Today is Groundhog Day-—Candlemas on the Christian calendar. Either way, it means we’re half-way to spring. I’m feeling better already. However…

In recent news reports, a certain conservative Republican candidate in the state of Missouri, running for the U. S. Senate against the courageous, conscientious, independent Democratic incumbent Senator Claire McCaskill, made a speech at a Christian event during which he averred that the sexual revolution of the 60s and 70s caused the worldwide scourge of sex trafficking.

Say what? This is wrong on so many levels it’s hard to know where to start. Aside from the fact that sexual slavery in one form or another has been going on since ten minutes after Creation, the implication of this candidate’s belief is that if women would just behave themselves, none of the current public outbreak of male sexual misbehavior would be happening. Oh yes. Blame the women. Again. Darned alluring those girls with their birth control pills.

Another Missouri Republican legislator claims that he expects his wife to have dinner on the table every night when he comes home, because that is the Biblical model. Say what?? I differ on religious interpretation, citing a source even this guy would (I think) consider authoritative. It’s the oft-quoted passage of the Book of Proverbs that begins, “A good wife who can find?” (See Proverbs 31:10ff). This good wife? She is a skilled weaver, an importer of foreign goods, manager of a large staff of servants and workers, a real estate tycoon, wine maker, manufacturer, entrepreneur, fashionista, and, yes, a great mom. “Her children rise up and call her blessed.” If said legislator would let his wife out of the kitchen he might find out she’s a better CEO than cook. The Bible says so.

Incidentally, that same chapter of Proverbs advises this (31:6ff). “Give strong drink to him who is perishing and wine to those in bitter distress; let them drink and forget their poverty, and remember their misery no more.” So there. That could be the answer to the whole problem of poverty in America. Can’t say it hasn’t been extensively tried.

As I approach the limit of my biblical allocation of years, I realize that time is running short on my opportunity to speak out on behalf of humanity—men, women, children, all of us. I’m trying not to waste it. My new book of poetry, WINDSHIFT, is a small whisper in the uproar. Yet it represents a lifetime of experience, observation, and perhaps even wisdom. Hope you’ll take a look. I’m pleased to link to a review that lifts my heart. Thank you, Bill.

Bill Tammeus Faith Matters