Happy Memorial Day

Their silent wounds have speech

More eloquent than men;

Their tones can deeper reach

Than human voice or pen.

~William Woodman

No matter what side of the fence you fall upon when it comes to war, it is important to remember those that paid the ultimate sacrifice for their country, we will always respect and honor those that are able to give so much of themselves.

This week the New Inklings will be on hiatus for the holiday.  We welcome you to take a trip the the Rabbit Room and revisit some of the great conversations the New Inklings and our readers have had.  We’ll pick the conversation up again next Monday.

The Agnostic Speaks: The Last Days Are Here Again

As some of our readers know, the beginning of my journey away from Christianity in my early teens had two great catalysts; Herman Hesse’s Siddhartha and a movie called the Seventh Sign. Wow, looking at that sentence makes me laugh. On one end this incredible piece of great literature and on the other a cheesy apocalyptic flick. But alas it is my truth. The movie prompted me to read Revelations. (the first book of the bible I read from beginning to end) which led to a year of not sleeping and being deathly afraid that the apocalypse was going to come at any moment. It was difficult to look upon the impending apocalypse as a happy event, what with the four horsemen, earthquakes, fire and you know death. Death is a difficult concept for most adults, let alone teenagers, to grasp.

The bottom line is, we’ve been here many times before; (Hailey’s Comet – 1910, 1976(Doug Clark), 1982 (Pat Robertson), 1990 (Vladimir Solovyev), 1992 Rapture Movement, 1994 (Harold Camping), 1997 (Heaven’s Gate)  1999 (Nostradamus), Y2K, 2008 (Ronald Weinland) just to name a few) and we will be here again. (I’m personally looking forward to Dec 21st 2012, which is coincidentally my Mother’s birthday! I’ve known for years how special my mom is and its awesome to know that she’s gets to have the last birthday for all of mankind.)  So when I first heard about the May 21st Doomsday event a few months back  I just laughed. But then I began to read about the nearly 20,000 people who had given up nearly everything because they believed so completely that this upcoming event was true. I remember watching a clip of a girl (almost the same age as I when I had my “Revelation experience”) standing on a street corner handing out these doomsday flyers. I recognized that look of fear masked by the constant need to convince herself that it was a GOOD thing. This is when I began to get a little angry.

One of the many reasons I will never return to the Christian faith is because despite the glimmers of good I do see from time to time there are still tremendous levels of, for lack of a better word, ploys that exist :

Fear: If you don’t believe in Jesus you are going to live an eternity in a lake of fire enduring incredible suffering when you die. Regardless of whatever incredible good you have done in your life. If you don’t believe that Jesus is Lord you will not got to heaven period. Don’t forget about the demons and witches that will come to get you! As my mom says “That doesn’t make a lick of sense”

Monetary: Family Radio brought in 18 million dollars of donations in 2009 alone. If they truly believed that the world was going to end why the hell would they accept that insane amount of money?

Control: Be it by convincing others that they must give away everything and travel the country via RV for a year to stand on street corners waiving signs warning of the apocalypse. Or believing certain morals, ie: Abortion is wrong, Homosexuality is a sin, ect ect because some man that says he understands the bible better than you do tells you so.  If you believe a certain way, it should be because it’s a conclusion you reached on your own not because someone behind a pulpit told you to do so.

It goes to show you what one man can do. This man was able to whip over 20,000 Christians into a frenzy. Whether it was all meant to be a scam, or whether he believed it wholeheartedly, only he knows. But for me, as a non-believer, it only validates that that whatever Jesus taught no longer exists in Christianity. Everything has been twisted and re-worked and re-interpreted a thousand times over to meet the needs of either those that wanted to scheme or those who want others to believe as they do. How can any of us say what is true and what isn’t?

But Fear is Universal; it’s not just a product of religion. Regardless of what we believe, we all as humans are connected because we have the ability to feel emotions; Love, Happiness, Sadness, Fear, Peace. It’s a shame that we continue to allow fear to overwhelm us so easily. My heart goes out to the girl in that video and to the thousands of other people who gave up everything; homes, marriages, relationships, jobs because they believed this guy.  There is a great post on the No God Blog that articulates best how I feel:

“If you’re reading this, and you donated money to Harold Camping’s campaign, by now you’re pretty depressed. You’ve been taken, and worse than that, you’ve been embarrassed. You may feel stupid, and that’s because you’ve done a stupid thing – you trusted your preacher blindly. You believed without thinking.

