Basic Theology 3

I would not have become a Christian were it not for the direct and personal experience of contact with the Divine. This happened on the day that I first accepted Christ, age 14, at 8 or so in the evening in the garret bedroom of the House of David in Fairview Slopes in Vancouver, now a bunch of townhouses and condos. I felt a presence so strong and so beautiful, such as was shared and experienced by my hosts who had graciously invited me for dinner that night. Yes, they wanted to persuade me to know Jesus, but I needed no persuading. I knew, from the deepest core of my being, I knew that it was God and that he was calling me in all his love, sweetness, grace and power. This is so hard to convey to those who don't believe, the skeptics, the scoffers, but this is because it is like describing the colour green to someone who is colour blind, as I said just a few weeks later to my scoffing and mocking brother. Several weeks later, when I was baptized in the Holy Spirit, I had never experienced such a heightened sense of power, joy and love sweeping into my life. This in many ways empowered me as a Christian, but also as a complete human being, and I am to this day convinced that I received through this presence of God in my life a great deal of healing and recovering from the fallout of my abusive childhood. I badly wanted my family to know for themselves, and to experience the beauty that was happening to me. They resisted from the first day, were angry, hostile, and scornful: my just-divorced and very angry mother who wanted to be a middle aged party girl, my alcoholic father, and my brother who abused drugs and was himself full of anger and hate. They didn't know what had got into me, neither was there anything they could do to withstand the power of God in my life. Even more to their outrage, I was happy! I no longer wanted to smoke pot or drink, I was peaceful, and I was becoming kind, responsible and loving, all changes that are consistent with an authentic Christian conversion, and they couldn't stand that this was authentic and there was nothing they could do to oppose, short of increasing their own personal resistance against God in their lives. This was painful for me. I was convinced that they would be going to hell and I didn't want them to burn forever in the Lake of Fire. I'm not sure what I think of this now. I like to believe that God is merciful and welcomes everyone who comes to him. But I also acknowledge, from very hard personal experience, that God calls us to repentance, to accepting and admitting where we are wrong and where we have wronged and done wrong, to turn away from that with the motive to do what is right, just and beautiful. I also understand from many of the near-death experiences I have read and heard about that those people who meet God in the afterlife have all been confronted with the wrong they have done to others and are called to repentance and a turning around in their lives. Neither can I imagine anyone who is not wiling to do this really wanting to live in God's presence, because as beautiful and loving God is, because God is love, he is also the essence of truth and truthfulness and I can't understand that anyone who avoids the truth would be able to bear being in the presence of the Living God. I know this from my own personal experience. When I am living in a way that is false and self-centred, it is very hard for me to draw near to God. There is a barrier. Our hold, our grip on our lives, in wanting to be the ones in charge, our own personal CEO, is so strong and so unyielding, that it is going to be something very hard and very difficult and challenging for many of us to really let go and let God. But before any of us can really move forward as complete human beings, that is exactly what we have to do. We are not our own.

Basic Theology 2

I have long been taught that there is very little point to reading the Bible without the help of the Holy Spirit. Now, for those of you who know little or nothing about Christian teaching or doctrine, let me explain a little bit about the Holy Spirit. This Holy Spirit is really another name for God, but God in action with the universe. So we have God the Father, the Creator, the Sustainer of the Universe. And we have God the Son, Jesus Christ, who is really God in human form, God with us, God making God accessible to us mortals. And we have God the Holy Spirit, who is the empowering action of God in the form of love and creation. Or simply put: God the Creator, God the Redeemer, and God the Empowerer. I still appreciate and abide by this warning, because the Bible can be one huge and confusing book for those who are not ready. like many curious fourteen year olds, I tried to start with Revelation, which really reads for me like a long and very bad acid trip, even now, almost fifty years later. So I tried to begin with the Gospels, focusing on Matthew. It was wonderful. And very strange, especially the passages about Jesus curing people from demonic possession. That summer, having finished grade nine, I remember spending the last days of June curled up on the grass in Minoru Park in Richmond with my Bible underneath one of a windbreak of oak trees, reading Matthew's Gospel, with intrigue, curiosity and fascination. I knew even then that I was being shown some eternal truths and I felt of all persons most privileged. Matthew's Gospel gave me my first real grounding in Christian theology. As did the letter of James, which we did a teenage Bible study on a few months earlier, just shy of my fifteenth birthday. James taught about the importance of leading a pure and unstained life before God and others, focussing on caring for and serving the most vulnerable while challenging the wealthy and speaking truth to power. Matthew and James together have helped form the template of my expression of life as a Christian. Even then, surrounded by unthinking and unreflective fundamentalist Christians, I instinctively knew that the letters of Paul must be read rather selectively. His writings about the worship and wonder of God and the importance of following Christ faithfully have always resonated with me: not so much some of his comments about women, marriage and homosexuality. But we weren't encouraged to ask those kinds of questions, and for some years I even accepted the teachings against homosexuality, but always drawing the line at sexual behaviour, while refusing to demonize or advocating for the sexual reorientation (now proven to be the most ridiculous and harmful concept that it is) people for being gay. Over the years, my position has modified considerably, especially after having had close friends in faithful same-sex relationships, and I do accept that Pauñ did not always know what he was talking about, though I still largely agree with him about sexual conduct in general: that is what monogamous marriage is for, but I would still tend to cut people a little more slack since, well, we are human beings, after all. Over the years, I have come to focus particularly upon the Gospels, as they relate directly about Jesus who is not only the way to God, but is also the Way of God. All else is commentary. More later, Gentle Reader.

Basic Theology 1

Good Morning, Gentle Reader. I think I have beaten Nuance to death, and now it's time to change gears for a bit. I think also, because I have been addressing in some of my previous posts a number of issues that pertain to Christianity, church, Christian life, and why do I even bother? None of these writings, by the way, are scholarly or ecclesiastically sourced, they are merely my own impressions, perspectives, opinions and observations. Anyone reading this material, if they want an authoritative source, had best look elsewhere. Otherwise, please enjoy the ride. I first want to address what I believe to be a lot of popular misconceptions concerning the Christian faith, and such misunderstandings are often spawned in the minds of people who are afraid, or they are not thinking clearly, or they have a general grudge against God, faith and religion, or they have so trained the rational mind as to exclude or strain out anything that touches upon the spiritual, the mystical, the numinous. In all fairness, I would prefer to keep all my referencing within the realm of my own personal experience and curiosity. I have already warned that I am not an expert in these matters. I began seriously reading the Bible when I was fourteen, just when I was converted to the Christian faith. This was given me as a prerequisite for growing in the Christian faith. I accepted the challenge and, even now, almost a half century later, I still believe this to be an important feature of my devotional life. I read the Bible not once, but twice daily, in my second language, which is Spanish. This has been particularly good for my fluency, as I am reading daily, aloud, and these are texts that have important resonance for me. I have known fellow Christians who claimed to have sworn off the Bible for a period of time, sometimes for years, because they felt a need to deprogram themselves from faulty teaching and to try to cultivate a more personal relationship with God. I cannot really comment about this because I don't want to put myself in the position of judge. In my own experience, I have always, since I first accepted Christ, and even more so after being, just over a month later, baptized in the Holy Spirit, had a personal relationship with God. This has never changed, not even when I intentionally backslid when I was nineteen and intentionally quit reading the scriptures. However, my relationship with the Holy Bible has been evolving and changing over the years. I do not feel so much a need or obligation to read it daily, but a desire. There appears to be a kind of spiritual sustenance that happens from this daily discipline, and it is a discipline, which I strongly believe in. The disciplined life is a life of freedom. There is something in our messy human nature that cries out to be ordered and properly directed. It isn't that I worship or deify the Bible. For me, it is a valuable devotional instrument, but there is also something about daily reading about the life, teachings and ministry of Jesus that helps ground me in the reality of my faith. I need that kind of discipline. If I didn't have access to a Bible, I'm sure I would be okay, spiritually, but as long as it's available I want to make use of it. God speaks in the scriptures, but they are not his only microphone, neither do I believe that the Bible is the complete and inerrant Word of God. I have covered this in other blogposts, but I would also like to further explore this theme. At first, I was given to believe that it was the literal and inerrant word of God, but even as a young teenage Jesus Freak I had some struggle with this. It is still, to me, a uniquely inspired document, however, and this remains my position and experience.

Nuance 35

Good morning, Gentle Reader. Today, I have some special people in mind as el blanco al día, as we call it in Spanish, or my target de jour, in fractured French, or in English, my target of the day. There has been raised, what could be called a semi-legitimate concern, that some people reading these pages could easily get the wrong message about some things, particularly about some of my struggles with the emotional fallout of dealing with a particularly corrupt Christian institution, otherwise known as the Anglican Church of Canada. Okay, a little more Spanish, here: ¡Oye! Or listen up! Any human institution that purports to represent God on earth is going to be in store for some real problems, not least of all the fact that said institutions are composed of imperfect, fallen and broken human beings. This does not reflect on, nor affect, the truth and reality of the very Gospel of Christ that we represent. So, Gentle Reader, if you are reading this blog primarily in pursuit of more excuses to discredit the Church and the Gospel and to deny God, then please stop reading this blog and stick maybe to Urban Dictionary? Thank you. By the way, GR, it isn't just the church that is flawed and imperfect. I am also flawed and imperfect, and you know something else, GR? You are also flawed and imperfect. And if you are looking for excuses for not turning your life over to Christ, then please seek those excuses elsewhere, on other blogs, other pages, because I am not going to be party to your chronic recalcitrance. Got it? Okay! Why do I write these things? One very white clergyperson has insinuated that this is my way of letting off steam. Oh, but what a bunch of othering crap. Yes, there is a therapeutic release to writing on these pages, that is part of it, but writing this blog is, before and above everything else, a public community service. Even if these little essays are written from my experience, perspective and point of view, it is also with the desire that there will be some resonance for the reader, and that they in turn will be influenced, perhaps even inspired, to think, ponder, meditate, inwardly digest, and open their horizons, if only just a little more. And also to influence positive and constructive activism. I have mentioned already that I have little in the way of resources or powerful connections for vectoring change , but this blog provides me with a voice and a platform. If I didn't think there was value in what I have to say, then I would have simply stuck to Dear Diary, not expecting that anyone would want to read any of this, not even after my death. in the meantime, I will try to be as fair and nuanced as possible. I am also not about to take prisoners. Including you, Gentle Reader. These are honest writings for honest people who desire truth. I am not claiming to write the truth. Thins are going to be filtred through my particular lens and perspective. But this is also my way of opening my perspective a little more, and your perspective too, Duchies!

