Tag: church

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I realized this past week that I don’t have any subscribers to my blog. The only way anybody knows that I have written a new post is through Facebook, and we all know that sometimes posts on there just get buried.

I have 200 plus Facebook friends and each week my blog is only seen by between 30-60 people and I would love more people to read it. I think that what I write about can help people, but not if they don’t read it.

So, this week I have a request to everyone who read this blog:

please click the button on the screen to subscribe to my blog

My goal this week is 100 subscribers.

Please help me meet my goal.

Thank you all for reading this far and for subscribing to my blog.

You Matter!

Chester Bennington, the lead singer for Linkin Park took his life yesterday. Hearing that shook me. I like Linkin Park songs because it seemed he knew what I felt and was surviving it and if he could survive so could I. Their song “Numb” was especially important to me.

Here are the lyrics:

I’m tired of being what you want me to be
Feeling so faithless, lost under the surface
I don’t know what you’re expecting of me
Put under the pressure of walking in your shoes
Caught in the undertow, just caught in the undertow
Every step that I take is another mistake to you
Caught in the undertow, just caught in the undertow

I’ve become so numb, I can’t feel you there
Become so tired, so much more aware
By becoming this all I want to do
Is be more like me and be less like you

Can’t you see that you’re smothering me?
Holding too tightly, afraid to lose control
‘Cause everything that you thought I would be
Has fallen apart right in front of you
Caught in the undertow, just caught in the undertow
Every step that I take is another mistake to you
Caught in the undertow, just caught in the undertow
And every second I waste is more than I can take!

I’ve become so numb, I can’t feel you there
Become so tired, so much more aware
By becoming this all I want to do
Is be more like me and be less like you

And I know I may end up failing too
But I know you were just like me with someone disappointed in you

I’ve become so numb, I can’t feel you there
Become so tired, so much more aware
By becoming this all I want to do
Is be more like me and be less like you

I’ve become so numb, I can’t feel you there
I’m tired of being what you want me to be
I’ve become so numb, I can’t feel you there
I’m tired of being what you want me to be

Written by Brad Delson, Chester Charles Bennington, Dave Farrell, Joseph Hahn, Mike Shinoda, Robert G. Bourdon • Copyright © Universal Music
Publishing Group
and the music video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXYiU_JCYtU
When I listen to that song I always think of my relationship with my mom. I was never good enough for her as a kid, everything I did was wrong. I grew up and realized that I just had to be me and not do what other people expected me to. When I was comfortable with myself, people would accept me.
I thought that was what the song meant to. I thought he had it figured out. I thought he had traveled through the darkness and come through it.
What I have also learned in this life is that once you’ve traveled through the darkness you never really leave it behind. It is always there threatening to consume you again at any moment.
If you have traveled the darkness before, or are in the darkness now, know that you are not alone. Know that you matter. Know that the people around you will miss you terribly if you are no longer with us.
Know there is help available:

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 1-800-273-8255

Truth is Free

For some people believing a lie is easier than believing the truth. Sometimes the truth is too painful or dirty or harsh and people want to be like an ostrich and bury their head in the sand, ignoring the truth around them.

Truth is not always easy or pretty, but it is always true, no matter who believes it. Just because someone doesn’t believe the truth doesn’t make it any less true.

Recently, I have been called a liar by a person that I used to hold in high esteem, because I have told some not so pretty truths that involve that person.

When truth comes out it is always better to accept your responsibility in the situation, make amends and move on. If you attempt to perpetuate the like, it could cost you more than you’re willing to pay.

It could cost you your job, your reputation, your friends, your family. That’s a high price to pay for a lie.

Along the same lines, I have been accused of trying to destroy the person who called me a liar. That me speaking truth is hateful and ugly and I should just keep it to myself.

I can’t do that anymore.

I have kept so much to myself in my life that I’m going to explode. I have to tell the truth. I have to expose evil where it is present. I can’t hide it just because it’s ugly and messy and some people will get offended.

Telling the truth has cost me nothing. I still have a job. I still have my family, I still have friends who support me.

