Wow, I’m a bit of a tool. Way back on December 12, Bill tagged me for a meme and he even told me about it but I didn’t read his comment until just now so I didn’t know.

SORRY!

OK, here goes.

Five Things You Probably Didn’t Know About Me

1. I’m fat, and I self-identify as fat. I’m also fat positive, which means I don’t think it’s wrong or bad or even unhealthy to be fat. If you call me a fat bitch, I won’t take it as an insult ’cause neither of those words is an insult in my vocabulary.

2. I’m allergic to wheat, eggs, and dairy. Not in an anaphylactic way (like my brother is to nuts) but just in the way that they make me feel crappy so I avoid them. ‘Course sometimes I cheat, usually when chocolate or whipped cream is involved. My two best friends are vegan and they cheat under those same circumstances (one of them also cheats for brie).

3. When I was a preteen I spent endless hours playing out in the drainage ditch behind our house. Though it was a human-made feature, it became a habitat to all manner of wildlife including ducks, red-winged blackbirds, snails and frogs. One spring my mom even had to suffer me having an aquarium with tadpoles in it on her desk! I would make little habitats for the frogs in an old baby bathtub.

4. Speaking of my childhood, because the subdivision we live in wasn’t fully developed when I was young, there were a lot of empty lots in the neighbourhood. My brother and I used to play ‘Pioneers.’ That involved packing up our toy wagon with blankets, dolls and other playthings and carting them out into the empty lots, and picking the tall grasses and pretending to cook them.

5. I often fantasize about surprising random people at bus stops by offering them a free ride to wherever they’re going. Sometimes when I’m waiting at a bus stop I wish that someone I know would drive up and give me a ride — this has happened to me, but as you can imagine it’s a very rare occurrence. It’s almost always nicer and easier to get a ride than to take the bus. So when I see people waiting at bus stops when I’m driving a car, especially when it’s cold or otherwise inclement, I have this desire to stop and ask them if I can take them wherever they’re going. I would never do this, though, mostly because I don’t think most people would take me up on the offer. The would think I was a freak.

Ooops, almost forgot to tag. I herethuswith tag:

Brother Mark of Shifting Shifted Shifty
Steve of Stupid Church People
Lindsey of The Wolf that Lives in Lindsey
Pearlbear of Metacentricities
Kevin of Wasp Jerky

So I guess awhile ago I said something about writing in this blog more regularly? Turns out I was full of shit apparently. I’m not entirely sure why I haven’t been writing — I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that I’m not feeling particularly theist these days and don’t know how to go about religious discussion bearing that fact.

I haven’t been keeping up with the blogs of those folks you see on the sidebar (and some who aren’t on the sidebar — I do try to stray outside the mutual admiration society every now and again). This has been a mistake, as I see some of you have been making startling, intruiging, thought-provoking posts and hopefully I’ll find it within myself to respond in kind.

Anyway. As you may recall, I’d given up going to church (First Church of Suburbia, herewith known as FCoS) at the start of the summer; I have not returned. I had planned to keep going to the “College and Career” “small group” (it’s not small — it has an average of 15 people). And I had gone… for the first few weeks at least. But I’m done. Now I’m done with both services and Smallies, so I guess I’ve quit church entirely now? I dunno.

The reason I quit Smallies (or, at least, begun a break. Maybe in a few weeks I’ll calm down) is… well, there’s no one reason. But I guess I’m just tired of spending two hours a week being one of two badasses in the group, trying to push boundaries and bring up new ideas and ways of looking at things that don’t involve the usual Christian platitudes and Sunday-School answers. I’m not interested in dealing with a group where thought-provoking discussions are shut down (And where Christianity isn’t a patriarchal religion, apparently).

I don’t really want to get into it too much in detail because a certain amount of confidence should be kept. But I’m sure you can extrapolate.

