Let’s Talk America

Commentary on American Life

United States Food Scandal

Jan 8

Posted by Matt Tavares in Culture | 1 Comment

Our Experts Are Good

We are processed people.  Why?  Well, The movie Processed People tries to address just that.  You see, in America we have many experts and professionals, who are extremely talented at what they do.  We have people who are experts in math, science, engineering, and business.  It shows in our great success as a country.  If we have this in mind, it should be of no surprise that there are individuals in this country, who are extremely good at selling you and I food.  And, that’s exactly what they’ve done.  They’ve sold us a “normal” diet of salt and processed “foods”.  There are experts out there who spend their whole day trying to figure out how to maximize the profits of their companies.  This means using cheaper products, which taste good, and therefore maximize profitability.  The major problem for us, is that we’re under nourished.  As a consequence of being undernourished, we eat more of these terrible foods they’re selling us, and it comes as no surprise that we get fat.  Dr. Fuhrman talks about this below:

Salt

We were not meant to consume salt, but if you look at any food label you’ll see sodium in it.  We’re used to having salt in our food, whether you realize it or not.  Just try tasting some food without salt, and it will probably be bland.  Look at the back of your food boxes and you’ll be amazed at the daily value of salt you’re having in just one serving.  Sure there is some natural sodium in fruits in vegetables, but it’s so minuscule, that it wouldn’t even register as 1% on the so called recommended daily value.

Processed Foods

The experts I talked about above are extremely good at developing cheap chemical substitutes to natural substances in our food.  They’re making us extremely unhealthy at the cost of their profitability.  It’s really an ethical struggle in my mind. Watch this video below by Dr. McDougall, who does a nice job of explaining why we’re in for a health disaster in this country:

The Consequence

Only 4% of Americans had heart disease in 1900.  Now it’s 41%.  Isn’t that amazing?  What has changed?  I would argue the industrial revolution, the desire to maximize profits, and the growing education which supports the extremely smart people selling you and I terrible foods.  The question for us all is, do we want to give our body the correct octane, or will you just throw anything in the tank?

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Who Do They Say I am?

Dec 25

Posted by Matt Tavares in Culture, Religion, World | No Comments

Merry Christmas

Christmas has arrived for us again, and among many other things it’s a time to ask Who is this holiday about?  It happens to be a very good question, because the people of Jesus’ time were wondering the exact same thing, “Who is this Jesus guy?”  As a matter of fact, Jesus even asked his followers the same thing, “Who do they say I am?”

Our Jewish Heritige

I feel Christmas is also a time to acknowledge our Jewish heritage, and the deep history the Jewish people have in this world of ours.  I believe that we must understand Jewish heritage to begin to have an answer to the question Jesus asked his followers, which is, “Who do they say I am?”

Some Say You’re Elijah

Some of Jesus’ followers responded, “Some say you’re Elijah”.  Well, who is this Elijah guy?  In short, Elijah was a Jewish prophet, who lived hundreds of years before Jesus.  Elijah did all sorts of things including predicting events that happened within his lifetime, raising someone from the dead, and immediately being brought up to heaven without dying.  These are certainly hard things to believe during this day and age, but we’re told by the Jews that we shouldn’t be experiencing things like this in our times.  The Jews were told by the prophet Malachi that Elijah would return here on earth before the coming of the Messiah (Jesus).  So we must understand that the Jewish people would be expecting Elijah before even considering the coming of Jesus.

Some Say You’re John the Baptist

Who is this John the baptist guy, and why do people keep mistaking Jesus for all these different people.  In short, John the baptist was born before Jesus, and his job was to set the way for the Lord (Jesus).  John performed baptisms, or cleansing in water, to purify humans before the coming of the sinless Jesus.  As a matter of fact, to add to the confusion, people asked John if he was Elijah, or if he was the Messiah.  Hopefully we shed a little light on the Elijah question in the last section.  And as for the Messiah question, John simply responds to them, “I am not even worthy to loosen his sandal, I am just preparing the way for him”.

Let’s Ask The Man Directly

Hopefully now we realize, as expected, Jesus himself would have gotten the same line of questioning.  His followers asked him,

“Why do the Jewish leaders insist Elijah must return before the Messiah comes?”.

Then Jesus clears the whole thing up for us and says,

“In fact, he [Elijah] already has come, but he wasn’t recognized, and was badly mistreated by many… Then the disciples realized he was speaking of John the Baptist.”-Matthew 17:10-13

Who Is He?

So after all this confusion about who Jesus was, hopefully we can give a more complete answer now.  Simply put, Jesus is the fulfillment of God’s salvation for us through the line of the Jewish people.  Christianity was born from a group of Jewish people, who interpreted Jesus as the Messiah promised by the prophets.  The prophets Isaiah, and Daniel (to the exact day) told the Jewish people that the Messiah would come to cover up the sins that we continuously fall short of avoiding.  Even today he covers them up under one condition, and that is we choose to actively love Him.  The big question for all of us this Christmas is whether we’ll accept this gift.