Nuance 34

There have been women in the Canadian Anglican priesthood since the 1970's, and now we have women bishops. A very good and significant development, I'd say, as this has given free expression to the many women who have had a legitimate call to ministry, and now can bring it to full expression. I have often referred to myself as a feminist, and naturally I would welcome this development, and for the most part, I have. Which leads me to an awkward question. Why have most of my really acrimonious relationships with clergy been with women? I am certainly not a misogynist. I have also enjoyed excellent professional relationships with women in positions of authority, be they politicians, my own housing providers (the men have usually been absolute jerks!) bosses and supervisors, and I have also got on well with woman doctors and counsellors I have interacted with as a patient or client. As far as female clergy, there have been a couple of positive exceptions, but for the most part, it usually goes badly, and sometimes very badly. Right now, there is a woman priest in the parish church I am attending, and things between us are starting to go very badly, to the point where I am now wanting to quit attending, though this time I will probably try to white-knuckle it. She is not a bad person, and at first we got on very well. But I have been noticing certain traits that many of the female Anglican clergy in my experience seem to share in common. To me, they all seem very ambitious. And highly competitive. Their social orientation is very middle class, they seem to extol middle class values, and even conflate as the true collective Christian expression, those same middle class virtues. None of them, not one of them, have seemed interested, willing or able to communicate with me at my level. I have felt patronized and looked down upon for my poverty, my sense of social marginalization, my experience of disempowerment, and my inferior social status by each one of these women clergy. I feel pathologized. And when I mention this, they try to censor me, or make feeble excuses. I have always felt treated by these women as an inferior being, and that I am some invasive species from which they must protect their beloved middle class parishioners. I have come to understand that this is not merely my problem. I am sure there are some real systemic and structural issues in the Anglican Church that breeds this kind of phenomenon. I am going to suggest that a lot of women clergy do not know how to interact well or constructively with many of their male parishioners. They are going to be more comfortable around women, and their preference of ministry is going to weigh towards women. I think there are legitimate reasons for this. I will cite here, first of all, a radio interview I heard the other day with Monique Begin, a former federal Liberal cabinet minister with Trudeau senior during the seventies and eighties. She said very frankly and succinctly that the problem with modern feminism is that no one wants to dismantle the patriarchy, and this needs to happen if women are going to be completely free to come into full expression in their lives and potential. I couldn't agree more. This, I believe, is also why we have ended up with such walking and breathing nightmares as Margaret Thatcher and Golda Meir, two woman leaders who really governed with all the toxic masculinity that can be concealed underneath a skirt. We have a similar issue with the Anglican Church, which still remains a distinctively patriarchal institution, regardless of their many trendy cosmetic adjustments. The Anglican Church of Canada is also, in my view and experience, a corrupt and secularized institution, very toxic and contaminated by secular and non-Christian values. Even if there are a lot of male Anglican priests who are going to have a lot to answer for, I have often noticed one particular feature that distinguishes some of them from many of their female colleagues. Many men are in the Anglican priesthood with the desire to serve. Because Christian ministry is not considered an ideal Alpha-male calling, there would be a tendency to attracting men who already have a spirit of humility and the desire, however imperfect, to serve God through serving others. While I completely agree that women priests are similarly motivated, there is one little complication here that no one seems to want to reckon with or recognize. I suspect that a lot of women, however legitimate their call to serve as priests and ministers in the church, are also motivated by the lust for power. This could be because the toxic masculinity that is embedded in the patriarchal structure of the church, with all its social, cultural and historical male-dominant baggage, has done much to hobble the spiritual effectiveness of the church, and precious little to really minister the Gospel of Christ. Women, coming from a middle class culture and frame of reference very much formed and informed by cultural toxic masculinity are equally vulnerable as their female counterparts in the political sphere. Add to this brew the contamination of secular feminism, and you wind up with women who want to be as powerful as or more powerful than men, climbing their way to the top, be it in church or politics or business or all of the above, and woe betide any poor miserable bastard who gets in their way. Especially if that poor miserable bastard should happen to be a male of the species. I think this is a real problem in the church, and I don't believe that it is shared by all women in ministry, but I still think it needs to be acknowledged and reckoned with. I am of the persuasion that had some of the women priests with whom I have had negative experiences been not so contaminated by the lust for power, that things would have gone differently, and rather better. It is really unfortunate that for a lot of women, feminism means becoming more like men. I would prefer a model of feminism in which men and women would be more inclined to become like each other, balancing the feminine and masculine forces, rooted in love, with the desire and motivation to serve well their communities, parishes, the world, and especially God. I am hoping that my current priest and I can have a constructive dialogue around this.

Nuance 33

Accommodating the stranger, welcoming and integrating the newcomer. Such a lovely concept. One that is fraught and problematic. I was having a conversation yesterday with a couple of friends about Israel and Palestine. Unlike me, both have visited. One lived there for a while. Neither one is Jewish or Palestinian. For various reasons, they were just there. And they observed. We more or less agreed that Israel, similar to Canada, the US, Australia, South Africa, (and we forgot to mention New Zealand and the Latin American countries) are all settler-colonialist countries. I do have trouble with the terminology if not the concept, but that more has to do with my allergy to politically correct language and postmodern narratives. Or with any narrative, really, since narratives tend to have value as tools for understanding and forming ideas and concepts, but are rather useless as conveyors of truth, and a lot of people don't seem to get that distinction. Of course, every colonized land has its narrative and its founding myth. Here in Canada, the myth goes that British and French explorers were seeking new lands and better opportunities to thrive and survive, given how problematic and overpopulated Europe had become, and here they came across a vast empty land just waiting to be settled, cultivated and civilized. (In the case of Spain, or Mamá España, it was more a case of greed, and they plundered the new world for gold and products, but so also did England, France, Portugal, Germany and Belgium) But this was not an empty land, being the home of some four hundred plus nations of aboriginal inhabitants speaking more than sixty distinct languages, and all with distinctive cultures and customs and traditions, who had already been here for thousands and tens of thousands of years. In most cases, the early settlers were welcomed and often helped by the native inhabitants, but at some point things always have turned ugly. The settlers would soon lose their exotic appeal and become a threatening invasive species. They would denigrate, or outright deny the humanity and dignity of the aboriginal inhabitants, referring to and treating them as animals and mistreating and slaughtering them at random, sometimes as systematic genocide. There are also differences between the various colonial experiments, notably with Israel. The Jews had been mostly scattered across the earth since the Roman Empire, with only a small population of Sephardic Jews remaining in Palestine. The constant persecution reached its nadir with the Shoah, when six million sons and daughters of Abraham were slaughtered in the charnel houses of the Nazis. The survivors were, understandably, very desperate to hie themselves to Palestine and create the modern state of Israel, where they would have self-determination as a Jewish state and freedom from persecution. Even the earliest Jewish settlers, however, were pushy and considerably less than tolerant of the Arabs who had themselves been living there for centuries, and no proud Arab was going to take lightly this slap on the face. It wasn't too long before hostilities were igninted and now we have this chronic nightmare of oppression, violence and racism as the Israelis continue to marginalize and steal the land of the Palestinian people, and the Palestinians go on reacting with violence and rage. Nobody wins, but it is especially bad for the Palestinians. I understand that under the radar there is a lot of work and organizing being done collaboratively between Israelis and Palestinians in the interest of justice and peace, but I am not going to go on about something I know so little about. A friend of mine, who is also a scholar with some knowledge of this troubled region, once said that people who have been in Israel and Palestine for one week, go home and write a book about it. Those who have spent a month there go home and write an article. Those who have been there for a year keep their mouths shut. In the meantime, I am interested in this delicate and often clumsy dance that occurs between strangers and one is never quite sure what is going on. The stranger is welcomed and helped with open arms, then is shunned or even persecuted as an invasive threat. Or the newcomer simply refuses to recognize the prior rights, human and otherwise of their hosts and will move heaven and earth in order to dominate the land and turf out the original inhabitants. To coexist peacefully, productively and, dare I say, joyfully? Oh, you've got to be kidding! But maybe this hasn't really been tried yet.

