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Post by nikita on Aug 29, 2010 22:26:00 GMT -5
No no no no... Court shows. You know, where they're on welfare and section eight but somehow managed to buy the $500 smartphone and then signed up their last unemployed boyfriend they'd only known for two weeks who then ran up a $2000 cell phone bill with downloads and ring tones and now refuses to pay for it and has moved on but with whom they have a child (number five) although they are now pregnant with baby number six from the even newer boyfriend who they met at a club four months ago. Etc. And none of them are working. These aren't paid actors. These are their actual lives. They're just trying to get the delinquent cell phone bill paid (or the 'loan' for new rims the boyfriend insisted was a necessity) and have filed a small claims case to try to get paid back. The details of their lives comes up in the telling of their case. Them, I am frustrated about. Hmmkay, but again... How much of the poor population of North America is really represented by people shameless enough to go on court shows? I don't watch these, but from what you're saying... Fair enough, but is this really widespread enough to constitute a serious social problem? Depends on what city you live in. I am not saying they represent 'poor people' I am saying they as individuals frustrate the hell out of me. And they go on the court shows because that is the only way they are going to get their judgment paid if they win because the person they are suing is poor or a deadbeat or whatever and the court shows pay the judgments in exchange for coming on the show. So there's an incentive for poorer litigants to take that route when it's offered to them. At any rate, I agree with pretty much everything you've said. I am not denigrating the poor, grouping them into class or race, nor am I of the opinion that people should only have children if they are solidly middle class or above and can afford the appropriate private lessons and private college etc. (I've heard people take that stance and it pisses me off, so I want to be clear that's not where I'm coming from at all). I have known and lived with women who needed welfare and lived on it and I was glad they and their children had that resource. I'd also like to second what Cindy said about life circumstances. Life is messy and all the planning in the world sometimes gets you bubkis.
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valsa
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Post by valsa on Aug 29, 2010 22:43:30 GMT -5
And how old are you? I think you probably aren't considering how much things have changed since Welfare Reform... Also, I'm not sure various kinds of criminality are "playing the system." They're just...criminality. Certainly, it's possible to get rich via involvement in illegal trafficking of any kind, but I think it's wrong to conflate this as another side of the same problem. They're two different things. And if prostitution were regulated and all, by god, it'd be possible to claim it... That's why I said that I can only speak for the time frame of the late 80s and early 90s. I don't know the specifics of welfare protocol today but I do know that people who’ve spent their whole lives playing the system aren’t likely to stop. There are always going to be loopholes that people, whose alternative options are limited or difficult, are going to exploit. As for criminality, other than the drugs and the prostitution, nothing the I mentioned family did was illegal. Multiple generations and families in one home where no one is employed and only the very little kids go to school is legal. So is drinking and taking legal drugs while pregnant (even if it’s pursuit of disabling the baby for disability checks) I do agree with you about legalizing and regulating prostitution. However, I don't think it's very likely that the sort of woman I lived next door with would be a legal prostitute, even if that were an option. Why do we have to go beyond food, shelter, and clothing? A lot of people have more kids when they can’t even afford those things for the ones they already have.
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Post by chbernat on Aug 30, 2010 0:35:59 GMT -5
I got a good laugh out of ya'lls comments on the toenail clipping!
Here is some clarification: Yes, I have no problem with backrubs, IF, AND I DO MEAN IF, they are done as a familial sort of thing that encorporates the healing powers of massage.
However, in this particular family, it is far more than that. The incestuous bond between the father and the adult daughter is far more sexual than it should be. And the father, Jon, is physically fit and trim. So its not just super creepy, its truly incestuous. (I would know, my father did far worse things to me).
Also, the mother, Candy, sleeps with her 13 year old son who also sleeps with his sister on occassion as well. She is very open about this.
This family is super creepy and paranoid. They also stockpile illegal weapons and ammunition on their secluded property in southern MO.
I think it would be interesting to feature that part of the QF movement at some point, because at least in my part of the world, the militant extremist/whacko QFers pretty much ran the homeschooling scene here in our state for years. Its minimized from what it used to be, but that element is still alive and strong. I would imagine other states like TX and maybe UT have those elements running in the blood too.
