Then, please tell me what a "meme" is.
9:33:33 PM    Comments?()  

Stephanie Staker is a woman who suffers from chronic, debilitating pain. A born-again Christian, she belonged to a church who believed in healing by faith. When her pain continued, her born-again friends chided her, saying her faith obviously wasn't strong enough. For awhile she bought in to that, feeling guilty for her lack of faith. Interviewed for "The Truth About Chronic Pain" by Arthur Rosenfeld, she tells of needing a hysterectomy for an unrelated problem. "This one particular friend, who, at that time, was my best friend, said that I had turned to the Devil, to Satan, because I opted to have a hysterectomy. She thought I should have had more faith, and that God would have healed me if I did, and that having a medical failure was a sign of my religious weakness, my failure."

I read that passage to my daughter's mother, herself a good Christian (and I say that with absolutely no sarcasm or irony). Unfortunately, she said, that's all too common in some circles. A friend of hers is manic-depressive and an alcoholic. This friend belonged to a charismatic church, where she was told that her faith would heal her. She tried her best, as only a manic-phase convert can do, but she remained a mentally ill alcoholic. So she went into a church-run treatment program. It was a residential program and the first thing they did was take away all her medications, told her she didn't need them. They were wrong, of course. She got worse, instead of better. Instead of seeing their own failure, they told this woman the problem was with her lack of faith in God and sent her and her meager suitcase into the street. Now, she's back on medication, going to a real treatment program and is doing better.

These were well-meaning people, these fundamental Christians. Well-meaning, but without a clue into the nature of brain chemistry and addiction. Like so many fundamentalist Christians, Muslims, Jews and Hindi, they are utterly convinced that they know the Truth and that knowledge confers a right to judge and a duty to make everyone's lifestyle conform to their own. The narrowness of their vision keeps them from seeing beyond themselves.

It becomes more important every day to keep religion and government separate. A religious state owes allegiance to its God and its adherents. A secular state owes allegiance to all of its citizens, without respect to religion or dogma.
9:23:42 PM    Comments?()