October 2011 Archives

Given that this is the season to honor and remember loved ones who have passed from this world, I thought I would make today's blog post a more personal one and talk about a beloved relative, my paternal grandmother.

I forget my exact age, by Grandma Harris passed away when I was very young, before I began school, if memory serves.  The past several years of her life, she battled cancer.  I vaguely remember many nights where my sister and I would sit in the hospital waiting room with one of my parents while the other one would go upstairs to visit Grandma during her latest hospitalization.  I cannot think of Grandma without thinking of memories of her failing health because I never knew her before her battle began.

I am told that Grandma was a caring and strong woman all of her life.  I'm inclined to believe that because of the strength, grace, and dignity with which she faced her fading health in her final years.  Anyone can be strong and loving in the best of times.  However, it takes a special person -- like Grandma Harris -- to be strong in sir darkest hours.

One of my most cherished memories is of a day I spent alone with my grandparents.  Grandma Harris gave me a peanut butter cookie¹ and I laid on one of the couches in my grandparents' single-wide trailer munching on it.  Now, like any preschooler, I was a messy eater.  And peanut butter cookies are prone to leaving lots of crumbs.  By the time I was done, both I and the couch were covered in crumbs.  My grandparents saw it.

Grandpa Harris -- who had a much harder edge than his wife -- started to get upset and critical.  But Grandma Harris calmed him and told him that these things happens.  Besides, Grandma Harris had a solution.  She told Grandpa to go get the old vacuum cleaner.  He did and Grandmother began to vacuum up all the crumbs, both those on the couch and those on me.  Grandma Harris was a rather practical woman.²

When I think about the kind of person I want to be, I often think of Grandma Harris.  If I manage to embody half the love, strength, and no-nonsense approach to living that she did, I think I'll have done a great job.  And I'd like to think she'd be pleased with the man that little boy grew up to be.

[1] Grandma Harris loved making peanut butter cookies, and they are forever intwined with memories of her in my mind.  If you asked me for an honest evaluation of which cookies I thought tasted the best, I would likely say chocolate chip cookies.  But if you ask me what my favorite cookie is, I will still tell you "peanut butter" cookies more than three decades later.  It's not about how they taste, it's about the fact that they are the cookies Grandma Harris used to make.

[2]  Plus it gave me countless opportunities to watch people's reactions whenever I mention in passing that I got hovered by my own grandmother.

While I do not consider myself Wiccan and I'm certainly not an Initiate of Gardnerian Wicca or any of it's close relatives, my own understanding of witchcraft has been strongly influenced by the thoughts and writings of various such Initiates, including the public writers of Gerald Gardner himself.

Gardner presented a piece of writing in his books which he referred to as "The Myth of the Goddess."[1]  He indicated that it was one of the -- if not THE -- central myths of the form of witchcraft he taught.  It also happens to be one of my favorite myths.  As it features the god of the witches as Death himself, I thought it appropriate to post it the day before Samhain.

Now, G. (the Witch Goddess) had never loved, but she would solve all the Mysteries, even the Mystery of Death; and so she journeyed to the Nether Lands.

The Guardians of the Portals challenged her, "Strip off thy garments, lay aside thy jewels; for naught may ye bring with ye into this our land."

So she laid down her garments and her jewels, and was bound , as are all who enter the Realms of Death the Mighty One.

Such was her beauty that Death himself knelt and kissed her feet, saying, "Blessed be thy feet that have brought the in these ways.  Abide with me, let me but place my cold hand on thy heart."

She replied, "I love thee not.  Why dost thou cause all things that I love and take delight in to fade and die?"

"Lady," replied Death, "'tis Age and Fate, against which I am helpless.  Age causes all things to wither; but when men die at the end of time I give them rest and peace, and strength so that they may return.  But thou, thou art lovely.  Return not; abide with me."

But she answered, "I love thee not."

Then Death said, "An thou received not my hand on thy heart, thou must receive Death's scourge."

"It is Fate; better so," she said, and she knelt; and Death scourged her, and she cried, "I feel the pangs of love."

And Death said, "Blessed be," and gave her the Fivefold Kiss, saying, "Thus only may ye attain to joy and knowledge."

And he taught her all the Mysteries.  And they loved and were one, and he taught her all the Magics.

For there are three great events in the life of man; Love, Death, and Resurrection in a new body; and Magic controls them all.  For to fulfil love you must return again at the same time and place as the loved one, and you must remember and love them again.  But to be reborn you must die, and be ready for a new body; and to die you must be born; and without love you may not be born.  And these be all the Magics.

