It's a secret, shhhh!

Well, it has certainly taken some prayer and a lot of thought to decide whether or not to open up this can of worms. I am concerned that there are probably a lot of people out there who would prefer that this secret remain secret. Certainly I don't think every Christian home school family has this secret to keep, but I am also quite sure that there are many out there that do!

In the past, no one has been willing to talk openly about any downside to home school. The fear is that any flaws might be used by our enemies to take away our freedoms. That still might be a valid concern (I don't think so) but the flaws will out themselves anyway. I think it will be best to discuss them ourselves and do a little problem-solving to mitigate the effects of our problems, rather than to deny problems exist.

Problems don't go away simply because one pretends they don't exist. And these problems are real.

I know because I have met families dealing with this secret and befriended them both online and in real life. In thirteen years of experience in the Christian home schooling community, I have met a lot of home schooling families!

Certainly a lot of other families who do not home school also keep the same secret, but it is a particularly damaging secret for Christian home school families for two main reasons.

The first is the home school community's pretension to having the perfect family life set-up. My public-schooling non-Christian neighbor may have the same little secret that I kept for a long time, but then no one is proclaiming that way of life as ideal or idyllic. At every home school convention you will hear someone loudly proclaiming that home schooling is the best option for a happy Christian family, and even claiming that a particular set of family dynamics is essential for a Christian home school.

The dichotomy between the claims of the Christian home school community and the reality of daily life for many of the families trying to live that lifestyle is stark. If for no other reason than to warn new Christian home school families of the dangers they will face, the secret needs to be told.

The second reason that this secret needs to be told is that keeping this secret is damaging to our brothers and sisters in Christ. Fellow disciples of all ages are being blind-sided by this reality, and then are either shamed and ostracized by a Christian home school community that doesn't want to deal with it, or self-condemned into silence because they wrongly think they are the only ones facing it. Our fellow disciples dealing with this awful secret need our help, not our silence.

On then to the big reveal! What is this secret? What is it that Christian home school families are dealing with in large numbers, yet afraid to admit as a community that the problem exists? What is so awful, that even though it pops up in every home school support group, and even community leaders have been taken down by it, no one wants to own?

Crappy marriages.

That's right, crappy marriages.

Oh, the stories I could tell! I know of unhappy marriages that end in divorce, and many more that just limp along wearing the mask of Christian perfection when one or more of the spouses is (are) depressed, lonely and angry. Problems range from short-term and temporary (because they are quickly recognized and addressed) to chronic and debilitating.

I personally know of marriages afflicted by adultery, sexual perversion and porn addictions. I know of marriages characterized by long-term psychological, emotional and spiritual abuse. I know of some marriages that are in recovery and others that have ended in divorce. I even know some Christian home school families that have always been happily thriving, but no one is keeping that a secret-LOL!

Christian home school families dealing with crappy marriages do exist. I propose that they exist in every home school community, sometimes in leadership. It is time to expose the secret and find some real solutions to the problem, because what is being done presently is not helping.

Bad marriages happen. It happens in all communities, not only the Christian home school community. But all communities are not claiming to have all the answers like the Christian home school community claims.

Bad marriages happen. It happens in all communities. However in families choosing institutional educational options, the children get escape from the crazy-making secret-keeping for a few hours a day, a couple of days a week.

In the less isolated home school families this is also true, with sports, lessons, co-ops, play dates and taking classes outside the home providing relief from being in the problem all the time. But in the extremely isolated home schools, where no one goes anywhere without the whole family tagging along, there is no relief.

Bad marriages happen in all communities. However in the world outside the Christian home school cloister, there is support for people dealing with problem marriages. In society as a whole there is support for people who are depressed, angry and lonely. In society at large, women are encouraged to get out of abusive situations, and there is help offered to people who want to stop being abusive but don't know how.

In the Christian home school community, crappy marriages are redefined as "biblical" as if that makes it all okay. Unhappy, depressed home school moms are shamed rather than helped. Articles and books are written chastising women who suffer from the lack of being loved, appreciated,and honored as being selfish and sinful. Those burdened by large families, scarce resources and failing health are condemned as lacking in faith, rather than offered real help and given the freedom to take better care of themselves and the children they already have.

