Mommy Brain

Very few things make me as angry as Christians jumping on the bandwagon for or against something that they have never read or experienced personally, simply because “all the other Christians are for/against it, so they must be right”. (I am speaking here of areas that are unclear from a scriptural standpoint — times when we are not sure whether something is unbiblical or not. Obviously, I do not advocate going out and experiencing various sins so that we can speak out against them with authority!) The release of the new Harry Potter novel has brought this frustration again to the forefront of my mind and I’m going to rant a minute.

My pastor strongly came out against Harry Potter a couple years ago. When I asked him if he had read any of the books or seen any of the movies, his response was, “Oh, I would never do that!” How frustrating – and how sad that this response is all too common among evangelicals.

I personally have not read any of the books, but I LOVED each of the movies so far and am eagerly waiting the release of the next one in November. I also plan to read the books to my kids when they are old enough. My oldest is 8, but she is more easily scared than her brothers, so I will wait for a while. Not because I think they are evil, but because she’s not ready for them yet.

Aside from the fact that many Christians who come out against Potter have not even read one book, the hypocrisy involved also irks me. These are the same people who embraced the Lord of the Rings trilogy as “finally a good Christian-worldview movie”. Good vs. evil? Check. Wizards — good and bad? Check. Scary monsters? Check. Heroic quests? Check. Love wins out? Check. All of these elements are evident in Lord of the Rings — and each one of the Harry Potter movies that I have seen so far. So why is one okay and the other not?

I believe part of the problem is that many Christians got sucked into believing a phony article posted on The Onion. This article stated that Ms. Rowling had published the Harry Potter novels for the specific purpose of converting children to witchcraft. This article was then forwarded — and forwarded, and re-forwarded — throughout e-mail-land from Christian to Christian. Unfortunately, not many of the people who received this e-mail bothered to check out The Onion’s site and read this:

The Onion is a satirical weekly publication published 52 times a year on Thursdays.

Notice the use of the word satirical. Satire: use of wit: the use of wit, especially irony, sarcasm, and ridicule, to attack the vices and follies of humankind. (Definition from Microsoft Encarta Dictionary) The very people this article was ridiculing were the ones who believed it was true! How’s that for irony?

I have lost count of the number of forwarded e-mails I have received from well-meaning people that turned out to be entirely or partially fabricated. There’s a great website out there called truthorfiction.com. They have a wonderful search engine. The next time you receive an e-mail that is not verified from some other source — check out their site. You can search by keyword. Then you will know whether you should hit that forward button. Usually, you shouldn’t.

Anyway, in the interest of people thinking for themselves, I am listing some links to articles on both sides of the Harry Potter debate. But remember, it’s not fair to speak out on something unless you’ve experienced it yourself. So don’t just read the articles — read a Potter novel. Or rent one of the movies. (I promise you won’t go to hell.) If you still feel it is inappropriate for your family, great. I respect you for that. Just don’t judge those of us who believe it’s fine.

Media Q&A – Teens

Saint Frodo and the Potter Demon – Books and Culture

How to Handle Harry

The Return of Harry Potter
A quote from this one:

“The Bible clearly condemns witchcraft and tells Christians to “avoid every kind of evil” (1 Thess. 5:22). But for the most part, Christian experts agree that the world of wizards and spells created by Rowling is not the same as the occult-type practices Scripture condemns. “The magic in these books is purely mechanical,” says Charles Colson, Christianity Today magazine columnist and head of Breakpoint ministries. “Harry and his friends don’t make contact with the supernatural world.” The magic serves as a framework for the story, a technique used by writers as far back as Shakespeare, Tolkien and de Troyes (the creator of the King Arthur tales).

According to Italian theologian Massimo Intovigne, “Magic is the main metaphor for life in fairy tales. If one should ban Harry Potter, one should also ban Peter Pan, Cinderella and Pinocchio. Harry Potter, unlike a number of cartoon superheroes, doesn’t win because he’s more proficient at magic than the bad guys. He wins because he’s intelligent and brave, and more human than his opponents. What the bad guys utterly lack is human feelings and basic human values.”"

another one:

“As Christian parents, it’s important to be aware of the things our kids are reading, watching and listening to. The best way to determine if Harry Potter is right for your family is to read the books for yourself. Then filter their content through your own family’s value system.”

