Monthly Archives: March 2010

March 8, 2010 · 23:52

Padre Steve Gets Adolf the Kidney Stone Removed: Musings on Laser Lithotripsy

Adolf Von Grosse Schmertzen will see his last sunrise in the morning, or whatever he can view from where he is at in the ureter.  Whatever, since he has stayed in his bunker and made my life miserable for the past two weeks he will not get to stay intact as a reward for leaving.  Instead he is going to get blasted to pieces by the latest and greatest in Kidney Stone breaker-upper technology, the Laser Lithotripsy using a holmium laser mounted in a endoscope.

This procedure is replacing the older method of extracorporeal shock wave lithotripsy as the standard of care in treating bastards like Adolf.  The older method was less invasive and used shock waves generated outside the body to break up the stone. The new method which according to the literature is “minimally invasive” involves passing the endoscope up the pee-pee thru the bladder and into the tunnel, the ureter, between the bladder and kidney where Adolf is dug into, sort of like his namesake who did the same in a Berlin Bunker back in 1945.  When the endoscope reaches Adolf the Urologist will direct a “laser” beam into Adolf “vaporizing the stone.”

Evidently there is no stone that has been able to withstand this high tech assault and the remnants of Adolf will be flushed into to sewer of history.  The success rate for this procedure is in the 90-95 percent rate according to the literature which means that for me there is a 50-50 chance of success though only a ten percent chance of that.  My assumption as to why this has replaced extracorporeal shock wave lithotripsy is that for the Urologist it is much more like imitating Luke Skywalker when he blasts the Death Star or playing the video game Asteroids.

Now I will go in tomorrow and be prepped for the procedure, I report at 815 and am told that it will be an hour or two until the procedure will begin.  Usually the preparation involves placing an IV, placing monitor equipment and asking lots of questions.  The one question I hope they ask if I have any special religious needs.  If they do I will ask if the have a live chicken, a sharp knife and an altar with candles and a shot of rum.  I am told that I will go under “General Anesthesia” which I imagine as being forced to watch a very boring Army General giving a briefing on power point to his subordinates.  Since I have slept through a few of those I image that this will be the case again.

Today I got a call from the Ambulatory Procedure Unit where I will be prepared for battle and then taken to the Operating Room, or the O.R. as medical professionals call it.  My Urologist says that the procedure could take up to three hours but that he expects that it will be done sooner than that. I do hope so because I need to wake up fast after the briefing of the boring General so that I can get home and then top off the day at Stein Club appreciation night at Gordon Biersch…yes, I know I’ve heard that you are not supposed to have alcohol after being under anesthesia but it won’t be like I will be having a beer in post-op, they don’t have any good beer there but I digress.

Today Adolf obviously sensing that his time is short has been giving me a lot of pain even with the Vicodin on board.  I cannot eat or drink anything after midnight so I’d better finish this so I can eat something to go with my last dose of Vicodin.  Providing nothing goes wrong I expect to be writing of my experiences tomorrow night, inshallah.

Of course my mind drifts to great medical films like Robin Cook’s Coma and certain episodes of House, M*A*S*H, Scrubs, the X-Files and the “Junior Mint” episode of Seinfeld which I find very comforting when facing surgery.

Pray for me a sinner,

Peace,

Padre Steve+

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March 8, 2010 · 03:40

A War Crime Denier, an American Terrorist in Karachi, a Christian Bully and thoughts on Grace and Reconciliation on a Lenten Sunday

Molly Checking My Facts

Well sports fans I sit up with my little Papillion-Dachshund mix Molly musing tonight after watch a replay of a pre-season baseball game.  Today of course I have been dealing with the pain caused by Adolf my large and well dug in kidney stone who evidently will resist until the end and have to be blasted by a laser on Tuesday.  I didn’t sleep well last night and woke up in pain this morning and look to be doing the same tonight, hopefully the pain and sleep meds will kick in and I will get some sleep.  As I wait I shall write as Bucky Katt once said “you can wordify anything if you just verb it.” So tonight I shall spend some time with a war crime denier, an American traitor, an allegedly “Christian” political pundit and muse on grace and reconciliation, which are key themes in my Lenten journey this year.

