As I went over my blog stats, I saw this question pop up in the search engine list. I thought it was kind of self-explanatory, but obviously not everybody understands why a courtship might be kept secret (in certain groups/families).
First off, not every girl (or family) feels the need to keep a courtship a secret. As you can imagine, some girls are so happy about being courted that they just can’t keep it to themselves. Openly talking about courtship is something you’ll see in the more “liberal” groups of the P/QF movement. It’s especially important to differentiate between P and QF here – strictly patriarchical families are more likely to keep it secret than families with a strong emphasis on the QF theologies.
And yes, there are families who aren’t patriarchical but live quiverfull. Others again are full-blown patriarchical families, but don’t believe in the quiverfull theologies (aka NFP and sometimes condoms are allowed, but it’s the man who decides when the wife will get pregnant).
The thing is simply that the patriarchs feel very much like they have to use the (successful) courtships of their daughters to show off how well they filtered potential suitors before hand. A failed courtship can imply that the father did not pick well and this might reflect back and his authority and leadership skills – at least in the public eye of the movements. Of course this isn’t true for every case, but the motto is usually “better safe than sorry”.
And it’s not just the fathers. In very strict groups, a girl turns into “damaged goods” faster than you might think. Even a failed courtship might label her as damaged goods and have a negative influence on the range of future suitors. It’s all about the “value of the bride”.
Imagine you’re in a store for soft pillows. The shelves are full of soft, handmade, expensive pillows. Lots of people come in to buy pillows. Now, some pillows might have attracted more customers in the past – they look a tiny bit “touched”, there might even be a little stain. They’ve never been slept on (no pun intended), but one or the other customer already picked it up to inspect it more closely. Now, if you do want a flawless pillow, you won’t even buy the “inspected” ones – you’ll go for the ones in the back, the ones nobody ever inspected, fresh from the storage room – if possible still wrapped in plastic.
It works very much like that in strict courtship movements. If a girl has one, or, even worse, more than one, failed courtships, there’s something “wrong” about her. A girl breaking off a courtship is something rather “wild”. The idea is that the girl will certainly like the man her dad picked out because, well, her dad knows her best. If you hear of broken courtships, the general idea that comes to mind is that the guy broke it off for some reason (or the dad, which then would be kept secret again because dad doesn’t pick “the wrong guy”). The girl’s value decreased with every courtship she goes through. She’ll be labelled damaged, easy to get, high maintenance and so forth. And simply because of that, it’s so much easier to keep courtships secret until the day of engagement.
Much of the way girls are raised in the QF/P movements is to prepare them for married life. Of course, some families and communities support college for girls to ensure a well-rounded character (within the limits of that group or family, of course). You will typically see girls and young women taking online courses on things such as literature, culture, nursing and other medical classes, nutrition and so on. It’s easy to tell that all of this is things you can use at home, either to teach your own girls the beautiful girly things (literature), to be able to perform first aid and to cook a well-balanced meal. You’ll hardly ever see these girls taking classes like law, architecture or physics. It’s just not a useful thing to know as a wife and mother.
But among the most important preparations to be a wife is child-rearing. Of course there’s always children around. If the family doesn’t have enough children on their own the daughters will help other big families and perform ministries that prepare them for a lot of kids.
My family was lucky enough to have a big bunch of kids that I could prepare with. Except that I didn’t feel like I was being prepared at all. Don’t get me wrong, I love my siblings more than anything. I simply didn’t have the patience to take care of 4-6 kids at a time. If I had only one or two I was fine. That seemed easy to me. I was able to stay in relative control of the situation. But as soon as there were 3 or more, things got really messy. You know how kids are, they scream, run and tease each other. They fight. They might play nice for half an hour and suddenly one starts crying for one reason or another.
I had a completely different style of relating to my siblings than my mother did. My Mom was always a good Mom, but she was very much a hen. It started to upset me that she acted this way with the younger ones when I was in my teens, knowing that she would “ruin” what I had accomplished the day before. Whenever one of the kids got hurt – and you know they fall or hurt themselves a lot – she focused on the tiniest things. If one fell outside in the garden and barely even scratched his or her knee, she would swoon all over the little one, showering it with pity and hugs and kisses and sentences like “Oh it looks so bad. Does it hurt? My poor baby!”. I caught myself rolling my eyes more than once a day at that. It was barely a scratch! It didn’t bleed! She fell on the grass, it couldn’t possibly hurt that much! But no, my Mother had them sit on their lap for about 10 minutes, letting them cry, telling them how bad it is and so on. Whenever one fell when I was close, I grabbed them, sat them on the kitchen counter, checked their knees and cleaned them if necessary, told them it’s not bad at all and quickly changed to a cheerful conversation of what we had to do next. As long as Mom wasn’t close, they quickly forgot about their tiny hurts and started laughing again. But whenever Mom was in range, they’d scream my ears off and push me away so they could get Mom’s attention. I mean, I understand that this was partially because it meant individual time with Mom, but it upset me that I had to deal with a cranky little one for 30 minutes just because Mom had to put so much attention to tiny matters. Once the little one came back from Mom, it would stand a bit further away, hugging a teddy or a blanket, and when the other ones asked the little one to come back to play, they’d say something along the lines of “I can’t. I’m hurt badly.” Eye rolling from me.