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Post by nikita on Aug 30, 2010 0:45:09 GMT -5
I got a good laugh out of ya'lls comments on the toenail clipping! The toenail thing is really freaking me out. I personally know only one pair of male feet I've ever met that I thought were attractive (my husband's, thankfully). All other male feet are best out of sight IMO. The idea of clipping a man's toenails - any man's toenails - just does me in. To require this of one's daughter as a preparation for marriage...well, that doesn't even bear thinking about. Creepy indeed.
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Post by jemand on Aug 30, 2010 7:29:27 GMT -5
I agree in principle but it's difficult to regulate that. Part of my standard "adult responsibility" talk to my kids included the fact that I could point out to them, in their extended family and close friends, examples of the failure of every method of birth control except abstinence. How do you police that? How do you determine who's using bc and who isn't and what do you do about the children who come along even if bc is being used? Then what do you do about the woman who escapes a QF situation, or is in one, with a slew of kids who need food? I wish there were a simple answer but I'm afraid there isn't. Actually, abstinence fails at a pretty high rate if you consider the people who were *planning* on using it. But unlike when someone puts a condom on wrong, the failure is always ascribed to the *people* and not the *method* which is a pretty unfair comparison tactic. When any OTHER BC tactic is so complicated, confusing, or difficult to use properly, we consider that a problem of the method and try to improve the delivery system or make it simpler to use. When abstinence fails to be used properly, we just blame the people using it and say, they are at fault, not the system. Also, perhaps even pregnancy due to rape in abstinent women is perhaps on the order of failure if using both a copper IUD and hormonal contraception, or if not yet, add condoms in there as a THIRD method, and I'm pretty certain perfect use there would result in fewer pregnancies than abstinence-- even if only counting rape. It's kind of like when people respond about QF, well the problem is certainly not PATRIARCHY, that's great! The problem is YOU and our particular husband weren't doing it right enough! It's both unfalsifiable and doesn't take into account human realities. Here's a more entertaining take on the subject than mine: gretachristina.typepad.com/greta_christinas_weblog/2009/08/abstinence-theory-and-practice.html
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Post by hopewell on Aug 30, 2010 9:53:24 GMT -5
Wow! Get away from this board for a weekend and I miss so much I don't know if I can catch up!! This may get long--I'll try to keep it focused:
1. [The easy one] The Duggars state in their book that they did not have air conditioning--I believe the "donation" was the duct work--not the expensive heat pump or ac units.
2. I am really excited to hear so much more about how non-celebrity families live. We all see that the Duggars are telegenic--but would they be in their umpteenth season on tv if the girls still wore panda jumpers and the boys still Brillcreamed their hair down and tucked in their plain matching polo shirts? No. But, in addition to accepting a more "worldly" standard of dress Jim-Bob also knows SALES. The old image wouldn't have sold for long! Plus, at the time of the first tv special there were only 3 teenagers. Today they have a few YOUNG ADULTS and plenty of teenagers. Every parent, if they want peace, learns to compromise a little!
3. Homeschool. I have homeschooled both of my kids at one time and now have one in public school and one in homeschool. For my son I came to the conclusion it was the only choice. Everything he did, in spite of the IEP, was "insubordination" and he ended up with no credits for the first years of high school. I really don't know how big families homeschool--but I honestly believe the Duggars took the sanest path available--the computer classes. MANY kids today are "homeschooling" but doing online Charter or regular Public programs. In many states this is FREE. Kids with behavior problems are often left with no choice. I did not choose this route for my son because he is my only student. I have examined the programs and even the Wal-Mart workbooks the Duggars use. Their kids are receiving a perfectly adequate education--and all have passed the state tests. People who have not grown up in rural or urban public schools, but in successful suburban schools, do not necessarily see the poor education so many kids gets. So, in that, the Duggars are fine. They actually do go out and see other families for broom ball, home Church etc. No, that is not freedom, but it's not captivity either.