So anyway….today was a weird day.  I had an irate Japanese “Rape of Nanking” denier comment on my article about that subject.  Sorry, the truth hurts war crimes and atrocities committed against civilians by any nation are immoral and to defend the indefensible or try to deflect criticism by referring to other nations that have done similar acts is simply being an accomplice to evil.  That goes for any nation including the United States and unfortunately our history is not always as pristine as some would make it out to be.

Moving on… there are conflicting reports that one of the great traitors in modern United States history, Adam Gadahn the chief spokesman for Al Qaeda was apprehended by Pakistani security forces in Karachi yesterday. A day after Gadahn urged Moslems in the US to emulate the Fort Hood terrorist Major Malik Hasan and attack high value targets in the United States Pakistani officials announced that he had been captured. However later reports that the Al Qaeda member captured may not be him after all.  This guy is a slime bag of the biggest order and I hope that if we didn’t get him this time that he will catch a Hellfire missile between his eyes so he can be the martyr that he urges others to be.  Lead by example Adam, its called leadership but then it is always easier to urge people that you don’t know or care about to do the dying for you.  Don’t worry someday you will get your 70 Virginians and they will kick your sorry ass for eternity.  If the Hellfire doesn’t get you Adam I hope that you get captured and sent to prison here in the US with the Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN or the Terrible Blond Network) piped into your jail cell 24/7, an unending supply of Chick tracts and Gordon Klingenschmitt as your Chaplain, a fate worse than a fate worse than death.

While the aforementioned idiots are simply idiotic at least they don’t attempt to rationalize illegal or dishonorable activity by citing scripture and invoking Jesus like Townhall.com columnist Doug Giles did on Sunday.  Giles likes to fancy himself a defender of American and Christian values but is simply a bully whose imbecilic theological rants are about as Christian as those of Adam Gadahn, the American born Al Qaeda spokesman.  Giles prostitutes the Christian faith and wraps it around the flag so that the Gospel is indistinguishable from right wing politics.  The fact that he uses Jesus and says that Jesus would approve of such behavior is blasphemous and the fact that he has a degree from a seminary puts him on the same level as religious leaders of Al Qaeda, the Taliban, Hezbollah and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard clerics in camouflage.  I do believe that Christians should not divorce their faith from politics and that faith can inform and guide a Christian in life and even in politics but Giles and his radicalized followers are dangerous and will be the death of the Evangelical church.  His justification of the use of methods including deception and violence that in times past would have been denounced by the church are simply heretical and not a part of the Christian faith, even if he can “proof text” by citing disjointed and unrelated scriptural texts and by drawing false analogies to justify or prove his point.  While he as a conservative pundit may well oppose and even rightly criticize his political opponents it is wrong to use God or Scripture to justify unseemly and dirty politics even if one is tackling equally unseemly opponents.  I think this is why so many theologians, pastors and church leaders throughout history going back the Apostles and early Church Fathers distained politics and felt that Christians and their faith could only be corrupted by involvement in political movements.  The actions and words of Giles and his fellow travelers may make them feel better but only undermine their witness as Christians as they prostitute the faith for short term political advantage.

Though I did not get to Church today because of not sleeping and being in pain I was able to celebrate Eucharist at home with the Abbess.  If you have read my Lenten meditations you might notice the theme of reconciliation.  Such was the case in the lectionary readings for today, the Gospel being the parable of the Prodigal Son out of Luke Chapter 15 and the New Testament lesson being 2 Corinthians 5: 17-21, the latter which has been a major part of my theological journey since my return from Iraq.  I post the passage below because it speaks volumes about the ontological change that should be part of the Christian life imparted in the waters of Baptism and how that change should be a major part of how we relate to others in the world.  I think it stands in stark contrast to those of any political party who use Scripture and the faith for political gain and power.

“17So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! 18All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; 19that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself,* not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. 20So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” (NRSV)

As Karl Barth said “Grace must find expression in life, otherwise it is not grace.” I dare say that Giles and other “Christian” radicals have forgotten the grace of God or somehow do not think that applies to their opponents.  In their zeal they misuse Scripture and justify hatred forgetting the great commandments to love God and love our neighbor and the witness of Christians who lived in truly evil times like Dietrich Bonhoeffer who said “Our enemies are those who harbor hostility against us, not those against whom we cherish hostility… As a Christian I am called to treat my enemy as a brother and to meet hostility with love. My behavior is thus determined not by the way others treat me, but by the treatment I receive from Jesus.”

