And God Said, "Abracadabra!"

In celebration of AmenAbility's 100th post, behold! A fun (illustrated) fact:

The phrase "abracadabra" is derived from the Aramaic abra (אברה) and cadabra (כדברא), meaning, "I would create as I spoke."



In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth,
the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep,
while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.
Then God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light.

Genesis 1:1-3 NRSV

Father, Son, and Friendly Ghost

For Chris.

The Spider Prey Paradigm Shift

As a kid, I was immensely allergic to mosquito bites. The Hives of Wrath reached the point that my mother was once wrongly suspected of abusing me.



Suffice it to say that I grew up loathing them. For a kid in a family of campers, mosquitoes were the Enemy. This massive monstrosity in Manitoba no doubt would have sent me into hysterics:



In my mind, a flyswatter was actually a mosquito-squisher. It was justification to me that the world hated them as much as I did. Or more - because, despite how much I despised them, I was rarely able to kill them myself.

During my teenaged years, when my skeeter-hunting skills (e.g. height, eyesight, and reflexes) should have been at their peak, I once enlisted my grandmother to take down a mosquito in the bathroom because I couldn't bring myself to bare my flesh in the shower knowing that that sucker was out there.

Even then the irony of that scene did not escape me.



Just the same, it was her attack model that I attempted to replicate years later. One fateful day, I was alone in my apartment and a sizeable mosquito happened along, hovering near the ceiling.

I knew it was only a matter of time. It was either me or that mosquito - and I wasn't keen on letting it be me.

I put on my big girl panties and wielded a rolled-up magazine, dreading what I would have to do as soon as it flew within reach. I tried in vain to talk myself into a murderous rage. That blood-sucking beast was going down. I had to believe it. I took a breath and raised my weapon.

Suddenly, a stealthy spider that must have been waiting in its super-secret Spider Cave in the corner of the ceiling launched outward and snatched the mosquito mid-air.

One wrestling mass, together they plummeted down to the ledge below, where I had an art print and some handouts I'd recently received.



I don't usually keep crucifixes or images of Christ on the cross - I think this may be the only one I've ever had, certainly the only one I've ever placed somewhere readily visible. And now it was serving as the backdrop to the scene unfolding before me.



Once it ascended to the center of Jesus' body, the spider turned the mosquito corpse over and over to embalm it and secure it there.



Of course I could appreciate the natural, biological drive for a spider to kill a mosquito, and I don't hold it responsible for any malicious act.

But you've got to admit that this spider looks vaguely villainous:



And it could have carried off its kill anywhere. Really, it could have. But instead, it had an acute sense of biblical irony.



I learned at an early age that "spiders are the farmer's friend" and that we were to permit them to live in our home, or else release them to the wild. I was a really big fan of spiders when I made the connection that they killed mosquitoes (see above illustration of childhood), and by college I was nominated resident Spider Liberator.

But this experience was by no means a matter of sympathizing with the poor little once-living creature that served as another living creature's food and sustenance. That lesson is a story for another day.

Rather, I was filled with a bizarre and personally unprecedented reverence for the mosquito as an innocent.

Yes, I understood that its death served a delicious purpose for the spider that was brazen enough to catch it mid-air. (P.S., I'd never seen one do that before, but I guess it beats the presumably painstaking process of web-weaving.) But witnessing this entire interaction - and remembering what I had set out to do - rendered me stunned.

Perhaps not for the first time, but the first with such impact, I realized the power I held as a human; realized my inability to comprehend the consequences of the actions I was physically capable of doing. I remembered that the people who actively killed Jesus were people nonetheless; that the people who actively do any harm are people nonethless. I envisioned countless victims of violence in cases in which the offenders had somehow justified their actions: genocide, hate crimes, revenge, retributive human justice.

This experience did not mysteriously transform me into a perfectly harmless being incapable of inflicting pain or making errors in judgment. But something happened that day that forever altered my perspective on the human impulse to judge, to speculate, to assign value, to take fate into one's own hands.

And I just can't erase the image from my mind - a creature whose species has only caused me discomfort and taken my very blood from my veins, hanging lifelessly on a cross alongside the savior of my soul.

'N Syncretism: The Boy Band of Religion

I'm increasingly interested in interfaith work, improving relations between groups of differing beliefs and traditions, and encouraging peace and collaborative efforts. (The environmental justice movement is a prime example of people seeking and discovering "common ground." Check out GreenFaith, Interfaith Partners for the Environment, based in New Jersey.)

But from discussion of interfaith collaboration often sprouts mention of syncretism.

