The American Soul
The American Soul
What We Do to the Least of These
What truly matters in your life? In this deeply reflective episode, we examine how our daily choices reveal our actual priorities, creating either strong foundations or inevitable collapse.
Looking at faith and marriage through the lens of consistency and investment, we consider how the mathematical reality of "putting in the hours" applies to our most sacred relationships. Using an unexpected analogy from Kobe Bryant's training philosophy, we explore how small, daily investments compound over time, creating either unshakeable strength or revealing devastating neglect.
Our scripture readings journey through divine judgment in Revelation, where even amid consequence, hearts remain hardened, contrasted with David's beautiful Psalm 51 – perhaps the most profound prayer of repentance ever written. These passages challenge us to examine our own hearts: Do we resist correction or embrace it? Do we hide behind excuses or seek true redemption?
The conversation takes a sobering turn as we confront abortion as America's modern moral crisis, drawing parallels to our historical reckoning with slavery. When Representative Henry Hyde declared that human dignity comes "upon creation, not upon birth," he articulated a principle deeply embedded in our founding documents. How we treat "the least of these" ultimately reflects how we would treat Christ himself.
Through historical accounts from Fox's Book of Martyrs and reflections on America's revolutionary period, we see patterns that might prepare us for challenges ahead. The committees of correspondence that unified the colonies might offer a model for believers seeking connection in an increasingly fractured world.
What priorities are shaping your life today? What foundations are you building that will withstand whatever storms may come? Join us as we wrestle with these essential questions of faith, citizenship, and moral courage.
The American Soul Podcast
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Hey folks, this is Jesse Cope, back with another episode of the American Soul Podcast. Hope y'all are doing well, wherever y'all are and whatever part of the day you're in, sort of appreciate y'all joining, giving me a little bit of your time and attention, a little piece of your day. I know y'all have other things vying for your attention, so I appreciate you spending some of it here with me. For those of y'all who have been around for a while, I'm glad you're still here coming back. For those of y'all that are new, hope you enjoy it, hope you get something out of it. Hope you come back and hopefully you're able to share it with somebody else to listen, together with somebody else. For those of y'all who continue to support the podcast, thank you so much, and share it, tell others about it. I'm very grateful for that. For those of y'all who continue to pray for me and for the podcast, most of all, I appreciate your prayers. I'm grateful for your prayers. I certainly need them and want them. So thank you, father. Thank you for today. Thank you for you, father, and your Son, jesus Christ and your Holy Spirit. Thank you for your love and your mercy, your grace and your forgiveness of sins. Thank you for all your many blessings, father, the ones we admit and the ones we don't. Thank you for those of us who have healthy bodies, who can get up each day without some illness or injury or infirmity, and please be with those who can't Help us to comfort them. Help them to feel your peace and your comfort. Thank you for a job for those of us who haven't, for the ability to work, for the ability to earn money for our families, and please be with those who don't have that option or who are struggling, have that option or who are struggling in that area. Father, comfort them Again, give them your peace and help them to feel your presence. Help us to help them as we're able, father. Be with those who are listening to the podcast, wherever they are, across the nation and around the world today. Thank you for them. Be with them. Be with their families, guide them, bless them, surround them with your angels, draw us all closer to you, father and your Son Jesus Christ. Help us to practice virtue in our lives, in every aspect of our lives, father, and to encourage it in those around us. Be with our leaders, both civic and religious. Give them wisdom, give them courage, help them to lead in fear of you, father, and your Son, jesus Christ, not in fear of man or woman. Guide our steps, guide my words. Dear Father, in your Son's name we pray, amen.
Speaker 1:Have you made time for God today? Have you made time to read his word? Have you made time to pray, to talk to him? It doesn't have to be fancy folks. There's no magic speckle words that you have to use.
