abre tu boca por el mudo en el juicio de todos los desvalidos." The Bilingual Bible New King James Version says, "Open your mouth for the speechless, in the cause of all who are appointed to die."
John Donne caught it years ago and placed it in graphic terms: "No man is an island entire of itself. Every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main." And he goes on toward the end to say, "Any man's death diminishes me because I am involved in mankind; therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee." We must see this, believe this, and live by it if we are to remain awake through a great revolution," says Christian Minister and Civil Rights Activist Martin Luther King, Jr., in his Remaining Awake Through A Great Revolution speech.
In America we are being diminished by the deaths through abortion of a baby boy or a baby girl every 30 seconds. Since 1973 when abortion was legalized in America, more than 55 million babies have been killed. Since China's one-child policy was implemented in the 1970s more than 336 million babies have been killed by abortion; that's more Chinese baby boys and baby girls have lost their lives to abortion than the combined total population of the United States of America and Australia.
Chen Guangcheng, a blind lawyer who in April 2012 escaped from house arrest in China, is now in the United States studying, writing a book and engaging in human rights activism. Guangcheng played a key role in exposing forced abortions and forced sterilizations in China. On Tuesday he testified before a subcommittee of the U.S. House Committee On Foreign Affairs about his family's persecution in China and other ongoing human rights abuses in China. Guangcheng gave Congress a list of 130,000 Chinese officials involved in forced abortions and forced sterilizations.
"If you have the feeling that something is wrong, don't be afraid to speak up," says Japanese Fred Korematsu who resisted the forced detention of Japanese Americans during World War II.
The fight for Japanese-American justice took from the 1940s until 1988 when Congress passed and former President Ronald Reagan signed legislation which apologized for the internment and said that the government's actions were based on "race prejudice, war hysteria, and a failure of political leadership." The US government eventually dispersed more than $1.6 billion in reparations to Japanese Americans interned and their heirs. Each citizen who had been interned was awarded $20,000.
Should African Americans receive reparations because of African American slavery in the US? What about the unborn once Roe v. Wade legalizing abortion in America is overturned and China's one-child policy is stopped?
Martin Luther King, Jr., taught personal, social and economic freedom and justice. In his Remaining Awake Through A Great Revolution speech he says, "In 1863 the Negro was told that he was free as a result of the Emancipation Proclamation being signed by Abraham Lincoln. But he was not given any land to make that freedom meaningful....
Every court of jurisprudence would rise up against this, and yet this is the very thing that our nation did to the black man. It simply said, "You're free," and it left him there penniless, illiterate, not knowing what to do. And the irony of it all is that at the same time the nation failed to do anything for the black man, though...Congress was giving away millions of acres of land in the West and the Midwest. Which meant that it was willing to undergird its white peasants from Europe with an economic floor."
Everyone needs the right to live, survive and thrive. Proverbios 31:8 Biblia Bilingue Version Reina-Valera 1960 dice, "Abre tu boca por el mudo en el juicio de todos los desvalidos." The Bilingual Bible New King James Version says, "Open your mouth for the speechless, in the cause of all who are appointed to die."
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