Brother Raymond and familyWe were harrased, thrown out of churches, threatened and on a few occasions stalked for miles by people who I seriously thought were going to kill me.
I have never seen such murderous hatred toward people trying to create dialog to counter the massive propaganda campaign Americans have been subjected to since 9/11.
____________
This country is losing any love for the truth and feeds on media sound bites
and official fairytales.
Brother Raymond, middle
In the summer of 2007 he and Brother Elliot
walked from Denver to Washington D.C.
for 9/11 Truth
____________
and to protest Christian complicity
in the war in Iraq.
In the summer of 2007 he and Brother Elliot
walked from Denver to Washington D.C.
for 9/11 Truth
____________
and to protest Christian complicity
in the war in Iraq.
More about Brother Raymond here.
THE New American
Dream Interview
Dream Interview
BROTHER RAYMOND, 33, lives in Loveland, Colorado.
He is the founder of Beit Shalom Ministries.
In the summer of 2007 he and Brother Elliot and walked from Denver to Washington D.C. for 9/11 Truth and to protest Christian complicity in the war in Iraq.
___________
The New American Dream Trivia Question:
To win a round button that says, "Bush Is Lying About What He Knew," be the first one to correctly answer the following.
Brother Raymond would rather be ....
a. Anywhere but West Terre Haute
b. Going from Denver to D.C. in an airplane
c. In a gift shop in Estes Park
d. Anywhere but Fort Collins
e. Playing right field for the Rockies
f. Shooshing the slopes at Sterling
Answer: AAA
___________
NAD: Raymond, hello, thank you for taking the time for this.
Why Brother Raymond? What does that mean?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
It means it does not matter who I am.
We live in an age where ministry is defined by how big of a personal empire you can create.
I also am known by the name Eved, which is Hebrew for slave or servant.
Jesus told us not to get hung up on titles like Rabbi, father etc.
I am just another brother in the struggle for truth and light.
NAD: How did you come to be Brother Raymond?
Where did you go to high school? College?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
I'm not sure how to answer that.
I never meant it to be a title because that would work contrary to living outside the need for the security of those things.
It just seemed simple.
I went to High School in the wilderness of Kansas and pursued my College Education at Colorado Christian University.
I am just now finishing my degree after being expelled for a year due to my activism surrounding the Christian support of the war.
NAD: What does Beit Shalom mean?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
Beit is Hebrew for house. Shalom is a more complex term.
Literally it means peace but the hebraic understanding of the term encompasses wholeness in every aspect of life.
If we are unhealthy, spiritually dead, morally corrupt than we do not possess Shalom.
NAD: What does Beit Shalom Ministries do? Where are you?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
Beit Shalom is in a transition stage.
I've come to realize that America is in a hopeless downward spiral and the apathy which we recieved during our walk across the country confirmed that save supernatural intervention we are in for a rough ride as a nation.
God is moving more to ministering to the poor as outlined in Isaiah 58.
In the spring I plan to travel to Cambodia in order to work with organizations that help rescue children form the sex trade industry.
It's time to get out of such a public, political ministry and go where people are desperate for change, for life.
We also desire to do more work with the underground church in restricted nations like China.
Right now I am just focusing on strengthening my family from the stress of public ministry in the lovely state of Colorado.
NAD: Why did you and Brother Elliot decide to walk to D.C.?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
I spent a week in a monestary in the mountains seeking the Lord for my life.
I had all this angst toward the deception being blared from the pulpits concerning 9/11, the war on terror etc and didn't know how to focus it.
It was during that time the vision for this walk came to me.
I shared it with Elliot, he fasted for confirmation and after seven days he had a vison which confirmed mine.
After that there was no turning back.
Not to mention the being photographed by white fed vans,
and followed and harrased by police.
___________
It got pretty scary at times.
and followed and harrased by police.
___________
It got pretty scary at times.
NAD: Do you have families? How did the walk affect them? Before, during, since?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
Elliot was single at the time but is now married with a baby on the way.
I have a wife and four boys.
The walk was challenging, sometimes discouraging, supernatural, and faith building.
Yet as some of you know when we went through Kansas the State tried to sieze one of my children and we were in legal battles for over a month.
