tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21557866439058467342024-03-13T12:22:40.739-07:00 THE BAPTIST TALIBAN and beyondMilitant Baptists Doing HarmCindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.comBlogger47125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-35752680068906954812023-06-24T22:33:00.004-07:002023-06-25T08:47:08.048-07:00<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">THE PREACHER vs BILL GOTHARD</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="font-family: times;"><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAknJE3pnRRC0tUcOCmqyY2TQUxYH0EOS583EASOjSbTN1A0yQJVnZLeTJmc8HJO08061VZaVD9bQ15oR8QSsPWxXqINLUDIAvdZgLWJGlEWDKkIcVsM6QYsx3mB7jkhP55kaa7to71MOpaydaj6cNScRItza6tJevPbtWYfkhKRC7bQLJdhsVur1ZO4g/s2436/IMG_5468.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1663" data-original-width="1125" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjF75KE0aphTxdokRwF0QMY_jmJQrNmhVj8k_S3wmvkAm5f8ZORwNO5gaTKh-Z0wQXqEKo12z39BEvrnj1Lo2WLAROrxScfLsC1TCYLIEu8QS4pVIANjzIU9ucitVC4LeFT99qXI6AwnRzy-oCZKBELsxTUoALMDUdLT59uJDviX3SI6GMjmSJ4E-JqKSE/s320/IMG_5466.heic" width="216" /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgk0zKGmrDRHbF-zNmB3J7fXNzjv__CkCTOdt6XzVXlJnOd1Yei-wnHCeyqKfiqYHU4TtJ0FJgvUc6viKul0scvNKSu-cILgkatkM5Y7hVUxfUz6MD4pjjVuGmx-D8V27hZ5sQhhW_3_-IKR1n6IFB_-9-lL7rjGX7bg_gXvkbHmlqSK_mq_mORCBqja4I" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1640" data-original-width="1125" height="318" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgk0zKGmrDRHbF-zNmB3J7fXNzjv__CkCTOdt6XzVXlJnOd1Yei-wnHCeyqKfiqYHU4TtJ0FJgvUc6viKul0scvNKSu-cILgkatkM5Y7hVUxfUz6MD4pjjVuGmx-D8V27hZ5sQhhW_3_-IKR1n6IFB_-9-lL7rjGX7bg_gXvkbHmlqSK_mq_mORCBqja4I=w219-h318" width="219" /></a></div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjF75KE0aphTxdokRwF0QMY_jmJQrNmhVj8k_S3wmvkAm5f8ZORwNO5gaTKh-Z0wQXqEKo12z39BEvrnj1Lo2WLAROrxScfLsC1TCYLIEu8QS4pVIANjzIU9ucitVC4LeFT99qXI6AwnRzy-oCZKBELsxTUoALMDUdLT59uJDviX3SI6GMjmSJ4E-JqKSE/s1663/IMG_5466.heic" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br /></a></div></div><br /></span><span style="font-family: times;">A few weeks ago, Amazon Prime launched a new docuseries, Shiny, Happy People.</span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">The series producers interviewed several survivors of Bill Gothard’s disgraced parenting and homeschooling programs. Two of the survivors are daughters of the now infamous Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar, former stars of TLC’s 19 Kids and Counting.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">Several grown children of Bill Gothard’s homeschooling movement recounted in eloquently tragic detail the havoc Gothard’s methods imposed on their families and their lives.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">Although we did not use Gothard’s curriculum for homeschooling purposes nor did we ever attend an Institute in Basic Life Principles seminar, my family had close encounters with Gothard’s Advanced Training Institute and IBLP through friendships with families deeply committed to the programs. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">Also, there was a large church with which we enjoyed fellowship for several years that was heavily committed to the Gothard programs. Its membership included a sizable, homeschooled population and leadership of the church enthusiastically endorsed and promoted the program. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">Nevertheless, The Baptist Taliban had already distinguished itself as being unimpressed with programs outside its own exclusively designed programs and particularly Gothard’s program, but it began attracting families who for one reason or another left the Gothard-dedicated church. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">Since these families had previously been so devoted to the Gothard teachings and practices, it seems these new members were looking for the same kind of extra stringent church in which to enjoin their families.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">They were apparently willing to look past the BT’s opposition to Gothard’s system of beliefs and as a resource for homeschooling curriculum needs in exchange for membership in a church with very similar beliefs as Gothard, a seemingly thriving children and youth program and a smaller more intimate family-like church community. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">The Preacher did not approve of the Gothard program. He did not believe various non-Independent Baptist denominations like Southern Baptist, Pentecostals, Assemblies of God etc. singing, praying and essentially what he called ‘worshiping’ together as a group was biblical. He prohibited his church from participating in any gathering that was ecumenical—even homeschool support groups and Gospel music concerts!</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">He also did not like the fact that the Gothard seminars would come to a city or town and hold week-long meetings causing people to miss the services of the local churches where they were members.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">There was another teaching of Gothard with which The Preacher seemed to struggle. An evangelist and family who may have been influenced by Gothard’s teachings, eventually joined the BT. He emphatically believed that couples should never marry without their parents’ expressed approval and blessing. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">Even if the parents were unbelievers or not in ‘God’s Will’, couples were not to marry but should pray until God convicted the parents to change their minds. If that never happened, they should never marry each other, or their marriage could never be Gods’ Will and would suffer great distress.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">There was a time when The Preacher adamantly opposed this belief probably because his parents were not in favor of the one he chose to marry--my husband’s sister. He preached many times over the years about how he stood up to them and told them he was not asking for their permission but their blessing. He would marry her regardless, even if they granted neither. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">But here’s the irony. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">As critical and denouncing The Preacher was of Gothard’s movement, he was practicing most of those same beliefs and directed his members to practice them as well. It seems his contention was more about who got credit than the actual beliefs. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">There were occasions over the years when we would attend a camp meeting or youth rally (He usually did not go. Paul and I alone would take our teens) and we would come back praising sermons and preachers who spoke at those meetings. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">He almost every time would have only negative responses--nothing positive—no matter how soundly independent, fundamental, and Baptist these preachers were. This is when we realized he was probably jealous and found it best to keep our praises to ourselves.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">We had only been four years outside the BT when the Duggar family first began appearing on reality TV. I believe the first time I saw their show was in 2004 when they had 14 children. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">I came into the room where my youngest daughter was intently watching and was shocked to see lovely, long, curly-haired Duggar daughters with their modest flowing dresses on the screen. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">I was immediately triggered. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">Here was a family getting very favorable national exposure who behaved and dressed just as we had forced our own kids as well as all the kids in the BT!</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">I stood and observed in anxious astonishment for only a few minutes to verify that my eyes had not deceived me but then noticed that my daughter was completely mesmerized. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">She was only 10 years old when we left but we would not let her wear pants for another 3-4 years. By the time the Duggars made their appearance on TV, she was already growing curious about what all really happened with our leaving the BT. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">Seeing the Duggars who displayed beliefs similar to those of the BT and who looked and dressed so much like her siblings and others she remembered from there, stimulated a great deal of curiosity in her. I didn’t prohibit her watching. I wanted to see what her perceptions would be, so she continued watching the show from time to time. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">But not me. The cognitive dissonance was intense. I never had any desire to relive through this shiny, happy-appearing family all the things they proclaimed as ‘godly and righteous’ about their separated practices because, by then,</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;">I knew better…</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUuXeXK2L7V-LhqQ0-ePsMgDOJOyaS7GQJVnGSIfpaa8999eaZ8_9cDI7KVS-WlFFvR-1a94wJWQ2W0dv-6muIEKKxLW-0jDuewCj1lYgJ6ryqlFuzeQ9NaqisI0IPp2dgaMwelmZkqP5YQykUz48nfWthdjnzWBRBzaXn2c8AnEwaiVJEts0tJtbkudg/s1125/IMG_5465.heic" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="838" data-original-width="1125" height="475" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUuXeXK2L7V-LhqQ0-ePsMgDOJOyaS7GQJVnGSIfpaa8999eaZ8_9cDI7KVS-WlFFvR-1a94wJWQ2W0dv-6muIEKKxLW-0jDuewCj1lYgJ6ryqlFuzeQ9NaqisI0IPp2dgaMwelmZkqP5YQykUz48nfWthdjnzWBRBzaXn2c8AnEwaiVJEts0tJtbkudg/w640-h475/IMG_5465.heic" width="640" /></span></a></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"> </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div></div><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p>Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-20659353018895992432023-06-05T13:35:00.008-07:002023-06-05T14:38:40.138-07:00<p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> CONFESSION</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgas8ZJkEIgww1zFlocnWApvJ_drtq3SzzA4gsftj-k-uwn5gdNBtIXFwK2_3psohnWtwAd27DBT-WDRN_J68JflaRbxDabFomNzrk-88RRkUlQVAosXca4Ad5qdWjPm5ViFozkj1yDwanNmdSGQvUgC0PeqlIZiWAofBOB4cFFZlpRvXrhKuDdzE7X/s1600/IMG_4540.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1149" data-original-width="1600" height="461" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgas8ZJkEIgww1zFlocnWApvJ_drtq3SzzA4gsftj-k-uwn5gdNBtIXFwK2_3psohnWtwAd27DBT-WDRN_J68JflaRbxDabFomNzrk-88RRkUlQVAosXca4Ad5qdWjPm5ViFozkj1yDwanNmdSGQvUgC0PeqlIZiWAofBOB4cFFZlpRvXrhKuDdzE7X/w640-h461/IMG_4540.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">So, I have a confession to make.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">Don’t worry. It’s nothing scandalous.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">I am not having an affair.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">I have never had an affair.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">I am not getting a divorce.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">I am not gay (for those who would think me a reprobate and less than human).<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">I have not converted to Catholicism (for those who would think that to be worse than gay).<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">I have not become an atheist (for those who would think that to be the worst of all).<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">Certainly, admitting to any of the above would be considered scandalous enough to members of a Baptist Taliban church but if that’s what you are hoping for, sorry to disappoint. <br /><br />However, there is much in my evolving beliefs a BT practitioner would find scandalous and I will get into more of those in later posts. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">I am sure, My Dear Ex-coconspirators, you will enjoy some validation upon getting news of how much leaving the endangered ‘remnant’ has ‘contaminated’ my beliefs. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">NOTE:<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">To explain and defend my sarcasm…<br /><br />“Sarcasm: the last refuge of modest and chaste-souled people when the privacy of their soul is coarsely and intrusively invaded.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">Fyodor Dostoevsky<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">And now for my confession:<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">Since leaving, a nagging, prevailing fear has plagued me. This fear is not rational, logical or even scriptural. I do not fear it because I believe in any way, shape or form it is valid. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">So then why do I fear it?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">Maybe “fear” is not the best word. It’s more of an annoying voice followed by feelings that are triggered from time to time when certain difficulties arise in my life and in the lives of my family—particularly my adult children.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">I guess you could say it does cause me some fear for the effects it has on my moods, my reactions to my kids’ and grandkids’ behaviors and my influence with others with whom I may be trying to help in some way.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">When I am ‘triggered’ by this voice, I have to stop and and take a quick “Trip In” which basically means to recognize what’s happening, think through the falsity of it and reject it before I wrongly react to it. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">Not an easy thing to do at times since there are times I don’t even realize it is happening.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">So, here it is:<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">For the 19 years and 3 months we continued as leaders in (we also helped establish) the BT, we were continually, consistently and emphatically drilled with the threat that since there is no other practicing sound, fundamental, doctrinally correct, KJV only Baptist church in the area and very few outside our area or even other states in the USA than the Baptist Taliban, then anyone who leaves against the ‘God-directed’ objections of The Preacher, God will pronounce devastating judgement on their families. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">According to him, IT. WILL. HAPPEN. There is no escaping it.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">This message was delivered with so much force and frequency that it has become deeply branded on my brain. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">As I have grown older, I discovered that I have always had a strong tendency towards taking the declarations of others all too literally. When people make statements emphatically, my strong inclination is to believe them. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">Even more so when someone with authority or even supposed ‘authority’ tells me something, my default system is to believe it. I have trouble thinking an authority, especially a ‘spiritual authority’ would lie to me. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">Call me, “naïve”. Call me, “gullible”. But it really isn’t that simple. What is naïve and gullible about me just might have more to do with what has been instilled in me since early childhood. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">I was trained to do this.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">Anyway, there you have it. My most plaguing confession. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">The following link is to a sermon preached at the Baptist Taliban church. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">It was the funeral of one of the kids in the youth department led by my husband. <br /><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><br /></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"><span style="font-size: 16pt;">Robert Brady drowned tragically at the tender age of 20. I think it was 20 years ago this very week that he died.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">He left home sometime after turning 18. His parents were members of the Baptist Taliban and somewhat beholden to The Preacher. When he left, his parents were extremely angry (especially his father) and there were altercations between him and his son. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">There is so much more to this story, but for now, I want to include quotes from the sermon The Preacher preached for his funeral. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">We attended this funeral to honor Robert’s memory. It was held 2 or 3 years after we left to honor Robert’s memory. There were several young people who had left also but attended the funeral. They loved Robert and wanted to honor his memory as well. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">I cannot but believe his cruel words were directed at us—all the ones who left--as he made several direct references to us without using our names but leaving no doubt of whom he was speaking.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">I shudder to think how such treacherous statements have ill- affected the younger more impressionable, vulnerable people under his influence. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">It has certainly affected me and even though I was in my mid-forties, mother of 8 children and reared in fundamental Baptist churches and could by then, see through the hype, it has still oppressed me.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">For those who can stomach it:<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><a href="https://youtu.be/N_Ab498XpD8" style="color: #954f72;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">https://youtu.be/N_Ab498XpD8</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span><a href="https://youtu.be/fU4zIM4LFdw" style="color: #954f72; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">https://youtu.be/fU4zIM4LFdw</a></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><a href="https://youtu.be/31xWmB41VhU" style="color: #954f72;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">https://youtu.be/31xWmB41VhU</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><a href="https://youtu.be/WsETQpthu6o" style="color: #954f72;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;">https://youtu.be/WsETQpthu6o</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><b><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">DIRECT QUOTES FROM FUNERAL SERMON:<o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><b><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><b><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></b><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“Some of you despise me and I’m the best friend that you’ve got! Some of you hate this church and it’s the best friend that you’ve got … we’re the only hope you’ve got.” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“Go ahead and smile, you’re next! Go ahead and smile you’re next!” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“Do you think God is is judging the people that are sticking it out and doing right?” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“I’m not here to be nice. I’m here to wound you!” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“You know why there’s no grace in your life you know why there’s no joy in your life, it’s because you’re full of pride!” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“God wouldn’t give Robert 2 more weeks so he could get right!” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“Some of you have got the look of being used on your face today!” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“You know, some of you here today, your lives are miserable because you’ve turned to preachers that will tell you what you want to hear. They won’t wound you; they won’t really inflict any pain; they won’t injure you because they don’t love you…” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“You’re so full of the devil!” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“God killed Robert so the fear of God would be in the church.” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“A lot of you are no different than Robert was. You could be next.” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“I’ve been praying for God to do whatever it takes, I’ve been praying it for 6 months and I’m going to keep on praying it. Our church has been praying it, and we’re going to keep on praying it. God almost killed one once; this time God killed someone.” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“So I ask you the question, Mr. Smart Aleck, Mrs. Smart Aleck sitting thar with a cocky grin on your face, acting like you’re so tough! And you’ve done stuck you finger in the face of God; who’s next, who’s next.” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“Listen I can look at you and tell you your life isn’t happy. You’re a fake, you’re a fraud you’re a hypocrite!” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“Some of you ought to be scared to death because you’re probably next. You’re so hard you can’t even tell it!” </span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;">“If people don’t get right then you’ll hinder the Spirit and people won’t get saved!”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="color: #333233; font-family: Times; font-size: 18pt;"><b><i>Get the picture?</i></b></span><span face=""Lucida Grande", sans-serif" style="color: #333233; font-size: 8.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16pt;"> </span></p>Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-64438056286515193762023-04-10T14:14:00.003-07:002023-07-09T20:56:25.205-07:00AND SO IT CONTINUES...<p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioCAlZ3cXfrV_Yzr4kxzlAprTX-jon7KEFT5J0nA6eS6YFzDYtusGehY7tQf1RcBR6e1RedcIxIb3H3dc98dl8uS_q7aQJmOWf4-waU_qW8Hdqa3aexKqUmeDL-3RTltOoN-eGN9w8rGFo3J4VpBkklKm0tDpPO_pbQfBVSlDlHSZIA8VWma5dJdgU/s4032/F434DB83-DD75-4743-9282-7B9991304BAF.heic" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioCAlZ3cXfrV_Yzr4kxzlAprTX-jon7KEFT5J0nA6eS6YFzDYtusGehY7tQf1RcBR6e1RedcIxIb3H3dc98dl8uS_q7aQJmOWf4-waU_qW8Hdqa3aexKqUmeDL-3RTltOoN-eGN9w8rGFo3J4VpBkklKm0tDpPO_pbQfBVSlDlHSZIA8VWma5dJdgU/w640-h480/F434DB83-DD75-4743-9282-7B9991304BAF.heic" width="640" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;">I want to start blogging again. I need to write and there is so much to tell.<br /><br />I looked over my blog today and couldn’t believe that it has been almost 6 years since I last posted! How could so much time have passed without my noticing how much time had really passed?<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;">The answer is obvious, really. Lots and lots of living. Days and days—very full days of struggles involving events outside my sphere of control (Covid, close family deaths, etc.) and then events needing my direct attention (adult children, grandchildren, and everyday challenges of growing older).</span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;">There is still so much about the years following our exodus from the Baptist Taliban I want to share because what we learned from those significant happenings in our lives could be of real value to others living through similar struggles.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;">We were learning so much about ourselves, our histories, our spiritual beliefs, the world around us and how fundamental religious beliefs and practices (to which we were devoted) often have harmful effects on everything and everyone past, present, and future. I believe the most effective way to communicate most of what we’ve learned as individuals and as a family is by the telling of our own personal stories.</span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;">Most of my blogging efforts up until now has been given to telling the story of our entrenchment in the performance-based, high demand Bible-based cult church we helped birth in 1982.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;">I have wanted for years to write more about the after years; the ‘relearning everything as we went’ years but I realize now that we were not able to process it all enough to adequately explain it all.<br /><br />Honestly, we were (or at least I was) afraid of losing more friends and suffering more abandonment because I knew how people in our sphere of beliefs react to anyone questioning those beliefs. I am still not ready to share all of it, but writing again will help in that process, I hope.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;">So, now, our story continues…</span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="p1" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Puritan; font-size: large;"><br /><br /></span><br /></p>Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-77859917880835024492017-05-19T20:56:00.001-07:002017-05-19T21:24:16.828-07:00BORN WICKED?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">There is one, pervasive fundamentalist dogma that continually haunts me.</span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It haunts me because there is no amount of re-education to counter the intensely negative effects practice of this precept has generated in my family. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">An enduring belief passed down from generation to generation becomes even more than just a belief. It becomes an absolute fact. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">And this is a problem with fundamentalist dogma. It is too easily absorbed as fact even though rarely challenged, tested or proven...at least not by fundamentalists of the rabid sort. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But the doctrine that haunts me, haunts me not so much for the doctrine itself as the twisted inclinations and actions it triggers. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The Doctrine of Original Sin as interpreted by fundamentalists; as it influences convictions pertaining to children and how they should be reared, is the one that so haunts me.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Without delving into the specifics of what the Original Sin doctrine actually means, I rather want to deal with the attitudes about children seemingly justified by it.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">While on the one hand, children are declared to be God’s rewards to us, they are on the other hand vilified as sinful humans from birth on, chronically devilish and untrustworthy.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Christian parents are admonished to always be suspicious of them in every thing they do or say and it seems most any act short of murder is acceptable towards driving the ‘demonic’ out of them.</span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">There are unstable, mentally ill parents who inhabit extreme realms of fundamentalism (of all religions and denominations) who become obsessed with squashing and purging their children’s sin natures--<b><i>this</i></b> is most injurious.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But it is not just the tendency for abuse this conviction provokes that interrupts, disrupts and often destroys healthy family bonds as well as mental, physical and spiritual health. It is not just the abusive acts that should not happen but do... awful as they may be. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It is all the good things that <b><i>should </i></b>happen but don’t. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Good things, such as: feeling empathy for them, being more attuned to their emotional needs and nurturing healthy, indestructible parent/child bonds drawing them closer to their families during those tumultuous, confusing teen and young adult years instead of pushing them away, due to emotional abandonment, to bond with their peers.</span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It is normal and good for parents, especially mothers, to want to believe the best of their children even though all genuinely honest ones know their children have flaws. We may deny what their particular flaws are or even act defensive of our children’s behavior to others... but not because we don’t know. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">We know they are terminally imperfect.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">We know they are often guilty.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But they are NOT to be presumed delinquent merely on the basis of being....kids.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">There <b><i>are </i></b>reasonable explanations for most bothersome childish behaviors, supported by science and logic and not contradicting of biblical beliefs. There exists valid, varying positive, healthful and provable interpretations<b><i> </i></b>of the very scriptures cited by extremists fundamentalists--the ones commanding believers to view children as wicked from birth, to beat the bad out, force belief and obedience in-- to move us toward some careful reconsideration.<b><i> </i></b></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It is beyond ludicrous to believe that babies are born selfish tyrants whose only desire is to monopolize their mothers’ attentions. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It is also ludicrous to believe that adults should always be believed over a child. How many times has THAT belief been used to abuse? Yet, this is the conviction arising from wrested interpretations of the Original Sin doctrine. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">I was once sternly rebuked by an elderly Christian leader because I questioned the accusation of an adult who claimed my 5 year old child had disrespected him.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">“You should NEVER question the word of an adult over a child’s,” was his reproof. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Knowing my son’s personality as only a mother could, the accusation made just seemed out of character and too mature for my 5 year-old, very sensitive, all-too-aware-of-serious-consequences child.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">I also had to consider the fact this adult had a particular axe to grind with me and might get a certain satisfaction from accusing my child of this particular kind of offense. </span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Adults do this. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Adults can and will use ageless, archaic attitudes about children’s tendency toward denial and deception to accomplish their own purposes. A serious matter with serious consequences we all need to consider.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">I know because I have lived it as a child.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">His rebuke was an old-school fallacy too dangerous to adopt as absolute truth.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">And thus, I have come to realize that the most significant damage this ideology has caused to my perception of my children--now and in the past as they were growing--</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">is a profound fear and distrust of my own God-given intuition.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But there is another effect.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">I have an intense, extraordinary fear of discovering and facing significant issues and actions my now adult children really do have. What I am beginning to realize is just how pathological this effect is and how unnecessary are the negative feelings I have. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">I should not have such fear and anxiety about the normal, human tendencies of my kids. It does not have to be this way! I should not feel I have to hide and avoid sharing with another parent or friend my feelings about certain issues certain of my kids may be experiencing.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">I believe this is because of the shame that is imposed on us all and internalized by me through rigid, absolute <b><i>interpretations</i></b> of the words of our Highest Authority who has been represented as demanding, shaming and punishing. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">To transfer those same qualities from God onto others, who by virtue of apparent successes, assume moral superiority is one disparaging by-product of fundamentalism. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But, it is one of which I am striving to recover. </span></span><br />
