Biography
Born on November 11, 1976, on the Roman Catholic and Anglican feast day of St. Martin of Tours, at age 46, I am currently a resident of Collingdale, Pennsylvania, one of the largest (by population) boroughs in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, after spending six years residing in Chester, Pennsylvania, the oldest city in Pennsylvania (predating the establishment of the present-day City of Philadelphia; Chester being originally known as "Upland" before the Swedes ceded the New Sweden Colony to the Dutch in 1655), and five years in Upper Darby Township, Pennsylvania, the largest (by population) municipality in the same county. However, most of my life was spent growing up in nearby Aston Township, and I have the privilege of graduating from Sun Valley High School in 1995, the Pennsylvania Institute of Technology in Media, Pennsylvania with dual Associates in Applied Science degrees in 1997, and completing the Pastoral Diploma program at the Independent Lutheran Seminary out of Klamath Falls, Oregon, upon which I was ordained as a minister in the Independent Lutheran Diocese at its second Pastor's Conference on May 16, 2015 (currently, I serve the ILD as an adjunct professor, as well as associate pastor of a small orthodox Lutheran congregation in Paoli, Pennsylvania, as well as an online ministry).
I also have the honor of being an Eagle Scout, in which I passed my Board of Review on November 3, 1994, along with being a Vigil Honor member of the Order of the Arrow, and a recipient of the Wood Badge beads.
Political Viewpoints
My political viewpoints is more along that of a Independent Conservative: I am all for a smaller Federal government (mainly in concentrating with on international matters, domestic security, etc.) with distinct and clear-cut separation of powers between the Federal and State governments (akin to that of the unrecognized Confederate States of America and modern-day Switzerland. Being a former member of both the Republican Party and the Democratic Party (identifying more as a "Blue Dog Democrat" in the latter), I am all for open primaries, allowing Independents like myself to fully participate in the democratic process (Pennsylvania's current laws act as a form of disenfranchisement), and at the same time, I am all for calling an Article V Convention and see the passage of proposed Amendments to the US Constitution that would do the following:
1. Raise the minimum voting age back to 21 unless one is serving on Active Duty in the United States Armed Forces, in which in such cases, the minimum voting age is 18. Also limit voting rights only to US Citizens with proper proof of US Citizenship as well as proper state and local residency (requiring showing proof of such when registering at the county/parish courthouse or State DMV), and either have not been convicted of a felony of the first or second degree, nor have been adjudicated for mental deficiency or mental illness by a judge in a court of law (restoration of voting rights for those convicted of a third degree felony, all misdemeanors and summary offenses, and those involuntarily committed should be allowed upon completion of requirements set out by the courts, with the courts or the executive authority of the State granting such).
2. Eliminate the Sixteenth Amendment (allowing Congress to raise and collect taxes based on income) and require Congress to implement a Federal Sales Tax that would vary by each state based on their total population based on each decennial Census.
3. Place limitations on the 14th Amendment, in particular involving "quality of life" issues (marriage, reproductive rights, etc., which should be a matter of the States allowed in the 10th Amendment). This would overturn controversial cases including Reynolds v. Simms, allowing rural constituencies to regain their voices in State politics, via their State Senates.
4. Entrenching (Article V protection) the Bill of Rights, and rewording the 2nd Amendment that shall say "shall not be questioned and/or infringed upon".
5. Repeal and replace the Seventeenth Amendment that would still allow direct elections of US Senators, but for vacancies, the governor of that State would appoint the Senator-designate, subject to confirmation by the entire State Legislature sitting in a joint session.
6. Reform the Electoral College that would implement the "Maine-Nebraska System" nationwide, giving the "smaller" (by population) States a voice again.
I am also a supporter of capital punishment and, despite setbacks and controversies, feel that it should be used when a criminal is found guilty beyond reasonable doubt. Besides its use against convicts convicted of first-degree murder, the sentence should be used against those who commit juvenile rape (unfortunately strucked down by the United States Supreme Court), especially when the victim is under the age of 13.
Hobbies
One of my favorite hobbies is astronomy. Since the age of 12, I have either been sleeping in a tent (either on a Scouting trip or on a family vacation), or at the eyepiece of progressively larger telescopes, culminating, in 2007, with the purchase of a "go-to" 11-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope. Although the planets are one of my favorite objects (I was able to look at the planet Neptune for the first time in my entire life, thanks to the "go-to" SCT), I also like to look at deep-space object (nebula, star clusters, galaxies, etc.), of which one of my favorite is the "Antennae Galxies" in the constellation Corvis. A pair of "colliding" spiral galaxies, the "Antennae" gives us a possible look at what our Milky Way and Andromeda Galaxies will look like in the distant future when they collide with each other. I also like to railfan, and travel on both the SEPTA Regional Rail System, Media-Sharon Hill Trolley System, the Norristown High Speed Line, Broad Street Subway, and the Market-Frankford El. On occasion, I will ride on NJ Transit, primarily to New York City, and has once rode Amtrak's Regional between Trenton and 30th Street Station, NJT's Atlantic City Line between 30th Street and Lindenwold; coming back to Philadelphia, via PATCO, and NJT's RiverLINE light-rail system between Camden and Trenton. I am a supporter for extending commuter rail service on SEPTA to Reading, opening a new rail line between Philadelphia and Dover, Delaware, allowing commuters an alternative to Delaware Route 1, and a SEPTA/MARC alternative to Amtrak for service between Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. in a manner similar to SEPTA/NJT for Philadelphia/New York service.
Religion
Shortly after my father's death in September, 1995, I was baptized as a accepted as a member of the United Methodist Church (the reason being my father, a Polish Catholic and my mother, a Methodist, born of German Lutherans parents from Pennsylvania's anthracite region, was denied a "mixed marriage" by a Catholic priest, forcing them to marry in a Methodist congregation, then still considered to be a "cardinal sin"). Despite being a member of a Reformed Protestant body, the congregation in many way functioned similar to that of Low Church Anglicanism. However, the congregation gradually became more on the lines of being "Calvinistic Weslyan," and because of this, a lack of younger membership, and a strong "liturgical" influence from my father's Polish Catholic side, I left the United Methodist Church in 2001 and became a member of St. Timothy's Evangelical Lutheran Church in Aston. At St. Timothy's, surrounded by membership of all ages, I was able to be more active (serving as a lector/subdeacon, choir, and even on the Church Council) in my Christian life. This allowed me to not only get through the death of my parents and the Great Recession, but it made me ready in accepting the ultimate call--that of being a pastor.
However, due to stringent requirement by the ELCA, as well as the Church's decisions to allow avowed homosexuals to become ordained into the clergy; as well as a yearning for traditionalism, I was lead by the Holy Ghost (the third part of the Holy Trinity) to the Independent Lutheran Diocese (ILD), which I enrolled into the Independent Lutheran Seminary in January, 2012. Even though I continued to attend services at St. Timothy's, I eventually left St. Timothy's and became connected to St. James Lutheran Church in Paoli, Pennsylvania--the flagship congregation of the ILD--upon which on September 21, 2014, I was set aside and made a deacon in the ILD, setting up the final phases of my ministerial formation which culminated on May 16, 2015 with my ordination as a pastor in the ILD. Currently, I serve at St. James Lutheran Church as an Associate Pastor, assisting the Pastor in worship and sacramental duties.
