Writing My Wrongs

Yes, JM, Indeed He Does

"Grow your own dope: plant a man! " - Unknown

So, the house sale is shaky.

Inspection did not go well even though they made offer on home in AS IS condition. They are nervous and I am freaking out and not eating and want to vomit at any given moment.

My dear friend, JM, messaged me on Facebook to inquire. I share with her the scoop. She sends me back this message:

"of course u can (run away to chicago and sleep under her couch). i will keep a good thought.
stay strong, the beauty of our lives is that we have survived worse...
u can try the upside down st joseph statue.
seems like he owes u one."

The last two lines sent me into a puddle of tears. (JM lived with me in the maternity home and surrendered her son to Catholic Charities).

St. Joseph statue is part of some odd urban legend that burying one in your yard will sell your home. 

However, St. Joseph is also the name of the hospital that my daughter was born in. The only place I got to hold her and talk to her. It was the place where I, three days post partum with raging episiotomy wound, handed my baby girl over to strangers through a river of crystalline tears.

Yes, JM, I agree. I  think St. Joseph does indeed owe me one.

He is Risen, She is Lost

" Now, if we are going to celebrate anything in America and it must be associated with death, then let's instead, on a national scale, have a day of acknowledgment for the soldiers who currently sacrifice themselves for a country; one in which the habitants brush off a soldier's efforts and say it's his patriotic obligation and nothing more while they pay tithing and empty themselves of reason for a religion. A religion, I might add, that birthed impetus for war: the conflicting religious difference between Muslims and Christians, a president that said he was carrying out God's will by invading Iraq, and the Christian support for the war." - Reconstruction of Reason

Putting aside the fact that I am not religious, I have disliked easter since 1986 even more than I did when I was a child.

The name of the agency that sold my daughter is Easter House.

I remember asking the caseworker why it was named such.  She recited some religious babble about Christ's resurrection and his life beginning anew. She actually made some odd adoption connection that by giving my daughter away I was giving her a new life and thereby saving her from the "dead life" with me. It was an odd exchange.  An agnostic even then, I recall sitting there, staring at her, secretly thinking that her explanation was as unbelievable at Father Pcolka's sermons at Sunday mass.

Many years later, when I began ehbabes.com and started to amass reams of papers on the agency, I was not the least bit surprised to see similar religious propaganda in  marketing materials the agency sent to prospective adopters. Some of their materials quoted from the Talmud. Others from the bible.  How wise of them to be an equal opportunity agency and quote appropriate religious scripture to suit their client base. Adoption, is, after all "gods plan", right?  Appeal to a persons religion, tell them by adopting (or buying) a baby they will be guaranteed a seat in heaven, able to cut to the front of the line and shake hands with St. Peter, and poof the PAPS  give you buckets of money. Pretty good racket, no? A baby and passage into heaven? Who could resist? How much can I pay? Where do I sign up? Will I get my own special cloud to float on? An extra set of angels?

Um, sorry, but I am not feeling it.  No Easter for me.  I have had nearly twenty two years of Easter. I am quite sick of it.

Yeah, he is risen and she is still lost as are so many others, all in his name.

Nothing to celebrate there.

Who's Your Diety?

"But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg. " -Thomas Jefferson, Notes on Virginia, 1782

All the Presidential candidate talk underway in the media and blogland  has me feeling ill and even a little frightened to be a female American.  Religion seems to be smattered all over every candidate and both parties.

Is America a democracy or a theocracy? Do we even know any more?

I am getting odd emails from random people telling me how Obama is an Islamic terrorist. Others quote Huckabee as the second coming of Christ. And still others are making Hillary Clinton into Jezebel (recall her husband is a bit of a ‘ho. Surely she must be one too? At least by injection?)

It makes me queasy.

Whatever happened to the separation of church and state?

As a liberal, agnostic, democrat I am genuinely fearful of the road ahead.

Huckabee scares the bejesus out of me. I get images in my head of the fictional character Nicolai Carpathia when I hear him speak or read about him. Sure in the Left Behind series Carpathia was allegedly out to destroy Jesus followers, as in, he was the antichrist.  As the antichrist, out to destroy all Jesus lovers, he made himself into a god and his own followers no different that those that followed Jesus.

Extremists fighting extremists – all vying for power and the ability to be worshipped as someone’s god (or president). A very slippery slope we have here.  Christian extremists killing Islamic extremists brings The Crusades to my mind. You can easily become the monster you are fighting. Nietzche said "Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster. As you gaze into the abyss, the abyss also gazes into you". Think about it. Deeply.

Suggestions that Obama is an Islamic terrorist simply because someone received an urban legend email and his name rhymes with Osama further disturbs me.

Hillary as a hoochie? Girlfriend, puhlease.

If we truly have a separation of church and state, why do we care of Hillary worships Bob the Tomato from Veggie Tales or if Obama’s name sounds like Osama?

Clearly, the separation of church and state is not so, well, separate, is it?