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-56425547104028522972016-04-09T20:08:00.004-07:002016-04-09T20:17:10.383-07:00DOES THE DEVIL MAKE THE MUSIC?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">I woke up yesterday morning to the glorious sound of music.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/usR7mMHUhlY?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></span></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">My twenty-year old son Dillon, was on our desk-top computer in our living room listening to his favorite songs on YouTube. </span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Often he listens through headphones, but this time he was letting his music serenade me through the speakers of our computer as he would if he were listening to the radio.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><i><b>He likes to do that for me.</b></i></span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">For the next few moments I did nothing else but relax on the couch and revel in the delightful melodies--the harmonies, the various instruments-- the very fact that these were among my son’s favorite selections. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The fact that he knew he could share them with me and be confident I would appreciate his tastes-- something that I will never again take for granted. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The fact that now, he is not limited to the few ‘approved’ forms of Christian music has added new dimensions to our understanding of each other. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">We very nearly missed out on this golden, momentary peek inside the soul of one of our musically sensitive kids. And how regretful that would have been! </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Another profound reality that we would never have realized had we not left behind those hyper-fundy, legalistic beliefs.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">My ode to joy! </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">I consider one of the most sublime of God's gifts to mankind is the facility to appreciate and create music. It can truly be the single most useful tool for penetrating and perceiving the innermost obscure feelings of our young and restless.</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Something so healing, so revealing, so nourishing cannot be from the devil.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Our children can communicate what may not be easily expressed in words, but though unintentionally, will through their music. </span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">To be ignorant of its value is to be deprived of its usefulness.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">We decided it was time to stop judging and prohibiting their choices in music and start listening to it with them. </span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">One thing I have learned and now firmly believe is that attraction to the anti-authority-- even violent--themes of Rock music is not so likely the source of teen rebellion as has been reverberated from the pulpits since the advent of Rock music, but more a reflection of troubled hearts and disconnected family relationship already existing. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Such musical, lyrical expressions are outlets, not causes.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">We are a musical family. </span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It is veritably in our genetics. Not only do we love many genres of music, but have diverse musical abilities. </span></span></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">We all sing and some play guitar, bass guitar and piano. When the kids were much younger, we sang together at church services and other church functions. </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">We even have gifted songwriters among our bunch. </span></span></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Two of the boys became skilled at composing computer-generated music by mastering apps such as Fruity Loops, Pro Tools and Garage Band and are self-taught sound and recording producers. My oldest sons have recorded and produced albums for various local artists.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Jt_PGqo-lnI/Vwlo82oLiLI/AAAAAAAACTc/Zf3Iok742CU6lqVL7VwlWWFZxBcLM4utg/s1600/431367_416166285113484_360938643_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="499" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Jt_PGqo-lnI/Vwlo82oLiLI/AAAAAAAACTc/Zf3Iok742CU6lqVL7VwlWWFZxBcLM4utg/s640/431367_416166285113484_360938643_n.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px;">my son, Ike-AKA Pied Piper</td></tr>
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Eb4psIvmLAg/VwlpB7iV8HI/AAAAAAAACTc/UoE-moly2T4rBRi51E0assmdKgwCi4Kaw/s1600/263709_170248509705264_1743992_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="308" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Eb4psIvmLAg/VwlpB7iV8HI/AAAAAAAACTc/UoE-moly2T4rBRi51E0assmdKgwCi4Kaw/s320/263709_170248509705264_1743992_n.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Did7u8nKBpI/VwlpGjNx84I/AAAAAAAACTc/G8vfaF4LflkfHHDNmPqmW3qq61glm1ZbQ/s1600/264071_170248586371923_2195793_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="310" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Did7u8nKBpI/VwlpGjNx84I/AAAAAAAACTc/G8vfaF4LflkfHHDNmPqmW3qq61glm1ZbQ/s320/264071_170248586371923_2195793_n.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">So, you could safely assume we are a family that cherishes music.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">I never realized before, how much our shared love of music could enrich our relationships until at least a year after we were forced to leave our legalistic, controlling church. </span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">We had been so entrenched in the fear that any music outside of the spiritual songs and hymns performed within the confines of the independent--independent, fundamental, King James Bible-believing local Baptist church was inherently evil, that this invaluable connection between us might never have been discovered for lack of intellectual and emotional freedom.</span></span></span><br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-gsUl4bjGyMU/TkrwGW5XzFI/AAAAAAAAA8k/4L3tHxpKqJg/s1600/images.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="clear: left; float: left; font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></span></a></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But after leaving all that, we cautiously-even fearfully began to sample some Contemporary Christian Music via the radio. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Actually, Paul and I were not quite ready to listen to CCM at first until my oldest son introduced us to some of Nicole Nordman’s music. </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It was strange and unfamiliar, and I was rather uncomfortable with the soft, breathy sounds of her voice as well as her emotionally-charged, reality-based lyrics. It was preached that such elements were sensual and worldly.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But at the same time, those were exactly the qualities that I found so comforting in her songs. The more I continued to listen, the less nervous I was about transforming our smothering paradigms.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It wasn’t long before we were listening to her music every time we went somewhere together in the car. That then lead to conversations about the relevance of the themes in the lyrics. </span></span></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">We added music by Point of Grace, Red Cloud, Twila Paris, Switchfoot and various other Contemporary Christian artists to our repertoire which always led to lively conversation about the songs we liked, didn’t like, the content, the musicians themselves and more.</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Once we descended on down that "road to perdition," we ventured into other genres of music stimulating more discussion about the many and varied issues and beliefs that our shared interests invoked. </span></span></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">While still a little apprehensive of possible negative consequences due to the ‘voices’ I was still hearing from memory--the rants of preachers prophesying doom and destruction to all entranced by secular music’s demonic magic--still, I refused to surrender to them and went right on listening.</span></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The music was breaking down the barriers to our communication. I was getting to know my kids....really getting to know them. And they were getting to know us better too! </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: x-large;"><b><i>Those times are sacred to me.</i></b></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Those were the times when I began to feel happy again. Those times were like the tiny, new sprouts that forced their way through the scorched, lava-soaked ground after the eruption of Mt. St. Helens. </span></span></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The promise that new, vibrant life could emerge through utter destruction. All the fears were subsiding and I was beginning to believe we would all be ok.</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">I can’t say we didn’t hit some huge bumps along the way, but I can say that those ‘bumps’ were accepted for what they were--bumps--not sinkholes. Not spiritual death sentences. Not indictments of incompetent parenting.</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">And I will now and forever be reminded of the lesson learned,</span></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">when I listen to the music.</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">And nobody says it better than Dobie Gray.</span></div>
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-88443653052595199782016-04-05T13:21:00.001-07:002016-04-07T19:09:20.684-07:00GIRLS INTERRUPTED: second act<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> In the first act of "Girls Interrupted" found <a href="http://thetruefundamentals.blogspot.com/2016/03/girls-interrupted-first-act.html" target="_blank">here</a>, I wrote about one level of competition among the women that arose as a consequence of the belief that women were afflicted with some 'spirit of misbehavior' for which the men were obliged to control and correct.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">This indoctrination produced impulse-driven needs for mothers to present worthier-daughters-than-the-rest to attract ministry-ambitious, bachelors. It is no exaggeration to call it an all-out competition.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The winners were the mothers whose daughters snagged the sharpest 'God-called, daddy/preacher-approved prize... a godly husband.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">In addition to the <b>Mothers With The Godliest, Available Daughters'</b> competition, more divisions of female competitiveness arose.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The most notable of which was the <b>Most Humbly Spiritual</b>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">There were certain of the women whose backgrounds were marred by divorce, non-Christian upbringing, promiscuity, non-Christian husbands and various other maligned liberal Christian and 'unChristian' behaviors and associations. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Some exhibited a general lack of Independent, fundamental Baptist knowledge of the Bible which also contributed to their assumed inferiority.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">These women were discreetly treated as inauspicious 'lesser-thans'. No matter how carefully camouflaged, the stigma was acutely felt compelling these 'lesser-thans' to seek significance through hyper-spirituality.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But spiritual aspirations didn't always make for enthusiasm in all the right places.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Perhaps as a subversive effort to preserve some semblance of self-respect, a few of these countered by pardoning themselves from attending some, if not all, the ladies' events.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">So, in order to remain in the race for <b>Most Humbly Spiritua</b>l these would arm themselves with 'spiritual' reasons for their reluctance.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Some examples were:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">* I need to be home for my husband</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">* I don't want to be away from my children</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">* Women's activities are frivolous</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">* My husband won't let me go</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">* Women's activities tend to provoke gossip</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">* Women's activities promote cliques</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">* Too many responsibilites at home </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Anytime there was an activity planned for the women, all were expected to participate if they were to avoid being confronted by <b>The Elite Inner Circle (</b>comprised exclusively of the preacher's wife, her best friend and myself) as to why they were absent or wanted to be absent.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Women who were not actively, enthusiastically involved in everything would also <b>not </b>be considered part of <b>The Inner Circle (</b> the queen bee workers and typically unquestioning, dedicated followers ).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">These are the women given (rather token) leadership roles since women were only 'scripturally' sanctioned to be Sunday school teachers, nursery workers, women's leaders or musicians. </span><br />
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<i><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Digressing here….</span></i><br />
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<i><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Women were not even permitted to pray aloud in the presence of a man or men nor to witness to men on visitation. Oh, yeah, and that became another rule: women could not go door to door visiting unless a man escorted them so that if a male answered the door, a man would be there to do the witnessing.</span></i><br />
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<i>Women were also not considered scripturally qualified in this church to teach boys over the age of 12!</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">So, it just followed that the women who were always present, always conforming, always working and always committed, ( <b>The Elite Inner Circle and The Inner Circle )</b> would resent those who weren’t always so willing and present.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">This meant, the <b>Not So Willing </b>women had to find some 'claim to fame' lest they be considered insignificant, rebellious, contentious, spiritually weak, immature or... God forbid... even LOST! Therefore, they would also feel the need to be identified as among <b>The Most Humbly Spiritual</b> class.<b> </b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">At this point, one has to wonder how anyone could be so emotionally invested in such a dysfunctional mess!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> I <i>still</i> wonder...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Baffling as it is though, even the brightest held on in degrees ranging from the deeply invested to the terminally entrenched!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">What's more, criticism of the <b>Not So Willing </b>and <b>Most Humbly Spiritual</b> bunch was most always acceptable and even welcomed. That’s how truly spiritual ladies showed love and loyalty for their church family as well as for Christ. So blaring a contradiction, it is almost laughable if not so pathological...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> Interestingly, there were others who were not so easily maneuvered.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Some were considered <b>The Rejects</b>. These were the ones who just…weren't liked. There didn't have to be a legitimate reason. I liken these to the school girls who didn't latch on, were socially awkward, weren't pretty enough, weren't charismatic enough….you get the picture…</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Grown, immature women of <b>The Inner Circle</b> tended only to tolerate <b>The Rejects</b>, unless some skill the church could benefit from surfaced.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Such childish female behavior will continue unmasked and usually unchecked in high-demand, spiritually abusive environments.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But, that is just what would be expected of silly women, right? Perhaps pious men are getting just what they expect?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Granted, some were not liked because they were contentious people who just liked to cause trouble. Of course, no one really cared to find out why a woman like this might be so contentious. Reasons didn't matter….</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But there were some who were strong enough to resist being pushed to do things for which they did not agree. These presented a whole different problem. They were <b>The Thinkers</b>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It was difficult knowing how to handle the ones who wouldn’t follow because they were savvy enough to question. On one hand they could be church's greatest strengths for their intelligence but on the other, they could be the most obstinate 'rabble-rousers'.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The leaders in a church like this were terrified of <b>The Thinkers</b> for fear that they would attract followers.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><b>The Outsiders </b>were those who mainly attended on Sundays, didn’t really conform to all the church beliefs, but didn’t really challenge them either. They were always there on Sundays, but didn’t make waves.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">There were the <b>Not-a-Clues</b> who just went along with whatever they were told. They accepted things at face-value because they didn’t know enough about what to believe to question anything. These women were given sufficient grace until such a time as was determined they had enough time to 'get with the program'. At that time, they were prodded enough that they either 'got with the program' or left altogether--depending on just how clueless they really were….</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><b>The Rebels </b>were the ones who liked to question everything, even if there was nothing to question. They would rebel just for the sake of rebelling. I am not even sure why these women would want to stay in such a church. Could it be because there was so much to stimulate their rebellion?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">For ALL classes who were not among <b>The Inner Elite</b> and to some degree, <b>The Inner Circle </b>women, there were many behind-scene-secrets of which they were not privy. We were the ones who believed that it was perfectly within our ‘realm of discernment’ to discuss all the people problems of the church (code for gossip). Gossip was preached against regularly as among the most evil of evils, but it was the ‘duty’ of the leadership to discuss (gossip) about the problem people in the church.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">And there was plenty of problem people in every class to talk about.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">That church thrived on drama. Maybe, it was because there was little else for the home-bound women to do that made them feel alive.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Of course, there was no actual categorizing of women into the classes. I just made up these categories as I observed the various ways these women were affected by such high demands and according to their individual personalities. This solely for the sake of better understanding for those interested but who have never experienced a church dynamic like this.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">I want to point out also that there was some over-lap between the classes and those I've placed in one category often advanced to another the more entrenched they became and the more the demands increased. Some became more 'ambitious'. Others left altogether. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">So, a sketchy order from top down would look like this: (just for fun)</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">1. The Inner Elite Circle</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">2. The Inner Circle</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">3. The Most Humbly Spiritual</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">4. The Thinkers </span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">5. The Outsiders</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">6. The Rebels</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">7. The Not-A-Clues</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">8. The Rejects</span></b><br />
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<b>The Inner Elite Circle </b>was impenetrable, but one could appear in more than one category and one could always graduate to <b>The Inner Circle</b> once ambition was born and cunningness bloomed.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">As I wrote before, the worst of it was the trickle-down effect it had on the younger girls—particularly the daughters. The daughters would naturally take up the cause of their mothers, whether they agreed with their mothers or not, which naturally caused a great deal of tension among them.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It is such a shame.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">I believe these girls really wanted to have meaningful, lasting friendships and they should have but with their mothers always at odds, how could they?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">No wonder so many have walked away…..</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">much interrupted.</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">2014 church family camp-14 years after we left</span></td></tr>
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-30647823354603306042016-03-12T16:07:00.002-08:002016-03-24T09:36:47.747-07:00GIRLS INTERRUPTED: first act<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">How many times have we heard it?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">“Women are the cause of most of the problems in the church.”</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Women have been the brunt of such jabs-however jokingly, by preachers from their pulpit perches-so frequently and for so long- that they just laugh right along. But backhanded levity aside, most preachers didn't really mean it as a joke….</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Unfortunately, many women resign to it while others actually embrace it as biblical fact. Preach a contention like this emphatically enough, repeat it often enough and many will surely come to believe it.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But, is it really true that women are the cause of most problems in the church?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Or, could it possibly be that what problems appear to be caused by women, are actually symptoms of something else?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Perhaps, women have assumed the blame when really, the menacing, meddlesome-women characterization is just a scapegoat--a diversion-- for egocentric men from platforms of spiritual authority to deny their own insecurities, lack of perspective…and in some cases, intelligence?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Consider this….</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">When a preacher places heavy emphasis on submission to his 'authority' as evidence of one's spirituality, and women indoctrinated from childhood on, that the most godly, most submissive will be the most favored by God and man, what contentions might arise among them as a result?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">In my church's case, competitiveness and jealousy.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">So, in all honesty, I believe the 'trouble-making' determined the fault of the women, is frankly a provocation of the men.</span><br />
