WC112923: Hate or like True Crime and Why.

 

Today's Wednesday challenge is if I like or hate true crime stories.

I've only read one true crime story. Helter Skelter, by Vincent Bugliosi and Curt Gentry.

I read it while in college and it gave me lifelong insights into the legal system.

Bugliosi was the lead prosecutor against Charles Manson. He recounts the police investigation, how the old-time cops didn't think they needed to preserve evidence and bungled a lot of it.

After years of watching CSI and NCIS the general public has a pretty good idea of the importance of gathering all the evidence they can find and basing their findings off of what they have.

Back in this time scientific evidence was in its infancy. Silly since it had been in novel form since Edgar Allen Poe's Murders in the Rue Morgue and all the Sherlock Holme books and movies.

What I learned from the book and has still stayed with me fifty years since reading it was:

1. The importance of obtaining evidence, chain of possession, and keeping it safe.

2. Analysis of the evidence. They didn't have DNA at that time, but fingerprints and blood type gave clues. I remember that a boy found the gun and after watching a number of TV shows and movies knew not to touch the gun and picked it up with a stick. When he gave it to the police officer, he grabbed it with his hands on the barrel ruining anything they might have gotten from it. They knew the killers drove away from the Polanski home and which way they went. They knew they took off their clothes and threw them out of the car. They reenacted doing this and then found the clothes. 

3. Reconstructing the crime scene by using the evidence.

4. Building a hypothesis of what happened. 

5.Canvasing the area and interviewing all who knew them and who might have wanted to harm the victims. This led to the house the Polanski's lived in having been owned by Doris Day's son, and when she visited her son there saw Charles Manson and he gave her the creeps. Her son turned Manson down on recording Manson's music, giving him motive.  

6. Jail house snitches. None of the evidence at the scene pointed directly to any of the Manson Family. The same with the Labianca's. It was the women of the family while in jail on other charges that broke the case open.

7. The most important part of prosecuting Manson was to psychoanalyze him. What was his motive. Without motive, no case. Once the case was handed over to Bugliosi he had to analyze the evidence and when it pointed to Manson then getting into Manson's head and understanding what and why he was always in prison and what happened when he got out. Stephen King's The Shawshank Redemption focuses on inmates becoming "institutionalized." Manson whenever he was released, committed an even worse federal crime so he would get right back in.

8. The importance in understanding the evidence and finding motive took psychology. That criminology and psychology go hand in hand in establishing proof for conviction.

9.  The pitfalls of the trial. The different tactics the defense attorney used to try and get his clients acquitted.

10. While teaching both psychology and high school law this book and showing the documentary based on it opened up my students' eyes. It made me a better teacher.

I have never felt compelled to read or watch any true crime books or shows since. I'm content with fictional ones.

The Importance of the Book of Hebrews

 

Patrick Prescott

The Importance of the Book of Hebrews

Scripture taken from:

NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, Copyright © 1960,1962,1963,1968,1971,1972,1973,1975,1977,1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. 

I've read articles on Medium attacking evangelicals for their hypocrisy on the insistence of forcing the law of Moses and Leviticus even Deuteronomy on the masses while skipping over other parts of Mosaic law. Yes, they are hypocrites just as Jesus called the pharisees hypocrites. 

They do seem to find loopholes as all legalese assholes do. How they justify not following Levitical dietary laws,

"We can eat pork because in the book of Acts Peter was given a vision of all kinds of unclean animals and food and told to eat. When he refused the voice said, 'Whatever God has cleansed, no longer consider unholy." Ch 10:15'".

Peter didn't start eating pork, he went to someone considered unholy and unclean. A gentile, one Cornelius a Roman Centurian.

Now if that's a loophole to eat pork and shrimp and lobster, why don't they apply it to humans like Peter did with Cornelius. Doesn't that apply to all people even those who are different with alternative lifestyles? 

Evangelicals are today's Judaizers.

I've concluded that those who call themselves Christians, but insist we follow Levitical law are what Paul fought against, those he called Judaizers. The one's insisting gentiles who become believers must be circumcised and follow dietary laws. Only the ones today dropped circumcision and dietary laws and pick and choose which laws we have to obey and those we can ignore.

They also equate their faith as part of national origin. Christian Nationalism and just like with Israel if we violate these laws God will wreak havoc on us for our sins.

