Culture

Notable News: Week of March 9-15

Happy Friday, everyone! I hope you all had the chance to celebrate Pi Day yesterday by sharing some pie with friends and family. I know I did. We ate chocolate Oreo pie with homemade whipped cream. Mmmmm….

Anyway, here are some of my favorite posts this week.

1. On teaching men not to rape

I thought I’d start with this fantastic post by Zerlina Maxwell. Since this week was just full of “What about teh menz”-types crying foul over the use of the phrase “teach men not to rape” (and plenty who thought that it wouldn’t do any good anyway), here’s a look at what we can do and why it matters. Zerlina says,

When I said that “We can prevent rape by telling men not to commit it,” I wasn’t expressing some simplistic, fantastical worldview. There are organizations like Men Can Stop Rape and Men Stopping Violence that are already doing the work to train men from a young age to understand and challenge rape culture. Interestingly enough, many who disagreed with my argument chose to send me rape threats, insults, and dismissive remarks that in many ways proved my point.

2. On Joel Osteen

Fellow writer/blogger Chad Jones hits the nail on the head regarding the platitudes of people like Osteen. No, it’s not a “nice” sentiment; but neither is it nice to tell people they need to pray more or believe harder when life sucks. Many thanks to Chad for saying what a lot of us were thinking.

It seems to me, Joel, that their [people of faith in the Bible] hope was not in having the best life now, but in having a blessed life now.

Which meant walking with God, and trusting him, through hard things. Not being delivered from those hard things, but rather being delivered through them.

3. On church abuse

Gotta love John Shore. His approach reminds me a lot of how Jesus dealt with people in the Bible–he’s always gentle with the hurting, but you’d better watch out if you’re the one doing the harm. (Don’t believe me? Go back and read Matthew. Several times. Then come back and we’ll talk.) A few days ago, John posted this piece about Pastor Marc Monte. Yesterday, he posted this follow-up. Pastor Monte’s attitude is one of the reasons that people a) don’t go to the church for help and b) don’t return to church when they’ve been abused. Yes, I’ve seen this kind of thing happen. “Forgiveness” is often used as a weapon against the hurting. I hope my dear ones know that if they are hurting from abuse, especially when it’s happened in a spiritual context, that I love you and I stand by you no matter what. And screw this particular version of “forgiveness.”

Throw in other recent Monte tweets around this (sort of) debate, which include such enjoinders as, “Radically generous forgiveness is a good preventive medicine for mental illness,” “Dwelling on offenses is poison to the soul,” and “Practice the forgiveness of Christ and be set free today,” and you have a fairly comprehensive expression of a philosophy of forgiveness that today is very common, and which every day is not unlike a candy-festooned gingerbread house: it appears magical and wonderful—right up until you try ingesting it, at which point you realize that its hollow sweetness can only make you, Christian or not, ill.

4. On problems only the privileged have

This post on xoJane, which was retweeted by some of the people I follow, is a good example of “Please just shut the hell up now.” When it comes to patriarchy and misogyny, I am among the first to stand up against abuses. But women taking their husbands last names making anyone “die a little on the inside”? Well. You know what makes me die a little on the inside? Rape. Child porn. Sex trafficking. Slave labor. Yeah, I don’t honestly care whether a woman takes her husband’s last name (as I did), keeps her “own” (you know it’s probably her father’s and his father’s and his father’s, right?), hyphenates it, or makes up another one by pointing at random letters. Just. Not. My. Concern. Here’s a gem from the post:

And I find it especially upsetting that most of the excuses women give for changing their name are, well…not very convincing. At least be honest if you wanted to avoid conflict with friends and family members. I can respect that. [Good to know my own reasons are unacceptable to her and that she thinks my real reason was just to avoid conflict. Silly me, thinking I was happy with my choice and why I made it.]