4. WIC. I cringed and drove 40 miles to grocery shop while unemployed when my kids were little. It hurts to take this stuff--especially in a very conservative area. I applaud those QF Moms who ARE brave enough to use these. It isn't easy when the whole town is judging you! [Even if it's because you preached "debt-free" and God will provide"]
5. QF/Amway. The similarities are very striking. Those of you wanting to know more should read "Amyway: The Cult of Free Enterprise" it details the tactics used in the cult to keep people broke and blaming themselves. "Friendship Evangelism]--like "Ceila==the perfect QF mom in the NLQ story' is how Amyway lives. My own sil w/ PHD in PSYCHOLOGY got sucked into that mess!! At no time is any Amway person home with the family--they are "showing the plan" or paying big bucks to attend a motivational conference." I know there are families in my county [very rural, very, very poor] who live off deer season and cutting and selling firewood if they are honest--pot if they are not--most of the firewood/deer folks get home with more $ than any Amway/Quixtar person ever did! Jim-Bob Duggar is like the Dexter Yeager of ATI/IBLP. Most families lived like the Bates did the first time they were shown--tiny house, homemade clothes lots of beans to eat.
KEEP WRITING ladies--it's so interesting to hear how others are living!!!
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Post by tapati on Aug 30, 2010 10:16:26 GMT -5
The state tests must not cover evolution, then, given the episode I saw about it. Granted, there are public schools where the parents manage to put pressure on the board and have "creationism" presented as a potentially valid theory.
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Post by cereselle on Aug 30, 2010 12:26:26 GMT -5
Perhaps you are right, km, and we are misreading each other. She compared my loving statement of truth to a bomb though, a weapon of mass destruction, and questioned the integrity of my friendship in plain words. If I misjudged her, it should be plain where I would get the idea that she thinks evil of me, my heart and my church. [...] Even so, we are still not called or equipped to carry the financial burden for QF families who keep having children even though they have no steady source of adequate income. If you look back at what you wrote, humbletigger, you were the one who used the bomb analogy. Madame only quoted you. I agree with your last point. There is a huge difference between falling on hard times versus expecting others to finance your choice of lifestyle. If God is calling someone to have this many children, then God should be calling them to a job where they can make enough money to support them. (And by support, I mean provide them with enough nutritious food, adequate clothing, proper health care, and safe shelter.) If the two don't match up... they may want to figure out where God's falling down on the job. Society is composed of giving and taking. There is absolutely nothing wrong with taking when you need it. But there is something wrong when taking is all you're doing.
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Post by humbletigger on Aug 30, 2010 12:52:11 GMT -5
Yes, you are right. I did refer to my statement as a "bomb" first. I stand corrected.
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Post by cindy on Aug 30, 2010 16:24:17 GMT -5
Many multi-level marketing companies use thought reform technique to foster sales. Rick Ross, the thought reform expert that Dr. Phil uses on his program as an invited guest from time to time has a whole list of articles and personal testimonies: www.rickross.com/groups/amway.htmlIn fact, though I understand that Henry Reyenga has broken from the FIC movement somewhat, he writes about Amway technique as an ideal way to grow a church in his book about family discipleship. He used to have Voddie Baucham and Kevin Swanson speak for him, but I think that he parted ways with them. www.homediscipleship.org/about.phpOne of Henry's biggest benefactors was that guy that owned Amway about whom he speaks about in his home discipleship book.
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Post by cindy on Aug 30, 2010 16:45:49 GMT -5
Note -- I was responding to Hopewell's comment about Amway, also mentioning that a PhD in psychology got caught up in it.
I know there are people who participate here that detest the discussion of this topic, but I think that it's important to note.
I doesn't matter how much you know or how smart you are, or even how much Bible you know and understand. Idealistic groups appeal to human need, emotions, and intellect, using several finely woven logical tricks and rhetorical tricks to get people hooked into believing that their system is the best way to get them what they want or need.
In Amway, it is making sales and helping families. In QF, it is the formula for raising good kids. You can be the smartest cookie in the world, but we are all still very human and have a tendency to want to believe what we want to find to be true. This appeals to wisdom in many ways, and a wise person is generally willing to learn from and listen to someone who purports to have time tested and true techniques for accomplishing something.
If you are human, you are vunerable to systems of ideological totalism (idealism that offers a system that makes things simple and seems to accomplish a good end).
Things go awry when the system doesn't make perfect good on its claims, when people and situations fail to fit perfectly in the neatly prescribed boxes created by the system, and when the ends of the system are used to justify the not so idealistic, profitable and beneficial means used to achieve those ends.
