Evil

October 24, 2015

The Sin That Infected Our Entire Society

Sin PatentLast week I wrote about how the Governor of California, Jerry Brown, had signed a bill into law that legalized doctor-assisted suicide. When I found out about the new law, I thought about the deep-rooted thistles I had to dig up from the pasture next to my parents’ home when I was a teenager.

October 17, 2015

Sloppily Describing a Governor as a “Devout” Catholic

ThistleDuring the years I was growing up, my parents owned an acre and a half of land that was located next to our house. When I was a young boy, my dad made a pasture by putting up a fence around the land. He also built a barn on the land.

July 18, 2015

Backstage at a Professional Performance

Backstage PassDuring the spring semester of my junior year in high school (1974), I organized a barbershop quartet. I recruited three of my friends who were in the music program with me at the high school. We started out by practicing at the house of one of the guys in the quartet. We continued practicing throughout the summer and started performing in the fall.

June 6, 2015

John Wayne vs. Bruce Jenner

John WayneEvery so often, my wife tells me that I’m living in the wrong times. Because of my old-fashioned beliefs, she claims that I would have been better off living during the 1800s. Whenever she comments about this, I remind her that I spent the better part of my early years at my grandfather’s (Tom Williams’s) house, and since he was born in 1898, that’s probably where I picked up a lot of my beliefs.

May 16, 2015

Modern-Day Goddesses

KardashiansWhen I was growing up during the 1960s and early 1970s, my favorite movies were Westerns. I’m not sure why. One reason may have been because I watched a lot of television with my grandfather, Tom Williams, and he liked Westerns. Another reason may have been because the heroes in Westerns were always tough, rugged, no-nonsense men who reminded me of the men on the Williams side of the family.

April 25, 2015

Dumb Behavior

DumbI recently filed a chapter 7 bankruptcy case for a client who owed a significant amount of money to some local loan shark companies. (I call payday and title loan companies “loan shark companies” because they routinely charge up to 300% interest per year on money that is loaned to customers.) My client also had several thousand dollars in accumulated debt that he owed to credit card companies and medical providers. For the purpose of this article, I’m going to call my client “Jim.”

April 4, 2015

Flushing Poison Out of Your Heart, Mind and Soul

Forgiveness - PoisonDo you know what the Blessed Mother, the apostles, the disciples, and all the followers of Jesus had in common, other than believing that Jesus was the Son of God? They all forgave everyone who was involved in the torture and murder of their Savior. Think about how difficult that had to be. I know how hard it is for me to forgive certain people for what they have done to me, but I can’t imagine how difficult it would have been to forgive those murderers.

October 11, 2014

One of My Favorite Fight Scenes

Top Ten Fight ScenesLast week while I was on my way to a court hearing, I stepped onto an elevator to go up to the floor where the courtroom was located.  When I got on the elevator, there were five other individuals inside, one of whom was talking on her cell phone.  As the elevator doors closed, the woman said, “I’m in an elevator so if I lose you, I’ll call you back.”

July 19, 2014

Modern-Day Advice from a 13th-Century Saint

Thomas AquinasLast week, I wrote about how an adorer (“Tony”) had criticized me because of an article that I had written about Amazon.com and its founder, Jeff Bezos.  Tony provided several reasons why I (and other Catholics) should refuse to do business with Amazon, one of which is that “Amazon distributes pornography.”  Here’s how I responded to the comment about the pornography issue:

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