Enviornmental Forecasts

Of all tyrannies a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies, The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

C. S. Lewis

Why Me? I'm So Complacent!

In a USA Today op-ed, Tom Krattenmaker of Portland, Ore., "a writer specializing in religion in public life," puzzles over why a terrorist would consider bombing his city:

"For several good reasons, many of us Portlanders are having a hard time wrapping our minds around the horrific thought of a 19-year-old from the local suburbs wanting to kill and destroy. Why would Portland, of all places, be the site of a terror attack?

The "People's Republic of Portland"--so dubbed for its liberal ways--seems so utterly different from New York, Mumbai, London, or the other places that one associates with terrorist attacks. Portland is so much smaller, light years from the figurative front lines. This is a laid-back city where the red-hot rhetoric around terrorism, Islam, the "ground zero mosque," and the like runs cooler. It's a place where a live-and-let-live spirit extends ample latitude to anyone who might otherwise stand out--whether it's for wearing a Santa hat and pedaling around on a unicycle playing bagpipes (which my wife actually witnessed last year), covering every inch of your arm with tattoos, or wearing a head scarf and praying at a mosque rather than a church or synagogue."

This guy really needs to get out more. Portland is liberal, welcoming of weirdos, and munificent toward Muslims, and he thinks that sets it apart--from New York? And how self-absorbed do you have to be to think, almost a decade after 9/11, that terrorists won't target you because of your "live-and-let-live spirit"?

Examine the origins
It's time we begin to hear complaints against nativity scenes, "Silent Night" being sung in schools, even "Christmas" trees or vacation -- any instance of religion entering our public life.

In the State Dining Room at the White House, the fireplace mantle contains a prayer by President John Adams that President Roosevelt had carved into the stone fireplace below a portrait of Abraham Lincoln.

"Praise be to God" is inscribed on the cornerstone of the Washington Monument and "Preserve me, God for in thee do I put my trust," is inscribed in a window of the U.S. Capitol's chapel.

An image of the Ten Commandments is engraved in bronze on the entrance floor of the National Archives. The Lincoln Memorial quotes Lincoln: "He who made the world still governs it."

In the House chamber is the inscription, "In God We Trust."

A book by Newt Gingrich, "Rediscovering God in America," gives these and many other examples of the beliefs of our country's founders and leaders. Those who want to ignore it are free to, but why try to stop everyone else?

JOYCE PAHLKE
Southeast Portland

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