Jesus didn't come to save Israel. It was conquered and the Jews dispersed. He didn't come to destroy Rome. His followers converted so many to His name that the great empire was won over.

Judaizers still believe in the God of Sainai not the God of Zion. The book of Hebrews explains this. 

The Importance of Hebrews 

Martin Luther once said, "Who wrote Hebrews? Only God knows."

Whoever wrote it the book should be read by all and some of its passages should be memorized as faithfully as John 3:16.

The book opens in Ch 1 vs 1: that God "spoke long ago in the prophets... in His Son..."

It then describes His Son's (Jesus) birth, how all the angles worship him, that in vs 10: "Thou Lord, IN THE BEGINNING DIDST LAY THE FOUNDATION OF THE EARTH... SIT AT MY RIGHT HAND, UNTIL I MAKE THINE ENEMIES A FOOTSTOOL FOR THY FEET"

Ch 2 goes on with what Jesus's mission was, how he was made lower than the angels and it was God's plan.

It is chapter 3 that's important. Jesus is our high priest under the order of Melchizedek. 

The priesthood of Aaron is the Old Covenant or contract between God and Israel.

The priesthood of Melchizedek is the new covenant between God and everyone, not just one people or nation.  God changed the worship from offering sacrifice for the remission of sin in the Temple; to Jesus being the sacrifice and all who believe are forgiven, mercy is not needed.

Under the priesthood of Aaron and the Temple, on the day of atonement, the high priest would enter the Holy of Holies to offer a sacrifice on the altar under the solid gold "Mercy Seat" where on that day and time God would sit on the seat and give mercy to the whole nation.

With Jesus as our sacrifice there is no Holy of Holies or mercy seat. The Holy Spirit of God indwells us individually, and we each become the Temple of God. We are forgiven of our sins, there is no need for a mercy seat. It has nothing to do with your nationality or the country where you live.

This is the difference between obedience to the law and temple sacrifice to Jesus being our sacrifice and forgiveness of our sins by the blood of Christ.

A better Covenant 

Ch. 8 vs 6 "but now He has obtained a more excellent ministry by as much as He is also the mediator of a better covenant, which has been enacted on better promises.

Vs 7 begins quoting Jerimiah 31:31-34 where God promises the prophet that there shall be a new covenant.

Ch 9 explains the difference between the old tabernacle (temple) and the new tabernacle with Christ as high priest.

In vs 16 he requotes Jeremiah 31:33: "I WILL PUT MY LAWS UPON THEIR HEART, AND UPON THEIR MIND I WILL WRITE THEM,"

   "AND THEIR SINS AND THEIR LAWLESS DEEDS I WILL REMEMBER NO MORE."

Vs 18 sums it up, "Now where there is forgiveness of these things, there is no longer any offering for sin."

I tend to include a qualifying word here, not biblical, "there is no longer any NEED of offering for sin.  

  VSS 26-39 gives the Hebrews, their choice. The priesthood of Aaron and the laws of Moses or the priesthood of Melchizedek and the sacrifice of Jesus. Judgement will come to those who reject Jesus.

Judaizers may call themselves Christian and claim to worship Jesus, but their belief is based on the Priesthood of Aaron and not Jesus as our high priest next to his Father and that we are now with the Holy Spirit our own "priesthood of the believer."

In chapter 11 the author leaves from the differences of priesthoods and talks about faith.

Worshiping in the temple wasn't about faith it was about obedience. The laws of Moses where about judgement and consequences only giving mercy upon offering sacrifice.

Chapter 11: starts with a definition of faith: "1. Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. 2. For by it the men of old gained approval."

Kierkegaard, explained this as a "Leap of Faith." It's not blind faith, but a reasonable faith. Notice the word "assurance." 

The rest of the chapter is a roll call of the great men and women of faith. Some of the notables are Abel, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, Jacob, etc. Then he mentions those who were persecuted for their faith.

The climax of this list of those who lived by faith, not just obedience or because they had to because of the law comes in Ch. 12:1

"Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance, and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us."

Notice that because we are believers we are not without sin. We are to lay aside sin because it entangles us, but it's still a part of us.

We aren't to wait for Jesus to come again, instead we have a race to run with endurance, it's not a sprint. That race if to grow in the Lord and share with others about him for the rest of our lives.

