You know, Quix, I was starting to read and enjoy your posts since you became more congenial.
But with this last post you seem to be back-sliding.
Thanks for your kind words.
But I don’t see me backsliding at all.
I see me saying . . . to folks who SEEM
obsessively . . . affixed to thin skins, jumping to conclusions and chips on their shoulders to . . . grow up a bit.
And, I’m noting that IT IS ENTIRELY POSSIBLE
FOR ME TO RETURN to such a style. But that I don’t think that’s what the whiners would really like.
I see the above post as incredibly gentle and kind. I could have used a verbal 2 X 4 and it was far from that.
I don’t think RC’s or Calvinists or Pentecostals or any other Believer or value orientation do themselves any favors or their orientations any favors when they come across as petty, whining, thin-skinned, brittle with huge chips on their shoulders etc. It may be human . . . but it’s not blessed nor attractive. And usually, nowadays hereon, it’s not warranted.
Disagreeing and saying things with some reasonable forcefulness is not the same as RC bashing or any similar thing. The lack of ability or lack of willingness to make those distinctions is not attractive nor fruitful for collaborative discussion.
It seems to be an RC doctrine of faith or dogma or ritual or some such . . . that whenever a Proty disagrees with any seriousness or forcefulness AT ALL—that the RC respondent MUST, ABSOLUTELY MUST wail, throw dust in the air and fling ashes and blame far and wide about how horrible, unfair, abusive etc. the comment was. When, mostly, it was merely a forceful disagreement and different description or construction on reality.
RC’S ARE MORE FORCEFUL, brittle, demanding, startlingly ALL OR NOTHING descriptive about those who don’t buy into their construction on reality still . . . somewhat routinely. The double standard gets very old and wearying.
In short—quit whining about nothing before someone’s patience runs out and they return to giving something worth whining about.
Quite a number of Proties are NOT going to roll over and play dead just because RC's make some pronouncement about their construction on reality.
We feel just as duty bound before God to speak up for the construction on spiritual and Christian reality which we feel is MORE kosher, fitting, accurate, Scriptural, Christ-like etc.
We will not always wrap every word and phrase in 12 layers of foam and rabbit fur--bending over backwards to try and insure that every nuance has little likelihood in offending thin-skinned RC's with big chips on their shoulders.
NOT going to happen.
Deal with it.
We don't get hyper and foam at the mouth every time some RC poster rants, rails and accuses or throws some baiting thing in our faces any more. We may respond pointedly--even forcefully--but I haven't seen such with rancor in a long time. Maybe I've just missed it. But I think even Dr. E and I have been startlingly and sometimes sadly and overly quite mellow.
Mellow is OK when it's motivated by Love and consideration, kindness, compassion.
But AVOID mistaking it for kowtowing to a view of spiritual and Scriptural reality which we often still find startlingly horrid in this or that way or list of ways. Our mellowness does not imply growing agreement. It implies growing kindness and Christian preferring one another AS UNTO CHRIST because it pleases HIM.
It still appears that several RC's--perhaps a dozen or more even--feel duty bound to wail, whine, puff up their lips and generally throw dust in the air because we don't either agree with them or defer to them in exceedingly submissive, deferent tones. Tough tacos. Not going to happen any more than the reverse is going to happen. Get real.
My use of MAGICSTERICAL is now well known to apply across the board to ANY group of spiritual oversight leaders. ANY--IN ANY GROUP. Taking exclusive offense at the implications of the term for the RC examples of the magicsterical is . . . childish, petty, . . . missing the point wholesale . . . or worse, claiming that RC folks
GET REAL!
GUESS WHAT--RC FOLKS ARE !NOT! IMMUNE TO BEING HUMAN!
Sigh.