Speaker 1:If you're a parent, it's pretty much at least from what I have come to understand experience it's just like as a parent, how we like our kids to come talk to us. God wants to hear from us, wants to hear from you. Just tell him thank you for a couple of things. Ask his forgiveness wherever you're falling short for a couple things. Ask His forgiveness wherever you're falling short and accept that forgiveness through Jesus Christ. Pray for those around you Family, friends, nation, enemies, even you know we I say this every once in a while, but if we really want to put the pressure on our enemies and maybe this is kind of a backwards way of doing what god said, which is to pray for our enemies, but it's still still valid, I think if you really want to put pressure on your enemies. If you really want to see change, if you really want them to have more to be concerned with than you, what better way than to turn God's attention on them, to pray for them, to ask God to draw them close to him and his son? I don't think there's much else we can do that would be more effective, have the potential for more effect at any rate. And if you're married, do you act like it? There was somebody I follow on X recently. We were we were talking about this. You know so many people. They want the effects of great effort. We want to be successful, as if we're putting all this effort and time and energy in, but we don't actually want to put the effort and the time and the energy in. And then we pretend like we don't understand why our faith isn't strong, why our marriage isn't strong. It's really just a math. It's just a number scan, folks.
Speaker 1:Almost I haven't mentioned this in a while. It's an old story. I've talked about it in a while. It's an old story. I've talked about it in the past. It's an interview with Kobe Bryant. If you're familiar with him, if you're not a basketball player, and I'm not super familiar with all of his exploits folks. But I've watched a couple interviews and he talked about work ethic and he talked about the fact that you know, if he just got up an hour earlier each day, it allowed him to get a whole extra session in as far as his schedule allowed for workouts for basketball. And he said it's just math. He said if I'm getting two extra hours in every day, then after a year I'm this far ahead of my peers and after two years I'm this far ahead. And he said there comes a point where I'm so far ahead that even if my peers start to work harder than I am just crazy hard they're not going to be able to catch up with me. I'm so far ahead of them that they're not going to be able to catch up with me. I'm so far ahead of them that they're not going to be able to catch up.
Speaker 1:That's where you want to be, not because you're competing against other people, folks, but because you want a great faith and you want a great marriage. You want to be putting so much time and energy into those two things because there's nothing in your life that's more important than your faith and your marriage. In that order, nothing, nothing even comes close, not sure, not TV and sports and social media and movies and YouTube and all that stuff? For sure not that. But even not parents, folks, not kids, not kids, not friends, not a job, none of those things. Some close importance to god, jesus christ and the holy spirit first, and your spouse second. And if, if you're not treating them that way, if you're not clinging and cleaving to your spouse, then you're doing marriage wrong. And always, like I say on the podcast, not often enough, but anytime somebody is telling you something, folks, and it sounds, maybe especially when it sounds really right, but if it sounds right or wrong, go back and check the Bible. What does God say? Because that's what's important, go back and check the Bible. What does God say? Because that's what's important, that's what matters. Alright, revelation 16,.
Speaker 1:I think I hope we're going to pretend Six bowls of wrath. This is just a completely random side note. One of the questions I'm going to have for God someday is why mosquitoes? Why it's kind of like fire ants. I know there's a point, I get it. I'm sure it's super useful, but come on, god, mosquitoes Really. Anyway, it's one of the reasons. One of the things I look forward to in fall and winter is lack of mosquitoes. Six bowls of wrath.
Speaker 1:Then I heard a loud voice from the temple saying to the seven angels Go and pour out on the earth the seven bowls of the wrath of God. So the first angel went and poured out his bowl on the earth and it became a loathsome and malignant sore on the people who had the mark of the beast and who worshiped his image. The second angel poured out his bowl into the sea and it became blood, like that of a dead man, and every living thing in the sea died into the sea and it became blood like that of a dead man and every living thing in the sea died. Then the third angel poured out his bowl into the rivers and the springs of water and they became blood. And I heard the angel of the water saying Righteous are you, who are and who were, o, holy one, because you judged these things. For they poured out the bowl upon the sun and it was given to it to scorch men with fire. Men were scorched with fierce heat and they blasphemed the name of God, who has the power over these plagues, and they did not repent so as to give him glory.
Speaker 1:Then the fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast and his kingdom became darkened and they gnawed their Armageddon Phrates. And its water was dried up so that the way would be prepared for the kings from the east Armageddon. And I saw coming out of the mouth of the dragon and out of the mouth of the beast and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs for they are spirits of demons performing signs which go out to the kings of the whole world to gather them together for the war of the great day of God. The Almighty Behold, I am coming like a thief. Blessed is the one who stays awake and keeps his clothes so that he will not walk about naked and men will not see his shame. And they gathered them together to the place which in Hebrew is called Armageddon, seventh Bowl of Wrath. Then the seventh angel poured out his bowl upon the air and a loud voice came out of the temple, from the throne, saying it is done. And there were flashes of lightning and sounds and peals of thunder and there was a great earthquake such as there had not been since man came to be upon the earth, so great an earthquake was it and so mighty. The great city was split into three parts and the cities of the nations fell. Babylon the great was remembered before God to give her the cup of the wine of his fierce wrath and every island fled away and the mountains were not found and huge hell stones, about 100 pounds each, came down from heaven upon men and men blasphemed God because of the plague of the hell, because its plague was extremely severe.
