Natural Reason versus Faith

This blog post I'm linking to is very old, but someone I know just mentioned it on Google Plus last week, so I saw it for the first time. On the other hand, it consists of some of Martin Luther's words, and those are older still. But what struck me is how appropriate they are for the times in which we live. I encourage you to go read the whole quote, but for my purposes here, I'll just say that Luther compares those who live by natural reason against those who live by Christian faith in the context of marriage and children. In natural reason, according to Luther, caring for a wife and dealing with a smelly baby who needs his diapers changed is abhorrent and something to be avoided. On the other hand, the Christian sees even the lowest of service as pleasing to God, and so he is glad to do the most menial of tasks for his wife and children.

It really struck me how Luther, writing from nearly 500 years ago, captured the spirit of our age so accurately. I've been seeing people that don't even want to live with another person anymore, because it's too much work and hassle. The other person doesn't do his fair share of the chores, plus you have to deal with his bad habits, and work around his schedule, etc. It's much easier, they say, to just maintain your separate abodes. Get together at one person's place for the evening, have dinner, watch a movie, have sex, and then you both live your own separate lives until you feel like sharing time with that person again. And having sex, of course. The natural man wants all the pleasures life can give him, but not any of the work or unpleasantness.

This so relates to being a stay-at-home mom, too. Modern feminists insist that getting a job outside the home is infinitely preferable to staying home and doing the things Luther talks about: making beds, washing diapers, taking care of the baby when he cries. Of course, you then have to turn around and hire someone to do those things, but somehow that is seen as acceptable. I've never seen anywhere how feminists view those women, the ones who are working but are doing those menial tasks that other women are too good to do. It might be interesting to find that out.

I find it sad that people are willing to forgo the benefits that marriage and children can bring, because there are lots of benefits. In fact, I could even suggest that the good one acquires not only outweighs the bad, but is better than the fleeting pleasures that the perpetually single-by-their-own-choice find, simply because the work required is more difficult. And in loving someone else despite the frailties, weaknesses, and times when the other person simply messes up, we find someone who loves us despite our frailties, weaknesses, and times when we just mess up. There is a true beauty there.

Parenthood as an Option

I've been thinking a lot about something the Dancer said to me the other day. We've been talking about the role of marriage and having children in our current society. So many secular couples decide that they absolutely don't want children, or that they'll have them "when they're ready," whatever that means. Even if "when they're ready" gets pushed into their thirties, or even later. At which point they freak about being infertile, but that could be a whole separate post.

Anyway, I think that the Christian couple should definitely have children, if God blesses them with offspring. There are many couples who deal with the pain of infertility; there is a blog out there run by Lutherans for families who deal with this. But there are Christian couples out there who aren't having children at all, and I'm not certain that is the Christian way to do things. Of course, when I really thought about it, "being Christian equals having children," isn't something specifically mandated in the Bible, is it? God tells Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply, to fill the earth. Is that just meant for filling the earth? But also, God also talks about how children are a blessing, a heritage, from the Lord. And He talks in the Bible about putting the lonely in families. Despite St. Paul's praise for the single life, it seems like most often the family is God's ideal for how people should live. A man and a woman, joined in holy matrimony, bringing up children in the way they should go.

What the Dancer said, though, was when we were talking about a friend of hers. This friend is one of four kids. Mom has abandoned the family, and Dad is not always a great father. Not bad enough for social services, definitely, but sometimes rather absent with affection and effort. I said perhaps the parents should not have had children at all. The Dancer quickly pointed out that I've previously said people should have children. I did say that. So, what then? I told her, then, that they should have grown up and accepted parental responsibilities. But that doesn't seem like something that is done very often today either. See Wendy Davis as an example. She is running for elected office mainly on her status as a "single mother," when for a lot of time she wasn't even the primary parent because it wasn't "a good time" for to be a mother! Wasn't a good time? The good time to be a mother, is when you have kids.

I keep going back to what the Dancer said to me. All I've ever wanted to do was be a wife and mother, as primary vocation. Should you have a calling to be a parent, or should you do it because it's what God wants? Certainly not everyone is called to marriage.