And so to you my friends I wish you a good night.

Peace,

Padre Steve+

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March 7, 2010 · 02:47

The Beginning of the Nuclear Surface Navy: USS Enterprise CVAN-65, USS Long Beach CG-9, USS Bainbridge DLGN/CGN-25 and USS Truxton DLGN/CG-35

Iconic Photo of USS Enterprise CVAN-65,USS Long Beach CG-9 and USS Bainbridge DLGN-25 during Operation Sea Orbit 1964

Note: This is the first of four articles on the US Navy’s Nuclear Surface Force. Future articles will deal with Task Force One and Operation Sea Orbit, the Nuclear Cruisers and the Nuclear Carriers.

In the 1950s the US Navy recognized the Nuclear power could play a key role in the future Navy.  The operational flexibility of Nuclear powered ships which would not be dependent on underway replenishment provided by tankers or port calls to conduct high speed operations over vast expansions of the world’s oceans.  Orders were placed in the mid-1950s for an attack aircraft carrier, the USS Enterprise CVAN-65, cruiser the USS Long Beach CLGN-160 and later CGN-9 and the USS Bainbridge DLGN, later CLG-25.  These ships would become the prototypes of a Navy which early advocates of nuclear propulsion hoped would become the future of the surface Navy.  This would become the case in regard to Aircraft Carriers but not in regard to cruisers pr smaller surface ships.  While seven more Nuclear Cruisers would be built none would be retained after the post Cold War reduction in force with all of the ships decommissioned, their nuclear plants recycled and hulks scrapped.  However they represented the pinnacle of surface ship design in their time and had the budgetary constraints of the post Cold War world taken place the likelihood is that at least six nuclear cruisers would still be in commission possibly upgraded with the Aegis Air Defense system making them the most versatile of surface ships.

Enterprise in 1978

The first Aircraft Carrier designed and built as a nuclear ship was the USS Enterprise.  Named after the heroic USS Enterprise CV-6, she dwarfed even the Super-carriers of the Forrestal class which preceded her and the Kittyhawk class which followed her.  Laid down February 4th 1958 and launched September 24th 1960 the “Big “E”” was commissioned on November 25th 1961.  At 1,101 feet overall and displacing over 85,000 tons full load she was the largest carrier built until the Nimitz class.  Her power plan was both experimental and revolutionary.  Equipped with 8 Westinghouse A2W nuclear reactors generating 2800,000 SHP powering geared turbines the Enterprise was capable of 35+ knots.  With a air group of over 70 aircraft Enterprise would serve in the Cold War, Vietnam, Desert Storm, the Balkans and Middle East culminating in Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom.  Coming into her 50th year Enterprise still serves on active duty as the oldest warship in the US Navy.  She is scheduled to be replaced in the next few years by CVN-78, the USS Gerald R Ford.

Long Beach firing Missiles 1961

The USS Long Beach was the first nuclear guided missile cruiser and the only cruiser built following ships designed during World War II built as a large cruiser, all others would be on large destroyer platforms.  Previous guided missile cruisers had been converted from World War Two Light Cruisers and Heavy Cruisers, some of which retained their forward gun turrets while mounting missiles aft.  The Albany class also converted World War II ships had their entire main battery exchanged for missiles.  The long beach represented an entirely new type of cruiser.  Laid down December 2nd 1957, launched July 14th 1959 and commissioned September 9th 1961 she displaced over 15,000 tons full load. Large and fast equipped with 2 Westinghouse C1W reactors powering GE turbines producing 80,000 SHP she was capable of 30+ knots.

Long Beach after modernization in 1980s

She was equipped with a twin Talos missile launcher, 2 twin Terrier launchers two 5”/51 dual purpose guns in single mounts, the ASROC anti-submarine rocket system and six 12.75” ASW torpedo tubes.  Long Beach would serve until 1995, taking place in every major operation except the Balkans when she was decommissioned.  Her unique superstructure was razed, her nuclear plant recycled and her hulk remains, the trim cruiser lines still in evidence awaiting the scrappers torch at Bremerton Washington.