Notes:
[1] At least that's the name he used for it in Witchcraft Today.  In The Meaning of Witchcraft, he renamed it to "The Magical Legend of the Witches."

As Samhain approaches, my thoughts turn to the ancestors and the realms of the underworld.  As a witch whose practice tends to be highly shamanistic in nature, I'm quite familiar with these realms and spend a bit of time exploring them and drawing on the wisdom of their inhabitants.

Some of my friends -- including Pagans who tend to focus on the brighter side of the divine and upper- and mid-world beings occasionally ask me about my interest in the darker places of our spiritual cosmos.  They find the underworld realms a frightening and daunting place.  And there wariness is not unwarranted.  The underworld can be a strange chaotic, and troubling place.  After all, half-formed and malformed things live their, including our own shadows.  As a witch, I'm thankful that I have guardians, guides, and other allies to walk with me in such places.

But just as I wouldn't amputate an arm just because because it's broken or is suffering from pain, the troubling aspects of the underworld are not sufficient reason for me to ignore it.  There is great power and wisdom waiting there.

In addition to everything else it is,[1] it is the home of the ancestors, those who have gone before us, built up the world we lived in, and even gave us our lives.  These are the ones who have set the stage we now walk upon and helped form the person we would become as we walked on them.  The ability to visit them, thank them, and learn from their experiences is cherished.

The fact that we come from the ancestors who inhabit the underworld is also one of the things that makes the underworld the home of all potential.  It is the place where dark -- as in unrevealed and unformed -- forces exist, waiting to be given shape, form, and purpose.  As a shamanistic witch, I seek to seek out and explore these potentials that lay in the underworld so that I may draw them out and pull them into something in this realm.  It is the realm which provides the source material for new beginnings.

Notes:
[1]  Indeed, trying to describe everything that can be found in the underworld (or mid-world or upper world, for that matter) is not something I can do in a thousand blog posts, let alone this single post.

While I was attending college at Susquehanna University, I took a class on religious philosophy.  A week of class-time was spent discussing morality.  The first day of that segment of the class, the instructor made it clear that the purpose of moral philosophy -- and morality in general -- was to aid an individual in evaluating situations in sir life and determining zir best course of action.  It's a lesson that has stuck with me.

Unfortunately, it's not a lesson that seems to stick with some groups, such as the Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry (CARM).  Consider as evidence  CARM's statements about morality in their Statement of Faith:

Homosexuality, lesbianism, bisexuality, pedophilia, bestiality, necrophilia, cross dressing, trans-genderism, lying, bearing false witness, adultery, wife-swapping, pornography, fornication, and coveting are all sinful practices, against scriptural revelation, are contrary to proper living, and are not acceptable to the CARM ministry as normal or approved behaviors. Still, we do not hate those who practice these things but pray for their deliverance.

Note that with the exception of laying, bearing false witness (how it differs from lying is unclear), and coveting, this list is almost exclusively about declaring what sexual practices[1] and gender non-conforming practices are to be considered sinful.

This is not a useful moral paradigm by the standards of my college professor, standards which I'm inclined to accept for myself.  It offers no advice to someone who is confronted by injustice, nor does it offer any practical advice on how zie may come to recognize injustice.  It does not cover what it actually means to live with integrity, how to embody compassion, or what it means to love both your neighbor and your enemy.[2]  The average person would find this list completely unhelpful in answering the question, "What can I do to live a more moral life?"

That's because CARM did not develop the morality clause of their Statement of Faith to help guide people through the process of determining the moral thing to do in everyday situations or when confronted with some troubling situation.  CARM developed this clause in order to declare who they considered immoral -- particularly and almost exclusively in terms of sexuality.  They creed it to attempt to exert control over other people's sexuality.  This is not called morality, but moralizing.

I tell you the truth, there is far more moral guidance in 1 Corinthians 13 than in the CARM blurb.

Notes:
[1]  Actually, CARM doesn't even say that same sex sexual activity is sinful.  It condemns homosexuality, bisexuality, and lesbianism.  It is not clear whether CARM does so because it does not consider sexual orientation does not exist beyond sexual orientation or if they are one of the last groups to still insist that even being gay -- that is, having feelings for and experiencing an attraction towards  members of the same sex -- is sinful in itself.  Either way, CARM demonstrates that even if we accept that CARM's statement is only about sexual morality rather than morality in general, it is still deeply flawed.

[2]  Considering Jesus himself gave a direct command to his followers to love their enemies, I think it's fair to say that any Christian organization's morality clause that does not cover that command[3] is fatally flawed.