“Why do the Jewish leaders insist Elijah must return before the Messiah comes?”

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The US Jewish Population – Fascinating

Nov 1

Posted by Matt Tavares in Culture, Religion | No Comments

An Amazing Small Population

In America, the Jewish population is less than 2%.  That small number encompasses the second largest Jewish population of any country other than Israel.  Historians have been amazed that the Jewish people have survived thousands of years despite continually maintaining such a small percentage of the world population.  Worldwide, Jews only make up less than 1 percent of the population.

American Universities – A Jewish All Star Team

Below I’ve listed some American Universities, and their percentage of student body, who are Jewish.  Despite Jews only taking up less than 2% of the American population, they make up 20-30 percent of the student body in these major universities.

Rank University Enrollment of Jewish Student (est.) % of Student body Undergraduate Enrollment
1 New York University 6,500 33% 19,401
2 Boston University 4,000 20% 15,981
3 Cornell University 3,500 25% 13,515
4 University of Miami 3,100 22% 14,000
5 The George Washington University
University of Pennsylvania
Yeshiva University		 2,800 31%
30%
99%		 10,394
9,718
2,803
8 Syracuse University 2,500 20% 12,500
9 Columbia University
Emory University
Harvard University
Tulane University		 2,000 29%
30%
30%
30%		 6,819
6,510
6,715
6,533
13 Brandeis University[51]
Northwestern University[52]
Washington University in St. Louis[53]		 1,800 56%
23%
29%		 3,158
7,826
6,097

What Does This Mean?

Among many other possible conclusions, including Jewish locality, and tendencies of Jews, I gather the Jews have figured out a way of life that works.  In a world of takeover and conquest, they’ve found a way to survive and thrive without the benefit of numbers.

Where is it Going?

There are some people who believe, statistically, that the US Jewish population may be gone within 100 years.  Why?  In 1940, only 6% of Jewish marriages in the US were mixed marriages with non-Jews.  Today, that number is 40-50%.  Additionally, the number of these mixed marriages, only 33% raise their children Jewish.  Finally, the decrease in Jewish birthrate reduced the US Jewish population 5% in the 1990s.  I’m not going to go any farther other than to say these statistics are interesting, and could potentially lead to a different America.

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Room for God in the Age of Reason?

Oct 8

Posted by Matt Tavares in Religion | No Comments

College

You would be hard pressed to find a college degree in which a student didn’t have to display some sort of analytical thinking through logic, proof, and/or empirical research.  It is the major mechanism of thinking for most college classrooms.

The question is, can we apply this type of reasoning to the existence of God, or does this reasoning disprove or make the existence of God uncertain?

The Roadblocks

It has been said that being a religious Jew boils down to whether God spoke to the Hebrew people on Mt. Sanai–where he gave the Ten Commandments to Moses.  For a Christian, it boils down to whether Jesus rose from the dead the third day after his crucifixion.  If God didn’t speak to the Jews on Sanai, then he’s not real.  If Jesus didn’t rise from the dead, Christianity is invalid.

The Questions

Blind faith is weak.  My guess is that one of the atheist standpoints is that believers in the Jewish and Christian God simply accept Him blindly.  I would suggest that if this is the case, the believer will run into many roadblocks.  Understanding is faith in action.  We must be able to apply our reason and logic to investigate the following two questions:

1) Did God talk to the Jews on Sinai over 3,000 years ago?

2) Was a man named Jesus raised from the dead 2,000 years ago?

Not Going to Be Easy

As you can tell proving the existence of these two events can be fairly difficult considering the people, who need to take the stand, are dead.  I’m not going to spend paragraphs trying to prove the existence of either one of these two events.  I’m just going to suggest that these two events can be a starting point to your journey.  When it all started, the Jews knew God existed because they saw them.  The first Christians new Jesus existed, because they saw him risen from the dead.  Today, we have the task of exploring their writings, praying to God and Jesus, and coming up with our conclusion.  The one thing I know for certain is that if we don’t pursue the experiement, we’ll never have the chance of figuring it out, either way.  I’ll leave you with the story of Thomas after Christ had risen from the dead:

‘We have seen the Lord.’ So he [Thomas] said to them, ‘Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe.’ And after eight days His disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, ‘Peace to you!’ Then He said to Thomas, ‘Reach your finger here, and look at my hands; and reach your hand here, and put it into My side. Do not be unbelieving, but believing.’ And Thomas answered and said to Him, ‘My Lord and my God!’ Jesus said to him, ‘Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.’

There is either much to be taken away from this short story, or it is perhaps one of the cruelest hoaxes of all time.  I think it’s worth pursuing.

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Simplicity of a Child’s Mind

Sep 18

Posted by Matt Tavares in Culture, Philosophy, Religion | No Comments

We’re living in an age of amazing technological advancements.  Even as an engineer, it truly amazes me to look around every day at cars, computers, medical technology, and amazing architectural feats.  One slight concern I have for myself and the country at times is that we live for these things.  What is truly natural in this world is amazingly simple.  A child can have much joy without knowing the inner workings of the natural physical world or the man made world.  Perhaps that is why Jesus said,

“Let the little children come to me, and do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.”

