Taking on the church....ie. my father in law

Wow, I'm all backed up like I ate a brick of cheese, cept it's a blogging clog.

1. I dislike Halloween intensely and I'm happy it's over. Thank God the kids have Cullen or else I'd make them skip it.

2. Another anonymous donor friend got a letter from her recipient, and I LOVE IT! It actually makes me feel like I got a letter when I read it, it fills me up so. I love it and it's just what I need to read and be reminded of.

3. I got to skip the baptism, which made me happy for a lot of reasons. One, I don't believe in it. Two, it was a 2.5 hour long service. Three- doing that with 4 kids is CRAZY and THANK GOD I didn't have to try to keep 4 kids quiet throughout that. Cullen had to participate though, poor baby. I don't get what they did, or what it means. Cullen and Shawn are BOTH God fathers to Nick, Rick is Godfather to Nick, Kim is God mother to Nick, and Em's sis is God mother to Adalaine. So...? Brian and Em are the ONLY practicing Catholics in the family now- so if these people are suposed to support the kids in the God-ness--- GOOD LUCK. And if Brian, Em and Heidi (Nick's mom) all kick at the same time...we'll have a load of custody battles on our hands. I don't get it, and it's so silly to me. SIGH.

So..at some point...how in the world did it come up? I was at Jane and Mikes yesterday and at some point he said.."Well, you're PROLIFE, right?" and he nodded and was going to continue. I didn't let it slide this time. I said "Well, actually, I'm not." And there we went. I said I just don't feel that it's my place to decide what's right or wrong for anyone other than me, and that I don't know if I believe in right or wrong at all anyway. So on and on it went. He called me new-agey, and I don't care. One of the things we discussed was how I don't feel like I can fault anyone in a war- most wars are religious based and people are doing what they are told is the "right" thing to do....and who am I to say "no, YOU are wrong, but YOU are right"? Especially since my own ideas of what's wrong and right continue to change? How scared are those suicide bombers before blowing themselves up?
Mike's question to me was what IF my daughter became Muslim, married Muslim and was beaten and eventually stoned to death for one of the many offenses that women are stoned for in that religion (becausee GOD said to do that...not MY God, but apparently enough people believe that ANY God would say to do something like that). He said "So you'd just be okay with that, because they thought they were doing the right thing?"
First of all- let's admit that without ever being in that situation, it's impossible to guage how I would truly react. I'd be utterly devasted by the loss of my daughter, but chances are good that I would have mourned the "loss" of her in other ways before that- I'm pretty sure that our relationship would be very different from how it is now by that point anyway.
BUT- could I forgive the men who stoned her to death?
Watched her bleed and scream for help and cry and beg them to stop? Could I?
I don't know. Even if they were doing what they believe is right....
However- IF I COULD, would I not then be even more Christ like? It wouldn't be giving them a free pass, it would be acknowledging that there is much I don't understand about their ideas and beliefs. If I could stay in that space and not be burdened by hatred for them for the rest of my life...isn't that what Jesus would have done? And he was trying to make me "wrong" for that- my Catholic father in law...
So, now he's going to try to save me, and he'll pray for me even harder now. What a shock it must have been to him to find that the girl he loves so much doesn't believe Jesus is her sole ticket back to where she came from.

Last night Cullen hung out in the garage with Other Chuck til past 10. He had said he was going to hang out til 9, but he must have been having fun. He always comes in to check on me, and he bought me a lottery ticket to keep me "happy" (that's not what makes me happy, but A for Effort, I supose). He did that last week also. This is fine, in all reality. I can read and entertain myself just fine. But- BUT- I'd prefer him to be honest with me about his intentions, for one, and two, let's be honest. If I did that 2 times in a week, my needy husband would make me pay for at least 2 days. He'd be offstanding and I'd hear "Are you SURE you love me?" So that irritates me A LOT, and I did tell him that I'm bothered by the double standard. Plus he drinks a lot more when he's hanging out outside, and we all know how I feel about taking a seat to stupid alcohol.

Caiden is laying here cheesin away at Jordan, happy as can be. He is SO CUTE!!!!
Time to play with him before he goes back to sleep, and hit the laundry.