Then there’s this.  I/We are walking with some friends who are preparing to move to another state.  There are some potential pitfalls and ups and downs involved with this move.  They hit a snag, a snafu (that’s Army for Situation Normal, All Fucked Up) as it were, this past week.  Up to now they were very happy with the house they’d found, gleeful in fact.  They felt that it was “in God’s plan,” for them.  This snag, this snafu, caused them to begin to doubt the rightness of the house for them.  Just for a moment.  They have continued ahead with the move because the house really is a good place for them.  It really is a good decision.  But the conversations and prayers have gotten me thinking.  I’ve been thinking about how we perceive and communicate God’s plan in our lives.

It’s quite common in the evangelical/institutional church to discuss “God’s plan” for one’s life as if it’s a blue print that may be discerned by a variety of means.  Some of those means are almost magical and require spiritual gifts and talents that merge with those of a nature that I liken to tarot card reading, looking into a crystal ball, or prophesying/divining (and I don’t mean in God’s name).  People wonder if they’re going to the “right” college (i.e. the one that is in “God’s” plan for their lives), or if they’re marrying the “right” person, or taking the “right” job, or purchasing the “right” house or the “right” car and so they look around for signs and symbols that they are making the “right” decision.  That is, the decision that puts them on the path that is in “God’s Plan” for their lives.

Increasingly, I am having a hard time with that line of thinking.  I used to think like that.  I used to think that there was a “right” decision to make and a “wrong” one about things like jobs and colleges and cars and such.  (I still think there might be a right and wrong mate, but that has nothing to do with God’s plan and everything to do with personalities and character and traits and things).   I’m not sure that God really cares about which college I go to.  Okay, well, I’m not going to college.  I don’t think S/He cares about which car I drive, other than the fact that cars degrade creation.  So in my decision to purchase a car, I ought to take that into account.  I need to take my income into account when I’m purchasing a home so that I can continue to be obedient to God’s call in my life after purchasing a home … but I’m pretty certain that God doesn’t particularly care which house I choose.  It’s just a house.  And any cover over our head is a blessing.

I think that something very uncomfortable has happened in Western evangelicalism.  We’ve taken a verse out of context and made it mean something completely adverse to its original purpose.  Big surprise there.  In these times of decision people often quote Jeremiah 29:11.  Some people have even co-opted it as their “life” verse.  So I went to the chapter and re-read the whole thing this morning.  Here’s the verse all by itself.  Actually, I’m just going to quote the part that people usually say all alone:  “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, … “  Then they put that with a bit about the sparrows and the lillies in the field (parables in Matthew) and come up with an idea that God has put together an individualized blue print for each of our lives.  If we could just divine that blueprint and live accordingly, we’d have a perfect happy life.

I have a lot of problems with the picture that paints of God.  What kind of God is it that has a perfect plan for Her children, but keeps it secret?  Which of us, as parents, has plans for our children, but dangles only enough details for them to get in trouble and then holds them accountable?  Even we humans are not that evil.  That paints a picture of a mean, stingy God who is waiting for His children to get into trouble.  The God I read about in scripture loves us.  Loves us enough to give us free will.  But having a closely held blueprint and a free will I think are somewhat oxymoronish.  If my path to sanctification lies through that blueprint, but I cannot know the details.  And I have a free will to do what I choose.  Then do I have a free will at all?  If my path is already chosen, do I actually have free will?  I know that some would say that free will lies in my choice to be obedient to the path, the blueprint, or not.  But I don’t quite believe that.  Here’s why.

I went to Jeremiah chapter 29 and read the whole thing.  The first verse stunned me.  Chapter 29 of Jeremiah is a letter!  It is a letter from God to the exiled Hebrews in Babylon.  The first four verses are the bona fides.  But verse five gets into the meat of what God wants the Israelites to hear from him.  So read with me now:

5 “Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. 6 Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. 7 Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.” 8 Yes, this is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says: “Do not let the prophets and diviners among you deceive you. Do not listen to the dreams you encourage them to have. 9 They are prophesying lies to you in my name. I have not sent them,” declares the LORD.

10 This is what the LORD says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my gracious promise to bring you back to this place. 11 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 12 Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by you,” declares the LORD, “and will bring you back from captivity. ^[b] I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you,” declares the LORD, “and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile.”

