I almost want to just crawl into a cave for the rest of this year. More & more divisiveness & strife on the horizon. All these attacks, senseless police shootings, & the colossal joke of an election year...this will be a tough year to get through. The Pulse shooting is still on my mind. It seems so stupid to me to argue about what to call it. Was it terrorism? Absolutely it was. Any mass killing of this scale fits that category. Is it a hate crime? Absolutely. It be a hate crime if it were a nightclub filled mostly with straight people. It takes a lot of pure hatred to decide to murder innocent people for no good reason what-so-ever. Hate that I could never possess as a Christian & that is the God's honest truth.

There are some that think Christians are being persecuted here in the U.S. I strongly disagree considering there are places where being such is a death sentence. I don't see us getting that bad off. At least hopefully not in my lifetime. It is tough though to be one in this country. Pretty much difficult anywhere in the world as we are called to love & forgive one another. So difficult this is to do. Takes so much grace to be able to forgive the vilest, most hate-filled individuals. I couldn't imagine it. I just know it's possible as I've seen it done. Like the family of the victims slain in that Charleston church. It has to be done. Holding onto grudges just wears the bearer of it down eventually. It's not pretty when it does as it can lead some to be just as hate-filled as the perpetrators that have wronged them.

I certainly don't speak as someone high-&-mighty with all the answers. I know I don't know all the answers. Never claimed to. I've messed up so many times. Let myself get so caught up in my own desires & self-gratification that I've lost sight of my faith at times. I also realized with has had negative impacts on a few folks I have met. It's a main reason why I don't frequent this site much. Well that & being very busy with work/life & thus not completing much in the way of art. Been working on a piece for near on 2 months now & I just haven't gotten around to finishing it. But I digress. I am will always be a furry. That'll never change. I put the emphasis on Christian furry though...not furry Christian. My identity first & foremost is in Him & I'm doing my level best day in & day out to live that way. It means at times knowing when something has too much a hold on your life that you need to back away. In this world of instant info & gratification, it's easy to get carried away. Just remember to be true to who yourself & not what the world tells you is currently the "in"-thing to be.