I don't want to take away your hunting rifles...but I don't "get" why you feel you need an assault rifle with 30-bullet ammunition clips.
Target practice? That's an art.
I'm o.k. if you want to go hunt deer, but I feel less safe knowing that you are next to me at BJ's armed to the hilt.
While I don't interpret the Second Amendment the way that the conservative Republican justices on the Supreme Court do, it is the law of the land. I respect your "right" to own guns (the same way I respect the "right" to abortion), though I vehemently disagree with it.
I still don't understand, however, how Christians who worship the ultimate icon of nonviolence can double down on weapons that kill. Maybe someday I'll run into someone who can explain it to me in a way that makes sense.
Jesus cradling a rifle in his hands...imagine.
http://lancasteronline.com/article/local/805092_Column--Seeking-Jesus-in-these-violent-times.html
samedi, janvier 19, 2013
vendredi, janvier 18, 2013
Deep six the "F" word
There are some idiosyncrasies in the journalistic world that drive me crazy.
Frankly, I blame the advent of social media, including blogging, for the fact that, all of a sudden, everyone's a writer.
In one way, that's a blessing. We now get to hear from people who might have been too shy to express an opinion before, or not had access to a way of getting their ideas out before the public.
Sometimes what they have to say is worth reading.
But with the popularity of Twitter, Facebook and Blogger comes a lot, forgive me for saying so, of dreck.
That includes certain memes that seem to rise and fall in popularity, becoming trite before you can say " Bob's yer uncle."
I'm not crazy about writers who label other writers "elites" from another privileged position.
Nor am I fond of the way that some conservative authors call newspapers, blogs and online magazines with which they happen to disagree "the media" (meaning the mainstream media) when conservative media outlets like Fox are both vociferous and extremely well-funded.
What media outlets are leaching jobs left and right? Or should I say -- left or right?
But in the interest of fairness, it's not only conservatives who fall deep into the linguistic mire.
Liberals also have their favorite words -- one on which is "fascist." Often, it's a response to the accusation by conservatives that those who favor government-funded health care and unemployment benefits are "socialists."
Thus ideas held dear by conservatives become totalitarian or "fascist."
Real fascists (or real socialists, for that matter) would find these comparisons absolutely ludicrous. But it's just another sign of the disintegration of our political and social discourse.
Frankly, as a descendant of people who survived (and some who perished) in the Holocaust, I don't just find it ridiculous. I find it offensive.
In addition, we happen to live in a democracy, however dysfunctional. That's why we have elections -- right?
But liberals don't own the f-word anymore. And perhaps that fact means that we can begin to wean ourselves from overusing it.
Conservatives like Jonah Goldberg have also been known to throw the word "fascist" around when speaking of his political opposites.
Then there are people like John Mackey.
Frankly, I'm not sure what the Whole Foods owner would call himself. He recently termed President Obama's Health-Care act "fascist" (though he later walked it back -- perhaps when he realized that he provides his employees health-care).
Wait up. I'm worried.
What are we to think, however, of a man who talks about our "food addictions" and the need to cure them?
Scary dude.
Conveniently enough, Mackey has provided us with a nationwide network of Whole Foods stores so that we can be reprogrammed.
Oops. I mean, have stores in which to purchase healthier products.
Sounds a little fascist to me.
Frankly, I blame the advent of social media, including blogging, for the fact that, all of a sudden, everyone's a writer.
In one way, that's a blessing. We now get to hear from people who might have been too shy to express an opinion before, or not had access to a way of getting their ideas out before the public.
Sometimes what they have to say is worth reading.
But with the popularity of Twitter, Facebook and Blogger comes a lot, forgive me for saying so, of dreck.
That includes certain memes that seem to rise and fall in popularity, becoming trite before you can say " Bob's yer uncle."
I'm not crazy about writers who label other writers "elites" from another privileged position.
Nor am I fond of the way that some conservative authors call newspapers, blogs and online magazines with which they happen to disagree "the media" (meaning the mainstream media) when conservative media outlets like Fox are both vociferous and extremely well-funded.
