What do you believe and why?

What are some of your most deeply held beliefs or convictions? Why do you believe them? For most of us, our parents played a key role in shaping our beliefs.  Many of our beliefs have been shaped by personal experiences, teachers, peers, society, ministers and traditions.  They are not our original beliefs, but someone else’s.

What we believe matters.   What we believe can lead us down a path that leads to good or bad, success or failure, safety or danger, happiness or sadness, humility or pride and even love or hate.   One set of convictions or beliefs shapes those  that belong to the Ku Klux Klan or The Black Panthers or ISIS and another set of beliefs shapes those that belong to charitable organizations, support groups, community service that benefits all, etc.  What we believe really does matter.

From the earliest times Christians made attempts to summarize their essential beliefs the Apostle’s Creed is an example of that.  I know of no church organization that does not have a statement of beliefs and I know of no fraternal organization that does not have a statement of beliefs.  Beliefs matter!  They define our values, morals and relationships.  They shape our goals, ambitions, hopes, and dreams.  It is important we know what we believe in and be able to defends those beliefs.

Unfortunately we can be so rigid in our beliefs and convictions that we cannot listen to those with different beliefs or convictions.  This is especially true in the religious world.  Regardless of what we believe about God, humanity or our world, we will lack certainty and that lack of certainty should lead us to humility in our convictions and in our interactions with those who disagree with us.  How can anyone prove beyond a shadow of doubt  what they believe is absolute truth and that there is no other way?

I learned long ago that what I believed was sometimes flawed and not only hurt me it hurt others.  This is not going to set well with many, but there was a time that I believed if you did not accept Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior you COULD NOT go to heaven.   Pastor Joel Olsten is criticized by many in the religious community because he will not state point blank that your destiny is hell if you do not accept Jesus Christ.  I am not God and God has inspired men in scripture to write, “My ways or not your ways”, I am not to judge, but leave that to Him, that He can do anything He pleases and does not need our permission. 

I once believe that abortion was an unforgivable sin.  I once believed people that divorced and remarried without jumping through the church's legal loops to get an annulment could not partake of the sacraments.  I once believed if you were not baptized you could not go to heaven and that babies who died before being baptized were in LIMBO.  I once believed in purgatory.  I once believed priest had a special power to represent God when it came to forgiving yours sins.  I once believed we needed to sacrifice Christ over and over again at every mass as if the one sacrifice on the cross was not enough.  I now do not believe any of those things.  Not only did I sincerely believe those things I taught them to others.  I believed them because that is what my parents believed and my church believed.  I did not know any different and did not think I had the right to question them.

What we believe has a significant impact on our lives.  Our beliefs influence who we marry , the career we choose, the way we see right and wrong, how we see our parent and our children, what we do with our time and money, and how we face adversity.  Those beliefs lead us to say no to many things we may have said yes to and yes to things we might otherwise have said no to.

“I believe in God, the Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth.”  I believe Christians must believe there is a God, a Supreme Being, that created the universe.  How God created it may be open for debate, but it is essential that a Christian believe that God did create all things.  I believe Christians must perceive God not simply as a force of nature, but as an entity, a Being, that is both intelligent and powerful.

Men like Isaac Newton, Blaise Pascal, and Galileo, who, despite the church’s blunder in criticizing their conclusions, continued to maintain their faith in God.  I do think science and faith are compatible.  I also believe these men were far more intelligent than me.  There are some scientist that do not believe in God, but there is just as many that do.

 Jesus Christ is our defining story.  Jesus demonstrates who God is, what God is like, and what God’s will is for our lives. His life and ministry, His death and resurrection shape how we see ourselves and how we see the world.  Jesus Christ provides us with a different perspective on life.  Christians believe we were born with purpose, our lives have meaning and when our mortal body is finished, we’ve only just begun to live. 

Richard Dawkins (who I believe to be evil) once wrote, “We are survival machines—robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes.” But faith in Jesus says that we were made for more than this.  In fact, the pain and brokenness in our world are largely the result of our living as “robot vehicles” blindly focused on serving the self.  Jesus calls us to be authentically human, to love, give, serve, and rise above our selfish genes.  As we do so we not only make the world a more just and compassionate place; we find joy in the process.  I pity Richard Dawkins and I am willing to show him mercy because of his broken body that may influence his beliefs.  Regardless of what Richard Dawkins says about Jesus Christ or what anyone else may say I know Jesus of Nazareth has been the dominant figure in the history of Western culture for over 2000 years and I doubt that Richard Dawkins will be.   

