Monday, April 12, 2010
Disgraceful Reporting about the Pope
This post needs very little from me. The link explains it much better than I could. It seems that journalistic integrity flies out the window when the topic is the Catholic Church. In this case journalistic integrity flew out the window, dodged a few cars, played chicken for awhile and finally ended up smashed on a windshield. It is official: nothing is sacred any more.
Friday, April 9, 2010
Define Irony
My pastor has struck again. Usually, I write on ways to better communicate and help people better understand Catholic teaching. I do my darndest to show fidelity to my pastor, my bishop, and of course, my most Holy Father. Usually my concerns are about what has gone wrong with secular society and how that has spilled over into what people believe about the Church. Usually. This posting is different. Since my pastor has side-stepped our bishop and then bashed the Holy Father, I am not going to post with fidelity to him. And he has done it all while not noting the plank in his own eye while pointing out the speck in another.
In fairness I need to post a link to the article. But not knowing how long our local paper will keep it active, I am trying to decide how much to pick out and quote or how much to merely comment on the article. The title of this post however, is due to a direct quote so I will show that in context.
The article is here: http://www.idahostatesman.com/2010/04/06/1142699/a-stronger-younger-pope-is-needed.html#ixzz0kauO0i2i
And the part I am specifically addressing is quoted here:
He basically claims he was "asked to weigh in" on the most recent sex abuse scandals and how the allegations are currently handled. While he does not identify the person or persons who asked him to weigh in, he does a fair job of explaining, albeit vaguely, for anyone but the fairly knowledgeable Catholic, the process the Church now has in place for preventing future occurrences and weeding out past ones. He begins to go off the rails when he claims that while the Church herself has a good system in place, there are still problems at the diocesan level.
His solution is that most bishops should have retired 10 years ago, especially and specifically including our most Holy Father in that list of the "much too old for strong leadership" category. (I was really glad our bishop responded to the article and set a few things straight because our pope is not too old, and Father was speaking without any authority whatsoever.) Now all of this was just one man's opinion and while I completely disagreed with his assessment of the facts, I do feel he has a right to voice his opinion on the age and competency of his fellow priests as long as he is very clear it was merely his (ahem, ill-informed) opinion.
But where I finally took umbrage was to the bolded sentence in the above quote, "They might be nice people; they just made terrible errors in administrative judgment." It is in bold again so no one can mistake my reason for my break in my normal blogging style. Administrative judgment, eh? Errors? Let me take you back to 2004 and show some "terrible errors in administrative judgment" concerning the exploitation of children.
There is currently only one person in the Catholic clergy who has been accused (and convicted, I might add) of crimes against children in the valley, and possibly in the entire diocese which includes the whole state of Idaho. That person was a deacon found to have copious amounts of child pornography on his computer. Which parish you might ask? Mine. Under the "watchful eye" of my pastor. Now I will grant that the awful images were on a computer at his employment and not at the parish. But it was a crime against children by someone in close contact with our pastor.
I do not hold Father personally responsible for the crime since he was not the perpetrator, but I do hold him accountable for the "terrible errors in administrative judgment" he showed after the fact. When was Father informed of the crime? Oh, sometime in late Spring, early Summer. When was the deacon relieved of his duties? Oh, sometime in early Fall! When did I come in contact with the deacon? When I was arranging for my infant son's baptism after he was born in mid August. There was only one good thing that came out of my son's illness at birth, a delayed baptism. He was too sick to be around people, but not so sick that he was in danger of death. So we delayed his baptism...until early November. The deacon had just been relieved of his duties a few weeks before.
Our entire parish was up in arms with our pastor's handling of the situation. We all felt so lied to. This was 2004! We were fresh on the heels of when the first scandals broke. Our priests and bishops had promised a "transparency in dealing with past abuse cases." It even went so far as our bishop writing a letter of apology for his part in a transfer in another diocese decades before. We knew that many people, back then, believed a pedophile could be rehabilitated. We understood that if you had only been in contact with one person, you would do what appeared to be the "normal and correct way of handling it." Our bishop asked our forgiveness and came clean with it. We didn't need to know the details because he was being upfront about it. We laid it to rest fairly quickly.
But when the scandal broke in our parish many people felt so betrayed that our pastor KNEW and yet he DID NOTHING! This was 2004! What did our pastor think; that because they were only images that real children weren't in danger? Didn't he learn anything? Pedophiles begin their crimes by those who are closest to them. This man was a husband and father. This man handled small children over a baptismal font! And yet this pastor felt it was fine to keep this under wraps for months on end. How absurd!!
