Here's a disturbing statistic: Twenty-three children have died this year (eight in the month of August alone and we're only half-way through the month) due to extreme heat overexposure because, in almost every case, their parents simply "forgot they were in the car".
Okay...really?!
This statistic both baffles and sickens me, but since I realize there is a fine line between outrage and self-righteousness (a line I feel I'm about to teeter precariously on), I'll try my best not to say that everyone who loses their child due to something that is entirely preventable is an idiot. They're not. I don't want to give the impression that I feel like I'm a better parent than anyone else. I'm not. No matter what, losing a child is a horrific tragedy and these tragedies aren't specific to a certain socioeconomic class, race, or gender. We're all human and we are all capable of making mistakes.
That being said...
People are not stupid, but what they are is incredibly self-absorbed, which as far as I"m concerned, can be even more lethal than being stupid. I know, I write a blog. I spent hours of my life slaving over a hot computer, trying to perfectly formulate my every thought under the guise that someone, somewhere thinks that my opinion is important and articulate enough to read and possibly take seriously. How self-absorbed this that?! The difference is, this self-absorption has never (and will never) hurt anyone. I don't leave my kids unattended in a hundred degree car for hours so I can write about issues of injustice, when I'm committing the biggest act of injustice myself; not taking care of my kids.
Here's the thing. No matter how many wonderful days you have with your children, how many hugs they give, milestones they pass, finger paintings they create and how much love you accumulate in your life, the truth is that being a parent is really, really hard. I've had moments where I'm so overwhelmed with the sheer responsibility of being in charge of two lives that I feel like I'm hyperventilating and crawling up the walls. It can be terrifying. But it's also a choice. I choose to be a parent and I choose to do the best I can possibly do.
If you need ten minutes to yourself, I get that. Believe me, I get it better than anyone else. But leaving your child in a sweltering car in the summertime with the windows rolled up so you can go walk around the mall is not a viable solution. Being a parent means you now come second. I know it sucks sometimes, especially when you feel like you never get a break, but from the minute that second line shows up on the pee stick, it's not about you anymore. You have a job to do and you only have one shot at it. No one is perfect, but we can all try. And just so we're all on the same page, forgetting your kid in the car because you're too busy thinking about the Iphone 4 or what Ryan Lochte looks like shirtless does NOT constitute trying.
And honestly, how do you truly forget that your kid is in the car? Yes, sometimes they fall asleep or are occupied by looking out the window or reading a book, but generally speaking, kids are hard to forget. For one, they're loud. They talk, talk, talk or if they're too young to talk, they will occasionally cry because they're bored, hungry, or just want to remind you that they're there. At least my kids were that way and I doubt very highly that they were abnormal in that regard. So my question is, what exactly are the parents doing? What's occupying their minds? And why aren't they paying attention to their kids?
Which brings me right back to self-absorbed. If you can forget about your kids, what exactly are your priorities? I can't think of a single time I forgot about my kids. Even when my kid's grandparents keep them for a night, I still think about them. I'm constantly worrying if they've eaten enough, are behaving well or are sleeping well. I'm by no means trying to suggest that I'm a better parent that anyone else, but my kids occupy a majority of my mind a majority of the time. So for me, even a night off isn't really a night off at all. The fact is, you just don't get time off when you're a parent. You are a parent twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, three hundred and sixty-five (or six) days a year until the second you kick the bucket. There are no sick days, no calling in late, and no excuses. That is the reality. So unless you're ready to face an unspeakable tragedy and lose what should be the most important thing in the world to you, get used to it.
We only get one shot at raising our kids. So wake up, get your head where it needs to be and take care of your business. Otherwise, be prepared to face the consequences.
Thanks. I feel much better now.
Friday, August 17, 2012
Saturday, August 11, 2012
Peter Jennings Was The Love Of My Life
Hey guys.
Since my blog has felt pretty heavy the last couple of weeks, I thought I'd lighten it up for a minute. At least until my next rant comes to me. So for now, it's story time.
The following is a true story. Because there are some things you just can't make up.
One of my earliest and clearest memories was the day in kindergarten when I was given a note to take home to my mom. I was a willful and stubborn child, but also obedient to a fault and I lived in constant fear of getting into trouble, so when I was handed a sealed envelope accompanied with a stern look, I panicked. I spent all day obsessing over what I could have done wrong. Did I forget to listen? Talk during story time? Was it because I said I wanted to be a dinosaur when I grew up? Or was it because of the incident?
