Sarahbeth Caplin's Blog, page 34

Jewish hair, Christian faith: excerpt from ‘Confessions of a Jew-ish Skeptic’

My one-time experience at a Jewish sleepaway camp (I know, I know, don’t get me started on the absurdity of the phrase “Jewish camp”) was full of, shall we say, unique experiences: from a production of The Sound of Music featuring nuns with popsicle-stick Stars of David instead of crosses to lively debates about who looked “most Jewish” and who could pass for a gentile. In that contest, I ranked somewhere in the middle with my coffee-brown curls and pale skin. The winner of the Most Likely to Pass for a Gentile award was a tall, blonde, blue-eyed girl who was half-German, half-Swedish. Before camp, I had no idea such a Jewish person could exist without the help of colored contacts and hair dye.

I never knew whether to take offense when people occasionally told me I “looked Jewish.” I imagine it’s somewhat similar to being told you “look gay”: it’s offensive, a compliment, or a casual observation, depending on who says it. But how can it be offensive if it’s true? I am Jewish, ethnically speaking. My heritage is a mix of Polish (my last name, pre-Ellis Island, was Czaplinski), Russian, and a dash of German. As previously mentioned, I check off Ashkenazi any time it’s required for an accurate assessment of my medical history, and with that background comes an expectation – read, stereotype – of physical appearance. But don’t all stereotypes begin with a grain of truth?

Growing up, it was not my so-called big nose or thick eyebrows that gave me grief over my Jewishness, but my thick, unmanageable curly hair, which only decided to be curly on some days. The only consistent thing about it was its poofiness, frizz, and tangles. When a stylist commented, “You have enough hair for three people!” as I settled into her chair, I cried. I was nine years old at the time, just hovering at the edge of preadolescence, when having the right look started to become very important. For me, that “right look” was shiny, fine straight hair like my friends in ballet class had. Their buns looked smooth and effortless; mine threatened to burst like a shaken soda can with the release of a single bobby pin.It’s not an exaggeration to say that hair has a huge impact on one’s identity and self-esteem, and living in a culture that worships shiny, straight hair as the ideal standard of beauty certainly doesn’t help.

My battle for curly hair acceptance began three years before that moment at Great Clips (which made my mother realize it was time to join her at an official Grown-Up Salon) when a ballet teacher told me my bun wasn’t smooth enough. Well, news flash: curly hair is anything but smooth! I ranted for days on end when The Princess Diaries heroine, Mia Thermopolis, received a “royal makeover” that turned her wild mane sleek and unnaturally straight. Couldn’t those royal stylists, with every kind of product supposedly at their disposal, have given her a different haircut and recommended a special shampoo and leave-in conditioner instead? Why enforce the idea that curls somehow equal disorder and sloppiness?

Today, it’s somewhat of an embarrassment to admit that part of my acceptance of being Jewish happened when I learned to properly care for my hair. To me – and to anyone belonging to an ethnic or cultural group marked by a very specific kind of look – having the right hair could make or break an effort to assimilate. A jab about frizz can be a jab about who you are as a person, and where you belong.

To that end, the limitations and boundaries about the appropriateness of cultural jokes are still blurry. I can make jokes about the “Jewfro” I had when I was six, but if someone else makes a similar comment, does that make it anti-Semitic? And today, is it fair to say that my beliefs may be Christian, but my hair never will be?

To be born into a particular heritage is a critical piece of identity that you don’t get to choose. That piece was decided for me by fate, before I could develop the cognitive ability to form my own beliefs. If the Jewish piece of me is something that “just is,” was I right to be somewhat offended when someone told me during a church retreat, “I thought you looked Jewish!”? She was merely stating a fact, not an insult…right?

For some of us, how we look cannot be completely severed from who we are. There are so many ways to assimilate before coming to terms with the radical thought our natural states are the way we are meant to be.

Confessions of a Jew-ish Skeptic is now available for pre-order: amzn.to/1SJAQxs 

Filed under: Religion, Writing & Publishing Tagged: Author Sarahbeth Caplin, Christian culture, Christianity, Controversy, Judaism, Writing

In other news, publishing is wild and unpredictable

As I prepare to click “publish” for a sixth time (technically seventh, but my first novel, Someone You Already Know, is no longer in print), I reflect once again on my four-year publishing journey…especially since I found out yesterday that A Stunning Accusation’s publisher, Booktrope, is closing its doors at the end of next month. Booktrope was my first experience in traditional publishing, and I’m sure it won’t be my last. This is an unexpected hurdle as I continue working feverishly hard to produce Confessions of a Jew-ish Skeptic, but that’s the writing life, isn’t it? It’s never easy or predictable, and I knew that going in. As the expression goes, what’s past is prologue.