The opinion piece by my pastor in our local paper brought up some very strong feelings in me. When my newborn son was in the NICU it was this deacon who came to give him a blessing. While I know because of my faith that the office of deacon gave my son the blessing, so it was therefore valid, I still can only see the image of a pedophile handling my newborn son. For my pastor to have the nerve to go to our paper and accuse others of "terrible errors in administrative judgment" based almost solely on their age is beyond ridiculous. That he does so now, in the shadow of his own reprehensible errors, is the definition of irony.
In fairness I need to post a link to the article. But not knowing how long our local paper will keep it active, I am trying to decide how much to pick out and quote or how much to merely comment on the article. The title of this post however, is due to a direct quote so I will show that in context.
The article is here: http://www.idahostatesman.com/2010/04/06/1142699/a-stronger-younger-pope-is-needed.html#ixzz0kauO0i2i
And the part I am specifically addressing is quoted here:
[Emphasis by me]It is my opinion, for what it is worth, that 10 years ago many American bishops should have been retired. They might be nice people; they just made terrible errors in administrative judgment. I think the same thing should happen today throughout Europe. I think it would be best if Pope Benedict were to retire. He may be a saintly man, but he is much too old to lead the church through this mess. We need a strong leader who will call the church to humility and penance for our past.
The central focus of the sex abuse scandal always has to be the victims. With that in mind, I have confidence in the good people who make up the church. Our managers have failed us in the past years, but management has never been the heart of the church: God is the center and that has not changed.
He basically claims he was "asked to weigh in" on the most recent sex abuse scandals and how the allegations are currently handled. While he does not identify the person or persons who asked him to weigh in, he does a fair job of explaining, albeit vaguely, for anyone but the fairly knowledgeable Catholic, the process the Church now has in place for preventing future occurrences and weeding out past ones. He begins to go off the rails when he claims that while the Church herself has a good system in place, there are still problems at the diocesan level.
His solution is that most bishops should have retired 10 years ago, especially and specifically including our most Holy Father in that list of the "much too old for strong leadership" category. (I was really glad our bishop responded to the article and set a few things straight because our pope is not too old, and Father was speaking without any authority whatsoever.) Now all of this was just one man's opinion and while I completely disagreed with his assessment of the facts, I do feel he has a right to voice his opinion on the age and competency of his fellow priests as long as he is very clear it was merely his (ahem, ill-informed) opinion.
But where I finally took umbrage was to the bolded sentence in the above quote, "They might be nice people; they just made terrible errors in administrative judgment." It is in bold again so no one can mistake my reason for my break in my normal blogging style. Administrative judgment, eh? Errors? Let me take you back to 2004 and show some "terrible errors in administrative judgment" concerning the exploitation of children.
There is currently only one person in the Catholic clergy who has been accused (and convicted, I might add) of crimes against children in the valley, and possibly in the entire diocese which includes the whole state of Idaho. That person was a deacon found to have copious amounts of child pornography on his computer. Which parish you might ask? Mine. Under the "watchful eye" of my pastor. Now I will grant that the awful images were on a computer at his employment and not at the parish. But it was a crime against children by someone in close contact with our pastor.
I do not hold Father personally responsible for the crime since he was not the perpetrator, but I do hold him accountable for the "terrible errors in administrative judgment" he showed after the fact. When was Father informed of the crime? Oh, sometime in late Spring, early Summer. When was the deacon relieved of his duties? Oh, sometime in early Fall! When did I come in contact with the deacon? When I was arranging for my infant son's baptism after he was born in mid August. There was only one good thing that came out of my son's illness at birth, a delayed baptism. He was too sick to be around people, but not so sick that he was in danger of death. So we delayed his baptism...until early November. The deacon had just been relieved of his duties a few weeks before.
Our entire parish was up in arms with our pastor's handling of the situation. We all felt so lied to. This was 2004! We were fresh on the heels of when the first scandals broke. Our priests and bishops had promised a "transparency in dealing with past abuse cases." It even went so far as our bishop writing a letter of apology for his part in a transfer in another diocese decades before. We knew that many people, back then, believed a pedophile could be rehabilitated. We understood that if you had only been in contact with one person, you would do what appeared to be the "normal and correct way of handling it." Our bishop asked our forgiveness and came clean with it. We didn't need to know the details because he was being upfront about it. We laid it to rest fairly quickly.
