Pro Life Propoganda
I went to church with mum last night. We both got a hymn book and a mass book and a church bulletin. But Mum also got a couple of pictures inside the bulletin as well. No one else seemed to have one but then I wasn't really paying attention and it may have been a 'in every few copies' thing. It wasn't until everyone went to communion and I was doing some reading off the back of the bulletin that I noticed the pictures properly. Very little shocks me any more, if anything it interests me. But when I showed it to Mum and she noticed the dead foetus she was horrified. We came back home and I showed them to Dad, and Martyn and Jen, all of them equally horrified at the fact someone could put something like that into a hymn book. But surely that's the point of the picture? If it offends us it's for a reason, this picture was surely always drawn to shock. But does that necessarily make it right to put it in there?? I'm a firm believer that we shouldn't necessarily be protected from anything. I will never apologise for studying God as I told someone last month who warned me to be careful. I wont avoid issues which don't fit in easily with what the Church teaches. And I positively watch and read things that contradict everything I've been brought up to believe and accept as truth. But in the way I don't expect to be protected, should these groups respect their sheep, let them see what they want to and protect them from what is uneasy. I want to say no, we should be able to talk, express our own opinions and yet tomorrow I'll go into school and teach the children all the things I've spent the last 2 years doubting, I'll encourage them to live the life I'm not able to live at the moment, and I'll protect them from the 'truth', as much as truth is ever true, by giving certainty in things we can never be certain of. Does that make me a hypercrite? Should I say yes, take that out of the hymn book or should I just understand that whatever position I take I'm going to be contradicting my own values and beliefs.
posted by marishamunchkin at 8:24 PM
2 Comments:
It's a tough one and you've obviously given it a lot of thought.
I've been in the position in jobs and stuff before where I've been telling people things with confidence and authority that in my head weren't half as confident or sure. I kind of used the work persona to be authoritative and just questioned it all when I got back home. It's not easy, and it's not always easy to sustain - even if you can and do do it now.
So it may be that at school now you can do it, with your 'teacher head' on. It may be that the rest of you becomes as certain as the teacher one! Or it may feel too contradictory at some point.
I tried for a long long time to reconcile Church (esp. Catholic church) with other things in my life I was growing into, and the trying to reconcile it was quite agonising. At some point, I rejected the whole thing and actually felt relieved and like life made more sense. I'm not saying you will or should do that, but just sharing my experience.
Church is such a huge thing for people like us who grew up with it, and maintained it as adults, for a while at least. Catholicism in particular I think gets into your head and soul in such a huge way, 'shaking it off' just isn't possible!
You having studied it to such a degree as well has probably at times added to your faith, and at other times distanced you from it. I find my spiritual journey, for what it's worth, to be ever-changing.
I think you will continue to go into school and teach in the way that you have been doing, and expect yourself to do. I think you are intelligent and clear-thinking enough to see your role there as to teach a certain thing in a certain way, while maybe hiding some of the questions or dilemmas inside you until a more appropriate time.
I certainly don't think it makes you hypocritical. Not at all.
Having looked at a couple of other entries you've written you may want to watch a film I saw yesterday, called 5ive Girls. It wasn't a very good film I have to admit, but it seemed to cover some of the issues that you have looked at in other films (possession, witchcraft, Catholicism, evil etc).
Wow, I don't think I've ever left such a long comment!
Philippa x
thanks for this post!
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