More Than Stone

I feel so out of touch with the blogosphere. I traveled this weekend for work and was hoping to get to meet Calacirian this weekend, but didn’t get in touch soon enough. Darn it. Oh well, I’m in that area pretty often, so I’ll just meet her next time!

We are still in between churches. We found a great start up church. The vision is right up our alley in so many ways. However, there is not one kid my daughters’ ages, so we’ve been going to one church in the morning (more teens) and the other church in the evening. I always feel like I’m kind of cheating. It’s been 2 years since we left our staff position and 8 months since the home church thing blew up. I’m really feeling a desire to plug in somewhere and get settled. What DO YOU DO when you find a great church, but your kids don’t feel at home there? I’m really torn….any advice?

So I’ve been too quiet for the last few weeks. I had out of town company for two weeks. I had a great time, but I’ve realized that entertaining someone for 2 weeks can be taxing. I dropped my company off at the airport on Saturday. On Sunday, Mother’s Day, I got down to finally tackling some of the homework necessary for the 2 new classes I’m taking towards a nursing degree. Sunday evening entailed a trip to the ER, then my eldest daughter decided to give me her appendix for Mother’s Day. Several days in the hospital and now we have her home ….

I still have housework and homework to catch up on. I am leaving tomorrow for DC to work. ARGHHHH….

Too much to do, too little time.

My blog is calling and yet I do not have the time necessary. I haven’t even really had time to read my favorite blogs. Oh well. Here is the only glimpse I can give you into my thought process these days…

itis-inflammation
otomy-incision
nephr/o- kidney
mediastinum- the space between the lungs
appendectomy-worry, work suffering while sitting bedside, sleep missed with a 3 am surgery, limping around daughter, check up next week.

Hope everyone is well……

I’m following in the path of Molly from Adventures in Mercy. I’ve signed up to take two classes this semester. I’m finally taking the big jump and going back to school for a nursing degree. I’m taking Medical Terminology and Developmental Psychology this semester. Summer is a shortened semester, so I’ll be cramming in the knowledge over the next few weeks. Both classes are very heavy on memorization, so my posting levels may be down until I finish these courses.

In addition to that, it is the end of the school year for the kids. We have SATs, AP exams, band concerts and art shows to attend. My middle child is taking her SAT today. Can you say “stressed out and a bit crabby”? (Not me–her)

My posting will be down (or perhaps non-existent) for the next week or so, as I have my aunt in town. We plan to bum around, talk, and drink coffee in the morning and wine in the evening.

It will be lovely….

Interesting articles here and here by Dr. Robert Epstein.

Dr. Epstein maintains that the rebellious and irresponsible attitudes we see in teens are simply the result of artificially extending childhood, sometimes well into the 20’s. Cultures that do not recognize the period of “adolescence” do not have the phenomenon of teen angst.

“In most nonindustrialized societies, young people are integrated into adult society as soon as they are capable, and there is no sign of teen turmoil. Many cultures do not even have a term for adolescence. But we not only created this stage of life: We declared it inevitable. In 1904, American psychologist G. Stanley Hall said it was programmed by evolution. He was wrong.”

In recent surveys I’ve found that American teens are subjected to more than 10 times as many restrictions as mainstream adults, twice as many restrictions as active-duty U.S. Marines, and even twice as many as incarcerated felons. Psychologist Diane Dumas and I also found a correlation between infantilization and psychological dysfunction. The more young people are infantilized, the more psychopathology they show.”

Dr. Epstein has written a new book called “The Case Against Adolescence: Rediscovering The Adult In Every Teen”.

What do you think?

Do we artificially extend childhood?

Could this artificial extension be the very thing that causes teens to act irresponsibly?

Should we be giving our teens more freedom and responsibility, ie treating them more like adults?

I’d love to hear your thoughts…..I especially wonder about this in the church. My experience has been that in the church, we place even more restrictions on our teens than in the culture at large.

Have you ever experienced the fracture of a long term friendship? It is so incredibly painful. We experienced this recently.