5. On something other than feminism or religion

Yes, I am a New York Yankees fan. Shut up, haters. I have loved baseball since I was a kid, but growing up in a household with parents who didn’t care for the sport, I didn’t know one team from another. When I met my husband, I found out that he was an oddity–a Bostonian (more or less) and a lifelong Yankees fan. When we were dating, he would sometimes flip the radio on to listen to the games. Until we had kids, watching the Yankees play or listening to them on the radio was just part of our routine. For our fourth anniversary, we took a trip to New York to watch them play. Let me tell you, it was FANTASTIC. It happened to be Old Timers’ Day, which meant we got to see an exhibition game played by famous Yankees past. Even with my largely baseball-less childhood, I knew who they all were.

Anyway, fast-forward to 2013. I am sad to say that my all-time favorite Yankee is retiring at the end of the season. With him goes the famous number 42, as he is the last player who will ever wear Jackie Robinson’s number. So long, Mariano. It’s been a good run.

Mariano Rivera’s decision to retire after the 2013 season represents the end of an era for several reasons. The major leagues’ career leader in saves, he has been a cornerstone of the Yankees since winning his first championship ring with them, in 1996, and given his remarkable consistency and distinct lack of histrionics, he will be difficult, if not impossible, to replace.

Have a great weekend, folks. See you on Monday for the next episode in the continuing saga of “Amy Really, Really Hates 50 Shades.”

Guest post: Thirty seconds of silence, take two

Guest Post, Questions, Religion

Today I am privileged to have the amazing Daisy Rain Martin guest posting for me. We met online by chance, through writing for Provoketive. She is a talented writer and all-around fascinating woman. I hope her words speak to your heart the way they do to mine.

I Was Silent for a Whole Thirty Seconds

A few months ago, I wrote a smokin’ article for Provoketive e-magazine that addressed the slew of anti-public school trash talk that followed the Newtown tragedy in the name of Jesus. You can read it at your own risk here: (That last paragraph was a doozy, let me tell you…)

http://provoketive.com/2012/12/17/thirty-seconds-of-silence/

I got mixed reviews, to say the least. Many people understood my angst, but others, whom I love and cherish and would never hurt to save my life, were less inspired. Insulted would be closer.

I’m not looking to rehash the argument of the public school system being to blame for our societal ills. Public schools have never inhibited a student’s freedom to pray freely and it is not the Great Satan. I don’t need to take that discussion further with people who will never see it any other way. I do believe, however, that the discussion that followed on that thread was amazing and begged some great questions:

What’s a girl to do when she sees that a portion of the church adheres to paradigms that she knows in her knower aren’t true? What’s a girl to do when it feels to her that the church has taken that collective paradigm and seemingly created a mini “subculture” of thought which makes her feel as if she’s in the wrong if she pushes up against it? What’s a girl to do when she’s accused of being (let’s see… how many have I heard?) insensitive to the Holy Spirit, deceived by the father of lies, shaped by the world, or just straight up simple-minded. I have questioned those subgroups and voiced my opinions, sending the saints screaming into their prayer closets on my behalf, while I scratch my head and try to shake it off. I’d love some wisdom on this.

But you know what? I’m also falling in love with the church again. I see Christ’s body acting with patience and compassion all the time. I was Episcopalian for a day and fed the homeless a beautiful meal (which they do all the time—it wasn’t just a one-day shot) with some beautiful friends. A lady in my church is starting a support group for people who have been abused and just can’t seem to love themselves no matter what. She has a cure! I speak at churches whose members just can’t seem to hug me tightly enough when I tell them my story. They even let me sell my book with the f-word in it! Sweet, conservative, God-lovin’ folks who have read the book—all the words—still put their hands on my cheeks and say, “Bless you, child. You went through so much, and we can see that God has brought you from a mighty long way.”

I wasn’t expecting that.

I’ve underestimated the church. I’ve overestimated the church. When is it ever going to feel ‘jussssst right’?

Carlo Carretto captured my quandary when he wrote, “How baffling you are, oh Church, and yet how I love you! How you have made me suffer, and yet how much I owe you! I would like to see you destroyed, and yet I need your presence. You have given me so much scandal and yet you have made me understand what sanctity is. I have seen nothing in the world more devoted to obscurity, more compromised, more false, and yet I have touched nothing more pure, more generous, more beautiful. How often I have wanted to shut the doors of my soul in your face, and how often I have prayed to die in the safety of your arms. No, I cannot free myself from you, because I am you, though not completely. And besides, where would I go?”

