Off-Color Family Attempt to Show their "off color" passion...

You must not lose faith in humanity.

Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty,

the ocean does not become dirty.

Mahatma Gandhi

This past Friday night, I was watching the local news--or what we the off color family fondly call--"propaganda time."-when a news blurb concerning a new 

billboard in town flashed by...

It sparked my interest enough that I sat down the book I was reading and watched intently for the full story.

It seems some "local" church

posted a billboard

abolishing homosexuality and proclaiming 

abortion to be murder along with scripture to support their one liners.....

Then what caught my eye was the name of a church

closely associated with a local congregation that I had recently visited that was open and affirming---meaning 

all people--gay, straight, transgendered, fat, skinny, rich, poor---were welcome.

I felt an immediate rage and couldn't believe what I thought might be a malicious attack on a congregation

I felt embraced the true understanding

of good news of 

"The Gospel"---

I immediately googled the name on the billboard 

to see if perhaps there was a church locally with the same name.  The only church that appeared was the name of the congregation that I had visited and experienced 

an incredible glimmer of the human "kindom".

While I do believe we all have the right

to express our believes in whatever way we need,

I felt myself so infuriated that 

someone might attempt to maliciously 

portray a church in the context of 

the "opposite of who they are".

I sat there for a bit and decided to just e-mail/text the pastor, in case someone from her congregation were to see--it is better for the gal/guy in church to be in the know instead of getting a surprise.

I realize and understand that people have used scripture 

throughout history to suppress, exclude and deny anyone or anything that does not look, or talk, or dress or act like them

to not be invited to be a full-participant 

at the table of  "faith"---"faith" in whatever 

realm of "faith" one practices--but it still don't make it right.

Abortion--while I believe life begins at conception---I am a supporter of "pro-choice", believing in the theory of situation ethics based on Joseph Fletcher's model---"always do the most loving thing..."  

I continued to sit on the couch that night

and

suddenly I felt the rage of all 

I had experienced in and for and because of the church

bubble up from the center of my heart---

As I sat, I suddenly said to "Big Daddy". ...this just makes me really upset and I want to do something that makes a statement that says "not all people, not all of us from the genetic Christian pool" believe in this.....

I then said, "Would you be embarrassed if I carried a sign and stood underneath the billboard proclaiming that I don't believe this to be true."

Big Daddy thought for a minute and said, "yeah go ahead and do it."

My "what would people think" came to surface and

I said, "well it is getting dark...perhaps I'd better wait until tomorrow." 

Big Daddy said, "by tomorrow it won't be as big....you better do it now.....I will go with you (now when Big Daddy and I got married--his biggest worry was whether my friends who were gay would be kissing and holding hands in the church...so Big Daddy's world has grown a bit.)

I got up,

put on my beautiful red and white T-dyed shirt, grabbed a few poster boards from the garage and my hiking sticks.

Big Daddy got our chairs and water in case we wanted to sit down.  I went in and asked off color daughter if she wanted to go as well....and she jumped up.

She even called a friend of hers that we know is gay to see if he/she wanted to go with us.  They were too scared.

We get in the ghetto van and head down the road where the billboard was supposedly placed.

We drove and drove and drove and finally

I sent an e-mail to the reporter who told us just the spot to find it.

While we drove we created our signs---

"Love is not a sin"

"Abolish homophobia in my-our lifetime"

mine was placed on

my hiking stick

and

simply said,

"Honk if you believe differently."

After driving up and down the road, we finally found the sign, on the opposite side of a four lane highway, located way up on the hill facing the incoming lane---

darkness had settled and by this time,

it was unsafe and probably illegal to sit on the four lane in our folding chairs holding our signs....

At least we now know...

:the off color family--filled with passion and love---

isn't afraid to try to practice passive resistance in the name of love:"  We are still off color, we will still say anything and you never know where Big daddy might show up to produce one of his really off color greeting cards---remind me to tell you about his latest....I'm not quite ready for that one.

Okay

we are a bit weird

but

we are fun.

