Happy Birthday Dear Jesus!

This is my new Christmas present. I feel like a kid and also like a very responsible grown up. That is a good sign that I am becoming more fully integrated as a person. I get to be it all!

First I want to thank David Bruce and everyone else who has allowed me to come out and play. This has got to be one of the funnest and most enriching things I’ve ever been allowed to take part in. I am deeply honored.

Then I want to thank all my friends in the WWW who have helped and encouraged me and who I have never met and hope to someday in the Grand Forum in the Sky; Joey, Mikell, Cytem, FlamingoChavez, all those who I remember but I need more time to track down the names from the Project86 site, all those who helped me from The Cult Forums, The Matrix Forums , any other Forum which I have participated in, a tallhobbit at Bay Area Christian Goths , David Dellman at Gothic Christianity and fellow bloggers who inspired & responded to me: Bobbie Anonymous at Emerging Sideways and Jason Clark at Emergent. Thanks also to Len Sweet whom I think I frightened nevertheless he did the best he could under the circumstances.

Then thank you to those who have strongly influenced me for good in my local world; Dana, Macabre Schwab, Randeath, Dail, The Hatchet, mark, Paul, Kevin, Larry, Jim, Rodger.

And in the wonderful tradition I learned from my great teachers Project 86, NO THANKS TO: every one who may have recognized that I had a gift but did nothing to help me, those who harmed me or damaged me or weakened me, those who were part of the Problem which resulted in so much pain and suffering for myself and those loving people who are trying to make this world a better place. Unfortunately, you probably don’t know who you are. But God does. If I am ever clearly instructed to name you, I will.

And now a moment of silence for those who still suffer...
...

Then:

St. Patrick's Breastplate

I bind unto myself today
The strong Name of the Trinity,
By invocation of the same
The Three in One and One in Three.

I bind this today to me forever
By power of faith, Christ's incarnation;
His baptism in Jordan river,
His death on Cross for my salvation;
His bursting from the spiced tomb,
His riding up the heavenly way,
His coming at the day of doom
I bind unto myself today.

I bind unto myself the power
Of the great love of cherubim;
The sweet 'Well done' in judgment hour,
The service of the seraphim,
Confessors' faith, Apostles' word,
The Patriarchs' prayers, the prophets' scrolls,
All good deeds done unto the Lord
And purity of virgin souls.

I bind unto myself today
The virtues of the star lit heaven,T
he glorious sun's life giving ray,
The whiteness of the moon at even,
The flashing of the lightning free,
The whirling wind's tempestuous shocks,
The stable earth, the deep salt sea
Around the old eternal rocks.

I bind unto myself today
The power of God to hold and lead,
His eye to watch, His might to stay,
His ear to hearken to my need.
The wisdom of my God to teach,
His hand to guide, His shield to ward;
The word of God to give me speech,
His heavenly host to be my guard.

Against the demon snares of sin,
The vice that gives temptation force,
The natural lusts that war within,
The hostile men that mar my course;
Or few or many, far or nigh,
In every place and in all hours,
Against their fierce hostility
I bind to me these holy powers.

Against all Satan's spells and wiles,
Against false words of heresy,
Against the knowledge that defiles,
Against the heart's idolatry,
Against the wizard's evil craft,
Against the death wound and the burning,
The choking wave, the poisoned shaft,
Protect me, Christ, till Thy returning.

Christ be with me, Christ within me,
Christ behind me, Christ before me,
Christ beside me, Christ to win me,
Christ to comfort and restore me.
Christ beneath me, Christ above me,
Christ in quiet, Christ in danger,
Christ in hearts of all that love me,
Christ in mouth of friend and stranger.

I bind unto myself the Name,
The strong Name of the Trinity,
By invocation of the same,
The Three in One and One in Three.
By Whom all nature hath creation,
Eternal Father, Spirit, Word:
Praise to the Lord of my salvation,
Salvation is of Christ the Lord.

[translated by Cecil Frances Humphreys Alexander in 1889.]

It is also known as a Lorica. And you will meet her who goes by that name soon enough.

And one last prayer which I love from C.S. Lewis:

“Lord, forgive me of my trumpery, lest I die!�

And now I am ready to begin...