The day before "the note" a little boy in my class, Tommy Ulander, had called me four eyes during recess, and I had retaliated by calling him impotent. Full disclosure: I (unsurprisingly) had absolutely no idea what impotent meant, but I heard it somewhere and managed to deduce from both the context and the tone of the conversation that it wasn't a good thing. It had the desired effect; Tommy ran off crying and I acted like I could care less even though my stomach felt like I had just eaten a brick that was on fire. I regretted it the second it came out of my mouth and to this day I've always worried that Tommy Ulander did, in fact, grow up to be impotent and is somewhere blaming it all on me. Anyway, I felt like such a pint-sized douche bag for the incident that I think I almost wanted to get caught for it. So when "the note" was presented to me, I figured I was about to be in some serious trouble.
But, as fate would have it, the note had nothing to do with a potentially impotent five-year-old. In fact, I wasn't even in trouble. At least, not directly.
There's no easy way to say this, so I'm just going to say it. When I was five-years-old, I had a huge crush on an iconic television personality. No, not Zack Morris from Saved By The Bell or Leonardo DiCaprio on Growing Pains. My first love was Peter Jennings.
Yes, you're thinking of the right person. Peter Jennings, Canadian, Anchor of CBS World News Tonight from the year before I was born right up until his death seven years ago (I was absolutely devastated when he passed away, by the way). Never mind that he was old enough to be my grandfather, I adored him. I adored him so much that I watched his news broadcasts religiously, soaking up every word. And as it happened, that year there was a lot to soak up.
The year I entered kindergarten was the year the very tumultuous Gulf War began. I watched with fascination as Peter told me all about the Liberation of Kuwait, The Highway of Death, oil, and friendly fire. I don't know if it was the comforting tone of his voice or the way he could make something so complicated sound so amazingly simple, but I never felt scared while watching all of the horrific footage of the war. I actually kind of liked the fact that I knew what grown-ups were talking about for a change. I figured my fellow classmates and friends might also like to know what was going on in the world. So the more I learned, the more I went to school and shared my knowledge during show-and-tell, figuring I was probably doing the world (or at least, my own very limited world) some sort of public service by sharing what I knew.
Enter the problem.
You might not be surprised to learn that other kids my age didn't want to know what I knew. In fact, the things I knew scared the bejesus out of them (apparently, I didn't have Peter's knack for presenting vast knowledge in a simple, non-terrifying way) and worse, my antics really pissed off their parents. In turn, the pissed off parents started complaining to my teachers and demanding an end to my little impromptu news reports. This is where "the note" comes in.
While I have never known the exact wording of "the note", in my imagination it said something like this:
"Dear Debbie: Your insane five-year old future tree-hugger is scaring the crap out of the other children by coming in here and talking about depleting uranium and bulldozer assaults. Perhaps a cuddly teddy bear to bring in and show the children would be a nice change. P.S.: Ever heard of Sesame Street?!"
But that's just a guess.
What I do know is that if "the note" bothered my mom, she didn't show it. I was still allowed to watch the news (and more importantly, Peter) but she did suggest that I do more showing and less telling. Suffice it to say, I took my Barbies to school the very next day.
To this day, I still like to watch the world news and still have an unexplainable attraction to news anchors that I've never quite been able to pin down. I don't know what it is...Maybe knowing exactly what's going on in the world before anyone else and knowing just how to explain it all to me? A certain sense of authority? Either that, or I have way more Daddy issues than I'm willing to admit.
And while I've loved others (Bill Weir, Brian Williams, Tom Brokaw to name a few), I will always have a special place in my heart for Peter Jennings. He taught me the importance of knowing what was going on in the world around me, no matter how much the events of the world might freak me or anyone else out. He taught me that it was important to have my facts straight, to be well-informed, and that it was okay to be passionate about the issues that were important to me. All-in-all, not too bad for a first crush.
Since my blog has felt pretty heavy the last couple of weeks, I thought I'd lighten it up for a minute. At least until my next rant comes to me. So for now, it's story time.
The following is a true story. Because there are some things you just can't make up.