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<span style="color: red; font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><i>My brethren, be not many masters, knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation. James 3:1</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">An emotionally healthy church made up of emotionally healthy, spiritually mature people will not need to compete with one another for 'spiritual' supremacy.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">I will say this though, the women in this church were intelligent, efficient and talented. They were not stupid, needy ninnies, but a person can be highly intelligent and extremely emotionally immature at the same time.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Such problems were nowhere more evident than with the mothers and their daughters of this church.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">I may be digressing a bit here, but here are some facts that could be related:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Grown women who were physically, emotionally, psychologically and/or sexually abused as children will stagnate at the emotional maturity level they were when abused… at least without extensive intervention. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">That means, if a women was abused in one of the above ways at 5 years old, even when she has matured physically and intellectually, she will continue to respond to emotional events as she did when she was 5. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">So one has to wonder if the women who <b><i>are</i></b> actually causing significant 'problems' in the church (or anywhere else for that matter), could be victims of some kind of abuse. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The younger the abused victim and the more dramatic the abuse, the more significant the emotional consequences. Sadly, the ones most ill-affected won't even realize it…</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But one thing is for certain,</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">A contentious but subtle competition emerged between a few that rivaled the exploiting stage mother. Mothers who pressured and groomed their daughters to excel in the 'godly arts' of obedience, submissiveness, quietness, modesty, nurturance, homemaking skills, femininity and contentment in hopes they would attract aspiring preachers, missionaries or evangelists husband candidates.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">There were few other options for them..</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Any profession outside the home and apart from the husband or father's authority was aggressively discouraged-- even prohibited for women closely related to the preacher. A woman's value there was judged by her prowess as godly wife, mother and homemaker.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The younger women were expected to be content with staying home, growing in the Lord and perfecting their skills as future wives and mothers.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Being a wife, mother and homemaker is noble IF that is her desire and choice, but a woman has the right to an identity outside of these roles. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Also, a woman who aspires for a professional career or an identity other than wife and/or mother, married or single, should not be treated as an apostate by her church!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But, this is exactly how they would be and were treated.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Mothers of maturing daughters there feared the utter shame and humiliation they would endure if their daughter/s didn't measure up and therefore judged too worldly by the 'godly' preacher boys. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">So, when any other daughters appeared to be godlier, one mother in particular was noticeably resentful. Envy and jealousy roused her ‘competitive’ juices, prompting her to compare and find faults in the the godlier-appearing girls.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', serif; font-size: large;">Naturally, she would have to expose the godly-appearing girls for the UN-godliness she wanted to see in hopes that her daughters would unseat them in the eyes of the coveted preacher-boy/husband candidates.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">This scenario was reality in our little religious sub-culture.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Here's some examples describing how this competition unfolded:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">When the church rule was established that dresses and skirts must come to the bottom of the knee, the more ambitious mother would require her daughters’ skirts extend to the calves.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">If the standard for ‘courtship’ practice was that courting couples must be chaperoned, she would require ‘married’ chaperones.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">If other daughters were required to be home by midnight, hers would be home by 10:30.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">This enterprising mother even tried to reel in her hopefuls by promoting her daughters' cooking skills at the activities that involved food. After all, the way to a man's heart is through his stomach, right?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Imagine her jealousy when her daughters' dishes came back barely touched.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The most regretful consequence, though, was how the trickle-down effect interrupted and even ruined what should have been meaningful, life-long friendships between the daughters.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Contention among the women was continually brewing and there were other sources than just the competition for ‘mother with the godliest daughters.’</span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Surprisingly, several 'classes' of women were non-conformers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">You can read about them as well as the mounting conflicts and causes in the 'second act' of 'Girls Interrupted.</span><br />
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-86859883448996056382016-03-06T14:34:00.001-08:002016-03-08T09:09:30.862-08:00WHAT WOULD AMERICA LOOK LIKE IF IT WERE TRULY….'CHRISTIAN'?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">This season’s political climate and campaign have provoked me to revisit some of my formerly-held beliefs that America, it's foundation, founders and founding documents, is positively, expressly ‘Christian’ in identity and purpose.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">As one who now feels freer to question former beliefs, I have concluded that this nation is NOT and was never intended to be Christian in identity, though certainly morals and principles drawn from the Bible have INFLUENCED its identity, purpose and governance.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">There is a difference in being influenced by and being founded upon.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The first is about recognition and acknowledgment. The latter is about entitlement.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Many conservative Christians fervently believe America’s heritage to be of the ‘Judeo-Christian’ tradition. Those who believe this to be fact also expect this Judeo-Christian tradition to be by right of establishment and thus should be reflected in its laws and governance.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">So, what does this term‘Judeo-Christian even mean?</span></i></b></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Judeo-Christian values are somewhat dubiously defined as those values, ethics, principles etc. that Judaism and Christianity have in common. It was made popular by conservatives to describe their political ideals.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">From Wikipedia:</span></span><br />
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The present meaning of "Judeo-Christian" regarding ethics first appeared in print in an book review by the English writer <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Orwell" style="background-image: none; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="George Orwell">George Orwell</a> in 1939, with the phrase "the Judaeo-Christian scheme of morals."<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-5" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judeo-Christian#cite_note-5" style="background-image: none; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[5]</a></sup> The term gained currency in the 1940s, promoted by groups which evolved into the National Conference of Christians and Jews. They intended to fight <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism" style="background-image: none; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="Antisemitism">antisemitism</a> by using a more inclusive idea of values.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-Silk_6-0" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judeo-Christian#cite_note-Silk-6" style="background-image: none; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[6]</a></sup><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-7" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judeo-Christian#cite_note-7" style="background-image: none; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[7]</a></sup> By 1952 <a class="mw-redirect" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwight_Eisenhower" style="background-image: none; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="Dwight Eisenhower">Dwight Eisenhower</a> looked to the Founding Fathers of 1776 to say:</div>
<dl style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-top: 0.2em;"><dd style="margin-bottom: 0.1em; margin-left: 1.6em; margin-right: 0px;"><i>"all men are endowed by their Creator." In other words, our form of government has no sense unless it is founded in a deeply felt religious faith, and I don't care what it is. With us of course it is the Judeo-Christian concept, but it must be a religion with all men created equal.</i><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-8" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judeo-Christian#cite_note-8" style="background-image: none; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[8]</a></sup></dd><div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Conversely there are Orthodox Jewish leaders who would argue against Judaism and Christianity having much of <b><i>anything</i></b> in common as expressed in this article by Jewish journalist Yori Yanover: <a href="http://www.jewishpress.com/blogs/yoris-news-clips/theres-no-such-thing-as-judeo-christian-values/2013/12/26/"><span style="color: #1919a7; letter-spacing: 0px;">http://www.jewishpress.com/blogs/yoris-news-clips/theres-no-such-thing-as-judeo-christian-values/2013/12/26/</span></a>.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">His contention, simply put, is that Judaism rejects Christianity and Christianity rejects Judaism.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">However, those who use that term to mean that America was founded on the same moral principals included in both Old and New Testaments of the Bible should consider if this description, ‘Judaeo-Christian’ is really an accurate term to apply to this country’s founding history and purpose. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">For a pretty good overview of several uses of the term: <br />
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<a href="http://www.worldlibrary.org/articles/judeo-christian"><span style="color: #1919a7; letter-spacing: 0px;">http://www.worldlibrary.org/articles/judeo-christian</span></a></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But enough of that. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">What I’d really like to explore here is what America as an authentically ‘Christian’ nation should look like in actuality.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">In using the term ‘Christian’, I am speaking of those attributes and teachings of Christ as a believer in his deity or even as mere follower of his teachings.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Perhaps a better mission for Christians of America would be to model what a nation full of sincere, Christ-like people should look like.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Here are some thoughts:</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">If America were a nation of Christian people who take to heart Christianity’s<b><i> pure</i></b> Gospel message, its governing authorities certainly would not desire to convert personal moral beliefs and principles causing no harm to another’s right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness, into Old Testament-derived laws to be enforced with their accompanying brutal and archaic penalties.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">America as a nation of truly Christ-like people would not EXPECT it express such in its governance, but in the people identifying as Christian actually BEING Christ-like.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">America as a nation of truly Christian people would love their God enough to love their neighbors as their God commands.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">They would love their God enough to love their enemies instead of hating them, blessing them that curse, doing good to them that hate, praying for them that despitefully use and persecute.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">They would not be obsessed with storing up treasures on this earth.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">They would not be slaves to money.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">They would do unto others as they would have others do to them--Golden Rule.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">They would practice justice, mercy and faithfulness.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">They would walk in love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith and meekness.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">They would practice unconditional love and acceptance toward those with whom they disagree....even the LGBTQ, Atheist, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, and Liberal Democrat, etc.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">They would rather be defrauded than take a brother to court (when not involving a crime).</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Their love would be patient, kind, not envious or boastful, arrogant or rude. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">They would not insist on their own way, not be irritable or resentful. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">They would not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoice in the truth. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> Their love would bear all things, believe all things and endure all things.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Their godliness would be defined by and coupled with contentment.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">They would not do anything that would cause another to stumble. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">And, finally, America, if it were truly a nation of people who identified with purely ‘Christian’ ideals would not seek to be identified as such, but concern themselves with behaving as those who believe they are pilgrims and strangers in this land. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">They would behave as ones who truly believe their citizenship is of a homeland-- a heavenly country not built by human hands but a city whose designer and builder is God himself.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Those Presidential candidates and leaders, who have identified themselves as ‘Christian’, who promise to be human saviors of America’s ‘Christian‘ heritage, are largely catering to a disgruntled, disillusioned and uncomfortable group of people who-- perhaps subconsciously-- desire a morality-policing government that would protect and preserve their perceived right to NOT have to change and/or adapt. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">This is the cause, I believe, to be at the heart of the whole ‘return-to-America’s-Judeo-Christian-heritage’ cry.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">But, to me, this is a blatant contradiction.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">How can one expect to make this country into a heavenly kingdom consistent with the fundamentalist/literalist interpretation of the biblical ideal without using some kind of coercion?</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">And, how can ‘Christian-nation-by-force’ ever be consistent with the example and teachings of Jesus, the author and finisher or our faith? Hebrews 12:2</span></span><br />
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-31811653029792870352016-01-01T22:15:00.000-08:002016-01-02T07:51:34.453-08:00PURGING MY TALIBAN WAYS<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I was strolling down the aisles at Sam’s Wholesale Club one day about a year or so after leaving the church, and in the book aisle I noticed a book written by a woman from Afghanistan. It was obvious from the cover that she was a Muslim living under Taliban rule. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I picked it up and began looking it over as I do with any book that piques my curiosity. I turned it over to read the back cover and was instantly captivated by what I saw. There written, was a list of rules imposed and strictly enforced on women under Taliban rule.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">It was Post- 911 and all eyes were on the Muslim world and the religious radicalization that spawns and sustains terrorism, so the firsthand telling of a woman's experiences living in the Taliban world would capture anyone’s interest. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">But my interest was more of one who could in a tiny, suggestive way….identify. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">Perplexed somewhat by the thought that I could so readily identify with this woman who suffered such extreme oppression, I pondered the idea of writing as an outlet for my own disillusionment. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">Though the pain and betrayal I felt</span><span style="font-size: large;"> at the bidding of church family and co-laborers can in no way compare to the brutality of the Taliban, I began to recognize the extent religious radicalism could oppress in any culture and how ours is no exception. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">History teaches us this. </span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Still stinging from the rejection and the reality of all I had lost I was just beginning to accept that life as I knew it was forever changed. I was still trying to filter what I truly believed from what I just “accepted” as truth and was aching--even to feeling I would explode--with the need to purge it all.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Writing about the feelings and the endless debates going on in my head between those dogmatic, preaching voices and the inconsistencies I observed but never allowed to surface, could give me some peace and solace.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">So I decided to write.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">And I began to explore--to take a treacherous trip backward to investigate what circumstances, what state of need, what frame of mind and heart had lured us to this place.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">Both my husband and I were literally born into the Independent Fundamental Baptist belief system of Christianity so the foundation was already laid, but our early history in this group was nowhere near extreme by comparison to other Christian denominations, though often more conservative. </span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">However, there were Independent Fundamental Baptists who were extreme and so proud of their extremist positions that being Independent Fundamental Baptist of this ilk was as important an identity to them as being Christian.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">We gravitated to the extreme gradually as we were influenced by preachers and evangelists of the literal, KJV only persuasion.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">These men were so passionate and certain about the 'truth' of their extreme beliefs that it is not too much a stretch to compare their radical, fundamentalist Christian beliefs and practices to the extreme Islamic beliefs and practices of the Taliban. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">There are IFB preachers who I have heard state and even preach that the Old Testament capital punishment sentences should still be imposed to this day on atheists, adulterers, homosexuals, rebellious sons and other offenders of OT death penalty laws! </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">These sentences include stoning and burning--acts as barbaric as those of the Taliban. So given the sanction of the US judicial system, there are radical sects of Christianity who could rival the Taliban.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">The Taliban literally “lops off the heads” of the infidels—the ones who do not embrace their rabid beliefs and those who break their laws. There are Independent Fundamental Baptist churches who, in essence “lops off the spiritual heads" of their tender young by offending them with contaminated doctrines of men.</span><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">From what I have been able to find, the term “Taliban” originally was defined as- to seek, or seeker of knowledge, but it has more recently come to mean-a seeker of religious truth. There are extreme religious, cult-like churches in America that similarly “seek religious truth” but though very “religious” are very far from the Truth.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">Here is an article I copied from the internet reporting how women are treated under the Taliban and some of the many Taliban rules. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i>It is important to note how many of these rules apply only to women:</i></span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The following list offers only an abbreviated glimpse of the hellish lives Afghan women are forced to lead under the Taliban, and can not begin to reflect the depth of female deprivations and sufferings. Taliban treat women worse than they treat animals. In fact, even as Taliban declare the keeping of caged birds and animals illegal, they imprison Afghan women within the four walls of their own houses. Women have no importance in Taliban eyes unless they are occupied producing children, satisfying male sexual needs or attending to the drudgery of daily housework. Jehadi fundamentalists such as Gulbaddin, Rabbani, Masood, Sayyaf, Khalili, Akbari, Mazari and their co-criminal Dostum have committed the most treacherous and filthy crimes against Afghan women. And as more areas come under Taliban control, even if the number of rapes and murders perpetrated against women falls, Taliban restrictions --comparable to those from the middle ages-- will continue to kill the spirit of our people while depriving them of a humane existence. We consider Taliban more treacherous and ignorant than Jehadis. According to our people, "Jehadis were killing us with guns and swords but Taliban are killing us with cotton."</span></blockquote>
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<span style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Taliban restrictions and mistreatment of women include the:</span></blockquote>
