lawmummy

Apparently God has been too busy answering court complaints to help me sell my house.

This fact came up at my house last week with a group of friends.  I explained that I had even bought St. Joseph from the Catholic Supply Store (yes, my mom knows), buried him in the front yard and said the accompanying “sell my house” prayer.

Nonetheless, I explained, “And God didn’t answer my prayers.”  To which my friend, Suzanne replied, “Because he answered mine.”

I just found out that my priest’s cellphone ring tone is the intro to "Hell’s Bells."  How can you not go to a church where the priest listens to AC/DC?

Apparently, I’m all about the links today.  But there’s some good stuff floating around right now. 

I am especially drawn to this op-ed piece on CNN about religion and politics, something that I felt compelled to talk about earlier in the week.  It’s a thoughtful piece about embracing the larger issues in religion rather than cherry-picking in the name of God.

Enjoy, and Happy Easter!

Some of the criticism that gets sent my way focuses on the fact that I must be God-less because of my politics.  That always kind of intrigues me that people think that since I consider myself a fairly religious person.  I’m not sure how we got to the point in this country that we believe you can only believe one way or you’re a heathen.  I happen to think I’m a pretty God-fearing, politically savvy kind of girl.  A politically savvy Episcopal kind of girl.  And for the crazy lady who thinks I’m going to hell, I happen to go to church regularly…  Shows what you know.

Anyhow, I am really interested in this idea of religion and politics and whether they can co-exist without being leveled for political gain.  This post by Allison over at Find Religion is a pretty cool summary of the religious beliefs of our potential presidential candidates - check it out.

Both girls took communion today (note for my fellow Southerners:  in the Episcopal church, any baptized Christian, no matter what age, can take communion).  Sometimes they don’t want to, so I always give them the option.  Today is the first day that both opted to take it.

As the Father walked by, he says, "The Body of Christ" sees the girls and finishes with, "is large, so I’m breaking it in half."  Each girl got half of a wafer.  I got the giggles.

I’ve started taking the kids to church.  Not, no so much to "get them" some religion but because I didn’t have a good excuse for why we weren’t going.  Gosh, that didn’t come out right…

This is the thing.  I have, over the years, fallen away from church, largely driven by the intolerance and overabundance of pious judgment demonstrated by those in my prior denomination, Southern Baptist (please, no more emails from those of you who are offended by this, I think it’s great that you’re praying for me and that you hope I will see the error of my ways, now go think of another network to boycott as a way to misguidely expend your energy).  As a result, I have been "without church." 

Last year, on occasion, I started attending a local church.  And by on occasion, I mean twice.  Or something just as bad.

This year, I decided to make a more regular appearance at church.  And you know what?  I like it.  I like the tolerance, the acceptance, the fellowship at my local church, St. Timothy’s.  It’s Episcopal.

At first, I struggled with whether to take Amy and Katie.  I didn’t want to foist a religion upon them that might turn them off to the church at some point - that’s what I believe happened to my husband.  Raised Catholic, he now shuns almost all church all of the time.

So, I kept the girls away from church, thinking that I’d let them make their own choices.  But then it dawned on me:  how can you make a choice if you don’t know what the choice is about?  In other words, in my quest to not "over-religion" the girls, I am really just feeding them the perspective that church is to be avoided.  That certainly doesn’t make any sense.

I’ve been taking them to church, letting them hang in the nursery or do children’s church, but come up for the blessing.  And you know what?  They seem to like it.  Amy asks to go.  It’s made me realize that not doing something as a way of letting folks make their own choice is no choice at all.  You need both sides.

That means until they tell me differently (or on the occasional Sunday where they’re just too tired and I go to the early service alone), they’re coming with me to church.  Chris does not attend, a fact that has not gone unnoticed.  Katie asked him today why he didn’t go.  We pretended not to hear her, and I told Chris that I would like to talk to him about at least going during the holidays - he’s promised to make it on Christmas.

And I’ve been feeling pretty good about my decision to bring them with.  Even after today when, as the choir passed by singing their dismissal hymn, and as they finished up, Amy stood up and added loudly "E-I-E-I-OOOOO!"

Another rare religious post from me. Read on.

This makes me furious. A female Sunday School teacher was dismissed after 54 years of service because… she was a woman. Yeah, you read that right. 54 years of service means nothing to Rev. Timothy LaBouf (who also serves on City Council in the apparently overwhelmingly unenlightened town of Watertown, New York). He issued a statement saying women should not teach men in Sunday school, according to his interpretation of the Bible.

Rev. LaBouf, I’m guessing, is probably self-appointed as a minister. I am willing to place odds that he did not attend a respectable seminary. If he had, he might have learned a little something in his studies.