Being a parent isn't easy, but then neither is being a grown-up. People not only want to put off child-rearing; they want to put off marriage, as I've written about previously. Instead, it's all about you, all the time. Wendy Davis left her kids behind literally for her career and her ambitions. You shouldn't even get married until you have a great career, and you've traveled the world, and done a bunch of other stuff that somehow is necessary to do. And then you shouldn't have kids until you're ready. And then what? Are we going to end up like Japan? A very large percentage of young men and women show no interest in getting married, or even dating. They're too wrapped up in their careers. In other words, themselves.

I'm definitely not perfect at this, but part of being a family is living for something beside the self. Definitely within a marriage, even more so with kids. Spouses, after all, are generally able to care for themselves. Babies need everything done for them, and even as they grow, they still need things like laundry and cooking done for them for many years; money has to be spent for their clothes, toys, school needs. Driving them places seems never-ending. But I'm afraid, as fallen humans, that society won't stop in the pursuit of selfishness until it ends up like the Japanese. A healthy society is one that values marriage and family. Maybe that's because God designed it that way?

Even More on Marriage

Someone else has taken on the important task of encouraging young women to put off that boring growing up stuff, and spend some more time in the kiddie pool. Her name is Ms. Vanessa Elizabeth, and she writes for the Huffington Post. Rather than give her screed more hits, I point you to a rebuttal of her rather juvenile prattling, this time written by Katrina Fernandez at patheos. I'm not sure how old Fernandez is, but as a matron of forty-five, I find Ms. Vanessa to be rather quaint, like a toddler. Also like a toddler, however, she has apparently never developed the ability to look past her own immediate wants.

Yes, Ms. Thang will get some laughs out of hanging out naked in front of a window and making strangers uncomfortable in a public place, just like a toddler might find it funny to fling poo. And making out with a stranger, or dating two people at once until it blows up in your face, that's all just fun and games. Until coming home from your job and watching a marathon session of Girls while eating an entire jar of Nutella just doesn't cut it anymore. The problem is, a large part of your age group, if they are smart, will have long ago moved on and grown up. They'll have learned important lessons about not only about a maintaining a lifelong marital relationship, but about friendship, and aging, and grief. If they've been blessed with children, they'll have learned even more about unconditional love and sacrifice. They'll all be in the summer of their lives, but some of them will have planted seeds that will provide fruit to last them into the fall and winter seasons of their lives. Vanessa and her ilk will just be struggling to get some plants started in rocky soil. Which path sounds wiser to you?

Homeschooling in Ohio

So Ohio SB 248 has come and gone. It was going to be a bill that would have brought in Children's Services to decide whether or not homeschooling would be "in the best interests of the child." Right from the start, Children's Services would have been involved with you, and your children, deciding whether you had the right to homeschool. A complete invasion of privacy, and a strong blow to homeschooling rights.

Unfortunately, the withdrawal of the bill still leaves me dissatisfied. In the statement to withdraw the bill by Ohio Senator Cafaro, she states, "the true intent of the bill to curtail child abuse has been eclipsed by the issue of homeschooling." What did she think was going to happen? Of course homeschooling parents were going to be up in arms by the idea of letting the State decide what was in the best interests of their own children. This bill was all about... regulating homeschooling! I'm not an idiot, and I'm not going to be put off by political double-speak. This is simply another case where the laws were not administered, so politicians want to write more laws. In this case, I believe this senator saw a nice opportunity to gain State control over homeschooling families. Too bad for her that many people are aware and appreciative of all of the educational opportunities available, even if they aren't availing themselves of a given choice at a certain time. Too bad also that people are getting fed up with overreach by the State, and are pushing back, at least from the State's point of view. I think that the next bill that Cafaro comes up with, "for the children," also deserves some close scrutiny.

Just Two Things

I was just reading some comments by some lovely people who think the government should be responsible for healthcare and education. Why does my mind go to: the government should provide healthcare, and education. Two things, healthcare, education and housing. The government should provide three things, healthcare, education, housing, and childcare. The government should provide four things....

Compare and Contrast

I'm currently trying to get through a book called Inside the Victorian Home: A Portrait of Life in Victorian England. I'm not sure why I'm not more interested in the book, except maybe because it is certainly very discouraging. Given the way that women were pushed aside, children were viewed as nuisances, and girl children were seen as household servants, in the author's examples, I'm surprised any ideas of anything resembling a modern, intact family survived until today. And this book features middle-class families, not the poor who were busy trying to survive, nor the rich who handed the children to nannies and embarked on affairs. Anyway, the book has made me think about my own role in my family, compared to the role of women then as this book puts forth.

