Month: May 2026

Where’s the Tea?

Pat Liberty

In 1773, a group of Bostonians revolted against the British Empire. It arose from two challenges, the financial problems of the British East India Company and an ongoing dispute about the extent of Parliament’s authority over the British American Colonies. The claim was “taxation without representation.” Britain continued to levy taxes on the American Colonies without seating any representation in the British Parliament. As a result, Bostonians threw 342 cases of tea into Boston Harbor, and the famous Boston Tea Party became a part of American history.

We need another Tea Party. We pay our taxes and our tax dollars are used for things over which we have no say. For example, one billion dollars of our tax money has been appropriated for the “Ballroom.” You may remember that originally it was to be paid for with private donations (which is problematic in its own way). This is a classic bait and switch. One billion dollars. Let that sink in.

Former Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem, appropriated tax-payer money to lease a Boeing 737 Max 8 for DHS operations. This luxury jet featured a queen-size bedroom, 3 showers, a bar and a kitchen. It came with a price tag of $170 million dollars. It was used primarily for her personal and cabinet travel. After Noem was fired from her position the White House appropriated the jet to support cabinet secretaries and First Lady Melania Trump’s office. Noem faced further push-back when she spent $172 million dollars of tax-payer money to purchase two Gulfstream G700 private jets during the government shut down.

In a blatant act of corruption, the occupant has appropriated 1.8 billion dollars of tax-payer money to create a slush fund of sorts that can funnel money directly into the pockets of his political allies, including the January 6th insurrectionists. It is widely agreed that this is the single most corrupt act in American political history. It is unconstitutional in a number of ways. This, however, seems immaterial to this regime.

A vanity war in Iran is costing $1 billion dollars a day. The money financing it is our tax money. At the same time the regime says there is no money to fund Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. There is money. It is a question of priorities.

All of this amounts to taxation without representation. Our tax dollars are being hijacked for purposes that do not serve the people of the United States. Where do we find 342 cases of tea when we need it? 

Oppressive regimes are fond of diverting funds to serve their political ends.

Oppressive regimes also levy taxes on their subjects that they are unable to pay. This was true under Roman Occupation in Jesus’ time. Regime officials would tax the land of peasants at a rate that they were unable to pay. Consequently, they had to forfeit their land for non-payment of taxes.

Regardless of the methods, the end is the same. Money is used for purposes that do not serve the people. Jesus’ answer to that was to hang out with people who were victimized by an unjust government system and speak truth to power.

It is what is needed today. Write/call your Senators and Representatives. Even if you live in a blue state, your legislators need to know that you appreciate that they are fighting corruption. Protest. It’s easy to think this makes no difference, but that is not true. The protests in Minnesota drove ICE into the shadows and caused them to draw down their presence. Numerous arrest warrants, felony charges and FBI investigations are under way. This would not have happened if it wasn’t for the protests and push-back. It matters.

Dose yourself on the news. It is depressing. If we are going to stay in this fight for the long haul, we have to keep ourselves centered and energized. Watching news 24/7 is not conducive to sanity. Get your news from reputable sources. The three major TV networks are owned by the occupant’s supporters. Main-stream media is selling its soul; get your news somewhere else. 

Attend an observer training, which will give you skills to protest peacefully. Above all, our protests must be non-violent. It would take very little for the regime to call a state of emergency and derail the midterms. As far as it is up to you, be peaceful and non-violent.

Believe that what you do makes a difference. Do not be afraid to speak. Oppressive regimes count on people becoming tired, burning out or being afraid enough to keep silent. Show them they are wrong.

Everyday people are being victimized by an unjust system. ICE agents shoot people in the streets. Thousands of children have watched one or both of their parents are carried off in handcuffs by ICE agents. Both legal citizens and those without papers are treated in inhumane and abusive ways. Medical care is denied; food is infested with maggots; there is no adequate sanitation; and beds are non-existent. The answer of this regime is to fund ICE and Customs and Border Patrol until 2029 at a rate of 29 billion dollars a year. 

 If we are to save our democracy, we need to act. Daily. Don’t give up the fight.

The History of Mother’s Day

Pat Liberty

Before Mother’s Day became a twenty-five-billion-dollar holiday, it was a lot of other things, and it was a lot more complicated than cards and flowers.

Mother’s Day began as a radical movement led by women seeking social change, public health improvements and peace.

Ann Reeves Jarvis, in 1858, started Mother’s Work clubs. She lived in Eastern Appalachia where poverty was crushing as were all the realities that came when there was poverty. She had 14 children and only 4 survived into their teenage years. One way she dealt with her grief was to help other families who were suffering a similar fate.

Her goal was to combat high infant mortality rates and provide medical care to needy families. These community driven clubs educated women on hygiene, provided nursing care, worked with doctors to obtain clean water supplies and safe sewage disposal.