But when the scandal broke in our parish many people felt so betrayed that our pastor KNEW and yet he DID NOTHING! This was 2004! What did our pastor think; that because they were only images that real children weren't in danger? Didn't he learn anything? Pedophiles begin their crimes by those who are closest to them. This man was a husband and father. This man handled small children over a baptismal font! And yet this pastor felt it was fine to keep this under wraps for months on end. How absurd!!
The opinion piece by my pastor in our local paper brought up some very strong feelings in me. When my newborn son was in the NICU it was this deacon who came to give him a blessing. While I know because of my faith that the office of deacon gave my son the blessing, so it was therefore valid, I still can only see the image of a pedophile handling my newborn son. For my pastor to have the nerve to go to our paper and accuse others of "terrible errors in administrative judgment" based almost solely on their age is beyond ridiculous. That he does so now, in the shadow of his own reprehensible errors, is the definition of irony.
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Why Don't People Get It?
I was reading an article of yet another crime involving pornography. It is again child pornography. This is child pornography is called "Class 4" or something similar under British law. The only worse classification is 5. The height of tragedy is that these images, concocted by Satan himself, were held by a child murderer. This child murderer was a child himself when he murdered a toddler. He was let out at age 18 and given an entirely new identity. All of this was in the interest of his safety.
A child, from a horrible background commits a horrible murder. And society believes it is too expensive to house the murderer and attempts "rehabilitation." Few people believe it is really possible, yet the attempts continue.
I am going to assert that as long as any pornography is considered "normal," then rehabilitation is impossible! As long as images of degradation of any human being are tolerated in the mainstream, these crimes will continue and escalate. It has not been proven that the murder of this child was sexually motivated, only that sexual assault was included. I really don't care about the motivation. I care about the results!
Child pornographers are "motivated" by greed. The result is pure evil. I know it can be argued, even by me, that those very pornographers were victims themselves at one point. That is where this evil comes from. It is passed from generation to generation, spreading and mutating like the horrible virus it is. The mutations are caused by each generation slacking more and more in accepting immorality.
Each of us has been there. I've seen the steamy movies and watched to the end just to know how it turned out. I have sought to balance an artistic eye, only to have it assaulted by an image I can't erase from my mind. I have had the nightmares that the evil I have allowed in my own life, has played on. I don't hold myself innocent here and instead, find that speaking out against these atrocities is a way to heal and help the images fade.
The idea that we are allowed to muck around in the mud and still come out clean is even an idea touted by many evangelical Christians. They have this image of us being "dungheaps covered in a blanket of snow" that is Christ's sacrifice for us. But that is just plain not good enough! Either God actually makes us clean, or He doesn't. This idea that we are merely "covered by Christ" is what has led many to a path of continued depravity.
The whole point to authentic Christianity is an actual uniting of ourselves with Christ on the cross! It is not a simple, "Gee thanks for dying for me Jesus, now I will try to do better because I love you so much." That is absurd, and yet it is what many churches teach, (and sadly many Catholics who are not in union with Church teaching.) Every time a crime is committed against a child we are to re-examine our own lives and nail to the Cross each crime we committed against Christ. Every time we caused a child to doubt the love of God, a "great millstone" is hung around our necks.
The only way to stop the advance of evil is to grow in holiness. The only person I can change is me. And the only Person I can truly allow to change me is Christ Himself. He lives in us all and we must recognize him at every turn and invite him to each moment in our lives.
A child, from a horrible background commits a horrible murder. And society believes it is too expensive to house the murderer and attempts "rehabilitation." Few people believe it is really possible, yet the attempts continue.
I am going to assert that as long as any pornography is considered "normal," then rehabilitation is impossible! As long as images of degradation of any human being are tolerated in the mainstream, these crimes will continue and escalate. It has not been proven that the murder of this child was sexually motivated, only that sexual assault was included. I really don't care about the motivation. I care about the results!
Child pornographers are "motivated" by greed. The result is pure evil. I know it can be argued, even by me, that those very pornographers were victims themselves at one point. That is where this evil comes from. It is passed from generation to generation, spreading and mutating like the horrible virus it is. The mutations are caused by each generation slacking more and more in accepting immorality.