What media outlets are leaching jobs left and right? Or should I say -- left or right?
But in the interest of fairness, it's not only conservatives who fall deep into the linguistic mire.
Liberals also have their favorite words -- one on which is "fascist." Often, it's a response to the accusation by conservatives that those who favor government-funded health care and unemployment benefits are "socialists."
Thus ideas held dear by conservatives become totalitarian or "fascist."
Real fascists (or real socialists, for that matter) would find these comparisons absolutely ludicrous. But it's just another sign of the disintegration of our political and social discourse.
Frankly, as a descendant of people who survived (and some who perished) in the Holocaust, I don't just find it ridiculous. I find it offensive.
In addition, we happen to live in a democracy, however dysfunctional. That's why we have elections -- right?
But liberals don't own the f-word anymore. And perhaps that fact means that we can begin to wean ourselves from overusing it.
Conservatives like Jonah Goldberg have also been known to throw the word "fascist" around when speaking of his political opposites.
Then there are people like John Mackey.
Frankly, I'm not sure what the Whole Foods owner would call himself. He recently termed President Obama's Health-Care act "fascist" (though he later walked it back -- perhaps when he realized that he provides his employees health-care).
Wait up. I'm worried.
What are we to think, however, of a man who talks about our "food addictions" and the need to cure them?
Scary dude.
Conveniently enough, Mackey has provided us with a nationwide network of Whole Foods stores so that we can be reprogrammed.
Oops. I mean, have stores in which to purchase healthier products.
Sounds a little fascist to me.
lundi, janvier 14, 2013
Reaching out to the 'nones'
I spend a lot of time pondering this question: why are more and more of us Americans identifying ourselves as either nonbelievers (atheists, agnostics, freethinkers) or as "spiritual but not religious?"
For some general data on the "nones," take a look at this Gallup poll, which indicates that the largest percentages of those with no religious affiliation live in the West, or in New England, trend Asian, politically independent, and male.
Some of my ideas on this subject are completely unscientific. Others, just slightly less so.
There are lots of reasons for the increasing number of nonbelievers (although growth has slowed) that may have more to do with secularization and an increasing lack of a sense of a shared culture than with the failures of churches and other communities to reach seekers.
Somewhere along the way, we lost the sense of a "common good" -- a civic identity that encompassed people of many faiths.
But I can't help but wonder if the growth of the unbelievers is not, in part, because Christians (who are still the majority among U.S. believers) have done such a lousy job of conveying the wonder of encountering God in the person of Jesus of Nazareth.
I find it deeply troubling that we can't seem to find ways to get along among ourselves, let alone be welcoming to those who approach our doors with honest questions.
Again and again in the Hebrew Scriptures, God spurns the fatted calves and sacrificial offerings of the "righteous"-- because their hearts aren't right with Him.
I'm tired of sitting in Roman Catholic churches, wondering if the sophisticated theology behind denying me and other Protestants communion isn't just another long series of words for "pride."
Sick of Reformed theology that speculates on who is chosen -- and who isn't.
Impatient with Anglican "via media" that allows "celibate" gays to be bishops while barring heterosexual women.
These theological battles are so old-school...in fact, to many who have grown up in secular environments, they may seem completely irrelevant.
We can be so prissy and precious about our faith -- as though God had given us a hammerlock on the truth.
No wonder radio hosts like Terry Gross, interviewing gay Episcopal bishop Gene Robinson and many others, can show such shocking ignorance of the basics of Christian faith.
She doesn't need to "get it," the way she "gets" movements in art or politics or rock n' roll. She thinks she's got us nailed, as it were...because, in some ways, we've made it that easy.
Of course there is anti-Christian bigotry. Of course there is media bias (though not among all media, and not along treasured conservative-liberal lines).
But we have brought much of our problems upon ourselves, with our endless theological nitpicking and our lack of imagination -- the kind of imagination that allows God to be God, instead of trying to remake God into our own likeness.
That's not to say that everything goes. There are reasons that those wars were fought over phrases in the Nicene Creed (although it would have been much better for all of us if they'd figure out other ways of dealing with disagreements).
