Sex and Sin

Being religious in nature myself, I’m often surprised by the wide range of views  on the relationship between sex and sin that some people hold. In my view they have forgotten that religion is about relationships and is a mode of living. Instead, they seem to believe it is based on a prescribed set of rules narrowly interpreted from an ancient document created millennia ago when understanding of the human condition was not enlightened by the discoveries that we have the privilege of sharing today.

With regards to sex and sin, a fifty-five year old document published by the religious tradition that I call my religious home had this to say:

[W]e accept the definition of sin given by an Anglican broadcaster, as covering those actions that involve exploitation of the other person. This is a concept of wrong-doing that applies both to homosexual and heterosexual actions and to actions within marriage as well as outside it. It condemns as fundamentally immoral every sexual action that is not, as far as is humanly ascertainable, the result of a mutual decision. It condemns seduction and even persuasion, and every instance of coitus which, by reason of disparity of age or intelligence or emotional condition, cannot be a matter of mutual responsibility.

Although it has its defects – the document was created by a committee and it shows in places, and our scientific understanding of sexuality has progressed considerably since the early 1960s – there is little doubt in my mind that it has contributed to the acceptance today of a less rigid concept of what constitutes a relationship. It even had this to say:

We recognize that, while most examples of the “eternal triangle” are produced by boredom and primitive misconduct, others may arise from the fact that the very experience of loving one person with depth and perception may sensitize a man or woman to the lovable qualities in others.

Even today, so many people, religious or not, think of a relationship in terms of two people only. Sure, they might have replaced “man and woman” with “two people”, but why does it have to be only two? Isn’t it the nature of the relationship, and not the number that’s important?

In its introduction, the same document has this observation regarding why many Christians perceive sex as something sinful:

Throughout nearly all its history and in some sections of the Church today, the myth of Adam and Eve (called without justification the Fall of Man—This was never suggested by Jesus, but seems to have come from Paul; see Romans 5, v. 12-14) is treated as though it were historical fact on which logical arguments can be built. In this way, sexuality came to be regarded as necessarily polluted with sin in that event. Even when rejected as historical fact, this myth still has its effect upon the attitude of some Christians to sexuality; it will therefore be wise to think more about it. First, this, like other myths, had an earlier Babylonian origin and was used for religious purposes by the Jewish teachers. Further, like all myths, it is a poetic and symbolic representation of the condition and predicament of man. It is not exclusively or even primarily concerned with sexuality. It is a myth representing the transition of man, either in his racial history (phylogenesis) or his development from babyhood (ontogenesis) from an unreflective obedience to instinct to a condition in which he is responsible for his actions, in which he can reflect on them and make judgments and moral choices, weighing up possible courses of action in the light of a concept of good and evil.

It is a story, not of man’s fall, but of man’s growing up, and of the pain that growing up involves. It is significant that God is recorded as saying (Gen. 3, v. 22): “Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil.” To recognize and love what is good is to know also what is evil, to fear it and to be tempted by it. To know the good is to know joy, but it is also to experience pain, to be tempted to pride and presumption.

It is unfortunate that sexual intercourse takes place between Adam and Eve only after the expulsion from the Garden; this perhaps provides an excuse for thinking that sexual intimacy is associated with a sinful and disobedient state. But this is not given in the text nor is it a necessary implication. Indeed Eve claims the help of God in the matter. The shame associated with nakedness immediately after the eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge need not imply that sex became tainted there and then with sin: it may imply a recognition that our sexuality more than anything else in us can lift us to the heights of self-realization or plunge us into degradation; it is the focus of our self-awareness. The awareness of nakedness may further be a symbol of the awareness of vulnerability, of exposure to pain that must come with self-consciousness.

I acknowledge that the almost 400 year old traditions of my religious group are in conflict with the beliefs of Fundamentalist and evangelical Christians, but (at least, in my home nation) I find the majority of Christians hold values that do not conflict with mine.

Just a little shake

45 minutes ago we experienced a mild earthquake (magnitude 6.2). It was enough to disturb the dog and cause ornaments to rattle and hung picture frames to bang against the wall, but this time only a single item fell over – a top heavy vase holding orchids. It’s funny how different people react. I find them exciting, whereas the wife finds them disturbing.

This one lasted around 45 seconds and came in two distinct waves. The first was a series of vigorous shakes, the second was more of a rolling motion.