Each of us has been there. I've seen the steamy movies and watched to the end just to know how it turned out. I have sought to balance an artistic eye, only to have it assaulted by an image I can't erase from my mind. I have had the nightmares that the evil I have allowed in my own life, has played on. I don't hold myself innocent here and instead, find that speaking out against these atrocities is a way to heal and help the images fade.
The idea that we are allowed to muck around in the mud and still come out clean is even an idea touted by many evangelical Christians. They have this image of us being "dungheaps covered in a blanket of snow" that is Christ's sacrifice for us. But that is just plain not good enough! Either God actually makes us clean, or He doesn't. This idea that we are merely "covered by Christ" is what has led many to a path of continued depravity.
The whole point to authentic Christianity is an actual uniting of ourselves with Christ on the cross! It is not a simple, "Gee thanks for dying for me Jesus, now I will try to do better because I love you so much." That is absurd, and yet it is what many churches teach, (and sadly many Catholics who are not in union with Church teaching.) Every time a crime is committed against a child we are to re-examine our own lives and nail to the Cross each crime we committed against Christ. Every time we caused a child to doubt the love of God, a "great millstone" is hung around our necks.
The only way to stop the advance of evil is to grow in holiness. The only person I can change is me. And the only Person I can truly allow to change me is Christ Himself. He lives in us all and we must recognize him at every turn and invite him to each moment in our lives.
Monday, March 8, 2010
People Are Genuinely Good.
I really believe that. People are genuinely good. I haven't blogged in awhile. My computer was broken and then I just couldn't get my spirit into it again. This is really for me, I guess, since I have about 3 regular readers (Hi there!) so thanks for reading. I suppose if I got that "follow button" going I might have more, but it just hasn't happened yet, so here I am, me and my keyboard.
I really want to get this out. I almost put it in my private journal but I wanted to type it and my last private journal got lost in the computer crash. For whatever reason, I want this out there. I want it out in cyber-space so that I could somehow find it again if I need it. I think it is one of my more important "confessions."
I selfishly want to know everyone. I believe, no matter what, that people are inherently good and I want to know them all. I say that is selfish because at the heart of it, it is. It is all about me. I, I, I. I want to know the goodness in all people. I want to experience it. And mostly I want to measure up to it and be worthy of knowing that goodness.
Like all epiphanies, this one had a catalyst. (That word means "a beginning" or "an ignitor" for one of my readers who says I use too many big words.) And epiphany, in this case means "a big new thought or revelation." The catalyst was my friend's step-dad died of cancer. (Basically closer to her than her natural father, and helped her become the woman she is.) Death often makes people mull over life and examine their conscience, so I guess I am no different.
But in this case, I am doing all of it for entirely selfish reasons. See, I didn't know him. Without having reconnected with an acquaintance from high school, he would just be another name. But that is what is getting to me. He lived this exemplary life and I didn't know him. His funeral is going to be huge, and I never heard of him until I reconnected with someone I barely knew in high school. I feel like I missed out. He was this major contributor in the life of someone who I have come to know and respect. And I never got to witness it. Somehow, it makes me feel very insignificant.
I am going to the funeral, but again, I doubt my motives. Am I going just to go? I want to "be there" for my friend, but it feels so weird. Why would I need to "be there" for her when people who knew him already are? It isn't like she or I lack friends. She has dozens and so do I. If it were a small funeral I wouldn't hesitate to add some comfort to a small number. But this was one of those genuinely good men who had a devoted wife, lots of friends, and was a giver to society. He didn't share my religious beliefs and I know little of his politics other than the two governors who will attend. So why am I going?
Because he mattered to someone who matters to me. Because I wish I had made different choices in life and had gotten the chance to meet him. Again, all about me. How selfish am I that I shed tears for "what might have been?" He was a good man, from what I hear, a great man actually, and all I can think of is, "I missed out." And on a deeper level I want to be able to support my friend because she represents the one type of friendship that I have never had. I have never had a truly close friend who is on nearly all of the same common ground as me. I don't have to explain my religious beliefs, or political stance, or parenting style, or my husband's idiosyncrasies, or my family, or anything. She just "gets it." That hasn't happened with any close friendship, ever. But I didn't know him. So we aren't on common ground.