Men who fall way short of the loving service to their families Christ commands are not offered help to overcome any abusive tendencies. What abusive tendencies? In some Christian home school circles the idea of even questioning a husband/fathers decisions or actions is strongly condemned. There is no hope of change where no need for change is acknowledged.

So there, I have spilled the secret. There are a lot of crappy marriages out there in home school land.

For those who fear that admitting our flaws will result in losing our home school freedoms, relax. It's no reason to limit the freedom to home school. There are a lot of crappy marriages in the world at large too. We don't need to pretend home schools are little oases of human perfection in order to retain the right to home school.

Home education is one method of educating children, and a darn good one at that! The academic fruit is good.

What we need to do is be open about the crappy marriages, and look for answers other than the ones being repeated over and over right now. Because the marriage fruit is looking rather poor, and is certainly no better than the marriage fruit the rest of society is enjoying.

So the secret is out. Now you know. What will you do? Kill the messenger? I hope not! =)

Reinforce the wall of denial? I hope not.

Feel a sense of relief that we don't have to keep secrets anymore? That is my wish.

And further I hope that crappy Christian home school marriages will overcome their problems and find healing and happiness for all. But the first step in solving any problem is admitting that it exists.

Maybe I should have titled this entry "step one"? =)

One of life's sweet moments

I am at a coffee shop/internet cafe right now which also serves as the meeting place for our little congregation on Sundays and music studio for our worship leader, Ryan.

Ryan is teaching my son how to play the bass guitar. He has got to be the coolest guitar teacher ever. He write his own blog peopleonahill.org that I often find just hits the spot for me that day.

Anyway, I am not sure Ryan would like to be associated with me here on the world wide web, but sorry bro! That's just the risk we take when we put ourselves out in cyberspace. Or is that the risk you take when you associate with people like me? ;) Either way, LOL.

I am so proud of my daughter and son. They are really different people, but they both have so much to offer the world in their own unique ways. I really enjoy their company and getting to watch them grow and spread their wings.

It is hard to believe that we are all the same people we were this time last year. We have come through so much, and I think the story of what we went through to get here is worth telling.

When I started this blog I intended to do just that. But now that I know a few people are actually reading this, I am actually feeling some fear. That is not like me, but it's not necessarily a bad thing.

So I think I'll just go with it for right now. I think for today I'll just enjoy my coffee, the music and the peace we share as a family at this moment.

I'll save the storytelling for another day.

Jaded

Yesterday I found out that the "new" blog I found was fictional.

I am not very happy about that. Here is a comment I left on another blog about that experience:

I have been deep in thought about the X-ATI blog.

I have known several families involved with ATI, but without exception I would never have gotten to know them if they hadn’t already left the movement.

(Those still in the movement don’t make friends with “outsiders”.)

The damage done to these precious hearts who have escaped is serious, painful and very real.

The damage done to children by any kind of abuse is not at all funny on any level. Even though I was never ATI, I was a dominated, abused child.

As such I know how important it is to be heard and believed when an abused person finally starts to tell their story. One can not approach a wounded person with skepticism and cynicism. It only compounds their pain.

One of the big woundings of child abuse is that people make light of your suffering.

I remember a particular counselor encouraging me to be honest with him (about the abuse), though I hesitated at first because I didn’t think he would believe me. His response, “Well, I find that hard to believe! Your mom seems like a nice person to me.”, worked in my abusers favor, shutting me down and reinforcing to me that my abuser really did control every aspect of my life. There would be no escape.

In light of my personal experience, I am inclined to believe those who claim abuse. I think it is righteous and godly to assume they are being honest, at least honest from their perspective.

Because of this, I will make the statement that parody blogs that are not clearly marked as such do more harm than good. I feel manipulated. The authors of that blog purposely lie, making humor out of something that is not in the least bit funny to me.

It is as distasteful to me as if someone wrote a fake blog claiming to be a victim of forced prostitution. Some things just aren’t funny.