How about a little less theological judgmentalism -- and a bit more charity?
How about a little less arrogance and a bit more humility?
How about a heart open to prophetic words from others -- even if the others don't look or speak or read the same books as you?
As Christians, we need to figure out who we are to those who turn away from us. Only then can we begin to grapple with who it is we want to be.
For some general data on the "nones," take a look at this Gallup poll, which indicates that the largest percentages of those with no religious affiliation live in the West, or in New England, trend Asian, politically independent, and male.
Some of my ideas on this subject are completely unscientific. Others, just slightly less so.
There are lots of reasons for the increasing number of nonbelievers (although growth has slowed) that may have more to do with secularization and an increasing lack of a sense of a shared culture than with the failures of churches and other communities to reach seekers.
Somewhere along the way, we lost the sense of a "common good" -- a civic identity that encompassed people of many faiths.
But I can't help but wonder if the growth of the unbelievers is not, in part, because Christians (who are still the majority among U.S. believers) have done such a lousy job of conveying the wonder of encountering God in the person of Jesus of Nazareth.
I find it deeply troubling that we can't seem to find ways to get along among ourselves, let alone be welcoming to those who approach our doors with honest questions.
Again and again in the Hebrew Scriptures, God spurns the fatted calves and sacrificial offerings of the "righteous"-- because their hearts aren't right with Him.
I'm tired of sitting in Roman Catholic churches, wondering if the sophisticated theology behind denying me and other Protestants communion isn't just another long series of words for "pride."
Sick of Reformed theology that speculates on who is chosen -- and who isn't.
Impatient with Anglican "via media" that allows "celibate" gays to be bishops while barring heterosexual women.
These theological battles are so old-school...in fact, to many who have grown up in secular environments, they may seem completely irrelevant.
We can be so prissy and precious about our faith -- as though God had given us a hammerlock on the truth.
No wonder radio hosts like Terry Gross, interviewing gay Episcopal bishop Gene Robinson and many others, can show such shocking ignorance of the basics of Christian faith.
She doesn't need to "get it," the way she "gets" movements in art or politics or rock n' roll. She thinks she's got us nailed, as it were...because, in some ways, we've made it that easy.
Of course there is anti-Christian bigotry. Of course there is media bias (though not among all media, and not along treasured conservative-liberal lines).
But we have brought much of our problems upon ourselves, with our endless theological nitpicking and our lack of imagination -- the kind of imagination that allows God to be God, instead of trying to remake God into our own likeness.
That's not to say that everything goes. There are reasons that those wars were fought over phrases in the Nicene Creed (although it would have been much better for all of us if they'd figure out other ways of dealing with disagreements).
How about a little less theological judgmentalism -- and a bit more charity?
How about a little less arrogance and a bit more humility?
How about a heart open to prophetic words from others -- even if the others don't look or speak or read the same books as you?
As Christians, we need to figure out who we are to those who turn away from us. Only then can we begin to grapple with who it is we want to be.
mardi, janvier 08, 2013
The shadowed spirit
I am breaking the rules.
Every rule of loyalty, of politeness, of the covenant (or is it perhaps a social norm) that says you do not speak of family matters -- the ones that really matter.
For those of us raising children from whom we are distant walk among you like spies, watching you with grief and longing.
"Better not to compare" said a friend. I know she meant it kindly.
But I still bleed.
We talk to each other, parents with distant children, fathers and mothers who run alongside empty-handed. Somehow, amid the endless searches for new therapies, schools, physicians, we recognize one another. Find comfort, in a moment, sharing what we so rarely speak among those who have not spent nights weeping helplessly for their sons, head bowed for a daughter seemingly lost to them.
I read a letter about someone else's apparently brilliant, loving, endlessly mature and charmingly playful child and wonder: what did I do wrong?
And underneath that -- is the writer telling the whole truth? Or does she
have a need to make her child seem as naturally gifted as any pagan god?
All it does is reinforce my own sense of isolation.
I watch her as she sits at church, garbed in black -- at a distance from the other teenagers.
Bowed head, I listen with apparent meekness as I am blamed by one of her mentors for being too judgmental, allotting little praise, meting out too little responsibility.
