Subject: A minor rebuttal
First, although I appreciate the notoriety and honor of appearing in your diary (I also am visible under the heading: Internet Advisory Committee Members, within the State of Ohio Home Page [http://www.ohio.gov]), I would like you to feel free to e-mail me personally, yet I do not wish to impose on your time or energies.
Comments:
In re: Character development. It ain't easy. I, personally find myself creeping into many of the fictitious characters I write about. My self seems to creep in less when I edit a story, however, because I re-read with the intention of developiong a unique character who fits the scenario. I've got this book I call 'The Time Merchants' on which I spent a year of rapid development, then let sit for 5 years (I finally figured out how I wanted to end it, so roughly 2/3 through the thril of the unknown was gone!).
In re: Religious conversions. I used to think so. But it became apparent that True Christianity IS NOT religion, but rather a Relationship. Relational Conversion? Yup.
In re: Sharing Spirituality. When I first heard a new album by say, The Beatles (yeah... maybe it was Abbey Road), I KNOW I didn't want to hoard it... keep it hidden so nobody else could hear it. I wanted to Share it... at 200 watts! Because it moved me so. Because it was too cool. Because good stuff like that shouldn't be sequestered away. Because I wasn't embarrassed about what I had, rather, I knew I was onto something good, and everybody needed to know it.
In re: Conversion. See above. So too, know that I know that conversion is not something one person can MAKE another person do... and I don't even LIKE the THOUGHT of 'converting.' Repentance however, besides the fact that it sounds archaic and fuddy duddyish, is a super word. It means, literally, the internal act of changing one's mind. It is entirely too bad that certain words become associated with certain behaviours and/or flavors. Take the word 'fart,' for instance. Sounds crass and unsophisticated. Though in THIS case, nobody misunderstands what one means by the word, 'fart.'
'Repentance,' on the other hand, always invokes, in my mind, a picture of a suferagette vigilante abolitionist who wants to take away what little pleasure I may be deriving from something and replace it with wool shirts, cots of nails and other devices and attitudes of torture and un-fun. Yeah.
BUT... it simply ain't so. A change of mind. A change of heart. Like when I say to myself, I am so sorry that I ignored the needs of my friend. I resolve, with the unbounded grace of God, to do what I can when I can to make that person's life a little easier. That's a form of repentance.
Or when I kinda make a deal with God... not really but kinda because deals aren't a part of the picture. When I said, 'God... if you are indeed there, I suspect I need to know more about you. If you are NOT there, then I am, indeed wasting my time. But if you ARE there, and I don't know you, then I am the sorriest creature of all.'
'So God,' I said, ' if you are there, let me be aware of your presence, and please let me know in no uncertain terms in a way I might unmistakably understand, so that I might spend the rest of my life getting to know you better.'
And He listens, and He does and you do. THAT is repentance. THAT is a change of mind and heart.
In re: Condescention. Guilty as charged.... BUT ONLY because God isn't done with me yet.
I know I sometimes come across that way. And I don't mean to make excuses when I say I used to be much worse... years ago... but rather, I wish to point that out now, so that you might know that I know, but don't mean to be. I AM repentant about that and can only say that it is getting better because God uses people like yourself to bring that to my attention from time to time, so that He can work in my heart to repair my attitudes... obvious attitudes or more subtle. Each in it's own time, at the appropriate time.
In the olden days, I might be quick to snap back and say something equally condescending and stupid like, 'Oh, YEAH! Well, miss smarty-pants, just take a gander at all the condescention in your OWN writings... like that diary of yours for instance...' And though it may be true, all it REALLY does is shift the blame off of me and on to you, and leaves me in the same condescending mess I was in BEFORE you were gratious enough to allow yourself to be an instrument by which God was able to remind me of areas in my life He still needs to work on...
NEXT, He'll work on curing me of run-on sentences !
IN RE: ETHICS !!!
=================
I am pleased to share with you that which, I am certain, will benefit and honor you. I consider this ethical.
However...
ONE small example of what I consider not only unethical but disgusting and perverted, to boot, is this: In California, The Rainbow Coalition has persisted and managed to get approved, a Grade School textbook that preaches the 'beauty' of the gay lifestyle. This book (I shit you not) blatantly proposes to young children that it is 'most enjoyable for a man to urinate on another man.'
Ethical !?!?! I think not. So what are we (you and I) to do? Sit quietly and obediently by while special interest groups are offerred the only free forum for the presentation of views? Are we to consider ourselves unworthy of free expression while those that scream the loudest are heard and given the floor much to the detriment of the rest of us? May it never be!
Steve