On other occasions, I felt so overwhelmed by the sheer needs of the kids. I remember days where I had only 2 or 3 of them to watch, that wasn’t many kids at all! And yet I could be close to tears and feel so ashamed for being unable to deal with that little kids. I felt like I was going to make a terrible wife.
I remember one occasion where I had 2 of the boys and one of the smaller girls to watch. They played in the boy’s room while I was sorting through their closet. They jumped on the beds, played dragon and princess and screamed bloody hell. I was exhausted that day, I had gotten up even earlier than usual, got scolded by my parents for not doing some chores the day before (because I didn’t have time, just to add that) and had to those chores as well as the new ones. And the screaming of the kids made me incredibly angry. I stood there repeating over and over “Keep it down guys!” – “Be careful, don’t jump!” – “Don’t hit your sister with a stick!” – “Keep it DOWN!”. This went on for about 20 minutes and wouldn’t stop, so I turned around, grabbed them all by their arms, had them look at me and told them to either keep it down and play nice or to go outside. The oldest of the three, my brother, laughed at me and said “You can’t tell me what to do, you’re not Mom!”. I grabbed his arm a bit harder and said, very seriously: “Mom told me to watch you. I CAN tell you what to do!” He kept laughing and wriggled his arm free. He them took his “sword” and yelled: “LISA IS THE DRAGON! ATTACK!” and all three of them started whacking at me with their swords, my little sister grabbed one too even. The other two were too small to really get it. Oh wow was I angry. I was feeling tears in my eyes and an incredible urge to – excuse me – beat my brother with anything I could find. Instead, I took his sword away, grabbed him by the arms and held him, yelled at the two small ones to sit down RIGHT NOW, dragged my brother to the bathroom and sat him down on the toilet and told him to stay there until I called him back in. He screamed and screamed at me, face red, kicked at me, the full show. The other two started crying because I had yelled at them, my brother ran off and screamed and cried and left me sitting in the bathroom. I locked myself in for half an hour to calm down and cry some.
I was so ashamed of being such a terrible mother. I couldn’t even control 3, how should I ever managed 10 or more? And this is just one example. This happened so often, me trying to be nice and not use any violence and ending up with something like that – me defeated, the kids winning and laughing at me. I would never make a good mother.
And then again, there were situations were I got upset at my sisters for doing what they were supposed to do. I remember one occasion where one of my smaller sisters, she was 5 or 6 at that time, played with the real small ones of another family. The little girl was just starting to walk and wanted to explore, of course. My little sister kept holding her hand and helping her around. But she wanted to play doll with that little girl, so she kept sitting the little one on her lap. The little one struggled to get away from my sister to play with the other kids, who were playing and running around on the grass. My sister kept holding her. When the little one started to wail because she couldn’t get away from my sister, my sister started to “console” the crying little one, sang songs and rocked it back and forth. She didn’t get the little one didn’t want to stay. The others ran over and asked my sister to come play but she replied “I can’t. I have the baby and she’s crying.”. I watched the scene and felt anger rise up in me. Why was she so insistent to keep the baby? The little one cried more and more, my sister looking all serious, asking what’s wrong, shhhing it, singing and looking like a little Mom, while watching the others play. And that was the point where I lost my patience. I went over to her and told her that the baby didn’t want to sit on her lap. She answered “Yes she doesn, she’s crying can’t you see?”. I told her the baby was crying because she was holding it. She let it go then and the baby quickly got to her feet and started walking away, now happy again. I turned around to go away, after a few steps looking back at the scene just to see my sister off to catch the baby again, forcing it on her lap, doing the same thing. NOW I was angry. I stomped over to her, took the baby away and yelled at her:
“Stop it! Quit acting like you’re a grown up! You’re a kid, go play! YOU’RE NOT A GROWN UP! You’re not supposed to play baby’s Mom!”
I can’t explain where that came from. She was supposed to do exactly that. But seeing it made me so angry. She started crying and ran inside. I let the baby down, the baby just being happy to be finally free. But I felt so bad. Had I just yelled at my sister for doing what we were trying to teach her? She ran to my parents and told them about it, my Dad coming outside to yell at me what I was thinking, that I did the wrong thing and I should let her play with the baby. I went inside, excusing myself, to cry about my weird behaviour. I didn’t get why I said that. I didn’t get why it made me so angry. Once again I felt ashamed for being such a terrible mother.