Religious syncretism is the blending of different beliefs and practices into one new Assimilation Beast. The Melting Pot Model, if you will, rather than the Salad Bowl Model, which is my ideal edible analogy for religious peace - as well as for America, the context in which this imagery is more commonly used.



Syncretism has occurred countless times throughout history between all different traditions. It can be an element of exploration or inclusion of new ideas. It can be a result of cultural conquest - not necessarily even a reflection of strength in numbers and "majority rules," but of otherwise dominant, more "persuasive" culture.

Sometimes peace-seekers commend blending, perhaps the way that Boyzone wants the world to "turn out coffee-colored people by the score." Some appreciate the diversity and long for less nominal, homogeneous unity.

Sometimes people are "accused" of syncretism as an offense. In Shalom, Salaam, Peace, a great interfaith book for dialogue between the Abrahamic religions, Allison Stokes speaks of a minister who was thus accused and nearly lost his position in the church.

Judgment of that particular case is beyond the scope of my own ability and authority.

But here is what I think about syncretism:

It's the boy band of religion.

It seems like a good idea (at least to somebody), so they mastermind a group. Someone coaches them until they not only sound eerily harmonious but nearly indistinguishable from one another. Most of their music is in a major key and their lyrics never develop far beyond trite declarations of love. Cue cultic following and media attention.

Then the member bios come out, and you wonder who drew the short stick to get stuck with a favorite color that none of them actually like. Unable to morph into one cohesive entity, they have no choice but to exploit the individuality of the members. They follow unwritten laws like the Power Ranger Principle - that if they're a team whose members just happen to be differently empowered, brightly colored beasts, they will drum up a lot of interest. The Army Wives series and the Barbie company are similarly adept at this strategy.


(I had this realization thanks to an image on Tickets For Two.)


(Meanwhile - Mattel, can we talk?)

Anyway, after they've used their combined powers to defeat Lord Zedd, they suffer a schism. They annul their collaborative union and go their separate ways, and somebody works through rehab and somebody comes out of the closet and somebody goes on to make a solo album and somebody marries a fan-girl and even though no one remembers the last one's name they seem to recall that his favorite color was yellow and he liked liturgical dance.

In light of all that, or in spite of it, I have a theory.

I believe that every human alive or having lived has something to teach someone else - something significant, and often intensely personal for either teacher or taught. Or both.

I believe that interfaith and intercultural peace rest not in syncretism, but rather in learning itself. Learning just one thing from every other person one encounters. Learning one fact, one practice, one habit, one truth, one hope, one idea, one question that either transforms or informs one's perspective, if even just to fortify a view already held. Not necessarily taking up what is learned. Just learning it; respecting the person who taught it.

We need not all practice alike, believe alike, live alike. Some amount of influence and assimilation may happen, but it need not be forced.

In the film Chocolat, Père Henri preaches: "I think we can't go around measuring our goodness by what we don't do - by what we deny ourselves, what we resist and who we exclude. I think we've got to measure goodness by what we embrace, what we create and who we include."

But I don't think that entails syncretism: I think that would mean denying authenticity, denying ourselves the ability to believe in a way that Père Henri's message does not encourage. I think it is not about creating a single world religion that denies, resists, and excludes different expressions of spirituality. Rather, it is embracing, creating, and including others however we can, knowing that we may not understand them or agree with them perfectly well, and still accepting that as a foundation on which to build peace.

This is my personal interfaith creed: I believe I will learn something transformative or informative from every person with whom I share a conversation, and from many more with whom I may never speak.

Perhaps someone someday will prove it wrong.

But if that becomes the case, then I imagine that I will have much more to mull over than the basic idea that I had been wrong about this philosophy.

Sex Selection: No More Disappointments

Earlier in the semester in our Religion and the Social Process class, we discussed sexism, in the midst of which I came across this controversial article from The Guardian (UK), April 2010.

Although the procedure is limited to only certain countries, including the U.S., parents have the (expensive) ability to choose the sex of a future child. Interestingly, there is no remarkable sexist split, that one is preferred more frequently to another, as may be expected for any fathomable reason (for instance, because boys traditionally carry on a family name). Boys and girls are 'requested' at similar rates.



Reasons people choose such a procedure are varied: from preventing passing on an illness in the couple's genetics that is sex-specific, to already having had one or more children of one sex and wanting one of a different sex - guaranteed on the next try.




One mother with sons was "tired" of walking down a street and seeing pink dresses in windows and knowing that she didn't have a daughter to wear them. Would her maternal urges have been satiated were her sons to decide that they preferred to wear pink dresses as opposed to the presumably non-pink, non-dressy clothing that they had been given as growing boys?

