#I don't want to come across as if I'm proselytizing it's just that my religion legitimately is a huge influence in how I approach my writin | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

gwydionmisha · 2 months

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Personal: I Have a Lot of Feelings about a Lot of Things

I have lost track of how many missed cleaning appointments there were. It's been weeks. I've been scheduling twice a week since November in hopes of getting one a month. Which is annoying, but not nightmarish right now, but gets ugly fast in March, when Goth Millennial is going to burn through all their hours fast taking care of me post surgery.

The Millennials are working out a cooking schedule between them, but this is a huge load on Goth Millennial's shoulders.

Basically the company Medicare is out sourcing to is falling apart because treating their contract workers like shit and lying to them about things like mileage compensation when hiring them is a terrible business model in this economy on top of being an incredible shitty way to treat humans. My decision to start calling them the Asshole Agency within a week or two of starting to deal with them continues to be vindicated. The workers there need a union since the company is devoted to it's assholery, but I get why it's easier to quit.

The system is collapsing, basically. The Medicare advantage people know this and are "discussing options."

So Friday I spent hours playing phone tag with local volunteer organizations trying to get six weeks of help, but those systems are already flooded with people who are supposed to be getting Medicare advantage help, but can't because the Asshole agency isn't sending people and hasn't been for months. Still, I was hoping a short term acute need might get me in. The secular one got right back to me. They are full up. No word yet from the Catholics and the group that coordinates a bunch of protestant organizations.

I have been told over and over to try to get a church involved, but I'm not Christian and it feels weird, especially since most of my contacts with Christian strangers in the last couple decades involve aggressive proselytizers. I have Christian friends who are cool. I have no beef with the Quakers or the Unitarians or the Episcopalians or the Catholics who are trying to change things from within (Nuns on a Bus, queer friends trying to push their parish left) or what have you. I do have a beef with extremists, which most evangelicals are and the more conservative strands of catholic, orthodox, and Protestantism and there are a lot of door to door Mormons, Jehovah's witnesses, etc. in my part of the country.

Look, a had late family members who were very involved in their churches who were decent people with reasonable views. I was a Queer Medievalist and I have some sexy late medieval saint pin ups to prove it mixed in with all my other art, some of which references assorted other religions, despite never having been Catholic. I have a Quaker friend closer to me than my own sister.

I just… Christian religious strangers in my house make me uncomfortable as a queer non-Christian in a country where Christo-fascists are trying to make me literally illegal.

I know it would likely be fine. I did fine and made lots of friends at University which doing a major that is mostly Catholics, Ex-Catholics, and people in the process of converting. I come from a debate culture. I can quote scripture like Satan. ;) I was in Philosophy before I dropped out and moved west and switched to History in one form or another. I can talk theology across a whole lot of denominations and the major "heresies." I just don't want to anymore and I haven't wanted to for a long time. That was long ago and far away when I wasn't so exhausted and in pain.

I should have stared looking last August or October.

I am likely fucked because I waited too long.

Sigh.

In other news, I've been really doing well on the massive number of now mostly advanced physio things I have to do every day.

Sunday I was about a third of the way in when my arm noped out of about another third of Sunday's quota. I am trying to do all the remaining ones that don't move my arm that way, but I'm not sanguine.

I forgot to do my blood work Friday. I have an afternoon pre-op appointment Monday. Let us hope I remember then. I am so tired and it all hurts so much.

#Personal

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filmnoirsbian · 4 years

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It's hard to talk about my faith as a Christian without sounding like I'm trying to convert people. They seem to think that all Christians are inherently oppressive and when I try to explain how missionaries also do good, they don't listen. Do you ever feel like you aren't allowed to discuss your faith?

Firstly, I don't believe that missionaries do good. To deny the irreparable harm and cultural genocide that missionaries have done to so many vulnerable communities across the world is to deny reality. Somewhere along the line, the concept of "spreading God's word" began to mean only "proselytize" rather than "take the love and kindness for your fellow man that god taught you and spread that by helping others and living good lives." Doing good because you want something is not actually doing good. Transactional goodness is not godly.

Secondly, if you're having trouble discussing your faith without being accused of proselytizing, maybe reconsider the way you talk about Christianity with non-Christians. I am always honest and open when discussing my faith and I've never been accused of trying to convert someone--largely because I genuinely believe that faith is an inherently personal thing and that the act of converting to a different religion is something that you should not be persuaded or led into, but instead a decision that you must come to on your own.

Thirdly, it's impossible to argue that Christianity has not been used as a tool of oppression via european colonialism, predominantly in the west. But in those conversations, it is important to highlight the persecution that black and brown Christians suffer all over the world, especially in the south east, the levant, and north africa. These are people who are almost always forgotten by the west, and should always be part of the conversation regarding religious persecution.

It's true that many people--both conservative Christians and atheist leftists--need to learn how to discuss religion in a more respectful way. Sometimes I find myself having to explain my faith (& religion in general), but I typically view these conversations as a good test of my own reasoning, rather than growing defensive. What do I believe? Why do I believe it? How can I reconcile what I've been taught with who I am? I think it's good to ask yourself these questions every once in a while, if only to strengthen your beliefs and your relationship with your god(s). Believing in something unquestioningly just because you were raised with it is never going to give you the joy and comfort of knowing that you came to your belief system willfully. The goal, in discussing religion, should never be to convert the other person to "your side." It should simply be to leave feeling that you've both reached a higher level of understanding. Religion exists for many reasons, but one reason that crosses through every religion is to offer us an answer.

I hope this helps 💝

#asks #faith

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