Dick Staub Interview with Connie Neal, author of The Gospel According to Harry Potter

Frodo Good, Harry Bad

Matters of Opinion: The Perils of Harry Potter

Virtue on a Broomstick

Children’s Literature: Parents Push for Wizard-free Reading

Opinion Roundup: Positive About Potter

Harry Beasts

“For those who feel their lives are a grave disappointment to God, it requires enormous trust and reckless, raging confidence to accept that the love of Christ knows no shadow of alteration or change. When Jesus said, “Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy burdened,” He assumed we would grow weary, discouraged, and disheartened along the way. These words are a touching testimony to the genuine humanness of Jesus. He had no romantic notion of the cost of discipleship. He knew that following Him was as unsentimental as duty, as demanding as love. He knew that physical pain, the loss of loved ones, failure, loneliness, rejection, abandonment, and betrayal would sap our spirits; that the day would come when faith would no longer offer any drive, reassurance, or comfort; that prayer would lack any sense of reality or progress; that we would echo the cry of Teresa of Avila: “Lord, if this is the way you treat your friends, no wonder you have so few!”

“For it is not as if we had a high priest who was incapable of feeling our weaknesses with us; but we have one who has been tempted in every way that we are, though he was without sin. Let us be confident, then, in approaching the throne of grace, that we shall have mercy from him and find grace when we are in need of help” (Hebrews 4:15-16).”

“Only love empowers the leap in trust, the courage to risk everything on Jesus, the readiness to move into the darkness guided only by a pillar of fire. Trust clings to the belief that whatever happens in our lives is designed to teach us holiness. The love of Christ inspires trust to thank God for the nagging headache, the arthritis that is so painful, the spiritual darkness that envelops us; to say with Job, “If we take happiness from God’s hand, should we not take sorrow too?” (Job 2:10); to pray with Charles Foucauld: “Abba, I abandon myself into your hands. Do with me what you will. Whatever you may do, I thank you. I am ready for all: I accept all. Let your will be done in me and in all your creatures. I wish no more than this, O Lord. Into your hands I commend my spirit. I offer it to you with all the love of my heart, for I love you, Lord, and I give myself, surrender myself into your hands without reserve, with boundless confidence, for you are my Father.”"

“The letter of James counsels: Confess your sins to one another (James 5:16). This salutary practice aims to guide us in accepting ownership of our ragamuffin status, but as Dietrich Bonhoeffer noted, “He who is alone with his sins is utterly alone. It may be that Christians, not withstanding corporate worship, common prayer, and all their fellowship in service, may still be left to their loneliness. The final breakthrough to fellowship does not occur because, though they have fellowship with one another as believers and as devout people, they do not have fellowship as the undevout, as sinners. The pious fellowship permits no one to be a sinner. So everyone must conceal his sin from himself and from their fellowship. We dare not be sinners. Many Christians are unthinkably horrified when a real sinner is suddenly discovered among the righteous. So we remain alone with our sin, living in lies and hypocrisy. The fact is that we are sinners!”"

Brennan Manning in The Ragamuffin Gospel

I was all ready to launch into my busy week when everything came to a screeching halt. One of my sisters left a wonderful viral thing for us when she headed home, and three of my four are down with some stuffy nose-scratchy throat-fever bug. So, I cancelled the dentist appointment, the trip to the library, and the WIC appointment for Tuesday. Poor Jonathan, he’s the only one who is still healthy, but he keeps trying to convince me he has a fever in order to avoid his booster shots this afternoon. I’m hoping everyone will be well in time for the ladies’ potluck on Wednesday, or they will be devotionless. (That’s not a word, is it? Oh, well.)

Kevin is just hoping they will be well by Saturday so we can camp. Here we are in the middle of July, and we’ve had such a wet spring and early summer that we haven’t been to the lake once!

Hope you are all enjoying sunny skies and healthy families!

On a side note, I have posted some more wonderful words from The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning here.

