I have a gift.

I have a gift, and it is this:

I have the amazing supernatural ability to be good at things I don't understand.  I'm talking intellectual things that involve the cranium. Excluded from this ability is AP Physics in High School.  I didn't understand a word, and I got a C...which actually I suppose is still fairly decent for wanting to run around and scream during first period everyday Senior year.  I'm also not necessarily good at physical things that I don't understand: flying airplanes, rugby, teleportation.

In college I managed to graduate in the top 10% of my class, with a major that I drooled through with incompetence.  I am able to produce amazing assignments without ever letting the information click.  

I remember the day I realized my superpower.  It was halfway through junior year in COB300, where the majority of the semester was devoted to creating a business plan.  Once again, reminiscent of AP Physics, I wanted to run around and scream everyday.  I was sitting in Finance when myself and one other student got called up in front of a lecture hall of students to be honored in receiving acceptance into Beta Gamma Sigma internationally recognized business honors society.  I had never even heard of this organization before, but apparently everyone else in the room had, and was extremely congratulatory with hints of envy.

I remember returning to my seat and saying to my proud group members that maybe they should have given the award to someone who knew what was going on.

Now, I don't mean to bash International Business. Really, I had a lot of fun, and despite not retaining 85% of the information, I did learn a lot and wouldn't trade in the experience for anything. Consistent with my character, however, the information I retained has to do with the International part, not necessarily the Business portion.  And besides, sometimes you learn the most about yourself by discovering what it is you don't want to learn.

Today, I find myself taking online English literature classes, quite the opposite from International Business studies.  Finally I have found something that I am both good at and I understand.  That isn't to say that learning isn't difficult and that I haven't been challenged, but for once, I can actually look back at everything I have written over the past semester and a half and say wow!  that's good!  I get it!  Things make sense and I am finally grasping information that will make a lasting impression on my life.  I care about what I am learning, and I sit on the edge of my seat as I wait for grades to be posted.  The satisfaction in understanding something, trying your hardest and surpassing your superpower, and then receiving professor approval for your work is something I never thought I would experience!  

Here's to education and finding my niche!

On Writing, By: me...not Stephen King

My creative writing course is sadly coming to a close.  I had fun and definitely took away new techniques to improve my writing (we'll see if I actually use them).

If anyone is looking for an excellent book to help with the art of writing, I would highly recommend my textbook for this course: Writing Fiction: A Guide to Narrative Craft by Janet Burroway and Elizabeth Stuckey-French.

During week one of class I read a quote in this compilation of short stories, lectures, practical methods, and unique exercises, that will probably slosh around in my brain for the rest of my life.

"The best fiction comes from the place where the terror hides, the edge of our worst stuff.  I believe, absolutely, that if you do not break out in that sweat of fear when you write, then you have not gone far enough." - Dorothy Allison

This is true.  And this is scary.

I did quite well grade wise in this class, but my most impressive grade and professor feedback came from an assignment that I wept through as I wrote.  The prompt entailed writing a dialogue between two characters who are having a hard time communicating.

I wrote inspired by a dear friend of mine who said something to me that week.  And then I wrote what had been in my heart for the past three years.  

What I wish had been said years ago.  

What I wish I had said that week.  

What I wish no one would ever know.

I cried as the characters played out the conversation I longed to have myself.  When it was completed, I was frightened by my honesty.  I considered deleting the entire work: something that had escaped from the pages of my journals to be seen by someone else's eyes.

Finally, after much self-consoling, I submitted the assignment, convincing myself that my professor in grading will look past my personal life, and probably won't even know it's a topic that isn't entirely fiction. (On second thought, what good piece of writing isn't inspired by real life events?...uh oh.  Abort! Abort!)

A few days later when grades were posted, I saw that he was impressed.  

Every piece I've written since then has seemed safe and boring.  There's no wow factor without vulnerability.

Unfortunately, Dorothy Allison, you're right.

And I'm terrified.

My Life on Wheels

I find it quite ironic that one of my students who I teach how to read has just published her biography while I struggle to even maintain a blog.

But in reality, she is an amazing woman who deserves all the notoriety in the world.  I don't know much about her life except that she's Jewish, confined to a wheel chair needing help for every physical need, and brings joy to my stressful days with her huge heart and persistent attitude.  

I haven't read her story as told to Shaindy Perl yet (mostly because I didn't have the cash to buy it off her today... yet another one of my inadequacies), but I am anticipating only good, spirit lifting fun.

Afterall, when I asked her if she wrote a chapter about me she said, "Why, the whole book is about you!"

...Wise guy.  =)

Review to come soon.

My apologies, Ms. O'Connor

Am I the only one?

Please, someone tell me I am not alone.

This should disqualify me, here and now, from ever becoming an English teacher.

Fortunately there is grace... and 12 years of English teachers I can blame who never taught me properly.

Yes, my friends, today I found something out.

I found out that I am dumb.

And I found out that Flannery O'Connor is a woman.