Nuance 32

I seem to be facing some headwinds at St. Faith's, the Anglican parish church I have been visiting since last May. I say visiting, because I am still, after nine months, am made to feel like a visitor there. To the people there, I still seem to represent the other and I don't understand this, because no one has troubled to explain why. I have felt treated kindly, welcomed like a visiting exotic, perhaps a tropical bird blown off course and landing there for the short-term. I was hoping that something solid could develop, but following a coffee visit with the interim priest, I'm afraid those hopes are going to be dashed for awhile, if not forever. I was informed on our visit yesterday that people at St. Faith's are still learning how to trust me. Very unfortunate choice of words, and I have reacted rather strongly by withdrawing the trust that I have already invested in some of the people there. Well, trust is a choice. I chose to trust people at St. Faith's and now maybe I have to start reconsidering, because nobody seems willing to reciprocate. I will likely end up either leaving, or suffering with having to worship among strangers who will be nice and kind on Sundays, and otherwise, please don't bother us. I would like to be proven that I am mistaken here. This is an assumption I don't want to hold. It was suggested that maybe I should invite people out for coffee, but that shouldn't have to be my job. I am the newcomer, I am the one who needs to be welcomed, not vice-versa. So, I am holding out in hope that some of the faithful will read these words and do something to show interest in me as a friend. This hasn't happened yet, and I am not making the first step, because, as the newcomer, that isn't my job. We are all human, of course, but I think that a lot of people get hobbled somewhat by surface differences. And we don't really have very much in common. Most of the parishioners are married with families. Almost all of them are home-owners, many retired, some still working as successful and reasonably well-off professionals. They are all car owners. I seem to be the only one who lives in social housing, gets around by foot and public transit, earns less than a living wage, and basically subsists at survival level. I am the only one who has to cope without family, close friends, or other supports. I need stable people in my life. This is the attraction for me at St. Faith's, But I also need stable people who will not keep me at arms-length and treat me and passively exclude me like the other. One would hope that among Christians there would also exist the possibility of friendship. Well, I am still hoping. And I am still waiting to see the evidence. But there are limits to my patience.

Nuance 31

There are few matters of interest than can unveil the chronic and stubborn ignorance in people as a conversation about religion and faith. It seems that my profession as a Christian is problematic for some people, who remain stubborn and resistant to engaging in any constructive dialogue about the Christian faith, preferring instead to stew in misconceptions. It is as though they are somehow nurtured and nourished by this ignorance. By the way, I am not at all interested in proselytizing anyone, simply to help clear up some misconceptions, but no one is biting. This I find very sad, and perplexing, especially given that it is still, what I call, open season on Christians. Even in the dreadful wake of the attack on the World Trade Centre in New York City, or 9-11, I and many Canadians, instead of vilifying all Muslims as mouth-breathing and murderous fanatics, took special pains to learn more about Islam so that we wouldn't get swept in the tsunami of hate and bigotry against Muslims that was sure to follow. I have never heard of similar consideration or compassion offered to Christians. Had they been Christian fundamentalists manning those airplanes, and not Muslims, there would be no end to it. If some people knew that I was a Muslim or a Buddhist, and heard me mention it, or if they read any of my writings in this blog about about my Muslim or Buddhist faith and practice, I am certain that I would not be recipient to snide remarks about my faith. But a lot of secular and atheistic folk who are smug about their intelligence, seem to have an irrational hate-on for Christians and Christianity, and it really pains me that anyone would agree to be my friend in spite of my faith and spiritual practice, treating it like a kind of disagreeable hobby, such as raising pythons, or being a member of the Canadian Conservative Party. And I think that if I had a friend who was a card-carrying Conservative, though I can't think of many Conservatives who could spend more than fifteen minutes in the same room with me without wanting to run away screaming, but I am also willing to be friends with people whose politics I disagree with, if only to learn a bit more about them and to appreciate them as human beings. Do we all have to agree with one another in order to get along? No, even if that might be nice. But we do need to respect one another. And also to show at least some willingness to learn about the issues that divide us, listening to each other openly and respectfully, and addressing one another in a respectful tone. This can easily get lost in long-term friendships as people tend to become rather too comfortable with each other and start taking each other for granted. Nobody has to convert to my faith as a price for my friendship. They don't even have to agree with it. But that doesn't rule out respect, and respect comes with the willingness to sit in the seat of the unlearned with one another and this is a role that is always going to be reciprocated for any friendship to work in the long-run. In the meantime, I am not about to end any friendships, nor burn any bridges. I am only hoping that we can all grow a little bit more in treating one another, and our philosophical differences, with respect. i think it is helpful for people who are in friendship to see if they can draft together a common set of ethics. We might not all have the same beliefs, or values, but there is a universality in ethics, if those ethics are founded on a common and mutual sense of respect and fraternal love and goodwill.

Nuance 30

My mother phoned me one night at half-past eleven to talk to me about abortion. That's right. The year was 1988, and she was being treated for lung cancer. I was her primary family support. She talked for around half an hour about how strongly she believed that abortion was a woman's right and that the state, nor anyone else, had no right to tell her what to do with her body. I didn't really know what to make of the call, but I did feel decidedly creeped out. Why would a woman phone her son late at night to talk about abortion, of all things? Especially to think that for nine months, when I was in utero, she could have easily made that decision about me and I wouldn't be here. I since, following her death in 1991, learned from my aunt that Mom had been through at least two abortions. The last one happened when I was around sixteen, and I suspected then that she was pregnant. She told me nothing, of course, and when I did ask if she was pregnant she, naturally, denied it. This was all rather upsetting to me. Profoundly so, actually, given that I would never get to know the brother that had been taken in utero. I wasn't exactly pro-life or pro-choice in those days, though I did veer more on the pro-life side, but with reservations. When I was younger and a teenage Jesus Freak we were under a lot of influence from the pro-life people, especially in the Catholic Church, and since we were connected with the charismatic movement in the Catholic Church, this became an open conduit for a good number of things, both good and bad. But even in my early twenties, I was beginning to ask questions, especially when I heard Malcolm Muggeridge speak about abortion, when I would have been, I think, 23. Muggeridge had been something of a spiritual mentor to me in his writings about Jesus, Mother Teresa, and Simone Veil, all of them, especially Jesus, being of prime importance in my life. During the question and answer phase of his talk that May evening in 1979, someone, me I think, had delivered a question about his position on capital punishment, and if he would be so kind as to defend the rights of condemned prisoners as passionately as the unborn. He sounded a round and profound no about this, spoke in almost impassioned support for the death penalty, and I immediately got up and left, turning my back forever on this perfidious mentor I had adopted. In the following years, I had conversations with a number of women who were undergoing abortions, and found that I really had no right to judge them. Not one of them was in a position where they could successfully raise a kid. Neither was it my place to judge them for their sexual behaviour, whether or not I might disapprove of the moral details (I am still a firm believer in monogamy, and I do not approve of casual sex or multiple partners, but I am not going to tell others how to use their genitals.) When I was a twenty-two year old Jesus freak living in intentional Christian community while attending classes at Langara College, a young woman who had befriended me told me about her own abortion following a rape. I could only empathize with her, but at least I was able to clarify that anyone impregnated by rape or incest had every right to abort. In 1997, I was connected with a radical Christian community involved in my Anglican parish church, and they were vigorously, militantly, pro-life, even pooh-poohing the notion of abortion in cases of rape or incest. Two of their members were actually implicated in a stabbing incident of a Vancouver abortion doctor. I recognized these men in the police drawings and reported them to the authorities. I had many drawn-out and anguished conversations with some of those people. They simply could not accept that the rights of the mother need to be given priority, that women should not be treated like baby machines, that in the first trimester, a fetus cannot be reasonably or rationally considered a human being. Yet, at least one of those individuals was nearly aborted by her mother while in gestation, and it simply is not easy to argue about that with someone like her, given her circumstances. I think there are many valid reasons for both positions, pro-life and pro-choice, but I still lean these days towards choice. I would still hope that abortion be treated as a last resort by women, that alternatives and supports be put in place for those who choose to give birth, but really, it is the woman's decision, and she should be supported, no matter what she decides. Still, there are so many unanswered questions here, and I do hope that people on both sides of the argument can tone down on their screaming enough to really start hearing each other. I don't think that terminating a pregnancy is a decision that is easily or lightly made by any woman or girl who finds herself with an unwanted pregancy. If I was a woman, and unexpectedly pregnant, I have no idea what I would do. But I would hope, that whatever my decision, there would be people by my side to support me, and to not judge my personal decision about my own body.

Nuance 29

I have already mentioned that the Christian life is not an easy career choice. In fact, it is downright hard and difficult, and if done right, can even lead to one's death by martyrdom, though that isn't always inevitable, and martyrdom must never be sought as an end in itself. So, my Gentle Reader, my hedonist Gentle Reader, my consumerist, selfish and narcissistic Gentle Reader. Why even bother? Why trouble ourselves to go out of our way to choose such a difficult and challenging faith that is going to require such sacrifice, discipline, change and personal transformation? Simple. The Spirit and love of God compel us. I did not choose to become a Christian. Which is to say, I did not do research, sit through powerpoint presentations nor did I read and study spreadsheets nor consult with dear Uncle Google. In fact, none of those things even existed some forty-eight years ago when at the foot of the Cross I knelt. I wasn't even thinking of becoming a Christian, and I have already written exhaustively on other pages of this blog about my experience of conversion. It was all about timing. And much to the chagrin of one regular reader of this blog, my Christian faith cannot be simply explained away as a kind of perverse adolescent rebellion against my hedonistic and morally bankrupt parents. Otherwise, why would I continue, given the high cost of discipleship, especially now, almost fifty years later, now that both Mom and Dad have long ago gone to their eternal reward, whatever that might happen to be for them. I am still a Christian. I still take my faith and discipleship very seriously. It is still hard work being a Christian, and it is more than worth it. Why? God's presence. The sense of his love. The way my life has fallen into an indelible organic order, which I can only owe to being faithful to Christ. Even our detractors will admit that Christians generally have their lives very together and very well-ordered. So, then, why bother living as a Christian when it is going to be so difficult and challenging? Well, why have children? They're difficult, messy, demanding, always needing something, and your whole life will be absorbed into raising your progeny for at least the next twenty years, and then what do you have left for yourself and your empty nest? Perhaps love plays a critical role in wanting and having and raising kids? Perhaps love plays a critical role in living as a Christian. Otherwise, why even bother? Except, when you have children, raise them right, and other things fall into place, then you are contributing to the general wellbeing of humanity, by adding your wonderful progeny to the world. Christians, responding to the call and love of God, by accepting the discipline, hardship and the much change and many changes in their lives, also contribute to the general wellbeing, by making real the love that feeds and sustains us all. This isn't to leave out other faiths, by the way, but I am writing here about Christians. I trust there will be Muslim and Jewish bloggers out there as well to write about their respective faiths.