One of my earliest and clearest memories was the day in kindergarten when I was given a note to take home to my mom. I was a willful and stubborn child, but also obedient to a fault and I lived in constant fear of getting into trouble, so when I was handed a sealed envelope accompanied with a stern look, I panicked. I spent all day obsessing over what I could have done wrong. Did I forget to listen? Talk during story time? Was it because I said I wanted to be a dinosaur when I grew up? Or was it because of the incident?
The day before "the note" a little boy in my class, Tommy Ulander, had called me four eyes during recess, and I had retaliated by calling him impotent. Full disclosure: I (unsurprisingly) had absolutely no idea what impotent meant, but I heard it somewhere and managed to deduce from both the context and the tone of the conversation that it wasn't a good thing. It had the desired effect; Tommy ran off crying and I acted like I could care less even though my stomach felt like I had just eaten a brick that was on fire. I regretted it the second it came out of my mouth and to this day I've always worried that Tommy Ulander did, in fact, grow up to be impotent and is somewhere blaming it all on me. Anyway, I felt like such a pint-sized douche bag for the incident that I think I almost wanted to get caught for it. So when "the note" was presented to me, I figured I was about to be in some serious trouble.
But, as fate would have it, the note had nothing to do with a potentially impotent five-year-old. In fact, I wasn't even in trouble. At least, not directly.
There's no easy way to say this, so I'm just going to say it. When I was five-years-old, I had a huge crush on an iconic television personality. No, not Zack Morris from Saved By The Bell or Leonardo DiCaprio on Growing Pains. My first love was Peter Jennings.
Yes, you're thinking of the right person. Peter Jennings, Canadian, Anchor of CBS World News Tonight from the year before I was born right up until his death seven years ago (I was absolutely devastated when he passed away, by the way). Never mind that he was old enough to be my grandfather, I adored him. I adored him so much that I watched his news broadcasts religiously, soaking up every word. And as it happened, that year there was a lot to soak up.
The year I entered kindergarten was the year the very tumultuous Gulf War began. I watched with fascination as Peter told me all about the Liberation of Kuwait, The Highway of Death, oil, and friendly fire. I don't know if it was the comforting tone of his voice or the way he could make something so complicated sound so amazingly simple, but I never felt scared while watching all of the horrific footage of the war. I actually kind of liked the fact that I knew what grown-ups were talking about for a change. I figured my fellow classmates and friends might also like to know what was going on in the world. So the more I learned, the more I went to school and shared my knowledge during show-and-tell, figuring I was probably doing the world (or at least, my own very limited world) some sort of public service by sharing what I knew.
Enter the problem.
You might not be surprised to learn that other kids my age didn't want to know what I knew. In fact, the things I knew scared the bejesus out of them (apparently, I didn't have Peter's knack for presenting vast knowledge in a simple, non-terrifying way) and worse, my antics really pissed off their parents. In turn, the pissed off parents started complaining to my teachers and demanding an end to my little impromptu news reports. This is where "the note" comes in.
While I have never known the exact wording of "the note", in my imagination it said something like this:
"Dear Debbie: Your insane five-year old future tree-hugger is scaring the crap out of the other children by coming in here and talking about depleting uranium and bulldozer assaults. Perhaps a cuddly teddy bear to bring in and show the children would be a nice change. P.S.: Ever heard of Sesame Street?!"
But that's just a guess.
What I do know is that if "the note" bothered my mom, she didn't show it. I was still allowed to watch the news (and more importantly, Peter) but she did suggest that I do more showing and less telling. Suffice it to say, I took my Barbies to school the very next day.
To this day, I still like to watch the world news and still have an unexplainable attraction to news anchors that I've never quite been able to pin down. I don't know what it is...Maybe knowing exactly what's going on in the world before anyone else and knowing just how to explain it all to me? A certain sense of authority? Either that, or I have way more Daddy issues than I'm willing to admit.
And while I've loved others (Bill Weir, Brian Williams, Tom Brokaw to name a few), I will always have a special place in my heart for Peter Jennings. He taught me the importance of knowing what was going on in the world around me, no matter how much the events of the world might freak me or anyone else out. He taught me that it was important to have my facts straight, to be well-informed, and that it was okay to be passionate about the issues that were important to me. All-in-all, not too bad for a first crush.