That was terrifying to my children and eye opening to my wife about the depth of the danger truth bearing can be.
Not to mention the being photographed by white fed vans, and followed and harrased by police.
It got pretty scary at times.
Since the walk we have been trying to just love on each other and rebuild some stability.
NAD: Would you like to choose one of these to answer, elaborate on?
I don't ask this to make fun. I ask because I really seek the answers.
— Are UFOs real?
— Did we land on the moon in 1968?
— Did Bush knock down the towers?
— Was Paul Wellstone's death an accident?
— The Oklahoma City bombing? Wasn't that just another U.S. government terrorist exercise? Or not.
— Waco. We burned kids, right? You can see flames shooting out of the tanks. Or not.
— Is Bigfoot real?
— Is there a God?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
There is a God.
... What makes you think that?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
Not only is intimate communion possible with our creator through Jesus Christ but when you live for months, by faith and prayer and see clearly the supernatural moving of God's reality in your provision and circumstances, it becomes harder and harder to dismiss those things as wishful thinking or coincidence.
We chose not to ask for money or suppor throughout the walk and gave the videos we produced through much hard work out for free in order to protest the rampant Christian materialism in this country.
We commmited to pray when we lacked provision and sometimes we were down to no money or food and when the last morsal ran out and we got on our knees to cry out to our Father for provision we saw some amazing miracles.
If you want to know ... seek him in spirit and in truth and you will find out quickly God is real and active in the affairs of humanity.
NAD: What do you think about the election of Obama?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
Obama is a mystery and the madness which has possesed people in exahlting him reminds me of early Germany.
Nobody knows anything of real substance about this man but somehow he has become the hope for America.
It is a dangerous mentality.
NAD: Do you have high hopes?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
I have high hopes that God is in control and if the American people continue to be corrupt they will have wicked rulers to rule over them as we continue to see year after year, scandal after scandal.
My hope is Jesus and the reality behind God's word and its power.
NAD: Did you vote? Do you pay taxes?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
I have voted in the past but I believe if you vote for a man, or woman, you are not only responsible for the good they do but the evil as well.
The only candidate I felt would offer any sanity for this country was blacked out by the media.
Ron Paul understood the dangers this country is really facing from enemies both foreign and domestic.
NAD: You were asked for identification by law enforcement many times on your walk?
Did you at all feel like it was unjustified?
Did it have anything to do with whatever signs you were carrying?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
It was always unjustified by American Constitutional law.
We were exonorated every time we refused and were harrassed for not providing ID.
Many times it did have something to do with the message because the police would argue with us about what we were saying.
I believe some had a genuine concern to make sure we weren't a threat to their communities and they acted lawfully and respectfully.
Not all law enforcement are villains.
NAD: Were you harassed at all by other folks along the way?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
We were harrased, thrown out of churches, threatened and on a few occasions stalked for miles by people who I seriously thought were going to kill me.
I have never seen such murderous hatred toward people trying to create dialog to counter the massive propaganda campaign Americans have been subjected to since 9/11.
This country is losing any love for the truth and feeds on media sound bites and official fairytales.
NAD: How about gestures of support?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
There were many loving people that offered us food, financial support, shelter and love.
We had college professors snatch us off the street to speak to their classes and even a police officer who snuck up to our RV at night and left bags of groceries and shoes for my kids.
We had a couple, Mark and Phyllis Elliot in Missouri who let us stay with them during the time my son was in State custody and provided for all of our food and shelter expenses.
They wouldn't even let us pay.
May the Lord bless people like this.
NAD: How many days, miles was the walk? Did you end up at the White House?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
The walk took six months and ended in a rally outside the capitol.
I think the total miles was around 1700.
One of the groups who joined us near the end staged a protest outside of the White House and was arrested.
Yet, we did not achieve the critical mass we hoped to accomplish.
NAD: What do you feel the walk accomplished?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
It was a great mechanism for spiritual growth in our own lives which helped clarify the depth of the problems facing this country.
Everyone is so splinterd with competing agendas which is why I feel the anti-war movements failed to completely achieve their goals.
I also feel like I did as much as was in my stregth to bring an awareness of how much Christianity has strayed from the teachings of the bible in supporting the actions of the Bush administration and nationalism as a whole.