Sometimes I find myself getting wrapped up in the deep analysis of scripture, physics, and many other things.  It’s always helpful to get a fresh perspective when I’m reminded of the simplicity of what really matters.  Something has always gotten me in the simplest of prayers such as this one:

May the Lord Jesus Christ be with You.
That He may Defend You.
Within you, that He may Sustain You.
Before You that He may Lead You.
Behind You that He may Protect You.
Above You that He may Bless You.
In the name of the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit.

The world just stops when you think about something like that.

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Zion and Babylon, More Than Buzzwords

Aug 23

Posted by Matt Tavares in Culture, Religion | No Comments

More Than Buzzwords

Often times in Reggae and Rap, we hear the words “Zion” and “Babylon”, and I’m guessing that some of us have never taken the time to understand what they mean.  I hope to shed a little light on this in this post.  A popular song of our time is “Rivers of Babylon”, performed by Bob Marley, Sublime, and The Melodians, and others.  It turns out that this song gets most of its lyrics from Psalm 137 of the Jewish Tanakh and the Christian bible.  Matisyahu, a reggae artist of our time, in his song “Jeresulem” also pulls from Psalm 137.  When I searched youtube for a version of “Rivers of Babylon”, I found one guy toasting a beer to its intro, and another group using profanity to introduce the song.  I’m guessing they appreciate the groove of it more than its lyrics.

Zion and Babylon are both biblical terms, originating from the Jewish culture.    There is just such beautiful story behind these two words, that it will be hard to do to it justice in a blog post.  I will start with Zion, since it occurs first in the Jewish Tanakh or the Christian Bible.

Zion

The short answer to this one is that Zion literally means an area Jerusalem.  The first time we see it mentioned in the Bible is in the story of David.  David was the greatest Jewish King, who became a soldier and a hero in his teenage years.  David is also the author of most of the Psalms in the Bible.  We are told in the Bible that David is one of the people in history in high regard by God.  He is a hero of Jewish heritage.  If you want to get an idea of how a good relationship with God works, then read David’s Psalms, they’re beautiful.  A bible teacher of mine suggested reading one in the morning and one at night every day, otherwise you won’t get as much out of them in one sitting.  I highly recommend this.  As a favorite author of mine, Matthew Kelly, said, “Our lives change when our habits change”.  So, getting back to it, Zion refers to Mount Zion in Old Testament times, where David conquered a Jebusite fortress in the path to claiming the land that God promised to them through the prophets.

Zion – Deeper Meaning

Zion is also meant to have a much deeper meaning of God’s Holy Dwelling place.  It can be used to mean all things God.  In actuality, if you have faith in God, infinity is his, so why one mountain called Zion?  In the times of the first Jews, God’s relationship with them was very intimate.  So much so that he contacted Abraham individually to start the first covenant, or promise and agreement with the Hebrew people.  The first time we see God dealing with people on a massive scale was on Mount Sinai, shortly after delivering the ten commandments to the Jews.  To sidetrack a bit, if you talk to a lot of Jews this is a big moment for them.  The question of determining if God is real or not, really boils down to a question of whether he spoke to their ancestors on Sinai.  If he didn’t, the whole thing is a wash.  This is a very similar concept in Christinaity, which was born out of Judiasm.  The idea of Jesus’ validity can be boiled down to the whether he was risen from the dead.  If he wasn’t, all of Christianity is a wash.  To get back to it, Zion continued to be used in future places of the bible beyond just that one mountain.  It was used to described the Holy Land of God on all levels, both physical and spiritual.

Babylon

The simple version of Babylon is that it was an empire in the B.C. times.  The Babylonians conquered the Jews.  They took the Jews into perhaps the second biggest bought of slavery since the time they were enslaved in Egypt.  This was after a time in which the Jewish culture as a whole was becoming increasingly corrupt, and deviating away from the Davidic convenent with God.  Understanding this story makes the song “Rivers of Babylon” come alive.  As mentioned earlier, this song is derived from Psalm 137.  It’s just so sad and beautiful to think about what the Jews were going through in this Psalm. Here they are, in slavery, and their captors are badgering them to sing the songs of their God who appears to be no longer with them at the time.  The Babylonians say,

“Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”

The Jews reply:
How can we sing the songs of the Lord while in a foreign land?
If I forget you, O Jerusalem,
may my right hand forget [its skill].

You may recognize this lyric from the popular reggae and rap artists Matisyahu in his song “Jerusalem”.  He says,

Jerusalem, if I forget you,
let my right hand forget what it’s supposed to do.