Thursday, August 2, 2012
Let He Who Is Without Sin Cast The First Stone
There is entirely too much injustice in the world right now. Wars are being fought, car bombs are exploding, innocent people are dying in movie theaters, people are getting laid off, children are being abused and neglected, the environment is imploding, and according to the media, people are only as worthy as their number on a scale. You can't help but see the world crumbling wherever you look, in the unnecessary violence, the corruption, the way we can't even look one another in the eye and have a conversation anymore because we're too busy tweeting Justin Beiber, desperately hoping for a response. You would think that in a world full of awful things, we would be trying to be civilized and respectful and work together as a country, but we're not. In fact, it feels more like the exact opposite is happening. It's like we're actively searching for reasons to hate or discriminate, to prove that "we are right and they are wrong" and nowhere is this more true than the issue of gay marriage.
I thought long and hard about whether I wanted to address this issue or not and to be honest, I wasn't really planning on it. It's tough. There's really no right or wrong answer (although plenty of people are willing to disagree with me on that). There are varying opinions, even within my own family. It's sticky, uncomfortable, and controversial, much more so than anything I've ever attempted to write about. It makes breast feeding and 50 Shades of Gray look like flowers and lollipops and given the fact that I got more than my fair share of backlash for writing about those issues, I had all but decided not to touch this one with a fifty-foot pole.
But then Chick-Fil-A happened. Suddenly it was an issue of a Christian organization donating money to anti-gay marriage organizations because they wanted to maintain the "traditional family". Suddenly it got personal. It got personal because I, like the president of Chick-Fil-A, am a Christian. But maybe I bought the wrong version of the Bible, because in mine Christianity is not synonymous with hatred. It's not synonymous with ignorance. It speaks about loving people and accepting them for who they are, no matter how different they are from you. While part of me thinks "Hey, it's his money, he can donate it to whatever he wants" a louder, stronger part of me thinks that Dan Cathy could have found a much better cause to donate to: Food banks, literacy programs, churches...anyone who would be willing to take millions of dollars and put that money towards a good cause, and to genuinely help people who are in need. I'm at a loss to understand how anti-anything organizations actually help anyone.
Before I get too ahead of myself, I want to express how grateful I am to live in a country with free speech rights, a place where everyone can express their opinion, and express it in a peaceful, thoughtful, intelligent way (if they so choose). Dan Cathy certainly had no problem expressing his opinion, so here is mine:
First and foremost, I believe in God. I believe in the word of God. I'm not going to sit here and try to convince anyone that the Bible is outdated, a work of fiction, or irrelevant because I don't believe any of those things to be true. I know exactly what the Bible says about homosexuality. But I don't want to focus on that. I think that part of the Bible has been focused on enough as it is. I want to focus on two things: First, what exactly constitutes a traditional family and when did politicians (who are notorious for cheating, lying, and general acts of douche baggery...John Edwards, anyone?!) suddenly decide they care so much and secondly, what do hate and hypocrisy have to do with anything?
I get it you guys, I really do. We all wish it was 1950 and we had a family with the loving, hard-working dad, the mom who wore pearls while she vacuumed and had dinner on the table by six pm sharp. The perfect family rounded out by two perfect children (a boy and a girl, both honor roll students, she would be a cheerleader, he would be captain of the football team, naturally), an adorable dog and a white picket fence. A good old fashioned traditional family living happily ever after. In the land of delusions.
The truth (which is probably fairly obvious to all of us by now) is that we don't live in that world. Families don't look like that, and the reason they don't isn't because of homosexuality. Gay people didn't ruin marriage or put a scar on the face of the traditional family. Straight people did actually, with a little thing called divorce and worse, extra marital affairs that lead to divorce. I'm not saying that I'm anti-divorce (unless you're a Kardashian) but divorce put a whole new spin on families. Blended families were created. Kids spent weekdays with family number one and weekends with family number two. White picket fences were replaced with pull-out couches and bribing your kid into liking you more than the other parent. And yet, no one is saying divorce should be illegal because making divorce illegal would be taking away from people's rights, nor are there any limits placed on how many times people should get married or divorced for the same reason; No one wants their right to marry on a whim, get divorced three days later, and remarry a week after that taken away because it would be unfair and unconstitutional. Hmmm. How interesting.