In some ways, you see, my tasks as a stay-at-home mother are not very different from what the book describes as the expected tasks: nurturing the family, running the household, performing any chores one's family couldn't afford to pay another to perform, perhaps even teach the children. Of course, if you look at the stories related by those who grew up inside the Victorian homes described in the book, mothers did not always do the best job, judging by today's standards. Infants were viewed as vampires, feeding off of their mothers. Middle-class mothers preferred to be as ignorant as possible regarding the daily care of their children. Mothers, because of their own poor education, were hopeless at keeping the household books, and made poor teachers for their daughters, and their sons, before the boys left for school. Yikes!

One of the points made in the book, however, was how little time mothers had for themselves, once they finished all the duties they were expected to perform, well done or not. But really, how much free time do mothers have today, whether they stay at home or work outside the home? Precious little, from what most moms say. Even women who don't have children often lament, on places like Ravelry, that they do not have time enough to pursue their outside interests, such as knitting. I often feel like I don't have time myself to do the things that I want, not that I have to do. Of course, Mr. BTEG feels the same way, and I'm sure Victorian husbands often felt they did not enough free time either. I just find that bit interesting. There may be much to pity Victorian women for, but there are things that we hold in common.

She Believes That Children Aren't the Future

NakedDC gives yet another example of women who proclaim how wonderful it is not to have children. And in this day and age, you certainly do have control over whether or not you are punished with a child. Just don't turn around and expect my daughters to pay for your Medicare and Social Security. After all, with all that extra money you saved by not burdening yourself with offspring, you had plenty to put away for your future, right?

What's in a Name

More Hollyweird stuff! This time it's a Rebecca Romijn, who says eventually she's going to change her last name to her husband's, because she predicts that eventually, her daughters will wonder why they don't all have the same last name (they're four.) Which led to several people in the comments insisting that you don't have to have the same name to be a family, darn it! Yes, it definitely feels good to be all inclusive and open and accepting of everything. But considering that many of these same people are probably also fine with the break-up of the family via divorce, or the aborting of a family member, should we believe them? Or are too many people just parroting the standard phrases of the day because they've been told that's how the "right" people think? After all, is the family stronger overall right now, or weaker? How often have you heard "straights" have already messed up marriage so much, that gay marriage won't damage the institution any more?

I happen to think that the name *does* make a difference. We are the Evil Genius family, and in being so, we are part of something greater than ourselves. By birth, I am linked by blood to all of my female forebears. But I am also tied to all the women who produced the men in my husband's lineage, by name. I am one of a long line of Evil Genius women, and sometimes I am sorry there will be no more Evil Genius women directly after me. But my daughters will take their identities of what the Evil Genius family shares, the things that make us the Evil Genius *family*, and carry that to their new families. They will still be part of their father and I by blood, but part of their new family, the family they create, by name.

The Marriage Mart

At one of my daughter's dance classes, I was appalled to hear one mother say that she was counseling her daughter to not get married until she was thirty. Instead the daughter should be focusing on her own life and on establishing her career. I was even more shocked and unhappy when one of my daughter's dance teachers agreed. As a matter of fact, I became furious, and had a hard time keeping my temper. I wasn't even sure why at the time I was so angry, except that the institution of the family is very important to me, and I hate to see it treated so casually. I think it especially ridiculous for a Christian (like my daughter's dance teacher) to be advocating such ideas. I've spent a while turning it over in my mind, and I've come up with some specific thoughts.

When I typed the second sentence, one of the reasons I've felt uncomfortable about this really stood out: it is all about the self. Focus on YOU and YOUR career. Get yourself comfortably set up, and then you can be ready to let someone else into your life. The problem is, and this is assuming you were brought up in a close family, for about nine years of your life, your focus will have been on you. This is not about people who are single because they haven't found the right one to marry, by the way. This is about those who are doing it for essentially selfish reasons, to get the most out of life for themselves before they even think about sharing that life with another human in the most intimate way possible. But after having lived for yourself for years on end, tasting the best life has to offer for someone with no commitment other than a career, and no one to spend your money other than your own whims, why settle down then?

