A (good) anger.

I'm not sure exactly how to put my thoughts out there sometimes, but I cannot keep them inside anymore, even if they come out unorganized.

I almost cried today because some people that are close to me have shown themselves (conscious or not) to be sexist, racist and demeaning towards homosexuals at some level, even small. They are oppressive, and I don't even think they know it. 

I sat with them, eating lunch, and politics came up. I never talk to them about politics. All they know is that I'm voting for Obama and they are voting for McCain. One person says to us, "I just get a bad feeling, that Obama's name is one letter away from a known terrorist, Osama's name." All I could think was, 'Are you serious?!" A last name dictates a whole individual? A last name makes someone a terrorist? Makes you WORRIED because it SOUNDS like someone elses' name? All I could say was, "That's just silly. It's like when they said Reagan was the anti-christ because his first middle and last name all had 6 letters in it." And another person just said, "Well....he was the anti-christ."

Then the conversation went to Palin. The people I was with obviously love her, but one person said, "I hope McCain doesn't die, because I don't think a woman should be president." WHAT?! It wasn't even a matter of whether she was qualified, it was the fact that she was a WOMAN. She continued, "I just don't think women are stable enough...unless she was actually a man. Maybe she's a transvestite!" And then began the talk about homosexuality...

"I can't wait to see if the next one to run is going to be gay," another person said. "Yeah, can you image it? "Here's the president and his first man!" A younger friend added as they all laughed. "Yeah, and next an animal could run for president!" Really? The next step from someone being gay is someone being an animal. And this isn't the first time one of these close people has demeaned homosexuality to animal level. Just the other night we watched an add for a Prop about gay marriage, and someone said, "Yeah, and next they'll let people marry their pets." These are two PEOPLE who think and feel as PEOPLE. They are NOT animals. And it is oppressive and rude to put they at the same level as animals. It makes me very upset that Christians could even think this. But they do! AND SO MANY OF THEM DO. It breaks my heart. And some day when my son or daughter asks me if I was apart of oppressing homosexuals and imposing my religious belief system on them to say that they can't get married because my particular God says they can't, I will say "No, baby. No I didn't."

Missing the Magic

I sat with my family as we watched Criss Angel tonight. It wasn't very enjoyable, not only because Criss Angel is just weird, but because everyone in my family room would pause the show and nitpick the entire illusion, trying to figure it out. "There's no way he could be walking on water, because why are those girls not swimming in front of him. There's glass under him, there has to be," my mom kept repeating. And then it wasn't magic anymore. There is something very beautiful about just enjoying a magic trick. Of course Criss Angel didn't really walk on water, but that isn't the point. The point is to enjoy a great artist doing something he's very good at. Enjoying the magic of "seeing" a man walk on water.

And then I was reminded of how as Christians, we can do something similar. We can take something as beautiful as the story of God and His people and instead of just enjoying the simplicity and complexity of this story, we try to analyze every sentence and every word, and we end up missing the magic.

Straight to hell...

I walked into the doctors office with my mom for her appointment and sat down while she checked in. There was a big television with CNN showing clips of Clinton and Obama, showing their stand on gay marriage.

"Both Obama and Clinton support civil union" the newscaster said. Within seconds I was interrupted by another woman in the waiting room who loudly said to her elderly mother, "Oh my gosh. Our nations going to hell!!" I was confused and saddened. Who knows, maybe our nation is going to hell...but I'm pretty sure it won't be because of our stand on gay marriage.

The sinner at the well?

"And Jesus was trying to tell the Samaritan woman that she needed to get rid of her sin before she could drink the water that would never make her thirsty again. That's the point of what he was doing. Jesus points out our sin, and we have to deal with it first!"

These were only some of the words I heard while listening to the preacher on the radio last night. I was not angry at the words, but I was deeply saddened. They are missing the point. They are missing the beautiful encounter that this woman and Jesus shared. A moment that shouldn't have even happened, by their cultures standards. This encounter was much, much deeper than getting rid of your sins before you can come to God. In fact, I don't see that at all. I see the oposite. I don't have many other thoughts on this, as I am not educated in the story of the woman at the well, but I do know that it just felt wrong.

Micah 6:8

I sat as I waited for the car ahead of me to drive out of the driveway so I could get out on the road. A woman was trying to talk to the driver through the window but quickly walked away. When it was my turn to drive through I noticed the woman. She had sat back down next to a man under the bus stop bench. They seemed to be traveling together and looked like they needed some money, or food, or anything, really.

As I drove by my heart was saddened. I wanted to help them. But I thought about the streets of LA county and the dangers of being alone.

"But God,' I said. "How do you know when it's safe to go out?"......

And he replied, "I never asked you to be safe."

Survivors Guilt

My boyfriend Wes and I went down to Mexico with our church and our friends Ty and Danny. Our time there was amazing, and I'll probably write more about that specifically later, but for now I want to write about another event that happened on the way home.

On our way up the 15 freeway the truck we were in caught on fire. For a more detailed account of the event check out what Wes wrote here. But to sum it up, we were informed by another driver that our car was on fire, we hopped out, and then in a "blessing" we were not harmed, other drivers stopped to help up and with the "hand of God" a passing fire truck, not on call, finished up the job.

Here's what I'm really struggling with though: After the incident passed and we were on our way back up to the church, we saw two accidents on the freeway, far more harmful than ours. So why were we "blessed" and not the man and woman lying on the freeway pavement. Why did we live and miraculously save everything out of the truck before the flames engulfed the front of the car?

I do not understand the order of this world. In Yarchin's class here at APU (Hebrew Poetical and Wisdom Literature) we talked about consequences and actions in the Bible. In Deuteronomy there are specific rules and specific consequences or blessings that follow and it is NOT addressed as a "This might happen" but a "This WILL happen". What are we suppose to do with this when experience has told us that bad things happen to good people and sometimes blessing and wealth comes from taking advantage of immigrant workers?

We discussed this in class for quite some time and come to the conclusion that the Bible is telling us to critique it. The Bible wants us to say "hmm that's not what I see" and use the minds that God has given us to look at what is in front of us.

So maybe there is no black or white. But that doesn't help me. That just frustrates me. Not always. But in times like these. When I want to know why I didn't die. Why would God chose to save me? Did he close to save me? Did he have any part in it at all? I don't know. Maybe I'm just suppose to accept that this is just the way things are. We can't know why things happen because we can't see the bigger picture. But maybe God can't see the bigger picture either and he holds me and cries with me too and wonders why the man on the freeway had to die.

My Proverb

This is the proverb that I wrote for my class. Let me know how you interpret it or how it makes you feel.

As a fool aggravates an angry bull,
So is the one who provokes a pointless argument.