In the ancient days, we will return with no delay
Picking up the bounty and the spoils on our way
We’ve been traveling from state to state
And them don’t understand what they say
3,000 years with no place to be
And they want me to give up my milk and honey
Don’t you see, it’s not about the land or the sea
Not the country but the dwelling of his majesty

Babylon – Deeper Meaning

Today, Babylon can mean all things foreign to God.  Today it’s used to mean the West, and the portion of the world without God.  More simply put, godlessness  The meaning is ultimately up for you to decide.  To me, it’s a little reminder.  If we fall away from God, we will fall to Babylon.  Sin is subtle, and falling away from God is subtle, and hence why falling as a nation is subtle.  These things can creep up on us.  We should be reminded in America that most of our constitution was drafted on principles of the Bible, and implicitly the Jewish Tanakh.  George Washington himself often says that if it weren’t for the hand of God, they would have never won the Revolutionary war.  Read or listen to 1776 for a great recount of this.  The phrase “Jereslum, if I forget you, let me forget what my right hand can do” sings so loud when we begin to think about these things.

More Than Sound

Music can sound great, and this probably what attracts us to it at first.  But there is just so much more to music with meaning.  If you think about all the garbage we have out there today, with people singing about their body, fame, money, and ego, it’s just such a ripoff compared to songs like Matisyahu’s.  Hopefully, I’ve given you some sort of richer experience when listening to songs with the all too causally mentioned “Zion” and “Babylon”.

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China Aborts Almost Half its Babies

Jul 31

Posted by Matt Tavares in Religion, World | 2 Comments

Surprise, The Catholic Talks About it Again

I suppose it’s quite obvious for a Catholic to write an article in opposition to abortion.  I actually didn’t have any future plans of writing on abortion a second time, but sometimes things happen in life that stir up the pot again.  I suppose if this article helps even one person, it would have been well worth the second shot at it.

Why Am I Talking About it Again?

An article just came out in BBC describing some numbers that just made me more upset than anything in my life.  You see, China has 20 million babies every year.  China also kills 13 million babies every year through abortion. That means almost half of all babies inside a woman’s womb are killed every year.  Now we can go into the classic pro choice claim that abortion is really for extreme cases of rape, disease, or a mother’s concern.  But there is absolutely no way we can look at 13 million cases, and say that.  This is by far the greatest tragedy of our time.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8175864.stm

Their Solution: Sex “Education”

If you read the article, their “solution” to the abortion problem: more sex education.  The concept of sex education is just amazing to me.  The whole concept and class can be summed up into one sentence:  If you are open to having children, have sex, and if you are not do not have sex.  Instead we play this game where we think we can cheat sex.  Whether it’s consciously or not, as a society we think we can enjoy all the pleasure of sex without having a child.  And if we do have a child, it’s an accident.  We think we can avoid that with condoms, birth control pills, and other methods.  What a shame.  I mean, how much more logical can we get?  Instead, we put ourselves through so much pain by flirting with the tremendous power of the most spectacular thing we can experience as humans.  There is always a possibility of children when we have sex.  There is no such thing as safe sex.  It’s an illusion, it’s a myth, it’s a lie.

Why Don’t We Have Sex?

If you’ve never really thought about why Catholics and Jews aren’t supposed to have premarital sex, it’s a great opportunity to do so.  Why do Jews and Catholics forbid premarital sex?  Because God, through the prophets, told them not to (We’ll save the validity of the prophets for another day).  Why would God tell us not to?  He wants to help us avoid great pain.  Before marriage, there is absolutely no commitment to the other person.  We can give as many I love yous and romantic Hallmark cards as we want, but like it or not there is no commitment.  But for some really odd reason, we decide to partake in sex even though its consequences can be forever.  The new unfortunate answer to this cognitive dissonance: abortion.  We want to have our cake and eat it too.  We want the pleasures of sex with the backup plan: abortion.  It’s just not logical.

Population Control

It is perhaps one of the scariest terms of our time.  I suppose someone countering my arguments above would quickly point out China aborts this many children for population control, as if this macro-level argument justifies the scariest limitation of rights in our time.  The fact that another human could even tell you that you must kill your child is absolutely chilling.

Just to give some context, the Jewish Holocaust is sometimes thought to be the worst event for humanity in our time.  It is estimated that this horrific event killed 6 Million Jews.  Although it doesn’t minimize the lives of the individuals who were victims, it gives us some context to understand China aborts twice that number in one year alone.

13 million abortions to 20 million births every year.  Think about that.

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Why Prayer Doesn’t Work

Jul 10

Posted by Matt Tavares in Religion | No Comments

Prayer and Science

Under modern scientific examination, prayer doesn’t appear to work.  If someone asks me to pray for something on demand so that they may have empircal proof of its validity, I will probably fail.  If I pray for a pink elephant in front of me right now, then I probably won’t get it.  Is this because it’s impossible?  Maybe.  The big question then becomes does prayer not work at all, or does it only work under certain conditions?

