Tuesday, October 16, 2018

Rebuttal #3, AKA Conversations With My Daughters

This is the 3rd rebuttal to Pastor Sam's series of blog posts regarding witchcraft, paganism, and now, the occult.  Part of the title of this particular post is "Conversations With My Daughters", and the reason for that will become clear later on in this post.  First, let me post the link to Pastor Sam's most recent blog entry.

A Christian View of Witchcraft and Paganism, AKA The Occult

The very first thing I want to say is that this post is, again, fear mongering.  Pastor Sam is doing his best to try to make people afraid of anybody else who is different from themselves or believes differently from them.  Whether that is his intention or not, that is exactly what he is doing.  And this is the most dangerous thing anybody can do.  At the risk of sounding like a broken record, it is fear that causes the worst violence, the most killing, genocides, bullying, discrimination, and the list goes on and on.

In the mornings, I drive my very wise daughter to school.  I have two wonderful daughters, but lately I have enjoyed the morning drive with the younger of the two and the conversations we have.  I will often ask her opinion on different topics, whether they be politics, religion, or current events.  What I have found is that there is much to be learned from our young people before their views get distorted by the world.  They tend to see things very clearly.  If you don't have these conversations with your own children, I would encourage you to.  Ask them what they think and then listen without judging.  Because as soon as you judge, they aren't going to want to tell you anymore.

I have been having conversations about the dialogue Pastor Sam and I have been having through our blog posts with both my daughters.  This morning I explained how Pastor Sam shared a story about an occultist who was a very evil murderer and cannibal.  I said that I intended, as I formulated my own blog post, to tell a story of a Christian who was a very evil murderer who did horrible things.  My daughter said, "That shouldn't be hard".  We went on to discuss how Pastor Sam was telling the story of ONE PERSON, not a GROUP OF PEOPLE.  One very bad person who more than likely suffered from some form of mental illness or psychosis.  The fact that this one particular person happened to be an occultist is a minor detail.

Let's leave the conversations with my daughters for a bit and explore the word "occultist", which Sam uses in this particular post.  Do you know the definition of "occult"?  The definition is "knowledge of that which is hidden".  The definition is NOT working with demons, worshipping satan or the devil, or dabbling in magick and ouija boards.  Those are NOT the definition of "occult".  I feel the need to make this clear.  In this sense of the word, I can say that I am an "occultist" because I study and research the more hidden aspects of various religions and spiritualities.  Let me make it clear that I am not worshipping any demons, sacrificing ANYTHING living, or doing ANY harm unto others.  I find religion fascinating and love researching the history behind modern religions.  In particular, I enjoy Jewish, Christian and Muslim mysticism.  I enjoy reading and studying different religious texts.  I like trying to figure out why certain aspects of religions became "hidden" in the first place.

Whenever religion is concerned, it always seems like someone who is a member of that religion will call out someone else who is a member of that same religion for doing that religion the "wrong" way.  It's easy to go after people who believe differently than you.  It's easier to look at other people than it is to look at yourself.  It's easy to say other people are sinning and going to hell.  It's easy to say that only what you believe and practice is right.  These things are easy.  It's harder to find the beauty and joy in our differences.  But it's a better way to live.  Pastor Jones doesn't just speak out against witchcraft, Paganism and the occult, but I have seen, time and time again, how he speaks out against other Christians.  How he speaks out against social justice.  How he speaks out against anyone who is different from his congregation.

Back to my daughters.  At the time my older daughter was born, I was teaching in a Catholic school and also attending Mass at the church.  I was a member of the church.  I wanted to have my daughter baptized, but instead of having her baptized in the Church, I had a Christian minister who had studied Christian mysticism perform her baptism.  It was a beautiful ceremony.  By the time my second daughter was born, I was a bit more involved in the Catholic church and had her baptized there by the Priest.  Also a beautiful ceremony.  Both girls went through religious ed and both girls celebrated their First Communions.  I even got to celebrate my first reconciliation with my older daughter when she did hers.  It's kind of cool that we have that bond and went through it together.  Eventually both girls wanted to go to Protestant "religious ed" type youth groups.  Not being one to tell them what their spiritual paths were, I absolutely allowed and encouraged it.  Their school friends were Protestant, so they got to spend some time with them.  In the case of my younger daughter, several of her friends went to the same group at a church which, while being non-denominational, was most closely aligned with the Baptist Church.