Maybe if the authors of that blog clearly marked it as parody, some people might find it funny. But it would never be funny to me. And now I must confess I will doubt every new survivor’s blog out there.

That is all that this parody accomplishes that I can see. A few smug in-the-know people feeling smarter than everyone else, while readers who find out they have been deceived harden their hearts to future claims.

Personally, I don’t think breeding skepticism and cynicism toward claims of religious abuse is very helpful.

Stunned

Today I am stunned, shocked, dumbfounded, amazed, incredulous.

I found another new blog today, written by yet another escapee from a strict control-freak religious home school environment. My heart is scraped raw. How many precious hurting people are out there?

How did this happen? This is not what home schooling was all about when I started. It is not what Christianity is all about as I understand it. It is certainly not healthy parenting as I understand it or ever saw it practiced.

I am angry.

I was merely irritated with the religious nutjobs who are ruining the reputation of home schooling. Now those stupid magazines are not just annoying, they are infuriating.

I know in a free country we will always have people that abuse that freedom. It's inevitable.

But these people are abusing more than just freedom. They are abusing their children. And that is just not acceptable.

Nope, that is not acceptable at all.

Multigenerational Faithfulness

Psalm 100
A psalm. For giving thanks.
1 Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.

2 Worship the LORD with gladness;
come before him with joyful songs.

3 Know that the LORD is God.
It is he who made us, and and not we ourselves;
we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.

4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving
and his courts with praise;
give thanks to him and praise his name.

5 For the LORD is good and his love endures forever;
his faithfulness continues through all generations.

When I hear the phrase "multigenerational faithfulness" lately, one question pops through my mind and won't go away. The question is:

Whose faithfulness?

Whose faithfulness?

The Lord is the only one capable of multigenerational faithfulness! His faithfulness continues through all generations.

People are not capable of multigenerational faithfulness for reasons which should be obvious to any thinking Christian. We are incapable of being faithful to the Lord on an hourly, daily basis as it is. And we have no true power over any other person other than ourselves anyway. We can influence people in our lives during our lifetime. But we cannot make choices for them. God has not given us that privilege.

We do not have to go farther than Numbers 5:6 to find proof of our daily unfaithfulness to God. Here God declares that any sin we commit against anyone in our lives is considered being unfaithful to the Lord.

Numbers 5: 6 "Say to the Israelites: 'When a man or woman wrongs another in any way and so is unfaithful to the LORD, that person is guilty."

Is there any one of us who can claim to be truly faithful to the Lord at all times? Any time we sin against another human being we are convicted of being unfaithful to the Lord? If this is true, no one can claim to be a truly faithful person.

Wow. No wonder Jesus said that what we have done or left undone for the "least of these brothers of mine, you have (not) done for me". (Matthew 25:31-46)

As much as I want to be faithful to the Lord each and every day, I know that I have failed him more times than I can count. If every time I have sinned against another person I am convicted of being unfaithful to the Lord, then I would be a liar to call myself a faithful person. I can only come off as a faithful person if I ignore the definition of faithfulness that Numbers 5:6 lays down for me and invent my own definition of faithfulness to God.

If I can define faithfulness for myself, then I can feel pretty good about myself. If I define faithfulness as attending church regularly, home schooling my children, having daily devotions, praying before meals, reading the Bible out loud to my family every day, avoiding bad movies and bad TV shows, and not going to bars, I can come off pretty well. Actually I can just keep adding to that list things that are easy for me to keep, and come off with a higher and higher opinion of my own faithfulness every day.

And isn't it human nature to do just that? We really are a sad mess. Our capacity for self-deception knows no bounds.

But let's say that God is okay with our homespun definitions of faithfulness (even though we know He's not going to buy it), how can a person possible perpetuate multigenerational faithfulness when the Bible makes clear that we are only responsible for our own souls? The entire 18th chapter of Ezekiel explains this concept at length, while verse four puts it in a nutshell:

Ezekiel 18:4 For every living soul belongs to me, the father as well as the son—both alike belong to me. The soul who sins is the one who will die.

