Sarahbeth Caplin's Blog, page 44

Permission to be myself

A common flaw in Christian and Jewish culture I can’t seem to escape from is the debate about who “qualifies” as a Christian or a Jew. To be fair, the “Who is a Jew” question is prioritized more among conservative groups than liberal ones, especially when applications for Israeli citizenship are concerned. Still, the idea that one’s identity can be scrutinized by people not familiar with the intricacies of the journey behind it is troubling.

Sometimes definitions can be obvious. Who is a Democrat or a Republican? Someone registered to vote as a Democrat or Republican (technically speaking). Who is a vegetarian? A person who abstains from meat. But what if you consume meat only once a week? Once a year? Are you no longer a vegetarian?

What if you’re a Christian who curses? What if you’re a Jew who was born from a Jewish mother, but believes Jesus is the Messiah? Or believes in no god(s) at all?

I was wearing that teardrop star pendant when I went to get my glasses adjusted. I thought I had reached a place of contentedness about it: it represented my heritage, and I was comfortable wearing it for that purpose. But as she cleaned off my lenses, the woman behind the counter at LensCrafters said, “I like your necklace. I’m Jewish, too.”

All I said in response was “Thanks.” I wondered if I should say more, explain myself, because leaving that comment alone made me feel like I was lying to her. I left the store thinking, Lady, if you knew the truth, you’d probably hate me.

Why do I do this? Why do I continue making decisions based on how I will appear to other people? Why do I constantly seek to validate myself in others’ eyes? What would have happened if I explained my reasons to that perfect stranger, as if I were seeking her permission: Do you think this is okay? It’s not offensive because I really do have Jewish heritage, right?

Oh, enough already. This is a miserable trajectory I am on, constantly molding myself to others’ expectations so I can be accepted. Religion has become like high school again: I’m finding myself studying the ways of the kids I perceive as cool so I know what I can and cannot say. What I can and cannot admit to.

I am reaching a point of exhaustion, and I have no other choice: screw it, I’m just going to be myself.

I’ll encounter Jews who will deny my Judaism, regardless of how I was raised. I’ll meet Christians who might judge me if a curse word slips out of my mouth. I will run into legalism in many forms, wearing all kinds of masks, and will learn to not feel threatened by it. Rejection has added a layer of toughness on my skin, thick as grime, and just as difficult to scrub away.

Filed under: Religion Tagged: Christian culture, Christianity, Controversy, evangelicals, Judaism

“It’s Complicated”

While Judaism made me aware that everyone suffers, and Christianity taught me how to persevere through suffering, most of the time I really don’t suffer – I’m just uncomfortable. And the things that cause this discomfort are really kind of silly. When there’s grime in the shower again, and I can’t enjoy my book knowing that it’s there, both faiths remind me that at least I have a place to live. When I find myself sitting next to someone I don’t like, both faiths help remind me of his or her inherent value (I wish I could say this drastically changes my attitude, but at least I’m reminded of it).

The reality is, no religion will ever make complete sense to me and not have parts that I either don’t understand or feel greatly disturbed by. I have greater appreciation now for the ritual prayers of Judaism, but most of them being in Hebrew makes it difficult to reflect on their meaning, and reciting them in English just doesn’t have the same rhythm.

The closest ritual system I’ve found in Christianity is that of the Catholic Church (it even operates by a lunar calendar!), using rosary beads as focal points much like Jews use teffillim, and the prescribed prayers in English are much easier to understand. But I don’t think I could ever call myself Catholic because I don’t know how much I can untangle the beauty of Catholic tradition from the Vatican politics. I don’t believe the pope is infallible. Not to mention that I use birth control and am leaning towards not having children, both of which are frowned upon.

I’m not sure if viewing the Bible as inerrant is mostly an evangelical thing, but it doesn’t seem very popular to question it. What exactly do people mean when they call the Bible “perfect”? Is it grammatically perfect? How do they not feel the same stomach-churning that I do when reading the parts about genocide ordered by God, and laws about rape victims being forced to marry their assailants? Why are those things included if they contradict the morality that most people, religious and non-religious alike, condemn as evil? How hard would it have been for God to add an eleventh commandment, “Men, don’t rape or hit women. This is detestable”?

