Only in Oak Park did a splinter gay congregation, once part of Chicago’s Good Shepherd Metropolitan Community Church, survive:
[O]ver the years, many troubles came to plague Good Shepherd. First, the congregation repeatedly split due to ideological differences, spawning satellite MCCs, such as Christ the Redeemer in Evanston, Church of the Resurrection in Hyde Park and New Spirit in Oak Park [542 S. Scoville, 708-848-5460] — only the one in Oak Park survives today. [Italics added]
This is not surprising. Oak Park has been a major church-oriented town from the start. If a church can’t survive here, it can survive nowhere.
Then there are “Welcoming Gay Friendly Churches” in Oak Park:
Ascension
Oak Park Catholic St. Catherine of Siena-St. Lucy Oak Park Catholic Grace Church Oak Park Episcopal Good Shepherd Lutheran Church Oak Park Lutheran Oak Park Mennonite Church Oak Park Mennonite New Spirit MCC Oak Park Non-denominational First United Church Oak Park UCC, Presbyterian Pilgrim Church Oak Park UCC Euclid Avenue UMC Oak Park UMC First United Methodist Church of Oak Park Oak Park UMC Worship at New Spirit MCC is Sundays at 11am (June through August at 10am), with Wednesday Prayer and Hymn Sing at 7:30pm.
Sitting down
This is huge. Just dismantled the improvised computer-riser that allowed me to stand and deliver blogs and columns (not book copy, because it called for too much standing time) and am now SITTING and typing!
It’s one small step for mankind by the stiff-legged man whose casts were sawed off only a few days ago! Yahoo! On to book-length copy production, not to mention even greater blogging and columning.
Not glad you asked that question
What do you say as a school administrator when asked why so many black kids are disciplined, far more than white kids?
You vaguely question teachers’ and administrators’ sensitivity to black kids’ needs, refer to the little-known and less-appreciated cyclic nature of student misbehavior, and cite vaguely how different is each child’s experience — with the latter countering the widespread impression that each child’s experience is the same or at least similar:
Kevin Anderson, [District 97’s] assistant superintendent for teaching and learning, hesitated to hazard a guess when asked why he thinks African-American males are receiving the majority of out-of-school suspensions.
“Is that a sensitivity issue on our part? Are we going through a cycle of kids acting out right now? It would be so different for every child, I can’t guess at this time,” he said.
Not fair to nail the guy for off-cuff comments, or at least not entirely fair, you say. But would we expect something more pointed and informative in a considered official statement? It would be a first for a schools bureaucracy anywhere.
Oak Park Cops [not] keeping track of things
This is a bad sign:
The Oak Park Police Department has failed in its attempt to receive accreditation from the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies (CALEA), Oak Park Police Chief Rick Tanksley said Tuesday.
“This was our first attempt to get the accreditation status and we fell short in our paperwork-documentation process,” said Tanksley, who received verbal notification on the four-day process in December.
Paperwork documentation, also known as record-keeping, which is as crucial to law enforcement as bullets in guns.
The demographic that cannot be named
OP village manager reporting on decrease in crime:
As his police chief has done in recent months, Barwin hit hard on the need for citizen involvement and what it takes for a community in such close proximity to the economic and social ills of a large city to effectively deal with crime.
A large city? Rather, an almost all-black area of a large city.
No stopping by the woods on a snowy evening . . .
This tale of woe from a few miles east of OP reminded me of the dudes in Scoville Park who called me a white faggot because I didn’t stop and talk to them in the gloaming.
A 16-year-old boy has been charged in last week’s shooting of a 15-year-old girl who refused to talk to him, Chicago Police said.
Lawrence Felton, 16, allegedly tried to talk to the girl twice as she walked in the 4200 block of West Lake Street last Sunday, but she rebuffed him and kept walking, police said. Felton allegedly shot her from behind.
The girl suffered gunshot wounds to both legs and was taken to Mount Sinai Hospital.
Felton, who was arrested Saturday night and has been charged with aggravated battery with a firearm.
Girl, he wanted some respect!
OP gun ban slightly nudged
Big news out of the nation’s capital district, “Gun ban bites dust,” should have OP banners worried. It “sets up a Supreme Court showdown over the scope of the 2nd Amendment”: does it give gun rights only to militia, or to citizens? “It was the first time a federal appeals court has voided a gun law on the basis of the 2nd Amendment,” per LA Times, quoting lawyers.
If the justices were to agree with the lower court, the ruling would not likely sweep aside the many laws that regulate guns and gun ownership. However, it could cast doubt on measures that forbid law-abiding residents from possessing a weapon.
The Supreme Court has not give comfort to gun-owners, focusing on the “militia” part of the 2nd amendment. But Friday’s ruling by the D.C. appeals court
may cause the [S.C.] justices to reconsider that conclusion. Breaking with precedent, the 2-1 decision said the government may not forbid residents from owning “functional firearms” for self-defense at home.
This is the issue, of course. People living in war zones may arm themselves for self-protection.
“Once we have determined — as we have done — that handguns are ‘arms’ referred to in the 2nd Amendment, it is not open to the District to ban them,”
was the 2–1 majority opinion, which allowed “reasonable regulations” on ownership and possession — registration and the like.
The dissenting judge
argued that the high court had made clear the 2nd Amendment was intended to protect a “well regulated militia,” not individuals who want guns for their own uses.
Thus David Savage in LA Times (and Chi Trib). The AP story by Brett Zongker, has it different, however:
Judge Karen Henderson dissented, writing that the Second Amendment does not apply to the District of Columbia because it is not a state.