Speaker 1:A couple things. You look at verse 9 and verse 11. In both cases they say and they did not repent of their deeds. Right, and they did not repent so as to give them glory. Proverbs, I think, tells us not to despise the discipline of God. Or, just like a father who disciplines the son he loves, god disciplines those whom he loves, those who follow him.
Speaker 1:I think a lot of times I have gotten in situations in my life probably, where God had pretty good hands in disciplining me and I didn't appreciate it very much, I didn't like it, I was not a fan. And you know why do we discipline? And the Bible is very clear about the need to discipline our children. Why do we discipline our children? And the Bible is very clear about the need to discipline our children. Why do we discipline our children, hopefully so that they don't make the same mistakes again. Maybe, hopefully, so that they don't make the mistakes that we've made.
Speaker 1:But there's a point to it. It's not just for fun, and if you've been a parent, you certainly know that disciplining your children is often not fun. But I wonder how often we are disciplined by God as Christians and this, of course, is talking about those who weren't Christians, who had rejected God but I wonder how often we don't really repent of what we've been doing wrong and we don't really appreciate the discipline that God is handing out to try and keep us from doing something dumb. At any rate, that's just kind of the thought that I had. And then this At any rate, that's just kind of the thought that I had. And then this well, there's two more One, verse 15, behold, I'm coming like a thief. Blessed is the one who stays awake and keeps his clothes so that he will not walk about naked and men will not see his shame.
Speaker 1:You hear that theme often be ready. Jesus talked about that multiple times. Be ready, be on the alert, be paying attention. Are we really, are we truly treating each day, each coming day, as if God might come back, as if God might come back. And that doesn't mean, for example, right, that if we have a job we just skip work that day because God's coming back the next day so we don't need to go to work, right. But it does mean are we really working to have our priorities in line, to be acting the way that God wants us to act? And I think you can particularly apply that to your relationship, our relationship with God and Jesus Christ and our relationship with our spouse. Do we treat it as if we have just unlimited number of days left? Because we shouldn't. The last thing and this is just kind of I don't know. It just struck me when I read it Verse 18,.
Speaker 1:There was a great earthquake such as there had not been since man came upon the earth, came to be upon the earth through grad school and the courses in geology that were required. You know that was Darwinism. Old earth, 5 billion year old earth, was pretty much just. Everybody just assumed that. Everybody else agreed with that. But there were people that didn't, that were young Earth, that were 6,000-year-old Earth, and I think a lot of people allow their faith to be kind of brittle once they pick a side, like they feel like it has to be one way or the other. You either have to believe in a five billion year old earth or you have to believe in a six thousand year old earth, and if you don't, then your faith is really. Is it real, etc? And, and I've said often on here before, it doesn't really matter how god did it. God did, did it the Father of Jesus Christ? He created it somehow. And however he did, it's fine. And if you need to believe in one or the other, that's fine too, but I think we ought to have the humility to admit that we don't. Neither side really knows for sure, and either way, as long as we know that God did it, then that's fine.
Speaker 1:This verse struck me as the fact that there was a great earthquake such as there had not been since man came to be upon earth. There's stuff that happened prior to men being on earth that we just don't know about. We can look at evidence, we can make an educated guess, but we don't know, we weren't there. And I know that's kind of random and it doesn't really tie in, but it was just a thought that I had while reading and maybe that does help some of y'all if you're really tied to one side or the other and you feel like you have to be. You really don't have to be folks. If you believe Genesis is a literal account and the earth is only 6,000 years old, that's fine. That's great. God could have easily done it that way. And if you believe that the earth is 5 billion years old and God used evolution or some form of it to get to this point, that's fine too. He could have. He could have done it any way that he wanted to, because he's God.