"The Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce: Restored to the Good of Both Sexes"

John Milton.  I will never dote on him like my Shakespeare, but he speaks of some gripping matters.

In "The Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce", Milton fights the canonical law that states the only reason you can get divorced is adultery.  He delves into Matthew 5 where the church had taken Jesus' words and turned them into law, and argues that Jesus never meant that adultery was the only reason for divorce.  I will not focus on that for the purpose of this post since it is fairly convoluted.

Milton refers all the way back to Genesis to discover what the purpose of marriage is.  Why did God create Eve?  In the garden, Adam was romping around with all the animals, but he was still lonely.  There was a void that needed to be filled.  We all know the verse: "It is not good for the man to be alone.  I will make a helper suitable for him" (Gen 2:18, NIV).  God creates Eve to be Adam's helper.  This is marriage.  If Adam, in Paradise, needed a helper, how much more now does man, in a fallen world, need a hard-working, God-fearing, suitable wife to help him?

Considering we are fallen people, we make mistakes.  We may choose a spouse who is in fact not compatible.  Unfortunately, you probably won't find that out until after you're married and living in close quarters.  Milton actually condemns how hastily people get married.  We lazily go about our youthful lives, taking time in making decisions... except when it comes to marriage.  Society, friends, family, and even the Church, tend to influence us in the wrong direction and we become so desperate to get married that it doesn't matter to whom.  Upon marrying the wrong person, Milton says this:

Lest therefore so noble a creature as man should be shut up incurably under a worse evil by an easy mistake in that ordinance which God gave him to remedy a less evil, reaping to himself sorrow while he went to rid away solitariness, it cannot avoid to be concluded that if the woman be naturally so of disposition as will not help to remove, but help to increase that same Godforbidden loneliness which will in time draw on with it a general discomfort and dejection of mind not beseeming either Christian profession or moral conversation, unprofitable and dangerous to the commonwealth, when the household estate, out of which must flourish forth the vigour and spirit of all public enterprises, is so ill-contented and procured at home, and cannot be supported; such a marriage can be no marriage, whereto the most honest end is wanting; and the aggrieved person shall do more manly to be extraordinary and singular in claiming the due right whereof he is frustrated than to piece up his lost contentment by visiting the stews, or stepping to his neighbour's bed, which is the common shift in this misfortune; or else by suffering his useful life to waste away and be lost under a secret affliction of an unconscionable size to human strength.

As a woman, I have the power to either fulfill or increase the loneliness that man feels.  I have a lot of work to do before I ever put on that white dress.

Since the purpose of marriage is to fulfill that void of loneliness, there must be more to marriage than carnal pleasures.  There needs to be a total unification of spirit, soul, and body, in that order.  Believing that the only plausible reason for divorce is adultery, is believing that sex is the most important thing in your marriage.  This is shocking to realize.  What if your wife starts worshipping Satan?  (Extreme, ok, but you get the point.) What if she becomes a woman who cares not about you and your being, but only about your wallet?  What if your husband is emotionally or physically abusive?  When there are deeper impending issues, and when the man's loneliness is not being properly filled, THAT is when he commits adultery.  When a man is brought into a state of grief and loathing, or there are issues of idolatry and the unhappiness of souls, it is a much more legitimate reason to get divorced than simply adultery (which of course can be a path that unhappiness leads a spouse).   

Jesus on divorce says: "Therefore, what God has joined together, let man not separate" (Matt19:6, NIV).  But who says that your marriage was actually brought together by God?  God is merely a witness at your ceremony, not necessarily the one who joined you two.  Why should man try to keep together what God didn't even join in the first place?  In keeping with the character of God, if your marriage brings about more hatred than peace, it is not of Him.  When your marriage upholds peace and love, that is when God is in it and when God has joined the two.  In fact, by living in a situation where the relationship cannot be remedied, a failing marriage will affect the rest of your relationships, especially that with God.  Milton asks:

Where can be the peace and love which must invite God to such a house?  May it not be feared that the not divorcing of such a helpless disagreement will be the divorcing of God finally from such a place?  But it is a trial of our patience, they say: I grant it; but which of Job's afflictions were sent him with that law that he might not use means to remove any of them if he could?  And what if it subvert our patience and our faith too?

By being bound in a marriage that allows sin to enter, the effect is more separation from God, rather than seeking him out together.  But if you remove yourself from a hateful marriage, you allow God to have full reign over your single life once again.

...God prefers the free and cheerful worship of a Christian before the grievous and exacted observance of an unhappy marriage...

In a nation where divorce is 50%, and even higher in the church, it frightens me to even consider marriage.  Just because I may be against ever getting a divorce in favor of working through problems, no matter how hard, doesn't mean that my husband won't leave me without my consent.  After reading Milton's take on this issue (of which I just presented a mere smattering), I am no more willing to divorce, but encouraged to make sure I become the right woman and marry the right man, thus preventing the need to ever separate.

I like my Bible how I like my men...dark, artistic, and Swedish.

