Filled with disproportional rage

[wednes]

This upset me to the point where I figured I'd just share it with the all of you in its entirely.

I swear to Zod that this kind of thing makes me want to write a long letter about why I like the teachings of Jesus just fine, but wouldn't join a Christian church if they started handing out pot instead of communion. And maybe counter that with a little friendly advice from my main man Crowley.

EDIT: Oh, and apologies for not making this clear last night. This is from an Email that I got from H's mom. You know, the chick who walked out of my wedding moments after telling me that she believed "all good hearted people will go to heaven." Apparently she only means the good hearted people who are not satanic fucking pagans.



On a more serious note: I don't think I have words that can express how I yearn to know that my Ann Arbor children were saved by the power of Jesus Christ.
As I face my future, knowing that it is not going to be as long as it has been, probably, I just want it, so much. I want to know that, come what may, my childrens'
eternity is guaranteed to be good.

My Wednesday, can you not see that, whatever the world has done to you, your peace, your true joy can be found only in His Son,
the Lord Jesus Christ? It is so simple. God sent His Son, Jesus, to give us a way to be with Him when 'eternity' begins. He dosen't ask for us to do anything but
accept the "Gift". Ask Him to be yours. Admit that you need Him. It's that simple. The Bible tells us that there is no other way to get to that bright eternity. And,
a soul (an energized spirit) cannot be destroyed. It will spend eternity somewhere. Either heaven or hell. When you refuse the gift of Salvation, you chose hell.
What a horrific choice! Eternity in hell? No chance to change. Forever suffering? Surely, no sane person would want this. And, no loving Mother would no fight
to make sure that this is not what her children have to look forward to. So, I ask, again, please, accept the Lord's salvation. Don't let the world fool you into turning down this chance.

Comments

[groovesinorbit]

Eek! Who sent you this?

[wednes]

Ha. Did not realize I was so angry I forgot to point that out.

It was H's mom.

[groovesinorbit]

Ugh! She really needs to back off.

[rivetkitten]

Seriously, if she's using the bible as her justification, you could always break out the "Well, the Book of Law says..."

I mean unless you want to keep her appeased and all.

[wednes]

I'm really tired of appeasing her, and think I have reached my limit. The woman who walked out of my wedding in a huff, on the advice of her minister, no less--has a lot of damn nerve telling ME to accept Jesus.

[dark_mark]

I JUST commented on someone's post, like 5 minutes ago, about this! I'll copy and paste it here, and I'll send you both a message to introduce you!

[dark_mark]

Beautiful.

We have much in common, background-wise.

When you look at religion from a social evolution standpoint, it all makes sense. That is, there have been thousands of different organized religions throughout human history, but only a few survive -- the very same ones that preach unquestioning obedience to superiors. (Some people would argue that certain predominant Asian religions do not say this, but those are almost universally practiced in tandem with Confucianism, which preaches such strong obedience to superiors that one must continue to worship parents after they die.)

Hierarchical religions teach that at one end of the spectrum, there's God, who gives all the orders, and then at the other end of the spectrum is you, who needs to do what God wants. In between are those relaying the Word to you, and of course, they are just really a chain of command, again with you at the bottom.

Important to realize is that when someone tries to recruit you, claiming to want to save your soul, that person is actually just trying to move up the ladder.

The scary thing, to me, is that those people are the most likely to survive in a corporate world, where obedience to hierarchy equals groceries, healthcare, and all other means of survival.

[wednes]

I hear you, man. Religion makes sense in that it is designed to answer things that man doesn't have the means to discover. As society and science advances, our need for religion lessens, except in the case of those who are SO brainwashed that they can't accept the science that clearly disproves their storybook.

These days religion seems to be something rich people pretend to have so that poor people will like them--and vote for them. Then those rich people toddle off to steal and have gay sex and buy abortions for their mistresses while pretending they are staunchly against these things. But I digress...

So many religions come off as such obvious scams. Anyone who disagrees is in league with the DEbbil and trying to trick you into doubting your faith. Well how the hell does one argue against something so asinine?

My impression as a Christian (ducking!)

[(Anonymous)]

Hey Wednes, this is Trish. After reading what she wrote I just have to say that although what she wrote has hurt your feelings and angered you, I really don't think she meant to do that. What she wrote was intolerant at best, but she also wrote it out of ignorance. I think your response took the high road and I applaud you for that. And for the record, I am Christian but as a Latter Day Saint I do NOT believe that those who do not know about (or accept) Christ during mortality will be condemned to Hell forever. Our church practices baptism on behalf of the dead (really) and the person can either accept or deny that ordinance of their own free will and choice. There is a one year minimum waiting period after death before someone's work may be done and performing that work does not force anyone into baptism; it merely provides the opportunity, which the person may claim IF they wish. Some people have never heard of Jesus Christ in mortality, and others have been hurt by someone in some church at some point and they won't make that choice in life. At any rate, it's a beautiful thing and one of my favorite facts about our church. Every soul that has ever lived or that ever will is going to have the opportunity to accept Christ and will have the option of saying "No thank you," if that is their wish, too. Death is not the last chance. Babies who die don't go to hell, and families can be eternal.