Try raising this young woman, I want to say to her. Try looking at the endless years in counselor's offices, at school, sometimes pleading, sometimes dragging her dad along as the months slip by and every dream browns, curls up and seeps away.
She lies upstairs when she gets home, phone by her side, and computer on her lap. One by one, her real life friends disappear. Her world is becoming this screen -- that phone.
Time was, when I could put away that phone, intrude on her world. There was a time when rules would have meant something, but parents could not agree.
This time lost.
What I would not do to have it back again -- and yet I know that, given who her father and I were, are, are together, it would still be the same.
I have lost the trick of hope. Almost out of remedies, I am.
Soon she will be old enough that I will not matter. Her dad, who loves her too, is more accepting as she accepts the simulacrum of a relationship for a reality.
She is, despite those years, so innocent -- believes she does not need us.
If I could, I would roar like a lion in agony.
Instead I write.
As though somehow these words will allow some of the poison to leach away, giving a moment's rest.
Every rule of loyalty, of politeness, of the covenant (or is it perhaps a social norm) that says you do not speak of family matters -- the ones that really matter.
For those of us raising children from whom we are distant walk among you like spies, watching you with grief and longing.
"Better not to compare" said a friend. I know she meant it kindly.
But I still bleed.
We talk to each other, parents with distant children, fathers and mothers who run alongside empty-handed. Somehow, amid the endless searches for new therapies, schools, physicians, we recognize one another. Find comfort, in a moment, sharing what we so rarely speak among those who have not spent nights weeping helplessly for their sons, head bowed for a daughter seemingly lost to them.
I read a letter about someone else's apparently brilliant, loving, endlessly mature and charmingly playful child and wonder: what did I do wrong?
And underneath that -- is the writer telling the whole truth? Or does she
have a need to make her child seem as naturally gifted as any pagan god?
All it does is reinforce my own sense of isolation.
I watch her as she sits at church, garbed in black -- at a distance from the other teenagers.
Bowed head, I listen with apparent meekness as I am blamed by one of her mentors for being too judgmental, allotting little praise, meting out too little responsibility.
Try raising this young woman, I want to say to her. Try looking at the endless years in counselor's offices, at school, sometimes pleading, sometimes dragging her dad along as the months slip by and every dream browns, curls up and seeps away.
She lies upstairs when she gets home, phone by her side, and computer on her lap. One by one, her real life friends disappear. Her world is becoming this screen -- that phone.
Time was, when I could put away that phone, intrude on her world. There was a time when rules would have meant something, but parents could not agree.
This time lost.
What I would not do to have it back again -- and yet I know that, given who her father and I were, are, are together, it would still be the same.
I have lost the trick of hope. Almost out of remedies, I am.
Soon she will be old enough that I will not matter. Her dad, who loves her too, is more accepting as she accepts the simulacrum of a relationship for a reality.
She is, despite those years, so innocent -- believes she does not need us.
If I could, I would roar like a lion in agony.
Instead I write.
As though somehow these words will allow some of the poison to leach away, giving a moment's rest.
samedi, janvier 05, 2013
On deciding...not to decide!
I grinned when I saw cats miming New Year's resolutions yesterday at the Daily Beast (though I did wonder if there were a bit of coercion going on).
I have noticed, in the past, a spike in romantic interest around New Years -- as though the date itself was a significant marker of progress in finding true love. Or perhaps to take some steps towards gaining a hot bod, a better position, or a less irritating Aunt Sally.
Good luck with that, by the way.
But for most of us, resolutions don't work. For Christians, who believe that grace is crucial to growing in the spirit, a "do it myself" mentality is particularly problematic.
What would St. Paul say?
It's time to become a little more modest.and perhaps a little more successful, in our aspirations.
In that vein, I offer my "unresolutions" for 2013:
http://lancasteronline.com/article/local/799737_Column--A-minister-s-New-Year-s--unresolutions-.html
I have noticed, in the past, a spike in romantic interest around New Years -- as though the date itself was a significant marker of progress in finding true love. Or perhaps to take some steps towards gaining a hot bod, a better position, or a less irritating Aunt Sally.