Speaker 1:So I wanted to read a little bit more today out of Psalm before we move on, and I'm going to start and read a few verses out of Psalm 38. And this is a Psalm of David from Memorial. Oh Lord, rebuke me not in your wrath and chasten me not in your burning anger, for your arrows have sunk deep into me and your hand has pressed down on me. There is no soundness in my flesh because of your indignation. There is no health in my bones because of my sin, for my iniquities are gone over my head as a heavy burden. They weigh too much for me. My wounds grow foul and fester because of my folly. I am bent over and greatly bowed down. I go mourning all day long, for my loins are filled with burning and there is no soundness in my flesh. I am benumbed and badly crushed. I groan because of the agitation of my heart.
Speaker 1:So the verse that has stuck out here for me over the years is for for my iniquities are gone over my head as a heavy burden. They weigh too much for me. I identify with that in my life. I don't know if you do or not, but my sins at times feel overwhelming, crushing, and often probably maybe this is part of the reason that that happens or that I feel that way is because it reminds me that I have no hope outside of Jesus Christ. There is no way. If I lived a perfect life from this moment on and never made a mistake, there's no way that I could get into heaven because of how badly I have already messed up.
Speaker 1:So Psalm 51 came across on my daily reading recently and it was pretty comforting kind of, in regard to that, and so I wanted to read through it today. It's a contrite sinner's prayer for pardon For the choir director of Psalm of David when Nathan the prophet came to him after he had gone into Bathsheba. So whatever you've done. Folks realize that David took another man's wife, slept with her, got her pregnant, then lied about it and then sent the guy back into the war with his own death warrant so that the general would put him in the hottest fighting and kill him so that he could have his wife, who he'd gotten pregnant. Kind of hard to think of something worse than that. And Uriah was a stand-up guy. When you read that account, I mean, he looked like he was doing pretty much everything right, at least at this time in his life. He's actually going to be one of the people I really would like to sit down and talk with when we get to heaven, I think.
Speaker 1:But so anyway, verse one be gracious to me, oh God, according to your loving kindness, according to the greatness of your compassion, blot out. Be gracious to me, o God, according to your loving kindness, according to the greatness of your compassion, blot out my transgressions, wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin, for I know my transgressions and my sin is ever before me. Against you, you, only I have sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are justified when you speak and blameless when you judge. Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity and in sin. My mother conceived me.
Speaker 1:Behold, you desire truth in the innermost vein and in the hidden part you will make me know wisdom. Pain, and in the hidden part you will make me know wisdom. Purify me with hyssop and I shall be clean. Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow. Make me to hear joy and gladness, lest the bones which you have broken rejoice. Hide your face from my sin and blot out all my iniquities. Your face from my sin and blot out all my iniquities.
Speaker 1:Create in me a clean heart, o God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me away from your presence and do not take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and sustain me with a willing spirit. Then I will teach transgressors your way ways and sinners will be converted to you. Deliver me from blood guiltiness, o God, the God of my salvation. Then my tongue will joyfully sing of your righteousness. O Lord, open my lips that my mouth may declare your praise For you. Do not delight in sacrifice, otherwise I would give it. Declare your praise for you. Do not delight in sacrifice, otherwise I would give it. You are not pleased with burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart. O God, you will not despise. By your favor, do good to Zion. Build the walls of Jerusalem, then you will delight in righteous sacrifices, in burnt offering and whole burnt offering. Then young bulls will be offered on your altar".
Speaker 1:I really just hope that this is a comfort to y'all. That's why I wanted to read it. It was a comfort to me. When you're feeling overwhelmed by your sin, when you feel like you've just done absolutely everything wrong and nothing's going right, go back and read that song and read it to God and truly repent and be contrite. I just I hope it's a comfort to him, alright. So I wanted to. I'm not sure we're going to have time, but I'm going to try to anyway One of so. I've said this on the podcast a number of times. I think we have a fight coming and I maintain that not because I want to. I hope we don't. I hope there's some miracle by God. That just because, logically, I don't see a way out of it other than a miracle by God Almighty.
Speaker 1:One of the reasons why probably one of the key reasons, in fact, I would argue, one of the three main reasons is abortion. We fought a civil war our second civil war in this country because of slavery, and abortion dwarfs slavery. Abortion makes slavery look like child's play. We've murdered over 60 million of our own citizens in the last half century and it's shocking that it's not more appalling to more people. It shows you just how uneducated we really are, how disconnected we really are from God and reality and everything else.