But that doesn’t mean you’re stupid. Smart people sometimes do stupid things. A truly stupid person would NOT learn from this mistake. A truly stupid person would keep following Camping as he ‘recalculates’, or says “god has forgiven us because of the prayers we sent up” or some other lame excuse for his rapture not happening. Hopefully, you aren’t one of these people, who are destined to be hurt again. Hopefully, you have learned a lot in the last few days.

I urge you not to hurt yourself. Your shame will pass, and your money will be re-earned. You can lead a normal life if you start leading with your intellect, and not your desperation to see the end of the world… But no matter where you stand right now, YOU have potential. Use it”

Comments have been closed for this post.  Aaron will post the Christian perspective tomorrow.  Your chance to voice perspective comes on Wednesday.

The Agnostic Speaks: Physician-Assisted Suicide

Shortly after Ned and I began dating seriously. I remember sitting on the couch with him discussing the upcoming reading of his yearly MRI results. Most people who’ve never seen Cancer’s ugly face up close fail to learn its most devastating secret; If the tumor itself doesn’t kill you, the chances are high that the treatment will. He was roughly 2 years out from his brain cancer and the previous years results were not promising. There was radiation induced necrosis present in his tumor bed. Radiation necrosis means that healthy cells (healthy brain matter) in the area surrounding his tumor were dying off and the dead zone would get bigger and bigger if they couldn’t stop the progression. The ominous “white ring” came into my husband’s life a year after his brain surgery. A year after fighting so hard to get even the most basic skills back; learning how to walk, write, eat using utensils,  learning how to see the world through constant double vision. If they couldn’t stop the progression of the necrosis it meant all those basic skills would disappear, he would slowly and surely lose his mind along with the physical abilities he had left. My husband and his neurologist decided to gamble on a daily dose of aspirin and heavy omega 3’s in the hopes that it would prevent the “white ring” from getting larger. But only time could tell, so they decided to give it a year. We talked about all the possibilities that he was facing; the white ring could have grown, even the tumor itself could have returned. He asked me if the news was bad, if I would respect the decision he had to make. I remember him vividly telling me, that if it was any other cancer he knew he could fight it. But he knew deep down inside that if his brain tumor ever returned, or if his necrosis had worsened (which would likely mean more surgery to his traumatized brain) he just didn’t have another round in him. Should the prognosis be bad, his plan was to move to Oregon where assisted suicide is legal and end his life. I should tell you that my husband is very much a joker, he rarely takes life or conversations seriously. He knows all too well how fleeting life is. But in this particular conversation he was so eloquent and thoughtful and very very serious. He spoke of how much he loved me, loved his sister and nephews. But this was something he truly felt was the right and only thing to do if given a poor prognosis. He took the time to make me understand.

I myself have dealt with incredible depression. There has been a moment where I truly wanted to end it all. What stopped me was the awareness that no matter how better off I thought my loved ones were without me, I would still hurt them unnecessarily and deeply. I was lucky, I was able to see tomorrow and a day without the emotional pain I was so consumed with.

The fact is none of us know, no matter how close we seem to get to it, what it means to have a serious or terminal illness until we experience for ourselves. Until then we are on the outside looking in. They can tell us about their pain and suffering, we can hear it in their cries, but we cannot FEEL it. Because those of us on the outside can escape it; be it by either entirely walking away, or taking our experiences with them and turning them into a life lesson. We also don’t understand the level of thought involved in reaching the decision to end your life. Its easier for us to say “no you fight!” or “you have something to live for don’t do something so selfish”. But do we really know what it’s like to live in their misery or  in a shell of the body we once knew?

My husband’s scan was good. He had successfully stopped the progression of the necrosis and he celebrated his 8 year re-birthday this past March. We’ve been married for nearly 6 years and have a beautiful daughter. He still suffers daily from the effects of his cancer and we try and rise to the challenge of its many after-effects. But for him the reasons to live outweigh the ones not to. His life is now and forever his choice. What Mrs. Hydorn is doing, what many physicians and healthcare providers who participate in Physician Assisted Suicide are doing is to help these people end their lives on their own terms; and with the dignity that often their illnesses have robbed them of. We can choose every aspect of how we LIVE our lives, why is it such an abomination to think that how we choose to END our lives should be any different? Death like life is never cut and dry. What one person considers to be their limit is not true for another. But by taking this choice out of the individuals’ hands is that not in in turn playing God?

Comments have been turned off for this post.  Tomorrow it’s your turn to tell us where you stand.

The Agnostic Speaks: Why Pass the Buck?