As I am writing this, I just heard on the news that the billboard had been taken down saying an investigation was on-going.  As the news blurb exited--the name of the church  was given----in place of the word Christ they now used God-I google it and find the church in that town to have a different name--I don't know if it was malicious or not---my gut tells me it was and I passionately proclaim that 

this is not the manner 

in which

the guy with the knapsack taught us to display love.

Underneath all of this...

I guess what comes up for me

is my continued disappointment in the institution of church,

in humanity, and

in our world....

but then...

I remember

Love conquers Hate

Faith overrides fear

Courage raises us to Hope

and

Hope 

Hope she 

brings us back 

to the source of our creation....

"Love"

I still believe it that...

so 

I guess there might still be hope for the rest of us and the world.

Have a great day...

and

take 

a hint from the off color family..

follow your passion

even if it doesn't work out the way you think...

you will still learn alot about who you are

whose you are

and 

why you are here.

blessings and hugs...

the radical rambler

peel another layer back.....

Life is like an onion; you peel off layer after layer and then you find there is.....

~James Gibbons Huneker

Underneath all our facades,

underneath all the masks we carry around to make us

look like we

think others expect us to look,

is

a sliver of who we were created to become,

who we are intended to be,

who we really are.

I am continually amazed

at the wonder of what happens...

the deeper i go,

the more i allow myself to wonder

why i feel the way i feel

the more i discover

that

i am covered

by

the

layers of expectations,

perceptions,

and

experiences of my encounters with others,

tiny layers

put on top of each other

until finally

the

underneath me

no longer is visible to anyone

or anything

sometimes

not even me.

It smothers me,

one day

i needed to breath

and

so it started

the shedding process

and

little by little

speck by speck

I am pulling them off

picking them off

tossing them aside

it is painful at times

this shedding process of sorts..

but underneath

the heavy burden

underneath

perceptions and expectations

I

binds me,

keeps my true colors from showing

and

keeps my light

buried beneath

all the

stuff others have placed upon me

and

all the stuff I have unreluctantly picked up over time.

tiny layers,

built up over time

covering

me

find

glimmers

of the one

i used to know

and

I kinda like her.

so go ahead,

trust your core,

pull

pluck

pick

explore

there is a beautiful you

underneath all that stuff

trust who you are

and

let your core glow!!!

Happy Monday...

hugs and blessings

the radical rambler

effort=transformation=change

“It's not about perfect.
It's about effort.
 And when you bring that effort every single day, that's where transformation happens.
That's how change occurs"
― Jillian Michaels


I am a recovering first born over achiever.
I have been driven...
driven to be the best...
make the best grade...
do the best project...
climb the career ladder....be the first...
aiming for the "perfect" goal only to find that it leads to another.
The easier softer way has never been
my easier softer way...
working hard...
giving it everything I had...
often at the cost of the things most important to me...
well
I say I am
  recovering
because
all the swimming upstream
against the current all the damn time
has most often left me emotionally drained,
physically tired
and
spiritually bankrupt...
exhausted
and
unable to enjoy the journey.

but
even old sexy hot mama's can
try to learn a new thing
do things a new way...
put a trick or two back in the sack...change if you will

I discern--yes--that really means to sit and listen to my own intuition about where and what and to I devote my energy
or where
i need to give my efforts...
I try to balance my plate...
I once told my spiritual director that
"my plate was so full---i needed an additional one to balance it all out" --- my wild and crazy catholic nun director simply said,
Oh dear Pam...you only get one plate....
and so for the longest time
when I worked in the church,
I kept a plate sitting on my desk
to remind me
that my drive
my need to be perfect
my inability to let others be disappointed
often left very little room
for those I held dear,
for my own development
or my own sanity.

I'm better than I was...not healed...but better
I've discovered that I am satisfied
to put forth my effort at being the best me I can be on any given day....even when my best effort on one day is not what it may be on a different day
and what I've discovered along the way
is that when I relax
give into the journey
sit on the inner tube occasionally and float down the river instead of constantly swimming up...
well
the ebb of the journey and the gentle splash of waves along the way
provide an avenue for me
to rest,
to examine
and
ultimately
to transform.

transformation
leads
to change

which for me looks just like this...
giving my time and energy to the workplace,
coming home and not feeling like I have to run to the gym,
eat a meal cooked and prepared by big daddy
and
sitting out on the deck,
sun on my skin,
breeze in my hair
listening to the sounds of dogs barking in the distance
and birds
beckoning a lover through song.
and
for
me
for
This recovering over achiever...
that is a change worth celebrating.