Nuance 28

The Church does have a lot to answer for their treatment of women. By the same token, the Church has a lot to answer for their treatment of everybody. The Church has a lot to answer for. So does the state. So does history. And so do each one of us. It's all interwoven, intertwined, intertangled. Church, state and society, from the Fourth Century have made for a very odd and messy threesome, and no one seemed to want to take responsibility for changing the sheets. Now, let me make a few things perfectly clear, before I go on. I am a Christian. Despite my issues and disagreements with the Church, I am part of the Church, by fiat of being a Christian. No one gets a get out of jail free card. The Church has also played such a pivotal and foundational role in developing and building what is called Western Civilization, that even the most dogged and die-hard atheist must at some level accept being part of the Church, or at least of Christianity, regardless of how loud and shrill their protests to the contrary. Many of the so-called secular values of equality and respect for human rights come from, guess where? The Church. Guess who were the primary activists and vectors for the abolition of slavery? That's right, boys and girls. Christians. Advances in health and patient care and hospitals? Christians. Advances in public education? Christians. Anti-racism? You bet. Christians. Ever hear of Martin Luther King Jr? Baptist preacher. And if not actual professing or confessing Christians, still they have been people bred and nurtured on the Christian influence and underpinnings of society, even with the Inquisition, the Crusades, the witch-burnings and all the other horrible things that were also done by purported Christians. But all the purported Christians, rather than showing to be flawless saints, perfect and impeccable in every way, have always been flawed human beings. Some have most eloquently lived and exemplified the way of the Cross. Others, not so much. Many more fail miserably at this and just further bring disrepute on the Church and the Christian Gospel. Not because Christianity has failed, but because we have. And all of you smug armchair critics of the faith would do well to take stock and consider how well (or abysmally), you would do if you tried to walk and live in the way of Jesus Christ. But this is why I refuse to accept this nonsense that the church has always been anti-women, and, as some really addled feminists have claimed, actually had a planned and institutionalized plan of misogyny not too far off from genocide. Rather, that impenetrable entwining of church, state and society had had all parties trumpeting champing at the bit to maintain the status quo and the understood and accepted social order, using both scripture and tradition to justify keeping not just women, but everyone in their place and within their strict and prescribed roles. Women were really given the short end of the stick, but so was everyone. Men still were expected to go out and fight the kings' wars, and the punishments for infraction were swift and always lethal. Men and women both were expected to work themselves or be worked to death within their roles. No one lived to a ripe old age, without extreme luck. Women still had it particularly bad. And so also did slaves and indentured serfs and servants. Still, women had also to deal with the oppression of men, pregnancy, childbirth and childrearing, and anyone who tried to practice or help other women with birth control or abortions, or with health remedies were suspected and often tried and burned as witches, so, yes, there are here some very legitimate grievances. But this was not simply done by the church, but the whole monolithic hydra of Western Civilization. Has the Church done anything at all to address these wrongs? Yes. Lots. But the atheists and other nonbelievers who thrive on making armchair judgements are also woefully out of touch with what especially the Anglican, Lutheran, United and Presbyterian churches, among others, have been doing to publicly repent and address gender inequality, homophobia, and racism, especially against First Nations People. And I suspect that the reason why they haven't bothered to find any of this out, is because they simply don't want to. They would rather fester in their politically correct bigotry and stew in their hatred of God, and anything to persuade some of them to the contrary is not going to be kindly received.

Nuance 27

I am a Christian. This defines as well as describes me. This word for me is both noun and adjective. I used to define myself as a feminist, but really, I am first a Christian who believes in gender equality, because God has no preference of gender. I used to define myself as a pacifist, but really I am first a Christian who believes it is wrong for people, under any circumstances, to kill each other. I follow Jesus, who warned his disciples that he who takes up the sword shall by the sword perish. Instead of arming them to defend him against the Roman and Jewish authorities, Jesus accepted his unjust sentence and execution by death on the cross, knowing that thus he would be vector and author of the world's salvation and redemption. For this reason I disapprove of war. I could go on, about the environment, about human rights, about many many features I share in common with so-called progressive folk. But Unlike said progressive folk, I do not identify or define myself by any of those labels. Rather, I am a Christian, and my faith defines and informs my progressive values. Jesus, and not the Church is at the centre of my life. For those of you who don't believe, this has nothing to do with the Church, which is to say the Roman Catholic, or many Protestant denominations. Regardless of the Churches' historical record, and our differences, I am still part of the Church, because the Church claims to represent Christ, whom I follow. I am also an official Anglican, having been confirmed in the Anglican Communion and being currently enrolled in the parish of St. Faith's. So far, so good. Is my relationship with Christ dependent upon church attendance or membership? No. Then, why bother? It's about community and sharing. Christianity is not an individualistic faith, it is decidedly communal and communitarian. By connecting myself with other Christians I am completing my own experience as a Christian, because we are all in this together. I do get rather sick and tired of knee jerk politically correct folk who unfairly blame the church for misogyny, as the causes are far more complex than their simplistic little brains seem quite willing to plumb. While the church has been historically complicit in some horrendous crimes against humanity, beginning with the Crusades, then the Inquisition and witch-burnings, up to and including native residential schools and pedophilia, these are from internal corruption, and a very wrong-headed association with the state and with society. All this started with Constantine in the fourth century when he declared Christianity the official religion of the Roman empire. Thus, the church became a servant and a vector of the state, much in opposition to Christ's original mandate for his people. So, the Church became a very messy, sordid and bloody affair. But there were still many faithful adherents who loved God and served others in a spirit of sacrificial love, despite the abuses of ecclesiastical power. The church does get a particularly unfair rap in terms of misogyny, even if it is partially culpable. Part of the problem has been in the tendency of accepting as the direct word of God every single word in the Bible, including some of St. Paul's notorious and sometimes unfortunate statements about women and homosexuals. In the Anglican, and other Christian traditions, it has since been understood that many of these writings have been taken out of context. Paul was writing to specific persons about specific issues, which did not necessarily involve the casual reader. Paul was also a child of his era and culture, so that he would still take as gospel (sorry, bad pun!) all the Jewish traditions about women and sexuality, even if he was still, for a man of his time, quite liberal in his approach and interpretation. It is unfortunate that Christians throughout history have accepted his interpretation to the letter, even if it has since been found that the traditional roles and expectations of women could be legitimately considered as a social injustice, and that it is perfectly acceptable for persons of same-sex attraction to marry each other and live fully integrated lives as part of the community. As a Christian, there are aspects of secular feminism that I simply do not swallow, but I will explore this in a future post. Ta-ta.

Nuance 26

I just heard on the news that Pope Francis has kicked out of the priesthood a Washington cardinal who was sleazing his way all through the church, particularly for soliciting sex from vulnerable parishioners he was hearing in the confessional. Creepy, ugly, just plain awful. At least he's out now. Yes, Holy Mother Church will have a lot to answer for when standing before the Judgment Seat. But, really, Gentle reader, won't we all? I for one really get sick and tired of hearing my faith get slagged and dragged through the dirt. I am partially angry at the idiots who purport to represent Christ and his Church for not knowing better, for not wanting to know better, for using what really is an incredibly beautiful faith and reality to promote their own ugly agenda, be it Crusades, Inquisition, colonization, Native Residential Schools, sexual abuse of minors and others by clergy, pick your favourite scam. On the other hand, I get equally frustrated and impatient with people, including a couple of friends of mine, who will not see beyond these obvious sins and crimes, and because they really couldn't themselves be bothered with knowing much outside of their own prejudices, simply judge and categorize the Christian faith and all its adherents, without doing a bloody thing to inquire and really find out what is going on with an open heart and an open mind. Practising any religious faith, even adequately, is not a cakewalk. When we have aligned ourselves in devotion to the Higher (or, should I say highest) Power, then we are really putting ourselves in a vulnerable position, We have declared by our profession of faith, not only a certain belief system, but the willingness and determination to live out to the best of our ability the very tenets and teachings of said religion. Which means that we are going to actively seek to be better than what we already are, in service of God, community and the planet. There are so many obstacles to doing this well, among them our own human selfishness and laziness, our human moral weakness, our resistance to hard work and effort, our resistance to change, and our chronic refusal to cede control to a being who cannot be seen, but by the very existence and substance of this incredibly vast and complex universe, plainly makes evident their existence and being. Some of us come closer than others to getting it right. We usually are given little or no credit or publicity, with the rare exceptions of such luminaries as Martin Luther King Jr. and Mother Teresa. But because there is such a huge hatred of religion and love of sleaze in this world, they and other professing Christians who have been vectors of real change are often pilloried and it seems that no stone is ever unturned to prove them to be closet monsters or at least the most egregious hypocrites. In the meantime, there are also millions and millions of faithful Christians, Muslims and Jews, who live completely under the radar, who practice to the best of their ability their faith, and who really are often incredibly kind, generous and accomplished human beings as they go about their lives caring for the sick and elderly, feeding and housing the homeless, and fighting for social justice, peace and universal human rights. I can say this, because, I happen to be one of those people, and I have had the privilege of knowing many more people like me, better than me and worthier than me. Why don't we get airplay? Because nothing sells like dirt and sleaze and the perverse love of undermining and discrediting good people of faith. Yes, horrible things are done in the name of religion. Those crimes must be exposed and punished. But there is also much more good that also happens, which, unfortunately, folks who are too lazy and self-absorbed to get off their ass and do something worthwhile with their lives, are not going to bother to recognize, as they go on with their small, crabbed and selfish lives. Here is a suggestion. Instead of relying on the media to form your opinion about a religious faith, how about finding out about it yourself? Try reading and studying some religious texts. If it is Christianity, stick to the four Gospels, because they are completely about Jesus. Visit mosques, churches and synagogues. Meet the ministers, rabbis and imams. Meet and befriend some of the people there. Find out about their lives. If you are not willing to make even such small efforts to understand religious faith, then neither have you the right to sit in your armchair and pompously judge matters that you know nothing about. Rolling your eyes is not going to help. Examine yourself, your cynicism, and try opening your mind a little. You might even be very pleasantly surprised.