You see, while all of that was supposed to prepare me for married life and kids, it instead scared me. It made me feel inadequate and stupid. Until this day I feel like the only thing it taught me was that I neither want nor am able to have more than two kids myself. I feel like I have already raised enough kids in my life and doing it again doesn’t seem like something I want to do any time soon. The fact that I love my siblings doesn’t change that I don’t feel suited to raise kids. I keep wondering, if I didn’t have this many siblings, our family would’ve been so different, I might have never left, and might have gotten married, and might have ended up with 10 myself. I’d be thrown into the cold water just to realize that I’m not made for that. I guess I’m glad I could at least learn that.
Libby Anne is starting to put the questions for her Raised Quiverful project together. And just now I realized that, though I read all blogs written by the people who participated, there’s one person whose answers I’m most curious about. And that person is Joe from Incongruous Circumspection. I don’t mean to insult the women who answered in any way, I dearly love reading their blogs as well and I’m curious about their answers too. I think I’m so curious to read Joe’s answers because he is the only man to answer.
It’s so rare to read about men who lived in the P/QF movements and left them. It seems as if they don’t exist! Now, you could certainly argue on a gender based foundation, saying that women simply feel more comfortable talking about such emotional topics, that they talk more anyway, and that it’s easier for them to word these things because they know their emotions better than men do.
I don’t think that’s the (only) reason. I’ve been thinking about it and this is what I came up with:
In the P/QF movements, men model Christ with all they do, and they’re supposed to possess qualities such as strength both physical and emotional, intelligence, discipline, leader skills, responsibility, self-sacrifice by working and providing and so on. Women on the other hand are submissive, meek and quiet, simple (-minded), following their husbands who, as I said, are like Christ to them. Men are leaders, women are followers.
When a woman breaks free of these structures, she certainly will face a lot of problems with the circles she’s leaving. She’ll be called rebellious, evil, sinful, worldly. But you can’t ignore what she’s doing at that point: From being a follower, she strives to be strong, self-governed, responsible. She tries to equalize herself with men and, ultimately, with Christ. While that’s negative within the P/QF communities, she’ll be respected in the ‘real’ world. She’ll probably experience a lot of positive feedback from the normal people she meets, who will tell her she was right and strong. A woman always breaks free of rather negative characteristics and adapts positive (manly) characteristics.
Do not forget that women are blamed for ‘feminine’ men. It’s not the men who give up their strength, it’s always women who take it away from them. The strong woman is feared in the movement. She is something you have to scream about, criticize and beat to show her her place in the world. It takes a lot of violence to make a woman submit – or at least try to do that.
Now, men are never blamed for a loss of their power. It’s always women who take it. Men are generally attributed all these positive characteristics and the second they reject any part of this system – watch out, this is where it gets interesting – they lose their Christ-likeness. They voluntary step down from their position of power to a lower position – namely that of a woman. They lessen themselves by rejecting the P/QF beliefs. They supposedly admit their weakness, their lack of responsibility and intelligence, their lack of leadership skills.
While a woman who leaves is strong (in the position that only men should have), a man is weak and scared, retreating into the passive position of a woman.
And while a woman who leaves gets all this positive affirmation from the normal world, what do men get? Even in the normal world, they might seem weak and emotionally unstable. Even for the normal world, he loses his position of a ‘man’. And that’s precisely what I think doesn’t only keep most men from talking about their experiences, it’s also what stops men from leaving those movements in the first place.
No matter how you turn it, a woman will always be in a positive, strong position, a man will always be in the weak position. I can fully understand every man who is afraid of losing his entire manliness because of this. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t leave to preserve this manliness. But I understand what makes it so much harder to show ‘rebellious’ characteristics as a man.
Among other things, I am pro gay marriage. This is mainly because I honestly and genuinely do not care the least bit whom my friends and, more importantly, people I do not know nor will ever meet, are married to. I simply do not feel affected by the fact that two men in Maine are married and live together in a nice picket fence house. I don’t care if they live across the street from me either, or in the same apartment building. I do not care if one of my friends is married to a man or a woman, because it isn’t any of my business. I make my own choices in this matter and I don’t think it’s anybody else’s business who I’m dating, or marrying, or whatever. Live and let live, to be accurate. Why would I get upset that two men want to get married by law?
Sure you might throw in some economical and social issues here: That gay men can’t have children together and therefore shouldn’t have the advantage of paying less tax because they’re married, or have cheaper health care rates, or whatever. But on a more realistic note: How many couples are there who do not want any kids, ever, or simply cannot have kids. It would only be fair to families with children that these couples pay as much tax as if they were unmarried, right? Once you step on the area of social and economic issues, the ground gets shaky. Let’s not even go there.
I understand that churches don’t want to perform gay marriages and that’s perfectly fine. Hey, it’s your religion, do as you please. But the state, the law should give every single citizen the chance to make his or her own choices and be treated accordingly.
Now, there’s a lot of rage going on in the christian world against gay marriage. That’s alright, but you get your freedom of religion, let others have that too. The christians are still an important force in the fact that gay people are prohibited certain choices in life.
