TURN THE OTHER CHEEK???

Today is Monday, May 2 - the day following the news of the death of Osama bin Laden.  When I heard the news last night, I was relieved that this man will no longer be able to terrorize other human beings.  Yes, his organization (Al Qaeda) will still exist, but since Osama bin Laden was its founder and leader, hopefully his death will impact Al Qaeda negatively even if it doesn't dissolve completely (which would be the preferred outcome).  Of course, the impact that his death will have on the world and Al Qaeda remains to be seen.  Regardless, though, I agree with President Obama who said that "this is a good day for America."

After hearing the news and listening to the President's speech, I was astounded when I went on Facebook and saw the mixed reactions.  Some comments were positive and expressed relief and happiness as well as gratitude that Osama bin Laden had finally been brought to justice.  But other comments were somewhat negative, expressing feelings like "So what?" Some comments even said that he was "old news" and the only thing this did was to make him a martyr, basically inferring that it really didn't matter.  I disagree.  I think this is a very big deal, and is a positive development in the war against terrorism.  It may have taken almost 10 years after 9/11 to eliminate the evil forces that Osama bin Laden was hoisting on the world, but I see the fact that he is now dead and gone as very positive and encouraging.

This morning on my way to work, I was on a bus in downtown Denver, and a fellow passenger (male) was having a conversation with the bus driver.  During their exchange, the passenger said, "A man is dead, and we shouldn't be having a parade about it."  While I agree that death is not something to necessarily celebrate, I do feel that in this instance there is some jubilation inherent in the situation.  An evil man who masterminded the attacks on the World Trade Center on 9/11/2001 is now dead.  That is a good thing.  And even though I don't believe that the Book of Mormon is either true or actual scripture anymore, I do think the philosophy behind one of its scriptures does fit this occasion (namely, 1 Nephi 4:11-13) - and to paraphase it, "It is better for one man to perish than for an entire world to live in fear and terror."  In certain circumstances, I believe retaliation and vengance are in order.  And to me, this is one of them.

The man on the bus also asked, "What about turning the other cheek?," saying that the death of Osama bin Laden was not condoned by Jesus Christ or the New Testament.  The bus driver answered by saying that scripture does not apply in the situation.  He said that Christianity requires its followers to be humble, forgiving and to turn the other cheek when they are wronged.  But when the harm being perpetuated on that person is both harsh and repeated, they would be foolish not to retalitate and that Jesus Christ does not require them to be push-overs.  And I agree completely with what this man said.  Obviously killing Osama bin Laden will not bring back the people who have been killed because of his actions, but keeping him alive only makes his actions continue and the threat that he posed more looming and dangerous. 

In perusing articles on the internet, I came across one on http://www.beliefnet.com/, which I found to be very interesting.  That article is entitled, "The Limits of  'Turn the Other Cheek,' and in it, the author says the following:

The doctrine of nonviolence advocated by Martin Luther King is most commonly associated with the New Testament, specifically with Jesus' statement in the Sermon on the Mount: "Offer the wicked man no resistance.  On the contrary, if anyone hits you on the right cheek, offer him the other as well." (Matthew 5:38-39)

Although one might think that the example cited by Jesus (being slapped by a violent person) is uncommon, in fact it occurs quite often.  Many women, and a smaller number of men, are married to, or live with, a partner who slaps and beats them.  Does one counsel such people to accept abuse, to offer the other cheek, or rather tell them to immediately leave the relationship, and perhaps file a criminal complaint? I believe that the latter course - which rejects Jesus' advice both to "resist not evil" and to offer the other cheek - is not only more effective but also more moral.

It's worth noting that Jesus speaks of offering your other cheek to one who slaps you – a painful but not normally life-threatening circumstance.  It's not clear that he's also advocating that you allow yourself to be murdered rather than fight back.

Yet in the 20th century, people from Leo Tolstoy to Mahatma Gandhi interpreted Jesus' words to mean that one should be willing to die rather than fight back against a would-be killer.  I find this reading of the New Testament to be troublesome.  In any situation in which a would-be murderer confronts a potential victim, I believe that the world is a better place if the would-be murderer, rather than the intended victim, emerges dead from the encounter.  As Thomas Masaryk, the first president of Czechoslovakia and a great humanist, said in response to Tolstoy: "If someone attacks me with the intention of killing me, I shall defend myself, and if I cannot avoid it, I shall kill the attacker.  If one of us must be killed, let the one be killed who has the bad intentions."