Dag Soderberg of Sweden was inspired to create this: Bible Illuminated: The Book New Testament.  It is the entire New Testament, in a glossy magazine type finish, chock full of photographs and art depicting the culture that we currently find ourselves in.  It's kind of like the Bible transformed into a National Geographic, or high fashion magazine.  As Dag describes in his video, sometimes people are ashamed of their Bibles because they make people uncomfortable.  But, it should be celebrated, shared, and out in the open for everyone to see.  Sweden is a nation nearly void of all God-fearing people, but since the launch of this version, Bible sales have increased by 50%, not to mention that 10% of Stockholm attended The Book launch.

The mission of The Book is as follows:

"Illuminated World seeks to introduce today's audience to a revolutionary contemporary Bible, one that encourages dialogue and is culturally relevant, readily accessible and easily digestible for any reader regardless of religious, economic, racial or social background.

We have no religious agenda and support no specific faith.  Bible Illuminated is intended to be a unique vehicle for reacquainting today's reader with one of history's most important texts."

Interesting.

So many people have been hurt by the church, and the "religion" of the church, that the Bible becomes a disgusting object associated with that pain.  By getting rid of the uncomfortable stigma associated with the traditional Bible, and actually creating a Bible that is unlike anything else, yet still a Bible nonetheless, people will be attracted to the Word once again.  It is a shame, however, that the WORD OF GOD isn't already attractive to many by what it is in and of itself.  The Bible will forever remain timeless and relevant to our world, rather than remain an ancient, dead text that many believe it to be.  By adding modern artistic interpretations depicting the joys and pain of our culture, the life breathing forth from the words is exemplified.

I think the fact that this Bible wasn't necessarily created by Christians is making many Christians angry.  I agree with Paul:  "But what does it matter?  The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached.  And because of this I rejoice." philippians 1:18  If this gets people who normally would be embarrassed to own a Bible, to read a Bible, then I say it is beneficial.

These angered Christians see the artist's interpretations of some passages as adding to the word of God.  They perceive it as a "secularized" (which by the way, I don't believe there is a giant schism between the secular and the sacred), distorted view of Scripture.  What then do you make of your study Bible that adds little blurbs within the text on how to apply the verses, and includes all sorts of commentary?  Are these not also someone else's interpretations of the Scripture?  I would argue that the added thought provoking photographs further prove that the cross of Christ is relevant to every aspect of culture, and every corner of the earth. God works in mysterious ways and I find it a blessing that people who we wouldn't traditionally consider "believers" are able to be touched by the Word of God.

I'll admit, some of the images are disturbing, but we must ask why.   Are we disturbed because the images actually provoke anti-biblical principles?  Or are we disturbed because we become aware of certain issues we have been ignoring that a picture is able to remind us of?  Jesus may be prompting us to be his hands and feet in that area.  We are able to play our part in restoration only when we know what it is that is broken.  Or are we disturbed because someone's modern, artistic, culturally in-tuned interpretation of a verse might be different from our own?  The Word of God is so brilliant and moving that it is in fact able to touch people in different, unique ways, and has done so for millenniums.  I believe God's hands are very much in the arts and he speaks volumes through paintings, sculptures and photographs.  Occasionally, we have some artistic members of our church present "prophetic paintings" that are able to bring a new spin on Church, drawing every aspect of culture and gifts into the body.  

Nevertheless, it is important to hold fast to the words held in The Book, which of course is the Bible we know and love.  The text shouldn't be compromised for the captivating photographs adjacent to it, but it should be approached with prayer and discernment.  Prayer for your eyes to be illuminated by the words, first and foremost, and then to the artistic interpretation. Discernment as to whether the interpretation is valid, and what you should do about it, if anything.

I am falling in love

In the words of Will Ferrell:  "I'm in love!  I'm in love!  And I don't care who knows it!"

I never thought I would say this.  I never imagined I would become so enamored with this person, so swept away in his wooing words and his immense passion.  People told me I would fall in love with him, but I didn't take heed.  I to

ok their encouragement as a far off dream.  "This could never happen to me," I convinced myself.  "I will never have the love they do!"

But I am drowning in the ocean of his expressed feelings.

I am proud.

I want to scream it from the top of my lungs and the depths of my soul!

I LOVE WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE!

I've cried... in public... while reading soliloquies, at the death of characters I have become fond of, when I realize my own nature in certain persons, and even at the sheer genius of his use of language.  Wow.  Even though I am aware of the plots and outcome of every play before I dive into the text, the suspense and intensity he creates forces me to remind myself to breathe.

How dare anybody ever turn the man I love into a cliche.  "To be or not to be"... Just a common household phrase!?  Nay, Shakespeare was nothing less of phenomenal.  Do you realize the profoundness of this statement within the context of the rest of Hamlet's life!?  His turmoil!? The brilliance of his speech!?  I implore you all to read it and find out!  

Fall in love for yourselves.  It will not be love wasted.

...plus, he's a hottie.