You are not allowed to be married because you don’t want to marry the opposite gender. That’s freedom right there. What happened to the legendary pursuit of happiness? That’s only allowed if you conform to the standard.
I even understand people who have doubts about the socioeconomic consequences. Really, I do. But you have to realize that allowing gay marriage will not “make” more people gay. The percentage stays the same. Gay couples are just as productive to a nation as any other couple who doesn’t have kids – or no biological kids for that matter, since gays might still adopt one if they wish. Plus, this logic doesn’t apply in all cases! I know that many lesbian couples, in fact, do have biological kids. It’s no problem for them at all. I have even heard of one couple who ended up actually having sex with a man in order to get pregnant because they couldn’t afford artificial methods. Sure this isn’t for everyone, but matter of fact gay couples do have biological kids. Likewise, a male gay couple might just as well find a biological mother (and maybe a surrogate mother as well) and have biological kids – may it be through natural or artificial methods. It’s simply not true that gay couples don’t contribute by not having kids. And, as I said, there are just as well heterosexual couples who don’t have any. If you go down the road of social and economical value of a couple, you might as well punish every couple who doesn’t have kids by not allowing them to marry. I suppose every couple fill out a contract that forces them to have at least 2 kids within the next 5 years. If they do not, they’ll be automatically divorced. How’s that sound?
But moving on the my actual point: It creeps me out, it disgusts me, how any living person could compare gay marriage to pedophilia.
To quote Answers in Genesis on that matter:
The majority in power in many of our Western societies once believed the institution of marriage should be one man for one woman. But this has changed. Many are now allowing “gay marriage.” So how long before polygamous or pedophiliac relationships are allowed, which some people are starting to advocate? Who is to say they are wrong, if the majority agrees with them? (Full article here)
I also think it’s wrong to compare polygamous relationships to pedophilia, but that’s a different subject.
What’s being done here is lining up forms of relationships that are formed between two (or more) consentingadults to a form of “relationship” in which one adult in some sort of position of authority over a minor who is, by law and by developement, not in a position to consent. The first two forms are an agreement between adults, the last one is a form of child abuse by pressuring him or her into doing things he knows nothing about, with consequences he or she can’t understand yet, by making him or her believe “it’s ok”, “just don’t tell anybody”, it’s “their secret”. How can you possibly put that on one level?
It’s funny how suddenly supposed wrong behaviour in adults is made equal to certainly wrong behaviour (towards children). It’s especially funny to me because to those very same people, violence and physical abuse are two different things depending on whether the victim is a minor (and related to you) or an adult. Beating your children with spoons and belts is right, doing the same to your wife is wrong. Why differentiate here when you don’t differentiate sexual relationships? Why is two consenting adults having sex just as bad as having sex with children?
I get the point that sin is sin is sin, and in that matter they might be right, it might be viewed as “just as bad”, but so is stealing and envying your neighbor for his beautiful cow. But, speaking strictly from a point of view that puts freedom and equality of each and every citizen as the focus, gay marriage is NOT like sexual abuse. And the fact, the mere fact that you would publish a sentence such as the one I quoted above, and put this material into young people’s minds, that’s irresponsible and disgusting.
Have not enough people suffered and died because they were gay? Must you put them in a place where they are just as bad as people who sexually abuse girls and boys? What’s going to happen if these gay people end up being in a place where they are at mercy of maniacs who believe they are just as bad as child abusers? They’re going to hate them, beat them, and in some places on the planet, stone them. It’s done, just read the news.
Oh my, I can’t tell you how much these things upset me. We all scream for more freedom, consider us as people who live in countries of freedom. Not everybody here is free, nor will ever be. But, bah, can’t we at least try?
(I wrote this post a while ago and just now remembered it after I read one of Melissa’s recent posts. It’s not connected in any way and I don’t mean to associate her or her story with it. I simply remembered because she’s saying the same thing about gay rights and I think that’s something that needs to be said. Anyway, I encourage you to read her posts, I was very touched by her honesty and courage. How many people would’ve just given up? Sounds cliché, but Melissa is a role model for me – and so is her husband.)
As I was working on filling out the Q&A project by Libby Anne, I started thinking about the different churches we were visiting as a family. There was always some reason why we would leave a community rather quickly. And then, I remembered one incident when I was 10, which caused us yet again to leave another community.
We had been members of that community for a few months at that point. We weren’t crazily involved with them (yet) because it was a bit of a drive to get to church and we couldn’t be there for everything. Nevertheless we went there almost every sunday for sermons and community gatherings.
This church wasn’t all about QF families, but there were some. Others were fundamentalist, but not QF like we were. Others again were people my Dad called “luke warm christians”, so basically, they were average, worldly christians.