When God sought to communicate His love for us, he sent Jesus. It was in His Son that God’s message came to us and became our defining story. Through Jesus, God was saying: You matter to me and I love you.  In Jesus, God showed that He cares about those who are lost and those who are made to feel unimportant.  He showed us compassion for the sick.  He showed us how to love, to forgive, to give, to serve.  In Jesus’ death on the cross God showed us the depth of His love and the price of grace. And in Jesus’ resurrection, God defeated our evil, hate, sin, and death! 

My church has put so much emphasis on Mother Mary that our people know little about the Holy Spirit.  Many Christians in our church haven’t been taught about the Spirit, nor encouraged to seek the Spirit’s work in their lives. As a result, their spiritual lives are a bit anemic and they are trying to live the Christian life on their own power and wisdom.  That is impossible!

What are the voices you listen to, and what are the powers that shape your life?  I find there are voices in my own life that would lead me to give in to hate, indifference, desire, pride, infidelity, selfishness, or greed. But when we listen to the voice of the Spirit and open ourselves to the Spirit’s active work in our lives, we find that we are led to a very different place and to become very different people.

The Spirit convicts us and quickens our conscience when we’re doing wrong. The Spirit, through persistent nudges, urges us to act selflessly in our care for others. The Spirit makes us long to be more than we are at the present and to become more like the people God intended us to be.  in Galatians 5:22-23: “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.”  The Holy Spirit gives us these gifts and no where in the Bible does it say Mother Mary does. 

How different is this fruit than the fruit of our own hearts, and the culture around us.

The “Holy” and catholic (universal/unity) church.”  When many people view the church today, it looks neither holy nor catholic. It seems filled with hypocrites and judgmental people; in fact, this is one reason why many have turned away from “organized religion” and why so many young adults today say that they are “spiritual but not religious.”  Interestingly, these same young people have great admiration for Jesus, but far less admiration for His people, the church. They see neither holiness nor catholicity (unity) when they look at the most vocal Christians and the most outspoken churches today. 

The word holy in the biblical context means belonging to God, or “sacred to” God or “set apart for” God. You’ve likely heard it said that the church is not a country club for perfect people, but instead a hospital for broken and sinful people who are slowly being made well. We need to make sure the non-churched understand that we know that and stop pretending we are bunch of perfect people.  The church does not belong to us it belongs to God.  The next time you try and tell someone they are sitting in your seat at church remember that. The church is holy when we love Christ and seeks to be faithful to Him.  The church is holy when we are not attacking one another for interpreting a scripture differently. 

Christ tried to forestall the divisions among His followers by telling His disciples not to judge one another, and to love one another and forgive one another. Nevertheless, the church divided and continues to divide to this day.   Our belief in the holy, catholic church (universal/unity) is an ecumenical belief that all who call upon the name of Christ and seek to follow Him as Savior and Lord are, despite their denominational or nondenominational names, part of one universal church.  The Roman Catholic Church is a part of that one universal church, and so is the Eastern Orthodox Church, as well as the Lutherans, Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Baptists, Pentecostals, Methodists, nondenominational churches, and all the rest.  What right do you have to say Catholics are not CHRISTIANS?  Does it make you feel more important than Catholics, more loved by God?  PRIDE!

I still believe in the importance of the church, but unfortunately at the moment I find that I cannot attend and that certainly has affected my life in a negative way.  I pray one day before I die I will be able to find a church that I can return to and feel at home.  I have not stopped looking.  People need to be able to express differences of opinion within the church and be respected and loved.  I knew that once in a church in Galveston, Texas and I will never forget it. 

The Forgotten Man - Jospeh

All the attention is given to Mary the Mother of Christ, but what about Joseph?

Joseph had as much to do with raising Jesus as Mary and maybe even more. 

After the bar mitzvah the Jewish boy became the responsibility of the father. That is how Jesus was left behind in Jerusalem. Jesus got separated from his parents after his bar mitzvah and they started home. Going he would have traveled with His mother and returning it would have been the custom for Him to travel with his father. Each parent probably thought Jesus was with the other. 