I want to let everyone know that my seemingly narcissistic perspective is actually forced because in my local world I tend to be overly attentive to the needs and feelings of others. It is a compensation. As a method of contemplation it is also supported by the likes of Sister Wendy who has graced the world with not only her knowledge of art, but her ability to teach us to understand and benefit from art. She reinforces my instinct to take in the piece with all my senses, then go inside myself and observe its effects. I also would pass this suggestion on to you and encourage you to do the same. Try not to force the piece to fit into a pre-fabricated lesson or category, but simply let it alter your life and emotions and then see what happens. I’m convinced that it’s okay to be changed by the forces around us because God can come to us at any time this way. He is Lord, and there is no door locked to Him. Once we are His, these forces can be used by us for good while we must not be mastered by anything. If it is not beneficial, then don’t go there. Every individual eventually has to make that call for their self.

God, bless you and enjoy swimming in the deep end.

Vera Drake

Links
—Overview
—About this Film pdf
—Spiritual Connections

How many times have I seen it?

I’ve only seen this movie once so prepare for some glaring detail mistakes.

What I’d heard about the movie before I went.

The only thing I’d heard about this movie before I’d seen it was that it was about a woman who performed illegal abortions. I thought I read that she lived in the 1800’s, but I was wrong about that. I was surprised to see semi-modern clothing and topics of discussion.

How I identify.
I don’t identify with Vera at all. In fact, I think I identify with one or two of her patients more closely. Hmmm...

The story.

The story begins with her coming and going to people’s homes as she takes care of them, helps and encourages them. We see her making friends with a single, isolated man, Reg, and inviting him to dinner at her home with her family. Just because he’s alone. She sees him every day while she goes to take care of George, so he’s not a complete stranger to her. In the end he proves to be very important.

Then one day, she arrives at the home of a frightened young woman. She tells the woman that she must put on a kettle and then proceeds to help her into the bedroom where she is instructed to take off her knickers and lay down on a clean towel.

At this point I began to feel nauseous and very anxious – just like this young woman must have been feeling. I was expecting ugly and scary looking surgical tools and lots of blood and gore. Instead she unpacked only a very few mainly harmless looking and common objects out of a case and tin box with a towel (leaving out some details here for the same reason I wouldn’t want to give out bomb recipes...). Then after she prepared a simple mixture, she did a quick pelvic exam (ladies, we understand this, but imagine yourself in the 50’s and in England where they were taught to “Think of England� whenever something happened down there... n’kay?) and then pumped the mixture into her until she “felt full�. Then she packed up, smiled encouragingly and left these few instructions: “In a few days, you’ll feel a pain down below. When this happens, get yourself to the toilet. There’ll be some bleeding and then it will all come away and you’ll be right as rain.�

I felt weird after this. And I’m only now beginning to figure out why. Somebody’s lying to me. If it were that simple, then we wouldn’t need to go through all the blood, surgery and chemical and physical trauma that I’m lead to believe is actually involved with this. I could do this to myself at home! What’s the catch? What am I missing? Is the movie lying? Are the Pro-lifers lying to get us to think it’s always so incredibly ghastly? Are the drug companies lying so they can develop and sell more drugs? Is Vera lying to spare the woman unhelpful anxiety? If you want this movie to answer these questions, don’t hold your breath. That’s not what it’s about.

Her family life is quaint and loving. Her daughter, Ethel, is a total wall-flower and speaks maybe a total of 15 words in the entire film. Her son, Sid, is a lively, party boy who works at a tailor shop. Her husband, Stan, is a mechanic who runs a shop with his brother, Frank. Together, they operate a happy and generous family unit that does more for their country than their country does for them.

A side story that only lasts half the film is that of a daughter of a wealthy family whom Vera serves as a domestic. Susan Wells. One night she is raped in her home by a young man whom she thought well of and, then later we find out, becomes pregnant. I couldn’t be sure without seeing the movie again, but I thought the young man looked alot like one of Sid’s party friends. If it were, then it would help explain Sid and the kind of dilemma women were in at that time and now. If not, then he was a random young male and we have no insight into his motivations. He could have been an ex-con for all we know. But, somehow I doubt this. I think he’s connected to Sid.

At any rate, Susan seeks help from a confidant. Lunching at a cafe with her, she manages to convey that she is pregnant and needs to obtain an abortion by using the words... “I have a friend who...�, and then crying. This may seem insignificant, but I assure you, it becomes the main theme of the movie. Susan’s process is paralleled with that of the women who Vera helps.