Nuance 25

Don't you just love those privileged journalists and broadcasters at the CBC who just don't have a clue what it is really like to live with difficulties, challenges and marginalization? I mean, sure, they get it all in their research and interviews but to listen to those airheads on public radio gloating on about their loving families, their coddled childhood, that they could live in Chateau Mommy and Daddy till after they finished university, and then go on to establish their shining professional careers, marry their perfect spouses and pop out their perfect little minnie-me's, and it is all so revolting and so nauseating. I phoned the Early Edition at the crack of dawn to give them a blast for having that kind of conversation of their own personal privilege live on air, offering them as a reality check that I had to leave home at 18 because of my crappy family situation, was never able to finish university, nor earn a living wage, and now have to live in subsidized housing. I would have loved to have seen their faces upon hearing my little comment. And they are typical of the class of journalists in this country. Most of them have known nothing but privilege, white and otherwise, and so all the experience of the so-called lower orders gets filtered through their distorted privileged lens, and the rest of the privileged folk who live on this great stolen land of ours get their privileged interpretation of the life experience of people like me. This is always a bit infuriating, as it is unfair, because poor people simply do not have the resources that they do, and so we cannot really tell our own story, and we need to, because the rest of the country keeps getting a distorted version of our lives. This is especially problematic with our current homelessness crisis. This is a humanitarian catastrophe, and will only be realistically addressed once it is treated and tackled like the national emergency that it is, so that all the necessary resources can be funnelled and channelled into getting people off the pavement and into decent housing situations. The huge mistake that the news media makes about these people is in their lazy and arrogant way of lumping every single one of the homeless into a category of disenfranchised losers, little or no consideration given to them as individuals, each with gifts and strengths as well as challenges, who have simply fallen through the wider than ever cracks in our social support infrastructure. I was never street homeless, myself, but I did spend ten months or so couch surfing, some twenty years ago. There were, as there still are, some very broad and sweeping assumptions and generalizations about people like me, that I ended up for a while buying into. I no longer accept these definitions. This is what being poor has done for me: I have become extremely grateful for the little I have. Instead of becoming grasping and acquisitive, I appreciate what I have, and even if I am demographically poor, I feel incredibly rich. I have a roof over my head, and it is a decent, if modest place to live; I always have enough food to eat, and clothes to wear. I of course live modestly, and within my means, but because I have never had much, I don't expect much. I am very responsible with money and finances, maintain a strict but not onerous budget, have a savings account and am able to travel every year. All this on poverty wages, with help from BC Housing. Among all the low-income adults who live as I do, there are many like me. CBC and other media don't seem to know or care that we exist, perhaps because we are not newsmakers, but more because we do not gratify the public's craving for dirt. Our lives are too together for that. Neither do we make it easy for any of those bottom feeders to reinforce their favourite stereotypes about us (no, we are not lazy), nor to break out of their mental and intellectual laziness about perpetuating dumb and negative stereotypes. Do poor people have addictions? Some of us, yes, but I don't, and many other poor people are substance free, but perhaps for the common caffeine addiction. By the same token, we are not all mentally ill. How about all you privileged folk? With your daily martinis, and your neurotic obsession with wellness and perfection? Try and convince me that you aren't also sick. Go on. Convince me!

Nuance 24

People will assume all kinds of things about my life and situation, and for one simple reason: they have not lived my experience. It seems that almost no one else appears to know what it is to have neither family nor adoptive family. No one knows, nor wants to know, what it is like to be this alone. It is too frightening for them, and they don't want to think about it. For me, despite some of my recent complaints, this is a liberation I am not, here, going into detail about my horrible family, as their crimes against me have been elsewhere documented on this blog, but I am now free from the nightmare. It does repeat on me every Christmas, but there is a lot of trauma wrapped around that season for me, and I do not wish to write further about this, Gentle Reader. It has been very difficult for me keeping friendships, and I suppose for various reasons. One rather cruel individual, while trying to drive me out of his life, accused me of driving people away from me, and I know this is not true, and that bullies like him will use whatever justification they can grab out of the air for treating others badly. (So, sue me, Myer Leech!) But this is something we often all do to one another and at various times in our lives. If there is anything that frightens people away from me, it is simply, this: they cannot cope with having a friend who is so unmoored and so unsupported. It is frightening for them. It makes them feel obligated, because surely for a person like me, things are not going to come out well. What really heightens the injustice is this: if we cannot rely on our friends to help support us when we have no family in our lives, to try to become a kind of extended or adoptive family, then whom can we rely on, and really, how can anyone with that kind of selfish attitude be called a friend? But we're living now in different times, and people are a lot more selfish than they used to be. We have become a culture of consumers, and in all of our relationships, it seems to be all about what we can get, not what we can give. I do not place a demand or expectation that others are going to adopt me into their homes, otherwise I would have dumped every one of those losers whom I thought were my friends over these last ten years or so. But now, enough is enough. I happen to know, that if I was in a position to help any of those wankers during the Christmas holidays, if they were alone and without family, I would at least try to visit them, even just on the phone for that day, because I know how horrible it can be feeling alone and abandoned at Christmas, and I at least treat others like human beings. Unfortunately, very few of the friends in my life seem to share those values, so it is time to say goodbye. The other thing about being alone and without family is that you really need and appreciate your need for others. Those losers who are not real friends don't have a clue what it is like, and if they had to walk in my shoes even for one day, I would probably be visiting them in the psychiatric hospital. And, unlike those idiots, at least I would care enough to see how they were doing.

Nuance 23

I think that most of us are really desperately lonely, and those of us who are not caught up in the mad scramble of staying connected are likely to feel it the most. I have intentionally stopped contacting a lot of people, partly because I don't believe that they are real friends, partly because I am needing this time of solitude in order to face and reckon with this solitude, much as I don't always like it. I have also long doubted their integrity as friends, given that I have always had to do most of the emotional heavy lifting in order to stay in touch. I have felt passively stigmatized by those people, as though they have long believed that they are doing me a favour by being my friend, as though they are professional volunteers who are willing to be seen with me in public, but otherwise holding me perpetually at arm's length, as though I am not worthy to be counted in their circle of close friends, probably because I am poor, living in BC Housing, and living with a mental health diagnosis, that never has, and now less than ever, defines my life. Oh, so very kind and charitable for them to pretend to be my friends. Those are the same people who ignore me around Christmas, by the way, knowing that I have no family, and that this is an emotionally disastrous time for me, and seem usually too busy to visit, and certainly if they don't hear from me for a while, are probably more likely to feel relieved that I am no longer around to annoy or embarrass them. I do have two friends who want to stay in touch. The others, I'm not sure about, so I am going to first wait to hear from them. If there is no contact in a year, I will get in touch, ask them if they have ended the friendship, and if so, then simply let them go. As for making new friends, well, that's always easier said than done. I still think that the focus should be on being a friend first, but there also comes a time when I have to assert my needs and rights as a friend if I am not feeling adequately supported, and this can make some people very angry. One of my Mexican friends appears to have ended our friendship over this issue, which to me suggests that he never was a friend to begin with, so good riddance. With friends like him, who needs enemas? I am not optimistic about the others. They know that I have no family, and very few people who would care to visit me in hospital, or would attend my funeral or memorial service. As for people in church, I suppose that time will tell. I really can't imagine any of the good burghers at St. Faith's actually wanting to give me the time of day outside of Sunday services, but we shall see. At a recent workshop there, it was said that they do like to welcome everybody, but shouldn't be expected to help people whose needs are beyond their capabilities. No one offered examples, and I am interpreting this as a very convenient get out of jail free card. For example, if next Christmas I find myself, as usual, abandoned, with nowhere to go, can I count on any of those lovely parishioners inviting me into their homes to celebrate with their extended family and close friends? Didn't think so. Silly me, for expecting decent and kind behaviour from church people. In the meantime, this does give me something to do on Sundays, and people to chat with, even if the relationships are likely to remain superficial and without real substance. Unless there is anyone who would like to surprise me. You're innocent when you dream. In the meantime, I will go on reaching out in kindness and friendship and will continue to do everything I can to help out at church, and will go on casting the usual pearls before the usual swine, as is my Christian duty and obligation, and expect nothing in return, while faking my way through church with a smile on my face and a chronically breaking heart. And don't even think of accusing me of feeling sorry for myself, you who have never walked in my shoes.

