ClydeR
02-22-2009, 03:52 PM
Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal said on Meet the Press today that his state will not accept all of the stimulus money allocated to Louisiana. Jindal said the stimulus bill would be more stimulative if it had more tax cuts, like a capital gains tax cut, and less spending.
What many people don't know about Jindal is what an intensely spiritual person he is. Although he doesn't like to talk about it today (that's how modest he is!), he wrote an account in 1994 about how he used his spirituality to help a suffering friend.
Jindal's article, "Beating a Demon: Physical Dimensions of Spiritual Warfare (http://www.newoxfordreview.org/article.jsp?did=1294-jindal)," published in the December 1994 issue of the New Oxford Review, is accessible today only if you are willing to pay for the privilege, which I don't recommend. (During this Obama recession, even $1.50 is worth saving.) It's a long, rambling, introspective, not particularly well written article. Luckily for you, I'm going to retell Jindal's story in my own words, leaving out all the boring parts that made the original article so long.
One evening, Jindal invited his purely platonic friend Susan to go with him to a Christian a cappella concert at Brown University. During the concert, Susan abruptly ran outside. Jindal followed and found her sobbing uncontrollably. He wanted to comfort her, but he knew it would be wrong for him to hug her, so he waited for a female friend to come along. After the female friend hugged and otherwise comforted sad Susan, Jindal and Susan went to Susan's room.
Jindal sat Susan on the bed, and he sat in a "chair located several feet across the room." Again, I want to emphasize that Susan was a purely platonic friend.
Through a long conversation, Jindal was able to elicit clues as to the cause of Susan's angst. Susan told Jindal that she had a lump on her head, and a biopsy showed that it was skin cancer. She was having nightmares (or were they visions?). And she kept smelling something funny in her apartment, sort of like sulfur, but the maintenance people had not been able to find any cause for the odor. Another clue as to the possible cause of her sadness was that her roommate, the non-Christian daughter of a Hmong faith healer, had decorated the apartment with pagan symbols. And when Susan became ill, her mother had gone to a "pagan altar in the Far East" and made a sacrifice for her daughter.
Using logic and his limited religious training, Jindal considered the evidence -- the cancer, the visions, sulfurous odors, pagan decorations, Far East altars. Hmm. Finally, he realized what was causing Susan to cry. It was a demon! Jindal left the room and made the sign of the cross.
Jindal took Susan to a University Christian Fellowship prayer meeting. At the end of the prayer meeting, Susan fell to the floor and began thrashing about, as if she might be having a seizure, but everybody at the meeting knew what it really was.
They quickly gathered around Susan and held her down while chanting "Satan, I command you to leave this woman" and commanding "demons to leave in the name of Christ." This went on for a long time. Eventually the people holding Susan down relaxed their grip, and she jumped up and nearly made it out the door before they grabbed her and held her down again for more chanting.
The struggle was getting so intense that they called in a "rival campus Christian group," the Campus Crusade for Christ, to help them hold Susan down and chant over her. Susan started cursing (another sign of demon possession) and crying out for someone to help her, which the combined power of the two Christian groups did, as they continued to restrain her and chant.
After "a few hours," Susan indicated that the demon was gone, and the other students let her leave.
When the doctor later performed surgery, he was shocked to discover that the cancer was completely gone. The only explanation the doctor could think of was that the earlier biopsy must have removed all of the cancer cells. Right. I'm as much a fan of science as the next person, but there's no way I'm going to believe something that farfetched. Thanks to Jindal's article, we know what really happened all those years ago.
Jindal is regarded as a likely candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012 or 2016. Although I like Jindal a lot, I'm going to have to support Sarah Palin in 2012. I wrote a post here last year about how Palin's church is helping to drive witches out of the neighborhoods where they live. We need Palin more than Jindal because we have a bigger problem with witches in this country than with demons.
What many people don't know about Jindal is what an intensely spiritual person he is. Although he doesn't like to talk about it today (that's how modest he is!), he wrote an account in 1994 about how he used his spirituality to help a suffering friend.
Jindal's article, "Beating a Demon: Physical Dimensions of Spiritual Warfare (http://www.newoxfordreview.org/article.jsp?did=1294-jindal)," published in the December 1994 issue of the New Oxford Review, is accessible today only if you are willing to pay for the privilege, which I don't recommend. (During this Obama recession, even $1.50 is worth saving.) It's a long, rambling, introspective, not particularly well written article. Luckily for you, I'm going to retell Jindal's story in my own words, leaving out all the boring parts that made the original article so long.
One evening, Jindal invited his purely platonic friend Susan to go with him to a Christian a cappella concert at Brown University. During the concert, Susan abruptly ran outside. Jindal followed and found her sobbing uncontrollably. He wanted to comfort her, but he knew it would be wrong for him to hug her, so he waited for a female friend to come along. After the female friend hugged and otherwise comforted sad Susan, Jindal and Susan went to Susan's room.
Jindal sat Susan on the bed, and he sat in a "chair located several feet across the room." Again, I want to emphasize that Susan was a purely platonic friend.
Through a long conversation, Jindal was able to elicit clues as to the cause of Susan's angst. Susan told Jindal that she had a lump on her head, and a biopsy showed that it was skin cancer. She was having nightmares (or were they visions?). And she kept smelling something funny in her apartment, sort of like sulfur, but the maintenance people had not been able to find any cause for the odor. Another clue as to the possible cause of her sadness was that her roommate, the non-Christian daughter of a Hmong faith healer, had decorated the apartment with pagan symbols. And when Susan became ill, her mother had gone to a "pagan altar in the Far East" and made a sacrifice for her daughter.
Using logic and his limited religious training, Jindal considered the evidence -- the cancer, the visions, sulfurous odors, pagan decorations, Far East altars. Hmm. Finally, he realized what was causing Susan to cry. It was a demon! Jindal left the room and made the sign of the cross.
Jindal took Susan to a University Christian Fellowship prayer meeting. At the end of the prayer meeting, Susan fell to the floor and began thrashing about, as if she might be having a seizure, but everybody at the meeting knew what it really was.
They quickly gathered around Susan and held her down while chanting "Satan, I command you to leave this woman" and commanding "demons to leave in the name of Christ." This went on for a long time. Eventually the people holding Susan down relaxed their grip, and she jumped up and nearly made it out the door before they grabbed her and held her down again for more chanting.
The struggle was getting so intense that they called in a "rival campus Christian group," the Campus Crusade for Christ, to help them hold Susan down and chant over her. Susan started cursing (another sign of demon possession) and crying out for someone to help her, which the combined power of the two Christian groups did, as they continued to restrain her and chant.
After "a few hours," Susan indicated that the demon was gone, and the other students let her leave.
When the doctor later performed surgery, he was shocked to discover that the cancer was completely gone. The only explanation the doctor could think of was that the earlier biopsy must have removed all of the cancer cells. Right. I'm as much a fan of science as the next person, but there's no way I'm going to believe something that farfetched. Thanks to Jindal's article, we know what really happened all those years ago.
Jindal is regarded as a likely candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012 or 2016. Although I like Jindal a lot, I'm going to have to support Sarah Palin in 2012. I wrote a post here last year about how Palin's church is helping to drive witches out of the neighborhoods where they live. We need Palin more than Jindal because we have a bigger problem with witches in this country than with demons.