When the Civil War broke out, the area in which she lived, part of West Virginia today, was deeply divided. Neighbors fought with neighbors, family and friends were divided. From the outset she insisted that soldiers from both the Confederacy and the Union be treated equally.

Mother’s workday clubs remained a neutral presence and provided food, clothing, and care to both Union and Confederate soldiers.

After the war, Jarvis organized Mothers’ Friendship Day to bring together families and soldiers from both sides to help heal regional animosities.

In 1870, Julia Ward Howe, best known as the writer of The Battle Hymn of the Republic, issued an appeal for women to unite. Her appeal to womanhood was a pacifist reaction to the carnage of the American Civil War and the Franco Prussian war. The appeal was deeply connected to Howe’s feminist conviction that women had a responsibility to shape their societies at the political level.

Her original proclamation reads, in part,

“Arise, all women who have hearts, whether our baptism be that of water or tears! Say firmly: we will not have great questions decided by irrelevant agencies. Our husbands shall not come to us, reeking with carnage for caresses and applause. Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn all that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience. We, women of one country, will be too tender to those of another country to allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs.

From the bosom of the devastated earth a voice goes up with our own. It says: Disarm, Disarm! The sword of murder is not the balance of justice. Blood does not wipe out dishonor, nor violence vindicate possession. As men have often forsaken the plough and anvil at the summons of war, let women now leave all that may be left of home for a great and earnest day of council.”

She goes on to invoke the name of womanhood and humanity to bring about a general congress of women, of all nationalities. It did not come to pass. She did not give up. Rather she sought to establish an annual Mother’s Day for Peace, to be celebrated in June. It didn’t quite catch on.

The inspiration for Mother’s Day, moving toward what we now know, came to Anna Jarvis, Ann Jarvis’ daughter. After teaching a Sunday School lesson. She prayed for a memorial Mother’s Day to honor the service mothers provide to humanity. It was to be a day of tribute to all women, especially mothers, to recognize their service to humanity. Anna sought to fulfill her mother’s dream of establishing an official day to honor mother’s contributions.

By 1911, the holiday was celebrated across the USA, and in 1914 Congress authorized a national holiday dedicated to honoring the mothers’ social impact.

Anna Jarvis fought against the commercialization of Mother’s Day, arguing that the true meaning was focused on gratitude, activism and community. To this day, many view today through the lens of peace, social justice and political action.

Each year Mother’s Day offers a unique opportunity to reflect on and honor the role of mothers and people who nurture us, while remembering the rich and complicated history of our nation.

As Mother’s Day evolved, the text from Proverbs 31 became the siren song for women. I remember every Mother’s Day our pastor would do some harangue on Proverbs 31 and my mother would cry the rest of the day because she was such a failure. It kind of ruined the day.

So Proverbs 31 can come with some baggage. The passage needs some redeeming. Proverbs 31 is intended to show what wisdom looks like in action. The whole book of Proverbs is a wisdom book and Wisdom Literature emphasizes practical ways to live well by observing the world’s design and adhering to divine principles.  There is a strong emphasis on fear of the Lord.  But it’s not the fear and trembling to which our minds default. A more accurate translation would be “awe.” A wise woman is constantly in awe of what is around her and within her.

And the pronoun used for wisdom is always feminine. Wisdom is always “she.”  It’s important to say this text was never intended to be interpreted as a job description for women.

The intended audience is actually men. In Jewish culture it is not women who memorize Proverbs 31, it is the men. And they sing it as a song of praise to the women in their lives. This poem is about Wisdom with boots on the ground.

The only instructive language in the poem is directed at men. “Praise her for all her hands have done.”

The first line of the poem…a virtuous woman who can find?  It is better translated as valor.  This casts the whole passage in a different light. Valor means great courage, strength of mind and bravery. This fits with most of the women I know and celebrate. And valor is not just about what you do, it’s how you do it. When my sister was undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer, she said she had read this somewhere and she was appropriating it for that time her life. She said, “If you have to go through hell, act like you own the place.”  And she did. You don’t mess with my sister.

As Rachel Held Evans wrote, “If you are a stay-at-home mom, be a stay-at-home mom of valor. If you are a nurse, be a nurse of valor. If you are a CEO, a pastor or a barista at Starbucks, if you are rich or poor, single or married, do it all with valor. That’s what makes a proverbs 31 woman, not creating a life worthy of a Pinterest board.”

Proverbs 31 can be redeemed…it’s a way to celebrate all those daily acts of faithfulness exhibited by women. It is how men celebrate the women in their lives. It’s not our roles that define us, but the integrity and bravery we bring to those roles.

It brings us full circle to the rich history of Mother’s Day, women of valor who did extraordinary things with ordinary resources, women who refused to give up even when all the signs pointed to defeat, women who held themselves and their families together in the face of struggle, women who went through whatever was in front of them and acted like they owned the place.   Amen.