There is absolutely no way any human person can commit to multigenerational faithfulness. We are only single individual human people ultimately responsible only for our own personal individual choices during our one lifetime on earth. It is grandiose narcissism to pretend we can accomplish "multigenerational faithfulness". How embarrassing for the human race that people lay claim to having such power.

Do I want my children to know and love the Lord? Oh yes, more than almost anything. I want them to see how gracious and good the Lord truly is and to be enamored of the beauty of His holiness. I want that with all my heart.

So how can this home school mom make that happen? Not by holding up my "works of righteousness" and waving them around in their faces all day as evidence of my faithfulness. Nope, those filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6) are not going to draw one person to the Lord.

Humility and the fear of the Lord in my own life is a good start. But even then, the focus would be on me and I am nobody's Saviour. Better by far is to lift up the Lord in praise because He is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.

I can not make my children's choices for them, but I can influence them in a positive way when they see true gratitude for God's mercy spilling out of my mouth. I can influence them in a positive way when they see real joy animating my personality because of the great mercy God daily shows to me, unfaithful sinner that I am. When my daily life reflects Psalms 40:16 then I can know that I am doing all I can to influence not just my children, but everyone in my life for God's glory.

But may all who seek you rejoice and be glad in you; may those who love your salvation always say, "The LORD be exalted!"

Amen. The Lord be exalted. He is good. His mercy endures forever. His faithfulness endures through all generations. Amen.

Moderating Comments

Lately I spend a lot of time in cyberspace following the blogs of home school graduates who have had poor experiences to strict patriarchal fundamentalist home school philosophies. My heart goes out to these brave young woman who have found the courage to take back the gift of life that is rightfully theirs to live. I am both proud of these women, and horrified at the damage done to them by an extremist Christian home school agenda.

That is the reason I announced at the beginning that I would be moderating comments. I feared that people might actually read my blog and be offended by my common sense and bias toward liberty. I really can't deal with haters in my life right now, so I though moderating comments would be the way to go.

Fortunately, no one is actually reading my blog! :) Maybe that is a temporary thing yet, but maybe it will always be that way. Since I write to get my ideas out there for personal reasons, that is just fine with me. Maybe even best for me, who knows?

Additionally, I recently read one woman's blog wherein she wrote that comment moderation is a bad thing, akin to censorship. Censorship is all about controlling access to information, and is not at all promoting liberty. Since reading this woman's insights, I decided to stop moderating comments in honor of liberty.

So,comment moderation is off. Long live liberty!

Devoted things

Joshua 6:15-18
On the seventh day, they got up at daybreak and marched around the city seven times in the same manner, except that on that day they circled the city seven times. The seventh time around, when the priests sounded the trumpet blast, Joshua commanded the people, "Shout! For the LORD has given you the city! The city and all that is in it are to be devoted to the LORD. Only Rahab the prostitute and all who are with her in her house shall be spared, because she hid the spies we sent. But keep away from the devoted things, so that you will not bring about your own destruction by taking any of them. Otherwise you will make the camp of Israel liable to destruction and bring trouble on it.

I Samuel 15: 17-21
Samuel said, "Although you were once small in your own eyes, did you not become the head of the tribes of Israel? The LORD anointed you king over Israel. And he sent you on a mission, saying, 'Go and completely destroy those wicked people, the Amalekites; make war on them until you have wiped them out.' Why did you not obey the LORD ? Why did you pounce on the plunder and do evil in the eyes of the LORD ?" "But I did obey the LORD," Saul said. "I went on the mission the LORD assigned me. I completely destroyed the Amalekites and brought back Agag their king. The soldiers took sheep and cattle from the plunder, the best of what was devoted to God, in order to sacrifice them to the LORD your God at Gilgal."

These passages fill me with a holy fear as a parent. I did not participate in a religious ceremony in front of the local church, like so many evangelical parents do, when I dedicated my children to the Lord. I prayed a personal prayer of dedication the moment I found out I was pregnant each time. My husband, also, laid his hands on my belly and we gave our children to the Lord, committing ourselves to doing our best to serve him as parents. We did this in holy fear, aware that putting a stumbling block in the life of one of His little ones is a serious crime. We did this reverently, aware that even the giving of a cup of cold water to a little one in the name of Jesus is noted in heaven and considered by God a worthy act.