Speaker 1:The fact that we think that we can go in and rip babies apart literally because that's what happens, and that there's not going to be any consequences for that and that we can hide behind the facade that that's somehow our right. We have a huge bill coming due and you can easily see that we're already paying a price, but it's going to get worse. Folks, there's no way that we can slaughter that many babies and not have some pain coming, and it may be another Civil War that may be the pain. You know Lincoln made that comment that all this blood of the slaves and money that was stolen from their labor, god may just waste America away until every single drop of blood and every single penny is paid back and you can make the argument today with abortion that all the blood that's been spilled and all the money that could have been added to our nation through those lives. If we've got to fight a war until every single drop of blood is repaid and every single penny paid back, who are we to argue? But the bottom line is that abortion has to be abolished, just like slavery had to be abolished. Abortion has to be abolished. There's no way to get around that. It can't be given back to the states as a state, right, right where they get the choice of whether to allow slaughter or not, just like slavery couldn't be. You can't have some states that have slaves and pretend like it's okay and others that don't. And you cannot have some states that say it's okay to rip a baby apart and some that don't.
Speaker 1:Henry J Hyde, us representative from Illinois, in 1993, received the Defender of Life Award at the Constitutional Litigation Conference and he gave a speech after receiving that award. And this is just one little bitty section that I've seen a couple places Again America's God and Country Encyclopedia of Quotations, american Patriots Bible by Richard G Lee and America's Founders Bible all highly, highly recommend. So this is Henry J Hyde, us representative from Illinois, that all men are created equal and are endowed by their creator Human beings upon creation, not upon birth. That is where our human dignity comes from. It comes from the creator. It is an endowment, not an achievement. By membership in the human family, we are endowed by our creator with inalienable rights. They can't be voted away by a jury or a court, among which are life, the first inalienable right, the first endowment from the Creator. That is mainstream America. That is mainstream America, the predicate for our Constitution, our country's birth certificate, to respect the right to life as an endowment from the Creator.
Speaker 1:It is the unborn who are the least of God's creatures. The Creator, it is the unborn who are the least of God's creatures. We have been told that whatsoever we do for the least of these, we do unto Jesus". That last line ought to be terrifying to those of us who have either supported abortion, participated in it or gone along with it, and it ought to be an immediate check on our actions, doing a 180. Because however we treat the least of these is the way that we're treating Jesus that way, and I don't ever want to be accused of treating Jesus the way that we treat babies via abortion.
Speaker 1:And there have been points in my life. Folks, I've told you all before if you're looking for somebody perfect, I'm not it, and I wish that this was one of the areas that I was perfect in, but it's not. We do a huge disservice to our children and grandchildren when we refuse to correct them and to acknowledge a sin as a sin, when we hide behind the fact that we have done something ourselves and so we go. Well, I can't say anything to my kids or my grandkids because I did the same thing. That is absolute lie of the devil. That is Bravo, sierra, all caps, if anything. Folks, those of us that have committed sins are better prepared to teach our children and our grandchildren, to warn them. Right? I've said this before Sometimes the very best advocate against alcoholism is a recovered alcoholic, because they've been down that path.
Speaker 1:Sometimes the very best person to warn kids from drugs is the past drug addict. Because they've been down that path, they know how dark it is. You look at some of the very best advocates for life across the country over the last several decades. Some of them are the very ones that have been most pro-abortion, pro-death at some point in their life, because they've seen that darkness and that evil.
Speaker 1:You want to talk about sex before marriage, right, you tell I can't say anything about that to my kid. Why, if you've lived that heartache, if you've experienced that pain from not following God's clear commands when it comes to something, why would you not share that with your kid? Why would you not warn them what a bad idea it is to go out and drink and then get in a car. What a bad idea it is to get drunk to the point where you're throwing up. What a bad idea it is to sleep around with people outside of marriage, whether you haven't even ever been married or whether you're married and you're cheating on your spouse. What a bad idea it is to spread gossip and slander about people. That isn't true, right? Because all of these things, folks, true, right? Because all of these things, folks. Why wouldn't we warn our children and grandchildren?
