from Bruce
Anecdotes
Sabbath
• Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach was an Orthodox Jew, and he never traveled by automobile on the Sabbath. Once, he was late for a Sabbath “happening” at a temple in Los Angeles. Night was falling, and he told the group he was traveling with that he had to get out and start walking because the Sabbath was starting. He and his group pulled their two cars over, got out, and started what turned out to be a 27-mile walk to the temple. News of their walk traveled quickly — a deejay called the Night Owl even interviewed Rabbi Shlomo and broadcast the interview during the walk — and several people joined them. At 4:30 a.m., they arrived at the temple. Rabbi Shlomo prayed, held the Friday night service, told stories, and taught Torah, and finally at 8:30 a.m. Saturday, he and his group sat down to the Sabbath meal. A person who was there said later, “For as long as I live, I will never forget that Shabbos with Shlomo Carlebach. Everyone who did that walk was transformed. We were a bunch of kids who didn’t know anything about Shabbos until we took that walk, and this is how he taught us. After witnessing Shlomo Carlebach keeping Shabbos with such passion, devotion, and fervor … how could you not keep Shabbos after that?”
• British actress Constance Benson sometimes toured in Scotland, whose inhabitants took the Sabbath seriously. For example, when she checked into a rooming house on the Sabbath, she was locked in her room and warned not to raise the blinds, as the landlady didn’t want her neighbors to know that a “low play-actress” was staying in her house. Ms. Benson writes that the piano was locked up on the Sabbath, but “there was generally a cheerful aroma of whiskey about the house.”
• A Teamster with a problem went to his Rabbi: His occupation frequently made it impossible for him to attend Sabbath services. The Rabbi listened, then asked, “While you are working, do you carry poor passengers free of charge?” The Teamster said that yes, he did. The Rabbi next said, “Then you serve the Lord in your occupation just as faithfully as I do when I am in the synagogue.”
Saints
• One of the most famous slaves in history is St. Patrick, who was kidnapped at age 16 in Britannia and taken away by pirates to Hibernia, which we know today as Ireland. A chief named Miliuc bought him and made him a shepherd. For six years, Patrick remained a slave, until he heard a voice that told him, “Soon you will go to your own country. See, a ship is ready.” He then escaped and walked 200 miles to the seashore, where he found a ship that was willing to take him to home and freedom. Later, of course, he returned to bring Christianity to Ireland and became a saint.
• In 1431, English soldiers burned the French heroine Joan of Arc at the stake. After she died, the soldiers collected her ashes and threw them into the Seine River. However, the ashes of her heart were not thrown into the river because it had not burned even though the executioner swore that he had tried to burn it using charcoal, oil, and sulfur, in addition to the original wood. After she died, several people, including some English soldiers, became convinced that in killing Joan of Arc, they had killed a saint. In 1920, the Catholic Church made their fear a reality when it made her St. Joan.
Scandals
• Muhammad Ali is a Muslim. Christian televangelist Jimmy Swaggart tried to convert him, but Mr. Ali declined to be converted, saying, “Think about it. If Jimmy Swaggart can convert the best-known Muslim on earth back to Christianity, what would that do for Jimmy Swaggart?” Soon afterward, Swaggart was involved in a sex scandal. One of Mr. Ali’s friends suggested, “You really ought to write Jimmy Swaggart a letter, saying that God still loves him and Jimmy Swaggart should accept Allah as his only lord and savior.”
• Pope John XXIII often took walks through the Vatican Gardens. To preserve the privacy of the Popes, the cupola of St. Peter’s Basilica had been closed to the public, but the good Pope ordered it open to the public again, saying, “Why shouldn’t the faithful watch me? I don’t do anything that would give cause for scandal.”
***
© Copyright Bruce D. Bruce; All Rights Reserved
***
250 Anecdotes About Religion — Buy
250 Anecdotes About Religion -- Buy the Paperback
250 Anecdotes About Religion -- Kindle
250 Anecdotes About Religion -- Apple
250 Anecdotes About Religion -- Barnes and Noble
250 Anecdotes About Religion -- Kobo
250 Anecdotes About Religion -- Smashwords: Many Formats, Including PDF
Presenting
Michael Egan
U.S.A. replied:
has returned to semi-retired status.