That one sunday after sermon and community lunch, I was playing outside with the other kids. The church had a small but nice play ground. My parents were inside – my Dad talking to the elders, my Mom helping with cleaning up and talking to the women. Some older girls were babysitting us, but they just sat around, a bit further away, talking about their own stuff. They were 16-18 so they didn’t really want to play with us smaller ones. I was playing with some of the QF girls, singing songs and such. One of the girls I played with was 13 or 14, I don’t remember. Anyways, there was another group of girls, the luke warm girls, who were giggling and talking about how boring church was. That older girl I played with got upset and decided to lecture them – not a good idea. She stood in front of them like a grown up and told them not to speak that way of Jesus and the church. The girls didn’t take her serious at all and started laughing. One of them exclaimed: “I think she’s on her period!” and the other girls started laughing and agreed. “Yeah, totally!” “Aaaah that’s why she’s so moody!”. The older girl was very embarrassed, turned and walked away to sit in the sand further away.
Here’s where the joke comes in: I had no idea what they were talking about. Why was that so funny? What was “period”? How did you get “on” it? And how did you get off? (Please note, if they said “unclean”, I would have had a tiny idea but no knowledge either)
So of course I asked rather loudly “What’s a period?!?!”
At first, the girls looked shocked and humoured. And then, they started laughing hysterically.
“WHAT?! You… don’t know? You don’t know what a period is?!”
I figured that this thing they were talking about was something so essential to my existence that not knowing what it was made me look like a 3-year-old. I blushed, I think, I know my head turned so hot I was afraid my brain would melt.
“Of course I know!!!” I yelled. The girl they picked on earlier yelled at them to leave me alone, she’d tell on them. That scared them a bit, but not enough to drop the subject. They started talking to each other, loud enough for me to hear – of course that was on purpose:
“What’s Lisa going to do once she gets her period???” – “I bet she’ll cry and be like ‘Mommy, mommy look!” – “Yeah, or she’ll get a vacuum cleaner and suck it all out!” – “Oh yeah, ‘vacuum cleaner Lisa’!”
They actually said that part about the vacuum cleaner and today, I can only laugh. It is kind of creative to think that way, I guess. Any way, I was humiliated and close to tears, still standing in the middle between the group of girls and the bigger girl still sitting in the sand, just as humiliated.
“Come here, Lisa, it’s all just fun, I’ll explain” one of the laughing girls said. So I went over and the girls exchanged knowing looks. “Your period is when blood comes out, down there, you know”. They giggled, but I was HORRIFIED. “Down there?!? Blood?!?!” I asked and thought about it. “You mean, out of my butt?” They laughed again. “Noooooo Lisa, not your butt. Where your pee comes out!” Of course, I thought. And I was still horrified. Why would such a thing happen? Did it mean I was sick? I went back to the older girl and told her I was sorry she was on her period. The girl stood up and left, I had no clue why. I didn’t want to stay outside with the mean girls and I was too shocked anyway, so I decided to find my mother.
Later that night, I went to ask my mother about it. “Mom, am I going to get my period?” “Yes, eventually” she answered, clearly embarrassed. “Why? Is it that I’m sick then?” I wanted to know. “You’re only 10 sweety,” she answered, “you don’t need to know until the day comes. Why do you ask anyway?” I told her the story about the girls and my mom was shocked. “These are bad, bad girls and you shouldn’t talk to them any more.”
I bet you already figured that these girls weren’t as educated on the matter as they thought they were. Well, my mother talked to my Dad about it, who was equally shocked that these girls were so oversexualised. He decided that contact with them was unhealthy for us, and we never attended that church again. It’s funny to think how such stupid girl’s fights could stir up so much suspicion in adults. And considering the fact that ever since that I was even more scared of growing up, it shows that it’s not the best idea to keep this stuff a secret. I think my Mom would’ve saved me many worries if she’d come clear that night when I asked her about it.
As most of you know, many fundamentalists are involved in missions around pregnancy crisis centers and anti-abortion centers. Many of them feel called to defend one of the most important quiverfull rule: Children are a gift. Now, I don’t want to go into the whole pro-life/pro-choice debate here; this isn’t about abortion. This is about adoption.
Adoption in itself is something wonderful that should have your full support. It includes a mother who takes the responsibility for her child by giving it away and gives it away convinced that this is the only right thing to do, a family who has the wish to adopt a child, and hopefully, a happy child and finally adult in the end. That’s the perfect scenario of how it should work.
But a lot of fundamentalists don’t see it that way. Once you approach those “counselors” who are actually fundamentalists (of course, not all pregnancy crisis workers are fundamentalists!), they will talk you out of abortion at any cost. That’s step one.
Step two is where my personal issue comes in. Step two is to convince the woman to give her child up for adoption. Of course they’d never admit that this is the ultimate goal of the entire fuzz.
A lot of times, those women who approach these counselors are in a tough situation or at least not in the perfect situation. Maybe they’re young, or don’t have much money, maybe they’re in a tough personal situation due to death of a loved one or a breakup, due to sickness, you name it, it happens.