Susan is interviewed by a doctor, then a psychiatrist and then attended to by nuns - plural. She gets to stay in a lovely room with a view and is given two days of observation to recover after an apparently legal abortion. The process cost 150 pounds. She had 100 on her at the time of the interview.

Vera’s patients vary. From spoiled and perpetually drinking party girls who have “done this before�, to a poor Jamaican woman who is very frightened and feels heart breaking remorse, to a middle class married woman who fooled around while her husband was away, to a poor married woman who already has a house-full of kids and takes control where her husband won’t. The main contact between the women in trouble and Vera is a woman named Lily. Lily is an awful woman, rude, intolerant and completely lacking in empathic abilities, but Vera doesn’t seem to notice or mind. Women find Lily, then later she gives Vera their names and addresses. But Lily secretly charges them a fee and makes them promise not to tell Vera. As far as Vera knows, she is simply helping these women and cares nothing for monetary recompense.

In the psychiatrist’s office, Susan Wells is asked some painful and frightful questions. “Were you a virgin?� “Are your parents happily married?� Most of which she simply couldn’t voice a reply to. “Did he force himself upon you?� All she could do was squeak and cry. He asked her to please answer the questions as honestly and straightforwardly as possible. She obviously does her best, but something happens to rape victims, as well as women who are simply required to love and chronically not allowed to have a voice about their needs or objections. They actually lose their ability to speak. Their voices become submerged deep beneath a sweet exterior of smiling and serving. We saw the beginning of the process in Susan. We see the end of it later.

As Vera was treating these women, something kindof strange happened very consistently. When the intense, ambivalent emotions of these women began to erupt in front of her, a bizarre absence of concern was exposed. She stood still as stone with a blank, Mona Lisa smile on her face while one woman was nearly having a nervous breakdown. She calmly waited for it to pass.

Then one day, Vera “helps out� a young woman, Pamela, who is being comforted by her Mother. The Mother, Jesse Barnes, recognizes her from a job they both used to have at a factory years earlier. They chat nervously while Vera is working. Days later this girl is checked into a hospital as she is convulsing in abnormal amounts of pain. Something went wrong. I’m left feeling uneasy because I want to believe that the complication was from an unrelated problem that was pre-existing. But I don’t get to find out. All I learn is that the medical doctor knows that there was an abortion, Pamela nearly died but didn’t and that this is apparently a common occurrence from his point of view. He tells Mrs. Barnes that it must be reported to the police, and that if she won’t do it then he has an obligation to do it. She is clearly uncomfortable with this, but is forced to go along. Since she knew Vera, she gives them her name, and the game is up.

Meanwhile, a very sweet little romance develops between Reg and Ethel and in one of the most painfully archaic scenes ever, they become engaged. Along side of this, Frank’s wife Joyce (a whole different kind of painful!) becomes pregnant and they prepare to announce the good news. The next day at work, Stan invites Frank and his wife to dinner to celebrate and Frank plans his announcement for then.

Guess which events happen during the same dinner hour? Yes, at table, just as hugs are being passed all around and both wedding and baby announcements have been made, there is an ominous knock on the door! Stan answers the door and while both he and the Inspector were very cordial and civilized, the train wreck of values begins to spew its bodies in the November snow.


Character development.

--->Vera Drake fulfills all my fantasies of a nurturing Grandmother type person. In fact, she was like my own Grandmother in some ways. She was cheerful, friendly, sympathetic, caring, gentle, loved people and loved to hear their stories and sink her heart’s teeth into them deeply in order to connect and feed her need to be loving. Her love for her family was simple and total, and so fulfilling for her that there was always plenty left over for strangers and the troubled. I would even suggest that she filled a certain archetype. She showed no signs of dissatisfaction or disappointment or personal injury and she was always rationalizing and making excuses for other people in her attempt at smoothing over everyone’s hurts. She completely and totally absorbed the troubles of others in a seemingly endless hug.

But in a very important way, she was unlike my Grandmother. Vera’s voice had been buried so deep that finally she completely lost the ability to speak for herself. The interrogation and courtroom scenes showed us the inner drama of this lost woman more explicitly than any other device could. She was irretrievable. Gone. An emptied husk propped up by the good feelings she got when she “helped� other women. Helped them to not feel what she had at one point, long ago, felt and couldn’t process. In a flash we saw the whole picture.