One of the things I have come to know in my almost 39 years is that I have common ground with everyone. I have never met a stranger and I don't believe that evil is inborn. I believe we all have a natural predisposition toward evil but we are all inherently good. The Catholic Church refers to it in terms of "Original Sin," and "concupiscence," which is a tendency towards sin. We all have it and we all can overcome it. Without getting into too much theology, It is the teaching that we can all come to God even if we don't exactly know how, if we genuinely seek Goodness. My hope is to be one who fulfills the great Bishop Fulton Sheen's prophetic words, "There will be many surprised people in heaven." Surprised that I made it and surprised at who else did too.
In the end I think it all comes back to this idea of "control" that I am finally attempting to give to God. I can't save the world. I can't even really change the whole world. But I want to have at least known of as many people as possible who have touched it. I want to experience people. I want to see, first hand, joy and sorrow and distinguish the two while at the same time know that they are often two sides of the same coin. I don't make joy and sorrow, God does. Sorrow can be a very beautiful thing. What is the joy of reunion in heaven without knowing the sorrow that preceded? In heaven it is everlasting joy. What will it be to know everyone who ever was and ever will be and to fully know God? I have no words. I have no words.
I really want to get this out. I almost put it in my private journal but I wanted to type it and my last private journal got lost in the computer crash. For whatever reason, I want this out there. I want it out in cyber-space so that I could somehow find it again if I need it. I think it is one of my more important "confessions."
I selfishly want to know everyone. I believe, no matter what, that people are inherently good and I want to know them all. I say that is selfish because at the heart of it, it is. It is all about me. I, I, I. I want to know the goodness in all people. I want to experience it. And mostly I want to measure up to it and be worthy of knowing that goodness.
Like all epiphanies, this one had a catalyst. (That word means "a beginning" or "an ignitor" for one of my readers who says I use too many big words.) And epiphany, in this case means "a big new thought or revelation." The catalyst was my friend's step-dad died of cancer. (Basically closer to her than her natural father, and helped her become the woman she is.) Death often makes people mull over life and examine their conscience, so I guess I am no different.
But in this case, I am doing all of it for entirely selfish reasons. See, I didn't know him. Without having reconnected with an acquaintance from high school, he would just be another name. But that is what is getting to me. He lived this exemplary life and I didn't know him. His funeral is going to be huge, and I never heard of him until I reconnected with someone I barely knew in high school. I feel like I missed out. He was this major contributor in the life of someone who I have come to know and respect. And I never got to witness it. Somehow, it makes me feel very insignificant.
I am going to the funeral, but again, I doubt my motives. Am I going just to go? I want to "be there" for my friend, but it feels so weird. Why would I need to "be there" for her when people who knew him already are? It isn't like she or I lack friends. She has dozens and so do I. If it were a small funeral I wouldn't hesitate to add some comfort to a small number. But this was one of those genuinely good men who had a devoted wife, lots of friends, and was a giver to society. He didn't share my religious beliefs and I know little of his politics other than the two governors who will attend. So why am I going?
Because he mattered to someone who matters to me. Because I wish I had made different choices in life and had gotten the chance to meet him. Again, all about me. How selfish am I that I shed tears for "what might have been?" He was a good man, from what I hear, a great man actually, and all I can think of is, "I missed out." And on a deeper level I want to be able to support my friend because she represents the one type of friendship that I have never had. I have never had a truly close friend who is on nearly all of the same common ground as me. I don't have to explain my religious beliefs, or political stance, or parenting style, or my husband's idiosyncrasies, or my family, or anything. She just "gets it." That hasn't happened with any close friendship, ever. But I didn't know him. So we aren't on common ground.
One of the things I have come to know in my almost 39 years is that I have common ground with everyone. I have never met a stranger and I don't believe that evil is inborn. I believe we all have a natural predisposition toward evil but we are all inherently good. The Catholic Church refers to it in terms of "Original Sin," and "concupiscence," which is a tendency towards sin. We all have it and we all can overcome it. Without getting into too much theology, It is the teaching that we can all come to God even if we don't exactly know how, if we genuinely seek Goodness. My hope is to be one who fulfills the great Bishop Fulton Sheen's prophetic words, "There will be many surprised people in heaven." Surprised that I made it and surprised at who else did too.
In the end I think it all comes back to this idea of "control" that I am finally attempting to give to God. I can't save the world. I can't even really change the whole world. But I want to have at least known of as many people as possible who have touched it. I want to experience people. I want to see, first hand, joy and sorrow and distinguish the two while at the same time know that they are often two sides of the same coin. I don't make joy and sorrow, God does. Sorrow can be a very beautiful thing. What is the joy of reunion in heaven without knowing the sorrow that preceded? In heaven it is everlasting joy. What will it be to know everyone who ever was and ever will be and to fully know God? I have no words. I have no words.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Bring It On or Let It Go?