Amway sales presume to make people's lives better through a Christian company, yet they resort to indoctrination and success depends upon your life revolving around Amway. QF presumes to help families, yet the system often devours families.
If you have emotions, behaviors, thoughts and you take in information to make decisions about how to live, you are vulnerable to getting pulled into a system. And your best bet at resisting such systems is to understand how they work -- understand spiritual abuse and thought reform tactics. Understand manipulation.
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Post by cindy on Aug 30, 2010 16:53:08 GMT -5
Argh! Forgot twice to state this! No one is immune! Wendy Duncan was a social worker with experience, and she had a seminary degree from SWBTS in Dallas (back before they got wild about gender and fired Sheri Klouda, the Hebrew professor, for being a woman who might end up teaching men doctrine while teaching language). Wendy is a dynamic and excellent social worker who had experience in the field. But the SBC didn't want her. Her big hook into the cult she became involved with was that they did need her services and they did value her. So for her, they provided a place for her to use her best skills and she felt like she could make a difference in the world. And for all her knowledge and wisdom, she ended up deep in an abusive group. One of the chapter titles in the books is "I never wanted to join a cult." Her book is "I Can't Hear God Anymore" and I cannot recommend it more highly for those of you who have not read it. Find it on Amazon here: www.amazon.com/Cant-Hear-God-Anymore-Dallas/dp/097766600X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1283205104&sr=1-1And her website is: www.dallascult.com/She is a dear friend to both Hillary McFarland and to me.
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Post by arietty on Aug 30, 2010 20:17:02 GMT -5
One father is a wonderful person, honestly if you met him you would LOVE him! But there is a problem, he has no one job that will support his family. He teaches a few music lessons ($20 a week a student) and he is music director for our tiny church (a very part time job). I think all his hopes right now are resting on a CD he just cut, and I hope it sells, but his first CD *I* couldn't listen to and I really wanted to like it! They just had their 5th child- and no one signed up to bring them meals. People are just tired of helping them out, even though we really LIKE them! Oh, and they LOVE their children, and are super nurturing parents. Making a meal is too onerous a form of helping out? Frankly that's just petty and unkind. I have been the person who had too many kids so people didn't bother making me a meal when one more arrived. I will NEVER be the person who looks at a family and wonders if they are deserving enough for me to spend half an hour of my life making them a freaking meal. You keep saying that people "LOVE" them.. well guess what a meal is about a lot more than whether the family could or should be able to make a meal for themselves. No matter how poor you are you can probably scrape together some kind of meal. A meal coming from friends and church is a way of showing them that you "LOVE" them.. you actually care enough to remember them and spend a little of your time and money on them. It's not love if the person has to deserve it first. I kind of thought that was the whole point of the gospel? This makes me very frustrated. It's a horrible to thing to have to earn kindness by meeting the expectations of others. We are not talking about some family demanding their mortgage be paid or that the church buys them a car, it is a MEAL. I know a real kick in the gut for me in my church was seeing meals and baby showers heaped upon first time moms and with my last child I received nothing at all. I had made about 50 casseroles for the food bank there over the last few years too, that was a contribution I felt fitted my abilities as a mom of many. Yet for some reason it wasn't very exciting to fuss over a mom with number 8 baby, like it was to fuss over the ones with number 1 or 2. And no it wasn't that I needed food because I was poor, or because I'd just had a baby (thank you Gentle Spirit magazine for your make 30 meals and freeze in a day articles). What I needed was for someone to actually care about me and show it with simple, caring gestures. I still do not understand this. When I read the above I am right back there, not understanding it.