Indeed. Where would I go?

About the author (from her web site):

The juxtaposition that is Daisy Rain Martin stems from being born and raised in a show business family in the bright lights of Las Vegas while trying to navigate her way out of an abusive, ultra-conservative, religious home. [read more about Daisy here]

You can find her books here and here, and you can read her blog here.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Please join me tomorrow when I will be reviewing Daisy’s book Juxtaposed. Full disclosure: She sent me a (signed!) copy late last fall, but it was not in exchange for a review–favorable or otherwise. I read the book over the winter holidays, and I decided that the review and her guest post would fit together nicely.

Notable News: Week of March 1-8, 2013

Cool Stuff, Links, News, Odds 'n' Ends

It’s International Women’s Day! How are you celebrating?

Here are some of the articles and posts I enjoyed this week. Read them with your favorite woman.

1. On the importance of girls

This post is from more than a year ago, but Princess Free Zone shared it again today on Twitter. It means just as much now as it did then.

Sadly, around the world, girls are undervalued, underestimated, uneducated, used, abused, and ignored. Research shows that the plight of girls is directly linked to many of the world’s problems like hunger, economic disparity, and disease. Inevitably, helping girls and women in various ways can have a tremendously positive impact; one way to do this is through efforts to improve education.

2. On body image

I linked to this post by Jennifer Luitwieler in my own post yesterday, but here it is again in case you missed it.

When we hang so many hopes on one thing, one arbitrary, deeply powerful thing, expecting untold happiness from attaining the holy grail of physical perfection, we will be disappointed. Our bodies may look different, we may feel like we look amazing. But it won’t change our circumstances. It won’t make someone love us better or our families not be weird. Being skinny will not make us also rich or flawless.

Being skinny is not everything.

3. On the Jesus bridge

Reading this fantastic post by Addie Zierman, I found myself nodding in agreement. I, too, have had negative experiences with Christian “counselors” who offer pat answers about just needing Jesus. I, too, have listened to the testimonies of people who leave the impression that their lives did a rapid 180 rather than the truth of a slower turn.

Instead of looking into my eyes and seeing that I was fighting to hang on, she assumed that my doubt and pain and struggle was symptomatic . She assumed it pointed to a faith that had never been there, and so she sent me back to the beginning to take a first step toward God.

But the truth was that it wasn’t a broken faith at all. Just the normal middle of things.

4. On being an angry feminist

I love this excellent response from Sam Ambreen to yet another shameful post over at Good Men Project. Not surprising that GMP has included a woman stroking the egos of the “nice guys,” unfortunately.

I have every right to hold patriarchy responsible for the ways in which it controls women. Unfortunately the patriarchy is mostly made up of men. I am angry but there is love in my life. It surrounds me and supports me. Anger at the patriarchy is one of my redeemable features and shock horror; there are men that get why! And totally dig it.

5. On “good” racists

I constantly have to check myself because I know that as a person with privilege, I’m in danger of ignoring that privilege. I don’t want to be the “good racist” in this post who refuses to believe that such things exist.

The idea that racism lives in the heart of particularly evil individuals, as opposed to the heart of a democratic society, is reinforcing to anyone who might, from time to time, find their tongue sprinting ahead of their discretion. We can forgive Whitaker’s assailant. Much harder to forgive is all that makes Whitaker stand out in the first place. New York is a city, like most in America, that bears the scars of redlining, blockbusting and urban renewal. The ghost of those policies haunts us in a wealth gap between blacks and whites that has actually gotten worse over the past 20 years.

6. On making Satan proud

This is an incredibly heartbreaking story that should remind us just how important it is to make sure that we are holding churches, pastors, and leaders accountable not only for their own abuse of congregants but for their failure to take action when it’s warranted. Of course we want churches to be places filled with grace; but not at the expense of terrified 14-year-old girls. John Shore explains why he posted this:

I’m running this comment as a post for two reasons. The first is because if I have learned anything in this world, it’s that people—particularly if they’re trying to communicate an injustice visited upon themselves or anyone else—need to be heard. When you’ve been traumatized an affirmation of your trauma by others can spell the difference between salvation and desolation. I have no idea who has or hasn’t read this girl’s story. But having read it myself robbed me of any excuse for not making at least some effort to ensure that more people read it.