Actually, I wish that God had thought to add a few more commandments: “Treat homosexuals like human beings.” “Don’t bomb abortion clinics.” “Don’t try to turn America into a theocracy.” “Don’t tell your congregants how to vote.” “Don’t cry ‘persecution’ because someone disagreed with you.” “Never use an evangelism tract in place of a tip.”

I know, I know. If I’m so smart, why don’t I be God? And if religion causes me so many problems, why not abandon it altogether?

Believe me, I’ve considered that last possibility. But religion speaks to my desire to be part of something bigger than myself. It speaks to that part of me that believes we are more than just accidents of nature. I’ve always believed there was some kind of higher being out there, and religion is the tool to try and know him, as opposed to making up my own ideas about him. There’s a great deal of ugliness in religious history, to be sure. But there are stories of great glory, too, as well as the smaller, private moments of clarity that won’t convince skeptics en masse, but are enough to convince me.

People we love may be hard to understand at times, and have aspects of their personalities that bug the crap out of us. Honestly, I think the same of God.

Filed under: Religion Tagged: Christian culture, Christianity, Judaism, rape culture

Evangelicals and the surrender of privacy

I have a tendency to pull away from people during times of stress. Sometimes this is a necessary thing to do, but it was completely forbidden in my experience with Evangelical World.

During a summer retreat in Estes Park, Colorado with my college church, I fell in love with the idea of complete authenticity. How annoying is it to give the colloquial response “I’m fine” to store clerks who ask how you’re doing, even when you’re not? No one actually admits the truth. We all know that “How are you?” is really more of a greeting than a sincere inquiry.

Everyone was transparent that summer. You could walk up to a stranger at lunch, sit down next to them, and immediately learn everything you never thought you’d want to know about what that person’s life is like. A single conversation could include stories of painful divorces, struggles with internet porn, and drug use without ever learning anyone’s last name. Yes, at times this was extremely intimidating, but in a way, it was also refreshing. Without any pretenses or masks, you knew exactly whom you could trust.

I resolved to be completely authentic after that summer: no more “I’m great, how are you?” platitudes if I wasn’t feeling that great. Wasn’t it a sin to lie, anyway?

That authenticity phase didn’t last a week beyond the retreat. I returned home, got a job at a local restaurant, saw my rapist’s mother walk in and immediately had a panic attack. I started counseling, anti-depressants, and really dealing with un-faced trauma. I started drinking. Complete authenticity? Yeah, screw that.

But there were some bible studies and prayer groups I joined where privacy wasn’t a choice; or at least, it was highly frowned upon. The idea of being open among strangers is terrifying for many people, even without a history of trauma. Just being introverted makes me uncomfortable having to speak in front of crowds if it’s not necessary. I prefer the option of quiet listening and one-on-one conversations. When you are the only one in a small group who hasn’t said anything, though, your lack of participation is obvious. For me, it was not viewed as silent participation, but rebellion. We were Christians; we were a community. That community was automatic because we all loved Jesus, and as such, we had to be open and honest with one another so we could hold each other accountable for any sins.

Per small group instructions, I tried explaining some of my issues once to someone with zero concept of depression and anxiety as legitimate mental disorders. It didn’t go very well. In fact, it scared me out of opening up to people I don’t know ever again, because until I use my own judgment to determine whether or not a person is “safe,” I will be making myself vulnerable to getting hurt. That’s how many churches end up with an increase of empty seats. You can’t force community any more than you can ask someone to do you a favor in such a way that is really volun-telling instead of volunteering.

There is one instance I can think of in which being completely authentic among strangers was one of the best things that happened to me, only it wasn’t me who opened up: it was my future best friend, Kelly. On the first day of Intro to Counseling at seminary, there was a student who made a remark that depression was nothing more than a label used to justify sin. To add further insult to such a horrendous injury, the woman also added that “true Christians” wouldn’t face depression if they had true joy and contentment in Christ.

It was Kelly who immediately stood up and responded, “I’m a Christian, and I have depression. I’ve felt Jesus going through it with me. You can’t tell me that my relationship with him isn’t real.”

I had never been so proud of someone I didn’t know. Immediately after class, I went up to her and introduced myself. She is one of the few people from that toxic environment that I still keep in touch with, though I do wish I hadn’t had to pay $30,000 to be able to meet her. But, “there is a season for everything under the sun,” including an unfinished graduate degree. And through her I have learned that it’s okay to be have faith and still wrestle with doubt; she is one of my favorite sounding boards to share those doubts with.

Now that is community done well.