We have to make changes one person at a time and I know we impacted many people in this manner by the feedback we have received. My hands are clean.
NAD: What is next for you and/or what have you been doing since the end of the walk?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
As I stated before I hope to do some work in Cambodia, a nation ravage by tyrranical leaders.
It would be wise for Americans to reflect upon the fate of nations that allow their governments to operate without any sort of checks and balances.
Pol Pot murdered one-fifth of his country's population, killed anyone with an education and plunged the nation into horror, poverty and darkness.
Now they have one of the highest rates of child prostitution in the world and no infastructure to pull themselves out of poverty.
It will take decades to change.
As for the persecuted church over 165,000 christians are murdered each year soley for refusing to renounce their faith in Jesus.
China is one of the worst violators yet Bush, the evangelical president never lifted a finger to hold them accountable.
Nevertheless though people and ministries that are willing to support the underground church through bible smuggling and other activities the Chinise Christian Church is exploding in growth.
I realized I was wasting time dealing with people who could care less for biblical truth when my brothers in these restricted nations would give a years wages if they could even get a page from a bible.
I want to be where they are at.
I want to use my prosperity as an American to help.
NAD: What else would you like to add? What else should I have asked?
BROTHER RAYMOND:
If after reading my responses you have any other questions feel free to send them.
NAD: Please insert a link here to something you would like linked to, with a brief tag re: where that link goes:
BROTHER RAYMOND:
http://www.theshofar.org is our ministry website
http://www.cambodiachurch.org/index.html is the church in cambodia I am going to
http://www.persecution.com/ ministry to the persecuted church
____________
About
THE New American Dream Feature Interviews
If you search the archives below, you will find, in a sort of order [last to first], interviews with:
Korey Rowe, one of the producers of Loose Change
Dave Zweifel, editor of The Madison Capital Times
Cathleen Howard, expatriate, from Tucson to Mexico, to pursue her dreams
Sander Hicks, Brooklyn radical entrepreneur, writer, publisher
Joe Bageant, America's blue-collar author
Frida Berrigan, a lifetime of faith, hope and love
Denise Diaz, brewing up a revolution, at The Ritual Cafe in Des Moines
Deanna Taylor, Green Party activist, teacher, in Salt Lake City
Rossie Indira-Vltchek, writer, filmmaker in Jarkarta, Indonesia
Nora Barrows-Friedman, Pacifica reporter in Gaza
Delaney Bruce, Friends of Peltier
Keith McHenry, co-founder of Food Not Bombs
Michael Sprong, South Dakota Catholic Worker
Brian Terrell, Des Moines Catholic Worker
Bob Graf, One of the Milwaukee 14
Loren Coleman, Bigfoot researcher
Monty Borror, Sci-Fi artist from Virginia
David Ray, Great American Poet
Jack Blood, radio show host, in Austin, Texas
Danny Schechter, A Real Reporter
Bob Kincaid, host, Head-On Radio Show
Tony Packes, Animal Farm Radio Host, Keeping An Eye on Big Brother
Richard Flamer, Working With the Poor in Chiapas
David Ray Griffin, 9/11 Truth activist author
Barry Crimmins, U.S. comedian, author, social activist
Bret Hayworth, political reporter for the Sioux City [IA] Journal
Lisa Casey, publisher of website All Hat No Cattle
Joe & Elaine Mayer, activist couple in Rochester, Minnesota
Fr. Darrell Rupiper, U.S. priest revolutionary
Whitney Trettien, MIT student, Green Party activist
Meria Heller, radio show host
Phil Hey, professor, poet
John Crawford, book publisher
Steve Moon, Iowa Bigfoot researcher
Carol Brouillet, California social activist, 9/11 Truth
Russell Brutsche, Santa Cruz artist
Kevin Barrett, professor, radio show host, 9/11 Truth activist
A'Jamal Rashad Byndon, social activist in Omaha
Chris Rooney, Vancouver, Canada Catholic Worker, website publisher
Marc Estrin, political novelist, from the left
Peter Dale Scott, poet, professor, author, activist
Anthony Rayson, anarchist zine publisher, works with prisoners
Alice Cherbonnier, editor of The Baltimore Chronicle, an independent newspaper
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