Earthquakes are quite common here (around 14,000 each year), although only some 300 are noticeable. NZ lies on the collision zone between the Indo-Australian and Pacific tectonic plates. Visitors to the country often comment on the number of wooden buildings found here. The reason is simple. Wooden framed buildings suffer less damage than masonry and brick structures and are less likely to cause death or serious injury in an earthquake.

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Fellow Kiwi Blogger Bill Peddie provides another example of how Trump’s unilateralism has the potential to cause more harm than good.

And while Trump might have a point that Russia has not followed the letter of the INF nuclear treaty, it can also be argued that America has not followed the spirit of it by developing drone technology as an alternative nuclear weapons delivery system.

Although I follow what President Trump is trying to give as his real reason for pulling out of the current long-standing INF nuclear treaty with Russia, it is more than a little worry that we are left to puzzle why he comes across as one who talks as if he is unaware of some recent history of nuclear treaties. […]

via WHAT PRESIDENT TRUMP FORGOT TO MENTION — Bill Peddie’s website

Why it’s curmudgeon day

Why the grumps? I have had two nights of fitful sleep, among other things. A little over three months ago I decided to try another regime of Migraine medication as I was finding I was down to less than 10 migraine free days each month. And even on those days I usually woke with migraine-like symptoms that would take two to three hours to pass.

My GP suggested we try Propranolol again as it has been more than 10 years since I last tried it. Unfortunately neither the doctor’s notes nor my own record why I stopped taking Propranolol all those years ago except that the side effects were unacceptable.

As many people on the autism spectrum will tell you, the effectiveness and side effects of many medications can be significantly different than would be the expected outcome for neurotypical people. In the case of migraine medication, I have found the effectiveness of most treatments have been negligible, and in every case, the negative side effects considerably outweigh any benefits gained.

This is proving to be true with Propranolol. I’m having up to 20 migraine free days each month, but the side effects are getting to me. I can put up with such minor inconveniences as feeling my body has aged 10 years in the last three months, or the return of Raynaud syndrome if it means I can halve the number of days where I can achieve little or nothing. I can even put up with the itching skin and distorted night vision at a pinch, but there are other symptoms that I’m unwilling to live with long term.

Perhaps the most unsettling side effect is a constant feeling of unease, but about what, I’m not sure. I’m also aware of having vague “memories” of events that I doubt very much happened, and I’m unable to tell if they’re recent dreams, distant dreams, hallucinations, or real events sometime in my recent or distant past. They are so fragmented and vague that they make no sense. However my “recollection” of them feels recent. When or if they happened, they don’t seem to be upsetting at the time. In fact I think some might be the opposite. But in the cold light of day, when I’m fully lucid, they make me uncomfortable, but I don’t know why.

Since starting Propranolol, I’ve found my concentration and short term memory has left me. This is a normal symptom for me during a migraine attack, but it’s worse with medication than without it, so what’s the point of taking it?

One of the less common symptoms associated with my migraines is that I sometimes suffer from depersonalisation or derealisation just before or during an attack. Sometime it can extend to dissociative amnesia. In hindsight I’m convinced that this is a much more frequent symptom during those times I have been taking preventative migraine medication.

That experience of sometimes watching myself from a distance and feeling I’m an observer and not an actor is something I seem to have more frequently since starting the medication, even when I’m not experiencing any other migraine symptom. I seem to be achieving less in my 20 migraine free days now than I was in my 10 migraine free days less than four months ago.

Propranolol is not a medication one can safely stop cold turkey. It’s time to arrange with my doctor a plan to wean myself off them.

Curmudgeon day

Today I’m “officially” a curmudgeon. Opinions expressed here today may not necessarily be held by me tomorrow.

He’s no husband

I’ve watched a number of video clips from American current affairs programs and talk shows related to our Prime Minister’s visit to the United States. I’m surprised that Clark Gayford was frequently referred to as her husband (and occasionally spouse). Only recently has it occurred to me that this occurred during daytime shows, while late shows referred to him as Prime Minister Ardern’s partner.

Just to make it clear America, Jacinda Ardern and Clark Gayford are not married, have never been married, nor are they in a civil union. And yes they have a daughter. Why haven’t they got married? Because they haven’t got round to discussing that. Will they get married? It’s nobody’s business but their own.

