AWAKEN THE SLEEPING GIANT

Conference Call #4

For the Love of a Child

Philip Burley

January 11 and 12, 2006

Good evening everyone! This is Philip Burley speaking. This is our fourth Awaken the Sleeping Giant conference call. Our next conference calls will be on Wednesday, January 18 and Thursday, January 19, 2006. As usual, the content of tonight’s meeting will be made available to everyone by email and on our website.

In order to establish unity and oneness in spirit, let us begin by speaking out our names and cities in unison. On the count of three, please speak out your name and city three times: One, two, three…

Thank you.

Opening Prayer

Please join me in an opening prayer.

Our Heavenly Father, your presence is with us as experienced in each of our hearts and minds. Your infinite, unconditional love is permeating, guiding, maintaining, and uplifting this whole world. And we and the United States of America are no exception to this fact.

Father, it is not difficult to pray for the United States, as we can easily imagine many of our peoples’ physical and spiritual needs. As we put ourselves in the place of every man, woman, and child, our hearts grow more caring, sensitive, tender, and compassionate. Especially is this so with the children of our land.

If nothing else, dear Father, we want to secure our nation’s future for the children that they can live peacefully and prosperously. They are the children of today and leaders and foundation-builders of tomorrow. May our prayers, in some significant way, help make a difference for the children in America and around the world.

Please awaken the parents of all children to their sacred and special responsibility of providing for the loving and secure present and future for their children. For it is as individuals, and parents awaken that the whole land of America awakens. As the individual goes, so goes the parents, as the parents go, so go the children, as the children go, so goes the family, and as the family goes, so goes the nation.

Heavenly Father, please bless America by hearing our prayers especially for our nation’s children. Let your love rain down through our prayers, that they will receive your healing, parental protection, guidance, and love.

All of this Father, I pray with all united in this circle of universal, unconditional, Christ-like love. Amen

Opening Talk—For the Love of a Child

Jesus Told Me to Speak About Children

Immediately after the close of last week’s conference call, Jesus appeared to my right and told me that he would like me to speak about children this week. Whenever I think about the prayers that we are praying to awaken the Sleeping Giant of the United States of America, I am reminded again and again about those two huge rats gnawing at the sleeping giant’s feet in my dream. When I analyze such symbolism, I realize that such a dream is a startling wakeup call to find and honestly look at just what is eating away at our national foundation. One does not have to be a genius to figure out the answers to this question.

Our Children Are Our National Treasure

This week, as directed by Jesus I would like to speak on the children of our country.

Our children are our national treasure. And while it is a cliché to say that they are the hope of the future, it is true. And when I speak of children, I am not speaking of the privileged and moneyed few. I am speaking of all of the children of America.

If there was ever a reason to pray about the future of our country, it is for our children. If you want to be motivated to move heaven and earth to guarantee a bright and hopeful future for us all, then we need to consider the reality of all of the children in America, and for that matter, all the children of the world.

If Even One Child Suffers...

There will be some who will point out all the good that is happening and being done with many children in this land, and I don’t take exception to that. But, if one child goes to bed hungry, or has no place to sleep at night, or is physically or emotionally abused, or is deprived of needed dental and medical care, or goes without an education or clothing, or falls prey to drug peddlers or prostitution, or death by suicide, murder, or any other unnatural way of dying, then not enough is being done.

For the Love of a Child¹

¹"For the Love of a Child," Made for Television Movie
Re-airs Saturday, January 14 at 9 pm et/pt

Lifetime Television Web Site for "For the Love of a Child"
http://www.lifetimetv.com/movies/originals/forlovechild.php [no longer active]

Lifetime Television E-mail address:
http://www.lifetimetv.com/about/write.html

Lifetime Message Page Address for "The Love of a Child" movie:

On Monday night, I attended a by-invitation-only premier opening of a movie made for television called For the Love of a Child, produced by Lifetime Television. I will be sending you a separate letter regarding this movie, which I highly recommend for everyone participating in our combined prayer efforts.

The premier was held in a packed six hundred-seat theatre in Scottsdale, Arizona. Small packets of tissues were handed out at the door, since it was anticipated that many would cry as they watched. I cried off and on throughout much of the movie.

The movie was not just about sexual abuse, but also physical and emotional abuse. I have worked with adults who were sexually abused as children and have seen the devastating emotional and mental results of such a soul-centered invasion that have pursued some of these victims throughout their youth and adulthood. Many suffer their whole life because of childhood sexual abuse.

When you see it, you will experience For the Love of a Child as an unsettling true story providing a glimpse of the sorrowful condition of many children in America. It was reported by Lifetime Television that over five thousand individuals called their offices during the first hour of the showing, and the same film played on television on Monday. The response to this film was overwhelming. Please watch for my email letter to you about For the Love of a Child.

The Truth Is...

It was said by a spokesperson at the movie that at least three million children are abused in America each year. She said that this statistic is in error because so many abuse cases of children go unreported. This statistic, therefore, is but the tip of the iceberg!

It was reported by the U.S. Census Bureau² in 2004 that 17.8 percent of children in our country live in poverty. That is thirteen million children living in poverty in America. Can you believe it?