We saw something very wrong but inexpressible in the dusty and old silence between her and her aging Mother when she went to care for her. We saw the same thing when her patients needed her to help them with their pain and remorse. We saw her inability to raise a daughter to have a voice of her own. We saw it when Susan, the British ‘Generation Next’, was questioned by male authority figures and encouraged to speak, but without having any cultural reference point for such behavior, simply couldn’t. Later, while being questioned by the police in a sort of mirror image of Susan’s visit to the doctor, we watch as Vera is told to answer the questions as truthfully as she can, but can only produce tears and trembling. We saw it all along, but couldn’t put our finger on it.

Vera was given the chance to begin to grieve for her own loss, and recover her voice, but like those vague pains down below, it passed.

--->Stan was the quintessential compliment to his wonderful wife. He was kind, fair, appreciative, and directed the emotional traffic for the family with grace and economy. He even talked to Vera openly in bed one night of feelings about his war experiences after a particularly stirring conversation with Reg about how WWII affected their families. By her response, you could see that he did this normally. Later, in a conversation about how they felt about Vera’s arrest, Stan helped Sid sort out his feelings by being transparent about his own and leading the way to forgiveness. It was stunning! Especially for a man (Sorry, guys, my bias is showing.). I was terribly impressed (<--- read jealous!)! At another time, Stan also led the way by example for his brother to recognize and appreciate wonderful qualities in a woman.

--->Ethel’s silent presence is the Question begging to be heard. Who am I? What is my purpose? What do I feel? What do I think? When Reg asked her to marry him, she had to dig deep to consider her answer, even though her response was preprogrammed. She gave the “correct� answer, though we are left wondering if it is really her answer. Who is this woman? We never find out. Will she ever find out? In some of the very last frames of the film, we see her almost clawing to get out of her prison of silence, but then finally we see her back at the dinner table with Father, Brother and new Husband bowed even lower and submerged more deeply in fear and humiliation than ever. It’s torment to watch her

--->Sid is emotive, happy, socially well adjusted and a natural influencer to friends and customers. He is well liked. But Sid has a blind spot. He doesn’t see that he is part of a big problem. His dating advice is just an extension of his sales pitch from work. There is no sense of responsibility toward the impregnation of women. Women’s lives are routinely ruined by men who force desperate decisions onto them without sharing any of the burdens. I’m sure he’d be the type that if a woman were to inform him that he had gotten her pregnant, his values would direct him to make an honest woman of her. But out of sight, out of mind. And the unspoken rule is: “Ladies, tempt me with your clothes and figure and your “come-hither� look, but keep your little personal problems out of my sight.� He tried to present the moral objection to Vera’s work, but his hypocrisy completely cancelled out its validity. He is friendly enough, but he is selfish and simple-minded and, ironically, a direct result of his Mother not helping him to understand the needs and feelings of women. There is only so much that his Father can teach a son about that. Mothers must finish the job.

--->Frank is Stan’s brother and married to Joyce. He’s a very sweet and respectful man who helps and is helped by his brother. They have a most healthy and caring relationship. Honest, affectionate, supportive and flexible. But Frank has a problem. I’m guessing that the younger brother who needed to be different than the older brother, married the opposite “kind� of woman. My heart ached for Frank as he learned the hard way what the consequences would be for what he had done. After Stan was momentarily knocked off balance by the presence of the police in his home, and then left to follow Vera to the station; the dinner guests led by Frank, were strongly held to Stan’s request that they remain until he returned. If they had disbursed, they may never have recovered their trust. But since they stayed, the true family core plus the new recruit, Reg, bonded more deeply than otherwise possible. This was Frank’s doing.

--->Frank’s wife Joyce is a class-climbing snob who dishonors her husband with her poor character. Completely unconcerned with the wrongness of her remarks about others, she nearly blew the family apart the night of the arrest. Later she began her dirty work in full when it was clear that Vera’s place of Matriarch was soon to become vacant. I’m sure there are tragedies which force women into this kind of mold, but any justification they might come up with to become this nasty fall flat for me. That’s part of my own wounding.

Where Vera is selfless, Joyce is self-centered. Vera is plain and frumpy, Joyce looks “like a film star�. Vera goes without status prizes and is careful with Stan’s take-home, Joyce only wants to spend George’s hard-earned cash to keep up with the Joneses regardless of the size of the hints he drops about its limitations. Vera works to earn character. Joyce is a character who doesn’t work! Vera bonds with people. Joyce excommunicates people. Horrible woman!