7. On speaking about spirtual abuse

Dianna Anderson writes a great response to Matt Appling (of The Church of No People) regarding his series of posts on spiritual abuse. As she rightly points out, co-opting the term is inappropriate and diminishes the suffering of those who have been abused by people in spiritual authority.

Appling suffers from a common malady that afflicts a lot of white male evangelicals – not bothering to research the actual definition of the terms they’re using, and predicating entire ideas on a misunderstood definition.

8. On God-centered shame

Elora Nicole’s post on how words mean things delves into the worrisome teaching that shame is godly because it leads to repentance. When we make words mean what they don’t mean, even ancient words in foreign languages, we risk presenting a false gospel that isn’t filled with grace.

“I still don’t see how they relate.” I said. “Grief is not shame. Sorrow is not shame. When I feel shame, I believe lies. Grief and sorrow are healthy emotions. Shame is not. Shame is negative. Shame speaks lies.”

9. On environmental impact on sexuality

I get fairly sick of hearing about how one’s childhood experiences must have “turned them gay.” I’ve found that the people who say that must not know a lot of gay people. Or a lot of people in general, actually. I don’t really know if I think that this particular cartoon by Naked Pastor is necessarily logical, but it did make me smile and wish I could say this to anyone who thinks they can explain why someone is gay.

I’m okay with theories. If they work. When they no longer work it’s time to dispense with them. The number of theories out there attempting to explain away the vast array of orientations out there are just that: an attempt to invalidate them.

10. On my fiction blog

This week’s story is about unresolved sexual tension. Kind of.

Whatever it was, Kay found nearly everything about Devon maddening. She disliked his booming laugh, his boastful reenactments of his weekend activities, and his assertions that the team would fall apart without him. She even disliked his obnoxious printed ties—even if she did have to admit they suited him. Kay’s least favorite thing about Devon was the fact that he always looked good, no matter how horrid his ties.

Have a great weekend, everyone. Go celebrate a woman you love!

Holy Hand Sanitizer

Culture, Religion, Social Justice

Have you ever been somewhere and needed to clean your hands but were unable? Perhaps you were in a public restroom and the soap had run out. Maybe it was in church last week when you passed the peace and shook the hands of twelve strangers. You might have been in the park and picked up some stray trash. If you’re a parent, you’ve surely experienced the same thing with your kids–they tend to get their hands on a whole lot of disgusting stuff, and there’s not always a bathroom nearby.

For times like that, I keep a small bottle of hand sanitizer in my purse. It’s not ideal, even though it says on the label that it will kill the germs. I don’t know about you, but I never feel quite clean enough. It’s better than nothing, but I nearly always think, I can’t wait to get home and just use water and real soap.

The church can be a bit like that hand sanitizer in the way we treat people and the issues in their lives. This morning, I read this excellent piece by Jennifer Luitwieler on the ways in which our culture promises happiness is the reward for skinniness. Now, this was about the wider society, not the church, but a thought struck me: Inside the church, we do exactly the same thing, but we dress it up in Jesusism.

I read a blog post a couple of months ago in which the writer claimed that being fat wasn’t okay with God. It was my opinion then, and it remains so now, that the writer was projecting her own beliefs and insecurities on other Christians. The truth is, God is not sitting up in heaven policing our bodies and demanding that we be thin. There is absolutely no command in the Bible about being thin. We could have a conversation about gluttony, but we need to keep in mind that fat and gluttonous are not synonyms. What’s really going on here is that the cultural pressure to be skinny has seeped into our churches. Instead of being counter to society, we’ve appropriated societal norms and bent them to a Christian worldview.