Read more: http://www.beliefnet.com/News/2000/01/The-Limits-Of-Turn-The-Other-Cheek.aspx#ixzz1LEJQDi8L

While I think it is important that violence not be perpetuated, and that every slight should not be met with instant retaliation, I also think that people need to use their heads and decide when violence and retaliation are necessary.  Showing violent people that they are not dealing with a doormat is an important signal to send.  It shows that while others may not be looking for a fight, they are not going to turn away from such an altercation if the situation warrants it.

Time will tell what impact the death of Osama bin Laden will actually have on the world.  It may have none.  Al Qaeda may go forward, business as usual.  But at least the messages have been sent that we will not sit by idly and "turn the other cheek" - and that we as Americans are not doormats.  Those are very important messages to be sent and received.

Like I said in a Facebook post last night, "Whether or not bin Laden's death has any 'strategic importance in the long run' is really immaterial.  It is an important step in the war against terrorism, and it is very important for America in general, and the people who lost family members on 9/11 in particular." 

HEAVEN... or HELL???

This is an interesting sign.

HEAVEN up - and HELL down.

Contemplating this picture, I have to say that if given the choice between these two "final destinations," I would have to pick HELL... particularly if Heaven is the Mormon version...

Mormon heaven = Celestial Kingdom.

As Billy Joel said in his song, "Only the Good Die Young"...

They say there's a heaven for those who will wait,

Some say it's better but I say it ain't,

I'd rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints,

The sinners are much more fun...

I totally agree.  Heaven (or the Celestial Kingdom as coined by Joseph Smith) sounds extremely boring with a bunch of Mormons sitting around, reading scriptures.

And the procreating that would be going on.

All that polygamy and no birth control.

Way too many kids, and no Ritalin to be found.  Seriously.

Naturally, we all have preconceived notions about what Heaven is like as opposed to Hell.

HEAVEN is usually depicted as being in the clouds, serene and peaceful.  Everyone dressed in white with angels flying around. 

HELL, on the other hand, is normally pictured as a burning fire of brimstone where everyone will suffer endless torture - the Devil ever present with his pitchfork to help keep control of the masses.

It's interesting to consider different images of HELL and the way it is depicted in various forms.  One of the funniest images of HELL is from Far Side cartoons.  Here's just a few...

Some people can be happy anywhere.  This guy is apparently completely oblivious to the fact that he is in HELL.  The eternal optimist, making the best of a bad situation.  Missing the point entirely.

And the one below has always made me laugh.  Of course, part of the humor for me comes from feeling this way too many times in my life - particularly in one very long-term job I had in Los Angeles working for an abusive boss... and in one of my marriages.  Enough said. 

Of course, no one living knows what HEAVEN and HELL are really like.  One day, we will all find out if either one really exists or if they are both a figment of someone's imagination (into which a lot of people have bought).  I mean, really... when you look at life from a non-religious point of view, things really start to appear differently in many respects, and especially in regard to the purpose of life and the nature of death.  Things don't seem so ominous to me now.  And everything doesn't seem quite so serious as I was lead to believe when I was an active Mormon.

Since leaving Mormonism and organized religion behind, I now consider myself to be Agnostic and really don't know what to believe anymore.  Part of me wants to believe in God and Heaven (just not the Mormon version), and another part of me thinks that perhaps after this life is over, we all cease to exist.  Interestingly, that thought doesn't scare me at all.  For some reason, I was much more frightened and tenuous about afterlife types of questions when I was Mormon.  Probably because I always dreaded the Mormon version of Heaven - the Celestial Kingdom (one of Joseph Smith's inventions).

Here's another very funny Far side cartoon.  Gary Larsen has such an interesting view on things, doesn't he?  I've always loved his cartoons and was very disappointed when he retired in 1995.  But during his career, he produced some very funny cartoons (albeit off-beat), which were also very thought-provoking.  Depicting harps as the musical instrument of choice in Heaven, and accordions as the assigned instrument in Hell.  Very funny. 

But regardless of what our opinions are about life and death, in the end, we will all "shuffle off this mortal coil."  Of course, that term is from William Shakespeare's Hamlet, which contains the "To be or not to be" soliloquy.

William Shakespeare - To be, or not to be (from Hamlet)

To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?  To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.

Shakespeare offers interesting thoughts on life and the nature of death.  The last part of that soliloquy is especially thought-provoking:  "...the dread of something after death, the undiscover'd country from whose bourn no traveller returns, puzzles the will and makes us rather bear those ills we have than fly to others that we know not of?"  Similar to tolerating the devil we know as opposed to the devil we don't know. 

And what more can be said after Shakespeare has weighed in?
With a few Far Side cartoons thrown in for good measure...

