That is why those pathetic people who simply “want friends” can never make any. The very conditions of having Friends is that we should want something else besides Friends. Where the truthful answer to the question Do you see the same truth? would be “I see nothing and I don’t care about the truth; I only want a Friend,” no friendship can arise – though Affection of course may. There would be nothing for the Friendship to be about; and Friendship must me about something, even if it were only an enthusiasm about dominoes or white mice. Those who have nothing can share nothing; those who are going nowhere can have no fellow-travellers.

We can thus detect the pride of Friendship . . . in many circles of Friends. It would be rash to assume that our own is safe from its danger; for of course it is in our own that we should be slowest to recognize it. The danger of such pride is indeed almost inseparable from Friendly love. Friendship must exclude. From the innocent and necessary act of excluding to the spirit of exclusiveness is an easy step; and thence to the degrading pleasure of exclusiveness. If that is once admitted the downward slope will grow rapidly steeper.

I love Sarah with all of my heart and could not be happier that I am marrying her. 22 days does not sound like a long time at all now that I think about it. For those who don’t know us or our story, visit http://www.samandsarah.info for the scoop. Also, I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t point out that the site was designed and developed by yours truly. . .

LIBERAL TALIBAN ISSUES FATWA AGAINST MISS CALIFORNIA
by Ann Coulter
May 13, 2009

Not even Dick Cheney can incite the blood-curdling rage of liberals [like] the sight of a sexy Evangelical Christian. Paula Jones, Katherine Harris, Michele Bachmann, Sarah Palin and, most recently, Miss California, Carrie Prejean, have all come under a frenzy of attacks from liberals.

Christians are supposed to be fat, balding sweaty little men with bad complexions. It’s liberals who are supposed to be the sexy ones. (I know that from watching “The West Wing” and all movies starring Julia Roberts.)

But sadly for liberals, in real life, the fat, balding sweaty little guy with the bad complexion is Perez Hilton and the smoking-hot babe is Carrie Prejean.

This apparent contradiction incites violent anger in liberals, triggering their famous “fight or flight” response. So liberal masturbators are, once again, launching furious attacks on a beautiful Christian in a fit of pique similar to the one directed at Joan of Arc.

First, the Miss USA contest held a press conference to announce that Prejean had breast implants. Take a Christian position in public and Satan’s handmaidens will turn all your secrets into front-page news.

Next, a photographer released a single cheesecake photo of Prejean. This prompted liberal reporters who have never met a Christian to proclaim that Christians were outraged by the photo. Liberals believe abortion is a sacrament, but smoking, wearing short skirts and modeling lingerie are mortal sins. (And if wearing women’s underwear is a basis for being disqualified from the pageant, that’s the end of Perez Hilton’s judging career.)

Then on Monday some genuine “semi-nude” photos were released. These were not what we’d call appropriate for a Christian. In a curiously similar attack, the left’s final attempt to destroy Paula Jones was to lure her into appearing naked in Penthouse magazine. Oh well.

Christians aren’t people who believe they are without sin; they’re people who know they’re sinners and are awestruck by God’s grace in sending his only Son to take the punishment they deserve.

This is in contradistinction to liberals, all of whom believe they’re on a fast track to heaven on the basis of being “basically good” people — and also believe that anyone who disagrees with that theological view is evil.

Finally (so far, anyway), reporters gleefully released the divorce records of Prejean’s parents. Because when you want the truth, what is more reliable than angry accusations traded in the middle of an acrimonious divorce?

Liberals used the divorce papers to argue that Prejean had some deep-seated psychological disturbance causing her to oppose gay marriage. Symptoms of this debilitating illness include a belief in some sort of “god” and a reverence for the Bible.

It’s not as if Prejean’s special talent in the Miss USA contest was to perform an opposite-sex marriage. (Or, as the president and I call it, “marriage.”) She didn’t even volunteer her “controversial” views on marriage. Rather, she was asked for her opinion on gay marriage and gave it — in an answer wrapped in so many layers of sugar it took 10 minutes to get to the point.

