Randy Dean

Author of Radiance; If We Are the Light of the World, Why is Everything So Dark? by Destiny Image Publishers. Newly consecrated Bishop as of Nov. 23 2014.

[Bill Kristol @BillKristol]

"The UFC event captures something about this moment in our history.

After all, it’s vulgar, it’s violent, it’s commercial, it’s grandiose, it’s tacky, and it dishonors a place once thought worthy of care and respect. In other words, it’s Donald Trump."

https://t.co/4JB8V0GX4L

[John Jackson @hissgoescobra]

I want to give you guys some facts about General Chappie James. He wasn’t a “DEI” hire—he was a complete badass that had to overcome MORE than any white pilot. Did 178 combat missions—that’s like 7 bomber tours on a B-17 in WWII.

His medal count? Impeccable. 3 Distinguished Flying Crosses, 14 Air Medals, Two Legions of Merit, and a Defense Distinguished Service Medal. One of the original Tuskegee Airmen, the first four-star African American General.

Hegseth couldn’t sniff the level of soldiering and warrior that was in Chappie’s DNA. God bless him. And Hegseth took down his picture from a hallway like a racist little child, which is what he is.

[Hunter Biden @HunterBiden]

To everyone so eager to cancel someone for a tattoo they got at age 22, a drunk text, a selfie they took in the middle of a mental health crisis:

Show us your laptop.
Show us your iCloud.
Open your entire digital life to your worst enemy. No context. No filter. No explanation.

You won’t.

You won’t because you know what I know. Any one of us, frozen at our worst moment, photographed in our lowest hour, looks like a monster. Looks like a stranger. Looks like someone who deserves to be cast out.

That is not who we are.

My mom and baby sister were killed in a car accident when I was just a kid. Cancer took my brother Beau, my best friend and my rock. I battled alcoholism. I battled addiction. I chose the coward’s way out more times than I can count.

For years I believed the defining chapters of my life were written by tragedy, loss, and shame.

I no longer believe that.

Pain can shape us. Loss can humble us. Failures can leave scars that never fully fade. But none of them have the authority to define us.

And it sure as hell ain’t the critic that counts.

That authority belongs to us alone-the person in the arena.

Every setback presents a choice. Play the victim, or cut the bullshit and take ownership for who we become next.

Life does not determine our character. It reveals it.

Again and again we are asked the same question. When shit happens, what next?

We are not defined by what happened to us. We are not defined by the worst photo, the worst text, the worst tattoo, the worst night. We are defined by the person we choose to become. And by the courage to choose that person, every single day.

So before you reach for the gavel - show us your laptop.

You won’t.

The whole world saw mine. And I am still here. Still becoming. Still choosing. Still standing.

That is the only definition that matters.

[Rev. Benjamin Cremer @Brcremer]

God calls women to preach and to lead. Even when the church stands in the way of that call.

[Maria Shriver @mariashriver]

In this week’s edition of @thesundaypaper, I talked about this summer being a summer of friendship, a summer of connection. So many people in our country are lonely, divided, and scared to reach out. Reaching out is hard. Reaching out takes courage. Reaching out takes vulnerability. That is what I think @HunterBiden is doing here. He’s very open and honest about his own life, the mistakes he’s made and wanting to own up to them, while also wanting to reach out to others who might have gone through the same type of thing.

I think Hunter’s desire to talk and start a conversation about addiction, about recovery is wonderful. He acknowledges that not everybody will like it and that people might complain about it, but I’m glad that he acknowledges it. He’s also been met by a lot of love a lot of friendship. People need support in their lives. Life is tough for everyone, so when someone says, I’m here to start a conversation about mistakes I’ve made, about what I’ve learned about recovery, about addiction, I think it’s moving. It’s scary for them, and I’m sure scary for those who want to reach out and start that conversation with him, but in the spirit of this being the summer of friendship, the summer of connection, and in the spirit of moving forward and reaching across the divide, why not support someone who’s trying? 

Let this be your reminder or your nudge to reach out to someone you’ve not spoken to, whether because of a political difference, distance, or just because. Let today be the day you reconnect, and start your summer of friendship and connection off with an outreached hand.

[Hunter Biden @HunterBiden]

Things the recovery industry will not tell you:

1. The drug worked. That is why people use it. Not weakness. Not moral failure.
A neurological event so complete and persuasive that any honest account of addiction has to start there.
The problem is not that the drug fails. The problem is that what it does is unrepeatable, and you will burn your entire life to the ground trying to get back to a place that no longer exists.

2. Shame is not guilt. Guilt says I did something bad. Shame says I am something bad. Guilt is appropriate. Shame is a cell with no windows. Most people use the words interchangeably. That mistake is lethal.

3. You cannot shame someone who has already named the thing you are holding over them. Say it first. Say it in plain light. The weapon drops.

4. Guilt can coexist with self-respect. Shame cannot. You can hold the damage and the dignity at the same time. I know because I live there.

5. Radical honesty does not give you back who you were. It hands you the clean slate of who you always wanted to be. The mask comes off. The cartoon other people drew of you stays on the page.