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Post by ambrosia on Aug 30, 2010 20:21:58 GMT -5
If you are human, you are vunerable to systems of ideological totalism (idealism that offers a system that makes things simple and seems to accomplish a good end). Things go awry when the system doesn't make perfect good on its claims, when people and situations fail to fit perfectly in the neatly prescribed boxes created by the system, and when the ends of the system are used to justify the not so idealistic, profitable and beneficial means used to achieve those ends. Yes, THIS. I first encountered it in my now ex, also an intelligent and highly-educated person. We had similar political and philosophical outlooks, but in time I found that his position was extreme and held as fervently as a religious belief (we were/are atheists). It wasn't really what killed the relationship - we just didn't talk about it - but it was the first time I had encountered such a dogmatic position outside of a religious belief. Since then, I have tried to re-evaluate what I think/believe on a regular basis, especially when someone disagrees strongly with me. So far, I think I've done fairly well, my positions on a lot of things have changed with time and further thought. It isn't healthy IMHO to identify too tightly with beliefs, because if or when something occurs to shake those beliefs, a lot of "self" is shaken as well. (sorry, wandering OT)
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Post by rosa on Aug 30, 2010 20:42:53 GMT -5
It seems to me that this comes back to the discussion we had about closeness, in neighborhoods or friendships or churches.
For most people, a church is actually not a family. Not a social safety net. Not even a group of very very close friends - though you might make close friends within it. It's a group that worships together. Sometimes churches spontaneously have these extra special close groups inside of them, but it seems to me that the only church that is super extra close loving to every single member, is a cult. And they accomplish that by booting out/shunning anyone who won't put in the level of effort they require to keep functioning at that level of closeness. Expecting the level of closeness and care you (might - my family certainly isn't like that) get from family or your best friend, from every member of a group of more than 10 or 12 people, seems unrealistic.
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Post by rosa on Aug 30, 2010 20:48:54 GMT -5
And I'm sorry it hurt your feelings, Arietty, but even baby showers for *second* children are very rare in any place I've lived. Maybe meals for new moms - though even that isn't usual for stay-at-home moms unless you're related to them or they're having a problem pregnancy. A little babysitting of older children (though usually moms pay for that, if they need it - not professional babysitter rates, but "12 year old friend's child" babysitting rates), that's normal. But not baby showers.
In Vyckie's original story she talks about how sad she was nobody threw a shower for her third child, and it seemed really odd to me - is the expectation that each baby deserves a big bash something that comes out of the pronatalist ideology? It seems like outside of that, the assumption is that if you're having another baby it's because you were all set up - financially, time-wise, etc. - to do it. I have a work friend who had her kids very close together and pretty young (22 and 23) but since she was married and had a kid & kid stuff and a townhouse already, there was no baby shower - some of us gave her gifts, but it was an individual thing, not an organized one.
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Post by nikita on Aug 30, 2010 21:46:21 GMT -5
This discussion is interesting. I do think, however, that every experience has to be judged within its own particular environment. In other words, what is normal behavior toward church members is going to vary widely by geographical area, culture, church denomination, and individual church group. The flavor of the group is going to vary. So saying that one person is wrong to expect a meal when baby number eight comes along may be correct for one person in a particular area in a particular church environment, but not wrong for a person in another church environment. If, in a church, no one ever provides meals for women they don't have personal relationships with, then the expectation that you would have one is not realistic, it is not the norm. But if you look around you and everyone gets a meal delivered to them after each birth but you are left out, then that is a different flavor entirely. And I have some experience with that.
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Post by rosa on Aug 30, 2010 21:57:44 GMT -5
Well, specifically in Vyckie's story it struck me as odd because I'm very nearly her age and I'm from almost exactly where she is - my dad lives not too far from where V lives now, I went to high school in a town that competed with the town her mom lives in for sports and debate, and I went to college where she was living when she had her first few kids - she mentions the health clinic I used for 5 years in one of her story installments. I grew up in the United Methodist church but I get invited to various other churches by evangelistic "friends", so I've probably been to services in some of the churches she mentions.
And the expectation for *most* people in those places is that they will get married pretty young and have at least 2 or 3 kids, but I've never been invited to a 3rd child baby shower ever. So I wondered where she got the expectation that people would make a big deal over a third pregnancy.
It might be different where Arietty lives, but I know Vyckie's areas pretty well.
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Post by nikita on Aug 30, 2010 22:04:12 GMT -5
Well, specifically in Vyckie's story it struck me as odd because I'm very nearly her age and I'm from almost exactly where she is - my dad lives not too far from where V lives now, I went to high school in a town that competed with the town her mom lives in for sports and debate, and I went to college where she was living when she had her first few kids - she mentions the health clinic I used for 5 years in one of her story installments. I grew up in the United Methodist church but I get invited to various other churches by evangelistic "friends", so I've probably been to services in some of the churches she mentions. And the expectation for *most* people in those places is that they will get married pretty young and have at least 2 or 3 kids, but I've never been invited to a 3rd child baby shower ever. So I wondered where she got the expectation that people would make a big deal over a third pregnancy. It might be different where Arietty lives, but I know Vyckie's areas pretty well. But that still doesn't account for her actual church itself. Even in a homogenous area there are differences within specific congregations at specific churches. This can come down simply to which control-freak church lady runs the social workings of that church (there's one in almost every congregation).