The real eye opening conversations came from my younger daughter.  Today's youth are intelligent and smart and have been taught critical thinking skills.  They no longer just take anybody's word for anything.  They need proof.  They need reasons.  And I admire that.  In their youth group meetings, they would ask the tough questions.  The "why" questions.  Not just my daughter, but other girls who attended this group.  What they found time and time again was that the youth group leaders, who were amazing people, really didn't have the answers.  It would come down to "I don't know, it just says so in the scripture".  And these young people were not having any of it.  They can see injustice.  They can see bullying.  They can see right from wrong.  They can see discrimination.  They can empathize.  "Because it says so", was not a good enough answer for them.  So, eventually my daughter and others left that group.

I asked my daughter if I could quote her this morning and she said that I could, but I want to be very careful about how I word it.  She was making a generalization and is aware of that and so am I and we want to make it clear that we don't really feel there is one group of "bad" or "mean" people in the world.  But, what she said was, "It's the white Christians who are the mean people".  Which, I repeat, is not to say that she or we believe all white Christians are mean.  NOT AT ALL.  But, still, think about that and what her experiences are telling her.  I should tell you we are white, by the way.

Aleister Crowley is a well know name in certain spiritual circles.  He was well known for his work with a group of spirits known as "The Goetia".  However, it might surprise you to know that he never really believed they were spirits.  He actually believed they were part of our own brains, our own subconsciousness that was usually "hidden" (remember discussing what was hidden before?) and needed more than just our day to day thinking to tap into.  So, his system is not a system for working with spirits, but rather of accessing that part of our brain we don't usually use.  This doesn't really have anything to do with what my main point is, but considering the conversation, I thought readers might find it interesting.

I said earlier in this post that I could easily find a Christian who had committed horrible acts.  Dennis Rader, the notorious BTK killer, is one such man.  He was a family man.  A Christian, who, in fact, held high offices and was highly respected within his church.  Did he dabble in the occult?  No.  In fact, he is still a Christian.  He considers himself to be a victim rather than the 10 people he brutally tortured and murdered.  It is much easier for him to blame his acts on a demon than it is to accept responsibility for what he did.  And yet he was never involved with anything that could be considered paranormal or occult.  Think about that.  And of course, I don't believe Christianity is going to lead you to commit horrible acts.  That's not how any of this works.  And I could have recounted hundreds of other stories of horrible things done by Christians.   And to be fair and honest, I could have recounted hundreds of other stories of horrible things done by someone of any group any religion.  The truth is there are a lot of bad people who do a lot of bad things.  Saying it's all one particular group based on the actions of one is wrong.

I feel I must repeat that I do not speak for anyone other than myself.  I do not represent any group.  However, since Pastor Sam titles his blog post "A Christian View.....", I believe he feels he is speaking for all Christians.  And at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I feel that blaming misfortunes on certain subgroups of a community or on religious groups other than your own IS WRONG (not to mention primitive and irresponsible).  I feel that contacting city council members to say that a religion other than your own does not belong in our community IS WRONG.  I feel that trying to put a stop to one particular religious group having an event which harms nobody else IS WRONG.  This is why I am continuing this dialogue.  This is why I am continuing to write rebuttals.  I feel strongly about this.  Don't be afraid of that which you do not understand.  "Seek first to understand, then to be understood", Stephen Covey.

I will leave you with a link to an interesting read.  Someone tagged me in it this morning and I feel it is relevant.  Take from it what you will, have a peaceful day, and do no harm.  Mr. Ouija and Mrs. Gail







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