Body image isn’t the only way the church has done this. We’ve done it with parenting, money, leadership, and even sex. We don’t look for our actions in the persistent call for justice that runs like a river throughout the whole of Scripture. Instead, we’ve merely taken what’s happening in the world at large and tried to write new rules that conform to our interpretation of the Bible:

Culture says skinny is good/fat is bad; the church says God wants you to be a “healthy weight” through “biblical principles.”
Culture provides fertile ground for arguments and attacks on parenting style; the church says there is a Biblical way to parent, which is different based on which interpretation of Scripture one uses and looks remarkably similar to secular styles.
Culture bombards us with investment opportunities and encourages spending; While the church may not encourage consumerism (though this is debatable), it does encourage investment, savings, and tithing (which may or may not actually help those in need, and a portion of which funds the church itself).
Culture has standards for “excellence” in leadership and one can find books and seminars almost everywhere; the church not only encourages the same principles used in business, but often looks to secular leaders for advice.
Culture provides sex without context; the church provides context without sex. Neither encourages having both.

You may be thinking one of two things. First, if you believe we once were a Christian nation, you may be thinking that I have it backwards–it’s the world that has corrupted these biblical principles and the church is merely trying to redeem them. Second, you may be thinking that there is nothing wrong with using the things that have value, so long as we don’t lose sight of God’s truth. Both lines of thinking are flawed.

First, there is no such thing as a Christian nation. Even if there was a time when most people at least nominally believed, by the very nature of who Jesus is there cannot be a Christian government. Jesus effectively silenced any notion of that in the way he ran counter to both the Roman authorities and the religious ones. We have no business linking God and human rule. We also have no business–for much the same reason–linking Jesus and culture.

Second, there isn’t anything wrong with making use of good sense. It is indeed wise, in our society, to save money for retirement. But that isn’t a biblical principle! That’s an entirely secular one. By biblical standards, we should be making sure that our poor and our elderly and our children and our infirm are cared for–without expecting that they’ve “planned” for it. There is nothing wrong with having healthy bodies, but we simply cannot get carried away to the point that we use junk science to support our theories and then call that “biblical.”

In other words, there is no problem with being part of our culture, as long as we don’t become confused and think that what culture says is biblical. We ought to take our cues first from the calls to love and justice in the Bible, rather than attempting to use the Bible to whitewash the culture. The problem is that the church has mostly been in the business of sanitizing worldly principles. Instead of making a commitment to this,

But let justice roll on like a river,
righteousness like a never-failing stream! [Amos 5:24]

we’ve tried to apply the Bible like a Band-Aid to what the wider culture says. We haven’t committed to helping people find healing and wholeness. We’ve rather criticized them for what we believe are “poor lifestyle choices,” which are remarkably similar to what secular culture calls “poor lifestyle choices.”

I would love to stop reading blog posts and listening to sermons on the Ten Ways We Can Improve Our Lives. I don’t need another podcast with five points all starting with the letter P. I don’t need a workshop on becoming an effective leader. I need opportunities to love my neighbor, feed the hungry, and care for the oppressed. Jesus doesn’t care which seminars I’ve attended, he cares which people I’ve served.

When are we going to stop turning church functionally into hand sanitizer? When will we reach for the cleansing soap and water and really wash ourselves clean?

Notable News: Week of February 16-22, 2013

Cool Stuff, Links, News, Odds 'n' Ends

I have been highly entertained this week, thanks to an old Saturday Night Live video and the #rickwarrentips Twitter meme. Of course, there were other good things this week as well.

1. On anger, Young Life camp, and love

Registered Runaway is one of my favorite bloggers. Three(!) posts grabbed my attention this week:

The Importance of Getting Angry

But maybe, if just for a spell, it can be the splash of water our hearts desperately need. Maybe sometimes, we’re just not angry enough. Maybe growth isn’t possible until we scorch the earth.

Same Sex Couples and Smokers Rock

When condoning and encouraging the illegal use (we were all under 18) of a harmful substance is okay, but two girls holding hands is a conflict of faith, you know there is something wrong with evangelicalism.

Love is an Ability

I am convinced that saying you love someone doesn’t count as love. I am also convinced that willing your mind to love someone that you’ve never reached out and touched, doesn’t add up to much.