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Post by rosa on Aug 30, 2010 23:56:22 GMT -5
But that's why it made me wonder if it was part and parcel of the pronatalist package - if the anti-birth-control churches don't do more about later pregnancies than most churches do, causing an expectation of how people act about 3rd (and 4th and 8th...) babies that just doesn't translate into the rest of the world. That would reinforce the us vs. them feeling, and make moms of many feel like nobody (but the mom-love-talking QF congregations) values them.
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Post by nikita on Aug 31, 2010 0:06:34 GMT -5
But that's why it made me wonder if it was part and parcel of the pronatalist package - if the anti-birth-control churches don't do more about later pregnancies than most churches do, causing an expectation of how people act about 3rd (and 4th and 8th...) babies that just doesn't translate into the rest of the world. That would reinforce the us vs. them feeling, and make moms of many feel like nobody (but the mom-love-talking QF congregations) values them. That seems kind of political to me. I don't think it's that conscious a decision, just a church culture thing, a lot depending on who the top dog is in any particular church or community. Not everything is us-vs-them propaganda. Sometimes its just whatever the hell it is for a variety of reasons, especially in cultic churches that do not conform to the society at large. We used to have wedding showers. Then when I was planning a wedding shower for my best friend of several years our top dog (assistant pastor's wife in my church) came to me and said ixnay on the shower. No more showers. How could we possibly justify having something as shallow as a wedding shower when souls were being lost. Where were our priorities? So no shower, which my best friend was always bitter about btw. A year later, showers made a quiet return with her blessing. I guess we had time after all. These kinds of idiosyncracies happen everywhere. Different people, different reasons, but there is a culture that develops outside of the rest of the world.
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Post by arietty on Aug 31, 2010 0:25:35 GMT -5
If you will read my post you will see that though I mention showers in passing I am talking about the idea that meals should only be provided if you are worthy, ie haven't failed to provide for yourself in other people's eyes. My entire point was that meals are not about feeding so much as showing love. I am sure you would all make a meal for a friend to show your love if they had some illness or sad thing happen in their family, even if they were perfectly capable of buying pizzas. You wouldn't say "oh they can afford to get pizzas, no need to make them a meal", because you would know that your meal was about more than food. This is theoretically what church casserole making is also about, more than food, a gesture of care and friendship. And yet some people are still more "in the club" than others and are viewed as deserving of this care.
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Post by tapati on Aug 31, 2010 1:32:48 GMT -5
PRICELESS. ;D
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Post by anatheist on Aug 31, 2010 21:31:31 GMT -5
They actually do go out and see other families for broom ball, home Church etc. No, that is not freedom, but it's not captivity either. If you're only allowed to go out and do Christian things with Christian people, that can be a form of captivity. I withhold judgment without knowing how they would respond if one of their children told them that he or she was not a Christian and not interested in becoming one. Would they help their child find alternative friendships while keeping a minimum religious involvement requirement? Or would they try to drown the kid in Christianity and curtail their freedom because they trusted and respected the kid less? My gut says the second, but since I don't know, I can't say the degree of captivity they're in. But I wouldn't assume that they're not captives just because they can socialize with a few approved others.
