Posted by used2b on April 13, 2005, at 22:28:09
In reply to Re: Salvation » used2b, posted by Dena on April 13, 2005, at 9:28:01
> I'm so sorry that you had that experience -- one that I imagine scarred you badly...It probably confused me but I can't tell if my confusion is a scar or if I was born this way. Maybe everybody is confused.
The force by which i was indoctrinated, as I recalled after the post was irrevocably published, was usually domestic. We were at times treated as bad kids at home for no reason apparent to me, and dutiful participation in religious rites was a way of towing the line in hopes of not suffering domestic violence. Otherwise, it was a sober, considerate, polite family.
Recovery, such as it is, from whatever confusion the experience might have caused involved reassessing not just the gospel, but the history of the entire publication by which we were indoctrinated. That meant reconsidering the Abrahamic construct of a chosen people. The only way I can make that seem true now, is to say, "Okay, Abe's children are god's chosen, but so are all the others." But I'm not sure that's what the documents really say in that part about all the stars bowing down to the one star.
And then to make true the construct of the Hebrew royal being god's way of telling us he loves us, I need to say, "Okay, he was a very helpful fellow, as the stories represent him, but if god is all love he sent everyone here to demonstrate his love, and caused everything that happens to us to happen out of love." Then it becomes "God sent the tsunami because god loves us," and "God sent Hitler because god loves us."
> Thanks for daring to write about your own experience. I only wish that more Christians could see how badly they represent God...
>
> Shalom, Dena
The most daring thing is writing on this board, without any well-defined guidelines for style, and where almost any statement can be deemed offensive if the administrator decides so. But I don't have much to lose, so it doesn't take that much courage. Courage often arises from fatigue, so it probably indicates fatigue from trying to satisfy unreasonable caretakers. Fortunately, my original caretakers learned to be much more reasonable with me and with each other after they no longer felt responsible for me.
p.s. If my reference to skepticism about the Abrahamic tradition, combined with the proposal that "god sent hitler" troubles you, rest assured -- if hitler and his ilk give any children of Abraham any more trouble such as they have before, I'll give my life to stop it, if that's what it takes. And I do mean ALL of Abe's children. So while I don't claim "salvation," I can't claim that I didn't learn self-sacrifice in Sunday school, which influenced me as a developing child.
poster:used2b
thread:482296
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/faith/20050312/msgs/483949.html