Winter light at Valley Forge

It's 20 degrees outside at this hour in this day, and as I sit here working, reading, writing, contemplating, I am blessed that 233 years ago, in cabins such as these, the soldiers of General George Washington's Continental Army hunkered down, withstood the weather, and summoned all they'd need to go back up against the Brit's Sir William Howe and his army, which had taken over Philadelphia and was threatening to win the whole war.  Look at the planks upon which these soldiers slept.  Look at the earthen floor.  Imagine going day in and out in winter weather on subsistence meals, waiting for the thaw.

There are threats without and threats within.  My prayer for this country is that it will rise again to decency.  That it will honor not just those fallen in Arizona last weekend, as our president so eloquently encouraged, but those who withstood a long winter long ago so that we could have what we now claim as ours.