CINNAMON ROLLS

No I don't have a great recipe for you. (Well, maybe I do somewhere in my files...) but yesterday I had a thought about cinnamon rolls.

Has anyone ever given you the center of their cinnamon roll? It's the best part; where all the brown sugar, cinnamon, frosting and yummy raisins accumulate in greater proportion to the amount of dough. Trust me, only a really unselfish person would give that part to someone else.

Once a month Rock and I participate with the other Assistant Directors of the Inner City Project to do a two-day training of new Inner City Missionaries on Welfare Principles and how to assist the Bishops/Branch Presidents with the various needs the members may have. We cover issues relating to medical, dental, legal, financial, education, employment, etc.... All of those areas of Self-Reliance that the Church teaches in the program of Providing in the Lords Way.

We broaden our efforts by gathering many other resources from the community, too numerous to list here without taking all day to explain. This has blessed our lives. This is where we feel like we are really making a difference in the lives of people who need the help. This has become the center of the sweet roll for us.

This past weekend we had our two day training and Rock and I had to give our customary talk on our responsibilities over the ICP Missionaries of 65 Spanish speaking units. (Wards & Branches). (No we don't speak Spanish, believe me we talk English to everyone and they pretend they understand us.) But we spend most of our time with the missionaries rather than the members and all our missionaries speak English.

Anyhoo, as I was saying we have to give these talks every month at Training. I have the unique opportunity, responsibility to speak on a subject that is somewhat controversial. Did I say somewhat? Okay that is an understatement. I get to talk about the Good Samaritan. Remember that story? You know the one in the Bible when some guy asks Jesus the famous question; "WHO IS MY NEIGHBOR"? Well then I have to go on to explain NO WHERE, NO HOW did Jesus make a condition how the "man who fell among thieves" should have been LEGALLY on the Road to Jericho. Then I have to explain to members of our church who have ancestors who were persecuted by uninformed and intolerant neighbors that our history should have taught us not to do the same thing to another group of people. I say a lot of other things....Rock tells them that the B of M teaches that this is the land of our inheritance AND THEIR inheritance. Well, you get my point about where I stand.

But alas, EVERY month there is one of our missionaries struggling with the fact that someone forgot to tell God about our political situation, and they tell me privately that they are more a disciple of Bill Riley, Sean Hannity, and Glen Beck than they are of Jesus Christ, and they just refuse to work with "THOSE PEOPLE". Yikes, I mean I am a Fox News, Rush Limbaugh junkie myself, but I am telling you, the immigration laws are complex and punitive, more focused on PERSECUTING innocent people rather than zeroing in on the dangerous people. One of our Primary Presidents was taken from her home and deported leaving her tiny children and husband. She had been in the U.S. since she was 2 years old, she didn't really have a home country. She had spent over $20,000 on lawyers to get legal. This is ripping families apart. You should ask someone why they came here. I asked. They told me because they wanted to be able to feed their family without someone trying to kill them.

The Hispanic people in our Church are our brothers and sisters and they are hardworking and good people who want the best life for their families. They are the kind of people that would give you the center of their sweet roll without thinking twice. We need to think of a humane solution to the immigration policies that don't include "putting them all on a bus and shipping them out of here..."