I’m sure such relationships are not that unusual in the USA these days, although perhaps not as common as here in Aotearoa New Zealand. Is there some unwritten rule, some remnant of nineteenth century religious fundamentalist morality that says that such arrangements are socially unacceptable for political leaders and cannot be openly mentioned in case it corrupts delicate minds, hence the need to refer to Clark as “husband”? I kid you not, that is how it appears from this distance.

And while we’re on the subject, Jacinda’s family name is Ardern, not Adern or Arden, or as in one case, Aden.  I saw all those forms in online publication that should have known better. Yes, I’ll acknowledge that New Zealand English in non-rhotic, but that simply means we don’t pronounce the letter R at the ends of words or within words unless it’s followed by a vowel. It doesn’t mean we drop the R when writing.

Oh, and when spoken, the stress is on the second syllable of Ardern, not the first. It’s not supposed to rhyme with harden. And ease up on the formality will you! When addressing her directly, especially on talk shows, it’s Jacinda, just as with previous Prime Ministers it was Bill, John, and Helen. The job title is attached rarely and only if really necessary (or if you don’t like the person or their policies).

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Literal idiots

Anyone who reads the Bible as a literal work or thinks that is how it should be read is an idiot. This applies to both the religious on one side and the agnostic and atheist on the other. There is a much sense in attempting to prove the Bible is true by constructing implausible explanations as to why obvious inconsistencies are not inconsistent as there is in attempting to prove it false by finding its many inconsistencies – and let’s face it, there are many.

The Bible is no more than a collection of works by multiple authors, some dating back to when culture was preserved through oral history. It’s value today lies in the fact that it gives us a glimpse into the evolution of a very anthropomorphic tribal god of war into a perfect, all powerful, all knowing, all seeing deity. It consists of allegory, metaphors, oral history, lessons in morality, essays on the human condition, even erotica. It displays prejudice, bigotry, hatred, kindness, generosity, ignorance and wisdom. In fact it tells us a lot about ourselves as human beings, about the human experience. What it doesn’t do is tell us how to apply what we can learn from it (and the many other works from the many traditions that modern society has access to) to how we live today. That’s up to us, individually and collectively.

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Work and play

The fourth Monday in October is celebrated as Labour Day here in Aotearoa New Zealand. This year, it fell on Monday the 22nd. Legend has it that a carpenter by the name of Samuel Parnell fought for, and gained, the right of an eight hour working day way back in 1840. It became an official public holiday in 1900.

Essentially it recognises the right to have a healthy work/life balance. In light of modern technology, work can now intrude on one’s own life 24/7 and can seriously impact one’s life and health, is it time to re-evaluate what Labour Day represents?

I’m not White, I’m skin coloured!

How do I know I’m not white? My six year old grandchild told me!

This morning I was hanging up the washing. It’s a task that has fallen to me as I have a 35 cm (14 inch) height advantage over my wife. Anyway, young T was with me and we were taking turns naming the colour of items as I hung them up. On hanging up a particular towel, I called out “Brown”.

“Don’t be silly, Jii-chan. It’s skin colour!”

(Jii-chan means grandfather in Japanese, and distinguishes me from their paternal grandfather, who they call Opa). The towel was a light brown, almost beige colour, and it never occurred to me to think of it in any other terms.

So I corrected myself and said “Well, it’s really a light brown colour, don’t you think?”, to which he again asserted that it was skin colour and not brown – not even light brown.

In light of a recent post by Clare (Why I’m talking to white people about race), I was struck by the fact that instead of describing people in terms of colour, young T was describing colour in terms of people.

“But not everybody’s skin is the same colour”, I reminded him.

“I know that! You’re a silly Jii-chan.”

“So, if you told someone that you dried yourself with a skin coloured towel, what colour would they think it was?”

A moment in thought, then a lightbulb went off. “Oh yeah! I’d have to say whose skin colour it was like!”

“When I visited America, everyone said I was white.”

“That’s silly, Jii-chan. Nobody’s white. Nobody’s the same colour as that towel”, said young T pointing to a white towel I’d just hung up. I have to agree.

“You’re not white, Jii-chan!”

 

In Aotearoa New Zealand it’s rare to refer to people in terms of colour. It’s more typical to refer to their ancestral cultural group or place of origin. Instead of hearing people described as white, black, brown, red or yellow, you’re more likely to hear them described as European, Pākehā, Polynesian, Māori, Native American, African, Chinese, Indian etc. So I’m not surprised he had no idea, that I’d be identified as being white in many other parts of the world.

