On Acting In A "Christ-like" Way......and the FLDS

Whether one considers oneself Christian or not, there is no disputing the fact that Jesus Christ was a pretty decent person. A caring, thoughtful, giving, compassionate man. So modeling one's behavior after this man, whether you believe in his divinity or not, is something that is apt to serve you well.

If you read various "Christian" dogma and doctrine, it usually sounds 'okay'. The usual stuff about kindness and giving and loving and so on.....sprinkled with all the 'shalls and shall nots' and a healthy sprinkling of fear....
But all in all, the writings of most "Christian" sects would lead one to believe that those that ascribe to these beliefs are a pretty decent lot of folks....

Not......

Too often I find folks that call themselves "Christians" to be terribly hypocritical. They quickly tell you what denomination they follow. Many quickly tell you all the ways you are going to hell or suffer damnation if you don't also begin to follow their denomination. almost across the board they tell you how to live your life. And what to believe.
This is especially true of those that claim to be 'evangelical'....holy jamoly are they fast to tell you that the state has no place in dictating religion, or interfering in religion!!!
On the other hand, these are the same folks who want to "bring God back into the schools..", "bring God into the courtrooms..."
teach our children in public schools...state funded, PUBLIC schools, that specific lifestyles are bad...particularly homosexuality. They want to teach creationism in science class...as a viable alternative to evolution....a set of religious beliefs...undisputably their beliefs about 'creationism' come from their belief in the bible...a religious document, or collection of documents....
They are fighting to maintain the current definition of marriage, in most places, by religious standards...i.e. one man, one woman.
There are those who object to Martin Luther King Day being recognized as a school holiday, but cry bloody murder when Spring break doesn't fall over Easter Week.....
They rail against feminists. Completely ignoring the fact that it is the feminists who are fighting to assure that "choice", including the choice to be a stay-at-home-mom is a valid and viable one for women to make...and that whatever choice a woman makes, it is deserving of the same respect and compensation and validation as those choices men have always had the right to make.....

And, worst of all, these so called "christians" both approve of, and often participate in, behaviors that deliberately hurt other human beings.....because they have judged them......somewhere along the way they missed the phrase "Judge not, lest ye be judged..."

Fact is, I had become pretty anti-christian because of these behaviors, until recently......
Well, actually, I have always been very, very 'pro christian' if you're talking about those folks who truly try to emmulate Jesus Christ's behaviors and demeanor....I had just become anti-assholes...most of whom I met called themselves "Christians".

Then the debacle in Texas started to unfold. The women and children were taken and Voila'!!!!, the FLDS were in the headlines.....Now I already knew a bit about their faith...but I knew nothing, except what folks like Flora Jessop or Carolyn Jessop said on television, about the people, themselves.....so I was willing to lump them into the pile with the rest of the "christians" I knew...or most of them, anyway....(I do know a few folks who truly do take emmulating Jesus seriously, and are really good folks.)
Be that as it may, I was horrifed at the abject trampling of the constitution...the clear and resounding bias and bigotry being displayed....the magnitude of the state's incursion into their lives...the damage the state was doing to the women and children it had taken into custody...I was simply horrified!!!!! So I knew I had to speak out...I assumed I would be just one voice amongst many that were crying out.....

Wrong....

I ran into a host of my "christian" friends...all telling me what a great thing the State of Texas had done...how "those people" deserved this, and worse...and just watch...they were gonna get what was coming to them...those freaks...those pedophiles...those weirdos in their funny clothes and hairdos....just you watch!!!!
Well, if I had misgivings at all, they dried up in a heartbeat!
So I started reading and blogging...
I found that Brooke Adams, from the Salt Lke Tribune, had about the fairest blog I could find. She seemed to go out of her way to present a balanced view. And she never inserted her own opinioninto her blogs...she just wrote stories...
So I started being a 'regular' on Brooke's blog...and, unbeknownst to me, so were a number of the FLDS community....if not posting, then following.....
And awhile into this mess, a couple of the FLDS started talking to me...and one or two emailed me....
And I started asking questions and learning not just about their doctrine, but about them as a people. And amazingly, I have found them to be amongst the most Christ-like of people I have ever come across.
They have a set of beliefs, yes. I have yet to find any one of them saying anyone else has to believe what they do. They are across the board respectful in how they speak and interact with others. They are accepting of the goodness of others, whether others ascribe to their beliefs, or not. Their doctrine also accepts and expects that people of all faiths and callings will be a part of heaven and the hereafter....
They turn the other cheek, they forgive, even the most egregious of wrongs....
I have made friends in the FLDS community who know full well I do not share their religious beliefs, but they take me at my word and like me for who I am, and ask nothing more than the same from me....
They work hard at following the United Order....they work hard at not falling prey to the vagaries of greed and envy and petty jealousies....
I don't know if they have a word for them, but I know them as 'mitzvahs'...doing good things for others, freely, often unheralded, just because it is the right thing to do...they work hard to make others feel good, to be happy, to have joy...to see the cup half full....FLDS members make 'mitzvahs' all of the time....
I have an FLDS friend who sends me 'smiles'...I know it sounds silly....but who knows, maybe they are divinely inspired, because they seem to come just at the point when I am most fed up with the ugly vagaries of the human condition.....

So this is long....and probably to most, quite boring...but I needed to 'say it'...to put my instincts in order...to give words to intuition....
To help me continue...to remind myself of why I fight....
And to honor a group of people I feel so very priveledged to have met...and to especially honor my new friends, for whom it took real courage to extend that first email, that first smile....

I am so angry and fed up with the ugliness that abounds...I am so grateful I have found some balance.....