Speaker 1:And so, whether you've been supportive of abortion or not and if you still are, folks, I'm telling you right now I cannot you better go, take a long hard, look in the mirror and make sure that you really want to be associated with the political and spiritual side of the war. That thinks that ripping a baby apart limb by limb is the good side, or that dumping them in a bottle of acid or a bucket of acid or tying them up in a trash bag and throw them in a trash? Can that? That's the side you really want to be on? There is zero room for abortion in the United States, just like there was zero room for owning another human being, like they were an animal, in the 1800s. And it may well come to a civil war, folks, and you need to get your head around that, and we need to be far more concerned with what God thinks, and you hear it in this little piece of a speech by Henry Hyde whatsoever we do for the least of these, we do unto Jesus. All right, we'll move on. Didn't get the Medal of Honors today, that's all right, we'll keep going. So we're going to get back into Fox's book of the martyrs, and this is the story we're in the middle of about the young lady that was delivered from the captivity of the Inquisition, and we're going to keep going with her story.
Speaker 1:The next morning, mary said Now let me dress you as nice as possible, for you must go and wish Don Francisco good morrow and breakfast with him. When I was dressed, she conveyed me through a gallery into his apartment, where I found that he was in bed. He ordered Mary to withdraw and to serve up breakfast. In about two hours' time, when Mary was gone, he commanded me to undress myself and come to bed to him. The manner in which he spoke and the dreadful ideas with which my mind was filled so terribly frightened me that I pulled off my clothes without knowing what I did, and stepped into bed, insensible of the indecency I was transacting. Though totally had the care of self-preservation absorbed all my other thoughts, and so entirely were the ideas of delicacy obliterated by the force of terror. Is a delicacy obliterated by the force of terror? Thus, to avoid the dry pan, did I entail upon myself perpetual infamy? And to escape the so much dreaded gradual fire, give myself up to the flames of lust. Wretched alternative, for the only choice is an excruciating death or everlasting pollution.
Speaker 1:Mary came at the expiration of two hours and served us with chocolate in the most submissive manner, for she kneeled down by the bed to present it. When I was dressed, mary took me into the very delightful apartment which I had never yet seen. It was furnished with the most costly elegance, but what gave me the greatest astonishment was the prospect, from its windows of a beautiful garden and a fine meandering river. Mary told me that the young lady she had mentioned excuse me would come to pay their compliments to me before dinner and begged me to remember her advice in keeping a prudent guard over my tongue. In a few minutes, a great number of very beautiful young ladies, richly dressed, entered my room and successively, embracing me, wished me joy. I was so surprised that I was unable to answer their compliments, which one of the ladies perceiving said Madam, the solitude of this place will affect you in the beginning, but whenever you begin to feel the pleasures and amusements you may enjoy, you will quit those pensive thoughts. We at present beg the honor of you to dine with us today and henceforward three days in a week.
Speaker 1:I returned them suitable thanks in general terms and so went to dinner, in which the most exquisite and savory dishes of various kinds were served up with the most delicate and pleasant fruits and sweet meats. The room was long, with two tables on each side and a third in the front. I reckoned fifty-two young ladies, the eldest not exceeding twenty-four years of age. There were five maid sermons besides Mary to wait upon us, but Mary confined her attention to me alone. After dinner we retired to a capacious gallery where they played on musical instruments, a few diverted themselves with cards and the rest amused themselves with walking about.
Speaker 1:Mary and Link entered the gallery and said Ladies, this is a day of recreation and you may go into whatever rooms you please till eight o'clock in the evening. They unanimously agreed to adjourn to my apartment. Here we found a most elegant cold collation of which all the ladies partook and passed the time in innocent conversation and harmless mirth, but none mentioned a word concerning the Inquisition or the Holy Fathers, or gave the least distant hint concerning the cause of their confinement. At eight o'clock, mary rang a bell which was a signal for all to retire to their respective apartments, and I was conducted to the me good morning, dressed much richer than the preceding day. We passed this time till eight o'clock in the evening in much the same manner as we had done the day before. At that time the bell rang, the separation took place and I was conducted to Don Francisco's chamber. The next morning I had a garment richer than the last and they accosted me an apparel still more sumptuous than before.
Speaker 1:The transactions of the two former days were repeated on the third and the evening concluded in a similar manner. On the fourth morning mary came into don francisco's chamber and told me I must immediately rise, for a lady wanted me in her own chamber. She spoke with a kind of authority, which surprised me, but as Don Francisco did not speak a syllable, I got up and obeyed. Mary then conveyed me into a dismal dungeon, not eight feet in length, and said sternly to me this is your room and this lady your bedfellow and companion. At which words she bounced out of the room and left me in the utmost consternation.