I know some of you are curious about the outcome of the meeting with the worship leader guy a few weeks back. Well, at the meeting proper I behaved myself (that is, kept the snarky comments to a bare minimum) but also totally chickened out and didn’t say any of the things I was planning on saying, due to the presence of some people who I didn’t really know if I could trust with my oh-so-radical ideas (I guess I’m really more scared of rolled eyes than I realized).

I mentioned in the comments of that last entry that the worship leader is in fact a really awesome guy, and he proved that by emailing me afterward and saying he was open to hearing my actual real thoughts. So, I told him. And gave him a link to this blog. And he didn’t write back for a week, and I thought maybe he was scared off but today he wrote back and was exceedingly cool in his response to everything I said about gender and even the non-theism thing.

Anyway.

I wonder if I should write a letter to the “small” group or something? My brother told me he’d explain my absence, since my frustrations are shared equally by him (the only difference is that he has an actual belief in Jesus to keep him going).

Ugh.

I’ve talked before about how throughout my young life, I found the spiritual, worshipful “feelings” elusive. I’ve also said that I’ve had far more religious experiences in a smoky club listening to a band or rapper as I have had in a service or a Bible study.

So when the beginning of July rolls around and with it the Winnipeg Folk Festival, I get pretty excited. I get excited knowing that I’ll get a taste of that intangible, ethereal zeitgeist that results when thousands of like-minded people gather in one place in a spirit of celebration. Ostensibly that is what one could/should get in church, but we all know it rarely works out that way.

Today I had probably the best festival day I’ve ever had. I actually hoisted myself out of bed (I was up late shaking booty to the Refugee All Stars of Sierra Leone) and arrived in time for the annual gospel workshop. “Workshops” are concerts at the festival where two, three or more artists/bands gather on the same stage, under the umbrella of some theme (some titles are “Old Songs, New Songs,” “Percussion Junction,” “One Fiddle to Rule Them All”). Ideally, the participants of the workshop will join in on harmonies and guitar parts of each others’ songs, sometimes jamming and creating entirely new tunes, or adding a bassline or a beat where otherwise there would be none.

“Working on a Building (Gospel Workshop)” featured American bluesmen the Holmes Brothers, local Mennonite bluegrass quartet House of Doc, and my personal favourite, Austin singer-songwriter/guitarist Ruthie Foster. Ruthie was raised singing and playing in the church in central Texas, and there really aren’t words to describe the magic she is on stage. Her voice is so massive and effortless, she really does merit comparisons to the great ladies of song (those comparisons are tossed around so often. This time I mean it). You listen to her voice and you just believe that everything is going to be OK. She’ll raise the roof even if there isn’t one, like at an outdoor festival when the only roof is the sky and so she’ll just raise that. In the workshop following the gospel one, she shared the stage with Bruce Cockburn and Richard Thompson and completely held her own. That’s how good she is.

She sang a song she wrote inspired by her mother, who, when Ruthie was in college, told her that education was fine but “you’ve got a soul to save.” She sang the song she sang at her grandmother’s funeral, two weeks ago. “It’s alright,” she said, “She’s fine. She’s here today… she’s everywhere.” And then she went on to sing a variation of Amazing Grace, about how God saw past her faults and saw her needs.

It’s stuff like that that can almost make a girl believe.

I mentioned Bruce Cockburn, who is well-known for being a “secular” Christian artist. I ranted and whined last week about Christian music, and Bruce indeed is one of those rare artists who manages to be Christian and also good. He sang “All the Diamonds” today, and… well, it was just really beautiful. Go read the lyrics if you’re not familiar. He also did “Lovers in a Dangerous Time,” which was also beautiful.

I’m not sure what my point is here. Maybe to say that I can understand why so many people are so attached to the church, because there are so many qualities of church in a festival like this: the fellowship, the transcendence of music (which I have come to believe is inherent to music itself, in some sort of magical, unknowable way, and not at all unique to Christian musicians, as a former choir director of mine actually claimed), the knowledge that you can go to this one place and be rewarded for your efforts with this amazing feeling.