--->Reg is a simple man, kind, respectful and articulate. He could have been an axe murderer as much as Vera knew about him! But all she could see was that he was alone. He’s not alone because he’s evil or socially challenged; he merely lost his family and needed help to connect. He was a lost treasure, and Vera found him. His final gesture to her was touching as his words couldn’t quite contain his deep appreciation towards her. Choosing to emulate Stan’s tone, he led by example in honoring and respecting the good intentions of a kind woman. He also voiced the problem for women and children very well (the voice of children was completely missing in this film – apparently, it wasn’t about them.), “It’s alright if you’re rich. But if you can’t feed ‘em, you can’t love ‘em, can ya?� This stood in contrast to Sid’s pompous attitude.

--->Detective Inspector Webster, the Police and the Courts represent the presence of the moral question about Vera’s work. They were enforcing a nearly 100 year old law with as much care and respect towards the problems of these women as they could. There was no hint of hypocrisy, cruelty, malice, judgmental disgust or elitism about them. This sterile voice of “morality� stood delicately out of the way while the war concerning people’s emotions raged on all around it. If there was a villain for the Pro-Choicers, it was not the people carrying out the Law, but the Law itself.


Social commentary.

But the Law doesn’t merely mark the presence of an archaic social value that no one adheres to anymore, does it? Much as some wishfully claim. This value is still present, though in many countries the Law no longer represents it.

When the two sides of the abortion debate settled on what their titles would be, their names were chosen carefully. “Pro-abortion� and “Anti-abortion� could not adequately communicate what they were about, because while legalized abortion was the practice they were arguing over, they both were desperately trying to speak up for people groups who were being systematically silenced. So “Pro-choice� became the rallying cry of women like Vera and Susan who literally could not speak in their “own defense�.

“Pro-life� was chosen both as the anticipated cry of living, human infants who’s chance to cry was taken away by others and some of the other voices which we witnessed in the film such as the necessarily submerged cry of women like the Jamaican girl and the married woman who’s grief began to ravage them while Vera stood coldly by and the unacknowledged objection of men who would want to “do the right thing� and commit to the woman who was carrying their child. Once situation which was not portrayed in the film, but which is becoming increasingly common is the number of women who want children but are unable to bear them.

The young man who was arriving at the door of one of Vera’s patients just as she was leaving may have loved his girlfriend and might have wanted to marry her, but we never get to find out because he is not heard. Sid’s voice, full of contempt and scorn for Vera and all women who would use her services, projecting his own problem onto women that he may as well have forced into the position to require them, was loud and clear then as it is now. The difference between their two positions should be acknowledged, but it rarely is. Stan set the right tone for him of respect and forgiveness while acknowledging that he too had a moral objection.

There is also an issue of religious freedom which, when co-opted by men who merely want to control the women in their society, will go to unpleasant extremes. But when practiced with integrity and loving devotion, it could be a stabilizing factor in a culture. What if there’s a religion which dictates that a male who treats women with disrespect should pay restitution to the female and/or her Parents for the damage to their honor? We don’t really know, do we? Because we don’t hear their voices. God knows the Law won’t reflect or provide that much needed correction in society today. Our system of Law ends up humiliating a woman as much or more than the man who takes advantage of her feelings and vulnerability in the first place! So when we shut out spiritual traditions which would champion women who are hurt by dishonest men, women potentially lose a powerful ally in our struggle for respect. Any religion can and has been manipulated by ambitious politicos who will use whatever means necessary to control people. But what if we could figure out a way to prevent the abuse? It would be refreshing to hear the voices of those who would seek a solution. But we don’t.

In America, the Media makes our decisions regarding what to argue about for us. If we’re not smart and quick enough to derail them, they will find the irresolvable conflict point, and erect monuments of advertising time in honor of them. Whoever came up with the tag line in the trailer, “The story of one woman who sacrificed everything for what she believed in.�, was clearly using this formula, even though the film doesn’t reflect that part of the polarity at all. That’s what they get paid to do. The difficulty is that in order for us to counter the efforts of the Media to baffle us with BS, we need our voice to be heard - but the best available vehicle for that is the Media. They’ve got us by the shorts. From what I can see, two of the best ways to combat this abuse of power are, the Internet and independent filmmakers who say something about these issues without using the authorized polemic. I think Mike Leigh has done that, but I can’t be sure because instead of simply displaying text, someone has chosen to put his voice on a type of technology which I cannot access at their website. I wonder why they would do that.