15 You may say, “The LORD has raised up prophets for us in Babylon,” 16 but this is what the LORD says about the king who sits on David’s throne and all the people who remain in this city, your countrymen who did not go with you into exile- 17 yes, this is what the LORD Almighty says: “I will send the sword, famine and plague against them and I will make them like poor figs that are so bad they cannot be eaten. 18 I will pursue them with the sword, famine and plague and will make them abhorrent to all the kingdoms of the earth and an object of cursing and horror, of scorn and reproach, among all the nations where I drive them. 19 For they have not listened to my words,” declares the LORD, “words that I sent to them again and again by my servants the prophets. And you exiles have not listened either,” declares the LORD.

20 Therefore, hear the word of the LORD, all you exiles whom I have sent away from Jerusalem to Babylon. 21 This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says about Ahab son of Kolaiah and Zedekiah son of Maaseiah, who are prophesying lies to you in my name: “I will hand them over to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and he will put them to death before your very eyes. 22 Because of them, all the exiles from Judah who are in Babylon will use this curse: ‘The LORD treat you like Zedekiah and Ahab, whom the king of Babylon burned in the fire.’ 23 For they have done outrageous things in Israel; they have committed adultery with their neighbors’ wives and in my name have spoken lies, which I did not tell them to do. I know it and am a witness to it,” declares the LORD.

When I read this letter, I hear the words of a parent speaking peace and calm to a troubled child.  I hear myself saying to my children things such as, “Yes, you really screwed up this time.  Here are the consequences of your bad behavior.  But you’re going to live.  You’ll survive and thrive.  I still love you and want what is best for you.  When you calm down, you can join us again at the dinner table.”  Okay … I know that’s the human version and God has much more stringent standards of behavior than I do.  But I think you get the picture.  What this verse does NOT say is that God has a plan for our lives that involves which college to choose, which car, which house, which mate … that’s why S/He gave us free will and good brains.

I believe that generally S/He wishes to bless us, to bring good into our lives (whether or not we can recognize it).  Generally, we ought to (because of our love response) desire to spread that love around to others using our gifts and talents.  In that way, we are living within Her plan for our lives.  But I’m beginning to think that where and how and when we do it, is kind of up to us.  We’re grown ups, after all.  Praying about those decisions, I’m increasingly thinking, is like praying for a good parking space.  It just might be a little trivial.  What do you think?

Listen carefully to the words …

This was filmed in my home town … and believe it or not … I do recognize every scene in the video, but not the main characters.  However, it wouldn’t surprise me if I discovered that I know them or someone related to them.  That’s how small the place is.

Yes, the capitol dome is plated with 14k gold.  That is true.  Yes, all the rednecks live in Barre (pronounced, barrie).  Everything else is pretty much true too.  This is just hilarious.

My daughter, known here as LightGirl, is amazingly perceptive about other people.  She is especially perceptive about me.  She picks up on my cues when I think I have them deeply hidden.  And they are hidden … from most people.  But she can see them.  She’ll look me straight in the eye and ask a quiet question that cuts straight to the bone.  It never hurts, but it’s clean.

Yesterday, she walked in and asked, apropos of nothing, “Mom, are we ever going to start going to church again?”  She looked a bit wistful.  I asked if she had a particular church in mind.  No.  I asked if she missed church.  Not really.  “But,” she said, “I really think you miss it a lot.”

We got interrupted at that point.  But I started thinking.  Do I miss church?  What do I miss?  We haven’t attended a Sunday worship service since early March.  What is church?

I think the thing I long for the most is communion or Eucharist.  I know that there’s an Episcopal church right up the street that I could attend tomorrow and take Eucharist there.  But that’s not the same.  That’s akin to prostitution.  I want to serve and be served the body and bread amongst a circle of community.  Where the liturgy calls down Spirit among us and we wait upon It.  I’m inherently greedy … and I want communion of heart and soul with God and with my friends.  I want it all.  That’s what I long for.

With the evaluation out of the way, I’m somewhat more relaxed now and able to have more conversations with LightChildren which are not some form of “You should be doing school because we are so far behind it will take multiple lifetimes to catch up.” Or some other such nonsense that comes out of my over-achieving mouth.  They were far more reasonable and healthy about the whole thing.  I really need to take more cues from them sometimes.