Notice to "share" is not to coerce or force others to believe like you or to conform to your ideas about how they should live.

Verses 4 through 13 discipline is mentioned. Discipline is not punishment. Today we might call it training. A successful football or basketball team must train for the sport and have the discipline to wait for the snap to be made or to control temper so as not to get a penalty. As a long-distance runner I trained long and hard covering many miles a day. At first a coach watched to make sure I didn't cut the course, but when I went to high school the coach told us what he wanted, and we went out on our own. If I cut the course the only one, I was harming was myself. 

When I attended a Baptist college there were lots of rules and regulations with varying penalties up to and including expulsion. When I graduated and went to Seminary. There were no rules like that. As I was told, "If you need rules, you need to rethink why you're here." 

Verses 14-17 advises believers to, "pursue peace with all men and the sanctification without no one will see the Lord."

Stop and think about this for a spell. Where is the peace when Christian's demand laws making it a crime for a woman to control her own body?

Are they pursuing peace when they pass laws making it a crime to love and marry someone of a different religion, color, lifestyle or mode of dress? Where is the Lord in that? Is this what Judaizers consider to be sanctification?

Vs 15 "See to it that no one comes short of the grace of God; that no root of bitterness springing up causes trouble, and by it many be defiled."

If a church will not allow someone to worship with them because of the alternate lifestyle or color or culture or any other condition imaginable where is the "grace of God?"

Vs 16 "that there be no immoral or godless person like Esau, who sold his birthright for a single meal."

Have the Judaizers sold their birthright for claiming an immoral, godless person to be God's chosen? Voting for him for president. Leaders gathering around him in the Oval Office anointing him with oil, and even forming a mob to attack the Capital building and wanted to hang the Vice President?

Sainai versus Zion

It is here from verse 18-24, that it is plain the difference between Aaron and Melchizedek, Moses and Jesus, Believers and Judaizers.

18. "For you have not come to a mountain that may be touched (physical mountain) and to a blazing fire, and to darkness and gloom and whirlwind... 21. And so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, "I AM FULL OF FEAR AND TREMBLING."

22. "But you have come to Mount Zion (spiritual mountain) and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to myriads of angels. 23. to the general assembly and the church of the first-born who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the Judge of all, and to the spirits or righteous men made perfect."

This is the new covenant. We live under grace. We live with the Holy Spirit to guide us. We worship a risen savior sitting at the right hand of God and there is a great cloud of witnesses with him watching down on us. Many of them our loved ones.

The Judaizers still worship the God of Sainai. They think serving God is to make everyone their servant living according to their laws and claiming it in the name of the Lord. The God of Sainai is a God of fear and not understanding how He changed. 

They are waiting for a King who has already come.

For a kingdom they are already in.

To become what they already are. 

For and age that has already come.

For victory that's already won.

The God of Zion is a God of love. The commandment of Jesus was to Love God, Love your neighbor as yourself. 

     

 

 

The Book of Romans and Hebrews

 

The Books of Romans and Hebrews

Introduction

Patrick Prescott

 

I’m a retired history/English public middle school and high school teacher. I’m not a biblical scholar. I was a lifelong Baptist, growing up in the church and have studied the Bible in Sunday School from childhood up today where I still attend a bible study class and teach one on Tuesdays. Only now in a Methodist church.

 Having lived through the takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention by the moral mafia that the SBC left me not me them. Their trying to control all believers into hating all who are different and the strict conformity of the Ten Commandments and other Levitical laws, cherry picked while discarding others that has destroyed the message of loving thy neighbor into hating the neighbor who is different.

The Methodist church I attend is an affirming church, we practice inclusion. On the wall of the sanctuary is a large rainbow. We allow worship to all regardless of race, creed, culture, or lifestyle. We have a float for the Gay Pride parade every year and a booth at the pavilion. We actively reach out in love to our neighbors.  The former pastor who began the church as inclusion has a brother who is living with a man. Our current woman pastor has a sister living with a woman. Many in the congregation have loved ones who live an alternate lifestyle and sill love them and affirm them as human beings.

For the past few years, the United Methodists have been splitting over this issue of affirming and inclusion. It seems a number of bishops are women and now openly in same sex relationships. 