Instead of acknowledging the fact that these women are actual very responsible, smart people to seek help and counsel, they’ll be talked into believing that they are not being fit to raise the child. Whatever her issue is, it will be used against her. And not only that, heavy pressure will be put on her in case she actually wants to raise the child on her own as a single mom. She’ll be shown statistics of the devastating effects of growing up with only one parent, she’ll be shown exaggerated lists of monthly expenses, she’ll be shown pictures of “perfect” families looking to adopt – typically rich, fancy, happy movement families – and at times she might even be introduced to them without even agreeing to an adoption (yet). Or even worse, the counselor him/herself is looking to adopt and will make it out to be God’s guidance that they found each other.
Whatever it is, it’s a fact that the movement doesn’t believe in single parenting. And to avoid more single parents, adoption is the only – THE ONLY – way they feel like they accomplished their mission. Having a woman leave happily with her child is failure to them. A child raised by a single mom is like spreading the heroin directly on the kid’s breakfast toast. They won’t give up because they believe that God sends these women their way so they can talk them into adoption, have the baby adopted by a movement family and the outcome is yet another mighty warrior for God’s kingdom. Come to think of it, it’s almost like having as many babies as you can before you die from some cruel pregnancy-related issue. It’s like every single baby they deal off into the movement is their own baby, their own creation, their own addition to the kingdom.
I read a heartbreaking story on a fundamentalist blog. It was the story of a 20something year old who got pregnant and initially wanted to raise it herself. She went to see a counselor so she could find out how to do this, and this counselor – by God’s grace a member of a fundamentalist group – convinced her that her idea was stupid. She ended up giving the baby away, which, as she said, pains her much until this day, but “she knows this is what God wanted her to do”. Sounds like a line to me. I’m not saying it might not be true, but it just doesn’t feel right.
Not every woman who gives her child up for adoption is happy with it. Some realize that they should’ve kept it. For some, it would’ve been easier to raise it on their own than to give it up. For others, this isn’t true, and that’s perfectly ok.
I feel this is an issue that needs to be addressed much more. Whatever each individual woman choses must be her own decision, one that she herself can live with. The fact that she’s seeking help shows a great amount of responsibility and mature behaviour. If the ultimate decision is not to keep the baby and to give to a different family to be raised, she must know what she’s signing up for. All of that talk about how it’s going to have a great life and family and all the financial support it needs is just distraction from the real issue at hand: The empty birthdays, the lone mothers day, the guilt some women feel when they have a baby later on, one that they keep. All of those are facts that are withheld from these mothers in order to convince them. All they’ll hear are those great stories of young women who gave their babies to christian families, and how happy they are about it. You don’t hear about the tears, the pain, the longing. It’s so easy to convince people when all you tell them are the good things.
I guess the end of the story is that adoption is something that should be encouraged, but if a woman is doubtful and you have to show her 500 different papers about how bad keeping the child would end up being, it might not be the decision that’s right for her.
I remember my Dad looking at a man who was supposedly gay (not officially). Dad (note: I mistyped God here first… Freudian slip?) told us kids that God hates “fags”. Sodomites! Perverse ones who engage in perverse sodomy. I had not the slightest clue what sodomy really was – it could’ve been a sinful game of cards for all I knew. But Dad said that God hated fags, so I hated fags too. I said that out loud when I was small and those were the days I was Daddy’s girl.
My Dad told us kids that sodomy – being gay – caused AIDS. In the 20th century, when more and more sodomites appeared, and when people started taking drugs and sleeping with each other without being married, he made AIDS to make all of those people suffer and ultimately to kill them. I was really afraid of getting too close to gay people. I didn’t want to get their AIDS! I was afraid that their gayness would rub onto me and then I’d have AIDS and die and go to hell because I committed sodomy. Some days I was so afraid, I didn’t even want the guy at the checkout counter touch my hand when he gave me my change. He looked so stylish, I bet he was one of those AIDS-fags. I once saw a transvestite when we took a day trip to a bigger city, and it scared me half to death. I swear, if he had come into the shop we were in, I would’ve run out crying, afraid of him spewing out AIDS.
I’m thankful I don’t have to think that way any more. I’m not afraid of gay people any more. But that took a lot of convincing. And a lot of making sense of it. I want to go through some of the questions I asked myself in order to understand what it’s really about.
1. AIDS is something gays and promiscuous people get.
Partially true. Being faithful to each other helps prevent AIDS. But so do condoms. Aids is mostly something careless people get, excluding the ones who got it for other reasons (rape, trusting their spouse and being cheated on, blood transfer etc). I don’t believe that infected people run around forcing people not to use condoms. It’s a mutual decision. It can be prevented if everyone takes responsibility for themselves – and others. I do not mean to offend infected people with this. We all make bad calls, trust the wrong people, get carried away by the moment. It’s human. It takes an effort to constantly remind yourself not to make those bad decisions and I don’t mean to blame anyone who made one or two mistakes – I make them all the time, too.