Filed under: Religion Tagged: Christian culture, Christianity, depression, evangelicals, grief

Another Form of Interfaith: A Christian From a Jewish Family

Beth Caplin:

Guest blogging with Susan Katz Miller today, author of “Being Both: Embracing Two Religions in One Interfaith Family.”

Originally posted on On Being Both:

Jewish identities are diverse. Christian identities are diverse. And, interfaith identities are diverse. I often write about the idea that every child, no matter which religious label and education parents give them, grows up to choose their own beliefs, practices and affiliations. Today, guest blogger Sarahbeth Caplin recounts her journey, from a Jewish childhood to her conversion to evangelical Christianity, and her sense of being interfaith.–SKM

No one, not even myself, can figure out where my fascination with religion came from: I wasn’t raised in a religious family, and I certainly wasn’t raised within any Christian tradition. I don’t know what my Jewish parents thought about my early fascination with saints and martyrdom; surely it wasn’t normal, at an age when most girls I knew were into reading The Babysitter’s Club and Boxcar Children series. As an adult, it’s clear to me that God had a firm grip on my…

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Filed under: Other stuff

I’m pro-life and I don’t support defunding Planned Parenthood

Far from the first time, Rachel Held Evans has described my thoughts in a much more articulate way than I could think of myself (bold emphasis mine):

Anyone else caught in this tension? I’m pro-life in the sense that I believe life begins in the womb and is worth protecting even before birth. However, 9 times out of 10, I find myself totally disagreeing with the pro-life movement’s methods for protecting that life.

For example, completely defunding Planned Parenthood with no plan to replace its other services (like offering affordable contraception, gynecological services, and prenatal care to underprivileged women), could actually lead to more abortions. Teaching abstinence-only education in public schools appears to be less effective than comprehensive sex-education at reducing the teen pregnancy rate. Simply voting for Republicans who want to make abortion illegal (even though they are very unlikely to do so and even though criminalizing abortion won’t stop it from happening) without considering how other conservative social policies affect women most at risk for having abortions seems like an exercise in futility. And opposing coverage for contraception in insurance policies seems like a great way to increase rather than decrease unwanted pregnancies.

It’s just so frustrating to agree with the pro-life movement’s ideals but virtually none of their methods, and to disagree with many of the pro-choice movement’s ideals and yet support many of their efforts to care for women in ways that are likely to decrease the abortion rate. It’s a classic stuck-in-the-middle dilemma and I’ve got no easy answers. Mostly I just find myself shouting at the TV screen no matter who is on to speak!

Look, I don’t agree with Planned Parenthood’s general ethic about sex: I don’t necessarily believe that “anything goes” so long as it’s between consenting adults using protection. I believe that the ideal placement of sex is between married couples. I believe sex is far more than a recreational act. But there is also more to Planned Parenthood than being an “abortion factory,” which it wouldn’t be, if there were less demand for abortions. I don’t know all the facts about other scandals PP has been accused of. But I do know that completely defunding an organization that does so much for women with very limited options in managing their health is a bad, bad idea.

I would love to see a world without abortion. I’m sure most pro-choice people feel the same way. I just don’t think defunding PP is the best way to make that happen. If that means I have to forfeit my salvation, so be it.

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

Cancer patients as heroes

Writing a letter to the editor of my hometown newspaper about the many faces of bravery got me thinking. For many people, cancer patients are likened to soldiers facing a battle, not knowing the outcome. I spent many summers of my childhood walking in Relay for Life marathons for cancer fundraising, during which cancer survivors were given survivor medals. Dad’s medal is still hanging in his former home office. Seeing it used to give me hope, but now there’s something about it that bothers me.

The people who lost the “battle” aren’t getting any medals. And it should go without saying that the biggest difference between a solider fighting for his country and a person fighting a disease is that a soldier chooses to enlist in battle. Cancer patients don’t get the luxury of choice.

What are we really saying when we call cancer patients “brave”? The reality is, no matter how you handle your diagnosis, you must show up for treatment if you don’t want to die. You can kick and scream your whole way there, but that doesn’t make you less brave than someone who shows up calmly. You could have an absolutely crappy attitude about life being unfair, but I think cancer patients have earned the right to be a little negative. While science has shown that a positive attitude can influence a person’s health, it’s far from being a cure. If that were true, my father would still be alive – he was the most optimistic person I’ve ever known.