IS THERE AN AFTERLIFE?

After realizing that Mormonism is a sham, I began wondering about an "Afterlife."  Not believing that those types of beliefs are exclusively Mormon anymore (as I was programmed to believe), I have sometimes wondered whether Christian beliefs are even plausible.  I've gone back and forth, sometimes calling myself Agnostic because I have not been sure whether God really exists, and if there is a God, I am uncertain as to what his/her form really is - and simply calling myself Spiritual but not Religious since I am very much against organized religion now because I believe it's all about money and power. 

My questions about an Afterlife came to a head the night before my father passed away in May 2006.  He was 92 years old, but had been in relatively good health up until a month before his death when he had a stroke and began to decline.  In mid-May, after hearing how he was deteriorating, my brother Jim, his wife Daisy, and I decided to go to Utah to see him.  I had just moved from California to Georgia that January (to live near my brother, his wife and several of their children and grandchildren) so I was living relatively close to them at the time.  My father had remarried a year or so after my mother passed away in 1977, and he had lived with his new wife Bonnie in American Fork, Utah since 1978.

When we arrived in Utah, we went to the hospital to see him - and I was immediately struck by how frail he looked.  He was paralyzed on his left side and his speech was so bad that it was very difficult to understand what he would say.  Of course, his wife Bonnie was there and was very distressed by the situation.  While Jim, Daisy and I were at the hospital, my father's doctor asked if he could speak with us.  He proceeded to tell us that our father's condition was very tentative, that his prognosis was not good, and that there was very little they could do for him.  It was at that point that the doctor recommended that my father be taken home and that hospice care should be instituted.  At first, hearing the doctor talk about hospice care was difficult for me, probably because I realized that meant the end was very near for him.  But then, I knew that if my father was relegated to living the way he was right then, and was indeed permanently paralyzed on his left side and unable to speak well enough to make himself understood, it would be tortuous for him.  He had always been a very active, vital man.  He had golfed from the age of 55 until 82 when he was forced to stop because of problems with his knees.  Laying in bed day-after-day, unable to take care of himself or even make himself understood did not seem to me to be a life my father would want to continue to live.  So after discussing the realities of the situation, we all decided that taking him home and beginning hospice care was best under the circumstances.  When we told him that we were going to take him home, he was very happy.

On Saturday afternoon, my father was transported to his home in American Fork.  But once he was home, it began to seem that he was improving.  His demeanor became much more upbeat, and although he still wasn't easily understood, he just seemed better.  Not long after he arrived at his house, his Mormon Bishop and some other men from his Mormon Ward came to the house.  After going in to his room and visiting with him for a while, the Bishop took me aside and began talking to me about how much better my father seemed and that it was obvious he was improving - and then he proceeded to tell me that we should not be doing hospice care on him but rather life-sustaining measures should be taken to keep him alive.  I remember looking at this Bishop and thinking that he was spouting the Mormon rhetoric as well as the official Mormon position, but he wasn't taking into account the reality of the situation or the quality of life that my father would be subjected to if "life-sustaining measures" were taken. 

At the time, I had not been to a Mormon Church for over a year and a half, so I had not had to deal with the rhetoric typically spouted by Bishops and other Mormon leaders.  After leaving the church, I had stopped being intimidated by these men and so decided to tell him my opinion - which was that quality of life was extremely important, and that if my father was forced to live the remainder of his life in a semi-paralyzed state and unable to speak coherently that it would be tantamount to holding him prisoner.  Naturally, the Bishop didn't respond well, and told me that it was obviously the Lord's will that my father live, so whatever I had to say on the subject really didn't matter.  Shut me down quick.  Of course, I felt like asking him why he was even talking to me about this since he didn't really want to hear what I had to say, but I decided to end the conversation rather than take it into those avenues.

Finally, the bishop and his entourage left, and just family was left in the house.  A short time later, two of my nephews arrived and visited with their grandfather.  One of my nephews, Todd, was visibly shaken up by how frail his grandfather seemed, and I was very touched when I saw him in the hallway crying.  Not long after that, Jim and Daisy decided to leave to go stay at one of their son's houses for the night, and my two nephews left as well.  But I decided that I wanted to stay there with my father and Bonnie, so I asked Bonnie if I could spend the night on their couch, and of course, she said yes.  Because of what happened later that night, I am very glad I stayed.