The Master

Jesus, whether we believe in his existence as a fictional or non-fictional character has an amazing knack for a simplicity and concisness for words.  Therefore, I will quote him in explaining why prayer may not work.  This is a reading from the book of Mark in the New Testament of the Bible:

Mk 6:1-6

Jesus departed from there and came to his native place, accompanied by his disciples. When the sabbath came he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astonished.  They said, “Where did this man get all this? What kind of wisdom has been given him?  What mighty deeds are wrought by his hands!  Is he not the carpenter, the son of Mary, and the brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon?   And are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him.  Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his native place and among his own kin and in his own house.”  So he was not able to perform any mighty deed there, apart from curing a few sick people by laying his hands on them.
He was amazed at their lack of faith.

There are three key issues going on in this passage:

  1. The elders are amazed at Jesus’ wisdom, despite the fact that he’s so young.
  2. Jesus points out the issue of human behavior in which we aren’t appreciated in our home land.
  3. He is unable to perform miracles for those of no faith.

Number 2 is pretty interesting to me.  Think about what happens when you try to explain some revelation you’ve had to a friend or family member.  They don’t really appreciate it, because it’s just you…the same person who’s always been around.  I think we can find comfort in the fact that even Jesus experiences this lack of enthusiasm.  A friend of mine who specializes in web startup companies points out the fact that the worst way to gain traction for a new business project is to start with your friends.  More than likely they will show a half-hearted interest in your project.  All the while you may have thousands of people in the world, who don’t know you, itching for your ideas.

Number 3 is even more interesting to me.  We read, “So he was not able to perform any mighty deed there, apart from curing a few sick people by laying his hands on them.  He was amazed at their lack of faith.”  We realize that Jesus was only able to perform miracles on those of faith.  There is major Theological value and question that arises from this key passage.  If Jesus is God in flesh, then why couldn’t he do something?  To step aside for a moment, there are two main themes behind almost every miracle encounter Jesus has with the sick in the Bible.  First he always tells them to tell no one of the healing.  Second, instead of telling them their sickness is healed, he tells them that their sins are forgiven.  How strange at first sight.  Why would he not want people to know he performed miracles if his mission on earth is to sacrifice himself for the greater good of humanity?  Why would he ignore the major physical fact of the sicknesses he healed to get at the issue of sin?

Piecing it Together

If we go back to the reading in Mark, where Jesus could not perform any miracles, and we go to the obersvations just mentioned during his frequent encounters with the sick, what can we piece together?  First he does not allow himself to heal those that have no faith in him.  Second, he does not want to spend any time or effort on the infinitely lesser issues of physical illness to more precicely get at the infinitely greater issue of soul illness.  He did not come to heal the bodily sick, he came to sacrafice himself for the sickness of the soul–sin.

Why Doesn’t it Work

In an age that needs empirical proof through the scientific method, we have no clear study to create.  Why?  Jesus plainly states it in Mark,  no faith.  A remaining question may be, why don’t I get my pink elephant even if I do have faith?  Well, I would argue that prayers which are good for us eternally are the only ones that are answered.  According to the book of all books, we’re here for one reason and that is to know and serve God.  If the prayer doesn’t have to do with that, I’m afraid we’re out of luck.  One may say that would create a pretty boring life.  But I would suggest that we remember we come to know God through the people and relationships around us.  Take marriage for example.  Our modern world views marriage as the right thing to do, or something to do, or somethin that feels right.  The Church takes a clear stance on marriage, and that is for the purpose of coming closer to God through the sacrafice to your spouse and children.  Praying for a better relationship with your friends, family, and spouse are prayer that can be answered, because they fufill the ultimate purpose.  The whole difficulty in all this is that it requires exactly what the Master says, faith.

May the Lord support us all today long until the shades lengthen and the evening comes, and the busy world is hushed, the fever of life is over, and our work is done. — John Henry Newman

sacredheartjesus3

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Is Debt OK?

Jun 20

Posted by Matt Tavares in Personal Finance | No Comments

For the last 4 years, since I’ve been out of college, I’ve been carrying around a student loan debt.  I went to a school that was too expensive for my family, because it seemed “normal”.  Shortly after I “bought” a car, because I had $1,000 of repairs on my old one.  My new car came with $18,000 worth of debt.  About a year later, I decided I didn’t like that car and “bought” another one.  I figured I was making enough money, so I could certainly do the “normal” car financing thing.

When I got to San Diego I started the usual task of setting my radio presets.  As I get older I find myself listening to more an more AM radio.  One Sunday, I had the opportunity of hearing Dave Ramsey on one of my choice AM stations.  He spent a lot of time talking about the giant debt illusion we’re under.  This includes thinking financing cars, giant student loans, and 30 year mortgages are normal.  After a few weekends of hearing Ramsey casually, I started to hate my car loan.  I was driving around in something I didn’t own.  My credit union owned it.  It just seems so weird thinking back on it.

I wasn’t totally financially oblivious, because I knew about the emergency fund and the need for retirement savings.  I was just lost as to how urgent these things were, and whether I should be tackling them all at once.  I decided that I really hated the car loan, so I decided to pay that off.  It feels great to actually own the car now.  As a matter of fact, when I called the credit union to close out the loan the representative complimented me on how much of an accomplishment it was to pay off the loan.  No matter what her motives were, she was truly right.  I removed that unnecessary shackle off my ankle.