Or maybe that inspiration can be found in many places. That one woman’s voice can be a salve, just as a few lines of poetry in the Old Testament can be. That dancing in the sun is what we should have been doing all along.

technorati tags: folk, music, bruce+cockburn, ruthie+foster, christianity, religion, church

So I think I’m gonna quit church again. This week really managed to rub me the wrong way. Does the worship leader have to announce that “One thing we all have in common is that we believe Jesus is _______” (fill in the blanks). Look, I know evangelicals have a distaste for all things pomo, but can’t we at least acknowledge that everyone in the service might not accept the same doctrinal points? Forget disagreements between Christians, because individual churches do tend to be communities of like-minded people as an obvious result. But aren’t you alienating any of those precious “seekers” who might be in the crowd, let alone semi-re-lapsed Christians like me?

To quote Gob Bluth (I’ve been on an Arrested Development bender lately), come on!

Then the sermon was all about how people who are believing in Jesus are going to heaven and those who don’t are going to hell. Yawn. Actually, it might have been more interesting but I got thirsty in the first five minutes of the sermon and had to take a water break, then I got sidetracked in the lobby by various things like two-month-old babies named Tobias (coincidence? I think not!).

I’d like to take this opportunity to shout out to Eddie(F) at Edge of Faith who, after much deliberation and study, is leaving the Christian faith for good. Now he gets to enjoy the patronizing remarks of still-Christians who comment that this is all part of his “journey.” In my experience, there is nothing more obnoxious than that, because the implication in the word “journey” is that journeys are OK as long as you end up with Jesus in the end. Stephen Colbert put it well last week at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner:

“And though I am a committed Christian, I believe everyone has the right to their own religion - be you Hindu, Jewish, or Muslim, I believe there are infinite paths to accepting Jesus Christ as your personal savior.”

It’s funny because it’s terrifying because it’s true.

technorati tags: stephen colbert, christianity, religion, politics, church, jesus

Steve and Josh are back from a hiatus for a second season of Stupid Church People and you have no idea how glad that makes me.

I was very excited for a few months when I discovered all these progressive blogs and started reading feminist theology in earnest. It was great, for a few months, learning new things and new perspectives. But now I’m afraid I’m right back where I started. I’ve read enough to know that feminism and Christianity aren’t mutually exclusive, and I’ve read enough to know that there are people who are finding new and interesting ways to practice and live faith in the modern world. But it still remains that Christianity is really difficult. It’s difficult to believe all the stuff you’re supposed to believe, and no amount of navel-gazing or study is going to change that.

At least, that’s how I feel right now.

Because when you think about it, Christianity is a really ridiculous thing, involving strange stories about fish and incidents of grotesque violence. You read the Gospels and you wonder, did Jesus even want anyone to understand his parables? Did he understand the parables, or was he just making it up? (I know I’m creeping over the heretic/blasphemer line here, but I don’t care anymore.)

There’s no way the Bible is completely “true,” so how is a person supposed to base her life on the teachings, stories, and traditions contained within it?

Look, I know I’m not the first person to go on about these things and people might even say that “wrestling” with these questions is the foundation of faith. I’m not pretending to be original, here. I just personally find it frustrating that I’m still wrestling. This might be a personal failing — a distaste for the incomplete, a latent strain of perfectionism that demands that the dots be connected and the pieces arranged so I can relax. Having a chronic illness has dulled these tendencies in my general life (I don’t have the extra energy to spare being all anal about stuff) but maybe hasn’t bled into my spiritual life. Not that I like to draw a distinction between the different kinds of “lives.” It’s all one life, to me.

I went to Church Pomo again on Sunday and it turns out a woman I know from childhood attends there and has in fact been involved since the very beginning of that church. She and I attended the same school for two years: grade one and grade nine. Grade nine was spent at a private Christian school, you can use your imagination about how that went. Also I almost choked to death in her back yard when I was six, but my mom gave me the Heimlich Maneuver and I survived.