No that it matters where you are when you dedicate your children to the Lord. I have no argument against having a ceremony about it in church if someone feels led to do that. We had our reasons for keeping it private, but that is not the topic of this blog post. Maybe someday, but probably not since it is so personal and not terribly important in the grand scheme of things. :)

What is so very important, extremely important, is that the dedicated things belong to the Lord! Once you dedicate a child to God, they belong to the Lord. You may not keep them to yourself. You may not keep them for righteous religious purposes. They are not yours anymore.

The devoted things belong to the Lord.

It is a grievous sin to hold on to devoted things. It is a grievous sin to take the devoted things and decide for yourself how they can be put to righteous use.

In the above passages, the devoted things were to be destroyed. I have often questioned why that is, and I think it is because the temptations to take the devoted things for ourselves is too great. Also perhaps in these instances of devoted things in war,it was to eliminate the temptation to take other people's things (lives?) and give them to the Lord in place of our own sacrifices. After all, Samuel wasn't upset that the people had grateful hearts and wanted to sacrifice to the Lord. He was upset that they were sacrificing the things devoted to God as if they were their own.

This speaks to me about parenting very strongly. The devoted things belong to the Lord.

The devoted things are not mine to keep. My children do not belong to me. Whatever good I have done as a parent, whatever damage I have done as a parent, in all events I was only a steward for a season. I dare not attempt to keep my children under my "authority". They have been dedicated to the Lord from the first days of their lives. They are under His authority. They have always been under His authority. That's why I am accountable to God for the cups of cold water and the stumbling blocks both.

My children are devoted to the Lord. I take my hands off in holy fear and commend them to the Lord again today. He is able to care for His own. I submit to you, Lord. I do not dare attempt to keep the devoted things for myself.

The devoted things are not mine to use in religious devotion to the Lord. I may not keep my children under my power in a misguided attempt to offer up their lives as a sacrifice to God. Their lives are not mine to offer. They already belong to the Lord.

No, any holy sacrifices I offer to the Lord will have to come from MY LIFE, not the lives of my children. I will have to bow MY heart to the Lord. I will have to sacrifice MY pride to the Lord. I will need to yield MY praises from MY lips, MY gratitude from MY heart. The only obedience I can offer up to the Lord is MY obedience.

It is no credit to me that I demand my children serve the Lord. In fact, it is taking the easy way out. It is offering up the already dedicated things as if it were a real sacrifice on my part. God forbid. The devoted things belong to the Lord.

When I hear or read of parents who demand their adult children's lives as their own- to make decisions for their children, order their children's lives as if those lives belonged to the parent, choosing their children's clothing, where their children will go, who their children can associate with- I am filled with holy fear. It would not suprise me at all if fire fell down from heaven and consumed such parents. They are keeping for themselves what is dedicated to the Lord.

These parents claim that since they are controlling their children's lives in order to offer those children up to the Lord, that their good religious intentions make it alright to keep the devoted things for themsleves. I tremble.

Seriously. I tremble. I fear God, and so I fear for these parents. It is a grievous sin they are committing against the Lord: keeping the devoted things for themselves.

If the above passages were truly written for our learning, then such parents can expect that they are bringing about their own destruction. Parents trying to offer up their children's lives as a sacrifice to God can expect to suffer loss.

Saul suffered the loss of his calling, Samuel told him that the Lord had rejected him as king. Saul suffered the loss of his peace of mind and became plaqued by evil spirits. Soothing Saul's troubled mind was a major reason that David was at the palace of Saul. Probably the greatest loss, though, was the loss of the promised legacy of kingship and annointing which should have belonged to Saul's children and grandchildren. Sad.

That is a lot of loss. I don't even want to guess how much would fall on my head if I kept the devoted things for myself. I will simply back away from the devoted things, rededicate MY life to God in prayer, and enjoy His presence as my life continues to unfold.

I think He can do a much better job with what belongs to Him than I ever could anyway. :)