After my car was paid off I started accumulating my emergency fund, which I had heard about in various places.  If you haven’t heard of one, it’s basically a bucket of savings that is designed to save you when losing a job or catastrophe happens.  It prevents you from getting into the credit card spiral when things get bad.

A few weeks ago my coworker gave me Dave Ramsey’s book called The Total Money Makeover.  I quickly realized that my low interest student loan was not a good loan.  Ramsey is really big into the psychology of debt, where he says debt is 80% mental and 20% mathematical.  I started to agree with him as I realized my seemingly low interest loan was causing subconscious mental burden in addition to several hundred dollars in interest every year.  It was for this reason I decided to dump that out-of-order emergency fund into this loan.

The reason I tell these stories is because I was overwhelmed by all the financial advice to take.  I thought my student loan was ok, because it was low interest, and I thought I was sitting pretty with my large emergency fund.  However I was still in debt nonetheless.  So many of us in America are worth negative dollars.  There is something massively wrong with that.

I’ll lay out the rules Dave lists in his book just to get you thinking a little.  Personally I’m really excited about getting rid of my debt, and starting to build a financial foundation which allows me not to feel guilty about buying a home or having leisure activities.  So, here it is, the plan that has drained thousands of dollars of my paycheck over the last several months:

  1. Save an emergency fund of $1,000.
  2. Pay off all your debts (except for the mortgage).  No, there is no good debt.  Pay it all off.  Start with the smallest debts first, because the psychology of knocking off one debt at a time is better than the interest benefits you may get if you’re highly disciplined.  If at any time your emergency fund falls below $1,000, replentish it and temporarily stop paying debts.
  3. Save a 3-6 month emergency fund.  Lean to a 6 month, unless you’re absolutely sure of your job.
  4. Start putting 15% of your gross income towards retirement.
  5. Start saving for your child’s college if you have them.
  6. Pay off your mortgage, or buy a house with a maximum 15 yr fixed loan.  Dave prefers you pay for your house 100% down.  This may sound crazy, but remember crazy is good when we’re talking about paying off “normal” debts.
  7. Invest in mutual funds or real estate.

An important thing to note is that you should not bite off any two or more of these steps at the same time, with the exception of 15% toward retirement once you hit that step.  If you try to bite it all off you’ll become overwhelmed.  Also notice there is nothing in there about credit cards, because you should cut those up before you even start the steps.  Dave goes a lot more into length about credit card myths, so I would go straight to the source for it.

In the process of all of this Dave reccommends giving away some money every week.  This teaches us not to be obsessed or selfish with our money.  I believe this is good practice.  So there it is.  If the crazy I listed above for our culture rings even a little true, I highly recommend looking into his stuff.  Wouldn’t it be great if we as a country ended this debt cycle?  At the least we can take control of it as individuals.

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Holy Bible, but Holy People?

Jun 14

Posted by Matt Tavares in Religion | No Comments

The Bible Cast

It seems to me that the general connotation about the Bible is that it’s a book about super holy people, doing really holy things and about really bad people, who go to hell.  Over the past 6 months, I’ve had the chance to study the Christian Bible under a former UCLA professor.  Over this time, I’ve ultimately realized that most of the Bible is about normal people doing the same things over and over and over again, the only difference being time frame in which they did it in.  The old adage, “history repeats itself” comes into mind.  We aren’t much different from these people.

What is The Bible?

The Bible originated as the Jewish Tanakh, written in Hebrew.  Today, Christians use the Tanakh as their Old Testament portion of the Bible.  The Old Testament (or Tanakh) is a collection of books, which describes the history of the Jewish people and their relationship with God.  For Jews, the Tanakh is the whole story.  For Christians, the additional New Testament describes the birth, life, and death of Jesus Christ, and the work of his disciples thereafter.  The major difference between Jews and Christians, is that the Jews do not believe that Jesus Christ fulfilled the Old Testament prophecies.  Christians follow the Old Testament, and believe that Christ came to become “the word in flesh”.   We were given a list of rules and guidelines in the Old Testament, whereas we are given a human example to follow in the stories of Christ’s life.  So this is the Bible, a collection of books covering the beginning of God’s relationship with mankind, leading up to the life of Christ, and ending with implications of what is to come.

The Story

Nations rise and fall.  Every nation has fallen, or will fall at some point in time for a variety of reasons.  The same goes for the Bible.  The people of the Bible rose and fell over generations.  Why?  Because people make the same mistakes time and time again in different ages.