If the twin girls she had due to this procedure eventually grew "tired" of tea parties and dress-up - perhaps beginnning to imitate their brothers or do other activities not widely considered "feminine," would Mom feel like it had been a wasted effort? Would she be simply content that she got to buy a few pink dresses while the girls were toddlers?

Would she learn to love her daughters as the individual beings they are, regardless of what they wear?

Regardless of the fact that they are female?




I realize it is perhaps unjust for me to raise even hypothetical questions in this accusatory light, and I intend these families no harm. But it hurts me as a daughter to think that my parents might love me because they already had a son, or because I allowed them to have one of each. It hurts to think not only that, if my parents had preferred one sex or the other, I could have disappointed them in my very birth, but also that we live in a world in which people aim to evade disappointment rather than overcome it. It hurts to imagine this as the foundation of any child's life.

Because I was born both a girl and seven years after my brother, neither of which I could control, my parents placed us in the two bedrooms of our old apartment while they slept on a pull-out couch. When I think of that time, I think most about the sacrifices that our parents made just for the sake of our privacy, a right that everyone does not even have, let alone as children. I'm sure it crossed their minds at some point that it would have been convenient in at least that circumstance to have had two children of the same sex and perhaps closer in age, but I also like to think that it did not make them regret having the son and daughter that they had.

I'm sure one of the aforementioned article's points of greatest impact is the stunning advances we're seeing in medicine, and not only the impact on personal health but the effect on autonomy.

But autonomy means you have a choice, and I think there's a far greater one implied than determining the sex of one's child. From my perspective, these are the questions that we face in light of sex-selection:

What are we communicating to children (and to others) about the relationship between parent and child?

What notion of the relationship between parent and child have we come to believe?

Are children accessories? Can we tailor them to our liking? Can we coordinate them with our lifestyles, our decor, our pets?




Are children singularly a parent's life decision?



Or do we acknowledge the impact that every child, every person has on countless people every day?

Do we acknowledge that each one of us is a part of a greater community, and not only an isolated being in a family?

Are children to be constructed to our liking, or do they serve some other purpose beyond satisfying parental instincts?

Of course, I understand the complexity of this entire issue extends far beyond all of this, so let me be clear:

I am not speaking to the classist privilege inherent to sex-selection.

I am not speaking to the selection made to spare a child a potential ailment.

I am not speaking to the debate as to whether this is all an example of humans "playing God."

I am not speaking to the extent that God might be involved in these parental longings and scientific procedures, or whether or not it is indeed God's will that Mr. and Mrs. Jonesing go out of their way to ensure the biological sex of their baby.

Each of these topics could fill a post in its own right.

Yet I find the fact that this article could declare as its subheading (facetiously or not) "No more disappointments" to be a far more potent and detrimental point. This is the stuff of our conscience and our consciousness, folks. This is not just ("just"?) a debate about elite privilege or universal free will. This is immensely internal.

Supporting sex selection (or any fetal-specifier, for that matter) as a means of parental satisfaction has serious implications for distorting the expression and experience of parental love.

It reshapes the image of humanity that we pass along to the generations for whom such science - and more - will be a reality for the entirety of their lives.

Instead of embracing the individuals entering the world, it tells them, "We constructed you. Don't disappoint us."

How to Fail in an Emergency

This is one of the most embarrassing and humbling of my life experiences that I also believe to be worth sharing. Embarrassing because of my thoughts and actions at the time. Worth sharing, I hope, in spite of them.

One day, while I was working as a porter for a cleaning company in New York City and canvasing the sidewalk for trash, a drunkard called out to me.

"Hey, wanna go out with me?"

He was sprawled out on the steps leading up to 2 Penn Plaza. Positioned between Madison Square Garden, the taxi stop, and the entrance to Penn Station, he was in just about everyone's path. Six empty beer bottles accompanied him in disarray.



His lips bulged around crooked teeth. His short hair was tousled; his clothing smeared with the grime of the City That Never Sleeps. Travelers, entertainment seekers, and business employees bustled around us.

When I realized he'd addressed me, I mumbled, "Uh. No, thanks," and went back to sweeping up cigarette butts and ticket stubs.

"C'mon, go to dinner with me. Just once or twice."

I imagined my acquaintance picking out something tasty from a dumpster around the corner. I imagined him falling over himself here on the steps. But I didn't imagine what he did next.

He raised his arm and sort of chuckled. "My hand is bleeding."

"Oh, my gosh!" I cried, surely seeming hysterical compared to his far-too-casual demeanor. His hand was absolutely covered in blood, a painful sight no matter what the size of the actual wound. "Are you okay? How did that happen?" I was genuinely startled and sympathetic. But I closed none of the distance between us.

