Category Archives: Life reflections

What Would You Do?

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So what would you do?

I joined the American Association of University Women to meet other educated women. They fact that they wanted to change the world for the better for future women was a bonus.

The group recently decided to book a DEI speaker; when I found out who it was, my heart sank. Don was on the board of a local theater and held a terrible conversation with me about being unwilling to pay a black female storyteller the same as a white male teller. During the conversation, he said the festival was already diverse because it had a performer from the LGBTQ+ community. I was the one causing trouble by making a false claim in the first place.

I left that committee; Don then denied he’d said most of that. In my opinion, this man has as much business talking DEI as the pope does birth control. I took my concerns to the AAUW person overseeing that program, who said she hadn’t booked him and shared my belief that he was inappropriate, not least because a man would talk to women about DEI. She asked me to line up an alternate. I did, but Don was then left in place. “What’s done is done,” she emailed me, when I asked what happened.

So here’s my question: do I go to the meeting and confront this DEI champion of the old school upholding he is benefiting from, or do I walk away? An org that says it intends to make the world better for successive generations of women but doesn’t want to start now isn’t a good bet for a future plan. But is it worth going to the talk, sitting with a fixed smile, and then asking him why he supported not paying the white male and black female storytellers (of equal national standing) the same amount?

Because, you know, if women want to change the world, we need to do so politely. Raising our voices, challenging questions, breaking a sweat: do we really need to do those? Won’t I just be seen as a woman being rude, perhaps even personal?

Every chance to make the world better is a rare one these days. If I don’t confront this situation, am I doing what I am accusing the AAUW group of: taking the easy way rather than challenging the old order in favor of stronger voices with better representation? Or will I be the bitch who yelled?

Accepting advice now, thanks.

Ruining the Psalms

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So the Psalms are generally considered almost a dessert when reading the Bible. The number of songs that come out of them, you can hear in your head as you’re reading. Sometimes I am almost singing along as I breeze along.

Except….. okay, I did a Samuel, Kings, Chronicles deep dive. These books are a little bit out of chronological order, but they feature the rise and fall (and rise and fall and rise and fall….) of Israel when it was one kingdom, and then Israel and Judah when it was two. And its exiling and rebuilding (twice) etc.

But the bulk of Sam/King/Chron complex features the adventures of David, from his anointing through the reigns of his descendants, (roughly running from three hours to 54 years). And when you have read them carefully, and used some online study guides to sort the chronology, you will see how hard David worked to get into power and keep it. And some of the very nasty acts that included.

Then you read Psalms, and you see that David and the other authors (there are at least six, but authorities differ) are basically either saying “Thanks God it’s going great and we owe it all to you” or “Help God, why aren’t you helping us, this is embarrassing in front of our enemies?” Plus a lot of them are very…. ehm…. flattering about David. Definitely meant to be sung at throneside banquets.

I grew up in a narrative that framed David’s life in a particular way. David was God’s chosen king. Therefore, whatever David did to become and stay king was fine. And, you know, that Bathsheba thing, that was just in there to show God could use flawed individuals.

OKay….. but reading these beautiful songs of worship in historic context, well, it gets conflicting. No pun intended, because many of them are about battles won or lost, and whether God showed up to help. And who he showed up for.

David once lined up a bunch of men and killed them by numerical order. David couldn’t figure out who was lying to him and who wasn’t when he had to flee his royal city (for the fifth or sixth time, I lost count). David knew better than to kill Joab (who was his nephew) even though he really really wanted to, because he needed this warrior to keep him powerful. They spent their lives eyeing each other, knives behind their backs.

The Psalms are complicated when you read them in this way. Summon your power, O God, because we want to fight. Hide me in the shelter of your wings, because we’re losing. Lead me beside still waters, because I’m exhausted with fighting.

What is the message of Psalms? For many, many commentators, it is that God chose someone and no matter what that asshole did, God stuck by him–and his increasingly awful grandchildren. For many charismatic churches, it is the source of beautiful worship music; sing the melody, never mind historic context.

For me, it is a reminder that nothing in this world has EVER been simple and Trump is not the worst threat OR promise Christianity has ever seen. Work out our salvation with fear and trembling and perhaps a modicum of common sense.