It wasn’t the cancer that made my father brave. Choosing optimism in the face of any negative circumstances is a brave choice, I think. Choosing to see the good in people no matter what is a brave choice. Reaching out to people with a helping hand and open heart, despite the risk of rejection, is brave. Speaking your mind without fear of judgment is brave. Even choosing fatherhood was brave – perhaps the bravest decision he ever made. Just being my father made him my hero. My dad was brave before cancer, and he would have been brave if he never had cancer.

Only at the very end of his life did he talk about some of the pressure he felt to live, as if dying would let people down. As if anyone would blame him for “giving up”! As if dying = no longer brave, no longer a hero.

While having an illness can strengthen a person in many ways, I do think that we need to be careful about idolizing cancer patients. The hospice nurses encouraged my family to give Dad “permission” to let go when it was time. I know that saying “You’re gonna beat this” is said with good intentions, but sometimes the people we love need to hear that it’s okay if they don’t. How a person lives matters more than how they die. We don’t get a say in how we meet death, but how we live says more about our strength than anything.

Filed under: Other stuff Tagged: cancer, grief

Bitterness: the new religious B-word

“Why are Jews still bitter about the Holocaust? It was over half a century ago; it’s time to move on.”

“You’d have a much better relationship with God if you got over your bitterness and forgave people already.”

Bitterness: a much-feared word in Christian and Jewish circles. This word is used when a consensus is reached that no one should be angry anymore, but if one still has degrees of trauma, bouts of anger, PTSD, or anxiety, it’s clearly a spiritual issue. Worse, it’s a stubborn refusal to grow.

In my experience, “bitterness” is something that takes root in one’s heart when their feelings are patted down with platitudes: “Just pray harder, you’ll feel better.” Bitterness takes root in my heart when my feelings are not being taken seriously.

Need I say that this is incredibly invalidating? This process is called gaslighting, and though it’s not a uniquely fundamentalist problem, it is obscenely prevalent in fundamentalist Christian circles. But I don’t think Christians do this because they don’t care about people who are hurt; I think they do this because many are not well equipped to deal with anger in a healthy way.

I can’t help but think of Jesus furiously tipping those tables on which people exchanged money in the temple, and I can’t help but think, Now that is a Jewish response! That is how you deal with chutzpah! But who would accuse Jesus of being “bitter”? When moral codes were being violated, when underdogs were being mistreated, anger prompted Jesus to act accordingly. But try suggesting in bible study that flipping tables is an appropriate response to the question What Would Jesus Do? and see what happens.

There must be more than one way to “flip a table,” so to speak. Anger by itself is not good or bad. Harvested properly, it could even be a good thing – but how many of us know how to do that?

If I ever figure that one out, I’ll write my next book about it. For right now, the best I can offer is what doesn’t work:

Responding to accusations with accusations. “You’re being bitter”; “Well, you’re just stupid.” Calling someone “stupid” is obviously unproductive, but substituting “ignorant” isn’t very effective, either. That’s another conversation-stopping word that basically says, “You’re telling me I don’t know anything.” The last time I heard someone say Jews are bitter for not “getting over” the Holocaust, as if it were the same inconvenience as a downpour at a picnic, I wish I had said, “Yes, Jews are still bitter, because there is still genocide happening in the world, and there are still people choosing to look the other way. That does make me bitter. It should make everyone bitter.” The accusing person is not being put down, but is hopefully challenged to rethink their approach (obviously, “bitter” is too tame a word to describe completely justified fury over genocide, but if that’s the word being used, I say just work with it).

Revealing the story beneath the label. I am a Christian who is frequently tired of other Christians. I’m worn out when I am asked about the most effective ways to convert Jews, since I have an insider’s perspective. Most of all, I’m exhausted at having to explain the connection between my rape and my feminist identity. It was the rape, the humiliation, and excuses I accepted that made me realize how desperately the world needs this cause. I’m tired of having to explain that I am not a feminist because I want to usurp men, or otherwise don’t value them.

But, I have built bridges with Christians by explaining some of my abusive history – just enough to get my point across, since much of it is intensely personal. This approach yields greater understanding, even if we still end up agreeing to disagree, than flatly spitting, “Quit yapping about something you clearly know nothing about.”