Actually, you should probably just go subscribe to the blog.

2. On the rape of Bathsheba

Two great posts on the subject of David and Bathsheba highlight the skewed way in which contemporary conservative Christianity views womanhood and consent. Sarah Moon talks a little about her work on Christian dating books and recalls an appalling bit of dialogue from a Mother’s Day production in which she participated. Crystal S. Lewis breaks down the differences in two different commentaries on the story of David and Bathsheba and how the perception of “inviting rape” continues to permeate modern culture.

3. On Rick Warren, memes, and tweets gone horribly awry

The whole thing started with this tweet:

New churches: Buy land as soon as you can but delay building for as long as you can. Cant explain all the reasons here.

I have no idea whether all the retweets and favorites came before or after the meme started, but the above tweet sparked a days-long series of #rickwarrentips that all feature the phrase “Can’t explain all the reasons here.” For your entertainment, I’ve compiled my favorites into a Storify page. You can also read Tony Jones’ explanation (once the servers are functioning again; I’m assuming that there is a high traffic volume at the moment). Even Rick Warren himself got in on the fun with a few tweets bearing the hashtag.

4. On the culture of applause

Here’s the YouTube video of the SNL sketch I mentioned above. Yes, it’s old-ish; my excuse is that I don’t watch SNL anymore. Heck, I don’t watch any television anymore, other than the occasional episode of Phineas and Ferb or My Little Pony with my kids. Anyway, enjoy. It’s safe for work and/or children.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSjLiQxEZlM]

5. On my other blog

This week’s story was inspired by a tweet. Any resemblance between the characters and persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

6. On poetry and ebooks

Several of my fellow writers are sending submissions for a poetry ebook. If you write poetry and are interested in contributing (you know who you are), here is the submission form.

Have a great weekend!

Notable News: Week of February 9-15, 2013

Cool Stuff, Links, News

Apparently, the theme of sexual ethics has carried over from last week. There have been a lot of great responses. These are some of my favorites.

1. On virginity

Joy Bennett has three great pieces on the subject, and it looks like there’s more forthcoming:

On Virginity: What I Did and Did Not Mean (clarifying her previous post about the chances most people will marry a virgin)
What’s Wrong with Virginity? Nothing, Unless You’re Obsessed with It (op-ed piece for The Guardian US)
If Not “Sola Virginity,” What Do We Teach? Part 1 of 2 (intimacy and marriage)

2. On “Biblical clarity”

Preston Yancey gives a great summary of the problems that arise from reducing sexual ethics to a list of Bible verses we can commit to memory.

3. On what’s missing

Slacktivist offers the perspective that the purity movement has failed to produce anything like a sexual ethic, only a sexual rule (“NO!”).

Evangelical purity culture and its attendant cult of “modesty” enthrones male lust, inverting what Jesus taught us. “If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away,” Jesus said. But purity culture says male eyes are inviolable, so if a man’s eye causes him to sin, then women’s bodies must be torn out and thrown away — or at least covered up and shut away. Modesty somehow always means women in burkas,* never men in blindfolds.

4. On sin and consent

Two more great pieces by Dianna Anderson:

Rejecting the Premise: Questions of Sex and Sin

We spend so much effort and energy telling people to say “no” that we’ve not equipped them with how to say “yes.”

No Touching: Consent As the First Step

A healthy sexual relationship has much more room to happen when everyone involved is doing so enthusiastically and with full knowledge and agreement about boundaries.

In unrelated news, here are two more posts this week you may enjoy:

5. On seasonal depression

Registered Runaway offers some good ideas for how to cope with winter depression. If, like many of us, you are suffering, you don’t have to do it alone.

6. On Valentine’s Day

In case you don’t follow my other blog, here’s this weeks short story.

Have a great weekend, everyone. See you back here on Monday!

Notable News: Week of March 9-15

Guest post: Thirty seconds of silence, take two

Notable News: Week of March 1-8, 2013

Notable News: Week of February 16-22, 2013

Notable News: Week of February 9-15, 2013

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