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This is too full and important for me to come up with a smart-alecky answer.

My own take is, well we know that gov’ts need revenue. And they need order, which means that some of us sometimes face the choice between saluting, saying yessir, and getting to work, or offering our resignation.

It’s morally and emotionally trying.

BUT, I’m thinking, where one is clear that, despite the grief and other pain, the job ought to be done, that needs doing, and that one is capable of doing it, then the sorrow and the spite are another what, prod for prayers for humility.

That is, I deserve hatred and contempt. The only mitigating aspect of that is that I don’t deserve it WHOLE lot more than anybody else, maybe. I hope.

Our Lord did not deserve it, and He got it.

So, maybe somewhere in there is equanimity. It’s not pain-free (If have yet to encounter anything that is.) But it doesn’t shatter the universe either.

This whole sinful rational animal thing is REALLY a ride!

Interesting thing in our shop was that we had several people who could give good, long, traditional Christian prayers ~ that were theologically acceptable to Pentecostals, Protestants, Roman Catholics, Russian Orthodox, Buddhists, Pantheists of all sorts, and so on.

That's actually a difficult job to do, but if you are a lay person, it seems to be more acceptable than if you are ordained clergy.

So, what did we do with that talent? Well, we traveled a lot and had meetings all over the place, and sat down to dinner (or lunch) together, so grace was always given.

I'd been in plenty of other government offices, but here, among the guys who ENFORCED the rules and started the ball rolling toward collecting the money, grace always happened ~ a big ol' gigantic grace, sometimes attended to by MORE THAN ONE person.

Now that didn't mean all these folks were the good guys ~ 'cause they weren't. But other than the fact we always had to tell the truth about every rule and every outcome (something the fellows further up the food chain didn't need to do) it was pretty obvious you had to put yourself into this thing and not let it kill you.

So, grace it was, and we always humbly accepted our food under the stipulation that without God we wouldn't have any.

There comes the day you retire from this sort of thing and move on to where you can reflect on it ~ and it does seem to me we went through cycles of being warrior monks ~ or what I imagine warrior monks would be like in terms of psychology.

It was good of Jesus to bring Matthew into the fold and I'm happy you folks remembered him.