The first event of the night was the arrival of my step-mother's son, Jay Paul.  He's a very nice man, and I like him very much.  My father had always spoken highly of Jay Paul, and I knew that they had become very close over the years.  After arriving, Jay Paul immediately went into my father's room to visit with him, and Bonnie accompanied him.  I stayed in the living room while they were in there because I wanted to give them some privacy.  They were in there for quite a while, and after they came out, they both seemed very distressed.  They sat down on the couch and began discussing whether the right decision had been made, questioning if hospice was the right route.  Of course, my step-mother sounded just like the Bishop, almost quoting him verbatim, so I knew that he had confronted her with his opinion as well and made her feel that hospice care was not the right route.  I could feel their distress, and I empathized with them totally.  After all, this was not an easy decision.

Deciding to stay out of the discussion at that point, I decided to go back into my father's room and sit with him again.  I tried carrying on a conversation with him, but it was very difficult since he couldn't communicate very well.  So I just sat there, talking to him, nodding my head a lot, and holding his hand for quite a while.  Finally, I told him that I needed to go to the bathroom, and I left the room for a few minutes.

When I returned to my father's room, it was as if I was walking into an entirely different world.  My father was looking at an area just above his bed, was holding his right arm out as if he was touching people, and was speaking (albeit incoherently) to what seemed to be spirits hovering above his bed.  When I entered the room, I went over and sat down in the chair by his bed again, although he seemed to be unaware of my reappearance in the room.  As I sat there watching this for quite a while, I was convinced that there really were spirits visiting him.  As he spoke to these spirits, he would smile and laugh - his signature very robust laugh that I remember so well growing up.  He seemed so much like his old self again, and it was very endearing.

After sitting there observing this for what seemed like a very long time, I got up and went to find Bonnie.  Jay Paul had left, so now it was just me, Bonnie and my father in the house.  I told Bonnie what I had been observing and asked her to go to my father's room with me.  So we both walked back there, sat down and watched what my father was doing.  After 10-15 minutes, I reached out and touched my father on the arm, startling him.  In fact, he was so startled that he seemed perturbed with me that I had interrupted something so important.  Then Bonnie spoke to him, asking him what was happening - and he just stared at the two of us for a minute or so.  It was very evident to me that we had brought him back from another place, perhaps from the threshold of the spirit world. 

Finally, Bonnie began asking my father to whom he had been talking.  Of course, since it was very hard to understand him, we couldn't make out what he was saying.  So Bonnie asked him whether he had seen my brother Bobby (who had passed away in 1961 when he was 14 years old) - and he nodded yes.  Then she asked him if he had seen my mother - and he nodded No, looking a little bewildered.  Then Bonnie asked him whether he had seen Bonnie's mother (who had passed away a few years earlier), and he again nodded yes. 

After that, Bonnie and I walked out into the hallway and talked for a little bit.  We were both awestruck by what was happening and didn't quite know what to make of it.  I told her that it was obvious to me that my father was at the brink of the spirit world, and that people he knew who had passed away were coming to visit with him, possibly as a precursor to his passing away.  Of course, she didn't want to believe that he was being drawn that close to the spirit world because that would seem to mean that his death was imminent.  At 92 years of age, though, and particularly after a month of struggling physically following a severe stroke, it was apparent to me that his death was most likely very close.  Bonnie is a very dear person, and she was a wonderful wife to my father, always taking care of him very well, but she is also 20 years younger than him, so there was always the possibility that he was going to pass away long before her life is over.  But she always seemed unwilling to accept that fact.

After we finished talking in the hallway, I walked back into my father's room and sat down beside him again.  As I sat back down, it became more and more apparent to me that he was disappearing further and further into this other world, seeming not to even notice my presence again.  But regardless of that, I spent the next two hours sitting there, watching what was going on.  It was 1:30 am before he finally wound down and fell asleep.  And he never woke up.  The following afternoon, he passed away.

When I relayed this experience to my brother and his wife, I found their reaction to be very interesting.  They immediately started telling me that this experience was confirmation that Mormonism was true and that I needed to go back to church.  Basically, they asked me how I could continue to turn my back on the Mormon Church when I had witnessed such a miraculous event.  Of course, this is a typical Mormon response since according to "them," any type of spiritual experience is inherently Mormon in nature.
 
At first, my Mormon programming began to kick in.  Hearing them talk about this experience that way made me almost begin to believe them, and I began to ask myself the same questions they had posed.  But then, almost like an epiphany, it struck me that this experience doesn't mean that Mormonism is true - it simply means that after this life, we will go to another place, whether you want to call it an Afterlife... or the Spirit World... or Heaven... or whatever... and a person doesn't have to be Mormon to either recognize those facts or go there.

