I do not hate you

I feel I must say this, or suffer the consequences in some form, whether it be an ulcer or the regret of being silent when I should not be.

Being a Catholic, Conservative, and (usually) Republican in Philadelphia is not a comfortable thing. But being maligned, misrepresented, and (to give benefit of the doubt where applicable), misunderstood, has been tough. I have lost some dear friends. Now, I am not whining, because I understand that to do one's best to follow Christ is to at times incur all of those things. But as the Presidential campaign heats up, and the verbal bombs are lobbed from one camp to another, I want to say a few things.

Bashing the Catholics and conservatives has become a pop culture badge of honor. It's so hip to slap labels on us. Depending on their origin, it goes from unintelligent,  "shiny objects" (DWS), to, racists, bigots, greedy wealth-hoarders, or war mongers. And don't forget hate-filled.

While I could very easily counter every one of those un-thought out labels, what I mainly want to clarify is this.

 I am your fellow human being.  

I may not agree with you on everything.

 I may not completely understand you.  

    But I do not hate you.

The political movers and shakers, mainly on the left, have found a few buzz words that are very effective and have plied them freely via every media vehicle available. It was so effective that even some people, in 2008, who identified themselves as Catholics or conservatives or what have you, suddenly felt that not to vote for Barack Obama was to embody all those labels, especially the H word.

I think that to fundamentally disagree with someone should not mean giving up your voice entirely in favor of dodging the difficult discussions. 

Sadly, some real hateful speech flies pretty freely in our direction. It is accepted and  popular now. I could, again, name names and specifics, but I am choosing not to go there right now. It's all a matter of record.

Disagreement     ≠        Hate

 


I have the responsibility to speak the truth at all times, with humility, and in love. As I had to explain to one of my daughters the other day, truly loving someone means NEVER lying to them to smooth things over. ALL my kids know that I love them to the ends of the earth and back again. For example, I will not lie and say that unmarried cohabitation is really okay. I will share my own heartbreak and failures at having tried that. But I will keep right on loving them if they make that choice. I will love their boyfriends/girlfriends. I will take them shopping, laugh, cry, joke, and be here for them.  There is no hate in the equation.

There is fear that some choices can lead in a direction that could possibly drag them ultimately to hell. I will work at living, loving, and praying them away from that end. I lay awake last night praying this:

Listen, I am not the author of Truth or the Universe. I am bound to love and serve the Savior who loves and saved me.  But He loved and died for the whole world. He does not hate anyone.

There are many, many great people, some great thinkers of history, who have died for love of Christ. I submit to any that would brush off all believers with easy, lazy reasoning, to do some objective research. Read the Early Church Fathers, who lived with Jesus or those that knew Him. Pray and ask God to help you really understand. Don't be so immersed in the pop culture, make-it-up-as-they-go-along, media icons. Don't do what we are so oft accused of -- following blindly. Think and reason for yourself, and let Him reveal Himself to you.

Demonizing people of faith, as frail and flawed as we may be, is no way to go about moving "forward" in this country.

I will support Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan because I believe they will do better for ALL of us. Do I endorse every single thing they promote? No! And I will take every opportunity to communicate that, if hopefully, they win the election. 

I will not apologize for my beliefs. But if you, dear reader, believe that I would hate you for yours, you would be wrong.  I have lived and experienced the following verse.

"For this reason I say to you, her sins, which are many, have been forgiven, for she loved much; but he who is forgiven little, loves little."  

Luke 7:47 

God Bless you~

+JMJ+

Kelly

choices and charity

 Did you ever stop a minute and look back over the events of your life and see the effect of a single choice that you made? How it led to chain of occurrences, and affected so much more than you ever could have forseen? I sometimes am astonished at the power a single choice has had on the world around me, rippling off into the future, taking on a life of its own. 

 One easy example is the birth of a child. If you, like I, went headstrong into the world as a young person, and did not wait until marriage to engage in sex with the boyfriend of the time, then upon becoming pregnant, had to decide how to proceed, then you know what I am talking about. So we decide, and that decision goes forward with us, whether we embrace or reject the life now created. After my first go at it, in which I chose to abort, I married and had seven children. Having learned from that the real agenda of the abortion/death proponents, and that it fostered death in my own life and those around me, I never had to actively choose if I would give birth to the rest. But in choosing to cooperate in the creation of each child,  whole new lifetimes of choice-makers are brought into the world. The ripples of effect from the abortion also followed me into the future, these being mostly negative, in the form of PTSD type symptoms, but the positive has been that I experienced God's grace and His willingness to entrust seven more souls to me, and that now I am able to enjoy all they give to me and to the world. 