Nuance 22

Here is the material that got automatically deleted: I had mentioned Dr. Rosalie Bertell, the nun who was also a cancer researcher, environmental activist and and epidemiologist. She was speaking at the 1983 World Forum of the convening of the World Council of Churches, which was taking place in Vancouver at UBC in August of that year. I find it interesting that no further mention was given of Ms. Bertell's theory about El Niño being caused by French underwater nuclear testing, a very plausible theory, but perhaps just a little too controversial for public consumption. During that time I heard other notable speakers, among them the Archbishop of Canterbury, Robert Runcies, and Coretta Scott King, the widow of Martin Luther King. That was an incredible and intense year for me. We also had our own solidarity movement, a huge coalition of labour leaders, social activists and professionals working in health and community support occupations and radicalized poor folk like me, all organizing against the right wing provincial government that was set to shred our social safety net. Unfortunately they succeeded and many vulnerable people have suffered. it was also during that time that I received my calling and began my ministry to street involved queer and trans people, AIDS sufferers, sex workers and others falling through the cracks. We are needing people with vision and hearts moved by love if we are going to find our way through this complex of messes we have created ourselves. We are facing some very challenging times. I think this is a time for people to really return to faith, to let go of their selfish excuses for rejecting the God of love. We are going to have to be no less than saints, all of us, if we are going to really get through the planetary challenges that are confronting us. It is not yet too late, but there are many forces dominated by greed and the lust for power that are getting in the way. They will not stand forever.

Nuance 21

Gentle Reader, my Blogpost this morning automatically deleted, so I will give a brief summary here of what I was writing. There is a lot of unexpected snow happening here and this is from climate change. The El Niño phenomenon is still at play and it was hypothesized by Dr. Rosalie Bertell, a cancer research scientist and environmental activist and nun whom I heard speak at the forum of the World Council of Churches back in 1983 that it was likely the French government underwater testing of nuclear weapons in the South Pacific that was causing it. I am thinking that during this snowfall that here all the schools are closed, even though we're getting maybe five to eight inches of snow, which isn't a lot. I also am thinking how, when I was a kid growing up in the sixties, and we were getting a lot more snow, the schools never closed, at least not in my district. We were stronger and tougher in those days. I rather shudder to think of this current batch of pampered little rose petals, and what weak, self-indulgent little sissies they are becoming, thanks to their over-protective mommies and daddies, and that these are the same people who will be taking over in a few years. It is sad and a little bit frightening to think that we have become such coddled and delicate and self-centred little consumers. And that this mentality is going nowhere fast, but will long be the dominant ethos of whatever remains of Western Civilization. I hope I am wrong, and I really hope there will be a counter wave against this institutionalized coddling. We are going to be needing strong, healthy, independent and ethically sound leaders for our future, if we are going to successfully navigate our way out of this mess we have made of things. Time will tell. Sorry, that's all I'm going to write for today, since this laptop seems bent on destroying my blogpost if I let it. Bye for now.

Nuance 20

I had a conversation with someone yesterday about a country I have never visited, but would like to, where this person goes frequently to visit family members. This person has married into the culture, so to speak, though does not speak the native language of the spouse (I am being very careful to not identify this individual, by the way, given that some of what I might be writing about said person might not come across as very flattering.) Now, I happen to be fluent in the language of that person's spouse and the country where this individual goes to visit every year. I found the comments of said person about this country to be interesting, if rather negative. I am also persuaded that the country is being viewed very much through this person's own myopic lens and that the people of this place are being judged according to that individual's personal prejudices and criteria. This is very easy to happen when you do not know the language of the place. I have also come to wonder whether there might be more to one's ability to learn a new language than neuro-wiring, as insist some linguists and neuro-scientists. I am not an expert and can only offer opinions and perspectives based on anecdotal evidence. So, here goes. There is a Colombian lady who lives in my building who seems absolutely incapable of learning English, even after twenty years. This lady is quite elderly, now, and will never forgive you if you imply anything about her age (this I have learned the hard way, Gentle Reader!) I have also been impressed by her absolute incapacity to adapt, or appreciate anything about the culture here in Canada. I recall one morning last year when in the hall she was complaining to me in Spanish about not being allowed to have parties in her apartment with her door open. There had been complaints by another tenant or two, besides me, and management cracked down her. She proceeded to lament how this place was way too quiet, that it was like living in a tomb. I have often suspected that there may be more to her inability to learn English than the sheer hard work it requires to become adept in another language. Simply, she probably never wanted to. She did not want to put aside even a little bit of her Colombian identity in order to accommodate her new country. I have come to suspect that, given how important it is that we make ourselves open, and vulnerable, to a new language in order to learn it, then possibly not being able to learn it might also suggest a lack of flexibility and a stubborn unwillingness to accept and embrace anything new. I do happen to notice that this could well be a trait shared in common by this lady and the other person I have just mentioned on this blogpost. By the same token, people who are multilingual, or even fluently bilingual, I have found to be very flexible and open-minded and always seem curious about the unknown, the different, the other. This isn't to say that my Colombian friend is a hostile churl. She is actually quite a lovely person, but the catch 22 she has found herself in is going to really limit her life experience. Learning a new language is not a cakewalk. To do it well, you have to become open and vulnerable and let the new language completely colonize your brain, like an incubus. This can be very scary, and persons with a more conservative bent (or a refusal to bend) are probably not going to do very well, as they continue to stubbornly live in their own little world while muttering bitterly about how lonely it is and how unfriendly others seem to be.

Nuance 19

I read in this weekend's Globe and Mail about how suicides have been going up among people in my age demographic. That's right, the Boomers. I don't really think of myself as a bonafide Boomer, rather, Generation Jones. We were born between 1955 and 1965, or so, and are more the forerunners for Generation X. Or to put it bluntly, the Boomers gave the world Woodstock. We gave you guys punk rock. I actually turned in my Boomer card while I was in my early twenties. I simply had ceased to like us. I was finding us to be self-indulgent, shallow, narcissistic and hedonistic, and not even in young children are these qualities to be proud of but to grow out of. I fear that not many Boomers have grown out of those traits, many of us remaining perennially stuck in the Terrible Twos, or the year of "It's MINE"!. I also noticed that I was at least a couple of years younger than everyone else. They all seemed set to stay young forever, and I didn't like this. I was only twenty-three, but already set to embrace ageing, perhaps because I was already starting to show early hair loss. I had a best friend, a radical lesbian feminist one year younger, with whom I was enjoying an ageing race. That's right, we both had a special fondness and respect for older people, maturity, and how much we had to learn from our elders, and we had a competition going to see who would pop the first wrinkle. Instead of getting in a panic about my thinning hair, I decided to accept it, and enjoy the challenge of maturing and becoming less selfish, which provided me a perfect lifeboat for escaping from this ship of fools. Now, forty years later, the Boomers have remained as pathetic as ever. Such a brood of narcissists. And all the usual life stages: getting married, buying a home (for the fortunate), having a kid, midlife crisis, menopause, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera, the Boomers all embrace and write about and blog about and tweet about, and whine about, and brag about as though they are the first and only people in all the two hundred thousand years or so of our species' existence for whom any of those signature moments of life have ever happened, and as if none of those things were ever experienced by their own parents, grandparents, great grandparents, or great great grandparents. And now, our oldest cohorts are finding out that none of the cosmetic surgery, diet, cleanses, yoga, mindfulness, or frenzied power workouts, are going to do one blessed thing to delay the inevitable. So, how have many of us decided to deal with it? By throwing one prolonged meltdown tantrum against life itself. Instead of accepting and embracing, like mature and responsible adults, the inevitability of ageing and death, more and more of those ageing spoilt brats, are hopping off to Holland or Belgium or Switzerland for medically-assisted suicide (I refuse to call it by its current euphemism.). They're afraid of the pain and humiliation that often comes with ageing. They are terrified that some paid stranger will end up wiping their stinky bums for them, of losing eyesight, hearing, of losing their minds, of regressing to the same infantile state of absolute dependence on others that is the way that all of us start life. And of course this kind of decline is not going to be inevitable for everyone, but the fear of pain, vulnerability and dependency seems to be enough to get a lot of us flipping the bird at the God most of us no longer believe in (whom I not only believe in, but love and serve, myself), and declaring in their usual self-indulgent pomposity that if they are going to die, then they would rather do it themselves. This is no less, really, than the ultimate fallout of our prolonged rebellion against God, and it remains my position that it is not the lack of scientific evidence that turns people into atheists, but the absolute refusal to accept that we are subservient, subordinate and dependent upon an ultimately higher power. There is nothing wrong with this by the way. It is the order of the universe, of which we are but nano-members. What is really wrong with our generation is that we have failed to love, we have failed to accept the humility of our human existence, and we have decided, most of us, to accept Satan's offer of complete self-determination, no matter the huge cost to our souls. But given how deteriorated the state of the soul of your average Boomer, it ain't gonna be a huge trade-off. Pathetic, eh, Gentle Reader?