Part of being a writer – particularly an indie writer – is keeping your expectations grounded in reality. This is generally true of adulthood, as well: my husband and I are floored at the prices of two-bath, two-bedroom condos in our area, and have downgraded our expectations for our first home enough so we no longer expect to have a yard, a two-car garage, or a guest bedroom. We will instead be pleasantly surprised if we can afford those things, but they are no longer part of “the dream.”

In the same way, I’ll be pleasantly surprised if I can pay for more than a few tanks of gas here and there with my writing. Not because I don’t think I can do it, but because it’s a tough business. Thousands of books are self-published each year, and religious nonfiction just cannot compete with the popularity of romance, erotica, or fantasy. My goals have downsized from New York Times bestselling author to making sales that are steady enough to buy more than a few Starbucks lattes per month.

Let me tell you, I’ve worked incredibly hard just to get that far. And if I continue to do what I’ve been doing – networking with other authors, commenting on blogs that are related to what I write about (which builds relationships with future readers), engaging on social media, updating my own blog, and writing posts for other blogs and media outlets – my business can only improve. And no matter how you publish, it is still a universal truth that the best way for authors to sell books is to keep churning them out. Whether it’s a novel a year or Kindle novellas, giving readers more to choose from is always a good thing (assuming it’s all professionally put-together and such).

While I’m incredibly grateful for the readers of this blog and everyone who’s taken time to read and review my books, I still get hit with self-doubt that I’ll never “make it,” though “making it” looks different for everyone and I’m still figuring out what that looks like for me. But doubt is always in the back of my head when working on a new project. I’ve spent more money advertising my books than I’ve earned back in royalties. I’ve paid to have my books placed in brick-and-mortar bookstores for several months, and earned under ten dollars in return. But I have to remind myself that at least I’m still earning something, while many writers do not. I cashed that bookstore check, and treated myself to Chick Fil A.

I also have to remind myself that four years in publishing seems like a long time to me, but in the grand scheme of things, it’s really not. Not if I plan to keep writing for the rest of my life. Simply put, I haven’t been doing this long enough to earn the right to complain about low sale rates. And I realize that I am damn lucky to make this a full-time job while my husband brings home the paychecks we live on – not to mention health insurance. If I were single, I’d be living off food stamps. I can never stop being grateful for the opportunity to stay home and write, market, and write some more.

So while things seem uncertain right now, this is not much different than the bumps that can occur with any other job. Companies go out of business all the time. Good employees get laid off. Life happens, shit happens, and we keep looking for other avenues to use our skills. More to the point, not everyone ends up in a field they are passionate about – talk about lowering expectations to match reality when the only job that puts food on the table is one you hate. I’m far from the only one feeling jaded, and having to supplement the work I really want to do with a day job that pays more. If there’s any big lesson I’ve learned over the last few years, it’s this:

You are not defined by what you do.

YOU. ARE. NOT. DEFINED. BY. WHAT. YOU. DO.

Not to mention that what you “do” does not have to be equivalent to how your bills get paid. Even if I end up supplementing my income with, I don’t know, bar tending, I will always say I’m a writer when people ask about my career. I mean, how else will people know my books exist?

Bottom line: adulthood is a rat race, and we’re all just trying to get by. So if you make good money in a field you love, count your blessings. If you don’t, just know that your work “title” doesn’t say anything about your worth or the gifts you have to offer.

As for Stunning’s future, my plan is to self-publish with a new ISBN and cover as soon as I can – I already emailed the epub to the formatter who worked on my other books, and sent a handful of stock images to my cover artist. This is all in the interest of preserving my Amazon reviews, which will disappear once Booktrope pulls the book for good. I don’t think I can pitch an already-published book to agents, so that leaves self-publishing as the only option to keep the story alive. And this is a story I believe is worth keeping, because I feel it’s my best work of fiction, and its messages about rape culture are so relevant.

If you haven’t read the original, now is the time to purchase it before it becomes a collector’s item on May 31st.

Filed under: Other stuff, Writing & Publishing Tagged: Author Sarahbeth Caplin, Indie Author Life, rape culture, self-publishing, Someone You Already Know, Starbucks, Twitter, Writing

Do I stay or do I go? ‘Jew-ish Skeptic’ excerpt

The beginning of the end of my time as a seminarian was in a small classroom of less than a dozen students. Week after week, students were asked to lead the class in prayer before the lesson began, and week after week, I dreaded when it would be my turn.

I’m not here to become a pastor, I thought. At the time, I believed God was calling me to be a crisis counselor. So why was praying aloud mandatory? Why couldn’t introverts have a different set of expectations?