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<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Complete ban on women's work outside the home, which also applies to female teachers, engineers and most professionals. Only a few female doctors and nurses are allowed to work in some hospitals in Kabul.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Complete ban on women's activity outside the home unless accompanied by a mahram (close male relative such as a father, brother or husband).</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on women dealing with male shopkeepers.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> Ban on women being treated by male doctors.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> Ban on women studying at schools, universities or any other educational institution. (Taliban have converted girls' schools into religious seminaries.)</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Requirement that women wear a long veil (Burqa), which covers them from head to toe.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Whipping, beating and verbal abuse of women not clothed in accordance with Taliban rules, or of women unaccompanied by a mahram.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Whipping of women in public for having non-covered ankles.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Public stoning of women accused of having sex outside marriage. (A number of lovers are stoned to death under this rule).</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on the use of cosmetics. (Many women with painted nails have had fingers cut off).</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on women talking or shaking hands with non-mahram males.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on women laughing loudly. (No stranger should hear a woman's voice).</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on women wearing high heel shoes, which would produce sound while walking. (A man must not hear a woman's footsteps.)</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on women riding in a taxi without a mahram.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on women's presence in radio, television or public gatherings of any kind.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on women playing sports or entering a sport center or club.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on women riding bicycles or motorcycles, even with their mahrams.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on women's wearing brightly colored clothes. In Taliban terms, these are "sexually attracting colors."</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on women gathering for festive occasions such as the Eids, or for any recreational purpose.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on women washing clothes next to rivers or in a public place.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Modification of all place names including the word "women." For example, "women's garden" has been renamed "spring garden".</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on women appearing on the balconies of their apartments or houses.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Compulsory painting of all windows, so women can not be seen from outside their homes.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on male tailors taking women's measurements or sewing women's clothes.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on female public baths.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on males and females traveling on the same bus. Public buses have now been designated "males only" (or "females only").</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on flared (wide) pant-legs, even under a burqa.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on the photographing or filming of women.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on women's pictures printed in newspapers and books, or hung on the walls of houses and shops.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Apart from the above restrictions on women, the Taliban has:</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Banned listening to music, not only for women but men as well.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Banned the watching of movies, television and videos, for everyone.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Banned celebrating the traditional new year (Nowroz) on March 21. The Taliban has proclaimed the holiday un-Islamic.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Disavowed Labor Day (May 1st), because it is deemed a "communist" holiday.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ordered that all people with non-Islamic names change them to Islamic ones.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Forced haircuts upon Afghan youth.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ordered that men wear Islamic clothes and a cap.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ordered that men not shave or trim their beards, which should grow long enough to protrude from a fist clasped at the point of the chin.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ordered that all people attend prayers in mosques five times daily.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Banned the keeping of pigeons and playing with the birds, describing it as un-Islamic. The violators will be imprisoned and the birds shall be killed. The kite flying has also been stopped.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ordered all onlookers, while encouraging the sportsmen, to chant Allah-o-Akbar (God is great) and refrain from clapping.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ban on certain games including kite flying which is "un-Islamic" according to Taliban.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Anyone who carries objectionable literature will be executed.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Anyone who converts from Islam to any other religion will be executed.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">All boy students must wear turbans. They say "No turban, no education".</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Non-Muslim minorities must distinct badge or stitch a yellow cloth onto their dress to be differentiated from the majority Muslim population. Just like what did Nazis with Jews.</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Banned the use of the internet by both ordinary Afghans and foreigners. And so on…….</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">There is only a few degrees separation between the legalistic Baptist and the Taliban. There is none so blind as ones who will not see. We must open our eyes...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large; font-style: italic;">(God) Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the spirit: for the letter killeth, but the spiri</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large; font-style: italic;">t giveth life. II Corinthians 3:6</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>Why would anybody in their right mind want to live by the letter of Old Testament Law when the New Testament clearly teaches they have been set free? </i></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>I believe an honest comparison of the ancient, biblical Pharisee to the modern-day 'Pharisee' in all of us could answer this question. </i></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i>Of course, the biblical Pharisee didn't believe Jesus was who he said he was nor that his teachings were from God, but it appears the spirit of that Old Testament, Law-abiding Pharisee still exists to day, even in those who DO believe in Jesus' deity. Of all the things we know about the Pharisees, this one thing is paramount: </i></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i>They were a mighty prideful lot. </i></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i> I would even venture to say that the Christians in our era who advertise, practice and expect others to practice strict adherence to the 'do's and don'ts' of their beliefs….are prideful as the Pharisees.</i></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i>How does one get this way?</i></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i>You see, observing the Law was something for which Pharisees were champions. They were devoted. They were highly disciplined. They were exceedingly knowledgable about the Law. They were even better at performing it to the last detail. Efficient law-abiding was something of which they could boast.</i></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i>And what human doesn't secretly strive for boast-worthy performances?</i></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i>But Jesus presented a new testament--a testament of grace. Now this-- imparting grace--was not a practice of which Pharisees were accustomed. It was too scandalous a concept for those lacking the heart for it and and anyone so consumed with performing the 'letter of the Law' has little time for concerns of the heart. </i></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></span><i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">If a person has need to live by a strict set of rules, there certainly is nothing wrong with that, but it has been my experience--reinforced by numerous testimonies of others from similar church backgrounds--that most strict, rules people do not limit such ideals to their own needs. </span></i><br />
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></i><i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Most come to believe their rules should be EVERY truly dedicated believer's rules. </span></i><br />
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></i><i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">So, herein lies the problem: these types are often granted positions of authority because, after all, a person who performs so well HAS to be good, right, disciplined, wise, knowledgeable and <b>qualified </b>to be a spiritual leader, right?</span></i><br />
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>Well, at least to the ones who equate outward performance with inward goodness.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>But, truth is, one preoccupied with following rules to the letter, is likely to have huge issues all that preoccupation is masking. And, there is no better way to mask abusive tendencies than by convincingly mastering the 'righteous' acts.</i></span><br />
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>Then, what happens when such a person believes he is called to be a pastor; when he assumes 'God-sanctioned', spiritual authority over a congregation?</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>It usually happens gradually. </i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>In my experience, it began with the women and their daughters, but the pastor's convictions became The Law for the whole church.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>In time, more and more rules are added until being a good Christian is defined by one's attitude about and willingness to abide by all the rules.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>My husband and I were youth leaders in such a church. We worked and worshiped in this church for over 19 years. We became all about The Rules ourselves, imposing them on our young people. </i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>It would be difficult to appreciate the intense pressure our young people were subjected to without detailing just what was expected of them. So, my husband and I carefully compiled a list of some of the rules--spoken and unspoken-- that we helped author and enforce while we were at this church.</i></span><br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-7Wl6SmBGY-w/T0505019vNI/AAAAAAAABZc/vDo6OZe9bMQ/s1600/images.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-7Wl6SmBGY-w/T0505019vNI/AAAAAAAABZc/vDo6OZe9bMQ/s1600/images.jpeg" /></a></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i> </i></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>We also compiled a list of hobby horse pet-peeves that grew out of our determination to do all the right things. These were treated as rules though not actually rules per se. </i></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i> Most of these “rules” came about as the result of some situation or crisis due more to overreaction than anything spiritual, but we could always come up with a “spiritual” explanation if challenged. </i></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i> Also, we enjoyed the distinction of being the "narrowest" or the "strictest." Only the most serious Christians could perform at this level, which was just the kind of 'Christian' we wanted to be.</i></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>Do you see the modern-day Pharisee? </i></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>This is not an exhaustive list….unfortunately.</i></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;">It was considered a sin for women and girls to wear pants.</span></i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was considered a sin for men and boys to wear shorts</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was considered a sin to use accompaniment tapes for special music.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Scriptural marriages were performed by covenant. Couples </span></i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;">with state issued marriage licenses could not be married in our church.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Single couples were required to have adult, married chaperons, regardless of their ages.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Single couples were not allowed to converse except in a group.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Single couples were not allowed to sit together in services, even with parents’ permission</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;">unless they were engaged.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Single couples or non-couple friends of opposite sex were not allowed to touch in any way.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> We were not allowed to attend any other Baptist para-church functions, meetings or youth</span></i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;">rallies.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> We were not allowed to participate in the music or Bible competitions at camp.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Teachers, bus workers or any other leaders were not allowed to go to restaurants with a bar.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Teachers, bus workers or any other leaders were not allowed to go to movies.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Teachers, bus workers or any other leaders were not allowed to rent movies from video stores.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Teachers, bus workers or any other leaders were not allowed to dance in any way.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Teachers bus workers or any other leaders were not allowed to mix swim.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> We would not fellowship with any church whose women wore pants to church activities.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> We were not allowed to attend any camp where women and girls were allowed to wear pants.</span></i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Church leaders were not allowed to visit other church member friends’ homes on Sunday to</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;">discourage cliques.</span></i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Church leaders were not allowed to take vacations during scheduled church meetings unless</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;">providentially hindered.</span></i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>These are just a few of the rules for teachers and leaders. This does not include the rules for the Institute attendees.</i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>This next list were not technically considered rules, but those who didn't comply or disagreed were viewed as rebellious or immature. We believed and taught:</i></span><br />
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<i style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;">It was wrong to listen to any music, including Gospel, which was not recorded by a local church group.</span></i></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong to attend a Gospel concert that was not held at a local church.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong for a church to be incorporated by the State. (makes the State over the</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;">church)</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong for women or girls to work outside the home.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong for young people to receive high school or college education outside the home.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong to participate in organized sports (joining up with the world).</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong for young adults to have social activities without married adults to chaperone.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong to read any books not written by a Baptist and quotes from KJV.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong for young men to take off their ties as soon as church over. (looks like rebellion against dress code)</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Ties with cartoon characters drew too much attention to oneself.</span></i></span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;">It was wrong to want to sit near back of church (shows lack of interest or rebellion).</span></i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong for guys not to wear hair parted.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong for guys to wear cargo pants.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong for guys not to wear ties to every meeting.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong to go to camp meetings (too emotionally charged).</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong to wear bright-colored nail polish.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong for women to spend more than a little time putting on make-up.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong for women to have short hair cuts.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong to display titles, such as “Dr. or Rev.” before name.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong for guys to talk about sports, cars, or any entertainment after church. (conversations should be about “spiritual” things).</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong to drink root beer from the brown IBC bottles (looks like beer)</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong to send women out as missionaries.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong for girls to pierce ears.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong to use word "pregnant". (should be "with child").</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Women are men's property (teaching about dowry’s in OT).</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> Old Testament civil laws and punishments should still be practiced (stoning rebellious sons,</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;">adulterers, etc.).</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong to watch Disney movies (supports the "sodomites")</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong to rent videos. (supports movie industry, indecent posters displayed, etc.)</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong to go to the mall. (posters of near- naked women on storefronts).</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;"> It was wrong to support mission's boards. (missionaries should be sent out by local church only,</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;">also, discontinued supporting BBF missions and missionaries, but sent our own missionary</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;">candidates to BBF churches for support</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #990000;">.</span></i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i>Had enough? I have. It’s exhausting just reading it, imagine having to live it!</i></span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>“Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances, (Touch not; taste not; handle not; Which all are to perish with the using;) after the commandments and doctrines of men? Which things have indeed a shew of wisdom in will worship, and humility, and neglecting of the body; not in any honour to the satisfying of the flesh.” Colossians 3:20-23</i></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>How could we have missed this? Rules and regulations are useless for controlling issues of the heart.</i></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>We were seriously, hopelessly, BLINDLY in love with our rules. </i></span><br />
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-44042615777956416772015-08-28T13:10:00.002-07:002015-08-28T20:31:13.729-07:00LAWS AND WALLS won't protect your children<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I have a couple of predominant thoughts about the most recent revelation of Josh Duggar’s sexual deviancy.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">To all the fearful, loving Christian parents: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">There are no invisible walls-- no matter how well-intentioned, no matter how carefully and scripturally constructed, no matter how efficiently guarded--</span><br />
<b style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-large; letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>thick enough </i></b><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">to protect your young from their own humanity. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;"> <span style="color: red;">20 Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances,</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">21 (Touch not; taste not; handle not;</span></div>
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">22 Which all are to perish with the using;) after the commandments and doctrines of men?</span></div>
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">23 Which things have indeed a shew of wisdom in will worship, and humility, and neglecting of the body: not in any honour to the satisfying of the flesh. Colossians 2:20-23 KJV</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Did you get that last verse?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Verse 23 as stated in modern terms by the ESV:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="color: red;">“These have indeed an <b><i>appearance of wisdom</i></b> in promoting <b><i>self-made religion</i></b> and <b><i>asceticism</i></b> and <b><i>severity to the body</i></b>, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.”</span> (Emphases mine)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">So, Dear Christian Parents:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">You can live it, love them and teach them. But it is only in setting them free to interpret and establish for themselves which of your values they will authentically embrace as truth. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">If you insist on forcing, manipulating or controlling, you will more than likely rear polished and professional.... hypocrites</span>…<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">.or even worse</span>…<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">And, here is a dark, incomprehensible tragedy that could be, to some degree, a consequence of home schooled isolation. This happened in Broken Arrow, OK, where our family lived for 22 years and home schooled all 8 of my children. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3173491/Suspect-18-admits-stabbed-parents-death-home.html" target="_blank">http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3173491/Suspect-18-admits-stabbed-parents-death-home.html</a></span><br />
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-60523291625230930692015-07-05T15:48:00.000-07:002015-07-05T19:00:16.571-07:00skullDUGGARy: An Effect Gothard's ATI Movement Won't Own<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I realize that I am the ‘Johnny-come-lately’ to this subject</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">BUT....</span></i></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"> </span></i><span style="color: #252525; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">After poring over the many disturbing facts surrounding Josh Duggar’s molestations, I want to extend the focus from Josh’s deviance and his parents’ learned, willful ignorance and denial to what I believe to be at the root of their troublesome response... which would be:</span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">PIETY-BASED, MOVEMENT-SUPPORTED DENIAL.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Jim Bob and Michelle’s parenting practices mirror dogmatic parenting policies of the highly influential Christian home schooling curriculum that has become a Movement, the Advanced Training Institute, established by Bill Gothard. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">The Christian fundamentalist movement also known as the Gothard Movement. It’s the one though the Duggars as well as countless others, have placed unwavering confidence and loyalty, has one (of many) major defects.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">that being:</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b><i>its</i></b> <b><i>downright refusal to acknowledge, own and correct its own errors and abuses. </i></b></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">This movement-- advanced, promoted and populated-- by many prominent leaders of Christian fundamentalism at large, who while eagerly identifying and decrying sins of ‘this evil and adulterous generation, are much less inclined to respond appropriately when its own transgressions are exposed.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>22 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>23 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass:</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>24 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth <b><i>what manner of man he was. </i></b>(emphasis mine)</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>25 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">But whoso looketh into the </span><span style="color: #ff1300; letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i>perfect law of liberty,</i></b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"> and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed. (again, emphasis mine)</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Additionally, the faithful followers of these hyper-charged sin detectors can’t or won’t accept the possibility that many of their beloved movement’s militant beliefs might actually be at the core. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">To reexamine those beliefs and renounce the ones lacking would be to accept and admit they actually can be and often ARE desperately wrong...all-the-while imposing these wrongs on their families and others.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It is rare indeed for the typical devout, self-respecting fundamentalist Christian, much less The Movement, to readily admit being wrong for fear of jeopardizing status, respect, credibility and public image.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">And then the Duggars are discovered and become the fulfillment of every good Christian Personality and parent’s fantasy of what they want their own family to be (at least in looks and pious behavior). </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">They appear so genuine, so humble, so happy, so pure, so attractive and sooooo convincingly Godly. They validate beliefs converted families have embraced and promoted in their own (non-famous) circles and gradually, they too gain recognition and admiration for incorporating such principles,</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">forgetting the fact that the Duggars are no more than ordinary people with extraordinary ideals...who being exalted by their Movement (and celebrity status via TLC) are fortified with the religious fervor and determination to live them out.</span></i></b></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">They are striving to, by due diligence and fear, circumvent the possibility that their children will dabble in the dubious ways of The World.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">But, the uglier truth is the level of control, repression and suppression they have to exercise over the wills and lives of individual human souls who, once grown, should be granted the physical and emotional freedom to make choices for themselves.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">So when the Duggars are declared “America’s Favorite Family,” it becomes verification that admiring participants have earned a spot (vicariously) in the elite fraternity of Christian parents who ‘do it right’.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Problem is: rearing ‘Godly‘ kids or even healthy, happy responsible kids is much simpler than any complicated formula extrapolated from private interpretations of the Bible by Bill Gothard or any other Christian parenting guru. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">This man has never been married and never reared children of his own but has won over a nervous multitude of parents by merit of his charisma and scholarly-appearing, counter-culture, ‘biblically-legit’, impeccably-organized, highly decorative materials and teachings. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">But, the ‘formula‘ fails. The champions fall. And the leaders whose credibility rode piggy-back on the Duggar’s success and fame resort to juvenile-brained defenses to shore up their own Duggar-relied credibility.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It’s as if the fundamentalist Christian community has been so hungry for positive public acclaim that once they get a champion to represent their ideologies, they can’t or won’t accept it nor admit it when they fall. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">So, what could be the cause for such blatant contradiction?</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I think it’s a kind of tribalistic pride.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Yes, the same Christians who have always condemned the tribalistic pride they see in the rest of the world, artfully (even if unintentionally) spin their own gratuitous pride into opportunities to promote the cause of Christ by their chaste choice of Duggar-types as supreme examples.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I am no longer surprised at Christian fundamentalist movements and their devoted followers’ defensively deceptive responses.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Why?</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Because we don’t have to search long or hard to find that historically, this movement is not a culture that is known for owning its own <i>blatant</i> errors.<i> </i> To give lip-service to the obvious fact that ‘even devout Christians screw up’, is an anemic attempt at diverting attention from the uglier truths. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Consider how long it took for the Southern Baptist Convention to acknowledge and apologize for its racism and defense of slavery? Somewhere around 200 years?</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>“In 1995, the Convention voted to adopt a resolution renouncing its </i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism"><span style="color: #1919a7; letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>racist</i></span></a><i> roots and apologizing for its past defense of slavery, </i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racial_segregation"><span style="color: #1919a7; letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>segregation</i></span></a><i>, and </i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_supremacy"><span style="color: #1919a7; letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>white supremacy</i></span></a><i>.</i></span><span style="color: #1846ad; letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>[44][45]</i></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i> This marked the denomination's first formal acknowledgment that racism had a profound role in its early and modern history.” </i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Baptist_Convention"><span style="color: #1919a7; letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Baptist_Convention</i></span></a></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Christian fundamentalists have yet (as far as I know) to publicly acknowledge its own racism and I doubt seriously it has ever, as a collective movement, renounced it. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Christian fundamentalists’ positions on: women’s suffrage, segregation, contraception, pain relief in child-bearing and equality for women in the work force....just to name a few, were also found to be on the opposite side of good.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">So, could we add beliefs such as: home schooling; separation; early indoctrination; extra-biblical interpretations of the scripture; excessive protection and control of children by parents in all things even into adulthood; fixated attention to modesty and purity; a quiver as full as the mother’s womb can bear; syrupy-sweet and submissive expectations of women and steadfast, authoritarian, entitlement-prone-with-a-smile fathers will <i>almost </i> always guarantee children will grow into Godly adults, to the list of things Christian fundamentalists just <b><i>MIGHT</i></b> be wrong about? </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Do we dare even consider it?</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Judging by the growing online communities of ex-fundamentalists such as Homeschoolers Anonymous, No Longer Quivering, Fundamentalist Cult Survivors etc. etc. etc., could we safely surmise that there are a host of abuses committed as a direct result of incendiary beliefs and practices of radical Christian fundamentalists? </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Considering my past intimate knowledge and experience as a defender and enthusiast, my answer would have to be.... </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">absolutely. </span></span></div>