Additionally, The National Institute on Media and the Family³, a watchdog organization for overseeing morality or the lack of it in the media, reported their findings in a research paper entitled "A Dark Cloud Descends Over the Industry" that, "Every day millions of boys and young men are entertaining themselves with a game entitled "Vice City" that denigrates women and glamorizes violence against them. The theory that it is a game that only adults are playing is simply not valid. Our recent survey of boys showed that it is extremely popular with pre-teen and teen males. Parents and other adults are almost totally unaware of the content of the game. We have surveyed over six hundred parents and teachers over the past month and less than three percent have any knowledge of the anti-female content of the game."

Pervasive is the watching of television in America. We can be sure that in large part, TV is responsible—literally and metaphorically—for putting the giant of America into a hypnotic trance and eventually into a fitful sleep! And speaking of children in this vein, it is a fact that "the average American child will have watched one hundred thousand acts of televised violence, including eight thousand depictions of murder, by the time he or she finishes sixth grade (by the age of approximately thirteen years). Violence on television affects children negatively, according to psychological research. The three major effects of seeing violence on television are:

1. Children may become less sensitive to the pain and suffering of others.
2. Children may be more fearful of the world around them.
3. Children may be more likely to behave in aggressive ways toward others."⁴

For me, the question that still begs for an answer, if we truly care about and love our children is this: To what degree do television, movies, and music affect the overall reality of problems with American youth, from all-out shootings in schools, to cheating on tests, to pervasive drug use, gang fights, murders and more?

²U.S. Census Bureau, Income, Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2004

³An independent, non-partisan, non-sectarian, non-profit organization that surveys the gaming industry and puts out "The Report Card" for the purpose of examining and focusing on issues related to child welfare.
⁴http://www.abelard.org/tv/tv.htm

Something Has to Change

Something has to change! And that is why you and I are called, moved, motivated, and pushed to pray for America. And while you and I could and probably will define other things eating away at the foundation of this land in the coming weeks, nothing is more terrible than the harm coming to our children through many sources in the United States.

I have not even mentioned the deplorable educational realities for the masses of American children, and as a part of this picture, the complete lack of appreciation of and adequate pay for our nation’s teachers. By what means do our leaders expect there to be an adequate supply of qualified teachers in the future for our nation’s schools if they do not pay these great servants of our children a decent and proper wage?

And what of American children falling behind many other nations in academic achievement? If this trend continues, it portends an unqualified, unprepared future national citizenry. It undoubtedly could cause our homeland to fall behind in other areas in the world arena of competition, leadership, and example setting.

If Our Founding Fathers Were to Visit Us...

If our founding Fathers were to visit us, they would be saddened by the plight of the masses of our children, as I have attempted to illustrate with a sprinkling of a few statistics or facts on children’s suffering in America. They would find thirteen million children living in poverty unconscionable and intolerable. It was they who wrote "with liberty and justice for all." National justice is not being served when only one child is being deprived of his inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And if he were your child or mine, we could not sleep at night knowing this fact.

Our Children are the Hope for the Future

Children are always the hope for the future of a nation in any given generation of people on earth, and our nation is no exception. They need our continued outpouring of prayers, as the least we can do, and a national plan to change things for the better through leaders led by selflessness, supreme caring, and higher conscientiousness.

I Believe in the Power of the Heart’s Cry to Reach Heaven

I am an optimist, and I do not pray with an eye toward defeat or decline when I pray—rather, just the opposite. As you know by now, I believe in the power of the heart’s cry to reach Heaven and make a difference, though not always immediately and maybe not even while I am on earth. Nevertheless, prayer power makes a positive difference for me and for the world.

However, I am also a realist. It is one of the reasons I took up this cause that you and I are now serving. When I look realistically at our nation’s youth, I seriously wonder about our country’s future and thus its foundation.

May we all enter soberly and hopefully into prayer as a beginning effort to make a difference for the better for the children of America and the world.

I would like to end my talk with what I think is God’s answer to our youth. It is called "A Cry in the Wilderness," by Florence M. Wells:

Prayer to Awaken the Sleeping Giant

Mission Statement

I understand that Jesus has asked for special prayer for America. To comply with his request, I have volunteered to be a prayer channel—ideally once a day for three months—for God to radiate through me unconditional, loving, healing energies to all Americans of the United States. It is not my responsibility to determine the outcome of my prayers. In faith, I leave the outcome in the hands of God.

Meditation for Personal Healing and Setting Intention

Let us enter into a meditative state of mind: Find a comfortable position and close your eyes. Focus your mind upon your heart. Breathe a small, gentle breath into your heart...and become more relaxed and centered. Take a second, small, gentle breath and become even more relaxed. Take a third, small, gentle breath and feel yourself totally relaxed, at peace and centered. Above you is an intense, holy, eternal, spiritual white light. Take your time to imagine its presence with you literally. This is the presence of God. And from this intense light are droplets of unconditional love raining down upon you, bringing about healing throughout your body and spirit, spiritually awakening, protecting, and blessing you, and leaving you in deep, deep, deep peace. You are awakening to your own true power within; you are being made whole through all of the prayers you are sending out to America with this prayer condition. Just know that.

I am going to be silent for a few moments to allow you to dwell upon your present state of meditation...

We are now ready to pray the Prayer to Awaken the Sleeping Giant.

Closing Comments

Thank you all for attending this fourth in a series of prayers for our country. Let us all keep the promise and remember to remember to attend to our sacred prayer duty, first for ourselves and secondly for others and our country of the United States of America.

God bless and good night.