In today's society, indeed, why settle down at all? There is no stigma attached to living together, not even in having children out of wedlock. And even if you don't find someone you want to shack up with, you can still be having plenty of sex. It seems to be a very tempting prospect; you can have a romantic relationship and sexual release on your own terms, and if it doesn't suit one or both of you, you can walk. But again, once you've lived that life for long enough, why change, and how well will you be able to commit to one person for the rest of your life after treating your relationships as temporary?

Of course, you can live with someone and call it committed without getting married. But that detracts from the whole point of what the mothers who want their daughters to put off getting married seem to want to avoid, and that is the pain of breaking up a relationship, and the annoyance of being stuck with an unpleasant ex if you have to deal with one because of shared children. Somehow if you wait until you are thirty, and have a successful career, you and your prospective spouse will be able to take on a committed relationship with extra assurance that it will work out. I will probably take on that idea soon. In the meantime, what do you feel think about putting off marriage?

Do You Want It All?

What does it mean for a society when children are seen not as gifts, but as a burden, something to avoid? We hear from a DINK, that "Not Having Children Is Letting Us Have It All." If by "all" they mean the material goods of this world, then yes, they have a lot of stuff. Of course, I don't think they'll always be happy with the amount of stuff that they have. There is always a bigger house, a fancier car, new furniture, a pool, a boat, a bigger boat, and then of course there is the curse of more, more places to visit, more clothes to buy, more purses and jewelry and shoes. This woman is very foolish if she thinks that she has it "all." First, because as I just stated, no one can have it all. Secondly, because she really doesn't have it all.

Maybe she and her husband will never appreciate it, but there is nothing like holding your newborn baby, a gift that God enabled you and your spouse to create with love. There is nothing like the special love that a toddler has for her mommy. There is nothing like that brief span of life where Daddy can fix anything. There is nothing like watching your child take her first steps, hug a sibling, learn to read, learn to play an instrument, go en pointe. There is nothing like the joy in the eyes of Mr. BTEG's late grandmother, as she held her newest great-grandchild, the last one she would live to see. That joy is even reflected in the Dancer's eyes.

If you look at the map towards the bottom right of my page, you can see that I have traveled. There are even places I've been that aren't on there, because I haven't figured out how to update the map. I've rafted the New River in West Virginia, been to the French Quarter in New Orleans, hung out on the beach in Costa del Sol, touched the Berlin Wall. I've had *experiences*. But experiences don't last. Since most of the traveling I listed above was done before I was 21, they are becoming dim memories of experiences, at that. I have plenty of photos, but even looking at the same photo can get boring over decades. Sure, I could do more traveling, and I probably will, but again, those are brief moments in the big picture of life. And even traveling can get old after weeks of living out of a suitcase.

For some reason, memories of the people I love never get old in the same way. Not just with my children, but also people like my grandfather or my dear friends. If you are blessed enough to be happily married, do you still like to think fondly of your wedding day? Do you remember sharing an activity with a grandparent, or the road trip you took with your friends in college? We are meant to want to be with people, to have people in our lives that we care about, and who care about us. Not all of us will be blessed with children, and the author above says she is happy she doesn't have any. That may never change; she might be eighty and be glad that she didn't have children. But I think that when I am eighty, I'll have a lot more to show for my life than old W-2s, purchase receipts and travel albums.

Oh No, You Didn't

Some Communist idiot on MSNBC has the temerity to say this:

“We’ve always had this private notion of children… We haven’t had a very collective notion that these are our children. So part of it is we have to break through our kind of private idea that kids belong to their parents or kids belong to their families, and recognize that kids belong to their communities.”

You can have your child brought up however you want. Keep your grubby mitts off of mine. Our daughters will continue to be brought up with their parents, in their family. Mr. BTEG and I will take them to church, send them to Higher Things, educate them how we wish, have veto power over what they wear and where they go, make sure they are eating properly, give them chores and expect them to be done, give them guidance and support as they move towards adulthood. Leftists aren't big on religious freedom, but Mr. BTEG and I have been blessed by God with children, and it is our vocation to train them up. It worries me a little that someone can say something so obviously totalitarian on national television with so little backlash, albeit on a channel that is very leftist to begin with. Although my daughters are older, I would prefer not to have to fight for the right for them to rear my grandchildren. May God protect us and have mercy on us.