Take a few minutes
put forth some effort
allow the tide to shift
and
quit striving to be perfect
Just Be
be all you can be
for it is enough
and
when one does this...

puts forth some effort...
become unafraid to shift, transform...change...if you will
then
we can sit down and sing..
that old song by Sam Cooke,

 I  was born by the river
In a little tent
And just like the river
I've been running ever since
He said its been a long time coming
But I know my change is gonna comeOh yeah 

Oh yeah...yes it will...
a change is gonna come...

Thankful for a moment to be....
just be...
for today..
that is enough
to cause my proverbial cup to overflow.

Have a great day..
blessings
and
hugs..

the radical rambler

I believe in miracles.....

“Miracles are a retelling in small letters of the very same story which is written across the whole world in letters too large for some of us to see.”

C.S. Lewis

What is a miracle?

The dictionary tells us that it is:

miracle

n miracle [ˈmirəkl]

1 something which man is not normally capable of making happen and which is therefore thought to be done by a god or God 

2 a fortunate happening that has no obvious natural cause or explanation 

                                                                                 

In the post modern world, we humans have become quite skeptical of things centered around this word.  We want scientists to explain it with a diagram and or great big words or we need some engineer to tell us how all those items work together to support so much weight.  We, the tainted and sarcastic, rarely let ourselves believe in anything associated with a miracle.

Now those sports minded individuals--

they seem to believe---want to believe and

have no problem telling the world about it:

it was a miracle,

he "caught the ball"

she "made that shot"

we scored the touch down.

Is that a miracle?

by somes definition I would suspect we say

Yes

but

We explain away,

talk away,

demystify away,

that

which we can't explain.

We rarely except it for what it is--or should I just say,

I don't.

Walking the other day,

I stopped to look closely at the pine needles

pushing forth new green spiky ends,

I stared,

stared at their make-up,

their concentric spacing

and

stood in awe of what I was looking at...

got lost for a moment

in

natural art

and

stood there hardly believing the wonder

that I myself was looking at---

Atoms connected,

bonded by something that somehow holds it all together,

colors mixing with light and water and soil,

growth,

new growth,

despite

snow and rain and ice and drought,

standing

despite of

or because of

something I cannot name or understand or see.

miraculously if you will....

Biblical stories tell us

water turned to wine,

people walked on water,

people rise up from the dead

and some of us

cock our heads,

roll

our eyes and say

"really"

but underneath

all they mystery

there is a part of us

who

wants to see it,

experience

be

covered in mystical awe and stand on holy ground. even tough most often we are afraid to go there.

Perhaps,

we humans are only able to catch tiny glimmers

of

that kind of power,

perhaps the mystery is too much for us to absorb more

than just a tiny spectrum of a smidget at a time.

a frown turns to a smile,

sun goes down,

moon shines,

sun comes up,

electrons cause a bulb to "light" the room,

hardened hearts melt,

fear turns to courage,

and

without rhyme or reason

we

every once in a while

we let ourselves hope for it,

and

open ourselves to the possibility

of what might happen

if it is so

miracles that is

and

that in itself

is a miracle

don't you agree.

i can't explain most anything anymore

the older i get

the more i know i don't know

it just is

so on a scale i can't even define

yes,

I believe in miracles

and I'm sure you all will agree

that

Big Daddy should be singing that old Barry White hit,

i believe in miracles...

since you came along

you sexy thing....

so

i cannot explain why

or what causes me to even want to believe

but

hurts have healed,

broken heart has mended several times over,

my spirit has died

several times

but yet

it rises out of the ashes

time after time.

I believe in miracles...

cause

I'm a sexy thing...

May each of you

experience

a small moment of awe and wonder

on this Wednesday....

and

experience IT..

a miracle of sort

and

claim it as yours.

blessings and hugs,

the radical rambler.....