Clermont, FL, Council Meeting
11 February 2020
Choice Edwards (296 words)

Mayor, Ash, members of the council, staff and citizens.

I am a member of the Central Florida Freethought Community. The expanding number of religion skeptics of which I am one.

Many open-minded, reasoning, kind and loving Free Thinkers are here tonight, including the co-founders, David and Jocelyn Williamson.

We are constitutionally dedicated to separating religion from government and government, from religion. Government is of and for both the non religious and the religious.

Thank you for the invitation to deliver this loving invocation.

We celebrate love on Valentines Day.  But what it love?

When I was a 15-year old boy, I thought it was five feet of heaven in a pony tail!  Homer said Aphrodite, daughter of Zeus and Dione, was the Greek goddess of love. In Roman mythology, Venus was the goddess of love, sex, beauty, and fertility.

The ancient Greeks used seven words to define the different states of love we can experience: Storage : natural affection. Philia : friendship. Eros:  sexual and erotica. : unconditional, divine love. Ludus : flirting . Pragma : committed, married love. Philautia : self love.

For me, however, love is an absolute... and it is expressed... in many ways: love of parent to child, sibling love, love of reason, love of religion, love of business, love of country, love of a special, significant... other.

Please join me in a moment of silent introspection as we contemplate how we can and shall express the power of love not to just one person but to many as we move from the despair of hate and discrimination to the glory of love and brotherhood.

(SILENCE)

We celebrate love on Valentines Day with but one expression of the emotion we call love. Let us love one another in all its expressions.

Mayor---