[3]  No, I don't consider a quick "we do not hate...but pray for their deliverance" tacked on at the end as sufficient for that purpose.  That's called "covering your ass."

This morning, my "signing off" post went up over at Confessions of a Former Conservative.  I won't post an excerpt here, as there's no notable text in my farewell and expression of gratitude.  I will, however, encourage any of my readers who don't already check out CoaFC on a regular basis to go take a peak.  I left the community over there a little present.  ;)

Guest-blogging over there has inspired me.  Beyond merely getting the creative juices flowing, it has inspired me to get more disciplined and serious about blogging here.  As such, I'm hoping to implement a few new practices in my blogging here:

1.  I will start trying to keep a regular blogging schedule.  I will try to post something every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, as well as a post on the weekend.  I figure four posts a week should be relatively doable.

2.  I will resist the urge to rapid-fire post entries when I get into one of my manic blogging moods.  Instead, I will save up extra posts and (providing the functionality actually works with my version of MT) schedule them to post over however many days.

3.  I will create a facebook page for this blog.  I'm finding that doing this seems to have helped FC a great deal.

So Friday, I should have something new up.  In fact, it'll probably be a follow-up post relating to my guest-posts at CoaFC.

And in other good news, it turns out that another favorite blogger of mine is considering asking me to fill in for her when she goes on vacation.  It'd be rather cool if I get a rep for being a guest-blogger.  And if it keeps me going here, all the better.

My final day of guest-blogging at Confessions of a Former Conservative is being met with My enemy's pawn is still just a pawn to me.  Here's the teaser:

Of course, I told myself that I didn't hate these Pagan people.  After all, they ultimately were not the enemy, and I was no Jack Chick.  I understood that these poor peers of mine were mere dupes of Satan, pawns of the enemy that were being used.  I didn't hate them.  I did not spew venom at them directly, but at their invisible masters, of whom they were completely unaware.

My stint over at Confessions of a Former Conservative continues with When losing your religion involves losing more than that.  Here's a snippet to pique your curiosity:

Beyond that, you might have no sense of who you are, because everything you based your identity on is now gone.  So in addition to not knowing how to relate to anyone from your past or new friends you might make, you find yourself trying to figure out what it means to be you all over again.

While I've lapsed into silence here at my blog (something I hope to remedy soon), I'm spending a few times as a guest-blogger over at Confessions of a Former Conservative.  My first post there talks about fundamentalism as an all consuming identity.  Here's a brief excerpt:

Granted, my story is probably not typical in the fact that not every fundamentalist gets as involved in leadership roles as I did.  However, the pattern of increasing involvement in church activities is pretty standard.  It may be another small group Bible study.  It may be some outreach ministry, like going door to door or handing out tracts for Halloween.  But it's simply assumed that "church stuff" -- a term used to great effect by Frank Paretti in his book, The Visitation -- will continue to consume more of the fundamentalist's life.

If you haven't done so already, hop on over and read the rest.  And if you're not a regular over there, be sure to check out the rest of FC's blog.  He's well worth the read.

Recently, a New Jersey teacher posted comments on Facebook that spoke out against teaching about LGBT people of historic significance and denigrated gays.  She went so far as to call homosexuality a cancer.  This has led some people, including Garden State Equality head Steve Goldstein -- to criticize her and even recommend that the school reconsider allowing her to hold her position.

Proving once again that the conservative Christian caricature of them is quite unfounded, the ACLU has actually defended teacher Viki Knox:

"Although we do not agree with the sentiments expressed on Ms. Knox's personal Facebook page, her comments are protected by the First Amendment," ACLU Legal Director Ed Barocas stated. "The ACLU believes that the response to offensive speech is not the restriction of speech, but more speech."

I agree with Barocas, and I am hesitant to remove a teacher for making personal comments outside of school and outside the capacity as a school employee and representative.[1]  As distasteful, hateful, and bigoted as I find the quotes in the article, I cannot in good conscience seek to silence Knox or prevent her from saying them on her own time and when she is acting as a private citizen.

Having said that, I think it's important to note that while I and the ACLU are more than willing to stand up for her freedom of expression, Ms. Knox is quite happy to deny that freedom to QUILTBAG individuals.  Indeed, the whole thing that sparked this controversy was the fact that she took issue with recognizing and acknowledging gay people of historic significance.[2]  And she made it perfectly known that she would like all QUILTBAG people to remain completely closeted:

"Why parade your unnatural immoral behaviors before the rest of us?

Bear in mind that according to religious conservatives and other homophobes, immoral behaviors includes things like two men holding hands and one woman giving another woman a back rub.