"I got beat up."

I must have subconsciously decided that what he needed first and foremost was to get cleaned up. I looked around at the nearby buildings, trying to remember the way to the nearest public restroom. I imagined myself sneaking him into our employee bathroom in the industrial depths of Penn Plaza. Then I imagined my supervisor's response to that bright idea, and the proverbial light bulb flickered and died.

I chased after a co-worker just a bit down the block. As the two of us tried, as usual, to work through our slight language barrier, I told him about the bleeding man on the steps and asked what we should do. He said something dismissive, perhaps frustrated with either the problem I'd posed to him or trying to communicate with such a frantic and monolingual mess.

By the time I spotted another co-worker, the premises' security staff were walking across the plaza toward the man, who by this point had slumped over a bit more onto the sidewalk. I was utterly relieved that someone had alerted security, and even more so when the police and an ambulance arrived, but also utterly ashamed - ashamed that I hadn't thought to call an official of any kind. Ashamed that I saw a bleeding man and my instinct said, "Clean him," rather than, "Heal him." Ashamed that I saw him as dirty before I'd even seen the wound.

After that event, I promised myself that I'd do whatever the conscious part of me could to react better in any sort of medical predicament. I've tried to remember that it's only in these experiences that we can learn how to respond to them.

And I've been listening for that voice of utmost wisdom beyond my humble understanding - the one that knows what it is to smear mud and spit on a blind man's eyes to restore his vision (John 9:6-34). The one that commends "clean," sure, but most actively seeks to "heal." The one that would have embraced the opportunity to share a meal with the man on the steps.

Subtle Message, Profound Love

Lately my father and I are learning how to communicate again, particularly connecting through new interests and a new appreciation of each other's experiences.

He's taken up photography, and now occasionally when we're in the car I find myself reminding him to "stop getting distracted by pretty sunsets!"



But inside, I'm excited to see him so excited about the sweeping colors and fading rays, to see him so aware of it all. The last time we were driving into a gorgeous sunset, the kind fit for heroes, and he whooped and hollered at how fantastic it was.

And then he sort of glanced at me, silent and slightly foreboding, as though to ask why in the heck I, as the only free-handed passenger, hadn't taken out a camera yet. So I did my best to capture what I could. On the highway. At 60 miles per hour. For Dad.

Then there's a strange shift that's been taking place, where I've begun talking to each of my parents - married over 31 years now, God bless 'em - about relationships. I've always had a good rapport with my mother, and ending a conversation between us always proves far greater a challenge than beginning one. But this is the first time I can really say I've been bonding with my father over something more serious than photography, crêpes, and Sleepless in Seattle (all fine in their own right, of course), and I'm really enjoying it.

My respect for my dad and his marriage knows no bounds. And although he doesn't always say it directly, I think he in turn has come to appreciate my boyfriend and our long-term, long-distance relationship.

Thus begins my tale.


Several years ago, before my boyfriend and I were dating, we went trick-or-treating. He was a frightening ghoulish figure who blamed his new appearance on the local water. I was a Serta sheep, i.e. an obsolete counting sheep looking for work. I brought a canister to collect for Unicef, but because I was sporting an "Out of Work" sign, people mistook me for a hobo and my collection had mixed results.

Just the same, the Great Halloween Endeavor of the Benefactor Sheep (long-time friend of Santa and the Easter Beagle) not only raised a little money for a cause, but also left me with a jar and slotted lid.

So I have a sheep bank now.

I've had piggy banks before - namely a plastic one I painted and glittered at a friend's party in elementary school, and a giant Crayola crayon bank. And probably others that I remember less vividly because, let's face it, little competes with a glittered pig and a two-foot crayon.

But I like the sound of a sheep bank, and I've begun saving change in mine.



And I've decided that it's only fitting that it go toward transportation to visit with my boyfriend. Besides being busy with school and work, we're both pennysavers and have gone anywhere between 3 months and one year between visits since the move. But instead of dwelling on the idea that we are putting off a trip, I'd rather have a visual representation of progress toward one. So I've labeled it Florida or Bust.

All that said, I wasn't keeping dollar bills in the jar, figuring I would simply collect change for now and could make up the difference when the time came. But recently, when I dropped a coin in, I did a classic doubletake. Where was that familiar chink of metallic collision? I opened the lid... and laughed.

My father had stopped in that week. There had been all of about a minute that I left him alone in the room, and little did I know that, while he was loudly reading off the titles on my shelf, he was stealthily slipping a few wrinkled dollar bills into my sheep bank.