When my turn came to pray, I wondered if maybe, just maybe, I could fake it for a day – “fake it to make it,” as the expression goes. How hard could it be? If I adjusted my tone and my volume, I might be able to convince the class that I do this all the time.

In the end, authenticity won. I couldn’t pretend to be good at something I wasn’t; couldn’t pretend to excel at something I had been taught all my life was a private, personal affair. “I’m sorry,” I told the professor, “but I’m not comfortable praying out loud.”

“Why not?” she asked, incredulous, as the other students turned to stare at me. You’d think I had done something far more scandalous, judging by the facial expressions of my peers.

“I’m just not comfortable with it,” I edified, feeling my face turn several shades of red.

“I’ve never heard of such a thing,” the professor said, the other students half-smiling in agreement. She let me pass on the public prayer – but not before shaking her head in a way that let me know my request was not normal.I wish I could say that was my only brush with awkwardness at seminary, but it wasn’t. That same semester, there were people who questioned the authenticity of my worship during mandatory chapel because, again, I wasn’t comfortable raising my arms during the music. There were people who chafed when I explained how the word “unbelievers” is not part of my vocabulary, either, because it implied that people who aren’t Christian have no beliefs at all. And then there was the Christian guy with the “heart for Israel” who believed God had sent me to be his Jew-ish missionary wife (the second time in one year that that had happened to me). He later called me a heretic during a lecture when I challenged his interpretation of Isaiah 53.T

That was a defining moment; perhaps the final nail in the coffin of my seminary experience. All students, regardless of concentration, were required to take biblical history classes, and one of the last courses I took happened to dissect several Old Testament prophecies believed to point to Jesus. None of them seem to foreshadow Jesus better than Isaiah 53, better known as the passage of the suffering servant. The verses clearly describe a man being “pierced for our transgressions,” which sounds a lot like crucifixion. Except my understanding of that passage, per my limited Jewish education, is that the “suffering servant” is referring to the Jewish people as a whole. Historians have commonly used the male pronoun “he” to refer to all Jews as a single unit. Rabbis interpret the passage as prophesizing the future state of Israel.

Quite honestly, as a Christian, I sometimes wish I never heard that interpretation, as it tends to open a smelly can of worms in Bible studies. You can imagine just how unkindly the average Christian will accept that what seems like such an obvious passage may not be talking about Jesus at all. I found myself in a mental tug-of-war, wanting to follow the majority who read the Old Testament with Christian glasses, because it was an easier path to take. But then my stubborn inner Jew scoffed at the knowledge of missionaries who purposely mistranslated passages to confuse and convert Jews, and who understands the Old Testament better than Jewish scholars, anyway?I figured if my people had erred in interpreting the prophecies, they’d have owned up to the mistake by now. It’s been a few thousand years, after all.

I wish I could say I’ve figured this all out, but I haven’t. The Prophecy Dilemma is yet another subject to be filed in the “I Don’t Know” folder of my brain on faith matters. But since my seminary professor was a Hebrew scholar, I wanted to know his opinion. So, either bravely or stupidly, I raised my hand and asked about the possibility that the Christian reading could be wrong.

“What kind of heretical question is that?” the Jew-ish Missionary Man snapped.

The word heretical slapped, and my face burned. I’d honestly rather have been called a hypocrite, because just about everyone is at some point, but a heretic? As much as I used to dream about following the same path as Joan of Arc, my favorite saint, the heretic label I could certainly have lived without. Once again, culture and faith collided, and that incident proved fatal for my career as a seminarian.

I don’t think I said anything in response to that student; I was too stunned. At any rate, the professor quickly moved on to a different topic.

Again and again, the implication was the same: you weren’t a real Christian if you didn’t do and/or practice X, Y, and Z.

This is what happens when you grow up Jewish in a town of gentiles: you tend to view Christianity as more than just the prevailing religion in America. You learn to view Christianity as somewhat of a threat to your safety and significance as a would-be follower of God. Because I was an “unbeliever” for most of my life, I was told that God was off-limits to me until I accepted his son Jesus.

Pre-order Confessions of a Jew-ish Skeptic to find out what happens next! Available as a paperback this summer.

 

Filed under: Religion, Writing & Publishing Tagged: Author Sarahbeth Caplin, Christian culture, Christianity, evangelicals, hell, Judaism, Seminary, Writing

I can’t trust my heart: the case for spiritual autonomy

I am so grateful for Christians like Elizabeth Esther who are dedicated to exposing the underbelly of spiritual abuse in many fundamentalist churches, as well as offering wisdom to people struggling with their faith after they escape. Spiritual Sobriety is one of a few books on self care after being hurt by a toxic faith environment. Others I’ve read recently are Faith Shift by Kathy Escobar and The Sin of Certainty by Peter Enns.