In memory.
BRUCE'S RECOMMENDATION
BANDCAMP MUSIC
BRUCE'S RECOMMENDATION OF BANDCAMP MUSIC
Music: "Paint This Town Red"
Album: LET IT BURN - ROCKABILLY, PSYCHOBILLY, GARAGE E SURF CONTRA O FASCISMO
Artist: Susan Brown and the Ballin’ Keen
Record Company: Reverb Brasil
Artist Location: Brazil
Info: “LET IT BURN is our second antifacist compilation. Now we have 30 bands that, together, take a stand against racism and fascism in the independent music scene.”
Susan Brown and the Ballin' Keen – “Whipper Snapper”
Price: $1 (USD) for track; $6 (USD) for 30-track album
Genre: Rockabilly.Psychobilly. Garage, Surf.
Links:
Let it Burn - Rockabilly, Psychobilly, Garage e Surf contra o Fascismo
Reverb Brasil Susan Brown and the Ballin’ Keen on Facebook
Other Links:
David Bruce's Amazon Author Page
David Bruce's Smashwords Page
David Bruce's Blog #1
David Bruce's Blog #2
David Bruce's Blog #3
David Bruce's Apple iBookstore
David Bruce has over 140 Kindle books on Amazon.com.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
New Venture
Michael Egan
Bonus Links
Jeannie the Teed-Off Temp
Reader Comment
Current Events
Linda >^..^<
We are all only temporarily able bodied.
Thanks, Linda!
that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
The going rate for live crickets is 17cents/each (plus tax).
Declines To Air Ad
Rupert
Fox News declined to broadcast an ad Sunday about the violence that law-enforcement members faced as they tried to stop the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, according to the creators of the political commercial.
“We couldn't have fathomed in our wildest imaginations that even a Fox News would reject an ad that simply condemns the insurrection, and condemns people who support the insurrection,” said Ben Meiselas, one of the co-founders of MeidasTouch, the liberal Political Action Committee that created the 60-second ad. “What Fox has really become is a fascist echo chamber gatekeeper for their base.”
The commercial features law-enforcement officers testifying in Congress and speaking to the media about their experiences during the insurrection, including getting sprayed with bear mace, engaging in hand-to-hand combat and being called “traitors.”
"It's been very difficult seeing elected officials and other individuals whitewash the events of that day or downplay what happened," DC Metropolitan Police Officer Michael Fanone says in a clip from a CNN interview as images of House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and other GOP elected officials are shown on screen.
The ad ends with block letters that say" “The GOP Betrayed America. We Will Never Forget.”
Rupert
Reporter Forcefully Detained
Al Jazeera
Israeli border police forcefully detained a veteran correspondent for the Al Jazeera satellite channel while she was reporting from an embattled Jerusalem neighborhood where dozens of Palestinian families are slated for eviction by Jewish settlers.
Givara Budeiri was released late Saturday, several hours after border police detained her in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, where she had been wearing body armor marked “press.” Al Jazeera said police also destroyed equipment belonging to a cameraman for the channel.
Budeiri suffered a broken arm and remained under observation Sunday at Jerusalem's Hadassah Hospital, said Walid Omary, the Jerusalem bureau chief for Al Jazeera.
Budeiri had been reporting regularly from Sheikh Jarrah, Omary said.
On Saturday, she was covering a Palestinian sit-in at the site. Omary said Israeli border police asked for her ID and that she offered to call her driver to get it from her car. Omary said the forces refused to let her retrieve it and instead started shouting and pushing her. At one point, the officers handcuffed her and pushed her into a border police vehicle.