Consequences

If you give the government almost unlimited control because you agree with them, you may find out that they are using that control to do things in private that you may not agree with. Like give birth control pills, IUDs, NuvaRings and the Plan B pill to minors without parental consent. I was able to find one doctor after a quick search who disagrees with the plan to distribute birth control to students without parental consent, even though it is the Evil Fox News. The doctor has a point, however. Birth control can have serious side effects, which necessitate a thorough medical evaluation, and simple birth control does not prevent STDs. How is it right to give a minor medication, without any medical supervision, which could possibly cause blood clots, high cholesterol or high blood pressure? The NuvaRing has indeed caused blood clots which might potentially be fatal. Actually, I take this news pretty personally, because over seven years ago, my husband and I lost a friend due to a blood clot that entered his lungs. We didn't know at the time that I wrote that post what had killed him; we discovered at the funeral that time spent in bed with kidney issues caused a blood clot to move. So yes, blood clots can be fatal. No matter how hard we try, intercourse is not consequence free, no matter how much people wish it was, and risking lives to try to sweep the consequences under the rug is criminal. Risking minors' lives without the consent of their parents is even worse.

Oh, and a great couple of lines from the original article. Referring to Mona Davids, parent of the NYC Parents Union: "Davids, who is black, noted that most school-based health centers are in poor neighborhoods. 'This was population control on blacks and Latinos without our knowledge,' she said." Somewhere, Margaret Sanger is saying, "Duh."

The Least of These

The more I think about the whole abortion issue, the more I disagree that it is ever a good idea. Christians have tried to be all compassionate and understanding about women who have had an abortion for at least the devasting reason of rape and incest. What has happened with this compassion and understanding, however, is a culture that considers a human life something that can be thrown away for any reason, at virtually any time before a viable infant arrives in the world. Even after a viable infant is born,if the mom panics and abandons the child by himself somewhere, we are supposed to feel more pity for the young adult forced to make such a horrible choice, than for the baby who may or may not pay for it with his life.

Women and girls who do face a surprise or unwanted pregnancy do need help and support. What a lot of right-to-death proponents gloss over is the fact that many pro-life people are providing help and support right now. Sadly, not everyone can get the help they need. However, not everyone finds, say, the mental health help they need either. Suicide is the final result far too often. Even having money and connections does not always make struggles easy. How many Hollywood stars have self-destruced, often due to awful things that happpened to them as they rose through the ranks to stardom? With the money for the best counseling and mental health retreats, some people still can't completely rid themselves of their demons. And again, the result is death.

I used to have at least a sort of sympathy for those who claimed they were only in favor of abortion until the baby was viable outside of the womb. I wanted to meet them halfway, hoping that they would develop into people who were pro-life for even the youngest and most vulnerable of those in the womb. Vulnerable. Even the infants that are born full-term are horribly vulnerable. How can we welcome some of these, and essentially tell others that they have no right to live, after being given life without their consent or their will? Look at the picture here of a developing human only seven weeks after conception. He looks a little odd, but he is undeniably human. Not a clump of cells. Not a bunch of tissue. Human. And one's belief in a God or gods or no deity at all does not change this. If you are not afraid of being punished by a deity for killing the life of a unique individual whose body is daily growing and taking shape, does that mean that life does not matter if you find it an inconvenience? The story below is where we end up, and it does not and will not end there. What kind of a society do we want to be? That is our true choice.

Step It Up

It's not just politics being inserted everywhere that is annoying me. Unfortunately, many of the places I've come across people inappropriately inserting politics are places run by, or mostly populated by, kids or young adults. I'm not going to be a total curmudgeon and say that these children should be seen and not heard. But if they want to be taken seriously, they need to up their game. One Tumblr blog owner has started another blog dedicated to what a "rich jerk" Romney is. I'm sure Romney is trembling with fear that the blogger is going to call him a "big fat poopie-head" next. Seriously, how is Romney any less rich, in the big picture, than the grandson of a bank executive, who had a nanny as a child and went to a private school in Hawaii. Who had pretty fancy digs in Chicago, from what I've been told. Whose wife thinks $200 will only get you "a pair of earrings." Who is currently sending his own daughters to an upscale private school. And who behaves very much like a jerk to people who disagree with him. Just look at this great fisking of the little gem that the president gave us yesterday. We can't have an honest discussion of the facts. No, Republicans want to pollute the water, crash planes, kill firefighters and push Grandma off the cliff.

