# 711 (11/25) "The Kennedy Assassination and American Patriotism"

CONSIDER: As you prepare to celebrate Thanksgiving next week, make a list of the non-believing family members who will gather with you and begin praying DAILY that God would open their hearts to hear the saving gospel of Jesus Christ. Go that day believing God to have prepared the heart of at least someone that you'll be able to share with. - Stan
SIGN A PETITION TO THE UN FOR THE PROTECTION OF CHRISTIANS :" The church in Syria has shone brightly for 2,000 years. But today violence and persecution threatens its survival. Thanks to an incredible response, Open Doors is helping 8,000 families in Syria survive each month. We believe the signatures and prayers of 500,000 people will encourage the UN to act and protect the rights and lives of all Syrians, especially the vulnerable Christian community." Go to: http://lp.opendoorsusa.org/emails/nov-13-action/save-syria.html?utm_source=action&utm_medium=email&utm_content=button&utm_campaign=november

URGENT PRAYER REQUESTS:

North Korea Detains 85-Year-Old American Veteran - CBNNews.com; November 21, 2013; http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2013/November/North-Korea-Detains-85-Year-Old-American-Veteran/ - "North Korea has detained another American, this time an 85-year-old veteran of the Korean War...Merrill Newman took a sight-seeing trip to North Korea in late October."

[11/21 - People in some rural areas continue to be in desperate need of even food. PRAY for relief suppplies to reach people in a timely way.] "Missionary in Philippines: 'Bodies Laying Everywhere'- By Dale Hurd and Heather Sells, November 12; http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2013/November/Truckloads-of-Bodies-Filipinos-Plead-for-Help/ - The official death toll from the Philippines typhoon stands at nearly 1,800, but authorities expect it to rise considerably. An estimated 11 million people were impacted by Super Typhoon Haiyen, with it's near 200 mile-per-hour winds and 20 foot storm surge. More than half a million people have been left homeless. In some areas, the survivors are being forced to live among piles of corpses. "It's just really death and devastation everywhere. Bodies laying everywhere. People need help," American missionary and storm survivor John Wynn said. [PRAY that relief supplies will get to the needed area in time to help the tens of thousands who are in great need. PRAY that security can be established in the midst of looters causing problems in the midst of the devastation. - Stan]

NEWS ALERT: Monday, November 04, 2013 - Saeed's Life in [Greater] Jeopardy After Prison Transfer - CBNNews.com, ; http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2013/November/Saeeds-Life-in-Jeopardy-after-Prison-Transfer/ Saeed Abedini, an American pastor imprisoned in Iran for his faith, is facing life threatening conditions after a recent prison transfer, the America Center for Law and Justice reports. Saeed's family says he has been moved from the brutal Evin Prison to Rajai Shahr Prison, known to be an even more dangerous jail. "Going to Karaj is a severe punishment," Loes Bijnen, a Dutch diplomat from the embassy in Tehran, described the jail in a 2005 report. "Once in there one stops to be a human being," she wrote. "One is put out of sight, even of human rights activists and the press. Murders or unexplained deaths are a regular occurrence." ... "While there is broad bi-partisan support for a Senate resolution calling for Saeed's release, ... it's crucial President Barack Obama step in "directly and forcefully" to save his life. "[Go to  http://beheardproject.com/saeed#sign and sign a new petition.][PRAY for President Obama to forcefully speak out against this latest development; for the pastor to be finally released. (See below for more info.)]                

NEWS ALERT: Oct. 23: "Christians Fleeing IRAQ Area Once Considered Safe," - CBNNews.com, http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2013/October/Christians-Fleeing-Iraq-Area-Once-Considered-Safe/  "Increased violence in northern Iraq is pushing Christians out of that part of the country. The Kurdish north was considered a safe area for Christians fleeing from violent persecution in the central and southern regions. But bombings in recent months are causing panic and many are fleeing the country. Al qaeda has claimed responsibility for several of those attacks. Some Christians have been told by local police that they "should not be in Iraq because it is Muslim territory." The Christian charity Open Doors International is urging people around the world to pray for Christians in Iraq. They say that if the persecution continues, there may be no Christians left in Iraq by 2020.[PRAY that believers in Iraq will know God's protection and provision; that believers will know[ whether they are called to flee or remain and persevere; and that their persecutors  may come to hear the gospel and come to faith in Christ. - Stan] 

"SYRIAN Christians Brace for Strike, Ask for Prayer," - by Gary Lane, August 31, http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2013/August/Syrian-Christians-Brace-for-Strike-Ask-for-Prayer/"As Syrians brace themselves for a possible U.S. military attack, many of the county's Christians are praying for divine intervention. They say military action against the Assad regime will only bring them greater hardship and suffering and they're asking Christians worldwide to pray that God intervenes to bring peace to their nation. They believe the collective prayers of Christians around the world could reverse an escalating conflict..."

Continue to Pray for EGYPT - Continue to pray for the tense situation in Egypt and especially for the Christian believers who are being targeted with violence by Muslim Brotherhood members.]  

Oct. 14, NORTH KOREA -"Kenneth Bae, Mom Meet; Release Not Guaranteed"  - CBNNews.com,  http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2013/October/Mother-Visits-Missionary-Jailed-in-North-Korea/Update on Kenneth Bae: "US Ready to Bargain with N. Korea for Bae's Release,"-  CBNNews.com,  Aug 14, 2013  http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2013/August/S-Ready-to-Bargain-with-N-Korea-for-Baes-Release/  - The United States is willing to engage North Korea to secure the release of imprisoned American Christian Kenneth Bae. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said the United States is "willing to consider a number of different options" to bring him home.In a video recently released by a North Korean newspaper, Bae requested the United States send a high-ranking official to North Korea to seek his pardon. It is unclear if he spoke of his own volition in the video. Bae, 45, was sentenced to 15 years of hard labor for sharing his faith. He suffers health problems such as diabetes and is currently hospitalized.[PRAY for 1) God's healing of and presence with Pastor Bae, 2) His earliest release by the North Korean government, and 3) God's comfort for his family and friends.] 