Sometimes people show their love and support for us in the simplest ways.

One of my favorite quotes is (debatably) attributed to St. Francis of Assisi: "Preach the Gospel always. When necessary, use words." My father is no preacher, but I think in his own way he has already begun to put "Francis'" concept into practice.

Thank you, Dad.

Getting Twitchy With It

Na na-na na na-na na.

(If that didn't sound musical to you, go here.)

True story.

I do local housecleaning. Today, the man of the house was in, and I helped him put up some wood molding along the ceiling.

This required the use of a nail gun.



Which he did not ask me to handle.



Fortunately.

Anyway, the family is planning a Halloween party and the house is Decked. Out. In fact, there's a witch decoration dangling from the ceiling about five feet from where we were working. It's motion- and sound-sensitive. Do you see where this is going? The witch didn't take kindly to the noise of the nail gun, which sounded just enough like a gun-shot that the ensuing animatronic screaming and maniacal laughter made for a good show.

Do you know how many nails it takes to secure wood molding? Neither do I. But that's how many times this lollapalooza of horrific fun happened. If the neighbors could have heard it, I would have had my fill of mischief 'til at least Halloween.

Sadly Mr. Boss was not amused. (He probably was when it first happened. I just must have missed it, and by then the novelty had worn off. I'm sure of it.)

But I was über amused, and über unable to record the actual event. So I conjured up some sound clips and re-created the magic for you. (Blogger-willing that it works.)



When I created the sound file, my computer wanted me to fill out a few fields of information on it. So I did.

Artist: Twitch the Witch
Track Title: It's Less Violent Than It Sounds
Album Title: Gettin' Twitchy Wit' It

I reiterate. Na na-na na na-na na.

I hope you sang it with me that time.

Bar Nun

For Lauren.

Good Text, Bad Text

To prooftext is to quote or cite parts of a document (such as the Bible) out of context and present them as basis for a proposition, often one that the document taken as a whole would not support. Even suggestions that seem reasonable may be no less a fallacy than the mathematical proof-spoof in the image above.

Read. Think. Ask. Don't enable proof-texters!


Read more about proof-texting from Wendy ("Bookgirl") here. And check out her blog while you're at it!

Squeaky Clean

Thank you for the name ideas - I am considering them all and even combinations thereof. I've just never experienced such indecision in naming my inanimate objects before. Clearly this one is special to me.

Lately, though, I find it difficult to envision my new bicycle with any name that doesn't sound like a squeal, or that is otherwise onomatopoeic, because if there is one thing my bicycle knows how to do, it's MAKE NOISE.

Allow me to illustrate. This is what Madison was like before this week:



And then...







Yes, I suspect it joyrides all day without me while I'm in class.

I can still hear it in my mind. It's like any other earworm. Repetitive and tuneless and the vocals are terrible, but you mentally sing along anyway because it allows you to think that you have some semblance of control over your own thoughts.



I'm pretty sure I can use "squeak" as a synonym for "ride my bike" now, as in, "I squeaked over to the store and picked up some squash."

So this week I squeaked to downtown(-ish) Madison. This trip went extraordinarily fast for a few reasons:

* Biking Squeaking is more efficient than walking.

* A good portion of the journey was downhill.

* The brakes are rather selective about when they choose to function.

But I was a warrior with an otherwise reliable steed, so I got there safely, and I met with a family for whom I'll be doing house-cleaning and maaaaaybe some painting and mostly a whole lot of organizing and finding places for things. I love exercising my spatial skill muscles. Putting food in tupperware is one nibble short of an adrenaline rush. It's like edible Tetris and my prize is a pre-made home-cooked meal for tomorrow.

I think my favorite part of the interview experience was when I started to name my price and they raised it. Was I asking too little? Do I really think so poorly of myself? Am I still being underpaid and blissfully unaware? Are they just so grateful for CLEAN?

Or, contrary to my prior fears, I'm a really good negotiator who is so skilled that the negotiating happens like a knife cuts through butter. When it's warm. Without someone having to hold the knife... Or something. Clearly analogizing is a lesser strength.

...I probably shouldn't push it.

Nonetheless, when I rode home, I felt triumphant. I squeaked up the hills, utterly left in the dust of this lovely older gentleman who apparently had more gusto than I... or equally likely, he knew what the little gears on his bicycle do. And I decided to pretend that the squeaky.squeaky.squeaky. that announced my plight was not just a characteristic of a donated bike with a mysterious past life.

No, I prefer to think it's heralding my arrival.



You know, when I finally get there.