Obviously I have some differing opinions than many people I know. Yes, hello, I am Catholic, and many people I know are not.
So a cousin of mine posted a "news article" about a topic upon which we disagree. She noted that it was an "excellent article written by a conservative lawyer" supporting her point of view. I read through the article, to the end, and did my best to stay objective. I failed. I will never get those five minutes of my life back. I don't miss them terribly, but I still can't decide if I should say something or not and lose another five or ten minutes. I guess pointing out that the lawyer was "conservative" (whatever that means) was supposed to say something like, "Look a liberal (whatever that means too) likes this article!" The problem was, the article had nothing in it that actually addressed the concerns of the opposing viewpoint.
I have learned that the way to show objectivity is to actually present the opposing argument in a way that a person who holds that point of view would actually recognize as his or her own. In the film, "Listen to Me" about a group of debaters, there is a wonderful scene where their coach makes a young woman switch sides of a debate after making her opening statement. The subject? Abortion. It was an excellent movie. A really well informed debater can do it without anyone knowing where he or she stands.
This wasn't that kind of article. This was the kind of article known as a "strawman argument." It means that you build a false picture of your opponent's point of view and then proceed to knock it down. Then for the kicker, you claim victory.
I try to keep away from strawmen. I think one of the ways to do so is to actually view your opponent as an intelligent person who came to their beliefs through careful study, faith beliefs, or legitimate experience. I have often said to an opponent, "I get where you are coming from. If I had your same experiences, I would probably hold the same point of view." So my job, I believe, in getting the word out on authentic marriage and authentic sexuality is to present the side they haven't considered and then Let. It. Go. Walk away, and take my soap-box with me. I fail at it far more often than I care to mention, but that is still my job.
We all want victory. If what we hold as important really is The Truth, then victory would really mean no one actually lost. But, we are all fallible humans. We will make mistakes. We will misrepresent the Truth eventually, accidentally of course. But we still have an obligation to interact even when we are slightly misguided. We aren't on this big chunk of dirt and water alone. We have to live together. We have to communicate and not just talk around each other. We have to know when to remain silent and be thought the fool instead of opening one's mouth and removing all doubt. A huge piece of of this is knowing when to bring it on and when to let it go. As of right now, I still don't know. Please pray for me.
So a cousin of mine posted a "news article" about a topic upon which we disagree. She noted that it was an "excellent article written by a conservative lawyer" supporting her point of view. I read through the article, to the end, and did my best to stay objective. I failed. I will never get those five minutes of my life back. I don't miss them terribly, but I still can't decide if I should say something or not and lose another five or ten minutes. I guess pointing out that the lawyer was "conservative" (whatever that means) was supposed to say something like, "Look a liberal (whatever that means too) likes this article!" The problem was, the article had nothing in it that actually addressed the concerns of the opposing viewpoint.
I have learned that the way to show objectivity is to actually present the opposing argument in a way that a person who holds that point of view would actually recognize as his or her own. In the film, "Listen to Me" about a group of debaters, there is a wonderful scene where their coach makes a young woman switch sides of a debate after making her opening statement. The subject? Abortion. It was an excellent movie. A really well informed debater can do it without anyone knowing where he or she stands.
This wasn't that kind of article. This was the kind of article known as a "strawman argument." It means that you build a false picture of your opponent's point of view and then proceed to knock it down. Then for the kicker, you claim victory.
I try to keep away from strawmen. I think one of the ways to do so is to actually view your opponent as an intelligent person who came to their beliefs through careful study, faith beliefs, or legitimate experience. I have often said to an opponent, "I get where you are coming from. If I had your same experiences, I would probably hold the same point of view." So my job, I believe, in getting the word out on authentic marriage and authentic sexuality is to present the side they haven't considered and then Let. It. Go. Walk away, and take my soap-box with me. I fail at it far more often than I care to mention, but that is still my job.
