a b-tch

ok, once and for all (cross your fingers) here it is:

what really, really gets under my skin is the way all those people, our 'friends,' dropped us like lepers when we said 'that's it. we're outta here. you all can go rot in hell by yourselves...we'll carve out our own little hell-niche.'

(so ok, maybe that explains it?)

seriously, though: it would have been nice for some of you to show concern. we were all 'friends' for nine years. raised our children together. camped together. worshipped together.

so we hit a rough patch and it' s sayonara, you don't exist anymore?

and for those who remained in contact: do you think that because we left the building that we left God, too? that we no longer have an interest in our own, or your, spiritual life? do you think that it feels in any way normal to no longer be acknowedged as one who seriously, passionately cares about God, humanity, you, us?

do you think that part of us was amputated?

how does this square with your own Sunday doctrine? (it doesn't, now, does it?)

could that, perhaps, be at least some of why we left?

gender, power and spirituality—a classic paradigm for asking this question

ok, cheatin' again. this is a cut-n-paste of a response i posted on sodacoaster.blogspot.com. it was my response to a post suggesting that a husband who recognizes his wife's discomfort with a congregation has an obligation to find them a new congregation rather than continuing to worship where they are:

"Shouldn't the husband care more? I say he should!! What's more - if the churchgoing experience should lead her to resent her whole faith, I say the Christian husband is fully responsible for her spiritual breakdown."

my thought: the Christian husband is fully responsible for her spiritual breakdown only if he is fully responsible for her spiritual 'success' in the first place.

my argument: the marriage covenant does not mean the that woman transfers responsiblity for her spiritual nurture and care to her husband.

my thought, based on my experience: husband probably has no clue how to address the situation. in a congregation which pushes the whole superiority of man over woman thing, the husband has to confront the entire congregation in order to protect his wife's spiritual development. rare is the HUMAN, much less male, who will do that.

my argument: the real problem is buying into the idea that one has, by virtue of gender and covenant, has absolute responsibility for or is subject to the limitations of another for one's own spiritual development.

scarey question: what if following God's will for your life means un-following what your doctrine tells you?

8:15 PM, July 31, 2005

move over, blue like jazz

a must-read before you go to your next bible study, Sunday school, cathechism, ALPHA class, youth group or any other meeting where someone in 'authority' takes charge of informing you of THE TRUTH:

go to the library and check out A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller, Jr. First published in 1959 by Lippincott, published several times since then.

my book review-style synopsis: this rollicking page-turner takes a good-humored, provocative look at the role certainty plays in the cultural and intellectual development of humanity after the U.S. (and world) experiences M.A.D. (mutually assured destruction).

go ahead. read it. then go to class and listen to all the certainty you hear. then think to yourself, holy cow, i thought that it was MY 20-something generation which invented postmodernism!

and then, if you worship with a conservative group, listen to the next anti-postmodern sermon.

you will realize (if you hadn't already) that your person in authority does not know what he (or, rarely in this circumstance, she) is talking about.