Accepting when someone is simply not ready to talk. It does come across as bitter by forcing a conversation that’s not meant to be had at a particular moment. I have never heard of a successful conversion story, be it to a religion or some other ideology, which involved forcing a viewpoint down someone’s throat, ignoring clear signals that this is not the time. There may not ever be a right time. Save your energy for people who are truly invested in learning. Those are the ones will become your allies.

These suggestions aside, I still have unhealthy bitterness in my heart. I pray not to get rid of it, necessarily, but to mold it into something productive. Some of history’s most successful revolutions grew from bitter unrest about the way things are. Choking down artificial happiness only masks a problem, resulting in – surprise! – harder-to-penetrate bitterness that will inevitably destroy anything it touches. Bottom line: being fake has rarely solved anything, but authenticity has been proven to go a long way.

Filed under: Feminism, Rape Culture, Religion Tagged: censorship, Christian culture, Christianity, Controversy, depression, evangelicals, Feminism, Judaism, rape culture, social justice

Cancer patients and Caitlyn Jenner: why can’t both be brave?

The following is a letter to the editor in response to an article that specifically names my father as a braver individual than Caitlyn Jenner:

Mr. Aceto,

I’m David Caplin’s daughter, and as flattering as it is for you to acknowledge him by name as a man of courage, you are wrong that men like my father are braver than Caitlyn Jenner, and even more wrong to assume that his suffering was worse than anything a transgendered individual might face in his/her lifetime.

There is no shortage of sympathy for cancer patients – it’s a disease that no one wants. It’s a disease that does not choose its victims based on gender alone.

Here are some examples of what transgendered people face, from The Huffington Post:

An 8-year-old boy was beaten to death by his father

A 14-year-old was strangled to death and stuffed under a bed

Two 16-year-olds were shot to death

Three 18-year-olds were stabbed to death, dismembered or shot

Two 18-year-olds were murdered with no details being reported

An 18-year-old suffered two violent attacks by a mob and survived

Among the 102-person figure that comes in from 14 countries worldwide, “36 persons were shot multiple times, 14 stabbed multiple times, 11 were beaten to death, three were burned to death, three dismembered/mutilated, and two were tortured, two were strangled, one was hanged, one had her throat cut and one was stoned to death.”

That a privileged celebrity like Caitlyn Jenner would use her platform to help this extremely marginalized demographic, fully aware of the bigotry she would receive, is pretty damn brave in my book.

Mr. Aceto, there is no single copyrighted definition of “brave.” Bravery comes in all forms, in all kinds of people, in many diverse situations. My father was one of the bravest people I knew, but he is far from the only one. Knowing the kind, compassionate soul he was, I think he’d be honored to share that character trait with the likes of Caitlyn Jenner.

Sincerely,

Beth Caplin Stoneburner

Filed under: Other stuff, Writing & Publishing Tagged: Caitlyn Jenner, cancer, Controversy, LGBT, Transgendered

The impossible lesson of empathy

The expression “Hurt people hurt people” could have been written about my life. One of the reasons I know I still need Jesus is because there are times during intense grief when it feels good to bring others down with me. I’m not proud of this. I make no attempts to justify it. I’m just admitting that I do it.

I lost two friends over fights I picked recently. The first was when an acquaintance told me that God protected his home during a storm. Other people on his street experienced varying degrees of property damage, but not this guy. If I wanted to respond tactfully, I could have suggested it was more likely that, in nature’s random, non-agenda-driven way, the storm just didn’t travel a path in which his house was a target. But that wasn’t a remote possibility for him: God protected his home. I told him, without trying to hide my spite at all, “Isn’t it funny that the people who believe in the prosperity gospel are the ones who benefit from it?”

The other instance was a friend who bragged that God provided her a new house: not a realtor, not the buyer of the home she was trying to sell. I had to ask why God provided her – someone with no shortage of monetary means – with a home, but not, say, an actual homeless person.

That’s the thing about these “providence” stories. When I hear them, I’m not going to feel encouraged and inspired, as the story teller wants me to feel. Instead I’m going to be wondering about all the other people in need of blessings and miracles; people who live on the streets and subsist only on the kindness of strangers. People who lost pieces of property in a storm that they can’t afford to replace. But the ultimate question of all is, rather than protect select people in these storms, why doesn’t God just prevent them from happening in the first place?

