Jesus and the Cleansing of The Temple- And Why We Need A Cleansing Today
My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations.“”Isaiah 56:7 , But you have made it a den of thieves“”Jeremiah 7:11
On of the first and most important events in the New Testament, and in the new movement called Christianity was the so-called cleansing of the temple. Remember that Jesus was a Jew and that Christianity is essentially a Jewish reformation movement. One of Jesus’ principle disputes was that the Jewish leadership was abusing her people. Nowhere was this more evident than in the temple where the money changers were chiseling the illiterate followers then selling them products they couldn’t afford and that they should not have been led to purchase. It is important to note that as much as Christianity was a religious movement, it was also an economic and social movement. It is also terribly interesting to note that the events described in four gospels are the only time when Christ shows real anger. Of all the persecutions and wars and conflict described in the Bible, it was the abuses of the money changers in the temple that sent Christ over the edge and propelled him into fits of anger. Click on this link Cleansing of The Temple for a detailed explanation of the first cleansing. Like the real event as described in the Bible, what you’re witnessing today playing out in our foreclosure courtrooms and in the streets is the beginning of a revolution…a radical challenge to the existing societal, political and economic norms….I believe what is coming is a modern day Cleansing of The Temple.
2010 Wall Street’s 4th Most Profitable Year!
Now let’s look at what’s happening in this country today. I am just seething with rage and anger at the dramatic divide between Main Street and Wall Street. I am angered enough by the suffering I see on Main Street. I am also angered by the absurdly irrational, dark and sinister forces I see playing out every day while the banks and institutions toy with and taunt the American people. But what has just pushed me absolutely over the edge and what propels me into fits of anger is knowing just how obscene the profits on Wall Street have been in the midst of this crisis and knowing these profits are paid for by the very people–the taxpayers–that are suffering such misery in order to make these obscene profits possible. Take a look here , here and here for some insight on Wall Street’s record profits, but don’t just read the articles, do your own research and consider the gross inequities that they represent. Now back to the Temple analogy. It is true that most of the people who are in foreclosure are behind in their mortgages and let’s ignore for a moment the legal issues about standing and ownership. The fact of the matter is that most of these people had no business closing these loans in the first place. Like the Jewish followers who were poor and had no business buying anything to sacrifice, much less the doves that were sold in the Temple, today’s Defendants were largely poor and financially illiterate and they had no business buying these loans that are now being foreclosed on….but no one is talking about that. If Ford were selling millions of cars that it knew, and that our leadership knew, were destined to blow up, there would be outrage. And that is exactly what happened with millions of loans….they absolutely knew that these poor illiterate people could not repay these loans….but they closed them anyway…..just so our business elders could continue to profit.
Boiling Anger and Resentment In The Streets
I keep my eyes and ears focused squarely only the American people and what I see scares me very much. People are seething with anger and resentment. They don’t like the emerging stories of fraud and waste and corruption. They’re mad at elected officials at all levels, they despise the bankers and the global cabals that have siphoned away the American dream. Take the time to read the comments that are posted on the major newspaper stories on Wall Street or foreclosure or banks. These comments are your jury pool and they tell a chilling tale. There are still a decent percentage of “screw the deadbeat homeowner” comments, but read the anger in those comments and sense the mis-direction. Just wait until they find out that they too are being suckered…just wait until they figure out that the deadbeats were right and that we’ve all been taken…then they’re going to be burning too. And what about all the people who’ve suffered the hard way when a bank or foreclosure mill cut corners and didn’t play by the rules when they used the court to throw them out of their home. Most people can take losing a fair fight when both sides played by the rules but when one side ignores the rules again and again and again…that’s a recipe for real trouble. I’m not stirring up this trouble, I’m just one small voice who is reporting on what is occurring on the street. There is real justification for the anger that is boiling…and I’m certain we’re going to find far many more things to be angry about as the full specter of this collasal crisis is reported.
My Beloved Courts
My real fear and greatest concern is the impact all of this is having upon our entire judicial system. Again, I urge you to read the comments that are posted under any foreclosure story. Our entire system of government depends on the electorate having respect for our system of laws and our courts and they are losing respect for both the more they see first hand and hear about what’s happening in their courtrooms. The stories are only now starting to be told and the public does not at all like what they are hearing….and my very real fear is that the stories that are going to continue to roll out are only going to get much, much worse. If that happens, the simmering crisis of confidence that is bubbling will boil over. I have developed a basic proposition that is beyond doubt or question anymore. The same shoddy documentation and shady business practices that caused the collapse of the mortgage and real estate markets have been allowed to infect our courtrooms. Not all the files are bad, but we’re way beyond talking about individual files…entire processes and procedures are now rightly under question and scrutiny. The responses from our leadership are absolutely off base and they miss the larger point. Yes people borrowed, and no they are not paying, but we cannot just throw them into the streets without examining how we all got here what is continuing to occur. First, there are just too many people to throw into the streets, but what is far more damming are the billions of dollars that are sloshing around behind the scenes and the repetitively egregious conduct of the evil banks on the other side. Until we all stop and take a hard look at those factors, we should not send one more family into the street. And for all you who wonder why the homeowner is entitled to a modification…..because he’s already paid for it. His kids have paid for it. His grandchildren have paid for it. If it were possible to calculate all the billions paid to the money changers and divide that figure by all the foreclosures, then we could arrive at the real number that loans should be reduced to….after all…the money changers are reporting obscene profits….profits that come on the backs of the people they’re trying to throw in to the street…..
We all need to be asking ourselves just how these thieves were permitted to set up shop in our temples of justice, equality, freedom and integrity. Then we must determine what is required to turn the tables and cleanse our temples.
(Many thanks to Nye Lavalle for sharing this thought. Click on the link and especially this link which will take you to a report he wrote long ago on the abuses of the mortgage industries. Nye has been sounding the alarms for a lot longer than most anyone else…what if someone had listened way back when?)