Nuance 18

I'm not listening quite so much to CBC nor to other radio the last few days. It is rather nice. The silence is soothing, and my nerves are more rested. The programming on the CBC has become nothing less than abhorrent, especially with the zeal of the CBC to reach out to the so-called hoi polloi, or the common man (shut-up, Politically-Correct Thought Police, shut-up, shut-up, shut-up! I am using man here in its original, historic context, which is to include all genders, and I am not about to make it inclusive just to satisfy the likes of you and your rabid pit bulls.) Anyway, the CBC. They scrapped most of the classical music programming nearly twenty years ago, and started cramming the airwaves with crappy pop and rap music, just like grandma getting a face lift and a boob job, then tottering out to the bar, cougar of the week, in her miniskirt and sexy stiletto heels, to see what kind of young flesh she can snare. So the CBC has flipped the bird at the elites and gone off after the trashy everyman, without thinking in terms of both-and, but either-or. So, I listen very selectively these days, and it's better than phoning in angry and profanity laden comments at those idiots for their absolute lack of judgment. I do like to imagine that I have a slightly higher calling in life, Gentle Reader, than verbally abusing smug and arrogant radio journalists with a severe midlife crisis (Stephen Quinn, host of the Early Edition), or tarted up menopausal women who sound like polka-callers (is there any such thing as a polka caller? Well, if there was, then Gloria Makarenko, host of On the Coast, would be an excellent candidate.) Anyway, I'm sick of all of them, and besides which, I'm sure they are not good for my blood pressure, so I'm taking a bit of a rest again. And, anyway, I don't even know why I listen to them, given that they are securely elite upper middle class and I'm just an overeducated prole living in bC Housing, so what do we really have in common? But this is so typical of the CBC, which is staffed by the elites and every time they try to reach out to poor or other marginalized people, they are going to come across as being clumsy, insensitive and patronizing. I will still turn them on from time to time for the news and for some of the interviews, but only very selectively, so I can stay informed without insulting my intelligence. Otherwise, like other listeners, I will again permit myself to be held hostage by upper class boors presuming to be our role models, and they are not my role models. I especially object to the way they have so normalized alcohol consumption as to turn our public broadcaster into a vector for a culture of alcoholism, with their programming to promote craft beer, spirits and wine. Very irresponsible, but they want to look hip. Granny with a boob job.

Nuance 17

A couple of days ago, I was watching a video in Spanish about wildlife in Mexico. There was a bit about a rather hideous little reptile (no, Gentle Rader, this post is not about president Dump!), a kind of lizard that was being pursued by a bobcat. Before the cat could turn the lizard into a snack, it secreted a kind of poisonous, bloody substance from its eyes that hit kitty right in the nose. The bobcat ran away, hungry, and the little reptile could saunter on to find a rock on which to bask in the sun. Then a roadrunner was confronted by a rattlesnake that must have been thinking of having him for dinner. The roadrunner struck back, killed the snake and happily dined on him that day. Tastes like chicken! This reminds me of the Adams Family motto: "We gladly feast on those who would subdue us." And of course, the Weka, a flightless rail native to New Zealand. It is a kind of a dumpy looking drab sort of bird related to the crane but looks more like a chicken trying to look like a duck. Like many birds native to remote islands, this bird is flightless and considered vulnerable to introduced predators. The Weka has done unusually well under the circumstances, and instead of being victimized by the introduced rat population, simply added them to its diet. This bird became iconic to me for my recovery after being homeless and living with PTSD for a while. Every time I felt confronted by an insurmountable obstacle, I would remember the Weka as it feasted on a rat, or some other introduced critter, then happily ran on to its next conquest, and suddenly I felt better and strengthened and able to face the battle. And then there were the daffodils and other spring flowers yesterday, that I noticed flourishing in the winter sun, despite the unusual and bitter cold. They appeared beautiful and robust, as though they were shouting that we don't care how cold it is, we are still going to thrive and flourish! In the wake of things I have been through the last couple of months, this for me is a very timely reminder. Even if I am not a poster child for worldly success, I have still done well, considering some of the obstacles I have had to surmount. It is good to know that I still don't have to cave to onerous circumstances. The onerous circumstances are going to cave to me. It is fight or flight, and I'm going to fight, and I'm going to go on fighting. Even when there are defeats, I will review my situation, discover where I have been weak, where I have been careless or lazy, try to improve and then move on. This is how I have done well in the last twenty years. It is too early in the war to accept defeat, and until this war is over, it will still be too early. I also have advantages on my side. I have a relationship with God, and while this is not the same as having a magic wand, it is still a huge advantage, because this fills and equips me with the love, joy, and hope, and ultimately the strength and vision that will keep seeing me through. I have had to accept that I cannot fight this battle alone, for which reason I have aligned myself with a church full of good and faithful people. I am also continuing in my work, not just to pay the bills, but because this is a work of love and there is strength in loving others. I am not always going to get it right. I am going to trip and stumble and even fall sometimes. There will be humiliations. But how else are we going to learn, Gentle Reader, how else are we going to learn!

Nuance 16

I have just, yesterday, uploaded for publishing on Kindle a collection of ten of my short stories. This is a free self-publishing service that I never even knew existed until a friend who works in IT told me about it and sent me the link and information. He is one of my language exchange partners and lives in Mexico, but his English is already fluent and he decided after reading some stuff on this blog that I should give it a go. Can't hurt, I guess, and I do appreciate the interest he has taken. There aren't many friends like that, and I have really done badly with some really self-centred idiots, whom only by courtesy I still refer to as friends. But time will tell. This has also caused me to search my archives and hard drives for all the short fiction I have written, but done nothing with, really, apart from some of it appearing on these pages. But even if I will be getting but a whopping seventy percent on three dollar ebooks of my stories, it is still better than nothing, and who knows, Gentle Reader, I might even be able to retire early. Maybe two weeks early. Maybe three. Wow! In the meantime, I cannot think of anything really original to write about this morning, except that I resist the temptation of perfectionism, which has become the new neurosis, thanks to global capitalism. There used to be special programs for underachieving students. Now they are trying to work in something similar for overachievers, which rather makes sense, even if it is still a bit of a hard sell to get some of those privileged little boys and girls to elicit much compassion or pity. In my case, I have resumed writing this post following an hour and a half nap, which I was needing, from having just more than five hours sleep last night. Which means that I can just get this blogpost finished with little time left, except maybe for a little work in my sketchbook, but the other stuff I will have to leave till later, and all because, well, I am not a perfectionist. Rest and self-care always come first in my life. I have had to learn my lesson the hard way. Here is the synopsis for my short stories: This a collection of ten of my short stories. These are all contemporary tales about people who live on the margins and who find strength and victories great and small in the challenging circumstances of their lives. Some live with mental illness, others are poor, dealing with many diverse circumstances of disempowerment. Some are gay, lesbian or transgendered. Others don't fit any pat or easy description, but have still found creative ways of living life, if not on their own terms, then at least on the terms that life has mandated for them. This collection of stories begins with a woman, Anne, from Canada vacationing for the first time alone. She is middle aged and has sought to keep ageing at bay through a series of cosmetic interventions, thanks to her Venezuelan ex-boyfriend and business partner, a plastic surgeon practicing illegally in Canada. Her twin sister, who has opted to age normally, has challenged her to try to give up her privilege while on this trip. She finds herself encountering and being challenged by her own inner shadows as she becomes unusually aware of the needs of the poor people around her and while trying to negotiate a romantic tryst with a young Mexican man. This is followed by Ducks, a story about a young woman, Denise, who is caring for her mentally ill mother who is also a concert pianist. A Sad and Ugly Tale chronicles the demise and untimely death of an arrogant radio broadcaster who hates the poor and homeless. Monster gives a glimpse into the life of Adrienne a young woman losing her fourth baby to family services as she spirals downward into mental illness, and how she comes into a better place in life thanks to the intervention of her long-lost mother.. In One Perfect Rose, a woman is reflecting on the suicide of a friend of hers as she is attending his memorial service. As well as being her neighbour, he was a professional mental health worker who for a while was supporting and caring for her during some stages of her mental illness. Violet Green Swallows is an exploration into the mind of a man confronting his own subtle homophobia after his son is convicted and imprisoned for participating in a gay bashing, His father winds up seeking out the male couple victimized by his son, to apologize and seek understanding. He is a bird-lover, and the nesting box he is building for a certain species of swallow has brought out in him a particular tenderness, started by his encounter with the young gay male couple. Persephone involves a retired Classics professor implicated in the untimely death of a young veteran from the war in Afghanistan. As a penance, he tries to support him while he is dying in hospital. In Rite of Spring an older woman who has lived most of her life with mental illness goes through a kind of personal rebirth. Lonnie's Mom tells about a fifteen year old drug dealer, Raymond, who is finally busted and has to reckon with more than just the law. The first story, La Tigresa Negra, involves a Canadian woman in Mexico. This final tale, Copper Beech, is a suitable conclusion as it is about a wealthy Mexican woman living in Canada, and her work with refugees, and of the suicide of her Chilean husband who was a survivor of the torture camps of Pinochet, and the life she has built for herself and her stepson. I prefer to let my characters speak for themselves as they make their way through the many challenges and obstacles in their lives, some finding a sense of inner reconciliation and growth, and others not doing so well, but still navigating the choppy and sometimes violent waters that all of us must confront: relationship and marriage failure, poverty, mental illness, discrimination, and even death. Each person becomes a kind of student of the universe, and even if their lives seem a confused and incoherent jumble, each is able eventually to make a little bit of sense of things and to even find and embrace a sense of purpose in their lives.