There’s a market for people bruised by faith communities I had no idea was out there. I’m so thankful for that; for proof that I am not alone in the struggle to recover the goodness of God that, at one point, turned my life upside down in the best possible way. I believe recovery is possible, but the road to healing is hard. It’s hard because of the reminder from small groups, Bible studies, and sermons over the years that my heart is wicked and deceitful, and therefore I cannot trust it.

This idea comes from Jeremiah 17:9: “The heart is deceitful above all things.” A similar sentiment is found in Judges 17:6: “In those days Israel had no king; all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes.” In a recent blog post for Focus on the Family, an organization whose worldview closely aligns with that of my former college ministry, Adam Holz writes:

We live in a time that says feeling good on our own terms is what matters most. But it’s a false gospel. And a dangerous one, too. Because as much as I don’t like to admit it, my strong feelings aren’t always right, aren’t always aligned with truth. Only as I take those strong emotions to God, submit them to Him, and ask Him to work in and through me as I seek to follow Him are my feelings likely to be reflective of that truth.

No, our strong feelings aren’t always right. Our feelings can cause us to believe things about ourselves that are harmful and untrue. But feelings should not be ignored altogether. For those with anxiety and panic disorders, ignoring our feelings is extremely problematic. If I’m sitting in church listening to a sermon that triggers anxiety, it’s not healthy for me to stay. Stomach pains and diarrhea from being triggered are not healthy.

One of the best decisions I made for my faith recently was to stop attending services at the church where I had an anxiety attack, and sit outside the sanctuary in the lobby area with my Bible and prayer journal while my husband worships there. I’m not without community, either, because after church we join our friends from small group for lunch. In addition, I attend a weekly Bible study with the same group. This is one example of when listening to my feelings was a very good decision.

Both Esther and Escobar recommend taking breaks from reading Scripture or attending church if it’s just too stressful at the moment. They aren’t saying we should quit either one, just take a break – but I imagine that Christians like Holz would call that suggestion blasphemous. Christians like Holz may feel “convicted” to tell me I’m wrong in pursuing this track toward healing. But according to his own theology, Holz’s heart can’t be trusted, either. He knows what’s best for my spiritual life way less than I do.

In both ministry and in seminary, faith was not supposed to be messy or gray. There was only right and wrong, no in between, and putting down your Bible or skipping church was just not okay. I was inexplicably taught that I could never know what’s best for me, because my selfish heart was only interested in instant gratification. Apparently, only spiritual mentors of whom I was a sort of disciple could know. And somehow, the deceitfulness of their hearts was not an issue when taking their advice.

I wouldn’t call either group a cult, but both had explicitly abusive tendencies that I could not recognize at the time. Only after I left was I able to recognize the red flags. And you know what? I owe my life to self-care. Once I started believing that I was worthy of a safe space to worship and grow, everything started to change. I still struggle with feeling that I don’t deserve anything good, but I’m not as deep in the hole as I used to be.

While it’s generally a good idea to discuss important decisions with people who are close to you, spiritual autonomy cannot be dismissed. This does not mean worshiping in a vacuum, isolated in a cave somewhere. It means trusting the reason that God gave you when something feels “off,” because doing so could just save your faith…if not your life.

 

Filed under: Religion Tagged: Campus Crusade for Christ, Christian culture, Christianity, depression, evangelicals, grief, self-care, Seminary, Spiritual Abuse

Your fears about transgender bathrooms are highly exaggerated

I have to be honest about something: I never thought I’d care much about LGBT rights. That sounds terrible, I know, but as a straight, cis-gendered woman, I never thought I’d have a reason to. There are too many causes I care about that directly impact my life to add another one onto the plate.

But I do care, even if I have no idea what it’s like to struggle with gender or sexuality. I care because LGBT people are minorities. While my beliefs have evolved, my Jewish heritage technically makes me a minority, too. And I know all too well what it’s like to have to validate who you are to people who just don’t get it, and don’t care enough to even try.

People fear what they don’t understand. It’s one consistent thing about humanity that has not and likely will not ever change. Some people’s misunderstandings are a result of bigotry. And then there are people like Kaeley Triller, a rape survivor who expressed her concern in an article for The Federalist about the ramifications of allowing biological men who identify as women to use women’s restrooms and locker rooms.

As a rape survivor myself (I feel weird saying “survivor,” because my life was never in danger, but it sounds a lot better than “victim”), I get it. Really, I do. I know the feeling of assuming every male stranger is a predator, especially when you are by yourself in places like malls, airports, and train stations. It’s not about sexism, but survival. Paranoia itself is generally not a good thing, but in many cases, trusting your gut about something that just doesn’t feel “right” can save lives.