“God had nothing to do with it, it was all my fight” -Ned Brown when told that his rare brain cancer survival was a “miracle”

There is one observation that visits me time and time again when it comes to my Agnostic belief. When I hear Christians talk about Jesus and the control they have of their lives. “Jesus was looking down on us when Joe found his new job” “Jesus will make my life better when he returns” “Jesus gave me this trouble to challenge me” Time and time again I find myself going. Really? Why does it have to be because of Jesus that Joe got his job? Why is it such a stretch to believe that it was simply a matter that Joe had the right qualifications and work history that said employer needed? Why can’t you believe that YOU, not Jesus has the power to make your life good and happy? It feels almost as if it is dismissive of the incredible potential we have as human beings to say that the good that happens in our lives is because of Jesus or Allah, ect, ect.

When I hear “give yourself to God (Jesus)”. I wonder why give control of your life to any one or any thing other than yourself? For me the good that exists in your life is there because you have worked for it. Because you had to believe in yourself. You had to put one step in front of the other, you had to learn a new skill, you had to put in the time and the effort, not Jesus. So why give Jesus or Allah or even Satan all the credit? Better yet why give him all the blame?

Don’t get me wrong, I know that not everyone chooses to be poor, or chooses not to have health insurance, or chooses to get a brain tumor or a bum kidney. Believe me I know. But if you are poor you can choose to try to go to night school or ask for a raise or cut off your cable to save money. They may not get you there as fast as you would like but you will get there if you just try, and if one thing doesn’t work you try another.  Even if these are impossible options its up to YOU not Jesus to find the good in every day even though every day may not be good.   Don’t just throw your hands up and give it over to God to fix. Fix it your damn self. Sometimes you are going to win and sometimes you are going to lose.

To me, as long as you fight as hard as you can, there is no one to blame (Jesus or yourself) be proud that you fought. Be proud that you gave it your all.  Eventhough he fought very very hard, I lost a wonderful Uncle to colon cancer. I have a good friend who lost twin boys to stillbirth and suffered numerous subsequent miscarrages, she too has fought harder (for her sanity and a child) than I could ever dream. Christians tend to blame Satan for the woes of their life or the world. My belief is that like the seasons, as sure as there is sun there is going to be rain in life. We cannot truly appreciate the good without experiencing the bad.  To me rather than trying to figure out who is to blame or thank its more important to accept the fact that bad things are going happen in this life.  But there is also incredible good if we just embrace it.  Since losing my uncle, my family members now undergo annual colonoscopies that they used to avoid, which ensure early detection and a chance at better health. My friend gave birth to a beautiful baby girl just after Christmas. And it is because of both of them that I continue to be grateful for each moment I have with loved ones. For me, its more important to remember that every beautiful flower would not be here without the sun AND the rain.

I just wonder why pass the proverbial buck when it comes to life?

The comments have been turned off for this post. Don’t worry, you’ll have your chance to join the conversation Wednesday.

Ye Old Viral: “The Good Book: A Secular Bible”

I (Franny) was  very excited to hear about the release of “The Good Book: A Secular Bible” written by famed atheist A.C. Grayling and his rock star hair.

Gaze upon my magical tresses.

Bloomsbury Publishing describes the Good Book as:

“Drawing on the wisdom of 2,500 years of contemplative non-religious writing on all that it means to be human – from the origins of the universe to small matters of courtesy and kindness in everyday life – A. C. Grayling, Britain’s most popular and widely read philosopher, has created a secular bible.
Designed to be read as narrative and also to be dipped into for inspiration, encouragement and consolation, The Good Book offers a thoughtful, non-religious alternative to the many people who do not follow one of the world’s great religions. Instead, going back to traditions older than Christianity, and far richer and more various, including the non-theistic philosophical and literary schools of the great civilisations of both West and East, from the Greek philosophy of classical antiquity and its contemporaneous Confucian, Mencian and Mohist schools in China, down through classical Rome, the flourishing of Indian and Arab worlds, the European Renaissance and Enlightenment, the worldwide scientific discoveries of the 19th and 20th centuries to the present, Grayling collects, edits, rearranges and organises the collective secular wisdom of the world in one highly readable volume.
Contents:
Genesis
Proverbs
Histories
Songs
Wisdom
Acts
The Lawgiver
Lamentations
Concord
Consolations
Sages
The Good
Parables”

There was a piece about the book for CNN’s Belief Blog. And there is a wonderful (in my opinion) write up about him in the Guardian.  For the sake of fairness I’m including an alternative perspective from the Telegraph as well.  Aaron and I both are very excited to get our hands on this book and you can rest assured the New Inklings will offer a review in the near future.

“The Good Book: A Secular Bible” is available at your local bookstore and Amazon