Al Jazeera
Weekend Box Office
‘Conjuring 3’
It used to be that the studios would space their horror movies apart on the schedule. It’s not usual that one would open up immediately after the other for fear of cannibalizing the same audience. That didn’t happen this weekend as New Line’s The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It opened to $24M, while Paramount’s second weekend of A Quiet Place Part II took in $19.5M. All of this just speaks to audiences’ urge to return to the cinema after being cooped up for a year-plus during Covid. We saw a slightly similar clash of demos when two fanboy IPs, Mortal Kombat and Demon Slayer, went at it over the April 23-25 weekend, each posting respective solid results of $23.3M and $21.1M.
Conjuring 3 is the largest opening for an R-rated movie, and the third largest overall during the Pandemic. It’s the 5th Warner Bros. release to rank No. 1 this year. The studio has spent ten weeks out of 23 in the No. 1 position during 2021.
Even the No. 3 title, Disney’s Cruella, did well, posting a $11.2M second weekend at 3,922, -48%, after a $3.28M Friday, -57%. Ten-day total for Cruella is $43.6M.
Meanwhile, the weekend’s second wide entry, Universal’s DreamWorks Animation’s sequel Spirit Untamed, made an estimated $2.4M on Friday at 3,211 theaters for a $6.2M 3-day in fourth place. CinemaScore audiences gave the movie an A. We’ve seen better from animated family fare during the pandemic: Uni shelled out big for P&A on Croods: A New Age, which translated into a $9.7M 3-day, $14.2M 5-day on its way to $58.3M domestic take, while Warner Bros.’ Tom & Jerry did $14.1M over its first Friday-Sunday. Heck, even Disney’s Raya and the Last Dragon‘s opening weekend of $8.5M was higher than Spirit Untamed, and it didn’t have No. 3 Cinemark in its opening mix.
Fifth place belongs to United Artists Releasing/MGM/Miramax’s 5th weekend of Wrath of Man, which grossed $335K on Friday (-38% from last Friday), $553K on Saturday for a 3-day of $1.27M, -41%, for a $24.6M running total.
‘Conjuring 3’
Pride Backlash
Lufkin, Texas
Confections in Lufkin, Texas announced on Thursday that it would be selling rainbow cookies for Pride Month. The bakery, located in East Texas, soon faced backlash for its decision.
Confections took to Facebook to reveal that many of its customers had sent hateful messages and canceled orders and claimed its "likes" were also plummeting.
"Today has been hard. Really hard," a Facebook post from June 3 read. "We lost a significant amount of followers because of a rainbow heart cookie we posted. We received a very hateful message on our business page canceling a large order (5dz) of summer themed cookies for tomorrow morning (that we just finished decorating) because of a rainbow heart cookie we posted."
According to Tyler, Texas, CBS affiliate KYTX, by Friday, Confections was inundated with messages of support from across the U.S., including from Mark Cuban's brother, Brian, who reached out to buy cookies to be donated to LGBTQ charities and other nonprofits.
"When things slow down a bit, let us know if shipping is possible. I'd like to support you," Cuban said, according KYTX. "If shipping isn't possible, I'll buy some by phone/email and you can donate my cookies to a local LGBTQ org or children's charity."
Lufkin, Texas
Not Backwards At Rally
Pants
Former President Donald Trump (R-Lock Him Up) has had his fair share of public gaffes — from Tim Apple to covfefe — but somehow managing to wear his suit pants backward at a recent rally isn’t one of them.
A video made the rounds on social media this weekend that appeared to show Trump wearing pants without a fly on them and badly wrinkled. Immediately, people seized on what they thought was a perfect meme moment, comparing him to Kris Kross (you know, the dudes who actually did make wearing pants backward fashionable).
Unfortunately for Trump’s critics, that does not appear to be the case. The fact-checking site Snopes did us all a service and watched the 90-minute speech Trump gave and was able to prove through visuals of the speech and Getty Images from the event that Trump was indeed wearing his pants right. They were, however, unmistakably and oddly wrinkled.
“Tabloid news publications like TMZ and Metro showed zoomed-in videos of the billionaire’s crotch area, and some social media users took to Twitter to mock Trump, suggesting that the 74-year-old had unintentionally put his pants on backward at the North Carolina GOP convention,” Snopes wrote, noting “the photographs were so popular that they trended on Twitter under #TrumpPants.”