My other big issue when people talk about traditional families is the hypocrisy factor. Everyone's favorite nut-job Sarah Palin tweeted pictures of her and her husband at Chick-Fil-A last week with huge smiles and even bigger, greasy bags overflowing with waffle fries. I found this development especially interesting, given the fact that her daughter had a baby out of wedlock at seventeen to a guy who wants absolutely nothing to do with his own son. How, exactly, is that a traditional family? Or is it acceptable because her daughter isn't gay, so the rest can just be swept under the rug?
Maybe it's because I was raised in a non-traditional family by a single mother who had to work hard (and do it all by herself) to raise a family, but the way I see it, a child being raised by two dads or two moms who are committed to each other and love their child is twice the love and twice the parenting I had. To me, those kids are lucky. Those kids are blessed. Some might argue that I don't understand traditional values because of my childhood, and maybe they're right. But the person who raised me taught me to accept people for who they are and to not judge because it isn't my place to judge anyone. And right now, that lesson seems infinitely more valuable than a white picket fence.
My second point is, no matter what your opinion or what you decide is right or wrong at the end of the day (so long as it's not a politician making the decision for you), the hatred has to stop. I've seen enough "God hates Gay People" signs to last three lifetimes and each and every one makes me sick to my stomach. Know who God hates? Absolutely no one. Anyone who thinks it's okay to say God hates anyone needs to go back and read one of the most famous Bible quotes ever, John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that He gave His only son". I've read it a million times and I've never noticed a footnote that says *Unless you're gay or *Unless you're a woman or *Unless you like Batman better than Spiderman. Here's some food for thought: After Sermon on the Mount, Jesus was approached by a leper, who's flesh was literally crumbling off of his face, asking to be healed. Back then, it was against Jewish law and custom for Jesus to even touch this person because he was "unclean". He could have been considered a heretic for even acknowledging the man, but instead saw that we are all people, deep down we all need love and acceptance, no matter how different we may be, and he chose to heal him. Talk about someone who understood the importance of doing the right thing, no matter what the people around you consider "right" or "wrong". It would be nice to see even a little bit of that spirit these days.
Yes, the Bible speaks against homosexuality, calling it a sin. And yes, a sin is a sin is a sin. I get it. But is hatred an appropriate response? Is ignorance an appropriate response? Far more times than homosexuality, the Bible talks about loving each other as we love ourselves, accepting one another, and not judging one another, treating others as we would want to be treated. One of my favorite stories in the Bible is John 8:2 in which a woman who is accused of adultery is brought by her accusers to stand before Jesus. He doesn't condone the sin of adultery, but he recognizes that the men who brought her to him are sinners too, and are hypocrites for trying to single her out as a sinner when they were sinners too, just for different reasons. Back then, the punishment for things like adultery was being stoned to death and Jesus challenged the men to face their own hypocrisy by saying that "He who is without sin may cast (throw) the first stone". My point is, no one in the world is without sin of some sort, and yet here we are, throwing rocks at each other, so ready to think that we're "good" and we're living "the right way" and someone else is "wrong" or that their sin is any worse than ours. It's not. There's no magic chart that lists sin in order from harmless to harmful. It's easy to be a hypocrite, to point out what people are doing wrong to take attention and accountability away from ourselves. It's infinitely harder to take accountability for our actions (or sins) and to realize that when it boils down to it, we're all the same.
I see it this way: If God truly thinks homosexuality is wrong, that's His place to decide, not mine. All I know is that we are all perishable and I want to spend the limited time I have on this earth loving people, not judging them. I believe we should all have access to the same rights and privileges. We are all human beings. It's a crappy world and we should be in it together, not constantly looking for yet another way to be divided. I think whether you agree with me or not (just for the record, most people in my life fall into the "or not" category, and that's okay with me) I think we should at least agree to treat one another with respect and kindness, no matter what side of the debate we fall on. I have kids to raise in this crazy place and I want them to understand and exercise tolerance, acceptance, open-mindedness and to love with their whole hearts. If that means never again stepping foot in an establishment that doesn't abide by those things, then so be it.
My point of this blog/amateur Bible study/rant is that, despite being a Christian, I don't stand with companies like Chick-Fil-A. I believe that being a Christian shouldn't automatically mean that I don't support gay marriage. I do support it. I support anything that gives people the rights they deserve and showcases us as equals because we are all equal. I love God and I also love all of the people He created, whether they're black, white, gay, straight, batman, or whatever. I don't think I should have to choose between one or the other. You can think what you want, but that's what my religion means to me.
