Conviction! Conviction? Conviction…

I serve as the pastor of a church with an old building that is constantly in need of attention. This becomes all the more important because we house several free clinics.

We’ve been having sewer issues. It’s a combination of old sewer lines that are addressed in piecemeal fashion, a limited pool of resources that prevents us from completely gutting and replacing everything, and people with various capacities and knowledge of appropriate use of bathroom facilities.

This week we had a blockage in our pipes which came about from someone stuffing paper towel (and probably other items) down the toilet. A whole lot of people utilize our church building and we have many people who come into the building with all sorts of challenging lives. I have learned that we make a mistake when we assume that everyone who enters the building understands how to use the facilities in an appropriate manner. The stuffing of the toilet resulted not in an overflowing toilet, but in a seepage from one of our sewer lines causing a mess in our basement.

A sewer problem at the church is unpleasant, unhealthy, and you have no choice but to deal with it.

For me, the sewer problems at the church is an appropriate analogy for the trials of the former president. Yesterday we heard the announcement that he was found guilty of all 34 counts in the so-called hush money trial. He is now a convicted felon awaiting sentencing.