The hulk of teh ex-Long Beach at Bremerton Naval Shipyard

Bainbridge 1971

The USS Bainbridge originally classified as a Guided Missile Destroyer Leader and a nuclear powered ship of the Leahy class. Bainbridge displaced 8,500 tons and 565 feet long she mounted two twin launcher Terrier missile systems, ASROC, six 15.5 inch ASW torpedo tubes and four 3” dual purpose guns and crewed by 475 men she like Long Beach had the capability of managing the air defense of the battle group.  She was equipped with 2 GE 2DG nuclear reactors powering geared turbines capable of 60,000 SHP which drove her at 30+ knots.  She was laid down May 5th 1959 and launched April 15th 1961 and commissioned on October 6th 1962.

Bainbridge transiting the Suez Canal 1992

She like Long Beach and Enterprise would serve in most every major operation undertaken by the US Navy and during the post Cold War draw down would be decommissioned on September 13th 1996, her nuclear plant recycled and her hulk scrapped at Bremerton Washington.   She would be modernized throughout her career with upgraded radars, missiles and having her 3” guns replaced by Harpoon Surface to Surface Anti-Ship Missiles and given the facilities to operate LAMPS helicopters.

Truxton 1979

The USS Truxton DLGN/CG-35 was a nuclear powered variant of the Belknap class DLG/CGs and equipped with the same power plant but mounted a 5”/51 single mount gun forward and one twin dual purpose launcher for Terrier and ASROC aft. She would also be designed with helicopter facilities to operate a LAMPS helicopter and like Bainbridge be modernized throughout her career.  Laid down June 17th 1963 and launched December 13th 1964 she would not be commissioned until May 27th 1967.  She also would serve in most of the major operations conducted by the Navy until she was decommissioned on September 11th 1995, her nuclear reactor recycled and her hulk scrapped.

Truxton being “recycled”

Enterprise alone remains of these pioneering ships but each would contribute to the future of US Navy shipbuilding.  Next: Task Group 1 and Operation Sea Orbit.

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March 5, 2010 · 00:00

Health Care Reform, Socialized Medicine and Adolf Von Grosse Schmertzen my Big Kidney Stone

I believe that the health care system in our country needs to be reformed.  A of my opinion comes from my days in seminary and after when the health insurance that I had was not worth the powder to blow it to hell for the most part.  My overriding concern is that people get the appropriate health care and treatment when needed and that a lot of this be preventive type care.  At the same time when the situation presents that is not a preventive medicine type situation but rather something that is dehabilitating to the point that an otherwise physically fit person cannot do their job because of pain or the effects of medication needed to keep the pain to manageable levels that treatment should be done expeditiously in order that the person would be able to resume their duties quickly.  This is especially true for those in the military who have a mission that must be done.

I am a moderate in most of life.  I understand the need for social responsibility as well as individual responsibility.  At the same time I know that even when you have a guarantee that you will have your health care taken care of that things do not always work out the way that you think that they should.

I was diagnosed with a 7mm kidney stone almost two weeks ago on a late night trip to the ER.  Despite the fact that there is almost no possibility of passing that big of stone I was given pain meds as well as medicines to help pass the stone.  I was referred to my family practice physician who was surprised that a Urology consult had not been scheduled during my late night ER visit.  He gave me a consult with Urology when I saw him and a couple of days later saw the Urologist who gave me more meds and scheduled me for a ureterorenoscopy to blast the stone and place a stint.  Since we have only so many surgery slots my surgery was scheduled for March 9th which is over 2 weeks after the initial diagnosis.  I had my pre-op appointment today and even though I am in pain even with a high dose of Vicodin my doctor is sending me back to work tomorrow with the instruction to take Extra-Strength Tylenol while I am at work only taking Vicodin if the pain gets too bad. Now with Vicodin the pain is reduced to an almost manageable level but not gone. Sleep is still problematic and just getting comfortable is difficult and between doses of Vicodin doses of 1-2 liters of beer does little to help.  I would venture to say that the pain is too bad already, but I am only a layman.