We all want victory. If what we hold as important really is The Truth, then victory would really mean no one actually lost. But, we are all fallible humans. We will make mistakes. We will misrepresent the Truth eventually, accidentally of course. But we still have an obligation to interact even when we are slightly misguided. We aren't on this big chunk of dirt and water alone. We have to live together. We have to communicate and not just talk around each other. We have to know when to remain silent and be thought the fool instead of opening one's mouth and removing all doubt. A huge piece of of this is knowing when to bring it on and when to let it go. As of right now, I still don't know. Please pray for me.
Monday, January 11, 2010
That Old Feelin'
Through much prayer and waiting we have discerned that God has called us to a small family. We are still leaving the door open if God has another plan for us, but everything has pointed to being called to be done having children. The reasons are many, and all are valid, some even extremely important, but it doesn't take away the hurt.
It is that old feelin'. Am I just falling back into a contraceptive mentality? I hope not. Do I just want more children on principle to prove a point? Very possible. Or am I just really having all of my maternal instincts in high gear? Most likely. It is so natural for a woman to want to have babies. But in recent decades it seems that our culture has tried to condition us out of our instincts.
Women want marriage and family and all of the trappings that come with it. For years there was a faction of people trying to convince society that women really wanted "freedom." They were right on one point. Women were enslaved in one way or another. But it wasn't our precious babies who enslaved us. It wasn't even really men, although they were the ones bore the responsibility for the outcome. No, it was and has always been we women who have kept ourselves enslaved.
I deep look at human history shows that every time women sought "sameness" with men is when men made their bad decisions. We have always been equal, since the dawn of time. What we have never been is the same. And this isn't the struggle of the civil rights movement to have to overcome "separate but equal." No. That was a certainly a battle that needed to happen, because they most certainly were not treated equally, and you cannot live anywhere on this earth and be "separate" from anyone.
No, this battle was a dog digging in his heels at the vet. This is the battle against neutering. Now I am all for neutering pets when needed. They have no self-control. But we humans do. So why don't we show it more often? Of that I have no real answer.
But this attempt at sameness was and is a battle of neutering. If women are less like women and more like men, then where does that leave men? Neutered, unless they dig in their heels and fight back. Every time in history when women stayed women, men did not fight back and our rights were maintained. We are equal simply because we are not the same. We are complementary. It is the universal yin and yang, push and pull, positive and negative. To be neutral has no power. It is through our complementarity that we have balance AND power.
It is that old feelin'. Am I just falling back into a contraceptive mentality? I hope not. Do I just want more children on principle to prove a point? Very possible. Or am I just really having all of my maternal instincts in high gear? Most likely. It is so natural for a woman to want to have babies. But in recent decades it seems that our culture has tried to condition us out of our instincts.
Women want marriage and family and all of the trappings that come with it. For years there was a faction of people trying to convince society that women really wanted "freedom." They were right on one point. Women were enslaved in one way or another. But it wasn't our precious babies who enslaved us. It wasn't even really men, although they were the ones bore the responsibility for the outcome. No, it was and has always been we women who have kept ourselves enslaved.
I deep look at human history shows that every time women sought "sameness" with men is when men made their bad decisions. We have always been equal, since the dawn of time. What we have never been is the same. And this isn't the struggle of the civil rights movement to have to overcome "separate but equal." No. That was a certainly a battle that needed to happen, because they most certainly were not treated equally, and you cannot live anywhere on this earth and be "separate" from anyone.
No, this battle was a dog digging in his heels at the vet. This is the battle against neutering. Now I am all for neutering pets when needed. They have no self-control. But we humans do. So why don't we show it more often? Of that I have no real answer.
But this attempt at sameness was and is a battle of neutering. If women are less like women and more like men, then where does that leave men? Neutered, unless they dig in their heels and fight back. Every time in history when women stayed women, men did not fight back and our rights were maintained. We are equal simply because we are not the same. We are complementary. It is the universal yin and yang, push and pull, positive and negative. To be neutral has no power. It is through our complementarity that we have balance AND power.
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Contracepting Lawnmowers
I wrote at an earlier date about a movie (unnamed here so I don't have to worry about legal issues) where the trailer begins with a young girl saying these words, "Most babies are accidents..." I was shocked down to the tip of my toes to hear that, but now it gets worse.
I saw an ad for a reality show where a couple has decided to try to conceive. So far they have been unsuccessful and are apparently seeking infertility treatment now. This woman is in her mid-30s and says a line that saddens me deeply. She says, "We spend all of our lives trying not to get pregnant and when we go to get pregnant we can't."