In any case, LightGirl has joined me at Curves.  I was not certain I would welcome the imposition on “my” time at first.  But I’ve come to enjoy the conversations we have in the car there and back again.  I also enjoy seeing her take on more and more of herself in these venues.  A recent car conversation was a little unsettling however.  It began like this, “Mom, did you ever find out that a guy you’d had a crush on for ages was a jerk just about the time he started paying attention to you?”  “Hmmm,”  I responded, “I don’t really remember if that happened.  If it did, it didn’t make a big impression on me.  Why do you ask?”  “Well … GoalieGuy was getting dressed in the hallway yesterday when we came out of our lockerroom.  He put his hands on his pants and asked if anyone wanted to see his p****.” (and yes, she used the anatomically correct term, as apparently, did he)  She was not entirely certain if this was funny or jerky behavior or a mixture of both.  Neither was I.  I told her she might want to give him a second chance because middle school guys are sometimes known to do weird and awkward things to get attention.  She agreed with that.  Later on I did suggest that she might want to begin to carry around a 6″ ruler.  Then she could whip it out if he ever does that again and say something like, “Hey, I need to measure that.  I’m doing some field testing for a homeschool biology class.”  She thought that was pretty funny and might put an end to the jerky behavior.

Last night LightBoy and I stopped in at 31-derful Flavors to order the cake for his long delayed birthday party.  It will happen this weekend.  We were with LightHusband.  He had to run along to pick LightGirl up at the rink, so it happened that LightBoy and I walked home from the ice cream store.  It wasn’t far and it was a pleasant evening to stroll along with an ice cream cone.  LightBoy picked the darkest chocolatiest ice cream they had.  For those of you who know him IRL, he’s not a particularly neat eater.  So he had a nice ring of chocolate around his mouth which prompted me to say, “Hey did you get any IN your mouth?”  He giggled.  And we walked on.  Pretty soon he said, “Mom, I’ve got something for your ‘Strange Facts About Kids Book’.”  “Oh yeah?” I replied.  “Yeah … Kids walking along the street with ice cream around their mouths makes adults happy.”  he said.  “Oh … really,” I said,  “but adults walking along the street with ice cream around their mouths …”   “… makes other adults nauseous.” he finished the sentence for me.  “Don’t worry Mom.  You have skin colored ice cream.”  (well that was a HUGE relief … that and the fact that I have learned in the past year or so to eat my ice cream without making a mess, but don’t tell LightBoy).  I very nearly fell out laughing, but of course, could not because … well … he was so serious about the whole thing.

This is a good age.  Good conversations.  Interesting conversations.  Now if they would only stop bickering ….

Ahhhh … I could use a beer right now.  Or something cold and delicious.  Or something chocolate.  Or really anything rewarding.

We’ve had another successful year of homeschooling.  Coach came today and evaluated the LightChildren and our homeschool (Osgiliath Classical School).  We passed with flying colors.  In fact, he said, “I wish I could bring other families out here and give clinics.  You have a healthy family and a healthy school.”

I’m feeling very relieved and just a little smug.

It won’t last long … we still have a lot of work to do for this academic year.  We’re quite behind.  But for now I will bask in the glow of a job well done.

I learned two things today.  The first is the vast difference between how I face evaluations and how the LightChildren face them.  They have a much healthier attitude towards it.  I’m glad; it’s one thing that I wanted them to get out education that I did not.  The other was a primer on how to do records of high school and how to think outside of the box so that a study of fabric dying can become a class on Textile Design and Production.  Yeah, buddy!  I’m lovin’ that …

Now we’re off to a Memorial Day cookout and swim at PlusOneFriend’s house.  Oh, what a relief it is …

Here is a video from the Estes Park Highland Festival in Estes Park, Colorado.

LightHusband and I have both performed at this in the past with our respective fife & drum corps. I just want you to know that there is nothing in this world quite like hearing massed pipes playing “Amazing Grace” 15 feet behind you. I used to sob out loud during the whole thing. To this day I can barely sing the song because of this experience … it was just that amazing.