I’m getting ready to enter the whirlwind again. I spent Friday and Saturday vegging out, relaxing, reading to the kids, and generally being lazy. But it’s time to re-enter the swirling vortex of busy-ness. On tap for this week:

- Monday: dental check-ups (with four kids this takes 2 to 2 1/2 hours), medieval stories and games at the library, Jonathan’s well-child check-up and 5yo boosters — that’ll be fun
- Tuesday: grocery shopping, WIC appointment
- Wednesday: Bible study potluck in the park — I’m giving the devotional, and I need to make a covered dish to share
- Thursday: worship team practice for Sunday’s service
- Friday: pack for camping
- Saturday: to the lake! And home again that evening — just me, Kevin and the kids will stay and camp over
- Sunday: leading song service at church

I’m tired already and it hasn’t even started. I keep saying, “Oh, well, it’ll slow down next week.” — but by the time next week is here, it’s just as busy! Part of the problem is that one of the other song leaders at church is on vacation for three months, so I’m doing double duty. I usually only do it once a month, and will go back to that in October, thank goodness.

All this to say I have no idea how much time I’ll have to post. I’ll probably find some time, but I’m not promising anything deep and profound. (As if it ever is, right?) I do have some posts on draft — still in my head, I mean — about some deep(er) and (more) profound stuff, but they’ll just have to wait. Or maybe I’ll just post them in the state they’re in and let you all sort it out!

Our week-long family reunion is over and my sisters are all safely back in their own homes. (Hi, Ange — I miss you tons already!) We had quite the busy week, and managed to fit in many trips to the park and lots of visiting amid the stomach flus and lack of sleep. Thank God, none of the other kids got the stomach bug, and so far everyone is still healthy.

I always feel a let-down after a week like this. I miss my sisters, and I hate that they don’t live closer. It was such a blessing watching all the cousins play together and my deepest wish is that it could happen more often — that we would somehow all live close to each other again. I know this is a long-shot — all of the husbands have different jobs and none of them really have the desire to move here and my hubby never wants to leave, so who knows? But God sometimes does amazing things that we have no explanation for and that are beyond what we could’ve asked. So I’m not done hoping.

Yesterday, even though it was our first day on our own, was extremely busy. I hadn’t gone grocery shopping for 9 days – except for those little one- or two-item trips that end up costing you twice as much as you expected. So I dragged the wee ones through the grocery store yesterday and spent way more than I wanted to, but we were out of everything!

In the afternoon, we went to the library to see a magician. Our summer reading program has a medieval theme this year and he told some stories as well as amazed us with his magic. Natalie kept looking at me from where she was sitting and mouthing, “How did he do that?” It was fun to watch the pure delight on their faces.

Last night after dinner we watched The Wizard of Oz. I hadn’t seen it in probably 15 years, and this was the first time for my kids. They loved it, but wondered why Mommy had been so concerned that it would scare them. I remember being terrified of those flying monkeys!

Today I’m just vegging. I’m doing some laundry so we don’t run out of clean clothes to wear, and I really should clean my bathroom, but that’s about it. I plan on catching up on all my blog-reading and just relaxing. I need to build up my energy — next week is already looking crazy busy and it’s not even here yet!

Thank you for all the comments on the picture-posting issue. For a more balanced view than the previous article I linked to, check out this post. (Hat tip to Andrea for the link.) I’m going to leave the pictures of my kids up, and just make sure I’m careful about any personal information. I want to protect them, but I don’t want to live in fear.

Have a great weekend!
Carrie

Okay, so I just figured out how to post pictures of my beautiful children – and I was pretty darn proud of myself, too! I even had to re-size them first and managed to do it without asking any questions of my techie husband. Then today on Keer Unplugged, I came across this article. This guy thinks that any time we post pictures of our kids we are providing fodder for perverts. I’m not sure what I think. On the one hand, I did remove the name of my town from my blogger ID, and just went with my state. I’m not stupid. So I’m pretty sure no one could actually find us, even if they wanted to. But the author of this post says that if we even post pictures for other people to view, we are not doing enough to protect our children. Head on over and read his post, and then let me know what you think. Those of you whose blogs I read are very different in the amount of personal info you post. Some of you never post photos; some of you very proudly show off your adorable children. I’d like some input from any and all viewpoints before I make any decisions.