That doesn’t mean that young T isn’t aware of cultural differences. Even at six, he’s aware that protocols differ depending where one is, and what might be acceptable within one group might not be acceptable within another. I want him to be familiar and comfortable in the cultures of his grandparents: Pākehā, Japanese and Māori, but I hope he never learns to associate those cultures and the differences between them with race. In fact I hope he never learns the concept of race. Culture and ethnicity, yes. But race, no.

On the other hand, when he’s ready, I want him to understand that history has not always been kind to some communities, and some ethnic groups have been disadvantaged by the actions of other groups, including our own. We, as members of humanity, have a responsibility not to allow the status quo to continue, but to take an active role in striving for a more equitable world.

I couldn’t have said it better!

Spouting facts comes naturally to me. It’s a trait that I have with many (but not all) who are also on the autism spectrum.

But I often find I am short of words when I wish to express an opinion or an emotion or an idea. This too is a trait I have in common with many others on the spectrum.

I don’t often reblog, but when I do it’s because I have found a post that expresses an idea, feeling or opinion that I have been contemplating or struggling with recently, and have no idea how to express it in my own words.

The article below is not strictly a reblog in the WordPress sense, but its sentiments reflect much of why I have little time for Trump supporters. It can be found at many places on the Web, and it’s authorship has been attributed to a number of people, but I believe the original author is Adam-Troy Castro.

So here, in the words of Mr Castro, is why I think Trump supporters are stupid

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An anguished question from a Trump supporter: “Why do liberals think Trump supporters are stupid?”

The serious answer: Here’s what we really think about Trump supporters – the rich, the poor, the malignant and the innocently well-meaning, the ones who think and the ones who don’t…

That when you saw a man who had owned a fraudulent University, intent on scamming poor people, you thought “Fine.”

That when you saw a man who had made it his business practice to stiff his creditors, you said, “Okay.”

That when you heard him proudly brag about his own history of sexual abuse, you said, “No problem.”

That when he made up stories about seeing muslim-Americans in the thousands cheering the destruction of the World Trade Center, you said, “Not an issue.”

That when you saw him brag that he could shoot a man on Fifth Avenue and you wouldn’t care, you chirped, “He sure knows me.”

That when you heard him illustrate his own character by telling that cute story about the elderly guest bleeding on the floor at his country club, the story about how he turned his back and how it was all an imposition on him, you said, “That’s cool!”

That when you saw him mock the disabled, you thought it was the funniest thing you ever saw.

That when you heard him brag that he doesn’t read books, you said, “Well, who has time?”

That when the Central Park Five were compensated as innocent men convicted of a crime they didn’t commit, and he angrily said that they should still be in prison, you said, “That makes sense.”

That when you heard him tell his supporters to beat up protesters and that he would hire attorneys, you thought, “Yes!”

That when you heard him tell one rally to confiscate a man’s coat before throwing him out into the freezing cold, you said, “What a great guy!”

That you have watched the parade of neo-Nazis and white supremacists with whom he curries favor, while refusing to condemn outright Nazis, and you have said, “Thumbs up!”

That you hear him unable to talk to foreign dignitaries without insulting their countries and demanding that they praise his electoral win, you said, “That’s the way I want my President to be.”

That you have watched him remove expertise from all layers of government in favor of people who make money off of eliminating protections in the industries they’re supposed to be regulating and you have said, “What a genius!”

That you have heard him continue to profit from his businesses, in part by leveraging his position as President, to the point of overcharging the Secret Service for space in the properties he owns, and you have said, “That’s smart!”

That you have heard him say that it was difficult to help Puerto Rico because it was the middle of water and you have said, “That makes sense.”

That you have seen him start fights with every country from Canada to New Zealand while praising Russia and quote, “falling in love” with the dictator of North Korea, and you have said, “That’s statesmanship!”

That Trump separated children from their families and put them in cages— managing to lose track of 1500 kids— and has opened a tent-city incarceration camp in the desert in Texas – he explains that they’re just “animals” – and you say, “well, ok then.”

That you have witnessed all the thousand and one other manifestations of corruption and low moral character and outright animalistic rudeness and contempt for you, the working American voter, and you still show up grinning and wearing your MAGA hats and threatening to beat up anybody who says otherwise.

What you don’t get, Trump supporters in 2018, is that succumbing to frustration and thinking of you as stupid may be wrong and unhelpful, but it’s also…hear me…charitable.