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-45005187446072010842015-01-06T22:19:00.004-08:002015-01-08T20:39:35.999-08:00FEELINGS ARE FUNDAMENTAL<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">There is an insidious, mostly unrecognized ethic prevalent among hard-core fundamentalist Baptists (as I am sure exists among other rigid belief systems),</span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">that emotions are largely the tool of the devil.</span></i></b></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Furthermore, female emotions are particularly suspect and men who don’t suppress them are... well...probably just weak.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">There have been militant, dyed-in-the-wool Independent Fundamental Baptist preachers, college professors and various leaders I have known, who continually communicate disapproval of ‘invalid’ emotions... first on their wives, their children, their students and ultimately on the local church.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Contrariwise there are emotional expressions they consider biblically legit.</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">These would include:</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">weeping over ‘lost souls, backslidden friends and loved ones; grief over the loss of friends and loved ones through death; empathy for the sick; anger over sin and the sinful culture etc. </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">The emotions they consider weak, carnal or even self-inflicted are, you know, those aggravating ones few of their kind would know what to do about-- depression, anger (except the righteous indignation kind), disappointment, doubt, fear (except of God and the Preacher), confusion, discontentment and any emotion that reveals ‘a lack of faith’ or neglect of personal devotion and relationship to God.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">But not only are these Fundamentalist preachers condemning of too much grown-up expressions of feelings they also expect the genuine, unbridled passions (both good and bad) of a child to be controlled and even punished at times. One pastor’s wife told me that her dad would spank her into smiling when her expressions were not to his liking.</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Hmmm....spanking a child into a happy face.....bewildering to say the least!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">These ‘privileged’ children would be allowed some crying after a ‘much deserved’ spanking... but not too much.</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">A child who cries too long after that ‘much deserved’ whipping will be warned that another is inevitable if the faucet is not... on command...promptly shut off and punishment accepted cheerfully.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I have spent some time pondering this ‘Christian’ phenomenon and I have some ideas as to why something as innately natural and even healthy as feelings is so problematic to these families of fundamentalists. Nothing scientific of course, just my opinion.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Here’s what I think:</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">THEY HAVE BEEN DENIED THEIR OWN FEELINGS</span></i></b></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It’s the gift that keeps on giving. Since most reared under fundamentalist principles and doctrines are trained to suppress emotions from earliest childhood, their own feelings are so deeply buried, they have become impossible to summon--even when needed at the ‘appropriate’ times!</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">There is just something about a child, noisily expressing feelings publicly or privately that can bring out the worst in any parent but much more in the image-obsessed preacher/parent. Rather than actually taking the time and effort required to seek out the cause for the ‘noise’ and <b><i>RESPONDING </i></b>lovingly they are inclined to <b><i>REACT. </i></b> He must do whatever it takes to ‘shut the kid up,’ spiritualizing selfish actions to witnesses and continuing in denial of his own incompetence and self-centeredness. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">This, ultimately to the detriment to the child’s emotional health and the health of the parent/child relationship. No doubt, few ever even consider future implications and those who do may fear such permissiveness a form of heresy.</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">What?</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Allow a child to freely express him/herself?</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Looking for reasons?</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Letting the reasons matter?</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Every good Bible-believing and God- honoring fundamentalist pastor or leader or even lay member knows that the ‘why’ doesn’t matter, only behavior matters!</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Must fix emotional </span><b style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-large; letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>mis</i></b><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">behaviors!</span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">So, these children grow up. Many (if not most) who go on to accept and embrace the fundamentalist beliefs of their parents become emotionally numb, ignorant, neglectful and/or abusive themselves. Some become pastors and church leaders even desiring to respond compassionately to their hurting families, church members and others but not having a clue as to how. No one wants to appear ignorant in such situations and especially not a fundamentalist, well-versed in fundamentalist-interpreted biblical answers, which are often woefully misrepresented. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Better not even try to navigate those deep waters. A bit of scripture, a little practical advice and a side hug while promising, “I’ll pray for you”, is about the best he/she can offer.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Then, even if they by some anomaly of fundamentalist’ child-rearing absolutes (perhaps their parents rebelled a bit in this area) they emerge emotions intact:</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">THEY THEMSELVES SURRENDER TO FUNDAMENTALIST TEACHINGS.</span></i></b></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">When such is the case, it is near impossible to reverse. An enlightened counselor might draw from this person’s childhood memories of anguish resulting from the emotional abuse and neglect and convince him his parents were wrong in this respect, but when his interpretation of biblical mandates are suspect, his belief systems must be dismantled. It might be easier to move the proverbial mountain than to convince a radicalized fundamentalist his beliefs might be at fault. No one <b><i>really</i></b> understands the Bible as well as a fundamentalist.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Anyone fully understanding of the hold fundamentalism has on a person’s identity knows that the bottom-line reason he can’t/won’t change is because:</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">THEY CAN NEVER OPENLY ADMIT TO BEING WRONG!</span></i></b></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">To do so would threaten their follower’s respect for their judgement and leadership. This is just sad because in actuality, followers would have more respect for leaders who could or would admit to weaknesses and wrongs... naming them specifically! Why is it that even though we can all know intellectually that no one has the power to judge perfectly, we continue to act as though that is ultimately what is expected of us? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Preachers talk of the need for Revival. Whatever that really means, one thing is certain. Churches would become closer to what they were originally meant to be and this ‘Revival’ more likely to happen if pastors were more transparent and less power and image-driven. Why this compulsive need for image and power?</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">THEY ARE DESPERATELY INSECURE AND NARCISSISTIC PRIDE COMPENSATES.</span></i></b></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">And one significant cause for this pathological state? The childhood emotional neglect they suffered, which perpetuates this vicious cycle. It is passed on to their children and the fundamentalist world turns, while few in its orbit and influence ever question it. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">What more disheartening testament to the ultimate end such derelict of emotional understanding can bring than the recent findings a professional, independent Christian organization (legitimately dedicated to educating about, preventing and uncovering sexual abuse in churches and affiliated institutions) appropriately named-- G.R.A.C.E. documented concerning Bob Jones University.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">After reviewing the G.R.A.C.E. (Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment) findings through their thorough investigation of sexual abuse allegations revealed to some of Bob Jones University’s prominent professors and leaders and after 5 years reading conversations of survivors of sexual abuse by ministry leaders (much alleged to be perpetrated by their own family member/leaders) there is one accusation that is proclaimed to be the worst of all abuses. Survivors are most offended and violated by the mishandling of their serious injuries by those ministry people they most trusted to possess the spiritual compassion and knowledge.... to help them. Instead, they were: blamed for inviting the abuse, not believed at all, told they were sinning by not forgiving, prohibited or discouraged from reporting to law enforcement, perversely questioned as to whether their bodies responded favorably to the abuse and/or categorically dismissed as irrelevant.</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: black; letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">The complete report can be found here: <a href="http://netgrace.org/wp-content/uploads/Final-Report.pdf"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">http://netgrace.org/wp-content/uploads/Final-Report.pdf</span></a></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><a href="http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/12/12/us/bob-jones-university-sex-assault-victim-study.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&smid=tw-nytimes&_r=1&referrer"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/12/12/us/bob-jones-university-sex-assault-victim-study.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&smid=tw-nytimes&_r=1&referrer</span></a></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><a href="http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/america-tonight/articles/2014/12/11/report-bob-jonesuniversityshouldrepenttorapevictims.html"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/america-tonight/articles/2014/12/11/report-bob-jonesuniversityshouldrepenttorapevictims.html</span></a></span></div>
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<a href="http://time.com/3629959/bob-jones-university-campus-sexual-assault/" style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">http://time.com/3629959/bob-jones-university-campus-sexual-assault/</span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">While many victims/survivors felt and acknowledged some BJU staff expressed care and concern for their pain, few felt they were adequately dealt with and as stated above, many were actually mistreated. </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">And what was BJU’s official response? Mostly defensiveness. The first response by university president, Steve Pettit, seemed to be genuinely apologetic and dedicated to change, but then as reality set in, it appears the old religious pride monster raised its ugly head and response turned from repentance to unjustified righteous indignation. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Why?</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Probably because (as I have witnessed many times before in these circles) humble admission to failure, weakness and wrongness is just too bitter a pill to swallow.</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">But is it really?</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Would these institutions and leaders really lose so much respect and confidence by admitting to themselves and acknowledging publicly that with pure intentions, they were wrong and miscalculated the injurious consequences to survivors, institution, leaders and Cause, all?</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Such courageous integrity is rarely found in Fundamentalist Christendom these days.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Perhaps some serious soul-searching by those who pride themselves on being RIGHT is long overdue? Perhaps the time to question our ‘Christian’ beliefs in parenting our children is also long overdue? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Let’s admit it. Our parenting beliefs and practices originate more from what is passed down from generation to generation than what we’ve actually discovered through science (the uglyword for fundamentalists) and practical, anecdotal evidence. Much Christian parenting resources are more attempts at altering what actually works and redefining ‘truth’ to fit conventional Christian wisdom drawn from misinterpretation of scripture. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">For example: the prevailing fundamentalist belief that ‘beating’ a child will save his soul from hell, instead of questioning whether that statement might have another meaning from what is accepted and considering that maybe...just maybe....that wrong interpretation <b><i>could be </i></b>a significant <i>CAUSE</i> of many of the ills of our youth culture. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">How many children are either completely broken, people-pleasers or pathologically hardened by literal ‘beatings’? Such harsh, punitive acts can permanently damage the way a person feels about virtually everything so how can we NOT recognize and acknowledge the true repercussions of such beliefs. A child’s feelings should be nurtured not squashed! Could this be a viable explanation for why Christian professors from BJU, Hyles Anderson and others not yet exposed, be so completely incompetent and in adept in their handling of such sensitive issues?</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Our feelings are fundamental to our design and creation.</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">They are the force that makes all violations against one other the far-reaching issues they are.</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">They are also the fuel</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">that makes this temporal life worth living. They can compel us toward self-sacrificing acts of love and kindness or they can drive us to commit horrific acts of evil. </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">If we can agree they are just that powerfully fundamental, then shouldn’t we pay more attention to them? Shouldn’t we give them the reverence they deserve...right from the very beginning...from birth, childhood and on through all the stages of life? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Consider the counsel of Dr. Jonice Webb PHD, on the topic of Childhood Emotional Neglect:</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">I love this song and video for the passion it evokes.</span><br />
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-509571383405833012014-08-26T13:53:00.002-07:002014-08-26T15:32:19.555-07:00*LOVE* IS FUNDAMENTAL<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="color: #cc0000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I Corinthians 13</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #cc0000; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">13 </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">2 </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">3 </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">4 </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up,</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">5 </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil;</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">6 </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth;</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">7 </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">8 </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">9 </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">10 </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">11 </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">12 </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">13 </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.</span></i></span></blockquote>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I puzzle over this concept-- this question of, "What is fundamental?" </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Although there are lists-- gleaned by Bible scholars holding to the belief in the absolute, word for word, literal interpretation of the Scriptures--there is much variance over what all in this list is truly, ‘fundamental’ </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">When I consider what seems to me to be God’s over-arching message to us through His Word, I am compelled to wonder how important, by comparison, excessive emphasis on these fluctuating fundamentals really is. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I acquired most of my ‘fundamental-ist’ beliefs by default, since they are what I was taught from birth. Not only was it taboo then to question what of this list was truly fundamental, but I fear it might be a tad dicey to do so even now.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Whatever my questions are now, about what is fundamental, (after all, what do I know??) they will not be the focus of this blog.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">But I have to wonder:</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Could the priceless, timeless, soul-nourishing truths found within the Bible’s pages be better utilized for understanding and practicing how, in this life, “to do justice and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with....God” and, to love our neighbors as ourselves? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">To begin answering that question, I believe the best place to start is with The Love Chapter, for Love (charity) must truly be the first and greatest Fundamental.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It is Fundamental because: no matter how eloquently we speak or express ourselves, or no matter how important the audience to whom we communicate, it is all noise.... absent love.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It is Fundamental because: no matter what supernatural gifts are bestowed upon us, we are nothing....if we don’t love.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It is Fundamental because: no matter how many or to what extent the ‘good’ acts we may perform--even to a torturous sacrifice, if we have no love.....it is of no profit to us. Without love, such motives would be no less than self-serving.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">True Love acts for the benefit of others. It is patient, kind, does not envy, is not puffed up, is unselfish, is not easily provoked, does not think evil, rejoices in truth--not sin. It bears, believes, hopes and endures all things, and my favorite attribute....IT NEVER, EVER FAILS! Now THAT is a fundamental I can celebrate!</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Shouldn’t we be directing more attention to what it really means to BE one who loves accordingly? </span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Second to the fact that Love never fails is the fact that of the three that abide, Faith, Hope, Love--the greatest of these is Love!</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">So, if there were a need to choose between the two practices: Loving as defined by this passage or being knowledgable and faithful to a somewhat subjective list of Fundamentals, which would be the weightier matter?</span></span><br />
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-4841788475971582892014-05-15T22:58:00.001-07:002014-06-12T22:02:58.434-07:00FACEBOOK IN NEED OF CHRISTIAN PROFANITY POLICE?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">I hate profanity. I really do. </span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I especially hate the excessive, over-use of it in movies, literature, music, private conversations so loud they become public AND yes..... on social network sites.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">But, what I hate even more? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">When loud and vocal Christians believe they have some kind of spiritual duty to police the use of profanity posted on personal statuses by people of whom they are only <i>slightly</i> acquainted.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">This ‘policing’ is performed by making a polite but pointed rebuke for the action, followed by heroic, (though faulty) reasoning for why the rebuke is made: because this is a “family site”.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Why do I hate this even more than the the use of the words themselves?</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Because the perception of many on-lookers is a beefed-up ego masquerading as a spiritual and righteous authority.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">And I really have to wonder if it's more for the benefit of their idolized spiritual authorities than to effect another's behavior for the common good. Ouch! I've been there! </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">No real good and much harm will be affected in the heart of the ‘offender’ as well as the on-looking public.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I realize comments are seen by everyone who is on the offended person’s Facebook friend list, so offending comments can and should be hidden from view on his/her wall.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Also, the cussing ‘friend‘ can be deleted or unfollowed (posts hidden) from the friend list. This would be a much kinder, gentler approach and would eliminate the ‘Grandstand’ effect.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">If this is not enough to satisfy the offended person’s conscience and sense of Christian duty, a short, simple but considerate private message could be sent stating the reason for the deletion.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">BUT, the one who will come closest to fulfilling his/her obligation to the heart of Jesus?</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">THAT would be the one who concerns himself more with what is troubling the heart of that person so compelled to vent using four-letter words on a public forum.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">This is the person who would ask in a <i>private </i>message, (not on a showy, public soapbox) “Is there anything I can do to help you? If you are upset about something, I am hear to listen”. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Which is easier: Shaking the proverbial finger and proclaiming, “Thou shalt NOT”, or actually investing time and interest into a real, live maybe even desperately troubled human being? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I submit that most are perfectly content that their “Christian” duty is satisfied by the former--<i>easier</i>--action.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">In order to preserve those fragile, rule-oriented-Christian sensibilities, I believe there are several realities that must be considered before joining social networks like Facebook:</span></span><br />
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<li style="margin: 0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It has never claimed to be a ‘family-friendly‘ social network medium,</span></span></li>
<li style="margin: 0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It most certainly has never claimed to be a ‘Christian’ social network medium,</span></span></li>
<li style="margin: 0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Facebook is obviously a place where people express feelings and opinions: religious, offensive and otherwise,</span></span></li>
<li style="margin: 0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">If one is easily offended by expressed feelings of others because of the words they use, they should probably not join sites like Facebook.</span></span></li>
<li style="margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Comments NOT made directly to the offended, should not be taken personally nor responded to as if the comment was intended for him/her, which reflects...well</span>…<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">. <i>their </i>immaturity.</span></span></li>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It is a fact: There is NOT ONE Christian who can claim perfect piety, for in that one were able to outwardly master every letter of the Law, he will probably violate every one in his heart. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">What’s more, It is likely that the harder one works toward outward piety, the more secret sins he will commit ( example: radical Islamists who cover their women from head to toe so as not to lust after them but abuse little boys instead?!) <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/afganistans-dancing-boys-are-invisible-victims/2012/04/04/gIQAyreSwS_story.html"><span style="color: #1919a7; letter-spacing: 0px;">http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/afganistans-dancing-boys-are-invisible-victims/2012/04/04/gIQAyreSwS_story.html</span></a></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Knowing what results from attempts at regulating morality, perhaps Christians would better serve their faith by policing their own hearts and lending a helping hand rather than shaking holy fingers at four-letter words?!</span></span><br />