2. AIDS is something gay people are punished with.
Not true at all. If two gay men get tested, get married and live faithfully together, they won’t get it. If a heterosexual couple doesn’t get tested or cheat on each other, they might get it.
What’s funny to me at this point is that the fundamentalists point out that it’s a curse for all homosexuals. But what about lesbians? You hardly ever hear of infected lesbians! Shouldn’t they be affected just as much as gay men? Matter of fact, You hardly ever find them in the statistics even. Because AIDS transfers via massive exchange of body fluids, and even better if it’s anally due to physical aspects. Women don’t produce massive amounts of fluids to begin with, hence it’s very hard to get it even if you’re sleeping with an infected person. The logic of the punishment for homosexuals crumbles when you look at this. Because, simply by this logic, I’d have to supposed that being a homosexual man is more sinful than a heterosexual person is more sinful than being a homosexual woman. If I don’t apply this sentence, that means that God fails to punish certain people for the exact same sin, and that doesn’t make sense at the end of the day. If God wanted to punish anybody, I’m sure he would do it right – read the old testament for more information on this.
6.5 Million US-Americans have (diagnosed!!!) cancer. No numbers on how many people actually have it including those who don’t know they do (obviously).
I was taught that people who have Aids are being punished. You can actually have a decent life with Aids these days. Imagine how many people die a cruel, slow death from cancer. How many more have it. How many fundamentalists have it. So what’s that talk about punishment?
Oooooh I forgot. Of course. If a non-christian gets sick, he’s being punished. If a christian gets sick, he’s being tested. Silly me.
I feel terrible that I used to think that way about people, no matter if they’re straight, bi, gay, whatever. Seriously ashamed. I swallowed up everything I was served. At one point because I was too young to know better and get informed, at another because I was too ignorant and scared to question it. I really wish I could make up for it somehow, but I don’t think that works. I wish I could apologize to every gay man (because, funny enough, I never even considered gay women!) as well as to every HIV-infected person (whatever they might be) for thinking that way about them.
It’s time for another courtship – engagement – wedding post.
There is something weird about courtship I realized. I never read anything about this particular issue and it doesn’t exist in every family, but in some (or many) it does.
Why do so many families keep it a secret when a daughter is starting to court? And it’s not like that for men – at least, not that I know of! When a man starts courting, he will say that he “has a feeling” or that “he thinks God is showing him something”. He might not directly admit “Yes, I’m courting”, but he won’t say no either. With girls, it’s different. A lot of fathers tell their daughters not to talk about it until the biggest deal breakers are out-of-the-way. Why is that?
I think it’s got a lot do with 1. the image of female purity and 2. submission of the female part in a relationship.
About the first: While evangelical circles deny that there is such a thing as a difference between purity in women and in men, we all know these differences exist. It’s got a lot to do with the image of how each gender “loves”. While women tend to get emotionally involved very quickly – and therefore give pieces of their hearts away – men love more on a physical level, physical attraction and sex are the major things a man will crave when he is in love, and not the emotional aspect of a relationship. Hence, once a courtship starts, the woman is much more likely to lose her purity and pieces of her heart while the man is only looking for sex and by that, won’t give away pieces of his heart. The emotional attachment comes much later (if it ever comes!).
And I see this as a major reason why so many families are eager to hide a new courtship of a daughter. This might go on for just a week or two, it might take months for the parents to allow the daughter to admit to it, depending on a large number of circumstances. But it is done on a regular basis.
I think for many families there’s a huge fear of their girls being “damaged goods” as soon as she enters a courtship relationship. To avoid this, the rules on courting seem to get stricter and stricter, and likewise, the girls seem to pick up a “holier than thou” attitude that wasn’t there before.
While holding hands or even kissing wasn’t “as bad” a few years ago – many fundamentalist couples admit to kissing before getting married – the younger generations, particularly the girls who are just getting into the age of being eligable for marriage. Kissing seems totally off-limits these days and the view of holding hands before marriage is changing as well. There are plenty of people who do not hold hands these days but instead hold a stick on each end to “imitate” holding hands. If you look around in the blogosphere of this group of girls, you will find an awful lot who are against any form of physical contact before marriage – we’re talking actual marriage here, not engagement. It goes as far as even the man not putting the engagement ring on the woman’s hand – he will give the ring to her father, who then will put it on her finger – to avoid physical contact.
I find this behaviour to lead down dangerous streets. I mean, there’s nothing wrong with purity, but the fact that you would avoid every form of physical contact in a way like this goes beyond my understanding. While only acts of sexual sin made you physically impure a few years ago, we’re already at physical impurity when it comes to sliding on that engagement ring.