I’ve been reading a book on parenting called Parenting Teens with Love and Logic. Actually, I’m pretty much finished with it now. It’s quite good. It’s really a guide to help parents understand how they can gradually put more and more responsibility for a teen’s behavior onto that teen. It’s a delicate balance and more difficult to achieve than you might think. It is difficult to love someone and yet allow them to accept painful consequences for bad decisions. This is difficult to even think about. But it’s been on my mind lately as I’ve had some conversations with LightGirl about issues like drinking and sex outside of marriage. These are issues that I have choices to make as I talk to her about them. I can make rules and forbid her from doing them. Of course, drinking alcohol is also illegal until she is a certain age. The problem is that when I make those rules, I put both of us in a really bad place. I put her in a place where she feels as though she must test the water and the boundaries I have set. I put myself in a place where I must eternally police those boundaries and that water. It’s bad for both of us. And it does nothing to nurture or grow our relationship.

In the last day or so, John Smulo posted about a recent Resolution passed by the Southern Baptist Convention concerning the use of alcohol by their members. I got to thinking about the resolution in light of the book I’ve just read on parenting. There are many styles of parenting. And there are many styles of living in community together. And there are many styles of relating to God. But somehow I think these are all intertwined with one another. I am coming to believe that the way we parent and look to parents is a reflection of how we interact with God and how we look to God.

For me, I believe that whether or not one drinks alcohol is a matter of personal preference. The consequences will be born by that person. God is going to love me no matter what, but it’s going to be painful for him to watch me go through that hangover. In the same way, if LightGirl chooses to drink when it’s not in her best interests, it’s going to make me very sad. It will be painful for me to watch her bear whatever the consequences are of that choice, but I will still love her. I’m going to give her lots of information, tools, and support to make good decisions. But they are ultimately her decisions … because it is ultimately her life, not mine. But she and I are in loving community with one another. We talk, we wrestle with these decisions. She knows I love her and have her best interests at heart and she has mine.

So, I wonder sometimes, about institutions and entities who feel that more rules will help these sorts of issues. I’ve come to believe that rules are put in place when community is lacking. Rules must be established when people feel they can no longer speak to one another face to face. Regulations and resolutions must be passed because it is no longer individuals who count but standards which must be upheld. Where there are laws, there does not need to be community, there only needs to be a police force … and life becomes more and more stark.

Last Tuesday (May 15) I closed the lid on my trusty laptop at about 11 p.m. and went to bed.  As far as I know that was the last time we had a highspeed internet connection in this house.  When I awoke and finished writing my morning pages at about 7:15 on Wednesday morning our internet connection was gone.  We have not gotten it back since.  The following is a chronicle of our interactions with the (un)helpful people who have answered the customer service phone (888-205-500) at Comcast.  The “I” refers to LightHusband … he has had the unmitigated pleasure of dealing with these jackanapes.  Just remember as you read this that we pay ~$150 per month for a business account.  This ensures rapid response when our service is down.  It is to laugh.

Lost Internet early Wednesday (before 0700), note left from Comcast that service disruption (“a few hours”) could be expected as they install fiber-optic lines in our neighborhood.

Called Thursday, 17 May, in the morning:

– Told that a Technician would be dispatched 1:00 – 5:00 (no show)

Called Friday, 18 May, 8:30am:

– Told that a Technician would be dispatched 11:00 – 2:00 (no show)

Called Friday, 18 May, 1:55pm:

– Told ticket was from 11:00 – 3:00 (still no show)

Called Friday, 18 May, 2:55pm:

– Told that they couldn’t reach dispatch and that my case would be elevated to “tier 2″… told that supervisor would be calling shortly (never received a call)

Called Friday, 18 May, 3:25pm:

– Told that it was sent to “escalation department”… supervisor would be calling shortly (never received a call)

Called Friday, 18 May, 3:50pm:

– Told that he was “walking it over to his supervisor” (put on hold… call dropped)

Called Friday, 18 May, 4:00pm:

– Told that there was “no record of the case being elevated” but that he was escalating it now. Then he said that “I’m showing that there is a tech on site now”. I assured him that I was standing in the street in front of my business and that there was no tech on site. Then I was told that local supervisor would be calling shortly. (never received a call)

Called Friday, 18 May, 5:10pm:

– Told that “every time you called today, the person taking the call backed your ticket out of the escalation queue because they were all received at different offices”. Told that “someone from the local office will contact you soon to set up an appointment”. (never received a call)

Called Monday, 21 May, 7:30am:

– Talked to “Mark in the main office”. He said that he was going to escalate the ticket from “his side” (it had not yet been escalated from “his side” before). He told me to expect a call back with a couple of hours.