There is not much said of Joseph in scripture. He is only mentioned by name about 17 times. The preachers do not mention Joseph much and do not preach sermons on Joseph. Sometimes he is mentioned on Father's Day.

I know my denomination teaches there were no other children than Jesus, but I personally do not believe that teaching is correct. I do not accept the doctrine that my denomination uses to explain away the reference in the Bible of Jesus siblings in order support the doctrine of Perpetual Virginity.

We do not know much about Joseph, but we do know he was a carpenter and trained Jesus to be a carpenter. We do know he was an honorable man. He married Mary in spite of the pregnancy.

We can use our imagination and assume since Joseph was a carpenter (craftsman) he would have been creative, patient, dedicated, disciplined, took pride in what he did, quite and humble. I say humble because God always chose the humble for great things in scripture. Scripture makes clear God always looks into a mans heart when judging him.

Joseph did not build houses because he worked with wood and houses were not made of wood in Israel. He made furniture, doors, shutters, etc. requiring great skill and dedication to perfection.

I would also assume Jesus had a good relationship with Joseph and called him daddy, since Jesus called His Heavenly Father Abba meaning daddy.

Yes, I would say Joseph was a good father and a good man all together. Jesus had a good role model on earth.

We can learn much from Joseph, especially daddies. If we do perhaps 26 percent of young men that were surveyed in the U.S. in 2016 when ask next year about their relationship with their father’s will not say they have a bad relationship with their father's.

What have we all done (mothers, daddies, grandmothers, grandfathers, aunts and uncles) to be good role models to children and young people today? We need to model our faith in order to pass it on to the next generation. We need to demonstrate love of God, others and self.

You would be surprised how many men and women avoid a relationship with God the Father because they had a bad experience with their earthly father.

Is celebrity worshipping healthy?

 Being interested in the personal lives of celebrities might seem like harmless fun, but is it?  Celebrities are worshiped worldwide, especially in poor countries. Celebrity worship is not new it can be traced back to ancient Greece and Olympus. Celebrity worship is more prevalent today than in the past because we have more access to celebrity’s personal lives due to modern technology.

There is a thin line between politics and celebrities in the Philippines. As of October 15^th there had been 29 celebrities file for election in 2016. I doubt very seriously if they are depending on their vast knowledge of governance, law, economics, national or world affairs to win them a spot in government.  

One Representative attended the third grade and has gotten a G.E.D. His ambition is to become a Senator and then President of the Philippines. English and Tagalog are the languages most used in the National government and he speaks neither fluently. Celebrity status has it perks outside of sports and entertainment.

I can remember when women started throwing their underwear on stage at Elvis Presley and media acted as if it was a new phenomenon.  Women threw their underwear on stage when composers Frederic Chopin and Franz Liszt performed on stage in the 19th century.

Celebrities tap into the public's fantasies and basic emotions. They allow people to escape their everyday mundane lives and believe anything is possible. The problem with idolizing celebrity’s lives’ is that the lives idolized are usually created by managers and agents and are fantasies. The celebrities we think we know turn out to be nothing more than fictional characters.

I think the dwindling influence of religion contributes to greater celebrity worshipping. The celebrities exploit’s and eccentricities become more than a form of entertainment. They become an escape to fill a painful void in our lives, a void the church and religion once filled.

Just because someone is good at acting or a sport is no reason for us to care about their opinions on domestic/foreign policy, the environment or healthcare, but many people do. When I want a view on the current situation in Iraq or Syria I look for an interview with a diplomat, an academic, someone whose profession is to know foreign affairs.

I may agree with the personal opinion of some actor or athlete, but I am not going to search them out for advice. I will go to an expert in the area that I am interested in. Yet on many topics unrelated to acting or sports, the media is more than happy to offer celebrities a platform to air their views, no matter how shallow they are. I heard Simon Cowell giving his political opinions, the same Simon Cowell who admits to reading nothing and watching only cartoons on television, but he got access to news media because they knew he would attract an audience.

I know some are saying I am being mean spirited celebrities are just getting “the message” out to a public who lack awareness. I sort of get that. I guess what bothers me is if you are listening to celebrities on global affairs are you really asking the hard questions? 