As a graduate of a Christian college (Meredith College), I have studied the Bible. I’ve also put in time as a Baptist Sunday School teacher, as has (and currently does) my mother. My mother was also a deacon, the victim of this “new” thinking by narrow-minded members of the Baptist Church; after a number of years as a service, she was also informed that women could no longer serve as a deacon. As I’ve mentioned before, I challenge anyone who knows my mother to find one bone in her body that isn’t deeply Christian. She is more of a servant than any person that I have ever known: she has put in countless hours visiting the sick and elderly; when we had no money growing up, my mother still insisted that we give our money to those
who needed it more; she spearheaded efforts to raise funds for needy children at Christmastime; she collected school supplies for needy children; she made dinners for the homelesss; she traveled around teaching Vacation Bible Schools; she taught illiterate adults to read in our home. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: when it comes to service, my mom is the kind of person that people of God should aspire to be. How dare some small-minded group of allegedly Christian men say different.

And yet, folks like Rev. LaBouf are at it again. And they’re wrong.

Rev. LaBouf quoted 1 Timothy 2:12: “But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence.” Words directly from God, right? Not at all. 1 Timothy is a series of letters written by the Apostle Paul to a new pastor (Timothy). That’s right, 1 Timothy is Paul’s advice to Timothy. Mortal, flawed Paul.

Perhaps Rev. LaBouf should read on… The same chapter goes on to say that women shouldn’t wear jewelry or expensive clothing to worship; I wonder if Rev. LaBouf’s family observes that verse? I sure hope so, because 1 Timothy 3:5 notes “For if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?”

1 Timothy 3 goes on to cite qualifications for the ministry, including “blameless”, “of good behaviour” and “vigilant” (meaning “temperate”, a word with which I am sure Rev. LaBouf is not familiar).

Finally, Rev. LaBouf would do good to put aside his “vain jangling” and remember the following: After a man betrayed Christ, after a man denied Christ, the men fled and hid. It was the women (Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and “many other women”) who stayed to witness the crucifixion. And when Christ arose, he appeared not to the men, but to those faithful women who cried for him. He told them to go tell those in hiding that he had arisen. I am sure that Christians everywhere are glad to this day that those women - those women of God - did just that.

Hmm, a serious theological post from me. What is the world coming to?

But I have something that I need to get off my chest. It’s about prayer.

I believe in God. I think that’s an important context for my post. I was raised Southern Baptist. I resigned from the Southern Baptist Convention, a decision I didn’t make lightly, having been very involved in my church - I was even a Sunday School teacher (!). But I couldn’t stay a part of the Convention, not after a good friend was railroaded out of town for (gasp) being gay and then, rather than focus on local problems that affect us profoundly, like the homeless and hungry in our towns, the Convention felt the need to squander our dollars planning protests against Disney for airing “Ellen.” So I quit. My minister refused to drop me from the rolls, explaining that I needed time to think. The following year confirmed my beliefs, when the Convention wasted more time and money, explaining why women, including my mother were no longer recognized as Deacons. How dare the “Church” arbitrarily decide that women can’t be effective ministers. My mother, as a Deacon, probably spent more time and energy visiting the sick and elderly than most preachers. When we had no money growing up, my mother still insisted that we give our money to those who needed it more. She spearheaded efforts to raise funds for needy children at Christmastime, she collected school supplies for children each August. She made dinners for the homeless. She traveled around teaching Vacation Bible Schools and tutored illiterate adults in our home. My mom is the kind of person that people of God should aspire to be. Yet, the Southern Baptist Convention, rather than encourage this action, told her and women like her, that they were no longer wanted in the ministry. That, easily, reinforced my decision to not be associated with Southern Baptist Convention.

I was, for years, a girl without religion. I now occasionally visit our local Episcopal Church. I find their tolerance refreshing. My daughter was baptized as Lutheran, in the same church where Chris and I were married.

So, I say all this to say that I do believe in God. I do consider myself a religious person, though, these days, disenchanted with much of organized religion, I am not an active church-goer. And I do respect the religious beliefs of others, as I hope that they respect mine.

And herein lies the problem.

My family, and many of my friends, are far more religious than me. I am fine with that notion. I happily accept the illustrated Bibles for my children, the “angel” coloring books and the Advent calendars. My parents bought Katie a small creche for Christmas and she was thrilled. I explained the story of Christmas to her and she listened very intently, though clearly she missed part of it since later, Diego, Dora and Baby Jaguar were all hanging out with the Magi.

But, with this increased awareness of religion has come lots and lots of talk about prayer - mostly from my family. At first, it was harmless enough. My parents insisted on Grace before every meal with the girls. Fine. And every time Katie had a sniffle, it made the Prayer Chain at my parents’ church. Also fine. The more prayers, the better. And then, when Amy’s hair was slow to come in - and thin - that made the Prayer Chain. My weight has been on the Prayer Chain. My job. My marriage. You name it. While my mother would shudder at how “public” my life is on my blog, she has no qualms about putting my “female problems” on the Prayer Chain. And I have learned, over the years, that I can live with that.