Not only has telling the truth been free, I’ve even benefited from it. I’ve made new friends. I’ve been able to help others struggling with similar situations.

It’s been amazing to see so much good come from speaking the truth.

Saying Goodbye is Hard

This week I had to say goodbye to a pet that I’ve had for 22 years, my turtle, Herman. He was the perfect pet for all those years. He wasn’t cuddly, he never demanded my attention, and I couldn’t take him for walks, but he was always there, quietly listening to whatever I had to tell him.

Granted, since my life has been good, I haven’t talked to him quit as much as when my life was a wreck all those years ago and he was a captive audience on my dresser in his tank. He listened without judging and I liked that. He never spoke back or asked questions I didn’t want to or wasn’t ready to face. When I was in the midst of anxiety I could watch him swim or crawl around his tank and some of his peace would transfer to me.

Tuesday morning, I went to feed him and he was dead. I cried. Even though he’s a turtle and I couldn’t cuddle him or whatever, he has been a part of my life for the past 22 years. He was moved with me too many times to count. The water fall in his tank is a relaxing sound that fills my house.

This experience made me think about all the people I’ve had to say goodbye too in my life. Grandparents, parents, friends. Some who have passed away, some who have left and some who I have had to leave behind.

Whatever the reason that we have to say goodbye, even if its good for us, its difficult. I hate saying goodbye! I only see my sister once or twice a year. When we leave each other, we don’t say “goodbye,” we say “see ya later.” It’s less final that way. Saying goodbye is just too sad.

Unfortunately, we always have to say goodbye. We are left with the lessons that we learned and the imprint they left on our lives and good or bad we can learn from them, no matter how hard saying goodbye is.

Evil Triumphs

Last week I watched the movie Spotlight, about a sex abuse scandal and the Catholic Church that was uncovered by the Boston Globe in 2001. This week I have been watching the Netflix series, The Keepers. It’s a docuseries about a sex abuse and murder cover up in the Baltimore, Maryland Catholic Church Diocese. One thing that these two cases had in common is that people knew about the abuse and kept quiet about it.

I’m not talking about the victims or their families staying quiet. They were silenced by their abusers and society with shame, fear and accusations of the abuse being their fault.

I’m talking about the ministers and police officers who knew about the abuse and kept it to themselves, moving the abuser from one place to another, rather than stopping the evil and putting the abuser in prison where they belonged.

When a minister, police officer or other person in authority, especially as a mandated reporter, chooses to remain silent, they are just as guilty of abuse after they were made aware of it as the abuser is.

Many people in authority work to silence the victims when the victims find the strength to finally confide in them. They may attempt to shame the victim by telling them the abuse was their fault. They may attempt to make the victim fearful of  retribution by the abuser for telling. They might silence the victim with their disbelief of the story. They may make the victim feel overwhelmed by the questions they will be asked by the police and make the victim doubt if that’s what they want to do.

There are many ways that someone in authority allows abuse to continue by their decision to remain silent and not act on behalf of the victim of abuse.

When a person allows abuse to continue, as so many did in the cases I’ve seen, that person is just as much to blame as the abuser. The person who knows what is happening and just moves the abuser from church to church becomes an accomplice to the abuse. They have allowed the abuse to continue.

In the case shown in The Keepers, Sister Cathy was killed because she knew what was happening within her church and school and was going to expose it. Some “Christians” are more worried about how the abuse will cause people to look at their ministry than they are about the abuse.

I am currently involved in exposing a group of accused, admitted and convicted child molesters who were allowed to work around youth. Some were allowed to work with kids even after those in charge new the allegations about the sexual abuse.

One of the people who allowed an abuser to continue to work with children isn’t too happy with my friends and I telling people that an admitted child molester worked with him at youth camps and taking youth on mission trips to Mexico.

In my opinion, he is more worried about those of us who are exposing the evil that happened, instead of worrying about the evil and how to help the people who were hurt. He has had his attorney draw up a lawsuit against us and is threatening to file it in court if we don’t back down. However, the truth is the best defense against a defamation lawsuit and we have the truth on our side.

Truth will stop evil!