How are we going to be truly heard and also hear one another if we keep letting Marketing reps for products and services dictate to us how we feel about these and other issues of this magnitude? If I were officially Pro-life, I would be really upset about how the secular Media constantly represents me as a simple-minded, religious hypocrite. And if I were officially Pro-choice, I would get tired of the religious Media portraying me as a strident, aloof, condescending, player of political games. Truth be told, I could truly voice each and every concern with sincerity and would genuinely care about every objection equally. I would want to collect the ideas of people who aren’t so invested in cultural warfare and try to find a better solution than simply using the Law to judge the end results. Am I alone here? I can’t tell because my voice is not represented!

How about yours? If everyone who has previously contributed to the Problem of arrogance and self-righteousness and paranoia would just sit down and shut up, which voices would emerge from the silence? What kind of Solutions might be drowning in the sea of sound-bites that is with us day in and day out? Is there anyone out there who might have something productive to say? I can’t hear you. The line most often repeated in this film was, “Would you please speak up?�


Connection to Faith.

This is much more personal than I thought it would be.

Initially I thought this film would be about abortion. But it’s not really. It’s about the silencing of women’s voices about their feelings of betrayal, disappointment, shame, fear, sorrow, confusion and doubt. But most of all their feelings about sexuality and intimate relationships. I have enough personal experience with this to earn my right to speak.

In all the ways we let one another down, we regularly dump toxic emotional waste into the world for other generations to clean up. And when that waste becomes responsible for crippling or killing people, we become numb, silent, belligerent or turn away. A child is dependent upon the preceding generations’ Integrity in order to grow up happy, healthy and wise. A culture is dependent on citizens to be happy, healthy and wise in order to flourish and overtake evil. The whole world is dependent on cultures who are flourishing and who can overtake evil in order to not blow itself to bits. How is the Christian Faith going to speak to these problems in Western or other cultures if we are as numb and belligerent as anybody else about the damage we do to people?

Before I was married, I was determined not to become a statistic, so I studied up on how to do relationships from A to Z. I knew that I had shortcomings and so I tried to find help in truly solving those problems. But I was unwittingly studying under the wrong teachers. It’s like getting ready for the Olympic Marathon by running sprints, buying the prettiest running shoes and shorts on the market and shopping for journalists who would get my story right. I had no marriages in my family that I could study and model, but I thought I could learn well enough from books and classes and teachers and seminars and workshops and counseling and trial and error. My teachers led me astray by selling me only what the mass market had to offer and avoiding the issues which they had no willingness to tackle in their own lives. They had nothing to help me with the kinds of real conflicts that I would eventually be having as a married woman.

When I finally did plunge into romantic wedded bliss I believed all the good things about our abilities to overcome the unknown obstacles of life. Only after it was too late did I realize that we had no training, and that there would be a lack of willingness to acquire the right training, to deal with the kinds of things that make up normal, interdependent, intimate relationships. I had thought we could make up for what we lacked with a dedicated effort – especially before our daughter got too old and would start to adapt her personality around our poor forms of relating. But it didn’t happen. So while my daughter ingested alot of bad exampling, I swallowed alot of anger and fear and disappointment.

After I realized how much trouble I was in, I tried to find better teachers who would help us or even just help me. I tried everything I could. Christian teachers, mind you. Teachers who claimed to speak for God and His Ultimate Wisdom. I was gently maneuvered into believing that I couldn’t think or speak for myself as a layperson, but especially as a woman. And so I tried as hard as I could to take the advice of the expert men in authority around me. Women weren’t much help either. They were basically in the same boat, and so couldn’t do much more than lend me a shoulder and sympathy. Some of them made noises that sounded like they were victorious and empowered, but really they were just parroting what men have been teaching them, and as long as they did it flawlessly and convincingly, I guess they were encouraged to teach other women. Both men and woman talked and talked and put on a lovely song and dance. And wanting to be a successful Christian wife, I tried as hard as I could to swallow down my gut instincts screaming within me, and complied as best I could. What I heard the most was, “Hmmmm. I’ll pray for you.� and that was the extent of it. Eventually I learned to deeply resent that phrase.