When the incumbent president has once again disabled credit card verification on credit card donations, maybe it's a good thing the guy the Republicans are running is rich. He can use some of his own money to back himself when he doesn't get a contribution from "Adolf Hitler."

Mad at Ohio

At my daughter's dance lesson tonight, I was talking to a father who happens to be a teacher in our school district. He informed me and the other mom there that the state of Ohio is shifting to mandatory full-day kindergarten AND mandatory *preschool.* I'm angry and appalled! Yes, I sent my daughters to preschool, and they enjoyed it, but it was only mornings, not every school day, and I certainly wouldn't want it to be forced on every child. I also don't see five-year-olds as necessarily being ready for all-day school, either. They're still so young! Of course, too many children that age are in all-day daycare anyway, and I have to wonder if parents who do have children in daycare were a driving force behind this. It also makes me mad that I am subsidizing their daycare, basically. They are probably using some sort of excuse about helping the children academically, but seriously. When my daughters were kindergarten age, they were still solidifying letters and numbers. I don't see going to a whole day making a difference in that. Not to mention that there is evidence that even Head Start ends up not giving kids an advantage in the long run. Where is the evidence that all-day preschool will work?

Another issue is the cost. Our school district is blessed to be in a financially good place at the moment, but adding all those extra kids, and the extra hours, will put a strain on the district's budget. How will districts that already struggle financially deal with it? Especially in this economy? It will mean more levies, and of course the schools know how to manipulate parents, by cutting "non-essential" classes like art, extracurricular activities and busing. Of course, so many parents work today that they are apparently happy to pay the extra taxes to ease the burden of having to drive them to school, and pick them up right after school.

I'm so disappointed in Ohio. I'm definitely contacting my legislators, although it's a bit late at this point. I wish I had a place to get good Ohio news besides the local rag. Homeschooling did not work out in the long run for us, but I think I would probably homeschool during the preschool and kindergarten years if I had children of that age. It's a sad development.

Children and Church

I saw a sign yesterday at a local megachurch that happens to run a daycare. The sign was advertising a reduced rate at the daycare for employees of the hospital directly across the street. I disliked it. Let me tell you first a bit about my feelings about churches and daycare. It is true that the Christian church has a long record of providing all sorts of aid. I'm not an expert on medieval history, but a lot of this help seemed to come from monasteries, from priests and nuns who made it their vocation to live to serve others for the glory of God. Nowadays, everything seems to be a "ministry." In my view, doing things for people in the hope that some of God will rub off on them in some way. This includes daycare at some churches.

If a church-going person feels called to help out a fellow church member, neighbor or family member with childcare, that's one thing. However, I'm not sure a church should be directly running a daycare, anymore than they should be directly running a soup kitchen, a hospital or a homeless shelter. The church is the Church. It is there to give Word and Sacrament. Individual Christians are supposed to help others in need. I also dislike seeing a church daycare being run as a straight-up business, instead of just helping those who need help. This includes running a discount program as an incentive to sign your kid up there. I'm sure some of the people who work at the hospital do so because they can't afford not to work. As always, there are of course other people who work for the extra clothes, fancy house, vacations, etc. The Church should support the family, and that means encouraging a parent be at home when possible.

I'm not sure how I feel about church schools. It is my understanding that church schools started in the Catholic church because of anti-Catholicism. Lutheran schools were started in the age before homeschooling vs. public school, and I believe were started to give Lutheran students some catechesis as well as the education they would have received at a public school. I don't see anything wrong with that, since the children are presumably mostly children of church members and the church is proclaiming God's Word to them. Obviously however, a school is not a requirement, nor something that should take resources from the church that are needed elsewhere.

Botox Never Dies

I had to report on this story from The Blaze, since I talked about this ridiculous plan for young people's health care in a previous post. What kind of parents tell their children to take their time following their dreams? If a dream is worth doing, it is worth doing as soon as possible, not just dreaming about it. For that matter, what it is a young adult supposed to be doing if they do have to work for a while towards their dreams, that they still need their parents to provide health care? And if a young adult can't provide his own health care, does that mean Mom and Dad also have to provide food, housing and clothing? I'm sorry; I'm going to raise my children to be better than that, thankyouverymuch.