THANK GOD.

technorati tags: stupid church people, church, christianity, religion

I’m the daughter of a pastor, colloquially known in some Christian circles as a PK. I freakin’ hate that abbreviation. Some people wear it like a badge of honour, some people use it to belittle and box-in. There are plenty of reasons to hate the label and that’s why I’ve never applied it to myself or to anyone else to whom it may apply.

My experience is quite atypical of that of many children of clergy, actually. Growing up in the church is a difficult and precarious thing for any kid, whether her parent is the pastor, the moderator, the women’s ministries coordinator, the pianist, the organist, whatever. When I look back on my childhood, I think the difficult aspects of the church stemmed from that sort of general involvement rather than the fact that my dad was the pastor.

Like I said, my experience is not typical. I lucked out and spent most of my growing-up years in a remarkably functional church, where there was little discord. Whatever there was my parents successfully hid from me. My brother and I were treated well. I’ve heard stories about other clergy kids being told things like, “You’re the pastor’s son/daughter, you have to set an example.” No one ever said that to me. Or if they did, I blocked it out of my memory because it’s complete bullshit.

When I look back on my life, being a pastor’s kid meant mostly one thing: presents.

When I was two, we moved out to a parsonage in the country. The rambling house was right next to the church, in the midst of wheat and barley fields cut into squares by gravel roads. My mom was in the middle of a difficult pregnancy, so on Christmas Eve she didn’t attend the service. But after the service, the doorbell started ringing, various parishoners seeking an audience. Not to chide her for her non-attendance (after all, physician-ordered bedrest is an excuse even the most religious can abide). No, they wanted to drop off the presents, for me. Granted, I was a really adorable (if moody) child, but that Christmas Eve set a precedent for years to come. Basically, being the pastor’s kid meant getting special treatment. More attention, more love. And it really was love — presents are nice, but I always felt that people cared about me, and even as a kid I knew that was more important than trinkets.

I never really had any pastor-kid friends until I went to bible school — there, four of my closest friends were children of clergy, and because the school was a denominational one, two of them had lived in the very same rural parsonage I had. In fact, one still did live there. It was super cool to go there on weekends and eat real food and sleep in the basement where I had watched countless hours of Mr. Dressup and built blanket forts with my brother.

Anyway, I don’t think my experience was much different from that of any kid with very devout parents. Which is good, I guess.

Sometimes I wonder what makes one church-raised kid rebel/resist their religion and others not. What makes one person able to incorporate their history and childhood faith into an adult one? Why is it for some a seamless transition, and others not?

In my case I wonder if it’s just flat-out a personality issue. I’m a cranky bitch, always have been. “Strong-willed” is the term, I believe. Though, I’d like to think my struggle with/against Christianity is about more than some kind of inborn antipathy.

Part of me has always been jealous of the people for whom faith is so easy. For whom religion is easy. The people whose eyes close tight in prayer and you know they really believe, that the structures and the symbols all make sense to them.

As a kid, I was always waiting for, praying for that moment when it would be the same way for me. But now I don’t think that moment will ever come, and I have to be OK with that — I have to accept it. Which is harder than it sounds.

technorati tags: childhood, religion, church, christianity, prayer, faith

I have lots to write about, or at least I think I do, but for some reason I’m having trouble putting fingertip to keyboard. There are lots of things swimming in my head and yet…

Before I get to any of those things I have to write this post.

I’m warning you, it’s going to be long, personal, and all about MEEEEE. I’m going to go back to the beginning and you might be bored to tears but I feel like I should provide some context. I hope I don’t regret this. Here’s me crossing my fingers.

OK.

What happened was a few years ago I decided to break up with Jesus. A clean break. Nothing fancy, nothing overdramatic. I just needed some time and space. As far as boyfriends go, Jesus is a time-consuming one. First of all, he’s never there. Don’t give me that bullshit about how Jesus is Always with Us because when was the last time you had a face to face talk with your Lord and Saviour? Believe me, I have no problems grasping the metaphysical mumbo jumbo but I still think that you can’t treat a relationship with God the same way you treat a relationship with another human being.