After the initial shock when my husband told me that he filed for divorce, I started to vomit up everything I had been swallowing down all those years. I lost 10 pounds in stress alone. I found an obscure passage in the Bible that I had never heard read or taught on before. I mentioned it to my Pastor when he went to see him because of the divorce, but he tried to tell me that I was interpreting it wrong. That was the last time I really listened to him. It goes like this:

“Under three things the earth trembles,
under four it cannot bear up:
a servant who becomes king,
a fool who is full of food,
and unloved woman who is married,
and a maidservant who displaces her mistress.�

Anyone who watches daytime soap operas knows these scenarios well. Each one can provide enough tension and drama to drive a plot for decades. These things make the world of pop fiction go ‘round. But they do not make the real world go ‘round. In fact, that dusty ol’ Bible is very explicit about its opposite effect. I watched those old shows with my Grandmother when I was little... “The Secret Storm�, “All My Children�, “The Edge of Night�... but I never understood the fascination. Tension and drama are not the kinds of things I signed on for when I walked down the aisle. In fact, I believed that I was leaving all the people who love that kind of stupid relating far behind me by locking myself in a garden behind a high gate with a man who promised to be different and then throwing away the key. All the teaching I had heard spoke as if this could be true.

But no one spoke up in my defense when it turned out to be a lie. And since I had been encouraged to be so passive, I also lost my own ability to speak in my own defense. I was easily manipulated. I lost my ability to carry my own weight in the world as my shoulders were driven deep into the ground by all the crushing disappointment, betrayal and despair. I am still in deep grief over it, 7 years later. My children have adapted their personalities to suit the caustic relationship between my now ex-husband and I and so they will also carry the burden of being ill-equipped to deal with the obstacles in their upcoming intimate relationships. Damage begets damage. And the world trembles under the weight of the millions who are like us.

When Jesus was walking the Earth, He provided a safe place within Himself for people to run with their weak and damaged lives. Often He would “fix� things for people, heal them, heal their family members, provide money, feed them, bring them back from the dead. Stuff that would put off the inevitable for a little longer and give them time to figure out what else He was up to. But He invested more of His time and energy teaching and demonstrating something almost intangible. Responsibility and care toward a damaged and dependent humanity. His teachings were directed toward embodying a more powerful presence of Good in environments where there was much evil, outdoing damaging forces with the will to protect and repair. His rebukes were often tempered by His estimation of how dependent the recipient was upon someone else. Those who had no power in their surroundings, the poor, the crippled, slaves, children and women were shown almost unbounded mercy; while those who had all the power, the rich, well fed, oblivious and unconcerned, popular, owners of land, businessmen, kings, politicians and religious leaders got brought up short and fast to the Judgment seat and held accountable. There was sometimes negotiation over His judgments and often people used that time to try and manipulate Him, but He used this opportunity to expose their unwillingness to take responsibility toward those who were dependent upon them. Always He exposed humanity’s resistance to acknowledge their very real and vulnerable state- that of Interdependence.

Unlike current American folk, Vera and Stan and the others were part of an era and a culture where people took care of each other when they were in trouble. If someone nearby was in need, people would be aware and someone would most likely rise up and fill it. There was no huge fear of ax murderers or lawsuits, nor welfare penalties from the state for simply receiving help from compassionate fellow humans. It was not very complicated. Kind people took care of one another. However, there is an even deeper dependence that historically had been taken for granted, but has now finally been dismissed as irrelevant. Our reliance on the Goodness and Integrity of another who is more powerful than ourselves even when we’re not yet sick or injured or in some kind of trouble. Just as Ethel depended on Vera to protect her and teach her how to know what she needed and negotiate with authority figures to get her needs met, Vera depended upon her Mother to do this when she was young and vulnerable. Without knowing what, we saw the damage from something which disrupted the trust between the two. Just as Ethel depended upon Reg’s Integrity as she drew closer and closer to putting her life in his hands, Susan depended upon the Integrity of Sid’s friend at her Parent’s home that fateful night. Just as Stan depended upon Vera to spend his earnings wisely and prudently, Frank depended upon his wife Joyce to do the same. As Vera depended on Stan to show others how to treat her with respect, Susan (and many other girls, no doubt) depended on Sid to model appropriate attitudes toward women to his friends.