I have done everything that my doctors have told me and still there is no relief.  I have to wait until Tuesday for the surgery to blast and remove Adolf from his bunker when if the statistical probability of me being able to pass bloody Adolf would have been employed I would have had him removed within days of his discovery. Instead I have had to wait in pain unable to do the work that I need to do and all the while losing ground on my physical fitness program that I have been working so hard on getting back into optimal shape.  My Urologist has elected to send me back to work Friday and Monday with only extra strength Tylenol as a pain reliever because I cannot drive nor do much when taking Vicodin, the world goes around in a counter-clockwise direction.  So tomorrow I will go in to work and try to survive the day. However in reality I think that without my Vicodin I will be back in the doctor’s office in pain begging for relief, in fact based on the pain that I am feeling with the Vicodin I know that I will seeing my family practitioner as soon as I go in to try to get some help.  It is no fun spending two weeks in pain that does not even allow you to sleep that is only mitigated by medicine that makes your world go in a counter-clockwise direction that cannot be taken if you want to drive to work which of course means that the pain will become unbearable.  This is indeed what is in the old parlance called a dilemma and even though I like dill pickles I think that this dill-Emma will be a very sour pickle indeed.

So I shall go in to work and see what happens….

As much as I want to discuss heath care reform in general, I must say without sounding too self centered or look like I am whining that there must be health care reform and let it begin with me.  But I am whining and because I am in pain now this is somewhat self centered. For two weeks I have gone without a decent night’s sleep, been in pain and missed work and lost ground on my physical fitness program while watching my living room move in a counterclockwise direction.  This is not fun and now I’m told to not take the only thing that is keeping the pain at bay.

Now of course there are a lot of people with a lot more dire conditions than me who suffer worse than I do and I don’t dare to compare what I am going through to them, I am not so self centered to think that somehow what I am going through compares to people in long term chronic pain that cannot be mitigated especially those dying.  Thus my complaint may seem in bad form, but I am not a happy camper.  By the time the stone is out and I am done with the recovery period I will have lost three weeks of work and life in general.

Anyway, it is time for my last bit of Vicodin before I go to bed.  Pray for me a sinner and forgive me for whining.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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March 2, 2010 · 18:02

Faith, Hope and Identity a Mid-Lent Meditation

“If it is hope that maintains and upholds faith and keeps it moving on, if it is hope that draws the believer into the life of love, then it will also be hope that is the mobilizing and driving force of faith’s thinking, of its knowledge of, and reflections on, human nature, history and society. Faith hopes in order to know what it believes. Hence all its knowledge will be an anticipatory, fragmentary knowledge forming a prelude to the promised future, and as such is committed to hope.” Jürgen Moltmann- Theology of Hope

When someone goes through a spiritual crisis or loss of faith it is a chilling time.  Even when you are trying to believe there is always a time that you really take stock of exactly what you believe and why.  Without regurgitating the crisis in my life and faith that came after my return from Iraq and near physical, emotional and spiritual collapse that came with my PTSD I wanted to just take a few paragraphs to meditate on the grace, mercy and love of God that is a central theme of the Gospel.

I have talked about the miracle that embraced me during the season of Advent and Christmas.  I call it my “Christmas miracle” because the year prior I had spent Christmas Eve walking in the dark and cold wondering if God even existed even as most of the Christian world was celebrating the Incarnation of Christ the Lord.  Since that time my faith has continued to be renewed and restored and with the exception of battling Adolf Von Grosse Schmertzen my very painful and very big Kidney Stone have come to feel like my old self for the first time since Iraq.

As I have entered Lent it has been a time of renewal.  Part of that renewal has been being able to believe again and as the Psalmist says, “be still and know that I am God.” This has been a refreshing time as I have continued to experience God’s grace as well as grown in my faith which is founded on the Anglican Triad of Scripture, Tradition and Reason.  That actually has helped me as I have experienced some measure of healing and recovery from what I experienced.

My time in Iraq was meaningful and I loved my Marines, Soldiers and other advisers as well as our Iraqi allies.  When I came back I felt alone and a lot of that came as my church had endured a series of scandals and splits and even before Iraq I had been thrashed by some of the people at the center of the storm who have all since left the church for other places that they can afflict.  Coming home to that was disillusioning, as isolation that I felt from many in the chaplain community.  I have found that my experience is not uncommon and that others have had similar experiences upon their return from Iraq.