  But even a seemingly smaller choice can resonate--something you say to someone, who takes that thing to heart and acts on it, positive or negative. Paying attention when someone is talking. Deciding whether to attend a daily mass, say a rosary, write a letter; they all go out from us and make their mark on the world. Do we always get to know what happens? No, but sometimes God allows us a window-we see someone we encouraged go on to pursue a certain path, or someone we discouraged with a harsh word, withdraw. 

 This reminds me of the discussion that can ensue with people who claim 

they are not puppets of any religion, or God. Who trumpet "choice" as a religion that worships whatever thought is in their heads at any given moment. Why would anyone think that choices belong to them alone? That they don't make any choice in a vacuum? God, in His wisdom allows us to live, free in every moment of our lives, to choose to live in Him and pursue holiness, or not. We know we never "arrive" at perfection but that the journey of a life relinquished to God  is the epitome of freedom. And alternately, a life dedicated to promoting separation from God (goes by the name of Pride) is really a life of shackles. The world, the flesh and ultimately, the devil are harsh taskmasters. Case in point, in observing the relationships of those who would eschew all allegiance to God, I see an angry, defensive lot that chews up and spits out its own as soon as someone doesn't toe the party line. "Wait!" I want to say--"I thought you were all about choice"? Oh--only certain choices--"who gets to decide which choices"? oh, a certain group of people--"who chooses which people"?--oh, only other people who reject God. okay. I think I get it....one who "makes all their own choices" is not entirely self driven, but rather a reaction to those who willingly submit themselves to God, and especially if they dare to share their faith with others, and claim, as Jesus said, that He is The Way, the Truth and the Life. So it is okay to follow in lockstep with some person who says that you don't need God. (Whose narrative goes something like-"who is HE anyway, to try and tell you what to do, oh and by the way--do what I tell you to do, and don't mess up, or you're out"!). Well, all I can tell you is that THAT particular drama played out in the garden, and it seems to be in theaters near you, perpetually.

 "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble." James 4:6 

This line of thinking then gets me to thinking about truth and charity. Many times, I hear people talking of Christian love, (charity), in kind of gloppy sounding terms, as though love=sappy words*, always agreeable words, words that would never hurt anyone's feelings, or in the terms of the day, "disrespect" them in any way. What is left then? How can you communicate truth to someone in error or (gasp) sin without ever countering the beliefs leading to their behavior? I firmly believe that to lie to someone is not to love them at all. I understand that a certain degree of relationship is needed to engage a person on that level, that is a given. With acquaintances we have to rely on our demeanor and example. So here, a demeanor that radiates God's love and peace are something to aim for. (of course, it helps to foster God's love and peace oneself before trying to import it). But there is a time for direct, truthful words. Ones that don't tiptoe around the truth. 

*what leaps to mind at the thought of sappy Christian love is the Franco Zefirelli depiction of Saint Francis, in Brother Sun, Sister Moon, a film from 1973, in which Saint Francis appears with an expression of ecstasy permanently stuck on his face.

 A friend loves at all times, And a brother is born for adversity, Proverbs 17:17

As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another. Proverbs 27:17

Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful. Proverbs 27:6

Who knows if the words spoken today will not shape someones future? Who knows if those words might even shape their eternal future? If we have the truth within us, we have a treasure that Jesus asked us to give away freely. He tells us we will be hated because of Him. Hated. Wow. Not irritated, not annoyed.

 But are we willing to go that far? Not to go around ready to bite heads off for Jesus, but to carry His love and mercy in us, and be ready in season and out of season, to give witness to him?

 ¹⁸"If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. ¹⁹If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you. ²⁰Remember the words I spoke to you: 'No servant is greater than his master.'^[b] If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also. ²¹They will treat you this way because of my name, for they do not know the One who sent me. ²²If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin. Now, however, they have no excuse for their sin. ²³He who hates me hates my Father as well. ²⁴If I had not done among them what no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin. But now they have seen these miracles, and yet they have hated both me and my Father. ²⁵But this is to fulfill what is written in their Law: 'They hated me without reason.'^[c]
 26"When the Counselor comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father, he will testify about me. ²⁷And you also must testify, for you have been with me from the beginning.

 John 5:18-27