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-49022836629568947182014-03-23T22:15:00.000-07:002014-03-27T09:19:22.593-07:00VINDICATED<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Upon hearing the news that ‘Gothard-- The Most Highly Revered and Spiritually Enlightened’ of all parenting gurus since Dr. Spock-- has allegedly... </span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-large; letter-spacing: 0px;">most probably.</i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">... fallen for being left to his own devices, a word immediately came to my mind. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Vindicated. </span></i></b></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I feel refreshingly vindicated.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">New Oxford American Dictionary defines:</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="color: black; letter-spacing: 0px;">vindicate</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"> |ˈvindəˌkāt|</span></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">verb [ with obj. ]</span></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">clear (someone) of blame or suspicion:<i> hospital staff were vindicated by the inquest verdict</i>.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">• show or prove to be right, reasonable, or justified:<i> more sober views were vindicated by events</i>.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I feel vindicated of all the guilt and shame that plagued me for not jumping on the ‘Gothardite’ bandwagon.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Why the guilt and shame?</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Every time a prim, proper, near perfect family polished in Gothard principles was paraded before me in churches and home school events, I feared we made the wrong choice.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">They looked so incredibly.....RIGHT, and good, and sincere, and Godly and pure, and sweet, and enthusiastic, and innocent, and HAPPY, and loving, and devoted, and most importantly...the most prized quality of all..... OBEDIENT. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I couldn’t help but question how we could NOT want to plunge in on all fours.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">These qualities were compelling evidences that the ‘Gothard</span></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Formula' worked. The parents who could effectively implement it were highly praised and credited for accomplishing the Christian’s greatest feat--raising up the Godly Seed.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">So, why didn’t we take that plunge?</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It’s actually rather contradictory--the reason I mean. Because, while we only knew a few of Gothard’s teachings, what we DID know, we saw as unscriptural. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">For instance, we were told that Gothard taught: children were to obey their parents even once they were adults and to the extent that they would not marry anyone unless their parents would give their approval and blessing.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Additionally, even if the parents were not believers, the adult children should not choose to do anything of which their parents would not give approval. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Instead, the Gothard child was taught that if he/she truly believed those desires were God-sanctioned, He would intervene through their fervent prayers and change the parent’s hearts. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">We did not believe that parents had God’s approval to trump the Holy Spirit in their child’s life.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">But funny thing is, and herein lies the contradiction: Though the Baptist Taliban church denounced Gothard, and criticized those who followed his teachings and attended his seminars, they were all-the-while inadvertently believing and practicing the exact same things! </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">They just wouldn’t give credence to Gothard.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">And now. as far as I’m concerned, even if one could cite some excellent principles from the Institute of Gothard, they hold little credibility with me. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">So I am vindicating myself of my own guilt for not churning out grown-up Gothard-formula reproductions. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">If Gothard’s sure-fire, fool-proof, flesh-constraining, protective fire-wall practices were not enough to keep the Guru’s own mind, heart and hands where they belonged, </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">How could <i><b>his</b></i> teachings really have benefited my family any more than what we were already doing?</span></span><br />
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-47775633867937006332014-02-16T23:36:00.000-08:002014-02-16T23:36:05.733-08:00ONLY CARNAL CHRISTIANS CANCEL CHURCH?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Paul and I wake up early enough most Sunday mornings, to make a routine Starbucks run for an hour or so before church--our way to ease into the events of the day. </span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Once scoring our favorite drinks, we nestle into our pre-selected, cushiony chairs, sign in to our Macs, read a bit, then share articles and statuses of interest with each other. Such is our early Sunday routine. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">On this day, we paid little attention to forecasts of potential snow and drizzle.</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">It was perfectly dry where we were and reports indicated only areas south of us would get significant accumulations.</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Besides, if our roads were affected, the big trucks were ready and waiting to keep them safely drivable.</span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Or so we were told....</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Gradually, as we watched curiously through Starbuck’s floor to ceiling windows, light snow began falling. Then heavier, heavier and heavier until within a few short minutes, it was coming down so hard and fast the ground was completely covered. It was obvious by then, driving would prove a serious challenge. We noticed the cars just outside our windows, fish-tailing on spinning wheels, struggling to get traction.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">When we left our house, only minutes earlier, it never entered our minds that weather might be inclement enough to cancel services. Suddenly, we knew we needed to make a decision. It wasn’t a difficult call. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Our church family is few in number. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Some drive 30 to 40 minutes to get to the place where we meet. Some are elderly. Some have crippling physical challenges. All (except retired, who have other difficulties) have demanding jobs working long, hard hours all during the week. All would feel they would somehow be slighting God if they didn’t strive to get there... <i>UNLESS.... </i>we cancel. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Why?</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I know why. It’s because that is how they’ve been conditioned by their high-demand religious backgrounds. I question anyone who declares, ‘ It’s God convicting them’.....how they could know....</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Six days a week, those who have jobs must abide by strict requirements and time schedules just to earn a meager living. They are expected to be there by a certain time and quit only at the scheduled time. They are expected to provide doctor’s notes to verify sickness for missing work, are regulated as to how long breaks and lunch times last, are disciplined or fired based on performance requirements and some are even expected to take extra work home without compensation. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">There are also unending household responsibilities, school activities, extended family considerations, community needs and many other necessary demands on time not to mention pressures and expectations from the high demand churches so many (without recognizing them as such) are committed to. It is especially difficult for younger families with children to find enough of the necessary down-time to spend with their children so they can actually <b><i>know</i></b> them! </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">So. We, in the interest of our most dedicated, loving, hard-working church family believe it no insult to God if we give them a break from the meeting on such days. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">And I’ll venture a few steps further. Digressing a bit, I know.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I don’t believe God would consider it an insult if we relaxed expectations for high-quality, stress-provoking performances in church services complete with activities-to-meet- every-need--at least somewhat--to allot more of that time actually ministering to real needs of our families and communities.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Say, <i> WHAT????</i> </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I even wonder why churches have to be so time-conscious anyway? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Why, on the day established as ‘The Lord’s Day’-- a day of worship and rest from our labors--it is so important services start and end precisely ‘on time’? Why can’t there be a time set for people to arrive and then begin when everyone gets there and is ready? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Instead of being so concerned with starting ‘on time‘ and ending ‘on time’, why couldn’t we use that set time simply as a guide, letting the ‘Spirit‘ lead from then on? Why would the Church want to order itself in so much the same way as the secular business world? Shouldn’t Sunday, <i>especially</i> Sunday truly, in all essence, be a day to rest from all that? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Why so much emphasis on all that pertains to the church meeting? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">For so many years I have heard it preached with exceeding fervor, that there was no good work pleasing to God outside church. But is the ‘Church‘ supposed to be all about its meetings and activities? Aren’t members of any local church still members of their respective churches when they are demonstrating ‘Christ’ apart from the meetings? Are we so inadequate and incapable in our ability to read and understand the Bible for ourselves that to be properly fed, we MUST rely on sermons preached from a raised pulpit in a building congregated by a crowd? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">While I can’t claim it to be wrong for church meetings to be conducted with the order in which most are, I do strongly believe it to be wrong for church-going people to be using public networking mediums to scold, rebuke, express concern for, numbers of people they suspect are making excuses (such as weather) to skip out on church, as to their devotion to God. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Church ‘truants’ are challenged by the ‘faithful’ to rightly examine their motives for missing. Surely they are selfishly neglecting their reasonable service to the Lord. Why else would any who are physically capable, miss, when the ones speaking out are so devotedly honoring their obligation to the Lord, except it be for devious purposes? Why else would the faithful attenders feel justified for publicly (albeit anonymously) admonishing the truants except they believed their works qualified them to exercise such ‘authority’.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I apologize for the pointed sarcasm. It just seems to find it’s way out through the writing. But it also expresses how much of a stumblingblock I believe such an action is.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Those of us who are professing believers need to separate ourselves from the finger-pointing acts that spell hypocrisy to those who have seen more of that and little else of the goodness of Christ which, if there is any repenting to be done, is what brings it. Not some verbal scolding by another sinning human being who might happen to be better at doing ‘church‘ but most likely has plenty of skeletons hiding in other regions of their lives.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Paul and I were thankful for the extra time we had to spend at Starbucks that day. I thought of it as a gift--a special time--that we utilized by driving my snow-bound, carless daughter to work. She really needed the money and her employer really needed her.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">We then drove home, made chili dogs and enjoyed some extra, quality time with the rest of our kids still living at home. We even watched the Super Bowl from start to finish for the first time in years and years. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">And I would not allow myself the slightest bit of peer-induced guilt for not scrambling about, looking for tools to clear the walkways, fretting over the safety of members driving on slick roads from 40 minutes away then fretting over their driving back home again in even worse driving conditions, fearing that our physically challenged members would slip and fall on the ice and snow outside their own homes as they tried to make way to their cars, just so that we could feel a bit of pride that we had endured the hardness and exercised our spiritual muscle by having services...anyway. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">What’s even more important, I felt not one iota of fear that God was not pleased.....</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Are we carnal Christians? Depends on who’s judging.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span></span><br />
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-87830463951993155602014-01-25T17:02:00.001-08:002014-06-16T22:10:22.158-07:00WHEN REALITY COLLIDES WITH EARNEST EXPECTATIONS<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">I’ve never been much good at New Year’s Resolutions. </span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I tend to over-think everything including all the areas in which I need to improve... so much... that instead of getting motivated and energized by the practice, I end up defeated and discouraged. I just can not seem to make it work for me. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I know what the problem is. My resolutions are entirely unrealistic and being that ‘resolutions‘ are supposed to be made for the long haul, it is necessary to evaluate them for their importance and edit out the trivial if one has any hope of keeping them. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">No matter how thoroughly I understand this, I can never quite fix it. My resolutions grow so big and more and more detailed that by the end of it, I have become some stranger--an inexhaustible, perfectionist person who is way far different from who I am! Attempts to prioritize are futile because how does one prioritize when EVERYTHING seems to be a priority? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">So, I gave up on resolutions a long time ago. I figured 50+ years of trying and failing was long enough... </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Now? Instead of New Year’s Resolutions, I look for New Year’s Revelations.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">This post is about my most recent and profound ‘Revelation’.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I had similar results with the more practical daily ‘To Do’ lists. I tried so many times. I so wanted to experience that sense of completion as I scratched off each task. I so admired the ‘successful’ women who could accomplish so many things in a day by faithfully utilizing their ‘To Do’ lists. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">But for me, every effort--started and restarted--ended in failure.</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">I would get five or ten tasks completed and scratched off, when one of several things might happen: </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span></span></div>
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<li style="margin: 0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">distractions in the form of needy little human beings made items on the list trifling;</span></span></li>
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<li style="margin: 0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I’d find myself making up things that didn’t need to be ‘listed’ just to have something to ‘scratch off;</span></span></li>
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<li style="margin: 0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">my list kept disappearing. Lost, thrown away or baptized in some spilled liquid substance.</span></span></li>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">The ‘To Do’ LIst’ strategy for organization was abandoned with the same resignation as the ‘Resolution List’. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Oh well...</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">There are other strategies to which one can resort for self-improvement purposes. I just need to find one better suited for my eccentric, scatter-brained ways, which I have finally realized is consistent with the criteria for an ADHD diagnosis. More about that on another post.... </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Though I am still looking for that customized-to-my-limitations strategy....</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Now, after many years of thinking that next in importance to being a mother who passionately loves her family, is one that efficiently accomplishes all that a ‘good’ mother is supposed to accomplish, I have learned a most profound truth--a new Revelation, if you will. At least... it is for me anyway.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">And that truth would be: My greatest source of unhappiness, anxiety, regret, insecurity and inferiority? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">UNREALIZED EXPECTATIONS!</span></i></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Why were they unrealized? Because they were fantastically <i>UNREALISTIC!</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Which brings me now to another revelation: The sources of those ‘fantastically unrealistic’ expectations. Where DO those expectations come from anyway? Of course, there are many answers too broad and varied to deal with now. However, for an excellent summary, here is a good place to read and ponder: <a href="http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-blame-game/201209/what-do-i-expect"><span style="color: #1919a7; letter-spacing: 0px;">http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-blame-game/201209/what-do-i-expect</span></a></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Probably most would say that the most significant voices to influence their expectations would be: parents, church, teachers, friends and media. I must state personally that as well as these being positive voices formulating my expectations--producing positive outcomes-- they have also contributed to expectations that produced profoundly negative ones.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Because, it is from these voices that I also derived my UNREALISTIC expectations! The number one most guilty contributor to my UNREALISTIC expectations has been the Baptist Taliban ‘church’ and its highly idealistic religious beliefs, and YES, Baptist Taliban, your expectations ARE religious though you will state you are all against ‘religion’ and practice only a militant faith. (Is there a difference?)</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Young, seeking parents tend to be idealistic anyway, so it shouldn’t surprise anyone when many are drawn to churches with high ideals and expectations. Any institution advertising ‘high expectations, (for example: schools, colleges, athletic organizations and any program employed to educate and train children) is equated to what is ‘The Best’ for the needs of those children. In short: high expectation = best outcome.<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Happily expecting Baby Eden in February!</td></tr>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It is so easy to get caught up in this line of thinking. It just seems like good, old-fashioned common sense. It’s conventional wisdom that’s hardly ever questioned. But high expectations as they are applied to areas of performance are profitable, even necessary as long is they don’t go beyond what is reasonable and what is considerate of the child or young person’s limitations, individual bent and desire.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">What happens, though, when this ideology is applied by churches in the realm of a person’s spirituality? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">When church leaders extrapolate their own interpreted ‘formula’s’ for rearing children from scripture, teaching and preaching them to their committed parent/followers as absolute truths yielding the much coveted ‘spiritual’ outcomes in their children, these committed young parents embrace and practice those teachings often without question. Thus resulting in expectations of ‘spiritually’ developed, mature and devoted children and MUCH is expected of them to be sure!</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Consider this:</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">“Evangelicals sometimes expect too much or, to put it more precisely, we look for a kind of change God hasn't promised. It's possible to expect too little, but under-expectation is usually a cynical reaction to dashed hopes for too much. We manage to interpret biblical teaching to support our longing for perfection. As a result, we measure our progress by standards we will never meet until heaven.” </span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>― </i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/19542.Larry_Crabb"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>Larry Crabb</i></span></a><i>, </i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/221110"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>Inside Out</i></span></a></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Paradoxically, ironically, these ‘formulas’ are practiced using much similar tactics for producing the spiritual behaviors desired that the often denounced ‘worldly,’ secular institutions employ to instill the behaviors and disciplines they deem important. </span></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">These motivational tactics or tools are often just cleverly disguised, creative methods of punishment! </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">When I was a young mother, I wanted all the best things for and from my children. I followed those voices that seemed to offer the best formula to achieve my highest ideals for them.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I was naive.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I was trusting of my spiritual leaders.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I was trusting of almost any information from ‘Christian’ sources.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I was ignorant and suspicious of alternative sources of information.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I was submissive to my spiritual authorities.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I was willing to sacrifice any personal desires to rear ‘spiritual’ children.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I tried as best I could to follow the ‘formula’.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I truly expected that this formula would not fail.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Then, when reality collided with my earnest expectations, it was a very messy crash.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">But the reality that escaped me was that no parent, no matter how perfectly they follow the formula, can shape a child into a spiritual adult using a formula, no matter how exactly Biblical it may be. It is beyond our power as humans to cause a child to develop into a spiritual adult by any actions we impose on them for that purpose.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">What we can do is live out consistently the Christ-like attributes we hope to see grow in their own hearts. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Oh, we can control their behavior for a time when it is necessary to do so. We can gently but firmly employ positive, effective disciplinary actions when they behave in ways that are dishonest, hurtful, irresponsible, negligent, disrespectful, dangerous, etc. We can teach them what is good and what is right in word and in deed. We can guide them in their decisions and inform them of consequences of bad choices as well as of good choices. We can be there for them in the good times as well as the bad, showing grace when they fail, nurturing and loving them back to wholeness. We can provide practical instruction to help them in their transition to a healthy adulthood using outside-the-family -and-church resources as is usually needed. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">When we’ve sincerely though imperfectly tried all we could, whatever the outcome, we can accept them for who they are and where they are, whatever that may mean. This is often very uncomfortable, but vital if we are to be consistent with the example of Christ even in our own lives.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Finally, we can transform unrealistic expectations to hope that always accepts the reality but never loses sight of the potential. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">THAT, I think I can do.... </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">“We all remember epochs in our experience when some dear expectation dies, or some new motive is born.” </span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>― </i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/173.George_Eliot"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>George Eliot</i></span></a><i>, </i><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/1461747">Middlemarch</a></i></span></span></span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">Have a happy New Year filled with hope and realistic expectations!</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Paul and Cindy</span></td></tr>
