Facebook Affirmations, Vol. V: Pro-Life
In my news feed on Facebook I will be served a daily dose of Christian affirmations from friends. In this series of posts, which I call "Facebook Affirmations™," I will post and discuss some of these gems. Here's the affirmation for today:
Think of the children!
I don't often weigh in on abortion because my views on it are complicated and it's an even more controversial topic than religion. Since I will never personally know the joy -- or terror -- of being pregnant I feel that any view I adopt regarding a woman's reproductive rights ought to be every bit as compassionate as it is logical. Ultimately I feel it comes down to an individual woman's right to decide whether or not her body will be used as an incubator for a potential human being. Let's discuss the post above.
Family Ties
ne thing religious people cannot stress enough is that they're all about family. Their organizations even have names like Focus on the Family and the American Family Association (branded a hate group out of MS). For the most part I find this to be true so long as everyone's keeping the faith and maintaining the status quo. I can say from my upbringing (aside from corporal punishment and having no say in church attendance) that our Christian family was very tight-knit and we spent a lot of quality time together. It wasn't perfect, but it was far better than a lot of other families I've seen. Now, to clarify, some of these not-so-happy families I've seen are religious as well so it's not as though they have a corner on the market. I'm just speaking to the Christian view that family is important.
As I said, religious families are close-knit and happy so long as everyone's keeping the faith. They don't say, "The family that prays together stays together" for no reason. It's literally true. I found this out myself when I started to upset the status quo of my family and I was made to feel like an outcast. My family's treatment of me was mild compared to what some people endure at the hands of their religious parents, grandparents, and siblings.
You Don’t “Have” to Go to Church
s soon as I was old enough to figure out how much fun weekends were and how much shorter they seemed when you have to spend more than half of Sunday sitting in church I began to ask my parents if we really had to go to church. The conversations usually went something like this:
Jon: Do we have to go to church today?
Parent: No, you don't have to go to church today. You get to go to church today.
Jon: But I don't want to go to church.
Parent: You ought to be happy we have such a nice church to go to. Besides, you're not staying home alone. Now get a move on!
This was exasperating every single time. I'm sure it was frustrating for my parents as well. They wanted to raise their children in the church with good, Christian values and their children seemed to want to be little unwashed heathens. What irritated me the most about this exchange was the unreasonable nature of the argument. I, as an autonomous human being, didn't have the desire to spend most of my day cooped up in a building listening to people talk when I could be running around the woods with a toy gun, saving the world. My parents, as dictatorial heads of the family, didn't acknowledge my autonomy. How unfair.
Inferiority Complex
hen you grow up in Christianity, one thing is made very clear to you over and over: you are a horrible sinner and deserve to burn in Hell forever. This sentiment rears its head pretty early on, as soon as you're able to understand and repeat the name "Jesus." The adults begin to prime you for the doctrine of salvation through grace. In order to do this, you must first accept that you are undeserving of anything but the worst punishment imaginable. Just to clarify, this punishment can be presented in a number of ways. My family subscribed to the "lake of unquenchable fire, eternal torment and darkness with weeping and gnashing of teeth" doctrine. Other sects of Christianity view Hell as simply the complete lack of the presence of god. Still others view Hell as obliteration (which, Heaven aside, aligns quite nicely with the atheistic view that once you die you simply cease to exist).
"Please, just a single drop of water!"
Spare the Rod
s I said before, I don't remember much about my childhood. My earliest memory was my acceptance of Jesus into my heart and then nothing until about 10 years old. It's been suggested by more than one therapist that I've repressed those years because of abuse but I have no real reason to believe that's the case. Although, corporal punishment in my family was applied (pardon the pun) religiously.
This will hurt me more than it will hurt you.
I and my siblings were spanked with hands, belts, rulers and wooden spoons. I had a wooden spoon broken over my tush -- an occurrence over which my mom had voiced much lasting remorse. As long as I can remember, spanking was nearly the first line of correction and it wasn't until later in life that punishments like grounding were implemented. My dad always told me, "You're never too old for a spanking."
Jon Willis
"Yes, I've read the Bible; it's why I'm an atheist."
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