“Well, I think it’s great that Americans are able to choose one way or the other. We live in a land where you can choose same-sex marriage or opposite marriage. You know what, in my country, in my family, I do believe that marriage should be between a man and a woman, no offense to anybody out there. But that’s how I was raised, and I believe that it should be between a man and a woman.”

What a vicious hate-monger! Any second there I was expecting her to bust out a “by golly!” or an “oh my gosh!” Angry gay-marriage supporters should be happy they didn’t get my version of that answer. It contains some terms you won’t find in your Bible.

Liberals wouldn’t attack James Dobson with the amount of bile they’ve directed at a 21-year-old beauty contestant. It’s not just Christianity — it’s women liberals hate.

From Jean-Paul Sartre, Pablo Picasso and Bertrand Russell, who treated women — mostly their mistresses — like dogs, to Teddy Kennedy and Bill Clinton in our own day, liberals are ferocious misogynists. They share Muslims’ opinion of women, differing only to the extent that liberals also support a women’s right to have an abortion and to perform lap dances.

You’d be better off in a real burqa than under the authority of a liberal American male.

I’m not sure we needed a psychological profile of Prejean to figure out why she holds the same position on gay marriage as: the president, the vice president, the secretary of state, Bill Clinton, John Kerry, John Edwards and his mistress, and the vast majority of the American people.

But what is crying out for an explanation is why every bubble-head TV news anchorette from a nice, churchgoing red state ends up adopting the political views of Karl Marx.

From Katie Couric on CBS to Norah O’Donnell on MSNBC, the whole stable of TV anchorettes weirdly have the exact same politics as their liberal masters. It’s the ideological burqa women are required to wear to work in the mainstream media. As with a conventional burqa, it enforces conformity and severely restricts the vision.

The only way to protect yourself is to do the liberal male’s bidding, as the bubble-head anchorettes do, or stand on the rock of Christianity.

Now, another beautiful Christian has thrown off the liberal burqa, thereby inciting mass hysteria throughout the liberal establishment. Prejean doesn’t care. She is blazing across the sky, as impotent nose-pickers jockey for a piece of her reflected light by hurling insults at her.

COPYRIGHT 2009 ANN COULTER
DISTRIBUTED BY UNIVERSAL PRESS SYNDICATE
1130 Walnut, Kansas City, MO 64106

Now she’s lost me by the end, but it still remains that some of what she has said really does reflect the attitude of some of our more liberal commentators in this country. I despise the blanket negativity Ann spews, but I agree some points:

1. This is an unwarranted attack on a moderate Christian stemming from a double-standard among many liberals. The double standard being: It is OK for women to exercise the same rights that men have, until those women say something that threatens the well-being of the interests of the men. In other words, you can stand up, as a woman, for what you believe in as long as you believe in the same things we believe in. This is not women’s liberation. It is fake.

2. Many liberals fail to understand Christians. This is a failure on our part as well as theirs. We hear of and see hate-mongering within our Christian circles all the time – whether it is directed towards homosexuals, abortionists, or even middle-easterners. It only takes so much of this in the left-wing media to solidify the idea in the heads of many of our liberal countrymen that all Christians are homophobic racists. It would do us good to show those that have been misled that the homophobic Christian is not following Christ at all – that the racist Christian is not following Christ at all. In other words, many of the Christians that these liberals hate are not Christians at all. It is sad that even a flowered and modest opinion like that of Miss California is attacked as homophobic, but the truth of the matter is that until we prove to the world that Christians LOVE homosexuals just as Christ LOVES homosexuals and weeps over their sin we are no closer to winning them.

“Knowledge of the sciences is so much smoke apart from the heavenly science of Christ” – John Calvin

I cannot prove God with physical evidence. I would be disappointed if I could. To the atheist it would certainly be a paradox. The atheist requires proof, but God commands blind faith first. God has certainly proved Himself to me, but only after I followed blindly. There is no satisfying proof to be had, save the power of the Holy Spirit.

Step aside, man, and you will have the true power of Christ manifest in your soul. Insist on nothing. Christianity is either fake and of no importance or it is true and all-important. If it is fake you will soon realize it. The Holy Spirit cannot work if He does not exist. If it is real the matter will sort itself out. God is faithful in proving Himself to those he wishes to rescue.