The First Mistake

Everyone knows the story of Adam and Eve.  Eve eats the apple, Adam blames Eve, and men have the ability to blame women for all of life’s problems for eternity…just kidding.  In actuality the important part of the Adam and Eve story is not the apple incident, it is what happened before and after the apple.  Rewinding before the bite of the apple, what do we see?  We are presented with a story where a guy named Adam is in a relationship with God.  He has this pretty sweet garden, and no worries in the world.  Him and God are best buddies; they talk in the garden together and everything is fine.  Adam is only told to stay away from the tree of forbidden fruit and everything will be cool.  He goes along for a while, and doesn’t really care about it, because everything is great in his world.  After a while God says, you know I like this guy, and he could probably use a companion that is a little more like him.  Notice, that Adam did not ask for a companion, he is content with his relationship with God.  Well, God gives him the gift of a woman, and Adam is just as excited about her as men are today about women.  He even breaks out into poetry about how much he adores her.

Now fast forward; things are going great.  We have Adam, Eve, and God, who are all best buddies.  There isn’t a worry in the world, because there isn’t anything to worry about.  Then one day, along comes the serpent that we may know all too well.  The interesting part of this story that often gets overlooked is the translation of serpent in Hebrew.  It means “shining one”.  What is the connotation behind shining?  It is attractive, it catches the eye, we like shiny things.  Well, this shining image attracts Eve.  Although Eve doesn’t have a worry in the world, the serpent sells her on a life that could be better.  The serpent says, “The moment you eat of it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods who know what is good and what is bad”.  Now the funny thing is at this point, is that Eve doesn’t know what is good or bad.  She has no concept of this dichotomy, because everything is fine her life with Adam, God, and the garden.  However, she sees the beautiful tree and the shining serpent, and wants to be like them.  She envies them, and wants more, despite what one of her best friends, God, asks of her.

Now we need to stop and ask, why doesn’t God forbid them of the fruit?  And moreover, why does God just program them so that they won’t want the fruit?  Does he need something to eat himself?  Is it some cruel trick?  Neither.  The thing is God gives us free will.  He also does not want us to become a slave to our bodies according to the bible.  This is why I believe he gives Adam and Eve the tree.  Just as much as the garden is a gift, and they are gifts to the other, so is the tree.  It is the gateway to discipline and self control.  After all, how could anything be a gift if people were forced to accept it?  The same thing applies today as it did back then.

The Forbidden Fruit Happens Over and Over

If you take the time to study the Old Testament you will realize the circular pattern by the end.  In relationship with God –> get comfortable –> forget about God –> turn against God –> fall as a nation, repeat.  This happens over and over again.  From Adam and Eve to Cain killing his brother Abel out of jealousy, things appear to get worse.  As Jewish story goes on, it comes to the point where God says I’m going to give humanity another shot.  He tells Noah to build his ark for protection, so he can wipe out the bad humanity.  But, as a favorite author of mine Matthew Kelly says, “sin is not out there, you can’t put all the bad people on one island and hope it’s gone, that’s because sin exists right down the center of your and my heart”.  So this is exactly why things start going haywire even after the fresh start with Noah’s descendants.

Abraham Comes On The Scene

So God’s people are on the path to falling away yet again after the whole Noah’s ark deal.  So one day God decides to bring Abraham in on the scene.  He basically tells him that he will start the Israelite nation through his blood line.  He said I will bless you and you will multiply, so long as you keep my covenant.  Some say this was the beginning of the Jewish religion.  What is that covenant?  At this point in history it basically meant two things:  1) You must circumsize yourself and your children.  2)  You must keep a relationship with me (aka praying).  The funny thing about this is that Abraham is 90 years old with no children because his wife Sarah is barren.  Abraham expresses his doubt and God tells him to go outside to count the stars, and that will be the number of his offspring.  There is a beauty to this story, because we can realize that we can actually see further in the dark than we do in the day.  Really think about that for a minute, cool thought huh?  This gives insight into the common phrase, “Jesus is the light of the world”.  In spite of all the darkness and evil we see, there is good news in this, because He shines brighter.

At Abraham it seems like we get another restart, and things are going well again.  But, surprise surprise, there are issues of jealousy and gossip even within his own family.

Pre-Exodus

Exodus, great Bob Marley song, but what is it really?  Well, in the time of a guy named Joseph, he had some brothers who didn’t like him due to jealousy.  So much so that they threw him in a water cistern, brutalized him, sold him into Egyptian slavery, and told their father he was dead.  Starting to catch my drift about the bible people not being so holy?  If this God is this loving God, then why does all this evil happen?  There seems to be a contradiction.

So Joseph goes into Egypt as a slave, and actually works himself up to the Pharoh’s trusted advisor. After being in Egypt for several years, Joeseph’s brothers show up to get food in a time of famine.  These are the same brothers that beat him and put him into slavery.  So here we are, the Bible and God’s relationship with humanity is riding on the back of a family who brutializes and sells their own brother to slavery.  Joseph, however, forgives them and is happy to see his family again in a bitter sweet moment.  This is the beginning of yet another downswing in Jewish culture as they move to Egypt.

This slavery foreshadowing was an image of what was to come.  As a side note it always amazes me how people think religions cause wars.  There is such an irony here, because this God oppresses his own people to open their eyes.  He is about to teach them a first-hand lesson about the evils of slavery.