It’s now gone a little further than the Prayer Chain. All cards - birthday or otherwise - now have handwritten Bible verses and reasons to pray. And emails from home have become exhortations to prayer.

It has gotten to the point where I literally feel like Dolly Parton’s character, Truvy, in “Steel Magnolias” who watches Daryl Hannah’s character, Annelle, go through a bizarre change of behavior where she prays all of the time. When M’Lynn asks what Annelle is praying about, Truvy responds “Maybe she’s praying for Drew and Belle. Maybe she’s praying for us because we’re gossiping. Maybe she’s praying because the elastic is shot in her pantyhose! Who knows! She prays at the drop of a hat these days.”

I’ve been asked to pray for the new baby, for my brother who is out to sea, for my older brother’s new house, for my Dad’s job. You name it. My favorite was recently, my Dad told me to pray for my mother who, having a diabetic episode, passed out in the parking lot of the shopping center. Dad says to me that she was “real bad” for thirty minutes and that I needed to “lift her up in prayer.” When I asked Dad if he took her to the doctor, he said no, that there was nothing that the doctor could do. Umm, yeah, there is. Cause diabetes is a real life condition - and maybe they could adjust her insulin again.

Everything, it seems, is like this. No real action is taken except a nice, long prayer.

I actually told Dad at Thanksgiving that if the prayers for the food were going to be that long in the future, I was going to start eating in the middle of them. Of course, I also noted that this Thanksgiving, he didn’t thank God for President Bush - as he has in the past. I think Dad realizes that even God doesn’t want to take credit for the last election…

Again, I respect the right to individual religious beliefs. I just don’t want so much of it in my own life. I would love to get an email from my family that doesn’t involve prayer - just one - though I will exempt any that mention God and ACC basketball together.

I know that my family just worries that I need to find some religion. Trust me, I don’t need to look - it isn’t lost (and neither am I). I just choose to honor God a little differently. I don’t leave “everything” up to God because I believe I have some personal responsibility, too. God, despite his omnipotence, isn’t, on his own, keeping me away from the Cadbury’s chocolate in the cupboard or healing my mother without some guidance from her doctor.

Sigh. All that said, in the grand scheme of things, I know this post, if my parents see it, will land me on the prayer chain. Again. If Blogger goes down as a result, you’ll know why.

The recent “honor” killings in Pakistan horrify me.

As a mother, I cannot imagine witnessing the slayings of my girls by my own husband for any reason - including some warped view of honor. And I understand, from reading the article, that apparently the mother was scared of being killed herself. And this I don’t get either. Because, and, of course it’s easy for me to say as I sit in the comfort of my own home, the girls in bed, with no fears for my own safety or their own, I would like to think that if any harm were threatened to my girls, no matter where it came from, that I wouldn’t care about my own safety. I would do everything that I could to stop it - even if that meant putting my own life in jeopardy.

It’s easy to say what I would have done - because I didn’t grow up that way. But I do know what it’s like to live in fear, there are things that I have experienced and witnessed that have definitely shaped who I am today and how I raised my girls. And maybe, somewhere along the way in my blog, I’ll post about them. But for now, I’ll just say that I simply do not understand how a woman, any woman, of any religion, of any ethnicity, of any socio-economic status can witness the murders of her children and just stand there.

Yes, that’s harsh. And yes, it’s judgmental. And I stand by it.

As for the very idea of “honor” killings, the thing is, it is wrong and it is not, in any way, condoned by Islam - nor is any of this degradation of women generally. My brother-in-law is Muslim. He married an Egyptian woman who is Muslim - and her family is Muslim. They both now live in Jordan (a Muslim country) where they are raising their three children, two of which are girls. My sister-in-law is extremely well educated (Princeton) and both of her girls are in school - there is nothing in Islam, so far as I know, that demands that women stay home and remain uneducated. My brother-in-law does not beat his wife or his children. My sister-in-law does not wear a burka.

Why have we distorted religion to such a degree that we allow it to justify the mistreatment of others?

And this is not restricted to Islam. Or Buddhism. Or Catholicism. Or Mormonism. I am Southern Baptist originally (I now attend an Episcopal church) and my religion professor used to tell us about the women she ministered to at the battered women’s shelter, who were beaten by their husbands who quoted the book of Hosea as they did it. Nice.

I wish women all over the world were empowered enough to say that this sort of thing is not allowed - honor killings and beatings and female circumcision and other mistreatment. We owe it to our daughters to bring them up in an environment where they are safe and valued. I wish I knew how to make that happen.