Looking back at this experience now, I am still struck by the feeling that there is indeed an Afterlife of some sort.  Of course, since I know that Mormonism is not true, the Mormon view of an Afterlife or Spirit World or Heaven cannot be accurate - and perhaps Christian views in general aren't accurate either.  After all, those who die aren't coming back to talk about it (even though some people would disagree with me on that, believing in mediums and seances).  Also, people do occasionally speak of Near-Death Experiences and seeing a bright light that they feel drawn to walk toward.  While I do not claim to understand what exactly it is they have seen, I do find the details of these types of experiences to be very interesting. 

But regardless of what Mormons, Catholics, Episcopalians, Buddhists, Muslims or any other type of religion may teach, and putting all "religion" aside, I still believe that our spirits continue to live after we leave our mortal states even though I cannot claim to know the form or nature of that Afterlife.  Atheists, of course, disagree with me on this -- and claim that this life is IT.  Nothing more.  When we die, we go into the ground, and cease to exist.  I guess that conclusion is simply too sad for me.  It seems to me that the implications of that conclusion are that our lives here have no purpose, no meaning, no reason for being.  So futile and moot.  Not a mindset in which I feel comfortable. 

For me, it all boils down to watching my father the night before he died.  And since I don't believe that he was hallucinating, I have to believe that he was indeed conversing with people on the other side.  That experience answered a lot of questions for me.  And no, it did not make me realize that Mormonism is true. 

Death is one of two things. Either it is annihilation, and the dead have no consciousness of anything; or, as we are told, it is really a change: a migration of the soul from one place to another. ~Socrates

I believe that when death closes our eyes we shall awaken to a light, of which our sunlight is but the shadow. ~Arthur Schopenhauer

Death is not extinguishing the light; it is putting out the lamp because dawn has come. ~Rabindranath Tagore

DEDICATION TO MY MOTHER

Looking back on my life, I realize that the person who has most influenced me is my mother.  Sadly, she passed away in 1977 when she was only 64 years old (and I was 25).  Because of her untimely death, I have always felt robbed of an adult relationship with her, and I have always wondered how different my life might have been if she had lived longer and been around for me to "garner wisdom" from her.

But even though I consider her to be very influential in my life, she has always also always been somewhat of an enigma to me, especially now that I left the Mormon Church.  The woman who I knew as my mother was a very strong, independent woman who always seemed to have it all together.  I have always admired those traits in her, and I have always felt that I inherted many of those types of mindsets from her.  But the fact that she was also a devout Mormon is a very big puzzlement for me.

There are so many questions I would like to ask my mother, especially about the Mormon Church and her conversion at age 40, just a few months after I was born.  My father lived to be 92 years old, and he passed away in 2006.  About a year before his death, my father and I were talking and he told me that when he and my mother were investigating the Mormon Church, my mother had a hard time accepting that Joseph Smith as a Prophet of God, but that she finally was able to reconcile her feelings and decided to be baptized.  I wish I could ask her what settled that issue in her mind, although to a certain extent, it still remains questionable to me that she actually ever did.  Perhaps she joined the Mormon Church to please my father or because she thought it would be good for her children for her to have a unified religion with her husband (since he accepted it all from the "get-go").  I wish I knew her motivation for joining the Mormon Church. 

I do remember my mother telling me once (shortly after I was married for the first time) that my father and her had discussed divorce a few years after they were married.  Of course, I was surprised - but the more I thought about it, the more I could see how their differences could have easily driven them in that direction.  The backdrop for her telling me this was my telling her about a Fireside for young couples that my then-husband and I had attended, and a speech was given by the Stake President who said that couples should never even let the word "divorce" cross their lips - that the concept of divorce should never even enter your mind, despite whatever the problems might be.  The SP then said that he and his wife had been married for 40 years or more, and that in that entire time, they had never even discussed "divorce."  While telling my mother about this Fireside, my father entered the room and stopped to listen to what I was saying.  After I finished talking about this Fireside, my mother turned to my father said said, "Well, we can't say that, can we?"  I'll never forget the look on my father's face as he looked at my mother said said, "Why did you have to bring that up?"

Perhaps one day, I'll be able to have further conversations with my mother.  After all, I still believe in God and an Afterlife - to me, those are spiritual beliefs, and the Mormons don't have an exclusive claim on God-related doctrine or the belief in an afterlife.

More than anything, I would like to discuss my exit from the Mormon Church with my mother.  Naturally, I wonder what her reaction would be to what I have discovered that has negated my beliefs in its doctrines.  Perhaps I am being naive and engaging in wishful thinking, but in my heart, I think she would understand and would celebrate my growth and independent thinking.  At least, I hope so...