Called Monday, 21 May, 9:30am:

– Talked to Bill… put on hold while he contacted the local dispatch. Told that “the phone wasn’t hooked up at the local dispatch and that’s why they never received my ticket”. I asked for the name of the local supervisor and was told that “he didn’t get his name”. Asked for the address or phone number of the local office and was told that he didn’t know. Then he said that the local dispatch “knows that I’ve been without service for a while and that he’d send someone right away”.

Received call Monday, 21 May, 1:10pm:

– Received call from Upgrade Department telling me that the reason that I had no connectivity was because they were doing work in the area. She went on to say that I should be connected in the evenings and on weekends. When I explained to her that we had absolutely NO connectivity at any time, she told me that an “inside technician” would need to be dispatched, but that the technician couldn’t work while her team was doing their upgrade. When I asked her how long I could anticipate being down, she told me that there was no way for her to tell, but that it affected other businesses in my area as well.

Called Monday, 21 May, 1:20pm:

– Talked to Brian… He assured me that a tech was due between 11:00am and 2:00pm today. He told me that the reason that we never received service on Friday was because it was marked on the system as completed.

Called Monday, 21 May, 2:10pm:

– Talked to Richard… put on hold while he talked with a supervisor. Told that “Eric the supervisor” would be calling me within 30 minutes. (Never called)

Called Monday, 21 May, 4:10pm:

– Talked to Latrice. She said that Eric did enter notes on my ticket. He stated that the local dispatch has been canceling work orders on my node because of outages due to the ongoing upgrade work. I stated that I had already spoken with an upgrade supervisor and was told that I should be up on the weekend and after business hours. When I told her that I had ZERO connectivity since last Tuesday, she put me on hold to talk to local dispatch again. When she came back, she told me that I could speak with Eric (her supervisor)… Eric told me that local dispatch had been canceling trouble tickets because they were performing work on my node today. I asked why my three appointments on Thursday and Friday got dropped without explanation, and he told me that he would speak with local dispatch and call me back. I also read to Eric the notice that was left on our office door last Wednesday morning telling us that there was ongoing upgrade work going on in my area and tht we should be prepared for service interruptions, but that “they would not exceed one day”. I then asked for a technician to at least come and test my line from the street to my router. He reiterated that he would speak with local dispatch and call me back.

Received call Monday, 21 May, 6:15pm:

– Received call from Eric telling me that local dispatch was sending a truck tonight to check the outside lines. If that didn’t resolve the issue, they would be sending a tech in the morning.

Not too long ago a book made its appearance in our home. It arrived with the LightMom; a gift from the GrandPea to his oldest grandson (LightBoy). It’s called the Dangerous Book for Boys.  At about the same time, Julie Clawson wrote about some serious misgivings she has about the book.  She makes some points that I’ve given some thought to.  But I’m not terribly concerned about them.  We’ve all been reading the book, including LightMom, who wished that the book had been around when she was a girl.  I want to build the crystal radio with the LightChildren, and I’m teaching LightBoy to quilt, LightGirl plays ice hockey, it would be fair to say that LightHusband does more cooking than I do.  So we tend to be fairly gender neutral in our house.  I worry about those books in terms of our culture, but also know that on a case by case basis I have more control over how my children perceive them than I previously recognized.

Then I took LightGirl and one of her friends to play hockey one afternoon and the friend (nicknamed the Beast by her team) told a story about her middle school softball team.  It seems that the girls softball team and the boys baseball team share equipment room space and practice time.  They do not, however, share a liking for each other.  So they have taken to playing somewhat mean jokes on one another.  This is not done in a spirit of fraternity, but in getting even, and ill will.  The latest prank was that  the girls broke into the equipment room and tied tampons and pads all over the boys equipment.  They thought this was hilarious.  I guess if you’re 13 it is.  What was disturbing to me is that the girls coach aided and abetted them in this endeavor.  LightGirl brought the incident up with me this morning.  We talked about it.  I told her I found it somewhat disturbing that the coach assisted in this.  I also told her that my biggest problem was that for centuries men have found women’s menstrual blood and the products they use to deal with it unclean and the butt of jokes.  So the girls were just perpetuating that myth and denigrating themselves by playing that joke.  They were, in a sense, further putting themselves down.