How upside down have we really become? Is it really so shocking to society that if you break something that it doesn't magically fix itself? Here's my thought: Let's say I have a riding lawnmower. I decide that it is fun to drive around. I can do fun little quick turns and make fancy maneuvers. But it has that pesky blade on the bottom. I can't go everywhere I want to go because I risk mowing down the daisies. I think the daisies look nice so I would like to save them for now. Maybe when they are not looking so hot I will go ahead and mow them down. But for now I want to drive right where those daisies are, and my blade is just stuck in the engaged position. I can't disengage it. Wherever I go, scattered daisies lie in my wake.
So I flip my mower over and smash the heck out of my blade with a sledgehammer. I keep bending it and smashing it until it will not mow daisies no matter where I drive it. The blade can spin and spin but will never reach the daisies. Now I can drive it wherever I want, on whomever's lawn I want and it will do nothing but make fancy maneuvers.
Then one random day I decide I want to mow. my. lawn. I want the blade to do what a blade was designed to do. I have decided that it is best to stay on my own lawn and stop driving over the daisies. I have decided this because I finally cultivated a good healthy relationship with my very own lawn. I would finally like to have a beautiful, manicured lawn of my very own. But it is too late. The blade is mangled. It will take professional intervention at great cost to straighten out the problem. I have to use precious time to fix what should have never been broken, (by me I might add,) in the first place. Can it be repaired? Well of course. It is just a silly lawnmower blade! Just rip it out and put in a new one! I can just do that so easily so I will.
So why would anyone mangle a perfectly good lawnmower blade just to be able to drive over the daisies? "What a silly analogy!" some might say. No one would do that to a perfectly good lawnmower just to go for a joyride! We see the idea of mangling a lawnmower blade as such a silly idea. So why do we treat our bodies with less respect than a lawnmower? What value have we placed on our human sexuality that we see corrupting a lawnmower as completely ridiculous, but corrupting our own bodies as perfectly reasonable? Word to the wise: Cultivate your own lawn and stop mowing over the daisies! You will be happier in the end. No mangled blade to fix.
I saw an ad for a reality show where a couple has decided to try to conceive. So far they have been unsuccessful and are apparently seeking infertility treatment now. This woman is in her mid-30s and says a line that saddens me deeply. She says, "We spend all of our lives trying not to get pregnant and when we go to get pregnant we can't."
How upside down have we really become? Is it really so shocking to society that if you break something that it doesn't magically fix itself? Here's my thought: Let's say I have a riding lawnmower. I decide that it is fun to drive around. I can do fun little quick turns and make fancy maneuvers. But it has that pesky blade on the bottom. I can't go everywhere I want to go because I risk mowing down the daisies. I think the daisies look nice so I would like to save them for now. Maybe when they are not looking so hot I will go ahead and mow them down. But for now I want to drive right where those daisies are, and my blade is just stuck in the engaged position. I can't disengage it. Wherever I go, scattered daisies lie in my wake.
So I flip my mower over and smash the heck out of my blade with a sledgehammer. I keep bending it and smashing it until it will not mow daisies no matter where I drive it. The blade can spin and spin but will never reach the daisies. Now I can drive it wherever I want, on whomever's lawn I want and it will do nothing but make fancy maneuvers.
Then one random day I decide I want to mow. my. lawn. I want the blade to do what a blade was designed to do. I have decided that it is best to stay on my own lawn and stop driving over the daisies. I have decided this because I finally cultivated a good healthy relationship with my very own lawn. I would finally like to have a beautiful, manicured lawn of my very own. But it is too late. The blade is mangled. It will take professional intervention at great cost to straighten out the problem. I have to use precious time to fix what should have never been broken, (by me I might add,) in the first place. Can it be repaired? Well of course. It is just a silly lawnmower blade! Just rip it out and put in a new one! I can just do that so easily so I will.
So why would anyone mangle a perfectly good lawnmower blade just to be able to drive over the daisies? "What a silly analogy!" some might say. No one would do that to a perfectly good lawnmower just to go for a joyride! We see the idea of mangling a lawnmower blade as such a silly idea. So why do we treat our bodies with less respect than a lawnmower? What value have we placed on our human sexuality that we see corrupting a lawnmower as completely ridiculous, but corrupting our own bodies as perfectly reasonable? Word to the wise: Cultivate your own lawn and stop mowing over the daisies! You will be happier in the end. No mangled blade to fix.
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