When I contemplate religion, our current slate of candidates along with family preservation, I become frightened. I become frightened for my children and their children.  I am frightened for young, single moms who may find themselves with an unexpected pregnancy. I become outright terrified for the children born to those mothers.

Family preservation activists, like myself, believe there is a deeply rooted, primal connection between mother and child.  Further, to break that connection, to attempt to mimic it, replace it, deny it, causes trauma to mother and child.

Not so, according to some Christians.

“The unborn entity within the pregnant woman's body is not part of her body. The conceptus is a genetically distinct entity with its own unique and individual gender, blood type, bone-structure, and genetic code. Although the unborn entity is attached to its mother, it is not part of her.”

I often wonder why Christians don’t do more to help young, single or expectant and unwed moms. Clearly, not being Christian, I don’t understand their views on women, social order and the stability of same.

While they are out saving the world and working as missionaries, why aren’t more of them helping us here at home? Helping poor Americans? Is that not gods work? Will that not get them into heaven? Helping moms keep and raise and feed their American born children?  Why are so many of the primary adoption agencies tied to major religious groups? Do Christians only help other Christians?

I am clearly befuddled at the ease at which many who claim to be Christian can swoop in and take a child from the milky breast of the mother. Is it any wonder that they believe it is perfectly okay to separate mother and child?  If they believe the above paragraph, if they call our children ‘entities’, of course they would. It makes perfect sense to me why they would believe children would be objects (entities) to be bought and sold. They would believe that children are blank slates that can be molded and shaped and conditioned all in the name of god. (Side note: When contemplating abortion, suddenly the Christian entities become human and its murder, right? )

I am not about to begrudge anyone their right to religion or challenge the desire to worship an invisible man in the sky. If you want to worship the tomato on your kitchen counter, feel free. If you are Taoist, Buddhist, Muslim or other, have at it. It is not my business nor should it be the business of the United States government to tell you who you should worship, when, how often or other. To do so would violate your rights as an American. (Recall the Pilgrims came here to escape religious persecution?)

What I am going to challenge is the movement of religion, any religion, as a whole, taking over our government. It has no place there. Can we all refer to the First Amendment?

If you are going to respond to me by saying that not all Christians are fundamental extremist whack jobs, don't bother. I will say I agree. But I ask you to ponder why it is that people assume Barack Obama is a terrorist simply because they heard from Aunt Mary (recipient of an urban legend email) he is Muslim  - because he is black and his name rhymes with Osama? 

This post isn’t about debating the validity or not of Christianity, it is merely stating that in my opinion, it has no place in our government and policy making processes and should it find its wicked way there, I fear more mothers and children will be separated by adoption. 

Furthermore, please, please don’t vote someone into a position of power based on their religious beliefs. Please help us keep this country a democracy and not a theocracy.  No zealots, please? Pretty please?

Show support  for the  issues and platforms that improve the lives all Americans: health care, womens rights, economic policy, foreign policy, etc and not for the person who happens to worship a your particular god or  red tomato of your liking.

You might indirectly save one more baby from getting taken from his or her mama.

Musta Been Gods Plan

copyright goes to Family Preservation Blog. Reposted with permission.

It happens almost every year; someone steals a baby Jesus from a nativity scene. This year, it happened at a church in Pennsylvania.

Father Aristotle Damaskos says he noticed the baby Jesus was missing from the township display last weekend.

A tipster led police to the adoption ring as they were trying to sell the swaddled babe to a couple from DesMoines.

Monique, 54, and Kash, 62, Hamilton are devastated. They deny any misdeed.

"We were assured the adoption was perfectly legal," said Mr. Hamilton as his wife sobbed about the nursery she had all fixed up at home and her broken heart.

Police report that a young woman named Mary had gotten in touch with the Hamilton's through a PennySavior ad by the Christ's Mercy Adoption Agency in Tallahassee, Florida.

The Hamilton's reported that they had been sending Mary money to stay at the Manger Inn in Bethelham, PA. Mary had left her home town and her boyfriend Joey.

The Hamilton's kept in touch all throughout her pregnancy via phone and email.

Then, last week, Mary asked the Hamilton's to come to the Inn and take custody of the male infant.

"Will we get our money back?" asked Mr. Hamilton.

Mrs. Hamilton said she would fight to keep the baby as she knew Mary was an unfit, and far too young to be a mother. She was sure she was far more deserving and would not give up the child they planned to rename Abraham Levee Hamilton III.

Mrs. Hamilton also commented that her three year old daughter, Grateful, adopted last year from Sears China Doll department would be very disappointed.

UPDATE:

Mary Virgina's boyfriend, Joseph has come forward demanding a paternity test.

Meanwhile, Mary's Father has said he will save her and help her raise her infant son.

Mary told reporters that she was threatened to have to return the fee for staying at the Inn if she tried to keep her son. The Hamilton's attorney, Theo Maggi states, however, that everything they gave her were just "gifts."

Mary further reports that three attorneys from the law office of King, Weissman, and Wyse were at her side even before the baby was born and had pressured her, taking the babe right from her arms.