6. Nobody gets clean on a winning streak.

7. You have to be almost self-delusional in your forgiveness of yourself. (Go watch Chase Hughes)

8. The greatest sin was not the chaos. It was the absence. Being unavailable to the people who needed you.

9. Sustainable recovery starts with one thing: honesty with yourself. If you love an addict and want to help, that is the only door in.

10. I am only an expert on my recovery. Nobody is an expert on anyone else’s.

[Randy Dean @RandyEDean]

@Rep_Stansbury Bravo!

[Randy Dean @RandyEDean]

@kwelkernbc @NBCNews @MeetThePress Thank you for being a fearless member of a free press.

[Henri Nouwen (1932–1996) @nofearinlove77]

“A Christianity without empathy is nothing but an empty religion. The heart of the Gospel is to love your neighbor as yourself, to rejoice with those who rejoice, and to weep with those who weep.”

— The Return of the Prodigal Son

[Vatican News @VaticanNews]

"Truth is not a territory to be defended, but a good to be shared."

- Magnifica humanitas, 25

[Pope Leo XIV @Pontifex]

In the Mystery of God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit – we are at home, just as Nicodemus felt at ease when he was in Jesus’ presence. The life of God is marvelous and captivating. It gives peace to our heart, which is often very restless, and it allows us to encounter our brothers and sisters in the joy of the Spirit. #GospelOfTheDay (Jn 3:16-18)

[James Talarico @jamestalarico]

Ken Paxton just gave an Epstein-style deal to a pedophile.

Paxton released Adam Hoffman — an admitted child rapist — back on our streets after Paxton’s rich lawyer friend got involved.

The Epstein Class has no place in Texas. Ken Paxton has no place in the US Senate.

[Randy Dean @RandyEDean]

@AdamKinzinger A vulgar scar on our house.

[Beth Moore @BethMooreLPM]

I’ve never pastored a church. Couldn’t pay me a jillion dollars to. Never been ordained. Have no desire to. The only paid staff position I’ve ever held in a church was as an aerobics teacher in our church gym. But how in heaven’s name a woman discussing a sermon on a podcast could be objectionable to some is beyond me and what I believe to be beyond scripture. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, good. Stay sane. If you do, I’ve lived a long time and this has been my observation:

Extremism, whether in conservatism or liberalism, whether in politics or religion, is never satisfied. It will always inch a little bit further. It’s a constant test of the purists.

[Vatican News @VaticanNews]

On Pentecost Sunday, the Pope prays that the Holy Spirit might help us overcome “resistance, selfishness, mistrust, and prejudice".

https://t.co/Jndij8646B

[Pope Leo XIV @Pontifex]

Without the fire of the Spirit, the Church remains a prisoner of fear, timid in the face of the world’s challenges, closed in on itself, and thus also incapable of entering into dialogue with changing times. #Pentecost

[Vatican News @VaticanNews]

Pope Leo on Pentecost Sunday:

"The Holy Spirit opens the doors of our hearts, helping us to overcome resistance, selfishness, mistrust, and prejudice, and enabling us to live as children of God and brothers and sisters to one another. Where the Spirit of the Lord is present, brotherhood arises among individuals, groups, and the peoples of the Earth, and all speak the one language of love, which unites and harmonizes diversity.

Brothers and sisters, even in our own day, especially on this day of Pentecost, we must invoke the Holy Spirit, so that He might open all the doors that still remain closed."

[James Lucas @JamesLucasIT]

Today at noon thousands of red rose petals will flutter down through the oculus of the Pantheon in Rome. This spectacular tradition is held each year on the feast of Pentecost.

[Randy Dean @RandyEDean]

@realDonaldTrump Christ have mercy. This is seriously messed up.

[The Husky @Mr_Husky1]

"On a June afternoon in 2009, something quietly extraordinary unfolded in the Diplomatic Room of the White House, a moment so human, so warm, and so beautifully unexpected that it stopped political Washington in its tracks. President Barack Obama, the 44th President of the United States and the first African American to hold that office, gently escorted 87-year-old former First Lady Nancy Reagan into the room to sign the Ronald Reagan Centennial Commission Act, a bipartisan piece of legislation that passed the Senate unanimously, honoring the upcoming 100th birthday of America's 40th President. Two people from opposite ends of the political spectrum, bound together in that moment by something far bigger than party lines: grace, history, and a shared love of country. And then it happened. As President Obama picked up his pen and began to sign the bill into law, Nancy Reagan leaned in and exclaimed with a delighted laugh, 'Oh, you're a lefty!' She was not talking about politics. She was talking about his left hand. The room burst into laughter, and in that single unscripted moment, the walls between Republican and Democrat, between generations, between two entirely different Americas, came tumbling beautifully down. Obama had publicly praised Nancy in his remarks that day, saying she had been 'extraordinarily gracious to both me and Michelle during our transition here,' and describing how, in what he called her 'long goodbye' with President Reagan through his decade-long battle with Alzheimer's disease, she had become 'a voice on behalf of millions of families experiencing the depleting, aching reality of Alzheimer's disease.' When Obama later signed an executive order to resume federal stem cell research, one of the very first phone calls he made was to Nancy Reagan, because nobody understood better than she did what that research could mean for suffering families across America. This was not a political moment. This was a human one. A young president honoring an old love story. A nation, briefly, at its very best.