So all of you Mike Huckabees, Sarah Palins, and Dan Cathys of the world, please do me a favor. Yes, I might be a Christian like you, but clearly our similarities end there. Don't be so quick to lump us all together.
I can only hope that some day everyone in the world will be allowed to marry the person they love more than anything. It's a great experience and we should all have the right to make it our own.
I thought long and hard about whether I wanted to address this issue or not and to be honest, I wasn't really planning on it. It's tough. There's really no right or wrong answer (although plenty of people are willing to disagree with me on that). There are varying opinions, even within my own family. It's sticky, uncomfortable, and controversial, much more so than anything I've ever attempted to write about. It makes breast feeding and 50 Shades of Gray look like flowers and lollipops and given the fact that I got more than my fair share of backlash for writing about those issues, I had all but decided not to touch this one with a fifty-foot pole.
But then Chick-Fil-A happened. Suddenly it was an issue of a Christian organization donating money to anti-gay marriage organizations because they wanted to maintain the "traditional family". Suddenly it got personal. It got personal because I, like the president of Chick-Fil-A, am a Christian. But maybe I bought the wrong version of the Bible, because in mine Christianity is not synonymous with hatred. It's not synonymous with ignorance. It speaks about loving people and accepting them for who they are, no matter how different they are from you. While part of me thinks "Hey, it's his money, he can donate it to whatever he wants" a louder, stronger part of me thinks that Dan Cathy could have found a much better cause to donate to: Food banks, literacy programs, churches...anyone who would be willing to take millions of dollars and put that money towards a good cause, and to genuinely help people who are in need. I'm at a loss to understand how anti-anything organizations actually help anyone.
Before I get too ahead of myself, I want to express how grateful I am to live in a country with free speech rights, a place where everyone can express their opinion, and express it in a peaceful, thoughtful, intelligent way (if they so choose). Dan Cathy certainly had no problem expressing his opinion, so here is mine:
First and foremost, I believe in God. I believe in the word of God. I'm not going to sit here and try to convince anyone that the Bible is outdated, a work of fiction, or irrelevant because I don't believe any of those things to be true. I know exactly what the Bible says about homosexuality. But I don't want to focus on that. I think that part of the Bible has been focused on enough as it is. I want to focus on two things: First, what exactly constitutes a traditional family and when did politicians (who are notorious for cheating, lying, and general acts of douche baggery...John Edwards, anyone?!) suddenly decide they care so much and secondly, what do hate and hypocrisy have to do with anything?
I get it you guys, I really do. We all wish it was 1950 and we had a family with the loving, hard-working dad, the mom who wore pearls while she vacuumed and had dinner on the table by six pm sharp. The perfect family rounded out by two perfect children (a boy and a girl, both honor roll students, she would be a cheerleader, he would be captain of the football team, naturally), an adorable dog and a white picket fence. A good old fashioned traditional family living happily ever after. In the land of delusions.
The truth (which is probably fairly obvious to all of us by now) is that we don't live in that world. Families don't look like that, and the reason they don't isn't because of homosexuality. Gay people didn't ruin marriage or put a scar on the face of the traditional family. Straight people did actually, with a little thing called divorce and worse, extra marital affairs that lead to divorce. I'm not saying that I'm anti-divorce (unless you're a Kardashian) but divorce put a whole new spin on families. Blended families were created. Kids spent weekdays with family number one and weekends with family number two. White picket fences were replaced with pull-out couches and bribing your kid into liking you more than the other parent. And yet, no one is saying divorce should be illegal because making divorce illegal would be taking away from people's rights, nor are there any limits placed on how many times people should get married or divorced for the same reason; No one wants their right to marry on a whim, get divorced three days later, and remarry a week after that taken away because it would be unfair and unconstitutional. Hmmm. How interesting.
My other big issue when people talk about traditional families is the hypocrisy factor. Everyone's favorite nut-job Sarah Palin tweeted pictures of her and her husband at Chick-Fil-A last week with huge smiles and even bigger, greasy bags overflowing with waffle fries. I found this development especially interesting, given the fact that her daughter had a baby out of wedlock at seventeen to a guy who wants absolutely nothing to do with his own son. How, exactly, is that a traditional family? Or is it acceptable because her daughter isn't gay, so the rest can just be swept under the rug?
