New roost (while still pondering what needs to be done)

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Roost in the coop.

Heads-up: This is about my belief in Christ, America's further descent into authoritarianism, and how those notions weave in and out of my gray matter. Oh, and a little about chickens, quilts, and books.

It's Saturday morning. Foggy. Gray. Warm for Humboldt County (Sixty-six degrees Fahrenheit). I wanted to write about the QIP (quilt in progress) in my Go Bag, as I'm prepping said quilt for further Round the World installments. But I also wanted to share the great roost my husband built a couple of days ago for the chickens, although they aren't super keen on it, yet. Only Owl gives it nod, again this morning hopping onto it, then reaching the second rung, then jumping to the floor. One of these days all the chicks will be perched on it, and not that far in the future.

Go Bag quilt: Small. Pretty. Peaceful. Necessary.

My heart this morning is torn; Washington D.C. is becoming a different city than what I visited a few years ago, what with the administration's attempts at a takeover still in place. I want to do something meaningful, so I pray for peace and justice. My Christian faith feels so.... Affirmed by what I believe in regard to Jesus Christ and so maligned by how the American government ignores what Jesus Christ truly came to do, which is to LOVE. There is no love in the president's actions in my nation's capital, very little love except for self at all in that man. Many Christians are following a blind guide, which I don't understand and yet all too well recognize. My husband likes to say that some people simply want a strongman despite all proof to his evil intents. As human beings, it appears we don't learn any lessons from the past, merely stumbling along from dictator to dictator while Rome burns.

Camilla top left, Owl top right, Barnevelders watching from the floor.

So first, the roost. We decided to build it because 1) It needed to happen and 2) My husband was in the mood to sort this out. Again the chicks are wary; the first night when we went out to retrieve their feed, all were huddled away from it like it was a silent Godzilla waiting to attack them in their sleep. I actually put Owl on it, then Camilla followed, both pullets climbing to the top rung, then having to figure out how to get down, lol. They walked to the right side, jumped onto the hay bale, then leapt to the floor. Smart chickens! The next day we saw poop on the rungs, so at some point somebody in the coop had tried it out. And as I said, this morning Owl sauntered along it, my bravest chicken, bless her!

Yes, God bless a chicken. God please bless my nation with calm, foresight, and less reliance on greedy, selfish, unGodly (in my opinion due to their actions/inactions) politicians. Since focusing on Lenten Bible readings since March, my peace quotient has risen, which has been GREAT because the shite quotient in America is zooming through the frickin' roof! Not that I want to ignore that nothing is perfect about ANY COUNTRY; America has no claim to be the best. However (again in my opinion) since the 20th of January, America has fallen to depths unseen in my lifetime certainly, and I've been around since before Richard Nixon. Yet as a believer in Jesus Christ, I must balance my fears for America with the better knowledge that a Saviour rose from the grave, righting all wrongs forevermore.

That's a great victory. It's a miracle. It's my truth, and the truth of others, many of them supporting a man who wants to crush democracy for good.

During Lent, and for weeks afterwards, I read Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Letters and Papers From Prison, as well as Love Letters From Cell 92, the letters exchanged between Bonhoeffer and his fiancee Maria von Wedemeyer. I also read a brief biography of the German theologian written by Eberhard Bethge, and was working through the Tegal Prison chapter in Bethge's larger biography until the chickens arrived. After we became chicken tenders (another of my husband's witticisms), I was barely able to maintain my daily devotional readings, yet those Biblical nuggets are ESSENTIAL to keeping my heart safe, my mind too. The wrongs being perpetrated in Washington D.C. and elsewhere in this nation are horrific, although I can't compare them to war zones like Gaza, Ukraine, Sudan, etc. Nor can I align them to what is happening to women in Afghanistan and similar places. There are levels of mayhem, and my goodness, I feel STEEPED in unpleasantness.

Am I supposed to say: Didn't we learn about this from WWII? Why are women and children still so disregarded? Why is the lust for power still so prevalent? Why doesn't LOVE matter more?

In A Love Story: The Enran Chronicles I wrote: Well is a deep subject, but why's even deeper. I have no answers for why shite still occurs. All I can do is what God puts on my heart moment by moment, like writing this post that doesn't proffer solutions, but does express my frustrations as well as my belief that no matter how BAD things get, something better waits. I don't mean chickens or quilts or novels. I do mean life eternal where no death or pain exists. Just weeks before Germany surrendered, Bonhoeffer was hung for his attempts to thwart Hitler, as was one of his brothers and two of his brothers-in-law. Over six million Jews were murdered in The Holocaust. Thousands of Palestinians have been killed by Israel. Millions of Afghani women and children are under threat by a government that cares less about them than my government cares about Americans. Shit happens EVERY DAY EVERYWHERE. Where is God, you can ask. According to Bonhoeffer, Christ is with those who suffer. Christ died for us because he loves us, not to rule over us. I have to grasp that with both hands, and what I do with that, well....

Chickens from about an hour ago, exploring the run before the rain began. My husband said they eventually huddled under the eves, then went back into the coop, tired of shaking off the rain.

Well is a deep subject. So is everything else in this post. Thanks be to God if you waded through all my considerations. Why is, again, even deeper. Off I go to get a shower and maybe ponder some why's if I feel so compelled.

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