There is a Book of Discipline, that is thicker than the Bible, and it forbids women pastors and homosexuality, but a previous convention voted to not uphold both of those prohibitions allowing women in the pulpit and leadership positions. A coming convention is expected to delete those prohibitions. The fireworks will surely ignite the skies over that city.

I teach a bible study class on Tuesday mornings, and it is comprised of a few men around my age some a few years younger most are older only one is not retired.

In my bible study class, some of the members are certified lay ministers or working on becoming one. I’ve looked into going through the training for CLM, but I’m too Baptist to wholeheartedly believe the liturgy that is handed down from the Church of England and copied from the Catholic Church. My beliefs are still those of the 1963 Baptist Faith and Message, though the moral mafia changed it to fit their agenda once they had control of the convention.

We’ve had much discussion the past year over the division affecting the United Methodists concerning the division over alternate lifestyles. I find using the alphabet soup for all the different groups distracting, so I’m lumping them all together as alternate lifestyles. I mean no offense.

The basis of our church choosing inclusion and affirmation of those with a different lifestyle as members of our congregation is Leviticus 19:18, Matthew 5:43, Luke 10.29, and Galatians 5:14. Summed up, Love God, love your neighbor as yourself.

John 3:16-17 reads, whoever or KJV “whosoever” believes will have everlasting life, and then in verse 17 says, “For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world should be saved through Him.” (NASV)

Doesn’t “whosoever” mean everyone? Even those with an alternate lifestyle? Doesn't it also mean that Jesus didn't come to condemn them for what they are, but to save them too?

In our group, we call ourselves “The Wild Bunch,” About as wild as a toothless and declawed tabby, but we like the name.

What we are all agreed on is that the biggest difference between those who are choosing to stay United Methodists and those leaving is we accept everyone with love as Jesus commanded us. 

We include them in our worship, they exclude. We love, they condemn. We choose to forgive them as we have been forgiven our sins. They say they hate the sin, but love the sinner, but that’s impossible if you won’t include them as sinners the same as those churches include the angry (same as murder) and lust (same as adultery). They want to pick and choose which sin is okay and which isn’t.

They use the Ten Commandments as a hammer and the book of Leviticus an anvil to bully anyone who doesn’t think and act like them rejecting them within their fellowship.

There is one member of our group who loves to point out the fallacy of their reasoning. He cites all the laws in Leviticus that we don’t follow and then asks why don’t we follow them if we have to follow the others? 

Here are my thoughts on those questions.

There are two books in the New Testament that explain the difference between the Old Covenant or contract and the New Covenant or contract: Romans and Hebrews.

Dan Fowler has a post in Backyard Church from August 2023: Romans Explained, that is enlightening.

His explanation concerns “Prosopopeia” A debate style where you give one side’s view and then argue how it is wrong and your view is the right one. The whole book is written in this style, so don't go quoting one passage and say it's what God said, without putting it into context. It's written debate.

Example in Romans Ch. 1 Paul lists the sins of the gentiles quite detailed on their immorality, then in Ch. 2 he lists how the Jews don’t measure up to God’s standard. He condemns both gentiles and Jews as not worthy of salvation. The moral mafia somehow forgets Ch. 2. Maybe because it refutes their insistence, we follow Mosaic law and want to impose it on the whole country. 

In Ch. 3 Paul refutes this argument vs 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 being justified as a gift by His Grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus;…

Guess what everything Paul said about the sins of Gentiles and Jews is forgiven (justified) through God’s grace.

Later in Romans Paul elaborates on justification of faith and that there is now no condemnation. If the moral mafia would stop cherry picking what they like concerning the vices of Greeks and Romans and actually read the message of Paul’s writing the world would be a much happier place.

There is not much more for me to say about Romans that Dan Fowler hasn’t already said. This brings me to the importance of the Book of Hebrews.

That will be in my second installment.

Books by Veterans

 

It's a bit late, but I'm responding to Berthold Gambrel's blog post for Veteran's Day about reading books by veterans. I thought I'd post some books by veterans that are good reads.

A Biography of Douglas MacArthur. Fascinating reading.

The movie MacArthur (1977) starring Gregory Peck, starts with the fall of Bataan, but follows the biography from there.

One tidbit I loved. His father was General Arthur MacArthur a civil war hero. While in New Orleans after the war, he was charged with cleaning up the graft and corruption there. While investigating he was approached by some locals and offered a vast sum of money, a mansion and the use of the most expensive hooker in town. He sent in his report and asked to be transferred to another post stating, "They're getting close to my price." 