Did you support the crisis in Haiti because of Shean Penn or because there was a legitimate need. The crisis is not over are you still contributing to rebuild the lives of Haitians? Where is Shean Penn today in regards to Hatti? I no longer hear anything about Penn and Hatti. Has he moved on to another celebrity cause? There are exceptions Elizabeth Taylor and A.I.D.S. she remained dedicated to the cause until her death.

Sean Penn denied anything was wrong with Haiti’s government and announced to the world that the small Caribbean nation had finally “turned a corner.”  In a Newsweek magazine article Sean Penn stated, “Haiti’s economy is among the fastest-growing in the Caribbean, as the government continues to make economic development a priority.” He fell to add they were making economic development a priority on the backs of the poor and middle class. Was his statements made out of ignorance of the real problems or out of friendship to the Martelly government.

It is a fact Sean Penn was friendly with the Martelly government therefore it would only be natural he would say good things about them. In fact Penn became Ambassador-at-large for the Martelly government the same government that confiscated and leveled homes in downtown Port au Prince for tourism in order to further enrich their friends.

The World Bank’s website shows that Haiti’s annual GDP growth was actually at 5.6% (following the 2008 hurricane) when Martelly came to power through highly controversial elections in 2011. GDP growth in Haiti dropped to 2.8% in 2012 and was at 3.6% in 2014. In many ways, the hurricane season of 2008 was the cruelest ever experienced in Haiti, 70% of Haiti's crops were lost, the damage was estimated to be $1 billion, up to that time it was the costliest natural disaster in Haitian history, but they recovered quickly.

Granted the earthquake cost far more lives and the damage was estimated at $14 billion. But, the aid Haiti received in 2010 following the earthquake was unprecedented. Within ten months of the earthquake $8.75 billion had been given for reconstruction. The Haitien Martelly government was having so many difficulties managing and disbursing the funds the Red Cross stopped actively soliciting donations. Penn was blaming everyone but himself for all the disasters of good intention, without ever considering he may not have had the qualification to lead a disaster relief program. 

Americans by August 2011 had donated over $12 billion. Where has the $14 billion raised as of 2015 gone? Six years later the rubble is off the streets. Haiti's back more or less to normal. But there have not been the improvements there should have been, given the resources.  

Penn was right Hatti turned the corner it went from having ghetto areas to being a ghetto country. “Millions of Haitians live on less than US$1 per day, and approximately 80% of the ten million live on less than US$2 per day. It is also one of the most unequal when it comes to rich and poor.  Penn never mentioned that Haiti’s national economy remains hostage to the powerful wealthy elite, his friends.

Penn’s claim that Martelly’s election in 2011 represented a peaceful democratic transition is absurd. Once again I ask was his statement made out of ignorance of the facts or friendship. The violence preceding and following the first round of the November 2010 presidential elections in Haiti is well documented. In fact, it is equally documented that most of the violence was perpetrated by the supporters of Michel Martelly.

Penn is just one of many examples why I do not want my news coming from celebrities or celebrities running charitable organizations. I want professionals that have dedicated their lives to those causes doing it. I have no objection to celebrities making public service spots to raise money or raising money from their friends, but I do not want them involved in the day to day operation.  I don’t go to an auto mechanic for medical issues and I am not going to a celebrity for advice on world or national affairs.

Why do we automatically become idolizers of celebrities the moment they make their first million or sign their first autograph? I know I am in the minority, but I cannot tell you the name of the star in any movie I have ever seen, not even the latest Star Trek movie that I saw only a few weeks ago. I am impressed or not impressed by the work they did in the movie I am watching and when it is over they have absolutely no influence on my life.

I was not let down when I discovered Michael Jackson was probably a pedophile; nor when I found out Bill Cosby probably had been drugging and raping women for decades; I did not expect Tiger Woods to be perfect and nothing Justin Bieber does surprises me. They or no other celebrity are my idols. I do not place any human on a pedestal. It does bother me that celebrities seem to get better treatment by the justice system than ordinary citizens.

Children are dying from starvation and lack of medical care and the public is saddened by some celebrity being arrested. They probably were released a few hours later simply because they were celebrities. Is it just me who believes the lives of celebrity are not important enough to be worrying about?