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-75172500717416712102013-08-21T21:13:00.000-07:002013-09-08T20:38:40.706-07:00LIVING HAPPILY IN 'PLAN B'<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">God had this perfect plan.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Let’s call it His ‘Plan A’.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">It included creating a perfect world, perfect living creatures, perfect food, perfect environment and a perfect man with whom to commune. Included in His plan was to create a perfect woman for His perfect man, and enjoy the goodness of all He made. It was perfect in every way.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Of course, if we believe God knew ahead of the fact it would all come crashing down with Adam and Eve’s disobedience in their perfect garden, we have to accept that even in the face of all He knew would happen, He did not abandon man or the plan altogether. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Or maybe He even knew ahead of time His original plan would fail. After all, He did design man with a free will. Paradoxical as it is, He still chose to allow His creation to continue--albeit greatly altered.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Bewildering.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">But is it really? </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Would I, as a mere human, want to change the course of my life if I could see ahead? If I could see ahead horrible events in my future, would I chose not to exist at all? </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">If I could know beforehand that I would lose a child to some debilitating, painful disease, would I choose not to birth that child into the world considering the good that often comes through such agonizing hardship? Maybe not. But then I don’t really know and I doubt anyone else does either--even if they think or say they do.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">If I could know ahead of the fact that the man I chose to marry would be called into war and die an untimely death, would I still have chosen to marry him? </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Would I, if I could foresee my future spelled ongoing tragedy, loss, sorrow and constant struggle, choose not to born? Though I can not say for absolute certain having not experienced such, I think I would still choose to be.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Part of me cannot even fathom God knowing all that would be... and yet... letting it be. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">But there’s another part of me that can. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">On an almost infinitely smaller scale, I can imagine that if the attributes God created in man--in me: a longing to love and be loved, compassion, empathy, need for companionship, desire to please, appreciation for beauty, that non-substitutable familial bond, etc. etc. were the characteristics in Himself he yearned to reproduce in living beings he called His “children”, I can see how he’d want offspring. Isn’t that why most of us want children? To reproduce and enjoy the good, naturally-occurring genetic modifications we desire in ourselves? </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Would I have chosen not to include my 19 year old cousin, Jim, in my life If I could see ahead that he would be violently, tragically killed in a car accident, leaving behind a 17 year-old adoring, devastated bride of only 2 weeks to-the-hour he was killed? I would have to say, no. It was worth having him in my life, even with the agony of losing him... even if only for those short 19 years. Knowing him was a bright memory in my life, and losing him made me a more sensitive person. </span></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Jim and Stella, exactly 2 weeks before he was killed</span></td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">It’s a feeble comparison, but it’s enough for me to get a tiny grasp on what might have been in the mind of God when he continued with his plan to create man--even knowing all he knew.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">It’s a legitimate, probing question and one often pondered. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">So God’s Perfect Plan A didn’t quite work out for Him as He... well..<i>.He planned.</i> But instead of trashing the whole idea altogether, He saw fit--maybe it even <b><i>pleased</i></b> him...</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">to settle for the ‘Plan B‘ He obviously crafted as the substitute. Perhaps that was one (of the many) prices He paid for allowing man a free will. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Perhaps. But, I don’t have to know for sure. Simply contemplating the possibility is strangely comforting in the aftermath of my own failures.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">When my husband and I first married, I can’t say that we had a <b>‘PLAN’</b><i> </i>per se-- other than the obvious-- to get married, get a place to live and eventually have kids. That was enough...at first.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">But later on, as we matured and began having children-- in rapid succession-- our whole perspective on life changed, then heightened with our move to Oklahoma. </span></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">The Fam before.....</span></td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Along with the change to a new state and home came many, many other changes. Our way of ‘doing church‘ changed. Our community of family changed. Our values changed. Our core beliefs changed. Our standards changed. Our goals changed. And most significantly?</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Our influences changed.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">It was through those influences that we began formulating a ‘plan’ for rearing ‘ideal’ children and becoming an ‘ideal’ family. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">We literally were surrounded by families who claimed and appeared to have discovered the secret to bringing up the ‘Godly seed’. What dedicated, novice, Christian parent wouldn’t want that? </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">These people utilized very specific, no-fault formulas for accomplishing that end and as far as we could tell, the ‘proof of the pudding was in the making’. Their ‘formulas’ were working and we were the <b><i>all-wondering eyes and ears</i></b><i> </i>recruits<i>. </i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">So we began incorporating those formulas--little by little-- into our child-rearing practices with high and lofty expectations.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">And the process for our own ‘Plan A’ venture was born.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">‘Plan A’ became the sum total of our utmost hopes and dreams for our children as pertaining more to their ‘Godliness’ than anything else. We assumed that ‘Godliness’ was the main ingredient to guarantee success in all their practical endeavors as well.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Our ‘Plan A’ hopes and dreams consisted of:</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">*smooth sailing through the teen years with no rebellion</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">*courting, chaperoned relationships where we the parents were involved in all aspects </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">*courting-aged teens who desired only to find spouse with same beliefs as the church</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">*courting-aged teens willing to bypass all prospects to seek the ‘one and only’</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">*all waiting until marriage to touch or kiss</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">*all virgins when married</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">*all married in their church with immaculately white dresses and celebratory service</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">*all desiring several children (not necessarily quiver full. At least we didn’t go quite that far)</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">*all serving in ministry in Independent, fundamental, pre-millennial, KJV only, God-fearing, sin-hating, standard-bearing and enforcing Baptist churches that were unaffiliated, unincorporated and only performed marriages by covenant (no state marriage licenses)</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">*all dedicated to home schooling their children</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">*all abiding continually in the church’s and parent’s standards, including no pants on women, </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">no shorts on men, no TV, no theatre movies, no drinking, no smoking, no dancing etc,</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">etc, etc.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">As I write this non-exhaustive list, it is hard to believe that once upon a time, we actually expected those very narrow, restrictive ideals of all our children! </span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">We really thought we were on the ‘right path’ to accomplishing them. It even looked like we were going to make it, as our oldest were in their latter teens and early twenties and <b><i>still</i></b> hanging in there. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">At least, so it seemed to us.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">But then, that subtle, perpetual descent into legalistic beliefs produced a whirlwind that blew away most all our ‘Plan A’ hopes and dreams in one fell swoop.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Next thing we knew we were thrust into an ever evolving ‘Plan B’.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Life is so much more enjoyable when we can ‘let go‘ of all the Plan A’s we dream of attaining-- devising elaborate, restrictive, obsession-driven formulas to achieve them. It was only then, by letting go, we could find peace and happiness in the “Plan B’’ acceptance of ‘those things we could not change’. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">There simply are things in life we can not change. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Our most expertly designed or extrapolated formulas on paper may, at most times not work at all when they involve real people with individual minds, hearts and wills. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Grace, mercy and self-examination will likely succeed where the best laid plans and formulas of man...fail miserably. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">So, It came to me recently, that there are many accounts in the Bible where God, in his continual efforts to restore his beloved to Him, punish their disobedience or refrain from destroying them altogether, altered his original plan.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">The first that I noted before, may not actually be the first.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Before the Creation, before Man, there were beings in the heavens. I am certain I haven’t misinterpreted the account of Lucifer’s fatal pride and resulting fall from Grace. Surely, God did not incorporate that event into his ‘Plan A’!</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Then, from Lucifer’s Fall from Grace, Adam’s Fall from sinlessness to every. single. act of man thereafter, God was overseeing a ‘Plan B’ actuality. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">In actuality, ‘Plan B’ was not really a plan at all, but God’s willingness to let his beloved ‘man’ operate according to his own self-serving will with resulting natural consequences. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">At times, when wickedness was so unspeakable and prevalent, God intervened with rash judgments, but never before sounding long and loud warnings. These acts, too, would not be part of His Perfect Plan, but the secondary plans He administered for judging evil and beginning something new and good. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">If God, being.... well.....<b>GOD</b>, with power to have anything and everything be the way HE wanted, would govern His Will according to His love, mercy and grace and adjust His Plan so as to continue His pursuit for the love and devotion of His beloved man, how can we mere, mortal, feeble, near-sighted, self-serving, created human-being parents impose LESS grace and mercy on our own faltering children than God Himself did for our many errors?</span></span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-o5yCcK0KXNA/UhWKXeRxkXI/AAAAAAAAB50/oPqO-kO9Qpo/s1600/555313_10151869981129853_733833471_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-o5yCcK0KXNA/UhWKXeRxkXI/AAAAAAAAB50/oPqO-kO9Qpo/s320/555313_10151869981129853_733833471_n.jpg" width="240" /></span></a><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">It has been my fiercest, most persistent internal conflict since confronting the ingrained, entrenched beliefs of our Bible-based cult training: Which of my children’s beliefs and behaviors I can only tolerate, which I can accept as non-issues, which actually were <i>OUR </i>misguided preferences, which upon reinvestigation required change on our part, and how to handle those behaviors that were unquestionably wrong.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">It became necessary to pore through a countless array of beliefs, philosophies and teachings to rest on the ones that were consistent with our specific beliefs and fit our specific needs. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">It was a very day-by-day, situation-by-situation, child-by-child expedition before we were able to un-train and re-train our way of thinking and feeling. All this while still trying to parent five children ages 9-16, and restore damaged credibility and relationships with the three older 17-21 year olds to some semblance of health. </span></span><br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-08Rupu7tTds/UhWKvWNdHjI/AAAAAAAAB6Y/58ZiElh-tX8/s1600/998217_10151811993124853_1069772724_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-08Rupu7tTds/UhWKvWNdHjI/AAAAAAAAB6Y/58ZiElh-tX8/s320/998217_10151811993124853_1069772724_n.jpg" width="180" /></span></a></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">When all is said and done, we had come to the conclusion that we had to make a decision between two ultimate views: If we wanted to reclaim them to our original dreams, we would have to incorporate the excessive, demanding, manipulative and ultimatum-backed control promoted by the belief system we had just left. </span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-YmP3i-EpcrQ/UhWKpwpBVkI/AAAAAAAAB6Q/tCxtUcnJc0g/s1600/945997_10151869996284853_931424768_n-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-YmP3i-EpcrQ/UhWKpwpBVkI/AAAAAAAAB6Q/tCxtUcnJc0g/s320/945997_10151869996284853_931424768_n-1.jpg" width="240" /></span></a><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">We could see from lives of families still in the Baptist Taliban as well as those from similar believing churches with which we were currently connected that those methods did appear to work, for some. </span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The other view and the only one with which we could conscientiously choose, was to while continuing to live out our beliefs ourselves, exercise patience, respect, mercy and grace for the personal beliefs and non-destructive behaviors our children had adopted... as they were, while leaving those areas that were not ours to change or control... to God.</span></span></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7jCWj-sUmV8/UhWKh40EnLI/AAAAAAAAB6I/zAFp9o0JvDc/s1600/1174931_10151869977134853_585729754_n-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7jCWj-sUmV8/UhWKh40EnLI/AAAAAAAAB6I/zAFp9o0JvDc/s320/1174931_10151869977134853_585729754_n-1.jpg" width="180" /></span></a><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">So, this was our ‘Plan B’</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">. </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">As best as I can tell from my understanding of scripture, this is as close to the way God dealt with His children from the beginning, (with the exception of those occasions He saw fit to execute His annihilating judgement on ones so wicked they had exhausted their days of grace) as we could get. </span></span></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-8s05Y-fK76Y/UhWKAhv8siI/AAAAAAAAB5o/cDaA7R-zakU/s1600/996907_10151850755759853_1419621965_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" height="249" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-8s05Y-fK76Y/UhWKAhv8siI/AAAAAAAAB5o/cDaA7R-zakU/s320/996907_10151850755759853_1419621965_n.jpg" width="320" /></span></a><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I’d rather use His model, though it may not yield the results the controlling, authoritarian parent can claim to his record. At least we <i>will</i> be able to claim it was by <i>their </i>choice and the decisions they make and claim for their own.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">And I am happier, even in the difficulties. Except for 'Plan B', these would not have been my grandchildren! That, I do not even want to think about.... </span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">For those who lust after control for the sake of what they may truly believe is the ‘right’ cause, will in the end, according to scripture, receive the ‘greater condemnation.’ James 3:1.</span></span></div>
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-26142559389942348972013-08-06T12:16:00.000-07:002013-08-06T14:20:42.445-07:00YOU'RE STILL THE ONE<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Who would have thought when I first s</span>pied HIM from the back seat of that fine Chevy Nova, (he actually was in the blue GTO challenging the Nova I was in to a race) I’d be marrying HIM 37 1/2 years later. </i></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i>I was impressed with his car, wowed by his drag-racing skills, bewitched by his striking looks, intrigued by his swagger but fell hopelessly, obliviously in love with every. single. part of him--inside and out! </i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i>I remember a specific night, lying in bed as a 12 or 13 year old, wondering what kind of guy I’d be marrying. “Who would he be? What would he look like? Where was he now and what was he doing at that moment?, I wondered and wondered... </i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i>Then the thought came, “He might even be living in another country! That would be so cool!”</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i>By doing the math one day I discovered, as it turned out, Paul was in fact living in another country at the very time I was wondering it. Seoul, Korea was where he was born and where he was then living with his missionary parents. </i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i>Makes me also wonder that, at least in our case, if God specifically chose us for each other. </i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i>I'd sure like to think so anyway</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i>So, now, all these years later we will be celebrating our 36th anniversary. We are a perfect fit in almost every way. I could literally write a book on that subject alone.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i>But there is one word I want to highlight at this point in our lives that best characterizes our relationship as it continues--FUN! We just enjoy life. No matter what troubles come, we still enjoy our life and plan elaborate ways to keep it fun, always!</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i>There was a song that came out (way back then) that has prophetically become a kind of motto for our</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i>present. </i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i>This YouTube video expresses it so well.</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i>I love you, Paulie! YOUR STILL THE ONE!!</i></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i> <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbH_sDyWZqo" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbH_sDyWZqo</a></i></span></div>
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-66297885393812566002013-04-22T22:38:00.000-07:002014-08-26T21:56:16.380-07:00THE IMPORTANCE OF MUSIC IN REMEMBERING<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Paul and I went to a ‘Chicago’ concert a few evenings ago.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">It was the latest in a number of concerts we’ve attended in the last couple of years. We’ve been having much fun in these later years experiencing activities that had so long been prohibited, so we take advantage of every opportunity to ‘catch up’.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">There were several songs the band “Chicago” recorded in the early days of our relationship that instantly summon memories of our newly discovered love and the moments that had to be stolen to be shared.</span><br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-tDDYEHnSq5E/UXYYiiT15uI/AAAAAAAABxg/9wtmgE_bThI/s1600/376106_10151637047524853_1360045386_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"></span></a></div>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0.0px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I believe it is very important that we DID have the liberty and occasion to enjoy the music of our day so that the intense emotion those memories evoke could be preserved to this very day. It enhances our relationship every time we hear one of ‘our songs’.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">We met at Baptist Bible College. We began dating. Then, in order to spend every possible moment together, we would meet in the snack shop between classes. We stayed there so long that we often missed classes and had to drop them. We eventually dropped so many classes, there were no more to be dropped!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Ah, but those stolen moments in the snack shop! The very fact that they were ‘stolen’ made them all the more cherished. Chicago’s song, “If You Leave Me Now” is the one I hear in my heart’s memory when I think of those times. </span></div>
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<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlKaVFqxERk" target="_blank"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlKaVFqxERk</span></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“Just You And Me” reminds me of the late night cruises up and down Kearney street in our ’67 Corvette blue GTO. Springfield was a hot rod town in those days and ‘crusin’ was a favored fix for boredom. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">We were young, often broke, and always looking for a little fun and what camaraderie we could summon in those who shared a love for the street rods. There were lots of quarter-mile street races, followed by gatherings at the A&W Drive In to rehearse the evening’s winnings and losings. Hoods were raised so that each contestant could curiously examine each opponent’s engine muscle. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Any night the stars were shining and the streets were dry was a good night for cruising. It was a time when hot-rodding couples could sit close and enjoy the thrill of a win or some affectionate ‘consoling’ at a loss. Those were the “Just You And Me” occasions.</span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">And we had a Chicago song for the times we had to be apart.</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">A very important step towards recovering from the identity</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">crisis that inevitably occurs as a result of spiritual abuse is to revisit and rediscover the person you were before the abuse. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">This has been a slow but steady process for Paul and I, as the angst we felt from our legalistic indoctrination made us so incredibly skeptical and suspicious, we feared even the most benign ‘worldly’ activity would land us in the opposite extreme.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">If there was one thing we wanted to guard against, it was gravitating towards another extreme. We knew we were as vulnerable as Stephanie Meyer’s newborn vampires turned loose on a world bountiful in rich, available blood, Ha Ha! Sorry, I just couldn’t resist. But it <b><i>is</i></b> a pretty adept correlation, don’t you think?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Nevertheless, we were continually being presented with questions like, “is it okay to do this; is it okay to listen to that; is it okay to wear this; is it okay to go here or there; should we minister with or even join in prayer with the non-independent Baptist (Yeah, we actually had to struggle with that one); should we join up with any activity such as team sports with non-independent Baptists; much less non Baptist; should we even associate at all with unbelievers except to try to convert them?” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">And the list grew the longer we were ‘out’.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Well, eventually we found ourselves tossing the <b><i>many</i></b> superfluous beliefs, if you can even call them beliefs. I am not even sure at this point that we ever really ‘believed’ in all the things we practiced. They became more habits we adopted in order to belong while really only convincing ourselves we ‘believed’ them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">I will try to list the discarded standards in order of their dismissal: </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">no more ban on TV (we even installed satellite, shock and awe...); no more ban on renting movies; we could go to restaurants with bars (you know, such sleazy dives as Olive Garden, Applebees or Ruby Tuesdays?); no more ban on contemporary Christian music; no more ban on Southern Gospel music;</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">no more ban on secular music (though there was much oversight on lyrics); no more ban on organized sports; boys could wear basketball shorts (but one 16 year old son had to wear long pants/slicks or sweats-the first year, anyway); no more ban on girls playing organized sports; girls could wear basketball shorts; </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> girls could wear pants; no more ban on theatre movies; no more ban on home school support groups or co-op classes and more and more and more..... </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Then, as the kids were old enough to drive, we relaxed curfews only requiring them to call us, tell us where they were and give us a time frame for when they would come home. This they complied with willingly and consistently. They began going to concerts with friends and siblings and pretty much had liberty to make their own decisions about their activities-- within reason, of course. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">It was uncomfortable for us in the beginning, but found that the more liberty (not neglect or excessive permissiveness) we allowed them, the better their attitudes, the closer our relationships grew, the more they began to trust us and the less they felt the need to challenge what boundaries there were. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">That is not to say they made a smooth, uneventful transition into adulthood or never got into trouble at all. That is not to say, either, they are ‘there’ even yet. Some did test the laws and paid the consequences. But the same ones learned from it and straightened right up--on their own-- without the excessive hand-wringing, threatening and drastic measures typical of parents who find themselves in such predicaments. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">But, with one HUGE consolation...we were by then, so removed from the disapproving, condemnatory, disparaging stance of our former ‘Christian’ peers and critics, we weathered those times with much more grace, peace and confidence. As uncomfortable as those situations were, we had the assurance that it was okay to let them fail from time to time and it wouldn’t cost us our ministry, our self-respect or most importantly....theirs.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">So, with all that, I am so happy that my kids are able to make the kind of memories we made from the music of their day. They are already relating more recent happy memories to songs they hear over the radio, on movies, TV or even through some PA system in a public outdoor square. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">And the best part of that? They share them with us!</span></div>
