Lord, Have Mercy

Yesterday, I was deeply grieved to hear the news of the killing of Charlie Kirk and the shooting at Evergreen High School here in Colorado.

Charlie Kirk

Charlie Kirk rose in fame because of his advocacy for conservative social and economic issues. In recent years, he also became an outspoken Christian. Ever since the pandemic, his focus on faith in Jesus as the ultimate answer became even more pronounced. He was also a father and a husband.

One thing I always appreciated about Charlie was the way that he welcomed polite and calm dialogue with people who had opposing views. Even if someone disagrees with another person’s political positions or opinions on things like gender and identity, that does not warrant murdering them and leaving their children fatherless.

Evergreen High School

I grew up in Jefferson County, which means that I played baseball at Evergreen High School. A good friend and fellow pastor is on staff there, and his daughter is a student.

When I heard about the shooting at Evergreen High School (a JeffCo Public School), it reminded me of April 20, 1999 – a day I will never forget: I was a sophomore in high school, also in a JeffCo Public School, when the shooting at Columbine High School (another JeffCo Public School) took place. There were people I knew at the school that day, and it shaped my final two years of high school in a major way – as it did our country, and the world.

Thankfully my friend and his daughter were not harmed, but the sense of unease that one gets after experiencing something like this lasts well beyond the event.

Pray

  • Please pray for our country, and for the hurting and frustrated individuals who are considering hurting others.
  • Please pray for healing and peace in the hearts and minds of those who witnessed or were affected by these tragic events.
  • Join me in praying what Jesus taught us:

Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

#SB50 and #Antichoice Doritos Ad

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This past weekend I watched as my Denver Broncos won Super Bowl 50. The last time the Broncos won the Super Bowl I was in high school. They won with their incredible defense, which throughout the year was exciting to watch, especially in the playoffs.

On Tuesday I took my son out of school and went down to Civic Center Park in Denver for the Broncos victory parade. I remember going with my dad to the parade back in 1998, the first time the Broncos won the Super Bowl, now I was taking my kids – it was a cool moment.

Apparently my son was one of an estimated 25,000 students who skipped school to attend the parade. My dad works for the Denver Mint, which is directly behind the City and County Building, where the parade ended and the speeches were given, and he was given liberal leave, not only so that employees could attend the parade, but also because it would have been nearly impossible to even get to the Mint for work.

Authorities verified that over 1 million people attended the parade – and it certainly felt like it. I remember the parade back in ’98, and standing in Civic Center Park, not too far from the stage in the crowd of 650,000. This time the crowd was so much bigger, it was uncomfortable. People packed into the park to the point where there wasn’t even an inch to move.

My wife’s favorite thing about the Super Bowl is that it means that NFL season is finally over and no more will Sundays revolve around Broncos games. For the Super Bowl she decided to give in and wear team colors, so she put on a blue shirt – only to realize she put on Carolina sky blue. Needless to say, we asked her to be the one to take the group photo…

Like many people, Rosemary’s favorite part of the Super Bowl was Coldplay and the commercials. One of our favorite commercials was this Doritos one about an ultrasound:

Kinda creepy, but no creepier than PuppyMonkeyBaby.

I was surprised to see that NARAL, an abortion advocacy group, took issue with the ad, claiming that it was “antichoice” (I didn’t even know that was a word…)

The problem? The ad “humanized” unborn children (whom they refuse to call children…)

What’s next? Will they begin advocating against ultrasounds? Because as ultrasound technology has advanced, we have only found more and more reason to consider yet unborn children fully human: as one spokesperson said:

“If NARAL is scandalized by the notion that a human fetus is human, then they are scandalized by science. We know children in the womb have distinct and human DNA. We also know that they exhibit all sorts of human behaviors in the womb such as yawning, thumb-sucking, and even dancing thanks to tremendous advances in ultrasound technology.

But groups like NARAL and Planned Parenthood rely on a denial of these scientific realities better suited to the Dark Ages to maintain their rabid insistence that those unborn babies are undeserving of basic human rights.”  – Ashley McGuire of The Catholic Foundation

For the most part, I think NARAL is shouting into the wind. Trying to take away a person’s humanity is a long-used method for justifying or coping with doing something wrong to another person.

That being said, I highly doubt Doritos was trying to make a political statement. For NARAL, fetal behavior which reflects their humanness is an inconvenient fact – but a fact nonetheless.