I depended on the Church to be a light, but instead it was a blindfold. My children depended on my husband and I to model conflict resolution in a mature and productive manner, but instead we grew endless hazard filled labyrinths of avoidance and denial around conflict. My husband and I depended on our families and mentors to teach and help us before and during our marriage. But instead they painted rosy pictures, criticized or avoided the subject. Everyone whose life I, my ex-husband and my children will touch will be depending on us to learn from our mistakes and change. Society will be depending on people like us to carry more than our own weight in order to keep the world from breaking apart.

But we’re ignoring that. Huge amounts of trust (and the resulting disappointment) in other people have been intentionally replaced by the knowledge of our Rights within the Law. If we screw someone, they are within their rights to try and sue. If they’re successful, then I’ll have my Lawyers use my buffer account to handle it. If they’re unsuccessful, then I get away with it and that’s like having permission. Either way, it’s all a game, and no one really expects me to go to all the trouble of having integrity. Not if life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness is what each one of us is after anyway.

The World’s systems of Justice are just as messed up as anything else, and often people are punished for wanting to bring an end to suffering. When there is no where in the World to turn, death for someone seems to be a viable option. Will the Church learn how we may have contributed to all this suffering and change our patterns of relating? Since we know that the Law cannot solve problems of character, will we honor those who are interdependent with us and have better character than those around us? Will we be wise enough to help and train those who have been sold a bill of goods by irresponsible teachers and families? Will we have the guts to reach in to tense situations where a family is about to blow apart or a life could be lost because people have come to the end of their ropes? Will we force ourselves to listen to the silenced ones, learn from them, and lift them up? Or will we continue to criticize, paint rosy pictures and turn away?


Scripture.

Just as the Temple Sacrifices became the sterile, empty duty of some “religious� people in Jesus’ day- putting a manageable and safe barrier between them and the important obligations they had to change and become more compassionate, responsible and better human beings- the religious practices of the Church have notoriously degraded into the same hollow signifiers. God spoke to this problem in both Old and New Testaments:

Psalm 51:16-17
“You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it;
You do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.
The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart,
O God, You will not despise.�

Matthew 5:21-24
“You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘Do not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment’. But I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment. Again anyone who says to his brother, ‘Raca,’ is answerable to the Sanhedrin. But anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell.

Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer your gift.�

When Jesus began His ministry in earnest, He went to His home town and announced His intent to be the beginning of the Solution to the problems that humanity faced. At Nazareth, He entered the local synagogue and respectfully opened the Scriptures to the book of Isaiah and read out loud:

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because He has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to release the oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor�

There is more to this passage, but He stopped there and, “rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on Him, and he began by saying to them, ‘Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.’�

This is the rest of the passage from Isaiah:

“and the day of vengeance of our God,
to comfort all who mourn,
and provide for those who grieve in Zion-
to bestow on them a crown of beauty
instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness
instead of mourning
and a garment of praise
instead of a spirit of despair.
They will be called oaks of righteousness
a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor.�

Later, on the Sermon on the Mount, He may have picked up most of the rest of what that passage in Isaiah was referring to but added an extra twist in order to emphasize the powerful transformation which they would undergo as they followed in His footsteps and became part of the Solution. This is what He said there:

“Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn,
for they will be comforted.
Blessed are the meek,
for they will inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
for they will be filled,
Blessed are the merciful,
for they will be shown mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they will see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called sons of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
[Blessed are you who weep now,
for you will laugh.� – from Luke]
And then He expanded on that in order to warn those who were part of the Problem:

“Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

[But woe to you who are rich,
for you have already received your comfort.
Woe to you who are well fed now,
for you will go hungry.
Woe to you who laugh now,
for you will mourn and weep.
Woe to you when all men speak well of you
For that is how their fathers treated the false prophets.� – from Luke]

Did He leave anything out? Oh, yeah. In case there is any doubt, he deliberately left the vengeance for the FUTURE. Not for us to enact now in His Name, but for Himself in the future after every game has been played out to the end and the final score has been tallied. This is the Year of the Lord’s FAVOR. How good a job are we doin’ at being the Solution?


Score Comments.

The score was minimal. Very plain accompaniment with the occasional small chorus of women’s voices singing notes without words. It perfectly interpreted artistically what the story was showing through narrative and emphasized the feelings of isolation and trepidation and smallness. Helplessness. Imprisonment within the boundaries of what is allowed. It is a prophetic cry. I hope people hear it.

Links
—Overview
—About this Film pdf
—Spiritual Connections