Happy Easter. For many Christians Easter is the holiest day of the year, surpassing Christmas. Easter is the payoff of eternal life in exchange for Christ’s suffering. I was raised to be an evangelical christian and I embraced my faith and every cockamamie concept spewing out of the evangelical community for years. I didn’t leave Christianity as much as the current trends of evangelicals left me. My father and mother had they continued to live, would be appalled at what passes for the Christian faith these days.
I was taught to not fear the theory of evolution as a challenge to the creation story, but as a way that God could make life on Earth happen. I remember my Dad saying, “To think God created the Earth without so much as a metaphorical hammer and screw driver is nuts. The real wonder of Evolution is the Miracle that it seemably worked. Anything left without care usually rots to dust.” That’s my Dad when he was at his best. He accepted science and didn’t need to take the Bible literally. That isn’t to say he didn’t believe the Bible was the inerrant word of God, because he did believe that; but he also believed that sometimes the meaning behind the words of the Bible weren’t all that clear. In fact, he would also say, “Christians miss the mark, we have become so arrogant that we presume to tell the Jews what their holy writings mean. The Jews had the Old Testament first and understood them then as they understand them now. True, the New Testament says the Jews of old didn’t recognize Jesus as the Messiah, but we also need to remember that our prophesies also say the Christians will not recognize the false prophet either.” As time went on I would be shamed for accepting these lessons from my parents on faith, evolution and the inerrancy of the Bible by people who held a more legalistic approach to Christianity.
The one thing I liked about my Dad was that he accepted (some of) his failings. My Dad was a mixed bag. Neither all good or all bad. He had his moments of unbelievable kindness and also some incredible bouts of insensitive cruelty. Like many Christians he struggled with “sin” what was acceptable and not acceptable. He hated hypocrisy while being a hypocrite. He opposed racism while being that Northern needling type of racist. He hated facing his own hypocrisy and was likely to explode when it was brought to his attention. It was a marvel to behold as a kid growing up, not knowing which lines were fuzzy as opposed to absolute.
No line was fuzzier than sex and nudity. We moved to the middle of Ohio toward the end of my first grade. As a new kid, the neighborhood made sure I knew that my teacher MISS Ball (not her real name and I’ll get to that later) had two children. Not Ms. Ball or Mrs. Ball, but MISS Ball. My limited experience in NY exposed me to several women led families from husbands dying or abandoning them and I said so. “NO! You don’t understand! It’s MISS Ball! She’s NEVER been married!” That little town had a thing about public shaming. Whenever you did something wrong the entire room would erupt in a single word “UMMMMMM!” Very loud. Very scary to a seven year old. Whenever you heard it, you hoped it wasn’t directed at you. Miss Ball, a woman in her forties, the mother of two adult children, was a grim, bitter first grade teacher; a far cry from my beloved teacher I had left in New York. We despised each other on sight. I now understand she didn’t know how to evaluate me and decide if I was ready to move on to second grade with less than 10 weeks to the end of the school year, but all I could think at the time was she was mean. I thought she was mean because the whole town was mean in how they shamed her. That’s quite a lesson to absorb at age seven.
Shame is a powerful weapon. It works with “guiding” children, silencing women by threat of humiliation. It works on men who don’t act “manly” enough. I knew shame was something to avoid, but I didn’t understand what deserved shame and what didn’t.
When I told my faily about MISS Ball at the dinner table, I was surprised that my parents directed me to try and get along. Overlook it and be Christian in my attitude toward Miss Ball. The reason I changed MISS Ball’s name is because although she died, she has living children and grandchildren who might not like a reminder of something they shouldn’t be ashamed of and yet, I know they could still be sensitive about her lack of marital status.
That was the start of some very confusing years. Clothing choices, TV choices and reading material were heavily censored, but my Dad has a stash of Playboy magazines hidden in the closet. We went to church several times a week, almost never missing a Sunday. We said grace before every meal and worked just about every church charitable event and went to conference after conference. We never cussed. I wasn’t allowed to have pierced ears. Tattoos were forbidden. Once my mother threw out a pair of shorts that I had cut shorter because they became indecent (there were still mid thigh) and yet my parents drove an hour away to see Fanny Hill (because they didn’t want anyone in town to know they went to see that show). Over those same years a family member used both my sister and me as a sex toy, but when it was brought to their attention my sister and I were somehow at fault for allowing that to happen and shamed in a suffocating, soul crushing manner. My sister “repented” and said she made the whole thing up. I had none of that, I wasn’t lying about it. So there! (There were some tense years after that, but I still loved my parents and managed to keep them in my life.)
Like I said, a mixed bag.
Over the years I’ve watched a lot of shaming going on over Bill Clinton, but not as much about his peers, Clarence Thomas, Newt Gringrich or Denny Hastert. I’m watching jerry Fallwell Jr. and Franklin Graham embarrass themselves defending a President who not only cheats on his wife, but cheats on his mistress. I’m watching dear friends who still faithfully go to church every week anguish over how they can support the current President. “At least he won’t take our guns away!” To which I reply, “Can you seriously imagine Jesus with a gun?” Oh, I know the story of Jesus overturning the money changers’ tables at the Temple, but the money changers all lived. That’s more than I can say about Ananias and Sapphira who held back some cash after selling some property from the early church that lived as a commune (see Acts 5:1). Then, I hear, “At least he’s pro-life!”. “Are you sure about that?” I asked. “Well, at least he’ll end abortion.” I replied, “Have you even absorbed the Passover Story? What happened to the first born of the Egyptian families that didn’t have the lamb’s blood painted across their door? They died, right? Do you know how many times the Hebrews were commanded to kill the womenfolk (who have lain with a man) of their enemies by slashing through their stomachs? That’s not pro-life.” There’s a census described in Numbers that doesn’t count babies unless they are male and at least 30 days old. I could go on, but what I am sure of is that this absolute anti-abortion attitude of many evangelical zealots is still covered by the blood of Christ of their professed faith. A fact, that many evangelicals choose to not acknowledge or mention.
It’s very difficult to get a devoted (some would say brain washed) Christian to seriously examine their beliefs — it’s too painful a process for them. My evangelical peers have sold their birth right for a few judges and fail to see trading self-deceit for a few judges is an obstacle in their faith. They will justify lying to desperate women to deceive them into remaining pregnant at crisis pregnancy centers; failing to see deception is just as spiritually harmful. They will overlook a pussy grabbing philanderer if it will get them what they want. Hypocrisy be damned. They are using a man, who by their own standards, “lives in perpetual sin” to achieve their “Christian” goals and fail to see how that disgusts those outside the church who see Christians as anything but Christian.
Stormy Daniels is bringing a breath of fresh air to the moral debate. I love her for saying she is not a sexual victim. I blinked in some surprise at her separation of consent with desire. Of all the things she said, that had to hurt the egomaniac the most. She presents a confounding image to those who profess moral superiority. She’s juxtaposes being a caring mother with being a paid sex worker with a compelling grace and humor. I’ve never met her, but can say I would love to have lunch with her some day which is more than I can say for the current President and the lot of sycophants sucking up to him. Stormy Daniels does not accept shaming and I respect her for that.
Which brings me to my Easter message. Live and let live. Love and let love. Think twice before throwing that stone. The plank in your eye might be getting in the way of you seeing straight.