On a side note, as one of Beck's commenters said, if Ms. Botox doesn't like pledges, does that mean she doesn't pledge to protect and uphold the Constitution? Does her word mean anything?

Who Is In Charge

I read a bulletin board which is mostly dedicated to discussing the many formerly great palaces of Russia, as well as the Russian imperial family, but also discusses other former and current royal families. I have mentioned before that I am interested in Victorian and Edwardian history and dress, and that I like to read about and look at pictures of the royal families of that time period. However, I do occasionally read about modern royal families too, and so I came upon this quote: "Am not impressed by either William or Harry (British heir to the throne and his younger brother-BTEG) but (as the mother of a 26 year old son myself) I know just what a terrible culture of cheap and freely available alcohol can do. Here in the Uk (I don't know about the US where I thought the law was far more stringent), the Government just will not address what is an extremely serious issue."

First of all, I think this speaks to how modern culture is putting off growing up for longer and longer periods. This woman's son is 26, yet his mother seems to still be worried about his alcoholic escapades, just as the two princes and other members of the upper class in Britain are often photographed in the wee hours of the morning leaving bars or pubs or whatever, in various stages of inebriation. While I see nothing wrong with drinking alcohol in moderation, repeated drunken binges speak to a desire to keep acting irresponsibly, instead of in a more adult manner.

Her concerns about circumstances in Great Britain contributing to this culture are reflected here by the chief constable of the Cheshire police, who says: "Alcohol is too cheap and too readily available and is too strong. Young people cannot handle it." I'd like to know why young people in particular cannot handle alcohol, at least in moderation. Young adults are perfectly capable of the maturity required to do this; whether they are encouraged to be mature is another issue.

Although written in 2005, this writer also points at the culture as a reason for outrageous behavior fueled by alcohol. "The relentless expansion of the student scene has resulted in a section of young society that has disposable income gained from disposable jobs, and little to do with their time. The rise of singleton society and the falling birth rate have contributed to the erosion of domestic life - your thirtysomethings getting drunk all night with their colleagues don't have homes to go to, so they stay in the pub." While they may not have siblings, shouldn't people in their thirties have spouses and children to go home to? Again we see a lack of desire to grow up and take on the responsibilities of marriage and children. Prince William is a great example of this. In his late twenties, having dated one woman (on and off) for what I believe to be about five years, why on earth shouldn't he be ready to marry? If this woman is not who he wants to spend the rest of his life with, surely he ought to have figured that out by now. Either he doesn't want the responsibilities of marriage, or he does not want to marry this woman and is just hanging on for the monogamous sex which is less likely to lead to disease or his face splashed across the tabloids like Hugh Grant.

My last question is, why can't the culture be countered? Is it too easy for me, a person who has a faith and a large support group of fellow believers to fall back on, to avoid cultural traps? While Christians certainly do sin and have temptations like everyone else, one of the fruits of the Spirit *is* self-control. We have a built-in counter-culture, as opposed to the mother in the first quote, who seems to see her son as a helpless culture victim, from which only the Government can save him. Especially as parents, let us train our children and model our lives based on what we know is right, not on what the world tells us is cool. Let's promote personal responsibility.

My Name *Is* Barb

but I am not that Barb! Let me 'splain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up. There is a well-known Lutheran named Barb who resides here in Greater Cleveland with her husband, a well-known Lutheran pastor. As a matter of fact, he is a pastor at the church my family attends! Anyway, a few people who have visited here have mistakenly thought I was Presbytera, as she goes by when she comments on blogs. So to clear up any misunderstandings, here is a picture of me, Barb the Evil Genius, with my alter ego, Presbytera Barb.



This pic was taken last night, when we gathered at the home of our pastor and his lovely wife for a "homeschooler's picnic" in honor of a homeschooling family from out of town, who is in Cleveland for a wedding. I didn't get as many pictures of this event as I wanted, but I did get a couple.



How many Lutherans does it take to start a grill?





The adorable little Lutheran kidlets at play in the sandbox.