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My rewrite of the famous quote by Lord Palmerston regarding “interests” to have it reflect the reality of Israel and its powerful friends would go something like this: “I say that it is a narrow policy to suppose that Israel is to be marked out as the eternal ally or the perpetual friend of the United States and of enlightened western values. By design, Israel has no eternal allies. Its interests are indeed perpetual but center on its own success at aggressively portraying itself always as the victim while also advancing its own tribal interests.” I admittedly tend to think often about the enemy we of the western Christian tradition have been nurturing at our breast for decades in a spirit of tolerance, a viper that is only setting out to corrupt and then destroy us, manifest particularly at this time of year, when the life and death of Jesus Christ ought to be rightly celebrated. Alas, in today’s Israel what is truly remarkable is the government’s open suppression of Christian identity and worship without any complaint coming from Washington or from the other nominally Christian nations of Europe.

An America dying in dictatorship is fraught with horror, denial, angst.

 Countless Americans now live in terror of the totalitarian state coming at us full bore.  

 As a people, we’ve flirted with homegrown fascism in our literature, arts and imagination.  But we’ve only briefly confronted it in real time.

 Obviously, it sucks.  

 But on a karmic level, based on what we have done to other peoples and nations, don’t we deserve it?  

 And won’t this Trumpian nightmare force us to confront the faults that have powered his rise?

 America’s core freedoms have been a long term assumption.

 Based on gender, sexual orientation, class, race, involuntary servitude, religion, national origin, etc, for millions that freedom has been a cruel illusion.

 But in the larger flow of human history, we inherited from Indigenous America a unique sense of liberty.  Few North American tribes were authoritarian in nature.  

From Gulf of America to mass expulsion of “illegals” (people of color) to continuing genocidal complicity in Gaza to whatever the daily news brings us , , , welcome to Trump America! Welcome to the small-minded, white nation so many long for, free once again from those large, inconvenient values – e.g., the Declaration of Independence – that keep disrupting the way things are supposed to be.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal . . .”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's recent visit to Washington was no ordinary trip. The consensus among Israeli analysts, barring a few remaining loyalists, is that Netanyahu was not invited but, rather, summoned by US President Donald Trump.

 All evidence supports this assertion. Netanyahu rarely travels to the US without extensive Israeli media fanfare, leveraging his touted relationships with various US administrations as a "hasbara" opportunity to reinforce his image as Israel's strongman.

Michelangelo’s Pieta, the larger-than-life sculpture of the crucified Christ held tenderly in Mother Mary’s lap, has attracted visitors to Rome since it was installed in the old St. Peter’s Basilica more than 500 years ago.

Contemplation of the Pieta gifts one with the powerful presence of sacrifice and divine acceptance, life summoned from stone, transcending death. Christians approach Good Friday with two powerful remembrances: Christ’s sacrifice and redemption on The Cross, and the acceptance, love and compassion expressed through The Pieta.

Countless images emerging from Gaza, of the sudden deaths of children, by bombing, shrapnel, gunshots, and grieving parents evoke modern day Pietas, occurring with terrible frequency. Unlike Michaelangelo’s crucified Christ, the dead children are seldom intact.

They are horribly mangled and disfigured, limbless, headless, often identified by a scrap of clothing. Yet, the bereaved parents, holding what is left of their child wrapped in white shroud, look to the heavens, and, resonating with divine grace and acceptance recite “Allah Akbar,” God is Great.