 Manchester also wrote Goodbye, Darkness. His memoire of going back to the islands where he fought in WWII years afterwards. He revisited the sights, could see the remains of ships sunk, and noticed that the U. S. forgot about them, and the Japanese had put up memorials to their fallen. 

Clavell was a POW during WWII, and this is his memoire only fictionalized. It was turned into a black and white movie starring George Seagal as the King Rat. This embarked him on his writing career which includes Tai Pan, Shogun, Noble House and others. 

Years later Steven Spielberg did a blockbuster movie, Empire of the Sun.  John Malkovich's role is strait plagiarism from King Rat.  

 

 This was Michener's memoire of fighting in WWII. Amazing how many great novelists were veterans. It was turned into a musical play and the movie had an unknown actor as part of the choir: Sean Connery. 

In another of his books he mentioned that in New Guinea, he went through a small, dusty and grimy village named Bali Hai. He liked the name and put it in his book which was then turned into a beautiful song. 

I once tried to read all of Michener's books. I gave up. I'd still be reading them and not get them all read after fifty years.

Tolkien was a veteran of WWI. It may be apocryphal, but the story is he was bet a certain amount of money that he couldn't write a story with the word "hobbit" in it. 

Like many of his fellow veterans of the trenches he was a part of the "Lost Generation," Those who lost all ideals concerning war. In the Hobbit the Battle of 5 Armies over Smog's treasure is a prime example of his disdain for warfare.

WC111523 Criticize your favorite book, show or movie.

 

Criticize your favorite book, show or movie.

I have read The Far Pavilions numerous times. I read it over a summer when in college. Used it for a book report in World Literature. Read it again while getting a divorce and out of work. When I started teaching 7th and 8th grade, I told the story (you don't look away from kids at this age). I told it to my World History classes when covering India during the Raj. It's a marvelous book. The mini-series with Ben Cross and Amy Irving mangled the story beyond recognition.

Before the critique let me give you the story line.

Book one: Hillary Ashton Pelham-Martin is born in India. His father is an explorer charting the northern part of India. His mother miscalculates when she would deliver him as his father planned on being in a British canton when the time comes. She gives birth in a tent during a dust storm and dies of child bed fever. 

Ashton is given to a native woman who's lost her child to nurse, and she becomes his Ayah, (nanny).

They continue traveling but come down with Cholera. Only Sita and Ashton survive as she knows to not drink the water. She dresses him as a native and they travel south to the nearest cantonment. They get there just as the Sepoy mutiny breaks out and all Englishmen are being massacred.

Sita takes him back to the north to a small kingdom at the base of the Himalayas. Northern tribes in India have lighter skinned people than southern India. The mountains are called the Far Pavilions. She finds employment as a seamstress, and they get a hovel to live and survive.

Book Two: Sita and Ashok, his native name, are getting by. She kept all the papers from the caravan that document who Ashton is and buries them in the dirt floor of their home. 

The Rajah of Gulkote where they live outside the castle is celebrating the birth of a son and there is a parade with a feast prepared for the villagers. Ashok and Sita are watching when the parade comes by, and the Rajah's eldest son's horse rises up and is about to throw him. Ashok, who is working in stables, calms the horse and saves the young heir's life.

Sita and Ashok are brought into the palace, Sita becomes the ayah of a baby daughter of the Rajah, Anjuli, and Ashok becomes Lalji's playmate. 

The new son of the Rajah's is from a different mother, and she is wanting to get rid of Lalji so her son will be next in line for the throne.

Sita becomes a mother to Anjuli, who is ignored whose mother is dead, and she means nothing. 

Ashton and Anjuli become close, and they find a place in the palace overlooking the walls and look at the mountains. They dream of leaving the palace and finding a valley where they can build a home, raise sheep and goats and live in peace.

Ashok thwarts a number of attempts on Lalji's life over the next few years. 

Word comes to Ashok that those trying to kill Lalji are going to kill him as he's in the way. Friends in the palace help Sita and Ashok escape from the palace and they flee Gulkote.

Book Three: Sita and Ash start traveling south to find an English Cantonment. Sita gets ill and she gives him all the papers proving who his father is before she dies.