Exodus

After Joseph’s death, the pharaoh of Egypt sends out an edict to kill all the Jewish children.  Do we think the World World II was the first attempt at Jewish holocaust?  Well think again, this happens a few times throughout the Jewish history.  The Jewish people have been through a lot, and unlike most every other culture they have found a way to stay in tact as a people despite being located in totally different geographic regions for over 3,000 years.  As the popular modern day reggae artist Matisyahu states in his song  Jerusalem:

“For 3,000 years with no place to be, don’t you see it’s not about the land or the sea?  It’s about the dwelling of his majesty.  Jerusalem if I forget you, let my right hand forget what it’s supposed to do.”

Getting back to Egypt, there is a small baby that escapes the planned Jewish holocaust.  His mother sent him down the Nile River as a last chance hope of keeping her child alive.  Pharaoh’s daughter sees him, and takes him in, which puts him in the graces of the Pharaoh.  Meanwhile the Egyptians have now fully enslaved the Jews.  God’s people in slavery.  Some people believe that God did this to make the Jews understand that they should never do such a brutal thing to anyone else.  By the time Moses grows up, he sees this brutality and is furious with the way the people of his roots are being treated even though he is in the graces of Pharaoh.  He gets so angry at them, that he kills one of Pharaoh’s slave drivers.  Now he’s forced into exile, because he will surely be punished by Pharaoh.  Not only exile, but desert exile.  Look to the east of  Egypt and you’ll see the brutal deserts of modern day Israel.  These are certainly not glorious grounds to survive on never mind thrive as God’s people.  So what’s the deal with this, God’s supposed people, the ones who had a covenant with Abraham are now on the back of Moses, a guy who just committed murder.

Well God comes back on the scene and tells Moses to go back into Egypt and get his people out of slavery.  Moses tries to make excuses, one being his old age.  God says, sorry you’re going.  So he eventually does.  He brings the Egyptians out of slavery with the help of the plagues God sends the Egyptians for not releasing them.  Very soon after the Jews are already complaining, worshiping false gods, and cursing God for bringing them out into the desert.  They were trying to claim their slavery was better than this freedom in the desert.  They spend the next 40 years roaming in the desert, while a lot of them fall away from God, and in turn die.  Along the way they get the explicit sent down rules to Moses known as the Ten Commandments.  God basically says, look just follow these rules and you’ll be all set.  Not so easy I guess, as I struggle with them quite a bit myself today.

The Land of No Rule

Fast forward to the book of Judges.  Israel falls away from their faith again, and soon enough the land of the tribal Judges develops where there is no organization.  As the Bible says, everyone does as they please, and there were no kings.  Every once in a while I’ll hear someone philosophizing about a land without law where everyone does as they please.  If you want to get some insight into how that works out, I suggest you read the book of Judges.  I fear that the extremes of modern day “open mindedness” lay down very similar circumstances to the days of the Judges.  I wouldn’t be surprised if history repeats itself in that respect.

The Rise of David and the Inevitable Re-fall

In the Old Testament, we are also presented the story of David.  In the story of David and Goliath, David sticks up for his country and the Jewish people.  Goliath’s Philistine army is in the process of taking over much of the land to the east of Egypt.  The teenage David sticks up for his nation and takes Goliath down with a clever attack.  He prevents the brutality, and has a growing relationship with God.  We see heavy evidence that God is very pleased with David.  David goes on to create a massive empire with a great trading setup.  The land of Israel is at its greatest, and fully united with one another and nations around it.

Does this last forever?  Fast forward, David is dead and we’re in a new era of Kings.  There is corruption, there is deceit, and even the Jewish priests are doing terrible things in the eyes of the commandments laid out by Moses.  Man, what is going on here?

Today

Where are we today?  2,000 years ago Jesus came into play and provided the last major rise rise of this rise-and-fall story of the Jewish people.  As of late, we have to ask ourselves, have we as a people been on a rise?  I fear not.  What we have in common with segments of the Jewish people is that we are far away from God as a world right now.  The next step in the cycle, unless we do something about it, is to turn directly against God.  There is a lot of hate out there towards religion these days, including Christianity and Judaism.  With the issues of abortion, birth control, and a promiscuity filled culture we appear to have made the full speed turn away from God.  We are no different than the thousands of years of Jewish people who entered the cycle.  Ultimately you may say, well it doesn’t matter, because God isn’t real and the Bible is nothing more than a story.  That is a choice to be made.  The Bible tells us, whether we believe it holds truth or not, that free will is the gift which God gives us.  That is why Adam and Eve were able to take a bite out of the apple even though it wasn’t in their best interest.  There is no such thing as a gift without free will to accept it.

I did a really quick buzz through of some of my favorite stories in the bible in the scope of showing the rises and falls of humanity in an effort to really get across that the people of the Bible are just like you and me.  These are not all holy people blowing trumpets at God all day.  These are people just like you and me.

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