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Post by humbletigger on Sept 1, 2010 11:27:15 GMT -5
One father is a wonderful person, honestly if you met him you would LOVE him! But there is a problem, he has no one job that will support his family. He teaches a few music lessons ($20 a week a student) and he is music director for our tiny church (a very part time job). I think all his hopes right now are resting on a CD he just cut, and I hope it sells, but his first CD *I* couldn't listen to and I really wanted to like it! They just had their 5th child- and no one signed up to bring them meals. People are just tired of helping them out, even though we really LIKE them! Oh, and they LOVE their children, and are super nurturing parents. Making a meal is too onerous a form of helping out? Frankly that's just petty and unkind. I have been the person who had too many kids so people didn't bother making me a meal when one more arrived. I will NEVER be the person who looks at a family and wonders if they are deserving enough for me to spend half an hour of my life making them a freaking meal. You keep saying that people "LOVE" them.. well guess what a meal is about a lot more than whether the family could or should be able to make a meal for themselves. No matter how poor you are you can probably scrape together some kind of meal. A meal coming from friends and church is a way of showing them that you "LOVE" them.. you actually care enough to remember them and spend a little of your time and money on them. It's not love if the person has to deserve it first. I kind of thought that was the whole point of the gospel? This makes me very frustrated. It's a horrible to thing to have to earn kindness by meeting the expectations of others. We are not talking about some family demanding their mortgage be paid or that the church buys them a car, it is a MEAL. I know a real kick in the gut for me in my church was seeing meals and baby showers heaped upon first time moms and with my last child I received nothing at all. I had made about 50 casseroles for the food bank there over the last few years too, that was a contribution I felt fitted my abilities as a mom of many. Yet for some reason it wasn't very exciting to fuss over a mom with number 8 baby, like it was to fuss over the ones with number 1 or 2. And no it wasn't that I needed food because I was poor, or because I'd just had a baby (thank you Gentle Spirit magazine for your make 30 meals and freeze in a day articles). What I needed was for someone to actually care about me and show it with simple, caring gestures. I still do not understand this. When I read the above I am right back there, not understanding it. Well, so you have experienced it too. Compassion fatigue is the name for it when giving people who have been giving to same endless need for a very long time run out of energy to give anymore. Yes, we as a congregation really do love them, no matter how hollow that sounds to you. We have helped them out financially as individuals and as a church MANY TIMES! Every day problems are a huge financial crisis to them- car repairs, home repairs, illness requiring medical attention, etc. They let the world know their needs on their "ministry" website, and people donate through paypal or hand them envelopes or checks. We really don't need a minister of music, but we have one now because we want to help them be self-sufficient as much as help them meet their needs. That's the same reason I asked him to teach music lessons. If they as a couple want to continue to have children every year, they as a couple need to be able to support them. The entire second letter to the Thessalonians revolves around the issue of people not working and expecting the local group of believers to keep meeting their needs. Paul was against it, for the record. This is the real world in which we live, and anyone who is QF and not independently wealthy is going to eventually drain the generous people in their lives dry. People don't mind giving when the need is occasional. Everyone- regardless of their religion- gets tired of constantly being asked to help the same people over and over again. Someone earlier wrote that it is the reason for the existence of social services- people continue to need help even after they have alienated all the friends and relatives who could/do help in a crisis. When it's no longer a crisis, but a chronic situation, continued donations are not the answer. It's time to change the underlying dynamics of the situation. When a family cannot meet the needs of the people already part of the family, at the very least they can stop adding more people to that family. Next they can work on meeting the needs of the family as it already exists- one or both parents working outside the home, for money and looking for employment that is sufficient for at least their most basic needs- including car/home repair, minor medical emergencies, etc. Wrong, it is not "just a meal". It was another meal requested after people have already been donating to help pay their mortgage and keeping their car running. And you can rant about it all day, but since people generally hate conflict, they use passive-aggressive means like not signing up for meals to let people know they are tired of being asked for personal sacrifice on behalf of QF families on a continuous basis. Would you like honesty better? I don't think so. I really doubt you would feel any better about it if someone wrote you a note saying: "I regularly bail your family out financially. When the water heater broke, we paid for a used one and helped install it. When your transmission went out, we donated to the fund used to replace it. When you go on ministry trips, we donated to help pay your mortgage when you missed work that month. All that because we like you, but we can't keep this up. If you are going to keep having children, you need to figure out how you are going to provide for them. We don't approve of your reckless approach to financial/family planning, calling whatever happens the will of God and then relying on the good will of others to carry the crisis. Figure out how to become financially stable so that you can be the one helping instead of the one always taking. Your honest friend, fellow parishoner." Methinks that wouldn't go over with you any better than a thin sign-up sheet for taking meals to a QF mother on her fifth plus pregnancy....
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