Triller insists she doesn’t believe that transgendered people are predators. She’s concerned about men who will try to pass themselves off as women to gain access to young girls at their most vulnerable.

First, let me just point out that men who dress like women are not transgendered. They are men dressed up as women, period. If we’re strictly talking about clothing here, gender dysphoria is way more complex than that. Men who dress as women with the goal of molesting women and girls are the real predators here. A study from the Williams Institute reports as follows:

In a separate, more qualitative survey of transgender people in San Francisco, Dylan Vade found that “out of 116 responses from those who did not identify as male or female, 48 people took the time to write out specific bathroom experiences, all negative. These experiences ranged from harassment to violence to getting fired” (Vade 2002, 2). Respondents reported being physically abused, verbally harassed, fired, arrested, and made ill from avoiding restrooms altogether.

Yes, there is a clear risk of allowing transgendered individuals to use the restroom that best represents their identity: to the transgendered themselves.

Lest you still think that transgendered = pervert in disguise, let me regale you with this golden quip from Louie Gohmert, a Republican congressman from Texas:

“I was as good a kid as you can have growing up, I never drank alcohol till I was legal, never to, still, use an illegal drug, but in the seventh grade if the law had been that all I had to do was say, ‘I’m a girl,’ and I got to go into the girls’ restroom, I don’t know if I could’ve withstood the temptation just to get educated back in those days.”

So a congressman publicly admits to wishing he committed voyeurism, and that’s not sick at all. The transgendered are still the enemy? Politicians like Gohmert seem like the real predators to me.

Back to Kaeley Triller:

While I feel a deep sense of empathy for what must be a very difficult situation for transgender people, at the beginning and end of the day, it is nothing short of negligent to instate policies that elevate the emotional comfort of a relative few over the physical safety of a large group of vulnerable people.

Don’t they know anything about predators? Don’t they know the numbers? That out of every 100 rapes, only two rapists will spend so much as single day in jail while the other 98 walk free and hang out in our midst? Don’t they know that predators are known to intentionally seek out places where many of their preferred targets gather in groups? That perpetrators are addicts so committed to their fantasies they’ll stop at nothing to achieve them?

Those statistics are disturbing, yes. But here’s the thing about predators: a stick-figure woman in a triangle dress posted on the bathroom door is not going to deter them. Will a person sick enough to commit rape have any qualms about going into the wrong restroom? I’m thinking…no, not really. If “free access” to young girls is the real concern, predators already have it. Let’s also not forget that having a vagina does not mean you can’t be a predator, either. The numbers of sexual assaults committed by women are small compared to assaults committed by men, but they happen (and are far less likely to be reported than male-on-female rape).

And then there’s this: 47% of rapes are committed by someone who already knows and has regular access to the victim, like a friend or a relative (the actual number could be much higher, since rape is one of the most under-reported crimes in human history). So statistically speaking, you might actually be safer in a public restroom than in the home of someone you know.

When it comes down to it, though, we all want the same thing: a safer world with less violence. I’m sure most people don’t want to see anyone get hurt, trans or otherwise. I don’t know what the ideal solution is, but let’s make sure our arguments are coming from facts, not fears.

For more insight, check out We STILL just need to pee by Callie Wright

The Lie Behind the Transgender Bathroom Predator Myth by Libby Anne

I’m a Transgender man in North Carolina. Here’s what the bathroom law means for me by Charlie Comero.

Filed under: Other stuff, Rape Culture Tagged: Controversy, LGBT, social justice

‘Skeptic’ cover reveal, now available for pre-order!

Confessions of a Jew-ish Skeptic has a cover…and is now available for pre-order!

I seriously debated querying this one, only to decide on self-publishing because this book is just too personal. It follows my faith journey picking up from where Prodigal Daughter left off: after seminary, after my father’s death; two events that flipped my world upside down and inside out.

I ask hard questions. I don’t try to answer them. But I’m hoping that my readers – “Jew-ish” or not – will see some of their own story in mine, and feel better about not having everything figured out yet.

I should also mention a trigger warning in chapter 4 of Part One. For the first time ever, I talk about my rape. I don’t think it’s graphic, but it’s frank and honest. So if that’s a sensitive issue for you…well, maybe skip the first few pages.

It’s relevant to the book because it’s why I had no trouble believing that God saw me as worthless and depraved; a “used tampon,” according to one student from Campus Crusade for Christ. I firmly believed that my sins were just as bad as those of my rapist. I believed I deserved nothing good to happen to me, in this life or the next. My understanding of God was so skewed for such a long time, especially because my boyfriend claimed to be such a devout Catholic.