Maybe it's because I was raised in a non-traditional family by a single mother who had to work hard (and do it all by herself) to raise a family, but the way I see it, a child being raised by two dads or two moms who are committed to each other and love their child is twice the love and twice the parenting I had. To me, those kids are lucky. Those kids are blessed. Some might argue that I don't understand traditional values because of my childhood, and maybe they're right. But the person who raised me taught me to accept people for who they are and to not judge because it isn't my place to judge anyone. And right now, that lesson seems infinitely more valuable than a white picket fence.
My second point is, no matter what your opinion or what you decide is right or wrong at the end of the day (so long as it's not a politician making the decision for you), the hatred has to stop. I've seen enough "God hates Gay People" signs to last three lifetimes and each and every one makes me sick to my stomach. Know who God hates? Absolutely no one. Anyone who thinks it's okay to say God hates anyone needs to go back and read one of the most famous Bible quotes ever, John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that He gave His only son". I've read it a million times and I've never noticed a footnote that says *Unless you're gay or *Unless you're a woman or *Unless you like Batman better than Spiderman. Here's some food for thought: After Sermon on the Mount, Jesus was approached by a leper, who's flesh was literally crumbling off of his face, asking to be healed. Back then, it was against Jewish law and custom for Jesus to even touch this person because he was "unclean". He could have been considered a heretic for even acknowledging the man, but instead saw that we are all people, deep down we all need love and acceptance, no matter how different we may be, and he chose to heal him. Talk about someone who understood the importance of doing the right thing, no matter what the people around you consider "right" or "wrong". It would be nice to see even a little bit of that spirit these days.
Yes, the Bible speaks against homosexuality, calling it a sin. And yes, a sin is a sin is a sin. I get it. But is hatred an appropriate response? Is ignorance an appropriate response? Far more times than homosexuality, the Bible talks about loving each other as we love ourselves, accepting one another, and not judging one another, treating others as we would want to be treated. One of my favorite stories in the Bible is John 8:2 in which a woman who is accused of adultery is brought by her accusers to stand before Jesus. He doesn't condone the sin of adultery, but he recognizes that the men who brought her to him are sinners too, and are hypocrites for trying to single her out as a sinner when they were sinners too, just for different reasons. Back then, the punishment for things like adultery was being stoned to death and Jesus challenged the men to face their own hypocrisy by saying that "He who is without sin may cast (throw) the first stone". My point is, no one in the world is without sin of some sort, and yet here we are, throwing rocks at each other, so ready to think that we're "good" and we're living "the right way" and someone else is "wrong" or that their sin is any worse than ours. It's not. There's no magic chart that lists sin in order from harmless to harmful. It's easy to be a hypocrite, to point out what people are doing wrong to take attention and accountability away from ourselves. It's infinitely harder to take accountability for our actions (or sins) and to realize that when it boils down to it, we're all the same.
I see it this way: If God truly thinks homosexuality is wrong, that's His place to decide, not mine. All I know is that we are all perishable and I want to spend the limited time I have on this earth loving people, not judging them. I believe we should all have access to the same rights and privileges. We are all human beings. It's a crappy world and we should be in it together, not constantly looking for yet another way to be divided. I think whether you agree with me or not (just for the record, most people in my life fall into the "or not" category, and that's okay with me) I think we should at least agree to treat one another with respect and kindness, no matter what side of the debate we fall on. I have kids to raise in this crazy place and I want them to understand and exercise tolerance, acceptance, open-mindedness and to love with their whole hearts. If that means never again stepping foot in an establishment that doesn't abide by those things, then so be it.
My point of this blog/amateur Bible study/rant is that, despite being a Christian, I don't stand with companies like Chick-Fil-A. I believe that being a Christian shouldn't automatically mean that I don't support gay marriage. I do support it. I support anything that gives people the rights they deserve and showcases us as equals because we are all equal. I love God and I also love all of the people He created, whether they're black, white, gay, straight, batman, or whatever. I don't think I should have to choose between one or the other. You can think what you want, but that's what my religion means to me.
So all of you Mike Huckabees, Sarah Palins, and Dan Cathys of the world, please do me a favor. Yes, I might be a Christian like you, but clearly our similarities end there. Don't be so quick to lump us all together.
I can only hope that some day everyone in the world will be allowed to marry the person they love more than anything. It's a great experience and we should all have the right to make it our own.
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