IRAN - Vigils Mark One Year Imprisonment of Pastor Saeed - CBNNews.com, Thursday, September 26, 2013 - Today marks one-year that American pastor Saeed Abedini has been held in an Iranian prison. He is serving an eight-year sentence because of his Christian faith. It has been a year of torment as he has suffered beatings, physical pain from untreated medical conditions, and separation from his wife and two children... The suffering has not dampened his passion for Jesus. Pastor Abedini has led more than 30 prisoners to Christ during his time in prison. This afternoon, thousands of Americans from coast to coast will pray for his release. Events will be held in 40 states at capitols, city halls, parks and churches. Thousands more will join from 15 nations around the world 

PRAY: - For comfort and peace for Saeed’s wife and children here in the U.S.\

- For a strong witness and testimony from Pastor Abedini in the prison where God has placed him

- For Christians around the world who are being persecuted for their faith in Christ

- BOLDly (Beside Our Leaders Daily) for leadership from the White House and State Department in defending the freedoms of Abedini and other Americans

- GO TO SaveSaeed.org to sign a petition over 600,000 others asking for his immediate release

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"The Kennedy Assassination and American Patriotism"- Rob Schwarzwalder | Nov 22, 2013; http://townhall.com/columnists/robschwarzwalder/2013/11/22/the-kennedy-assassination-and-american-patriotism-n1751678/page/full

All of us over a certain age remember where we were when President Kennedy was assassinated. Although only six, my memory of learning of his murder remains crisp and indelible. There are no apt words to capture the shock or measure the grief of an entire nation, or even of a single heart.

That we so intensely grieve the loss of a man killed 50 years ago speaks to a number of things: the horrific circumstances of his death, his blood-stained wife, his tiny children, his youth and the many things his murder left unfulfilled. The Sixties were a miserable time to grow up; the nation unraveled as all manner of evil, foreign and domestic, corroded our culture. Invariably, one wonders if the sudden, devastating death of a young president catalyzed a much more violent social unhinging than otherwise would have been.

We have come to learn that Kennedy was a serial, and not particularly discrete, adulterer. He took dangerous combinations of drugs to mask his Addison’s disease and other ailments. His perceived timidity with Nikita Kruschev at their 1961 meeting in Vienna helped precipitate the Cuban missile crisis.

He has been called “a liberal Cold Warrior.” Upon finding that the so-called “missile gap” he had run on in 1960 was chimerical, he nonetheless launched the greatest single acceleration of the international arms race in history with his ICBM initiative (by 1964, we had more than 2,400 missiles versus 375 for the Soviet Union).

Kennedy also cut taxes (modestly, although along supply-side lines) and stood firmly against Communism. And in perhaps the most eloquent explanation of the basis for American foreign aid ever delivered, he wrote, “[W]idespread poverty and chaos lead to a collapse of existing political and social structures which would inevitably invite the advance of totalitarianism into every weak and unstable area. Thus our own security would be endangered and our prosperity imperiled. A program of assistance to the underdeveloped nations must continue because the nation’s interest and the cause of political freedom require it.”

Regrettably, some of the aid Kennedy approved apparently included funding for “family planning” in the developing world.

But the man and his presidency are not really at issue in this essay. Overlooked, in my view, in all the writing and reminiscing about that day in Dallas is something that goes beyond the compassionate grief of a decent people. It underlies the trauma and the mourning all of us then alive have for so long felt. I can think of no better way to put it than simply this: American patriotism.

From our earliest years, most of us are taught, rightly, that this is the greatest nation on earth, that whatever our imperfections, we have more fully realized the promise of “liberty and justice for all” than any nation, at any time. We learn these lessons from an honest study of what Kennedy once called “our ancient heritage,” from the ongoing saga of men and women coming here to walk with hope and promise, and from our shared but personal experiences of liberty, opportunity, and prosperity.

Love for country is an underestimated force in American public life. Shortly after September 11, 2001, I was riding the D.C. subway system and saw a young African-American in worker’s clothes sitting by himself. He had a red, white, and blue bandana on. As I got off, I turned to him and said something like, “I like the colors of your bandana.” The young man broke into a warm but dignified smile as our eyes met and we both nodded. I have not forgotten, nor will forget, that moment.

For American patriots, and that remains the great majority of us (however incoherent such national devotion might be, depending on the individual and the views he holds), a president represents so much of who we believe, or want to believe, we are. In that single individual we invest more of ourselves than we might be prone to admit. Conservatives are not political fans of Barack Obama (I am talented at restating the obvious), yet were something to happen to him personally, it would be like an attack on all of us.

We disdain many of our current president’s policies, and fight against them. We are discomfited by his performance as our national leader. We esteem his office, and wish him and his family safety, health, and happiness.These impulses are not contradictory; our dissent is as much a validation of our patriotism as is our respect for the position of Chief Executive.

That’s an underlying reason we still ache at the memory of November 22, 1963. The president, who represents the nation in the psyche of America and the perception of the world, was brutally and unjustly killed. The bullet that ended his life convulsed our soul. A piece of all of us who remember that day and the painful days that followed was scarred ineradicably, as well.

May such an event never recur. May God protect the president of the United States, and may He guide and bless our beloved country.

[bold and italics emphasis mine]

"Was Kennedy a Conservative?" - John C. Goodman | Nov 23, 2013; http://townhall.com/columnists/johncgoodman/2013/11/23/was-kennedy-a-conservative-n1751672/page/full