But rather than mentioning the abuse and leaving it at that, as I did in the first Confessions, I expanded on what happened for a couple reasons. I will never be able to tell what happened to a court, so telling the world in a book is the next best thing. Keeping it a secret just didn’t work for me because it tore me apart. It lead to binge drinking and harmful thoughts about myself. It threatened to wreck my other relationships. I also debated for years whether what happened was actually “legitimate rape,” for lack of a better expression. It’s helpful for me to have a definition for it, even if it’s an ugly one.

Putting it out there makes it valid, and as many survivors can affirm, being validated and believed is one of the most empowering things that help with healing.

I’m also better at writing than speaking, especially on a topic as hard as this one. There wouldn’t be many opportunities to talk about it anyway, other than with a therapist, and if I did, I’d likely fall apart in the process.

So writing about it is, as always, the most healing route for me to take.

But that’s confined to one chapter, for anyone concerned that this is going to be a dark book. In some ways it is, but not because of that. A story about the struggle to keep faith in the midst of doubt is a harder story to tell than how I found it. Real life, as we all learn eventually, is rarely easy. But this book, I hope, will be encouraging to those who feel stuck, and worry that their fears will be addressed with the platitude “Just pray about it,” or worse: “You’re not really one of us.”

Skeptic’s tentative release date is May 27th (depends on how the formatting process goes). Pre-order it on Amazon here.

Filed under: Rape Culture, Religion, Writing & Publishing Tagged: Author Sarahbeth Caplin, Campus Crusade for Christ, Christian culture, Christianity, Confessions of a Prodigal Daughter, depression, evangelicals, grief, Indie Author Life, Judaism, memoir, rape culture, self-care, self-publishing, Seminary, social justice, Writing

Fundamentalism and interfaith dialogue

I had the privilege of participating in Colorado State’s first “Better Together” Day: a collaborative effort of various faith ministries on campus. The point was to wear a nametag with your faith affiliation on it so you could find someone of a different faith tradition to talk to and learn from. There were “Christian,” “Jewish,” and “Atheist” labels along with more creative ones: “Spiritual but not religious,” “Love is all you need,” and “It’s all good as long as you don’t try and convert me” (I liked that one best).

Me, well, I briefly considered “Jewish-born Christian” and “Jewish-born Christian with agnostic tendencies,” but in the end I settled on simply “Christian.” I like my labels to be neat and uncomplicated, even if that means people might make assumptions about me that aren’t completely true.

Those details were bound to come out in conversation anyway. This circle alone consisted of Christians (one Greek Orthodox), Jews, an agnostic, atheist, and a Catholic (I’m on the far left in the blue shirt and sunglasses).

I don’t know how other conversations went, but this one seemed to discuss religious background more than our current beliefs. I’m continually fascinated at how some people raised secular grew up to become religious, while others raised religious ended up secular. Me, I fall into the former category. Perhaps Christian parents should raise their kids without religion to guarantee they come to church?

Response to a misogynist who claims sex toys = satanism

“Too many Christian women are losing their salvation because they masturbate. Dildos and all of those other sex toys have been used for thousands of years in demonic sex rituals. It’s one of the main ways ancient pagan societies worshiped their demonic gods.

Masturbation is a direct path to Satan. There’s nothing normal about it. And shame on any Christian that says so.”

Dear Eden Decoded,

First of all, I must compliment you on your choice of photography to accompany your Facebook post. Did you download that picture from a photo stock website, or did you photograph it in person? If the latter, please let me know where I can find this magic garden of penises, because it looks downright enchanting.

Now, on to the content of your actual post. First of all, I am not aware of any Bible verse that says “Thou shalt not use sex toys.” Is this PSA for single or married women (and why did you only address it to women, anyway? Did you mean to imply that male masturbation is totes okay with God?)? You didn’t specify, so I’m going to assume you’re addressing both demographics. But what if a husband and wife engage in this practice because it’s the only way the wife gets any enjoyment out of sex? Asking for a friend.

My guess, however, is that you’re not all that concerned about what the woman feels during sex. Maybe you think that sex for pleasure and not procreation is a sin as well (in which case, you’re gonna be really shocked by the Song of Songs in the Old Testament). The thing is, ED, that sex SHOULD be an act of bonding and intimacy for married couples. You may or may not be aware that sex, for many women, is a highly unpleasant experience. Not all women are able to orgasm via intercourse, and no matter how much lubricant is used, it can still feel like attempting to slide down a water slide without water. Hence why sex toys can be, er, helpful.

Is this too graphic for you? Sorry, but Christians aren’t doing anyone any favors by not discussing the reality of sex: it’s a bone of contention (snicker, snicker) for many couples when they find out that abstinence until the wedding night doesn’t guarantee fireworks. Couples who are not advised to communicate and experiment in the bedroom will have problems. Maybe in your world, abstinence is all it takes to have magic sex, but reality disagrees with that notion. Therefore, I have to assume you are male, because honestly? Lack of sensitivity for women who find intercourse painful or unpleasant is such a typical man thing.