That’s a discussion for another time, though. I’m getting off track. I left the religion and, therefore, the church, much to my devout parents’ dismay. I tried to tell them, look, I’m just trying to figure things out. I never said I wouldn’t get back together with Jesus. But my mom said, well, how can you figure things out if you DON’T GO TO CHURCH? (Why is it that people always make that argument whenever someone leaves the church? Anyone who has left the church knows how stupid a statement that is, but the people making the statement never do.)

Then my dad got sick and almost died. He was rescued by staggering achievements in medical science and a bit of luck (or providence, depending on whom you ask). And after that all happened, I came to this realization that circumstance had robbed me of a certain luxury that so many of my peers have: the luxury of taking your parents/family for granted. I guess this normally doesn’t happen until later in life, usually after one or more parents is actually dead.

I always try to make a point of learning from other people’s mistakes. I also try to learn from the near misses.

I came out of that period of time in one’s youth when one wants to distance oneself from one’s family/parents as much as possible. I realized that I am not as independent as I thought I was and that I need my family to survive in a multitude of ways, blah-blah-community-cakes.

I should be clear: during my sojourn from the religion, I never stopped thinking about spirituality and related things. I never stopped trying to figure it out. Believe it or not, even my mom realized this, in time. She said, Jenny, I can tell you’ve found some peace. I was shocked when she said that, and a little more shocked when I realized she was right.

I decided to return to my old church community for two main reasons. First, that community had supported my family during the Time of Almost Death and I figured I owed it another chance. Second, religion and faith is a huge thing in my biological family on both sides. Faith is what brought my great-grandmothers over the ocean decades ago, faith is what sustains my mother, who lives a challenging, difficult life with grace and courage.

For better or for worse, this religion/faith/church is my culture. It’s where I come from, and maybe it’s not where I’m supposed to be going. I cannot for the life of me recall when or where I read this, but many Buddhists will tell those interested in Buddhist practice not to abandon their cultural religious traditions entirely, but rather to recognize the way Buddhism augments all religions, expands upon them. Or something. As I said, I don’t remember.

It’s not that I’m a Buddhist; it’s just that I want to honour the strengths of my forebears and try to find a place in the faith that formed the framework of their lives.

So that’s it. No transformation/conversion story. Just a decision to engage myself in the church community in addition to my private study. I went back to the church (and indeed the faith) with some rules. The first rule: no guilt. I wasn’t going to let the church or the people in it guilt me into anything. Anything I was going to do had to come naturally — praying, giving, volunteering, bible reading, whatever. So much of my childhood was spent feeling guilty — not for doing bad things, because, while I was quite a little jerk most of the time, I didn’t do any of the big ticket sins like have sex or drink or smoke. The guilt I felt most of the time had to do with religious practice, i.e. reading the bible, praying, having the “quiet time,” i.e. not doing those things regularly. I also felt guilty for not “feeling it” in church or in worship services or whatever. That I wasn’t “growing spiritually” the way other kids were. I was too busy feeling guilty for not being a good enough Christian that I didn’t have time feel guilty for being an ASSHOLE. Which I was. Which is not to say I’m not one now, but I’m trying to keep it down to a dull roar these days.

Anyway, now I’m not holding myself to that bullshit. I go to church, because I like to see my friends and hold babies. If I daydream during the sermon, I don’t beat myself up about it. I don’t take notes, and I don’t feel guilty about that, either. That’s the deal I struck with myself, and maybe even God. OK, I’ll come back to church, but there’s no pressure.

Maybe you’re reading this and you think it’s all pomo crap. If so: too bad, bitches. I don’t care, because I spent too long caring about that sort of thing and poisoning myself in the process.

Love,
Jenny

P.S. GOD IS A SHE
P.P.S. (Not really, I just said that to freak you out)
P.P.P.S. (But that doesn’t mean you can keep referring to God with male pronouns)
P.P.P.P.S. (At least, not on my blog watch)