Snopes noted that multiple sites had proof that Trump was indeed properly dressed: “Video posted by C-SPAN of the 90-minute speech also showed the former president wearing pants the right way. As such, we rate this claim as ‘False,'” Snopes said.
Pants
Doesn’t Apologize
Voices ‘Pain’
Pope Francis on Sunday expressed his pain over the discovery in Canada of the remains of 215 Indigenous students of church-run residential schools and pressed religious and political authorities to shed light on “this sad affair.” But he didn’t offer the apology sought by the Canadian prime minister.
Francis, in remarks to faithful gathered in St. Peter’s Square, also called on the authorities to foster healing but made no reference to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s insistence, two days earlier, that the Vatican apologize and take responsibility.
From the 19th century until the 1970s, more than 150,000 Indigenous children were forced to attend state-funded Christian schools, the majority of them run by Roman Catholic missionary congregations, in a campaign to assimilate them into Canadian society.
The Canadian government has admitted that physical and sexual abuse was rampant in the schools, with students beaten for speaking their native languages.
Ground-penetrating radar was used to confirm the remains of the children at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in Kamloops, British Columbia, last month. The school was Canada’s largest such facility and was operated by the Catholic Church between 1890 and 1969.
Voices ‘Pain’
Police Detain Journalists
Berlin
Berlin police said 13 journalists were detained Saturday while reporting on a protest by environmentalist against the construction of a highway in the German capital.
The journalists were covering an early-morning blockade of the construction site of the A100 Autobahn by activists from the group Sand im Getriebe, or Sand in the Gears.
“They entered the site along with the activists, so we treated them as participants in the protest," police spokesperson Martin Halweg said.
They are now being investigated on suspicion of trespassing on the construction site, which is operated by the publicly owned company Autobahn GmbH, Halweg said.
Environmental groups say the building of new highways in Berlin and other parts of the country undermines Germany's efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions. They argue that billion of euros (dollars) spent on roads could be used instead to pay for climate-friendly transportation infrastructure such as railways.
Berlin
Talk Radio
Arizona
Mike Broomhead talks for a living, but for a moment last week, all he could do was sigh.
With that flash of wordless exasperation behind him, he continued with his work: delivering the latest update on the Maricopa County election recount to listeners of his eponymous morning talk radio show. That day’s news was of a forthcoming conspiracy-theory-riddled documentary on what organizers call an audit — but Broomhead soon turned his attention to the officials overseeing this unfolding spectacle.
“You’re turning this into the clown show that you’ve been accused of. ... You’re turning this into the sideshow at the state fair,” he said.
This is the type of criticism one might expect from Democrats, who opposed the recount effort from the beginning, or from one of the many election experts who raised alarms at the stark departure from established audit practices, or from a Never-Trump Republican trying to wrest the party from the former president’s grip.
But Broomhead is a two-time Trump voter, a staunch conservative and a onetime supporter of this recount. In recent weeks, he has fashioned himself as a reality check for fellow Republicans.
Arizona
Returning To India
Cheetah
If all goes well, eight cheetahs - five males and three females - will make the 8,405km (5,222 miles) journey from South Africa to their new home in a sprawling national park in India in November.
The world's fastest land animal will make a comeback in India, more than half a century after it became extinct in the country.
"Finally we have the resources and the habitat to reintroduce the cat," says Yadvendradev Jhala, dean of the Wildlife Institute of India, and one of the experts tasked with the effort. This is the first time in the world, he says, when a large carnivore will be relocated from one continent to another for conservation.
With their black spotted coats and teardrop marks, the cheetah is a sleek animal, racing across grasslands at speeds touching 70 miles (112km) an hour to capture prey. The cat is also a remarkably athletic animal, breaking, ducking and diving as it goes for the kill.
The vast majority of the 7,000 cheetahs in the world are now found in South Africa, Namibia and Botswana. The endangered cat was reportedly last sighted in India in 1967-68, but their numbers had vastly dwindled by 1900.
Cheetah
| CURRENT MOON lunar phases |