The people who I idolize and think we all should be idolizing are the ones who save lives doctors, police officers, firemen, nurses, medics or the ones giving of their time, energy and money to help the poor or teachers that are preparing our youth to be our future, or military personnel safe guarding our freedom or scientist discovering cures for illnesses. Instead many choose to idolize over paid entertainers who in most cases pretend to be something they are not.

People Magazine has a weekly audience of 4.6 million readers the largest audience of any American magazine. People Magazine attempts to satisfy the public’s obsession with celebrities. That is a lot of people spending their time and money reading about people they don’t know and will never know.

Celebrity worship has become such a problem psychologists have a name for it, Celebrity Worship Syndrome or CWS. It is estimated 36% of the public suffer from it. I came across one story of a woman who cut her own wrists and throat when her favorite celebrity got engaged. John Lennon was killed by a “fan”. While most go nowhere near those extremes, there is still a wide spread fascination with the famous.

Taylor Swift, Shania Twain, J Lo, Halle Berry, Justin Bieber and Madonna all have their own perfume. Do we really want to smell like them? I would buy their product if it met my approval, but I would not buy it because the label has their name on it. We should remember celebrities are just people. People packaged up very nicely, but people all the same. They have the same ups and downs, fears and joys, successes and challenges as the rest of us. We can appreciate them when they entertain us, for that is their job, and then we should get on with our own lives.

Don’t let the fascination with celebrities become a substitution for real life - Your focus should be on your own life. Depression, anxiety, and a decrease in self-esteem are just some of the problems that can result when we take the focus off our own lives and focus all our energy on the life of a celebrity.

In closing parents should be role models and heroes for their children. When parents allow celebrities to be their children's primary role models, the line between fantasy and reality sometimes becomes too blurred for parents to teach them lessons on ethics, character and responsibility.

I must admit The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet at 4p.m. everyday gave me a perspective on family life I did not get at home. It allowed me to consider not all families were like mine, but I always felt somewhat depressed after watching and was left wishing for something that would not be.

Needless to say I was shocked many years back when the Nelson boys confessed they felt the show not only controlled their lives but, in many ways, left them confused about their own reality. They used the camera to communicate things to each other that they could not communicate to each other face to face.

The Nelson family, in real life, were not the Nelsons they portrayed on television. Rick Nelson’s life was shattered by drugs and other demons. The real-life Ozzie was the producer, director and writer of the shows; he worked all night, the show came before the family and he was a dictator that loomed over the family. Ozzie was a hands-on businessman who prevented his sons from attending college and constantly reminded them that they were obliged to work on television. Harriet Nelson began appearing in vaudeville when she was 3 years old and on Broadway as a teen-ager. She hung out at the Cotton Club, began smoking at 13, was briefly married to an abusive comedian and lived a high-flying life until she fell in love with Ozzie and handed over her career to him.

The Nelson family may not have been as dysfunctional as mine, but they certainly were close to it. In real life they dealt with an immense amount of pressure and unreconciled issues.

I am not saying all celebrities have a negative impact on the lives of young fans. There are actors who support charities, athletes who launch after-school programs and comedians who visit hospitals to cheer up patients. These are the "unsung hero" some celebrity personalities are inspirational and worthy of admiration. If your children choose celebrities as their role models, it's important that you discuss with them the specific traits you like, respect and want them to imitate.  Discuss with your children if the traits you like reflect the celebrities true values.

If you vote for a politician based solely on his or her celebrity status then do not complain when nothing improves.  

The new education bill ESSA may prove to be another disaster!

 I have written blogs before and made the statement I no longer know what the Republican Party stand for. It seems to me we now have a one party system in the United States – The D and R Party. I put the “D” first because when the Democrats stand up the Republicans bow.

We just saw another example of the one party system last Wednesday; the Senate followed the House in passing the conference report reauthorizing No Child Left Behind. The new bill, called the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), claims it will return education control to the states. It is supposed to allow the states to do away with the Common Core national standards, and prohibit the Secretary of Education from dictating standards and assessments.

Don’t be fooled the legislation passed by Washington lawmakers does not give states more control over their schools because the bill does not give states adequate authority and there are no enforcement provisions protecting states against overreach by the federal authorities. We must also remember that it is Washington politicians that control the purse strings.