Nuance 15

I was having a chat yesterday with the friend of one of my clients. He is about my age, early sixties, and works in a physically demanding trade. Like almost all working Canadians, he is basically stuck in his occupation until he turns sixty-five and can then begin to collect his full old age security and other benefits. like a lot of people of a certain age, he isn't as robust as he used to be and his work has become difficult and onerous. In this regard I feel lucky because I don't have to do a lot of physical work in my occupation, outside of going for long walks with clients. I am also in good physical condition, but I'm still doubtful that I could endure a full day, much less a full week, of being a plumber or a construction worker. There are limits that, being of a certain age, I am no longer interested in testing. Maybe I don't have a heart condition, but I still am aware that things tend to wear more quickly and heal more slowly after forty, and I am not about to end up in hospital just from wanting to prove something. To my friend, I mentioned that our government needs to enact policies that will help grandfather (pardon the pun) persons of a certain age into retirement. I don't see why they couldn't come up with the funding to help assist people older than fifty towards a gentler decline. If we want to take things a bit easier, then why not subsidize us for a shorter work week even before we hit fifty-five and the ravages of time really start to tell on us? There should be a universal suffrage program for gradually increasing financial support to older Canadians over fifty until they reach retirement age. This should include a full package of housing assistance, from rent subsidies to mortgage assistance that will ensure that no one in this country should end up homeless or hungry just because we are getting older. Maybe this would be expensive, at first, but the long term savings would make it all worthwhile: there would be fewer emergency and health care and shelter expenditures because we would already be much better cared and provided for. Neither should subsidized housing be the exclusive purview of people on low incomes or with disabilities. With the cost of housing being perpetually through the roof in this country, and especially here in that pretty dumb blonde of cities, Vancouver, there are going to be precious few individuals who are not going to be needing this kind of assistance. I still believe that anyone earning less than fifty grand a year should not have to pay any more than thirty percent of their income for rent, and if they are living in a high rental building, then the government ought to step forward with a program of subsidies in order to keep them housed which, in the long run, will still be less expensive to the taxpayer than the horrendous fallout of ending up homeless. We don't have to remain hostage to corporate greed in this city, nor anywhere else in Canada, but people's thinking is really going to have to change if we are going to see any significant developments or change. I have been, myself, incredibly lucky. Though my income is pathetically unliveable, my rent is cheap, thanks to BC Housing, and cheaper still, now that I am getting early CPP. Why cannot this largess be expanded and extended to anyone in this country who is needing it? Older working adults, for example. Earning low incomes in physically and mentally demanding occupations. Other low wage workers who, like anyone else, deserve a decent place to live. We really have to start holding our government's feet to the fire and the thinking of a lot of the people who vote them into power also needs to change. Especially now with this growing increase of food bank dependency and homelessness, and a lot of the people who make up this cipher are people older than fifty who have spent their entire lives busting their asses for this country. And for what?

Nuance 14

There is occurring, in my part of the country, a particularly cruel climate phenomenon. We have just ended a false spring, and winter has descended with particular nastiness on the West Coast. We don't have much in the way of snow, so far, but that could change in a couple of days. It is early February. Much of Canada languishes beneath layers of ice and snow, though strangely, it's warmer now in Toronto (the city the rest of Canada loves to hate) with six degrees and rain. We had mild weather throughout from November, sometimes with too much wind and rain. There were snowdrops already starting to bloom just before Christmas. Daffodils in early January, then crocuses and a few camellias. We were all just beginning to delight in this false spring, quietly hoping that it would continue past the last risk of frost in March. Now reality has hit, the flowers are all dead and we are bitterly cold and freezing. And, despite the lovely sunny weather and blue skies, I think many of us are battling depression. So much of our lives and our hopes are interwoven with nature. The early, if false and perfidious spring, corresponds with our quiet hope that our lives are improving, or will improve, the hope that we will not only get through this, but at the end, it will be somehow better than it was. Even though I am not a dog person, I find it interesting how much humans have in common with those disgusting and delightful animals. Disgusting? Well, how else can we describe an animal that stinks to high heaven, rolls in shit, eats it too, along with garbage and carrion, sniffs bums, pees on trees and the legs of people not walking fast enough, etcetera. Dogs are also affectionate, loving, loyal and self-sacrificing. They can also be aggressive, vicious and dangerous. Just like us. Dogs also live in the moment, and really, so do we, when we're not obsessed with the future and not beating ourselves up over the past. But when you see a dog left tied to a lampost or bike rack outside a store or coffeeshop, howling, whining and crying so pathetically and heart-rendingly for its human, one would think the poor animal has been abandoned forever. But dogs don't have that concept of time, and are absolutely incapable of rationalizing. Master has slipped away for five minutes and will be back in five minutes with a steaming take-out latte. Doggie doesn't know this, only that master is gone and this is the end of the world as he knows it. We are also like this. Our false spring has been shown for what it is. False. My false friends have revealed themselves for what they really are to me. False. The cold and hard reality of winter has set in and destroyed everything. True. It is going to stay winter forever and now this is the end of the world. False. This cold snap will soon end, and flowers will bloom again, and before we know it, we will be surrounded by the Vivaldi-notes of spring. We will get through this. In the meantime, bundle up. It's cold outside.

Nuance 13

I am an optimist. I can't help it. I don't think it's just in my nature, though this does seem hardwired into me. How odd, that I just switched on the CBC and there is an interview with historian Margaret McMillan who is saying that with the current concentrations of power in the world that there is a lot to be pessimistic about in the world. I suppose she's right. But this doesn't quite resonate with me. Perhaps because we've always got through all the catastrophes and disasters that have confronted us throughout history? As I mentioned to a friend yesterday, we have always gone through bad and worse. They have found that just over seventy thousand years ago, environmental disasters had reduced the human species to some two hundred persons all over the world, and they are all our ancestors now. Then there wss that last and particularly disastrous ice age. I really don't know. Or maybe we're the cat that has just been granted his ninth and final life? I have long thought of dispair as a luxury I cannot afford. I suppose this also runs with my personal experience in life. I have known my share of disasters and collapses, have somehow muddled or struggled through and have always come out okay, if perhaps a little bit bruised. I have certainly had to be creative with my coping strategies and solutions. This reminds me of an argument I had with my psychiatrist some fourteen or fifteen years ago. He tried to dish me a bunch of Freudian crap about defense mechanisms. I simply shot back that every one of the things about which he was trying to pathologize me were coping strategies, and nothing else. I was thoroughyly conscious and in control of what I was doing and the strategies worked. He ended up agreeing. Collectively, we are going to get through this current batch of crises. We always have. If we can stop being so stupid and selfish, that is, and here is where my optimism is always challenged and then I begin to teeter towards dispair. It doesn't take much. For example, I was listening to Spark, a program on CBC Radio One about how cattle ranchers in Alberta's use of high tech has been ruling out the necessity of branding calves. Now, they were mentioning this purely from a pragmatic perspective, as well that by not branding the calves, they tend to gain more weight and produce a better quality of meat. Absolutely nothing was said about branding being one less torturous cruelty that their animals were being subjected to. As if the wellbeing of their livestock would matter not a damn, simply their profitability. Well, of course. And probably those would be among the same Albertans who want pipelines and the oil industry to flourish, even as the future of this planet is being held hostage on a craps game. And those same, selfish, callous but pragmatic Albertans are not the exception. They are sadly and oh so very typical of the kind of peopke who populate this earth. The same folks who badmouth people like me as freaks and radicals. Fair enough, but those are still stereotypes, and one to one, I am not convinced that they are going to be so universally odious. Nobody is. This is an uphill climb, and it is a matter of time before we can really know where we are going with all these changes that are hanging over us. Perhaps it is also because I always believe that good will out, no matter how bad it gets. But hasn't it always, Gentle Reader? Eventually?

Nuance 12

How does one end a friendship? I have ended friendships in the past, and it has always turned out a bitter and pyrrhic victory. A lot of pain was inflicted on all of us, and I don't want to do this anymore. By the same token, a lot of people, more than I can number, have rejected me. I still haven't recovered, this has been so damaging to me. There is a famous saying of Confucious, that if you want to seek vengeance, then be sure to dig two graves. I am not doing this any more, and neither am I rejecting any of you. I am simply stating that you have all really failed me as friends. I am willing to reconcile with each and every one of you, but first you have to start acting like real friends and including me more into your lives and showing me more emotional and moral support. To start giving back what I have been giving to you. To start reciprocating. Friend is a verb. And not in the Facebook sense. Post-recovery, I befriended a small number of individuals who over the past ten years have seemed determined to keep me at armslength. They would call this maintaining boundaries. But this has also meant keeping me at an emotionally safe distance, unless perhaps, they wanted emotional support from me, but otherwise treating me as some sense of free inspiration and entertainment. They have never really considered me a friend, simply as a useful idiot. None of these people have ever thought to include me in their plans for Christmas, for example, except in a couple of circumstances where I had to almost beg and plead not to be left alone and abandoned. But you have all, unlike me, had yoyur own families, and friends that mattered more to you than me, to take refuge with, not caring that I am alone and socially isolated and, especially at times like Christmas, needing to be welcomed, included, and made to feel wanted. I have been deeply hurt by all these years of suffering because of your selfishness, and there has always remained between us a sense of stigma. If I'm alone at Christmas and struggling with depression and temptations towards suicide, well, that's too bad for me, I guess. You people are not, nor have ever been to me, real friends. You have subtley and discreetly treated me like damage goods, like a freak, like a borderline sicko. Not like a friend. I have kept returning and returning to each one of you, like a beaten dog, hoping that you wouldn't reject me, not wanting to cope with the loneliness of abandonment. Knowing that I have no family and almost no friends, you have each taken advantage of me while stroking yourselves for being charitable towards me. This is finished. I am no longer reaching out to you. I have two people who live in Greater Vancouver, who actually are friends, have been supportive, and seem to accept me, despite areas of disagreement. If both of you happen to be reading this, then I will allude to you in language that only will be understood between us, so as not to betray your privacy, but also, in case you happen to be reading this, that you will know that I am still your friend. One of you has two of my bird paintings. One of them features black and yellow, red and blue tropical songbirds, and you love to cook and chat on the phone. The other one of you, you are exactly the same age as me. and you have a drawing of one of my birds, a beautiful orange-yellow and black oriole. Both of you I have known since we were in our twenties. You two are both exempt, I love you both, and this blogpost is not directed to you. All the rest had better take cover. I am not saying that we are no longer friends, rather that we never were friends because, frankly, you have never been real friends towards me. The friendship has always been unequal and for the most part one-sided. If you would like to change this, if you choose to stop stigmatizing and marginalizing me, if you want to actually include me as part of your lives, then of course I will welcome you back into my life. I always welcome people back. But I am not going to go out looking for you, and first, I expect to see in you the fruits of repentance. Till then it's bye-bye.