Relay for Life

I signed up to do Relay for Life this year. I had to. I felt compelled to DO something about the things I'm passionate about.

I guess what I'm getting from reading the book of Luke is that Jesus put his money, time, and energy where His mouth was. I think He wants us to do likewise. Good intentions and good wishes are fine, but if Jesus performed his ministry with nothing more tangible than good wishes, nobody would care about His sermons. When it comes to activism, social work, and cultural reform - He is truly the MASTER!

So I saw that Anchorage was having Relay for Life in May. And I thought of my grandma, and my aunt, and my mom's aunts... and Sis. Rance, and me.... By God's grace mine was no biggie and it was benign... But still... Cancer is just something that has hit close to home, and I would like to do my part to help fund the medical field in this area.

So I have agreed to walk around a park for 24 hours straight - alternating with Paul... I need a team! I need a few more people so that there's always one person on the track while others get a break. I'm praying for the resources for the day.

I'm thankful that I've got financial sponsorship already. I'm almost 25% of the way there in 1 day! I thank God for the people who sponsored me.

After that, I picked my next 2 top topics.
1) SPCA! That stands for Sociaty for the Prevention of Cruelty against Animals. And today I donated $10 to their Operation Baghdad Pup. That is an initiative to help the soldiers in Iraq who befriend stray animals during their tour, to bring the animals stateside. It is against the law for enlisted men to take car of or won animals in a war zone, and they cannot use their transportation to send the animal home. So the SPCA flies in, takes the animal, immunizes it so it meets international flight standards, and then they fly the animal home to their new owners. It helps the soldiers in the heat of the war to bear with their deployment much better.

2) Pro-Life. I am 100% pro-life. I was thinking about it as I was mentioning it to a coworker, but I can't forget how the doctors wanted to push Paul to allow an abortion in October of 2006, with my very first pregnancy, because the baby had "no hope": He was oxygen deprived too long, his heart rate was low... He was probably going to pass away during the night anyways, and even if he did survive he would have such mental/physical complications that he "wouldn't be worth it". That I should just start over and try again. Had we caved in, I would've forfeited on Anakin. Which if you know anything about my family, you know Anakin is far from handicapped. He's one of the biggest blessings in my life, my buddy and my helper, and the man of the house (at the age of 3.5) when Paul isn't home. I just firmly believe that Doctors should be more pro-life themselves, so that more babies who have a chance can make it. There are already babies that don't make it - miscarriages, ectopic pregnancies, birth defects, complications with the pregnancy... If it isn't meant to be, then it won't - but that shouldn't be the Doctor's first option when things get tough. With so many personal losses to babies that we want, why on earth would we pull the trigger on "maybes"? And don't even get me started on abortion as a form of birth control.

Well that's that. Just my new 2 cents, for all that it's worth.