The president of the 3 million National Education Association members (teachers union) praised what lawmakers have done on Capitol Hill regarding ESSA. Have we not been told repeatedly by Republican politician’s that the teachers union is the cause of school failures. The Public School Teachers Unions like ESSA because it was designed to hurt charter, online and private schools. The only good part of ESSA, if there is a good part is that it continues to exempt homeschool families from any kind of federal mandates.

The Republican politicians could have taken the lead and written an education bill that would accomplish what the Republican Party leaders claim they stand for and conservative voter want. But, instead they fell in line with Obama and the Democrats on a bill that will seriously affect adversely millions of conservative Americans until the year 2020. It was a repeat performance of the passing of Obamacare.

The ESSA text is 1061-pages long and was only released on Monday. We now have a piece of legislation like Obamacare that was passed without many reading it.  Republicans and some Democrats when all the flaws in the bill start to appear will claim they were not given adequate time to study the bill before they had to vote on it just as they did with Obamacare. The new Republican House Speaker, promised transparency, an open process and a more responsive House, so much for that promise.

Opposition was growing among Republican member to ESSA so Ryan jammed the vote through faster than anticipated. Then they pretend they do not know why the Republican base is so frustrated with them that they would support outsiders like Donald Trump.

Speaker Ryan and his fellow Republican Representatives and Republican Senators once again raised the white flag of surrender to Obama and the Democrats. They gave liberal groups and teachers unions a huge victory. Republican leadership surrendered control of our children’s education for years to come to liberals without any kind of repercussions.

Were we not told by Republican politicians the Department of Education should be abolished because it is inefficient and we should return control of our schools to local districts and parents? Did they once again lie to us or did they just not have the guts to fight Obama, Democrats and liberals or are they really Democrats in disguise.

It appears that our elected officials in Washington both Democrat and Republican still do not understand that when they pass a bill, it gets implemented, and when it gets implemented, people feel it. There will be consequences to this bill that will affect millions of Americans for years to come. Our elected politicians have an obligation/responsibility to study every line of any new legislation before voting for it. They passed No Child Left Behind over a decade ago and today few want their name associated with the bill. Every Republican who supported this bill should be looked at closely in upcoming elections.

ESSA according to Jane Robbins, a senior fellow at the American Principles Project, allows the Federal government to continue to lay out particular requirements for state standards and uses code language throughout that gives the federal government the tools to pressure the states to stick with Common Core rather than risking their federal money by adopting something better. It maintains the federally dictated testing regimen and requires states to implement assessments that are expensive, that have been proven in the past to be ineffective and unworkable, and that operate not by assessing students' academic knowledge, but rather by measuring their attitudes and dispositions.

ESSA's new preschool program and President Obama's pet project, "21st-century
community learning centers" are all bad ideas. Obama has pushed the “21^st-century community learning center” idea for some time. It basically allows public schools to be expanded to replace family and church as the center of every child's life, "services" including mental-health programs. Parents should be alarmed that the government will assess the mental health of their children and worse the government will have the right to fix any problem the government claims to have found. I ask all fellow conservative Republicans if this is this is what you send Republican politicians to Washington to do?

ESSA is so progressive it was supported by every single Democrat in Congress. It was supported by Barack Obama. It was supported by the owners of the Common Core national standards testing group. Of course it was they make a fortune off their testing. It was supported by every pro-Common Core and pro-progressive education interest group in the country. It was strongly opposed by over 200 conservative anti-Common Core grassroots organizations.

Rand Paul voted against ESSA. Ted Cruz voted against cloture, but missed the final vote where it counts. He claims he opposed ESSA, but if he truly opposed the bill he should have been present for the vote and cast a vote against it. He certainly has attack Jeb Bush for supporting Common Core and ESSA is Common Core with a face lift. Marco Rubio claims he opposes ESSA, but he not only missed the cloture vote he missed the final vote. Lindsey Graham again demonstrated his love for the establishment and voted in favor of passage. I guess in some weird way I admire Lindsay Graham for having the guts not to dodge the vote. Jeb Bush, ‘Mr. Common Core’, in an interview on Fox News could not praise ESSA and Common Core enough. I never supported Jeb Bush, but after watching his spill on Fox I would not trust him with my dog, much less my child.

I guess Donald Trump will have to speak out and educate the voters and the Republican Party on ESSA as he has on immigration, terrorist and refugees.

ESSA is nothing more than a new name for a previously failed program known as Common Core.