He travels to an English Cantonment; gives them the papers and is sent back to England to be reunited with his family. 

To cut this short he is a fish out of water in England. He makes it through his schooling and enters military service headed back to England to fight for the Raj. 

Young Ashton Pelham-Martin has something that is very valuable to the regiment. He speaks the language as a native and can blend in as a native.

He's given an assignment to escort a wedding party for two brides from one kingdom to another. He finds that one of the brides is Anjuli. He falls in love with Anjuli, delivers them to the other Rajah, sees they're married and leaves.

Then he finds out a year later that the Rajah, who was old, dies and the two Rani's he delivered will be Suttee, burned alive on the funeral pyre.

He goes back to save them but is only able to save Anjuli.

They get married, but the regiment is given orders to go to Afghanistan to establish a diplomatic mission.

In Afghanistan Ash is used as a native in Kabul, to let the mission know what's happening.

The mission is attacked and killed to the last man, but he survives as they think he's a native. 

Ash and Anjuli go to find their valley in the Far Pavilions.

This is a very involved story. It has a great love story, extended history of India, social and economic dynamics, and religious factions between Hindu, Muslim, Sikhs, and Christians.

Now the critique: When I first read the story and even most of the other times, I could read it word for word and devoured every page.

I bought a copy on Kindle. It had been quite a while since I'd read it and was looking forward to it again. I'd also become a writer and was surprised at how many errors were in it. Misspelled words, run-on sentences, that I'd never noticed. This was published in the 1920's or 30's. All copies available today are from 1978, and they didn't edit it? 

Most of all though, it was the lengthy descriptions of the countryside. Pages and pages of flora and fauna, describing the mountains, valleys, plateaus, clothing etc.

I found myself skipping over this stuff. I do that a lot now. Maybe I've lost the ability to appreciate long descriptions in my old age. The first time reading it I learned about the Indian subcontinent, and it was new and exciting. I still consider this to be my all-time favorite novel.        

WC 110823: Something you believed, but found out it wasn't true.

 

This week's challenge is something you once believed but found out wasn't true.

Let's see, there was a time I thought I made a mistake and found out I wrong.

Seriously, 

1. I once believed that God created the universe in six literal days. Then I grew up.

2. I believed Rapture Theology was how the world would end. Then one question changed my mind.

3. I didn't believe in the theory of evolution. Now I do.

4. I believed I'd never get a divorce. Then I was.

5. I believed that a college education was a way out of poverty. Today college loans make indentured servants.

6. I believed that the United States would never condone torture and the president of the United States would call it a "No brainer." It took away everything this country stands for and flushed it down the toilet.

7. I believed in the checks and balances designed in our constitution as our protection from tyranny. The Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade has declared all women as wards of the state, and they have no free will over their own bodies.

8. I believed that The Orange Toad could never do what he has done and said for the past eight years and still be leading in the polls for President. I was wrong.

9. I believed that my children would have a better future than we did growing up. With global warming will any of us have a future past 2050?

10. I believed that racism and sexism and religious wars were over. I was naive. 

11. I still believe in God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit. The God of Zion, not the god of Sinai (Hebrews 12). Jesus whose commandments are to Love God, and our neighbor as ourselves. The Holy Spirit who gives comfort in our times of need. 

 

Double Dose of Wednesday Challenge

 

Last week the challenge was to create a holiday. I drew a blank. I enjoyed the others who thought up a new holiday, but it wasn't until Friday the inspiration hit. So here goes:

A Sadie Hawkins Day. (For those scratching their heads, this is where the boy's line up and the girls chase after them and when the boy is tagged, and they get married. From the comics Lil' Abner.

Here's my take: In each town or city all boys known as "incels" or involuntary celibate still living in their mother's basement at 25; line up and wait for the gun to sound.

All women aged 25 who are still virgins waiting to get married; line up a hundred yards behind the men and at the sound of the gun they start chasing the men. When they tag one, she then escorts her fiancé to a waiting minister or priest who then performs the ceremony.

The woman has the right to an annulment in the first six months for any reason. The man must wait for six months if he wants a divorce.

Now today's challenge: When I was in college, I was compared to John Denver, this was when I first started wearing glasses. I could sing along with Annie's Song and sound like him as well. Others said I reminded them of Spock on Star Trek. I do not have pointed ears!