Good luck with that, by the way.
But for most of us, resolutions don't work. For Christians, who believe that grace is crucial to growing in the spirit, a "do it myself" mentality is particularly problematic.
What would St. Paul say?
It's time to become a little more modest.and perhaps a little more successful, in our aspirations.
In that vein, I offer my "unresolutions" for 2013:
http://lancasteronline.com/article/local/799737_Column--A-minister-s-New-Year-s--unresolutions-.html
vendredi, janvier 04, 2013
What the years do (to some) of us
"Does he drink a lot"? asked a friend.
That would explain the puffy eyes, she said.
I wouldn't know how to recognize the signs.
I've been thinking about the problems age seems to bring with it.
At least to some of us.
Perhaps, in some cases, it exarcebates, carves in marble, disfunction that was there already.
If I hadn't had a profile posted online, I would not have recognized how great a variety of mental health issues exist among my cohort.
I ran into a lot of guys with serious challenges.
And I'm not talking about an extra twenty pounds or a bunch of old pictures (though I don't understand why people would post old snaps -- what about the same factor?)
I'm not speaking about depression, or other medical conditions. I assume that someone who is getting treated for these conditions has been grappling with them for a long time.
Even a spectacular "fail" in early life can be an occasion for self-reflection and growth. Stuff happens, ya know?
It's not even the superficiality (post a different picture, and you'll get "hits" from guys who have already viewed your photos before, five times or more, and never actually contacted you.)
It was the married men who got to me. (Well, mostly).
It was when I had two of them contact me within a minute, with their wheedling emails, that I shut down my profile on that site.
"Pathetic" AND "annoying."
Maybe someday I'll go back to that site.
But for right now, I find it too difficult.
Massage parlors...prisons.. men who lead secret lives as someone else that I can never imagine.
I have a lot of trouble believing that my friends, mostly married, are one thing on the outside and someone else completely on the inside.
Perhaps I'm vain.
But I see myself as more like my friends -- a woman who has struggled with real-life issues, and has real-life problems, but is generally healthy.
I wouldn't mind seeing a few of these men in therapy, once I get my counseling degree.
Maybe a few of them could be friends.
But I wouldn't want them in my life a romantic way.
That's not to say that all the men I found online were messed up. Not at all. But the percentage, I'm willing to guess, is a lot higher than our general population -- which is a disquieting thought.
What DO the years do to us?
My cat slumbers peacefully in my lap, looking up at me now and again, bronze eyes glinting.
How simple it must be to be a cat, I think -- not to be mentally affected by the passage of time.
Then he gets off my lap, and starts meowing, more loudly as I try to figure out what he wants.
Turns out it was a piece of sharp cheddar cheese.
I will never understand men -- or cats.
mardi, janvier 01, 2013
That morally superior planet
New York Times columnist David Brooks said, in a recent appearance on "Meet the Press" that President Obama governs as though he was a "visitor from a morally superior civilization."
http://www.politico.com/multimedia/video/2012/12/brooks-obama-governs-like-a-visitor-from-a-morally-superior-civilization.html
Apparently many people took this as a criticism of the President. Frankly, I think it's a compliment. Or perhaps, it's really a reflection of the stubborness, adolescent behavior, and navel-gazing of those who profess to represent us.
Namely, the men and women of United States Congress.
Everyone and their mother is complaining about the so-called "cliff deal" voted in by a coalition of Democrats and Republicans (not by most of them) in the House of Representatives. A lot of conservatives rightly point out that it does nothing to address spending cuts -- any ninny can see that spending cuts are a huge part of the answer in bringing down the deficit.
But the other piece of the equation is bringing in more revenue -- and liberals equally rightly point out that on this issue, Democrats caved.
What's so infuriating (or at least part of what's infuriating) is that we didn't have to arrive at this point. If Congress hadn't put the sequester in place (mostly because there are so few moderates left in the House), they would have been forced to come up with a compromise.
Instead, they continue to put off the tough choices, hoping that something will happen that gives them an edge. This latest "fix" merely put off the next emergency.