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-55220624930903626362013-03-29T12:50:00.002-07:002015-03-10T21:05:28.727-07:00THE MOST BLARING CONTRADICTION OF ALL<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-size: large;">Recently, I read a poignantly and transparently written post at ‘Stuff Fundies Like’ titled “Pining for the Leeks and Garlic”. Anyone with knowledge of the Old Testament accounts of Moses and the Children of Israel’s 40 year wilderness journey will immediately recognize the title’s significance.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I’ve followed SFL for quite some time finding the irreverent sarcasm to be perfectly refreshing for those times when I need to laugh at the stupid stuff. But this one took me back to an emotional place I hadn’t visited in a go</span></span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> Recently </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">od, long while. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><a href="http://www.stufffundieslike.com/2013/03/pining-for-the-leeks-and-garlic/"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">http://www.stufffundieslike.com/2013/03/pining-for-the-leeks-and-garlic/</span></a></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I too, watched several movies that theatrically but very accurately depicted, like “The Village”, the insidious nature of high-control churches and movements. The catalysts for their beginnings, the grooming processes, the distortion of reality, the re-interpreting past truths, the intertwining of relationships within, the demonization of all without, the procurement of absolute trust in and dependency on the leader/s and the spiritual and psychological control-- impenetrable as the walls of Alcatraz-- and all the patterns authentically revealed through the characters and stories. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">While I am deeply thankful to have rediscovered and returned to my original, pre-cult-ish beliefs, I can’t say that my heart has returned entirely to the condition it was before the hurt of betrayed and abandoned friendships....and more.....family.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I can relate in a small way to the characters from one movie “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” who chose to erase their memories and wipe out the intense pain of love gone sour. I have entertained such a fantasy at times even though mine was a loss of family and friendship rather than lover. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">One tagline from the movie, “You can erase someone from your mind. Getting them out of your heart is another story,” most certainly rings true for me.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Alexander Pope poetically opines:</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">“How happy is the blameless vestal’s lot! </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"> The world forgetting, by the world forgot.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"> Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind!</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"> Each prayer accepted, and each wish resigned.”</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">And Friedrich Nietzsche asserts:</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">“Blessed are the forgetful: for they get the better even of their blunders.” </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I do continue to preserve a little hope that we can all come together someday and lay to rest the issues that were misunderstood or misinterpreted--at least-- and appreciate the good memories and the virtuous qualities in each other. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Perhaps this would enable us to retain a warm, kind-though-distant- bond. After all, we were all once so closely connected for such a long time. It would certainly help me to find a ‘better place’ to rehearse and store all the memories.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">And that has been a problem. Where do I put the memories? How do I enjoy memories of better days without remembering the pain of how it all ended? Well, it’s actually not a problem anymore. I have found healing. I can remember without pain, but only in the last couple of years.</span></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">She and me in Mexico</span></td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">There are three friends in particular whose abandonment I have grieved the most, the main of whom is the Preacher’s wife, my sister-in-law. I still miss her and the others at times, even after all these years.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">We had done so much together. Our relationship was a unique kinship--a ‘sisterhood’ if you will. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">We shared the earliest days of our marriages followed shortly by motherhood. We lugged small children on mini adventures--lunch, garage sales, thrift stores, parades, the zoo, birthday parties, seasonal celebrations. We survived (or more realistically, the merchants survived) ‘double-couponing’ deals and OR-deals together.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">We worked together developing vacation Bible school lessons and crafts, teaching classes, organizing snacks, activities and rides. We went to youth camps in the summer and missions trips in the spring working together on the many details involved in taking so many on such long and sometimes treacherous journeys. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">We worked on ladies’ events, retreats and meetings together. We began our home schooling journeys together. We visited home schooling book stores and conferences together. We explored curriculum ideas together and took our kids on field trips together. We took out-of-town ‘mommy excursion’ trips together.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">We giggled, played games, binged on ice-cream and candy, gossiped, kept secrets, complained about our husbands and kids, and griped about rules annoyingly, irreverently as giddy teen-agers. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">We even got into trouble.. a time or two.. together.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">But with all we shared, all the years we shared, all the ‘consolation in Christ’, all the ‘comfort of love’, all the ‘fellowship of the spirit’, all the ‘bowels and mercies,’ when time and circumstances affirmed the Spirit’s leading that I, that we, could not and would not stay at that church.....</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">none of what was supposed to define us as ‘Christian’ sisters....was enough. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">But, it’s supposed to be enough! Love is supposed to cover a multitude of ‘sins’. So, why doesn’t it? Why didn’t it for me, even when I wasn’t ‘sinning’? </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">The blaring contradiction is not in the Word, but in the deed. The ‘Word’ gave them permission to continue our friendship, but THEY chose not to.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">There is no scripture to mandate or even justify abandoning friendships on the basis of differences in beliefs, standards or even leaving a particular church. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I have finally come to accept that the real ugly truth is simply this: people will resort to all kinds of manipulations of ‘truth’ in order to escape admitting the fact that they are mad, hurt, indignant and/or even secretly jealous when anyone, all the more a close friend, leaves their church-- no matter what the reason.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I truly expected my ‘friends’, and especially my sister-in-law would call me the morning after they were informed of our leaving. But when that day passed, then another and another and another until weeks, then months passed...no calls, no cards, no letters, no contact whatsoever forced me to accept that my friendless state was not likely to change for a good long while.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">How much heartache would be spared if they could just acknowledge the tendency-the reality, endure the initial pain then embrace the changes! Friendships formed from a Spirit-led, Christ-like love will not only survive, but thrive through the changes and the changes can actually be for the best if allowed! </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Relationships that blossom and grow over many years from youth to mature adulthood are difficult at best and in some cases near impossible to discover and cultivate again in mid-life. This certainly has been true in my life. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">When there’s no shared history, connections and experiences to bind one person to another, the one seeking friendship must start completely over in every way. That is extremely hard at 46 when there is little desire and even less energy.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">It was easy then, to wish I could simply forget.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Darrel, author of the SFL article, sensitively alludes to a scene and character from “The Matrix” to convey another reason people surrender their wills to avoid the hard work of dealing honestly with the ‘real world’: </span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">In scene of his betrayal <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7BuQFUhsRM"><span style="color: #1919a7; font-family: Georgia; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: normal; text-decoration: underline;">he sits at a table eating a steak</span></a> and proclaims that “ignorance is bliss.” The movie paints him as weak and despicable but if I’m being honest, I have to say that I know how he feels. Sometimes I wish I could forget too. Even though I love my freedom and know the truth of the emotional and spiritual slavery that exist back where I used to live, there are sometimes when I wish I didn’t know.”</span><span style="color: black; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: normal;"> </span></span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">Not long after and we're still in shock--even the youngest</span></td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">And so do I, Darrel, so do I. </span></div>
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-21530943083719230682013-03-14T22:04:00.002-07:002014-07-16T11:24:53.147-07:00GUILT AND SHAME....NOT THE SAME<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">This short piece was posted by someone from the ‘Unfundamentalist Christians facebook page <a href="https://www.facebook.com/UnfundamentalistChristians?fref=ts" target="_blank">https://www.facebook.com/UnfundamentalistChristians?fref=ts</a></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">and appeared on my wall. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The truths expressed are so profound, I wanted to preserve them here since they so eloquently differentiate these two ideas commonly, mistakenly, treated as synonyms. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">I have written on this subject earlier titled, “Stress, Pride, Shame and Frogs”. <a href="http://baptisttaliban.blogspot.com/2012/11/stress-pride-shame-and-frogs.html" target="_blank">http://baptisttaliban.blogspot.com/2012/11/stress-pride-shame-and-frogs.html</a> </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">It is vitally important that we learn the difference between the two and apply them appropriately since they each evoke such very opposing responses. </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #0b5394; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>Guilt = I did something bad.<br />
Shame = I am bad.<br />
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"When we apologize for something we've done, make amends, or change a behavior that doesn't align with our values, guilt - not shame - is most often the driving force... Guilt is just as powerful as shame, but its influence is positive while shame is destructive...<br />
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We live in a world where most people still subscribe to the belief that shame is a good tool for keeping people in line. Not only is this wrong, but it's dangerous...In fact, shame is much more likely to be the cause of destructive and hurtful behaviors than it is to be the solution.<br />
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...[I]t is human nature to want to feel worthy of love and belonging. When we experience shame, we feel disconnected and desperate for worthiness...<br />
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If we can share our story with someone who responds with empathy and understanding, shame can't survive... Empathy is connection; it's the ladder out of the shame hole."<br />
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Brene' Brown from her latest book, Daring Greatly</i></span></div>
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-66731117166401822832013-02-20T23:46:00.000-08:002014-05-06T22:37:54.088-07:00I'M COMING OUT!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Ok. I am finally coming out! </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I’ve been wanting to do this for a very long time. It won’t be much of a surprise to many of you since I have posted links to articles that reflect my leanings on this subject. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">But now? I am coming out<i> completely, </i>publicly and in writing.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">No, I’m not gay, agnostic, or atheist. I am not leaving my husband or my church. I am not 'coming out' in support of Obama (bet some are most relieved about that one!).</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">If you were hoping for something juicier, sorry to disappoint.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">What this....'coming out' is about, is that I am now emphatically and unapologetically OPPOSED to the use of corporeal punishment...better known as ‘spanking, beating, whipping, paddling, smacking, popping or whatever term preferred for hitting one's child or anyone else's as a means to 'discipline'.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">After rearing 8 children under the dogmatic belief that ‘sparing the rod’ meant you ‘hated’ them, I finally had to acknowledge to myself what I had always sensed, <i>“This just isn’t right”. </i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I don’t ‘hate’ my children for questioning whether the literal use of a ‘rod’ to beat them is really what is meant by the verses that seem to indicate such. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">One could certainly make the case that I could ‘hate’ them if I willfully neglected to discipline and correct them at all, but I don’t believe that ‘beating’ them is the biblical way to accomplish this.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I can say with all certainty that each and every time one of my kids committed some wrong considered a spanking offense, though I dutifully, resignedly obeyed the ‘biblical’ dictum, I NEVER felt good or even<i> right</i> about it.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">How could this be? </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">If there is no question that the scriptures clearly required the committed, loving parent to apply a literal ‘rod’ to their disobedient child’s body, then why did I struggle so to carry it out? </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I most always dismissed this feeling, falling on ingrained accusations that “it was my rebellious spirit warring against the Truth, so while they were very young, I would usually go ahead and spank them. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">But as they got older, it was increasingly more difficult to follow through with it, so I would usually back down and consider it an act of mercy. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">It would go something like this: Kid commits offense, I call him/her to my bedroom after locating some kind of ‘beating’ apparatus, then scold, lecture and declare my determination to administer appropriate licks. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">But something about looking into their faces, seeing their resignation, sensing their humiliation and somehow knowing in spite of all the ingraining, that this act really had nothing to do with discipline. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">It was about mechanically following a practice--tradition if you will--established by generations of spankers before me and none to my knowledge, ever really questioning whether it really was so biblically sound.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">At this point, I had rejected the practice of spanking older children and teens. (Ironically, I have since learned that if there were any biblical basis for spanking at all, it was ONLY for older, incorrigible boys--never girls--and applied by a rod as to the fool’s back. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">There is absolutely NO scriptural support <i><b>anywhere</b></i> for applying it to the buttocks! So, one major component of the practice is extra-biblical at the very least!) </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">By the time my youngest reached 12 years of age, I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I can even remember the last time I tried: </span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">He had been becoming more resistant of our efforts to correct him. He was never really defiant, but more like </span>forgetful or<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> neglectful of doing what he was told. Then when confronted, obviously suppressing anger and resentment for some reason unknown to us at the time. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">This troubled me, for I sensed something more to his resistance than just an impulse to defy authority. He was suppressing something and if we weren’t sensitive to this, we would eventually lose him.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">The last time I called him into my room to spank him, he came in and just stood by the bed. If he had truly been rebellious, there is no way I could have made him submit because he was as big as I was and much stronger. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I appealed to his heart by telling him why I was so concerned with his behavior. He stood listening, eyes welling up with tears, and I knew then he was struggling to understand more than I was. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I didn’t spank him then and never threatened to thereafter. I couldn’t. I was just smitten to the heart that day. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Of course, the old familiar guilt returned and hovered over me as usual but it was one of those defining moments when I began to listen to that spirit within me. Had I heeded it before, I probably would not have made the mistakes I did in the years before. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">It wasn’t a quick fix. The problems didn’t go away by my act of mercy that day. But I believe the years following would have had a much graver outcome had I not responded to my change of heart.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Years later, while suffering consequences to some unwise choices, he was able to share the cause of his repressed anger. Apologies were made and the relationship between he, his dad and I was restored and renewed. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I seriously doubt this ever would have occurred had I ignored that small voice of hesitation and administered that religiously-sanctioned punishment.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">So, that is only one story out of eight children exposing the effects of consistently applied corporeal punishment. Sadly, we didn’t exorcise that demon until that last child and incident. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">All of our children have their own spanking stories. Some were spanked more than others, though we didn’t practice it excessively. But I refuse to minimize the ill effects in order to excuse our ignorance. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">My troubled spirit that day, drove me to browse internet sites on the subject of corporeal punishment. I discovered the <a href="http://www.nospank.net/main.htm#101" target="_blank">http://www.nospank.net/main.htm#101</a></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">site and pored over the many articles, scientific studies and personal testimonies. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">The information was compelling beyond resistance. I then discovered Samuel Martin’s book, <i>Thy Rod and Thy Staff They Comfort Me, Christians and the Spanking Controversy </i><span style="color: #1919a7; font-style: normal; letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: underline;"><a href="http://samuelmartin.blogspot.com/2012/05/pen-is-mightier-than-punch.html">http://samuelmartin.blogspot.com/2012/05/pen-is-mightier-than-punch.html</a></span></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I ordered it and read it. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">His exhaustive study of the passages used to promote cp and additional information about the practice in Bible times as well as Jewish disciplinary practices was all I needed to be convinced. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Since then, I have read numerous articles and books on the subject from many varying ideologies and perspectives. All have affirmed my conversion--even the pro-spanking ones. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">So, with all the information there is available on the subject, I do not feel I can improve on what is already written. With that, I will post links to the writings I feel make the very best case against the use of corporeal punishment as the only accepted ‘biblical’ method for properly rearing ‘godly’ children.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Mothers, listen to your hearts and open you minds....</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">The consequences are drastic and far-reaching enough to at least warrant your consideration.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><a href="http://samuelmartin.blogspot.com/2012/05/pen-is-mightier-than-punch.html"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">http://samuelmartin.blogspot.com/2012/05/pen-is-mightier-than-punch.html</span></a></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><a href="http://samuelmartin.blogspot.com/2012/05/pen-is-mightier-than-punch.html"></a></span><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><u><a href="http://www.nospank.net/main.htm#101" target="_blank">http://www.nospank.net/main.htm#101</a></u></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><a href="http://everythingisknowable.blogspot.com/2013/02/euphemisms-20-reasons-not-to-spank.html" target="_blank">http://everythingisknowable.blogspot.com/2013/02/euphemisms-20-reasons-not-to-spank.html</a></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><a href="http://religiouschildmaltreatment.com/" target="_blank">http://religiouschildmaltreatment.com/</a></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><a href="http://cdugan0.tripod.com/RoyLessinOpenLetter.html" target="_blank">http://cdugan0.tripod.com/RoyLessinOpenLetter.html</a></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><a href="http://samuelmartin.blogspot.com/2012/05/pen-is-mightier-than-punch.html"></a></span><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><u><a href="http://www.littleheartsbooks.com/2011/09/25/spare-the-rod-the-heart-of-the-matter/" target="_blank">http://www.littleheartsbooks.com/2011/09/25/spare-the-rod-the-heart-of-the-matter/</a></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;">There is one so-called parenting resource that I want to </span>highlight here--one that has rightfully received much critical opposition in that it has been implicated in the deaths of at least three children and probably countless abuses of children who survived…physically….at least. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It is the book <i>To Train Up A Child</i>, by Michael Pearl. Here is one extremely moving and disturbing testimony written to the author, <a href="http://1324book.com/wp/?p=1342" target="_blank"><span style="color: red;">Michael Pearl</span></a>, by a victim of his 'expert' instructions. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Samuel Martin is generously offering his book, </span><i style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-large;"><b><span style="color: #cc0000;">Thy Rod and Thy Staff, They Comfort Me, Christians and the Spanking Controversy</span></b></i><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"> as a PDF download, free for the asking. It can be downloaded here: </span><a href="http://whynottrainachild.com/2013/06/22/download-martins-book/" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-large;" target="_blank">http://whynottrainachild.com/2013/06/22/download-martins-book/</a></div>
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2155786643905846734.post-447661127476959102013-01-03T19:48:00.002-08:002013-01-05T19:07:38.051-08:00DON'T WORRY...<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">As Paul and I were driving home from Houston, we were listening to some of our favorite music selections from his iphone.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The song, “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” came up. As I sang along, noting how magically it lightened my mood and lifted my spirits, my thoughts shifted to the political climate that seems to be so all-consuming these days. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Though it may be appropriate to be concerned about the State of our Union during these times, it seems to me there is much more going on in the thoughts and conversations of my fellow Christians than just prayers and appropriate concern. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The ‘conversation’ I am seeing all around me is one more of fear, anxiety, anger, condemnation and despair. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">But, wait a minute. Aren’t we supposed to be the ones who boast of a BIG, all-powerful, all-knowing, ever-loving God? </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">I think the song says it well as does this passage from Matthew 6. Consider the words of Jesus: </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: red; font-size: large;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Times; letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>25 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: red; font-size: large;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Times; letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>26 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: red; font-size: large;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Times; letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>27 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: red; font-size: large;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Times; letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>28 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: red; font-size: large;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Times; letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>29 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: red; font-size: large;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Times; letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>30 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: red; font-size: large;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Times; letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>31 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: red; font-size: large;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Times; letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>32 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">(For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: red; font-size: large;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Times; letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>33 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: red; font-size: large;"><span style="font: 12.0px Times; letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>34 </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">When we’ve done all that we can, it’s time to sit back, relax, have faith, don’t worry and be happy!</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Why? Because Jesus told us to.</span></div>
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Cindy Fosterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17942963391717614449noreply@blogger.com1