Knox is not unique in this matter.  Many anti-gay individuals and groups will work towards the silencing of QUILTBAG individuals, forcing us into the closet, and making us all but invisible, yet will complain about their own rights to spew their drivel are being violated -- or even just when they perceive them as having been violated.[3]

I don't fault them for sticking up for their rights.  I do think some LGBT advocates go too far in some (hopefully rare) cases.  I just wish they'd grant us the same courtesy.

Notes:

[1]  Of course, as Goldstein notes, one of Knox's comments include the phrase "That's what I teach and preach," which does suggest that the school would do well to make sure that she is not using her teaching position as a bully pulpit for not only expressing her views, but giving them some sense of authority.

[2]  For a wonderful examination of how writing marginalized groups out of the pictures contributes to their continued marginalization and oppression, see mmy's fantastic take on the well-known incident where it happened to women this past Spring.

[3]  This example was the result of a racist comment rather than a homophobic one.  However, the principle remains the same:  haters want to silence others while wrapping their hatred in the First Amendment.  Specifically who they hate is irrelevant.

Yesterday, I did a serious post about National Coming Out Day and cominng out of the closet.  Today, I want to share a fun little video I did.  I figure coming out is scary enough, I might as well find humor in it where I can.



I do want to take a moment to issue an apology, however.  After I made the video, I realized that I flubbed up and said "transexual" instead of "transgender."  I should have used the latter word, for countless reasons, such as the fact that gender identity issues delve into far more than physical sexual characteristics.  Normally, I do a better job than that.  But rather than trying to explain why I used the wrong word, let me just say this:

I fucked up.  I am sorry.  This is just proof that I need to work even harder at being a better ally to the transgender community.  I hope that the transgender community will give me a chance to do exactly that.

I'd rather be hated for who I am rather than loved for who I am not.

I ran across the above saying on a tee shirt a couple years ago.  It's always stuck with me, and it's a principle I try to keep in mind when I live my life.  It's an important principle when faced with the decision of whether or not to live as an openly gay[1] man.  It's a principle I want to discuss as a part of my contribution to National Coming Out Day.

One of the big hurdles to coming out -- whether in general or to specific people -- is the fear of rejection.  There's that fear -- and sometimes, it's a well-founded fear -- that friends, family members, bosses, and other individuals will reject us, stop loving us, and even make our lives miserable.  Personally, I've often found it far easier to come out to a perfect stranger.  After all, if they reject me, I've lost no relationship or support.  However, I maintain that remaining in the closet in order to get someone to continue to love and accept me isn't a good reason to stay in the closet.

I wish to be clear on what I am saying there, lest it be misconstrued.  Staying in the closet so that someone loves me is not the same as not coming out to my parents because I'm financially dependent on them.  Nor is it the same as hiding my sexual orientation from my boss so that I don't get fired.  In those cases, I would not be staying closeted in order to get the people in question to continue loving me.  I would be doing it in order to survive.  I could survive without my parents' love[2] relatively easily -- sadly, some kids do it all their lives.  But there was a time when it would've been much harder to survive if my parents quit buying me food and clothes or stopped providing me with a place to sleep and keep warm.[3]

The thing is, there are billions of people on this planet.  And a great many number of them will love me and accept me for who I am, gay man and all.  I've been fortunate in that over the years, I've found and built friendships with plenty of them.  Indeed, I've made far more new and incredibly supportive friends than I have lost old friends.

So I see no point in remaining in the closet to keep those "friends" who refuse to accept me for who I am.  Truth be told, if I have to lie to them to keep them as loved ones, then they are not truly loved ones at all.  I learned long ago that as much as it may hurt, I'm better off letting such people go and finding people who will not only accept me for who I am, but actually prefer me to be authentically me.

So yes, I'd rather be hated for who I am than hated for who I am not.  But I have a third, even better option. I can find people who love me for who I am.

Notes:

[1] And I'm pretty sure it would apply to other QUILTBAG people too.

[2] I am fortunate in that this was never an issue for me.  While it did take my parents time to adjust, they never rejected or disowned me.  Sadly, not every QUILTBAG individual has been so fortunate.

[3] Note, also that came a going when I no longer needed my parents' financial support.  And that's the thing about valid reasons to stay in the closet:  they are more often than not temporary and something that can eventually be overcome.  Granted, finding a new boss who isn't homophobic in today's economy may seem like a near-impossibility....

Check out the video he did, telling about his experiences with his family and his attempt to change his sexual orientation.  (TRIGGER WARNING:  Attempted suicide, extreme "conversion therapy" methods, physical and emotional abuse.)