Speaker 1:After remaining a considerable time in the most dreadful agony, tears came to my relief and I exclaimed what is this place, dear lady? Is it a scene of enchantment or is it hell upon earth? Alas, I have lost my honor and my soul forever. The lady took me by the hand and said in a sympathizing tone of voice Dear sister for this is the name I shall henceforth give you Forbear to cry and grieve for you can do nothing by such an extravagant behavior, but draw upon yourself a cruel death. Your misfortunes, and those of all the ladies you have seen, are exactly of a piece. You suffer nothing but what we have suffered before you, but we dare not show our grief for fear of greater evils. Pray, take courage and hope in God, for he will surely deliver us from this hellish place. But be sure you discover no uneasiness before Mary, who is the only instrument either of our torments or comfort. Have patience until we go to bed, and then I will venture to tell you more of the matter.
Speaker 1:My perplexity and vexation were inexpressible, but my new companion, whose name was lenora, prevailed on me to disguise my uneasiness from mary. I dissembled tolerably well when she came to bring our dinners, but could not help remarking in my own mind the difference between this repast and those I had before partook of this consisted only of plain common food repast, and those I had before or took of this consisted only of plain common food and of that a scanty allowance with one plate and one knife and fork for us both, which she took away as soon as we had dined, when we were in bed. Leonora was as good as her word and, upon my solemn promise of secrecy, thus began to open her mind to me. My dear sister, you think your case very hard, but I assure you, all the ladies in the house have gone through the same in time you will know all their stories, as they hope to know yours. I suppose Mary has been the chief instrument of your fright, as she has been of ours, and I warrant. She has shown you some horrible places, though not all, and that at the very thought of them you were so terrified that you chose the same way we have done to redeem yourself from death. But by what hath happened to us, we know that Don Francisco hath been your Nero, your tyrant, for the three colors of our clothes are the distinguishing tokens of the three holy fathers the red silk belongs to Don Francisco, the blue sent Don Guerrero and the green to Don Aliga, and they always give these colors after the farce of changing garments and the short-lived recreations are over to those ladies whom they bring here for their respective uses.
Speaker 1:We are strictly commanded to express all the demonstrations of joy and to be very merry for three days when a young lady first comes amongst us, as we did with you and as you must now do with others. But afterward we live like the most wretched prisoners, without seeing anybody but Mary and the other maidservants, over whom Mary hath a kind of superiority, for she acts as housekeeper. We all dine in the great hall three days in a week and when any one of the inquisitors has a mind for one of his slaves, mary comes about nine o'clock and leads her to his apartment. Some nights Mary leaves the doors of her chambers open, and that is a token that one of the inquisitors hath a mind to come that night, but he comes so silent that we are ignorant whether he is our patron or not. If one of us happens to be with child, she is removed into a better chamber till she is delivered, but during the whole of her pregnancy she never sees anybody but the person appointed to attend her. As soon as the child is born, it is taken away and carried we know not whither, for we never hear a syllable mentioned about it afterward.
Speaker 1:I have been in this house six years was not fourteen when the officers took me from my father's house and have had one child. There are at this present time fifty-two young ladies in the house, but we annually lose six or eight, though we know not what becomes of them or whether they are sent. This, however, does not diminish our number, for new ones are always brought in to supply the place of those who are removed from hence, and I remember at one time to have seen seventy-three ladies here together. Our continual torment is to reflect that when they are tired of any of the ladies, they certainly put to death those they pretend to send away, for it is natural to think that they have too much policy to suffer their atrocious and infernal villancies to be discovered by enlarging them. Villainous seas to be discovered by enlarging them. Hence, our situation is miserable indeed, and we have only to pray that the Almighty will pardon those crimes which we are compelled to commit. Therefore, my dear sister, arm yourself with patience, for that is the only palliative to give you comfort and put a firm confidence in the providence of Almighty God. And put a firm confidence in the providence of Almighty God, I think.
Speaker 1:Here I will stop for the day. It's discouraging as that discourse is. Folks. There's two comments. Maybe we'll read a little bit of Mary Otis Warren but one any institution can have bad men be a part of it.
