Monthly Archives: December 2012

"It is important that we know where we come from …"

“It is important that we know where we come from,
because if you do not know where you come from,
then you don’t know where you are,
and if you don’t know where you are,
then you don’t know where you’re going.

And if you don’t know where your’re going,
you’re probably going wrong.”

_ Terry Pratchett, from Author’s Note in “I Shall Wear Midnight”

Shura Lopez-Beale: "I Didn’t Deserve to Lose You: An Open Letter to My Anti-Gay Parents"

For Shura Lopez-Beale, this is

“An Open Letter to My Anti-Gay Parents”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/shura-lopezbeale/i-didnt-deserve-to-lose-you-an-open-letter-to-my-anti-gay-parents_b_1963070.html?utm_hp_ref=gay-voices

And what she writes, is relevant for anyone who is cast out of their family because the parents are stuck in ancient cognitive frames (thought boxes) where obedience and control are more important than love and growth.

Much love to any reader whose parents have done this to you.

Your parents did not deserve to have you.

Rev. Emily C. Heath on religous liberty

Link to a great article:

How to Determine If Your Religious Liberty Is Being Threatened in Just 10 Quick Questions

I’ll post reverend Emily Heath’s questions here.
You’ll find the scoring key in the article, along with some really good advice.

1. My religious liberty is at risk because:
A) I am not allowed to go to a religious service of my own choosing.
 B) Others are allowed to go to religious services of their own choosing.

2. My religious liberty is at risk because:
A) I am not allowed to marry the person I love legally, even though my religious community blesses my marriage.
 B) Some states refuse to enforce my own particular religious beliefs on marriage on those two guys in line down at the courthouse.

3. My religious liberty is at risk because:
A) I am being forced to use birth control.
 B) I am unable to force others to not use birth control.

4. My religious liberty is at risk because:
A) I am not allowed to pray privately.
 B) I am not allowed to force others to pray the prayers of my faith publicly.

5. My religious liberty is at risk because:
A) Being a member of my faith means that I can be bullied without legal recourse.
 B) I am no longer allowed to use my faith to bully gay kids with impunity.

6. My religious liberty is at risk because:
A) I am not allowed to purchase, read or possess religious books or material.
 B) Others are allowed to have access books, movies and websites that I do not like.

7. My religious liberty is at risk because:
A) My religious group is not allowed equal protection under the establishment clause.
 B) My religious group is not allowed to use public funds, buildings and resources as we would like, for whatever purposes we might like. 

8. My religious liberty is at risk because:
A) Another religious group has been declared the official faith of my country.
 B) My own religious group is not given status as the official faith of my country.

9. My religious liberty is at risk because:
A) My religious community is not allowed to build a house of worship in my community.
 B) A religious community I do not like wants to build a house of worship in my community.

10. My religious liberty is at risk because:
A) I am not allowed to teach my children the creation stories of our faith at home.
 B) Public school science classes are teaching science.

Oliver Burkeman: "Happiness is a glass half empty"


“Be positive, look on the bright side, stay focused on success: so goes our modern mantra. But perhaps the true path to contentment is to learn to be a loser”

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/jun/15/happiness-is-being-a-loser-burkeman

Well worth reading just for the information on “The Museum of Failed Products”, but there’s more.
Like this:

“Behind all of the most popular modern approaches to happiness and success is the simple philosophy of focusing on things going right. But ever since the first philosophers of ancient Greece and Rome, a dissenting perspective has proposed the opposite: that it’s our relentless effort to feel happy, or to achieve certain goals, that is precisely what makes us miserable and sabotages our plans. And that it is our constant quest to eliminate or to ignore the negative – insecurity, uncertainty, failure, sadness – that causes us to feel so insecure, anxious, uncertain or unhappy in the first place.

Yet this conclusion does not have to be depressing. Instead, it points to an alternative approach: a “negative path” to happiness that entails taking a radically different stance towards those things most of us spend our lives trying hard to avoid. This involves learning to enjoy uncertainty, embracing insecurity and becoming familiar with failure. In order to be truly happy, it turns out, we might actually need to be willing to experience more negative emotions – or, at the very least, to stop running quite so hard from them.”

And who are the good people?

Charlton Heston says: 

“Here’s my
credo. 
There are no good guns, 
There are no bad guns.
A gun in the
hands of a bad man is a bad thing.
Any gun in the
hands of a good man 
is no threat to anyone,
except bad
people.”
A lot of questions are jostling for starting position about this credo. 
I’ll leave it (and them) hanging for now.