But back to the discussion of keeping a courtship a secret. The second reason why I think it’s kept secret was submission. This might sound strange to you at first, but -
If a women went out to tell any of her friends, anybody really, about her courtship with a man, and even if that’s all she would tell them, she would put a sort of pressure on him. We all know about expectations from your environment and as soon as you’re in a courtship, certainly thing are expected from you. While many say that a courtship might as well fail, this is hardly ever the case. A courtship is typically only allowed once the father of the girl has already thoroughly inspected the suitor. The biggest deal breakers after starting a courtship would be coming from the girl or the boy, such as not getting along or wanting totally different things, feeling different callings. But that almost never happens. Most courtships are broken for reasons such as sexual sin and rebellion.
Now, once a woman goes out to talk about her courtship, the environment expects them to get along, to make it work. A courting couple in the mind of the people is almost engaged, and engaged is almost married. The simple act of telling others about it might be understood as a way of pressuring the man into taking further steps. But, as we know, that isn’t allowed. Even in courtship, a woman is expected to submissive – let him take each and every step in the relationship, the only thing you’re really allowed to do is follow quietly. Every form of trying to push a man are understood as a sign of a lack of submissiveness. And this, in fact, can be a deal breaker for young men.
Due to the fact that my next issue differs greatly from this one, I’ll split it into another post.
I went on a date with Daniel a few days ago. Dinner and the movies. I got dressed up nicely, put on make up, curled my hair. I was wearing bright pink lipstick and thought I looked very worldly, modern, normal. Just before I left the house Daniel called me asking to get something for him from the grocery store. I live much closer and it’s not a big deal for me to go there quick, so I went.
I felt good walking through the grocery store, looking forward to the night, and then I saw them at the check out.
Two of them.
Standing right in front of me in the line.
Chatting quietly.
Their long skirts covering their ankles, their pale faces tired but content and meek, part of their hair covered. With them, two toddlers and a baby.
Two evangelical christian women.
My heart started beating faster. I had never seen them here. The city I live in isn’t that big. I looked around. All the other lines were much longer than the one I was in. I wanted to get out fast, get our table at the restaurant. I looked at the stuff they were buying. Healthy food, fresh vegetables and fruit, bread baking flour. I looked at the things I was buying. Ice cream – a spontaneous pick, I just felt like it. A bottle of my favourite white wine and a bottle of Sprite because I like to mix those two. A pack of cigarettes, Daniel smokes on occasion. A bag of frozen Paella because there wasn’t any left at Daniel’s place and that’s what I love to heat up when I’m there and hungry. I felt ashamed, somehow. I looked at my bright pink fingernails, matching my lipstick so well. I thought of my lush soft curly hair that I invested the last hour into. My tight black leggings with a huge oversized shirt going almost down to my knees, one of those that look like you stole it from your husband or boyfriend. I realized how I must look to them. Like somebody who has no idea of the bible or jesus or the fact that I’m all wrong, all wrong. I didn’t look any different from the other girls and women around us. I was one of them, never a christian. I stared at them with I can only imagine to be huge shocked eyes. One of them saw me stare, and smiled at me. A smile filled with joy, encouraging. I smiled back to the best of my abilities.
I kept looking at them. And I thought to myself: I know you. I know what you do, how you live. I was like you. I was that little baby girl. I know what you believe, and I know that at least one of your kids is going to be like me. And you will be ashamed of it.
Somehow I wished I could tell them what I really am. I wanted to explain myself to them somehow. Apologize for being what I am. But I didn’t. When they had packed their stuff into their linen bags, and I was trying to balance all of my groceries in my hands, they blinked at me, smiled and wished me a good evening. I smiled back and wished them the same.
One of my favourite (cough) authors has done it again. She hit the nail on the head:
“Being a mother of four little kiddos constantly reminds me that foolishness (i.e. sin and selfishness) is bound up in the heart of every child. There is no “goodness” in them, no matter how cute or sweet they might appear at first glance. Screaming, whining, demanding, and bullying comes far more naturally to them than sharing, giving, blessing, and serving.”
You know, just when I’m about to accept her as a good-hearted person, one who might be misunderstood (especially by me!), someone who has a good thing in mind when she talks, I read something like this.
Of course kids are screaming and demanding. Especially when they can’t put whatever it is they need into words yet. Of course they are whining. They are new to this scary huge world and need somebody to tell them what’s normal and what’s not. While all of the things she says about children’s behaviour are true, I still think it is a dangerous statement to say that kids have no goodness in them.
I don’t know, I don’t know what to make out of her anymore. It’s so sad that a woman who is fully aware of her influence on young girls and future mothers blurts out statements like that, with no foundation, no explanation, no other comment. It’s plain dangerous. Especially because it’s such a stand-alone statement, you’d be tempted to find a way how get that natural evilness out of your children. And what else could possibly pop up on the large christian internet community than the Pearls and their twisted ideas of training children to be good people?
Yeah, you get the point, why it annoys me so much.