Speaker 1:That doesn't make the institution horrible, unless that institution tries to pretend that it's infallible and it can't make mistakes, and then that makes the institution pretty bad. It doesn't matter whether you're talking about a government like the United States, or whether you're talking about a church like the Catholic Church or the Methodist Church, baptist, greek, orthodox. It doesn't matter whether you're talking about the Boy Scouts of America or anything in between, the Marine Corps, the Army. The note of a really good organization, just like a really good person, is when they're willing to take accountability for their own actions. And so if you see an institution or a government that's willing to come in and acknowledge their failure and seek to fix it or seek forgiveness for it, that's a good institution, that's a good organization, that's a good man, because that's really all we can do before God is to ask his forgiveness and to repent of the wrong that we've done. By the same token, when you see an organization that refuses to acknowledge failure, that refuses to acknowledge that they're fallible choice and you got to remember that this isn't a movie script, it's not a book, it's a very real piece of history that was repeated numerous times.
Speaker 1:Our choice was to either be tortured to death or to go along with these evil men that claimed the office of, or to be serving God, which is astounding. I'm going to throw my father under the bus here. He gets thrown under the bus a lot, sadly. I guess that's the danger of having a son that does a podcast. But when you look around the world he's made that comment to me over the years a couple of times. I don't think that God's going to condemn this who have made similar choices under duress of torture, you turn back to God and all you can do is seek his mercy through Jesus Christ and trust him completely, and I don't know if that's a comfort to you or not, but I offer it in case it might be. Let's read just a little bit of Mercy, otis Warren and the History of the Rise, progress and Termination of the American Revolution the History of the Rise, progress and Termination of the American Revolution.
Speaker 1:By the frequent dissolution of the General Assemblies, all the public debate had been precluded and the usual regular intercourse between the colonies cut off. The modes of legislative communication thus obstructed. At a period when the necessity of harmony and concert was obvious to every eye, no systematical opposition to gubernatorial intrigue supported by the King and Parliament of Great Britain, was to be expected without the utmost concord, confidence and union of all the colonies. Colonies. Perhaps no single step contributed so much to cement the union of the colonies and the final acquisition of independence as the establishment of the committees of correspondence. This supported a chain of communication from New Hampshire to Georgia that produce unanimity and energy throughout the continent.
Speaker 1:As in these annals, there has yet been no particular mention made of this institution, it is but justice to name at once the author, the origin and the importance of the measure. Author, the origin and the importance of the measure. I think, actually, we're going to stop there and spend a little bit more time on that on the next podcast, but that's exactly what we need today, folks. We need something similar to these committees of correspondence between churches, schools, communities, counties, talking to each other outside of the official channels and inside, as long as we can get away with it, as long as you know, we're not having our legislative bodies dissolved legislative bodies dissolved. But, folks, if you think that we've managed to get to this point in time where we don't have any more storms coming, I think you really need to go back and look at history again. The left is just simply not going to stop until they're made to stop, and what we've got right now is kind of just a pause the calm before the storm, maybe and we need to be doing everything.
Speaker 1:You know in the Marine Corps, when we got into a position every time we moved, every single time. The first thing that we started to do when we moved into a new position was harden it. That's what we called it. So we would dig fighting holes and we would start to add defensive measures. It didn't matter whether we were going to be there a day or whether we thought we were going to be there three days or three months. That was our job was to start to harden that position, to make it harder for the enemy to get in, to make it harder for them to hurt us. And you did that as soon as you moved in, because you weren't getting shot at and you had the ability, because it was really hard to make a position more defendable once the shooting started Right. And so and I'm definitely not an expert on this there's men in the Army and the Marine Corps that can tell you a lot more about that, especially from different periods in our history. You can go back and talk to some of the veterans from Vietnam and Korea and the few we have left from World War II.
Speaker 1:But that's kind of what this last election perhaps bought us. It was kind of like. It's kind of like moving into a new defensive position and we've got a little bit of time and a little bit of breathing space right now. And this, this is not all just based on this last election cycle, folks. We've been headed this direction for quite a while. This last election cycle, folks, we've been headed this direction for quite a while. So we'll get back and see what Mr Warren has to say about these committees of correspondence, because I think it's a huge deal on the next podcast. God bless y'all, god bless your families, god bless your marriages, god bless America, god bless your nation, wherever you are around the world. Listen, folks, we'll talk to y'all again real soon, looking forward to it.