Sometimes the greater good lies in principled compromise instead of the reek of their idols, their false gods (can you say K street?), and the incessant din of their self-righteous cant.
Somewhere along the way, the House and the Senate stopped representing us, the people.
As someone pointed out this week on the radio, a lot of Senators and Congresspeople don't live in D.C. anymore. They come in for a few days each week, and return to their districts. They don't party together, or send their kids to the same schools. They stay in their bunkers.
I bet Steve LaTourette would be mortified if he ran into Mitch McConnell, Harry Reid, and Joe Biden and had to face them after making that crack about a deal made by "sleep-deprived octogenarians in the middle of the night."
Shame on you, Representative LaTourette.
They don't respect each other. Why should we believe that they respect the rest of us?
I don't always agree with our President -- there are things that he's done that I find disturbing, and other arenas in which I wish he would show some....intestinal fortitude.
Perhaps if he appears to hail from a morally superior civilization, it's because the bar in Congress has been set so low.
Maybe President Obama just treats the rest of us like we were fellow human beings worthy of his respect.
What a surprise that is.
When the House Speaker tells the Senate Majority Leader to go "f" himself (after said Majority Leader has accused him of running a dictatorship), our democracy is in sad shape - perhaps as sad as it has been since the Civil War or Reconstruction.
More sadly, we, the people, will probably sit back and watch as it falls apart, too stunned to vote out these scoundrels or revolt to change the system.
After all, they represent us, don't they?
.
http://www.politico.com/multimedia/video/2012/12/brooks-obama-governs-like-a-visitor-from-a-morally-superior-civilization.html
Apparently many people took this as a criticism of the President. Frankly, I think it's a compliment. Or perhaps, it's really a reflection of the stubborness, adolescent behavior, and navel-gazing of those who profess to represent us.
Namely, the men and women of United States Congress.
Everyone and their mother is complaining about the so-called "cliff deal" voted in by a coalition of Democrats and Republicans (not by most of them) in the House of Representatives. A lot of conservatives rightly point out that it does nothing to address spending cuts -- any ninny can see that spending cuts are a huge part of the answer in bringing down the deficit.
But the other piece of the equation is bringing in more revenue -- and liberals equally rightly point out that on this issue, Democrats caved.
What's so infuriating (or at least part of what's infuriating) is that we didn't have to arrive at this point. If Congress hadn't put the sequester in place (mostly because there are so few moderates left in the House), they would have been forced to come up with a compromise.
Instead, they continue to put off the tough choices, hoping that something will happen that gives them an edge. This latest "fix" merely put off the next emergency.
Sometimes the greater good lies in principled compromise instead of the reek of their idols, their false gods (can you say K street?), and the incessant din of their self-righteous cant.
Somewhere along the way, the House and the Senate stopped representing us, the people.
As someone pointed out this week on the radio, a lot of Senators and Congresspeople don't live in D.C. anymore. They come in for a few days each week, and return to their districts. They don't party together, or send their kids to the same schools. They stay in their bunkers.
I bet Steve LaTourette would be mortified if he ran into Mitch McConnell, Harry Reid, and Joe Biden and had to face them after making that crack about a deal made by "sleep-deprived octogenarians in the middle of the night."
Shame on you, Representative LaTourette.
They don't respect each other. Why should we believe that they respect the rest of us?
I don't always agree with our President -- there are things that he's done that I find disturbing, and other arenas in which I wish he would show some....intestinal fortitude.
Perhaps if he appears to hail from a morally superior civilization, it's because the bar in Congress has been set so low.
Maybe President Obama just treats the rest of us like we were fellow human beings worthy of his respect.
What a surprise that is.
When the House Speaker tells the Senate Majority Leader to go "f" himself (after said Majority Leader has accused him of running a dictatorship), our democracy is in sad shape - perhaps as sad as it has been since the Civil War or Reconstruction.
More sadly, we, the people, will probably sit back and watch as it falls apart, too stunned to vote out these scoundrels or revolt to change the system.
After all, they represent us, don't they?
.
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