I, like you, don't believe in condemning my friends. I have many in my circle who are gay, transgender, have differing religious beliefs, are addicted or in some way shunned by society and I love them all where they're at whether or not I would make the choices they're making. Someone who "came out" to me in recent years expected I would condemn them because I'm a Mormon, and they were pleasantly surprised when I responded with support and kindness. Yes, there are people in every religion who are intolerant and judgmental and those people run the risk of hurting the tender feelings of our neighbors and alienating people we should be serving. Jesus didn't hang out with the Polly Pureheart crowd or the pharisees with all the wealth and the knowledge - he surrounded himself with the poor, the afflicted, the thieves, the prostitutes, the lowly, little children; the most humble among us were those whom he taught and served.

I also have a mother-in-law, and although this issue hasn't come up, we had a really bad fight once and this email exchange reminded me of that. I received an email that made me furious and hurt; I responded as matter of factly as I could, thinking I was doing well not to rip her to shreds. Misunderstandings ensued (she mistook my factual tone as hateful) and the situation just got worse and worse. It ended when I sent her an email that said that I was so sorry that I had offended her, and that misunderstandings had run away with both of us. I told her how much I loved her and wanted to make up, which we did, BUT neither of us ever changed our stance or opinion on the issue; we just agreed to disagree and to respect each other. The situation left us a little leery of each other even though we went back to having a pretty good relationship and in fact family relations improved during that time. Years later, when their family was in... let's just say a very terrible situation... I had the opportunity to help my husband's parents tremendously. Everything had been forgiven in the past, but this was a gesture that just seemed to reinforce to them "You really do love us! You really did forgive us!" And my response was pretty much, "Of course! I would never let you suffer as long as I had any ability to help."

OK, I have digressed. I love that you are thirsty for knowledge AND understanding about many religions and that you're willing to accept truth where you find it. I love that you have a big heart, even though that means that it gets hurt easier. One thing I learned from my husband recently is that Christ's atonement is not just so that we can pray to have our sins forgiven - we can also pray when someone sins against (or hurts) us to be able to forgive them. As a former child victim of a crime this was huge for me. I could pray for that pain to be lifted and for the ability to forgive! And whether you personally pray to Christ or to someone else, I do believe that you, too, can pray for this. I hope I don't sound like I'm plying you with advice - I'm not trying to have a debate or convince you of anything; I like promoting peaceful understanding among friends with other beliefs. My one piece of advice - and feel free to take this or to leave it - is to try to work out something with your mother-in-law that resembles peace. You're going to be related for a long time. She raised H, so she did something right, right? From what she wrote it's clear that she has concern for you, and as misguided and clouded in ignorance as her message was, I hope that you two can make up. Keep your chin up and know that you are loved.

Re: My impression as a Christian (ducking!)

[wednes]

Thanks for taking the time to write.

You may know that H and I lived together for 7 years before we decided to get married. In that time, I developed what I thought was a good relationship with H's mom. She made the trip to Ann Arbor from Philly to attend our wedding. A few minutes before I went home to change for the ceremony, I thanked Grace for raising such a wonderful son. She told me that she, herself was "a very naive Christian who believes that all good people go to heaven regardless of the specifics of their faith." I thanked her for that as well. When I got back to the venue half an hour later I learned that she had left on the advice of her pastor, so as not to take part in a "Satanic Pagan Ritual." Needless to say, I was floored.

After six months without an apology from her, I decided to take the high road and apologize for making her so uncomfortable she felt she had to leave, and for being unavailable so that the situation couldn't be discussed. Again, no acknowledgement or apology came. I let it go, until I started getting these Emails.

I imagine you've seen my response to her. I wanted to be very clear in what I wanted to say. She wrote back this morning telling me that if I'd read the Bible, that I would understand. I am on the record as saying I loathe when people assume that if only I'd read the same books as they, that I'd agree with them. I have indeed read the bible in its entirety, as well as plenty of other religious texts (Including the Book of Mormon, if you were wondering *smile*) and I do not agree with her assertions or interpretations. My observations suggest that many so-called practicing Christians have not read the bible, or even the majority of it. But that's another issue, I guess.

I do thank you for weighing in and I appreciate your perspective.