For me this meant a period of almost two years where it seemed that God himself had disappeared from my life.  I struggled to even pray.  That is no longer the case, I seem to be on the rebound and God is real again.  So things have changed, I think that my faith has matured in some ways, I don’t need to go argue points of doctrine that saints, theologians and philosophers much smarter than me have legitimate disagreements about for centuries.  Nor do I need to push my views on people in my church or anywhere else as if I had the latest and last word from the Almighty.  I used to seek approval and want to have input on denominational theological or liturgical committees and I would write in the hope that my “brilliance” would be recognized and that my opinion would be sought after. When I write something now it is because I believe it and to stimulate interest and discussion and occasionally to answer or critique those who use faith as a weapon to bludgeon or intimidate those that they are against.  I do not expect to change anyone’s mind and since I have no position where I can enforce my beliefs on anyone else (nor would I want to thank you) my thoughts are simply that.  I hope that they edify and encourage and if someone has a “wow I could have had a V-8 moment” reading something that I write I’m okay with that.

Hans Kung once said: “Time and again we see leaders and members of religions incite aggression, fanaticism, hate, and xenophobia – even inspire and legitimate violent and bloody conflicts.” I guess to some this will sound “liberal” but I came back different from Iraq and I have seen too many people suffer from those that would use religion as a weapon to control others. In Iraq I had Iraqi officers; including Generals tell me that they did not trust their Islamic clergy Sunni or Shi’a because they by their words and actions had caused so much suffering during the insurgency that followed the US invasion of Iraq.  Unfortunately I am seeing the same kind of attitude that the Iraqi officers describe grow exponentially in this country, especially among the farthest right of the religious right. The use faith and religion to enforce their particular understanding of the Bible on people who are not Christians is troubling and something that our often very secular and not very Christian “Enlightenment” thinker founders understood. Some now declare anyone who doesn’t agree with them 100% as enemies not only of them, but of God and often over things that are not even Biblical like economics, gun control, taxes and a host of other conservative political issues. Now there are those on the far left that do the same thing but most do not use the Christian faith as justification for their intolerance of opposing views.  Somehow while I don’t think God sees things that way that the extremes see them I know that the Al Qaida Iraq, the Taliban and other groups think much in the same way.   However, such speech is protected and even if disagree with it would not support attempting to silence those who hold beliefs that I disagree with be they religious or political. Debate, dialogue and even disagreement on issues are important in both the Church and society in order that we don’t become a tyranny of the right or left, religious or secular.

As such my faith has grown in that I have no agenda other than to care for the people that God allows me to have contact with.  I’m certainly not perfect at this and at times my default setting of being an ass can re-emerge but I know that Christ is working in my life again.  I have emerged from what Saint John of the Cross called “the dark night of the soul.”  My faith is in God and in Christ crucified who in the words of St Paul who said “in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us.” (2 Cor 5:19 NRSV) I like what Chrysostom says about this passage: “For had it been His pleasure to require an account of the things we had transgressed in, we should all have perished….” The fact that God has condescended to reach out to his creation in this manner is evidenced also in 1 John 2:1-2 where the Apostle writes: “My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have one who speaks to the Father in our defense—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. 2He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for[the sins of the whole world.” For me this Lent is about reconciliation and the forgiveness of sins in an age where so many are drawing lines in the sand and preparing for war, be it religious, social or ideological.

So anyway, it has become more important to me after having gone to war and seeing its effects on people as well as having looked into the abyss of hopelessness to be an advocate for reconciliation, peace and hope for the future especially in my own country where the anger, division and even hatred between the political and religious right and the political, religious and secular left seems to rise to new heights every day.

My identity is not in a political leader, party or ideology, it is in Christ crucified. My optimism is based on him and the creation that he reconciles unto himself and I cannot give up hope or be silent about God’s love and reconciliation .  As Dietrich Bonhoeffer said: “The essence of optimism is that it takes no account of the present, but it is a source of inspiration, of vitality and hope where others have resigned; it enables a man to hold his head high, to claim the future for himself and not to abandon it to his enemy.”

Peace,

Padre Steve+

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