I’ll call my friends Fred and Jane. Reconciliation and restoration of the relationship with Fred and Jane has been our goal. Initially, there was a time where there was very little contact and it was strained when we saw each other. Next, we had a few meetings to try to “hash out” the hurt. It’s been difficult and painful to say the least.

Last Sunday, there was a birthday party for a mutual friend at a local winery. My husband was the entertainment. He plays oldies and “sing along” songs at this winery often. Fred and Jane were going to be at the party as well. We wondered what that would be like. Would it be awkward? Painful? How do we hang out and have fun, when there is still “this thing” between us? For the first few minutes, it was a bit awkward. Then I asked them to join us at our table. After a bit, Fred went up and sang a few songs with husband, just like old times. Before long, we were all laughing and having a great time.

I think I’m coming to realize something. Talking through hurt is important; we certainly can’t just shove things under the rug. However, I think that sometimes, we just need to hang out and be reminded of why we loved this person in the first place.

For the past 3 months, I’ve been drooling over a sweater pattern. I finally bought the pattern and the yarn ($12 for the yarn!!), and I now can’t stop knitting this beautiful thing. In addition to that the weather has been simply gorgeous, so I’ve had no deep thoughts to share, nothing humorous, not one thought provoking idea. Just knit, purl, slip slip knit, and a couple of calls to my knitting mentor to ask questions….

From N. T. Wright’s book “Evil and the Justice of God”

We are not told-or not in any way that satisfies our puzzled questioning-how and why there is radical evil within God’s wonderful, beautiful and essentially good creation. One day I think we shall find out, but I believe we are incapable of understanding it at the moment, in the same way that a baby in the womb would lack the categories to think about the outside world. What we are promised, however, is that God will make a world in which all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well, a world in which forgiveness is on e of the foundation stones and reconciliation is the cement which holds everything together. And we are given this promise not as a matter of whistling in the dark, not as something to believe even though there is no evidence, but in and through Jesus Christ and his death and resurrection, and in and through the Spirit through whom the achievement of Jesus becomes a reality in our world and in our lives. When we understand forgiveness, flowing from the work of Jesus and the Spirit, as the strange, powerful thing it really is, we begin to realize that God’s forgiveness of us, and our forgiveness of others, is the knife that cuts the rope by which sin, anger, fear, recrimination and death are still attached to us. Evil will have nothing to say at the last, because the victory of the cross will be fully implemented.

We return to the point at which we began. In the new heavens and the new earth there will be nor more sea, no more chaos, no more monsters coming up from the abyss. And, as with all Christian eschatology, the best news of all is that we don’t have to wait for the future to start experiencing our deliverance from evil. We are invited, summoned, bidden to start living this way in the present. I suspect that the problems this poses for us—the immediate problems of forgiving ourselves and our neighbors, and the practical and political problems of working for a world in which people no longer wish to become terrorists, in which people no longer enslave one another with crippling debt, and in which those who live at great risk of the natural elements receive special protection form civil authorities—are the real problems. The philosophical problems often function simply as a smoke screen behind which we try to hide. And I suspect, therefore, that the more we learn the meaning of forgiveness in our own lives, the more we shall glimpse the deep theological truth that all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well, and the more we shall be enabled to anticipate that reality even in the midst of our suffering world.

Technorati Tags: suffering, Virginia+tech, social+justice, poverty, aids

Silence can say more than a thousand words.

This day shall unite us all about this unbelievable painful & shocking event and show some respect and love to those who lost their loved ones.

On April 30th 2007, the Blogosphere will hold a One-Day Blog Silence in honor of the victims at Virginia Tech. More then 30 died at the US college massacre.

But it´s not only about them. Many bloggers have responded and asked about all the other victims of our world. All the people who die every day. What about them?

This day can be a symbol of support to all the victims of our world!

All you have to do is spread the word about it and post the graphic on your blog on 30th April 2007. No words and no comments. Just respect, reflect and empathy.

Spread the word about this event: