Tag: religion

Accidentally left car windows open…

meisajDaily Life

Accidentally left my car windows open last night.  And it rained… Only a little, so seats are a little wet but no build up in the car. 

However as I was driving I noticed something missing from my rear view mirror. 

Back 20 years ago I almost died from my appendix rupturing.  Gangrene, septic, removing part of my intestine and all that jazz.  A week in the hospital with a super high heart rate post surgery (fun thing… Cardiac ward is away more expensive than some other parts of the hospital).

All in all doctors told my girlfriend at the time there was a decent chance I’d not survive.  Showed them though. 

After that my dad got me a Miraculous Mary Medallion.  Now I’m not religious, I’m an atheist, but was raised Roman Catholic. My dad told me his parents got him one when he went to Vietnam in the Navy, and after my near death appendix attack he wanted me to have one (gave one to my brother also who was in a car accident around the same time).

I’m not going to wear it, but I love that it’s from my dad and has meaning to him so it has meaning to me, So I hung it on my rear view mirror immediately after he gave it to me.

Several cars later, it still hangs in my rearview mirror. Sure it’s dirty and a little bit grimy, and I’ve never cleaned it. I don’t think it’s even been in a house or apartment, just lived in my car. 

It’s been in a few fender benders, including one that had both girls in the backseat and we are all okay (the car was not and the necklace soon moved to our new vehicle).

It’s traveled all over the East Coast; from Maine, Florida, Delaware, Georgia, and Missouri – and everywhere in between.

But when I got my car this morning I didn’t see it hanging there. Took me a little bit of searching around my feet to find it under the seat. Adjust your someone saw the open window and absconded with it for a minute.

Glad I found it, not sure what I would have done if I hadn’t. Probably would have to have asked my dad to get me a new one. Because it came from him in anything other than that wouldn’t have been the same.

Glad I’ve left the church…

meisajDaily Life

I’ve been an atheist for a long time. It’s been 20+ years since I’ve considered myself a Catholic. 

I’ve only called myself an atheist for the last 12 or so years. A slow journey from the hypocrasy of the Catholic church to the realization that religion, spirituality, or anything resembling that has no place in my life.

But the church still baffles me. What does it do in response to declining membership, increasing scandals, and a narrow world view…. It puts up walls.

Case and point. Catholic Bishops in the America just gave themselves the power to deny communion on anyone who is pro-life.

And why…. Because Joe Biden is Catholic, President, and Pro-Choice.

My dad once told me “When I’m asked if it bugs me that you don’t attend church anymore, I tell them that it doesn’t at all. That I believe you (and your siblings) are good, kind, people that I can be proud of. That I think being raised in the Catholic church helped with that.”

This was long after I stopped going to church and well on the way to out and out calling myself an atheist. And for a long time I really liked what my dad said.

But reflecting on it over a decade later, giving any credit to the church is too much and takes away from the amazing people my mom and dad are.

My morals, who I am as an adult is largely in part to how he and my mother raised me, not some narrow minded conservative organization that shelters pedophiles, treats women as second class citizens unable to hold the same positions as men, and holding onto the belief the a woman’s body is no longer her own to make decisions over once she is pregnant – no matter the circumstances that lead to the pregnancy, the current situation or beliefs of the woman, or health/medical factors regarding either fetus or woman.

Ugh…

meisajDaily Life

This:

Rick Santorum: Religious persecution in the U.S. could escalate as high as it did under Nazi Germany

I’m a little disgusted, not at all shocked.  This is ridiculous.  He says religious liberties are under assault, which is blatantly a lie.  He’s essentially saying “WATCH OUT CHRISTIANS!!! YOU’LL BE PUT IN GAS CHAMBERS SOON!!!” Or that’s the comparison he makes.  He recants later in the article, saying religious persecution in America is “fairly mild.”

There is no religious liberty under assault in America.  His “religious persecution” is abortion rights and same-sex marriage.  That’s his words from the article.  That’s not religious persecution, that’s not being able to push his views on other people.  His views based on his faith on other people regardless of their faith.

It comes down to a “my religion is right and because I believe my religion is right you, regardless of your views, beliefs or non-beliefs, have to defer to my religious beliefs.”

You can belief whatever you want religiously, but you can’t use your faith as a reason to limit others rights.  Separation of Church and State.  Politicians can follow whatever faith they want, but shouldn’t use that faith to govern.

The United States isn’t a Christian nation, it’s a nation of and for its citizens.  All of them.  Whether they are Christians, Jewish, Muslim, Pastafarian or atheist.

Flying Spaghetti Monster

Christmas

meisajDaily Life

I bought Sam’s Christmas present about two weeks ago off of eBay.

It came in last Monday and I went down to the office to pick it up (all of our packages go to the apartment office to be held). Its a pretty big package. Holly, our building manager, had let me know it was there.

I pick it up and Holly asks what it is. I tell her its Sam’s Christmas present.

Holly’s exact words are: “But that’s way too big to be a ring.”

Holly loves us. We’re good tenants, we pay on time, we don’t bitch about small things, and we stop by and chat with her often. She always tells us we’re some of her favorite tenants and from the excitement in her voice when she sees I can tell its true.

“When are you going to do it? I can’t wait because you two are some of my favorite people!”

I tell her eventually to end this part of the conversation.

You see, its not that I don’t love Sam. I do. And its not like I’m going any where. I’m not. However I’m not sure marriage is important to me. Well I know its not. Its such a religious thing in my mind. And I’m not religious. Sam feels the same way. If marriage were a governmental thing without any religious twinge, I may feel differently. And I know you can get married without a church, or any religious institution, but living in the era of constant politics has made marriage a religious institution.

When religion is used as a basis to deny two people the opportunity to get married, I don’t care to get married. Period. That’s it. That’s how I feel about marriage. If the government changed the laws so that marriage wasn’t the word they used, instead it was civil union for everyone. Then yeah, lets get a civil union. Let religions have the word marriage, under the books and law it will be called civil union. Sam and I have joked about that. Civil Union. But regardless of what is said a Civil Union is not the same as a Marriage, and having two words to mean one thing during governmental law automatically makes them not equal. It has that feel. Only we, the right folk, can have this word. All you people we don’t like what you are doing, you get to have this word over here. Don’t worry, it’s exactly the same thing as our word when it comes to laws and rights, but its not our word. You can’t have that word.

I need a good happy relationship. Marriage, that’s like an end game, or a turning point in a relationship. I don’t need a relationship with turning points. I just want a good relationship that keeps growing. And ours does.

And Sam, and myself, are happy with our relationship.

Cause its a great one.

More Thoughts on Mississippi

meisajDaily Life

I don’t go church.  I grew up in the Roman Catholic faith, going to church every Sunday, but I don’t go anymore, haven’t since I went to college.  Faith is a personal choice, and while I still have an inkling that there is something more to life than just what I can see and feel with my senses, I refuse to belong to any organization that needs a leader who is somehow closer to whatever is out there than me.  Take that Pope.

One of my favorite conversations I have ever had with my father happened the first year I moved to Cleveland.  My father had driven out for the night and we were at the bar talking during dinner.  He told me that people sometimes asked him if he felt bad that his children didn’t go to church (we were one of the larger more recognizable families in the church).  My dad responded with “All of my children are good people.  They have all made their own decisions and gone their own ways, but they are good people.  What more could I want.  If going to church has helped then to be good people then I can be happy about that.  But they’re good people.”

It made me happy.  And I’ve always like that my family went to church and still had its own ideas separate from ‘church doctrine.’

It scares me when bills go are put up to be voted on that people only support because of their faith.  It scares me, because it reminds me of Iran, or other middle east countries where politics and faith are crazy intertwined.  Why do your opinions and beliefs based on faith need to be forced upon others.

Anyways, I’m glad that the ‘Personhood’ initiative failed.  I’m pretty scared that the group that backed the initiative is saying they will try again, and that they are comparing the issue to slavery.

This quote on Huffington Post frames it amazingly.

“Maybe a pregnant women should get two votes, or maybe she should lose her vote and the fetus should vote, since she’s losing all her other civil rights,” she said. “Maybe we should do a mandatory sonogram of the fetus to determine if it’s Democrat or Republican? It’s all ridiculous.” ~Loretta Ross

Read the whole article here.