Many people, Christian and otherwise, would call that “sexist.” And I must inform you, ED, that sexism is probably a much more direct path to satan than couples using sex toys.

Sincerely,

A sex-positive, married Christian

Filed under: Feminism, Religion Tagged: Christian culture, Christianity, Controversy, evangelicals, Feminism, marriage

No, I’m not going to smile for you

I’m not very good at knowing when to stand up for myself. I’m not even good at determining my rights in certain situations. I’ll be one of the first people to call someone out for telling a sexist joke, but when it comes to my own self, I don’t want to seem too entitled. Too self-important. Too demanding.

As a kid, I wasn’t aware of the stereotype that assertive men are leaders, and assertive women are bitches. My mother was my advocate when some of my elementary school teachers didn’t accommodate the conditions of my IEP for anxiety, OCD, and Tourette’s. I wasn’t afraid to do it myself, necessarily, but it felt awkward to correct someone I’d been taught to respect as an authority figure. And plenty of authority figures abuse their power to make you feel stupid for defending yourself at all, even if your reasons are legitimate and your words are polite.

I’ve gotten through many difficult circumstances by reminding myself that things could always be worse: my boyfriend abused me, but never to a point that I had to visit the ER; that stranger at the coffee shop, that college professor – both men – asking me why I’m not smiling could have said far worse things (though I did ask that professor if he would ever make that comment to a male student, and got no response).

Things could be a lot worse. Obviously one man’s dumb comment isn’t as bad as a physical assault. But aren’t the worst offenses piled on a foundation of smaller ones? Can all acts of sexism, big or small, be traced back to an unhealthy sense of entitlement?

Is it possible that the man who isn’t called out for being rude by telling women how to express their emotions will feel entitled to push things further by making ruder comments in the future – comments that could very well be considered harassment? Or that the man who emotionally manipulates his girlfriend into having sex she doesn’t want will escalate to physically damaging violence?

Whatever the case, in both scenarios, you have men asking or outright demanding a woman to do something for their benefit, not hers (do you honestly know anyone who smiles ALL THE TIME? I sure don’t). If something is offensive enough to make a classroom or workplace awkward or uncomfortable, it should be called out, even if it’s “not that bad” by most people’s standards.

Does my life have to be threatened before I can stand up for my right to a healthy relationship, a safe learning environment, a harassment-free walk down the street?

Back to the “really bad” stuff: there’s not a lot of difference in attitude between the man who gropes a cocktail waitress and the man who tells her he likes staring at her ass without ever laying a hand on her. The man whose rude comments are allowed to slide is only working his way up to the kind of man who assaults women. The problem isn’t just what some men say, but the attitude of entitlement they feel while saying it.

Take, for example, this brewery owner’s response to a customer he recently banned from entering his establishment. This patron never physically assaulted any of the bar employees, but thankfully the owner wasn’t going to wait for that to happen before issuing the ban:

In January he made several sexist remarks about the female staff that were working. He told them to their faces that that he liked looking at their tits while they washed dishes, and their asses while they were pouring drinks. He was told to leave and not come back. He came back last month, and was told we wouldn’t serve him. He came back yet again today, and when told he wouldn’t be served demanded to talk to a manger.

I sat with him for a few minutes as he explained that what he said would have been okay 20 years ago, and that it was just some off colour remarks. He told me he had apologized, and that he guessed my servers were too sensitive. He then told me that if what he said was a problem, then I should tell them not to wear low cut shirts, and that I should face the dish washing sink away from customers. But since he apologized, he should be allowed to drink in my establishment because he lives in the neighborhood and will bring in business.

I told him flatly that wasn’t happening, and that what he said to those ladies was incredibly offensive. The simple fact that he couldn’t understand that just because they were were working didn’t mean they deserve his disrespectful language. That these ladies were part of my family, and were human beings that deserved respect. They aren’t objects, and they certainly shouldn’t have to wear different clothes because he can’t be bothered with showing them any decency or respect. “But we’re men and they’re females. Is cleavage just not a thing anymore?”

The world needs more men like this.

Of course, the average man who tells me “I bet you look real pretty when you smile,” or something of that nature, probably isn’t, and never will be, a harasser or a rapist. He may think he’s being polite by giving me a compliment. But I don’t know who he really is. I don’t know what his true intentions are. It doesn’t make the comment any less sexist. Now, as a grown-up, I have reached a point where I can comfortably say, “Please don’t tell me what to do with my face.” And hopefully won’t get harassed for it.