I’m going to risk rejection by all you book-lovers again. I have to admit I did not like Gilead. In fact, I forced myself to finish it — mainly because I wanted to find out what horrible thing John Ames’ namesake did and whether he was ever reconciled to his family. Maybe it’s just the place I’m at right now, but I found it incredibly dry and slow-moving. The sections where the reverend rambles on and on about theology or human nature seemed contrived. I just didn’t get it.

BUT, I did learn two new words, so it wasn’t a complete waste of time. The first one is susurrus: (noun) a whispering or rustling sound. Doesn’t the word sound just like what it means? The second one is crepuscular: (adjective) of, relating to, or resembling twilight. That one sounds nothing like what it means. Twilight always evokes images of fireflies and porch swings and gentle breezes. Crepuscular sounds like something hard and old. I love learning new words, though these are two I can’t imagine having a chance to use any time soon!

Well, I finally decided to see if I’m technologically-savvy enough to put pictures in my blog. Turns out I don’t have to be — it’s pretty easy!

This first one is of my oldest — 8-year-old Natalie. She’s sitting between my sister and my dad, who is holding my nephew, Peter.

This one is of my middle two. Jonathan, age 5, is on the left; Noah, age 7, is on the right.

And here’s my baby — 3-year-old Josiah.

The JC Penney Kids catalog came in the mail this week. Featured are a line of boys t-shirts with the following slogans:

- Saw it, Wanted it, Threw a fit, Got it
- The dog ate my homework.
- Yeah, I know, go to my room.
- Just be glad I’m not your kid.
- My name is trouble and I’ve earned it.
- I know a kid who knows a kid who is on the honor roll.

So people are now not only raising kids with rebellion in their hearts — they’re advertising it!

Found another great meme at Quiet Life and couldn’t resist, so here goes:

5 snacks I enjoy…
1. Santitas and homemade guacamole with Pepsi
2. Peanut M’n'M’s with Pepsi
3. Nacho cheese Doritos and bean dip with Pepsi
(hmmm, I see a trend here…)
4. Santitas and jalapeno cheese dip…with Pepsi
5. Any kind of ice cream

5 songs I know all the words to…
1. I Love You For Sentimental Reasons
2. L-O-V-E
3. A Bushel and a Peck
4. Amazing Grace
5. Great is Thy Faithfulness
(all songs I used to sing to my children when they were babies and I rocked them to sleep)

5 things I would do with $100,000,000…
1. build my parents and my sisters each a new home
2. build us a new home — my dream home (I already have it designed, just need the $$)
3. get completely out of debt
4. hire a housekeeper and cook so I could spend more time writing without neglecting homeschool time
5. fully fund and continually support my friend Lee’s orphanage in Mozambique

5 locations I would love to run away to…
well, I don’t really want to run away, but if we’re talking vacations…
1. Ireland
2. New York City
3. Washington, DC
4. England
5. Greece

5 things I like doing…
1. reading to my kids
2. crocheting
3. reading for myself
4. blogging
5. talking to my sisters on the phone

5 things I would never wear…
1. a bikini
2. a tattoo
3. a piercing of any kind
4. cowboy boots
5. a grass skirt

5 recently seen movies I like…
1. Hitch
2. Hotel Rwanda
3. National Treasure
4. Sahara
5. Aviator – can’t really say I liked it — too sad, but Leonardo Dicaprio was incredible

5 famous people I’d like to meet…
I don’t really want to meet anyone famous, but I’d love to have an afternoon of coffee and conversation with all the ladies on my blogroll. Maybe we’d have to do 5 at a time!

5 biggest joys of the moment…
1. My three sisters are all in town from various parts of the Northwest. This is the first time in two years we have all been together, and the first time I’ve seen my new nephew Tallon.
2. My children are all potty-trained and sleep through the night — I’m spoiled, I know.
3. I thought my parents were moving away, but they’re not.
4. Watching Kevin play with our kids at the pool on Saturday.
5. My best friends Heidi and Terry.

5 favorite toys…
1. This computer
2. My PDA
3. DVD player
4. Our public library
5. Cranium game

Whew — that’s a lot of thinking for this time of night! I’m off to bed.