Without menstrual blood, we would not have the human race for much longer.  It is that monthly cleansing of the womb that allows pregnancy and prolonging our species.  It’s high time we acknowledged that far from being unclean and a joke, it is what allows us to be and continue being.  It is what makes us intensely feminine, female and other and beautiful.  And I am far more concerned about those underlying centuries old issues that women and girls continue to perpetuate as well as men.  May we learn to find beauty in these things as well.

We’ve been without service for three days now.  Since LightHusband works from home, we pay for a business account at $150 per month.  Supposedly this ensures rapid response when we go down.  Not so.  It simply means we pay more money per month to hope for rapid response when our service goes down.  Oh.  And we get to speak to someone who speaks English as a native language when we call for service.  That’s not particularly appealing to me since I have no problems listening to a heavy accent.

My biggest pet peeve is not being what one appears to be.  Or pretending to be something that one is not.  Essentially lying about one’s being.  So … Comcast stinks.  They are liars and cheats.  We’ve been waiting all day long while one customer service rep after another has lied and bs’ed to us.  We’ll be without the internet all weekend now.

In other news, I’ve been getting a lot of reading and quilting done.  I’m reading four books right now.  On the way out to Colorado, I picked up The Places In Between (you may recall that LightHusband read this awhile ago and I quoted from it).  I’m enjoying it too.  I came across this description of the British soldiers stationed at a crossroads town and thought it quite telling.  The Afghani men were describing the soldiers to Rory.  They thought very highly of the Brits, but were curious about some of their habits which did not make any sense at all to the wiry, desert-wise Afghani mountain men:

“British soldiers have chests as broad as horses.  We wish there were more of them to keep the peace.  Every morning they hook their feet over the bumper of their jeep, put their hands on the ground and push themselves up and down on their hands two hundred times without stopping.  I don’t know why.”

I thought about how strength has different requirements for different circumstances and different environments.  The wiry, small Afghani men are perfectly built for their environment.  They are strong and built for endurance in the arid, high altitude and high temperatures of the high desert.  The British soldiers, on the other hand, were building solid muscle mass which requires a lot of protein intake and water to maintain.  This is not easily accomplished in the terrain they were protecting.  So while they are large and strong by Western standards, they might not last so long in the wilds of Afghanistan.

I’ve also picked up Exiles:  Living Missionally in a Post-Christian Culture by Michael Frost.  I’m only one chapter into it yet, but it’s an excellent companion to Colossians Remixed.  I’d almost say it’s part 2, even though it’s written by a whole other person.

Then there is Parenting Teens with Love and Logic, by Foster Cline and Jim Fay.  Just opening this book in front of LightGirl is guaranteed to raise her hair and howls of rage.  She is determined to infer that this is about “bad” teens not all teens.  The authors have also written a general parenting book.  If it’s as good as this one, I’d highly recommend it.  They say there are several parenting methods. There’s the “helicopter” approach … where the parents hover and protect the children from everything bad, the children are never allowed to grow or own their own victories or defeats.  There’s the drill-sergeant approach where the parents bark out orders and the children are expected to obey them without question … again, children don’t learn how to listen to their own voice, they end up listening to an external voice.  There are laissez-faire parents who just let whatever happen and this also has fairly disastrous results.  Then there is the method which they recommend, the consultant approach.  In this approach, the parents ask questions about how the child will handle given situations and let them own their own victories and distasters (within reason).  It’s very good and has given me a lot of language to use that takes the heat out of aruguments and bickering with the LightChildren.

Last is a re-read of a book I read almost 20 years ago.  The Crone:  Woman of Age, Wisdom and Power, by Barbara G. Walker.  It’s fairly over the top feminist reading about Goddess worship.  But it is interesting from an anthropological and theological perspective to read about how the Trinity has been reflected in many different traditions from way before Christ (for example).  It’s also sad to read about how abuse of power and the patriarchal misuse of Church traditions took women out of their place of wisdom and healing in European villages and towns during the onslaught of the Roman Empire.  The unification of church and state under Constantine was more damaging than we can ever imagine.

So not having internet access is frustrating, but I’m getting alot of reading done!