The smile on the left is genuine. The one on the right is not. Smile 1 cannot be done on demand. If you ask me to smile, Smile 2 is what you’ll get.

Also, “resting bitch face” is a real thing, because Buzzfeed said so.

Filed under: Feminism, Rape Culture Tagged: Controversy, Feminism, rape culture, social justice

The scandal of disagreeing with doctrine

I’ve written before about why I don’t believe in good people. Truthfully, I could believe this with or without Christianity and the doctrine of Original Sin. But it’s one thing to believe humans are “not good,” and quite another to say we are fundamentally “broken.” I’ve listened to and read stories of former Christians who endured years of poor self-esteem because of the way they were indoctrinated: made to feel guilty and hate themselves simply for being born.

More progressive strands of Christianity might say we are “flawed” in place of harsher terms like “broken” or “depraved,” but the sentiment is very similar, and likely won’t make skeptics feel much better.

This has been an issue of contention between me and a close Christian-turned-atheist friend. This is one doctrine I have not been willing to budge on, much less reconsider. Here’s a revealing truth, though: it may not be entirely inaccurate to say my view of mankind has been strongly influenced by the abusive relationship I was in for five years. Being told I was worthless by my boyfriend, mostly through actions, and then told the same, in words, at Campus Crusade for Christ was an easy transition for me. Had I been a psychologically healthier person, I might have pushed back on this teaching a lot more.

I tried the “flawed not broken” approach with Neil. The idea that “doing good” is not the same BEING good. He wasn’t buying it:

Can you say instead that humans are constantly learning? How about evolving? Slowly progressing? Making advances all the time? In the cosmic time scale (think in millions of years, not hundreds, because life doesn’t evolve at the speeds we prefer), we are moving forward. Might we fail to overcome our own limitations? Sure, we might.

But any look back through history requires selectivity of some kind, an interpretive grid. The one Christianity uses DEMANDS that humanity be seen in a fundamentally negative light. But why? Why must the capacity for harm and self interest be the thing we say is MORE BASIC? What compels us to do that? Is it because the number of evils in our past outnumber the goods?

Are you sure about that?

Or are you compelled to do so by a narrative that requires it, because without that piece, the whole edifice of this religion collapses upon itself?

Well. Color me speechless. I really have no idea how to respond to this.

Or this:

You know how the news adage is “If it bleeds it leads?” The reality is that thousands, maybe millions of good things are happening every day, but they don’t make the news. Why not? Because that’s just not how news works.

And what is history if it’s not “the news” compiled over the course of thousands of years? Human history is a distillation of all the bleeding and leading of hundreds of thousands of news cycles. That skews our perception. Badly. Toward seeing humans as collectively worse than they really are.

Nobody writes history about the guys who decided NOT to start a war.

Neil’s words aren’t illogical. In fact, he presents a very believable case by citing real-world observations, as opposed to me citing a handful of Bible verses from a book that no longer has the same authority for him that it once did.

Brutal honesty must be one of my spiritual gifts, because otherwise I’d never ask myself what Neil is asking. Not to myself, and definitely not on a public blog (call me a spiritual exhibitionist): am I compelled to defend this view because a narrative I believe to be divinely inspired requires it?

I used to joke that anyone who is unsure if Original Sin is real should babysit a child in the midst of the Terrible Twos. Choose the wrong colored sippy cup, and bring on the apocalypse.

But that’s an expected phase of childhood, and I don’t have to have kids of my own to doubt this doctrine when holding an innocent, chubby-cheeked, sweet-smelling baby. I did just that at a Christmas party last year, and had to fight off that “Ooooh, I want one” feeling.

Yes, I doubt this doctrine. And it’s a slippery slope, because if humans aren’t inherently not-good, why did Jesus have to die? What is it that he died for – our bad life choices?

It could all fall apart.

I don’t think I’m a “true” agnostic. Agnostics, from what I know, make peace with uncertainty, and I’m not good at that. “Agnostic” is less a self-identifier as it is a name for a phase – a dry spell, a season – that I’m in right now. It’s not a place I want to stay. I have a long-term goal of getting my faith back. You could say I’m an agnostic with an agenda.

I’ve seen the complete picture of the puzzle on the box, and it looks beautiful (many will disagree, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder, right?). But putting all the pieces together myself is a long-term project, in which I’m fairly certain a few pieces are missing. The entire puzzle will never be complete. Therefore I must learn to live with an incomplete vision of the finished product.

Some people think all cats are depraved. Yes, those are claw marks in the toilet paper. No, she doesn’t look sorry. But she’s SO CUTE.

Filed under: Religion Tagged: Campus Crusade for Christ, Christian culture, Christianity, evangelicals