“God’s ways are just higher than ours” isn’t a satisfactory response anymore. I can’t take it seriously from people who claim to benefit from those “mysterious ways” while the rest of us are left floundering for things we still need. It doesn’t matter to me anymore that people generally mean well when they say these things. I only hear the unspoken implication that they are favored in ways that other people are not. I’ve heard stories of how God healed people with conditions just like my father’s because they prayed hard enough, which strongly implies that people like my dad didn’t have enough value to be worth saving. I don’t believe that, but that’s what I hear.

That’s why I bristle when I hear these stories, which I’ve heard in just about every church group I’ve been to over the last few years. That’s why I can’t help but think to myself, you are not a safe person for me to share my story with whenever I hear one. Maybe that’s unfair, but it’s an emotional risk I just can’t afford to take.

I received an email from a family acquaintance two weeks before Dad died, asking if he had accepted Jesus as his savior so he could go to heaven: the unmentioned implication being, of course, that no Jesus meant no peace after death, but only more suffering. That email pushed me into one of the worst anxiety attacks I’ve ever had. In my mind, the people who think nothing of asking a stranger if a sick relative has been saved are the same kind of people who don’t understand what’s so hurtful about these “miracle” stories. They are the same people who might not understand why I don’t find the platitudes comforting, and might even find it offensive that “Because God said so” isn’t enough for me. Not if I can’t understand why.

That’s an unfair generalization to make about people who just want to be helpful, but grief isn’t known for being rational and reasonable. It’s not a permanent excuse to get off the hook for lashing out, but sometimes the walls it builds can be helpful. At this still-fragile point when it hasn’t been a full year since I lost my father, those walls keep me from revealing too much to people who aren’t ready to hear or understand.

But one benefit of letting down those walls is allowing the grief to thaw one’s heart enough to understand that people who say those hurtful things likely haven’t experienced the same hurts in life, and if they have, they might come to different spiritual conclusions about them. If they truly believe that God protected them in a plane crash that killed everyone else on board, is it right to try and take that hope from them? Is it cruel to judge it and tear it to pieces?

Judaism taught me that no one is immune to suffering; that there is often no conceivable reason for it, and to give credit where it is due: to doctors, rescue teams, people in public service. Christianity is teaching me empathy for those who are lucky enough to have never suffered too deeply, and for those who process pain differently than I do. It’s a one-step-forward-two-steps-back kind of lesson, but I give myself points for at least acknowledging that I need to learn it. And admitting you have a problem is the first step toward correcting it, so I’ve heard.

Filed under: Religion Tagged: cancer, Christian culture, Christianity, Controversy, depression, evangelicals, First World Problems, grief, Judaism

The secret benefit of “spiritual disconnect”?

Every now and then I get this compulsion to go back and reread some old journals – maybe in hope of finding proof that I am, in fact, maturing properly, even if it doesn’t always feel that way.

This entry was written exactly a year to the day my father died: September 25, 2013.

I know why God felt distant then: I just left seminary, feeling like I wasn’t “Christian enough” (after being labeled a Christian extremist in college the year before). The “justice” I’m referring to is regarding my ex-boyfriend, whom I was either brave enough or foolish enough to send a letter “officially” calling him out for what he did, which I didn’t have the courage to do as he was breaking up with me. I was deeply concerned he would do the same thing to his current girlfriend, and I regretted not ever reporting him, even if by then the statute of limitations had long since run out.

Heavy stuff for anyone to deal with, at any age or place in life. But it goes to show the difference a year can make: if I had to choose between justice for myself and getting my Dad back, obviously the latter is more important. I lost someone who mattered – someone actually worth grieving over. If I thought life was hard the year before…well, I had no idea what more was coming to me. I feel like I’ve been stretched quite a bit, and I could sure use a break. Not a stress-free life, just…well, maybe a slightly more boring one. Except I am a permanent resident in SarahbethLand whether I like or not, and I know better than to expect less than perfect chaos.

Still, to say there isn’t any grief in losing an abusive partner would be a lie. I lost five years of time I could have spent seeing other people, and I turned down a few guys who showed some potential because that guy was my priority. And he was – perhaps still is – the kind of guy who could make anyone say “He’d never do that” with absolute conviction.

This journal entry brings up a few questions. Is justice really God’s alone, or can humans make it happen, too? And are the times when God “pulls away” from us (or so it feels) really the times that teach and enrich us the most? Because if so, I must be in for a major spiritual awakening.

Filed under: Rape Culture, Religion Tagged: cancer, Christian culture, Christianity, depression, grief, rape culture