Folks I have been sitting in my easy chair just letting my mind wander.

I got to thinking about my life when I was five or six years old and living on a big farm. A picture came into my mind of my sainted mother turning the crank on the milk separator. I clearly saw the milk going into one vessel and the cream going into another. My mind then recalled a scene a few years later after we had moved into the small town of New Lebanon, Ohio. We had the milk delivered. I remembered that if the milk bottle sat there very long the cream would rise to the top. Thinking about all this brought other thoughts of separation to mind.

Folks, things and people can be separated and this can be both good and bad. Take the milk for instance. The cream being separated from the milk took a lot of the flavor out of the milk. The cream however was used to make wonderful tasting deserts and great country butter.

The same can happen to people, organizations and even nations.

Take our beloved country. We fought a revolution to separate ourselves from England. Later we fought another war to keep our country from being separated.

Families split and lives are thrown into disarray. Religious groups split and new denominations arise. Many of these, down through the years, have been good.

Now we are in a stage where religions around the world are separating. Some are so violent that they are killing each other and others who believe differently than they do.

Our forefathers wisely, I believe, said that there should be a separation between church and state. However, we now have religious groups that want government to pass laws that favor some of their beliefs. I seem to remember someone saying, when asked, render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto God what is God’s. Hmmmm, that seems like separation to me.

There are still others who believe it is right to force others to live and believe as they do. Wars have been and still are being fought because of this idea.

I also remember my mother telling me an old adage: A person forced against their will, is of the same opinion still!

Folks I am writing this column on Mother’s Day.

As you can see she had a profound effect upon me!

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