ongoing struggle - advice welcome!

[Jake]

I meant emotional bias. If a judge is emotionally biased towards fundamentalist christian beliefs, he wont cite that as his reasoning, but it will affect his judgement, none the less.

OK thanks for clarifying that. But how does one determine that judges in the US have more of an emotional bias towards Christianity than do judges in the UK? And how is it relevant when comparing the treatment of pagans or other religious minorities under the two respective legal systems?

I'm a legally ordained minister under US law. If any judge in the US were to say that I am not authorized to conduct a legal pagan handfasting or a Humanist wedding ceremony, or that a pagan group can't purchase an old church building and establish a recognized religious congregation there, he or she would be breaking the laws of this country and the ruling would be overturned. If a judge in the UK made the same rulings he or she would be upholding the laws of that country, regardless of his or her personal feelings on the subject.

When Bush came here we got a taste of American freedom of speech.

Those were dark days indeed, I couldn't agree more.

The American press reports seemed strangely like a completely different parallel universe. In fact, the war as reported by America in general was so much different from how it was reported here, I had to keep checking it was, indeed, the same war.

It's always refreshing and enlightening to see how one's country is viewed elsewhere. For instance, in the human rights community over here, the UK is notorious for restricting freedom of expression - because of stuff like the Obscene Publications Act, the Christian blasphemy law finally repealed two years ago, the "guilty until proven innocent" libel laws, that six year long farce where Gerry Adams' voice was dubbed by actors on the BBC because the government made it illegal to hear him speak, and more recently the Terrorism Act and the Racial and Religious Hatred Act.

We have the right to freedom of speech here too - but not to incite religious hatred.

The way I see it, "you can say whatever you like unless someone takes offense" is not freedom of speech.

The right to be as bad as each other. Is that supposed to be a comfort?

The point (besides being a little dig about the blasphemy law ) is that the best way to confront misinformation is with the truth, not by forcing the misinformed to shut up under threat of imprisonment.

For those that refuse to stoop to such levels, they are left being victimised without recourse to the law, and you end up with a situation like the one under discussion. A humanitarian lawyer would be fighting to have international humanitarian laws acknowledged, at least.

Victimized? By an anti-Halloween pamphlet? Whose rights have been violated? And what right, exactly? The right not to be exposed to offensive stupidity?

Most of the Western world used to believe ridiculous things about non-Christians. They don't as much anymore. Not because governments stepped in and made it illegal to say such things, but because the truth became more widely known. Offended by a pamphlet full of lies? Then why not publish your own full of facts and let people decide for themselves? Let's see which perspective is more convincing in the open marketplace of ideas rather than employ the tools of fascism to silence our opponents because they hurt our feelings. Because we are all victimized when the State gets to decide what we can and can't talk about.

(In the spirit of self-censorship, if we want to continue this discussion let's do it elsewhere, ok? I don't want to clutter up Zylah's thread any further and the Druid Parenting forum is probably not the most appropriate place for this anyway. If the moderators want to move this post I am totally cool with that too. )

[Teileag]

Hello Zylah,

I read through this thread a few times and hesitated to post anything... But then, if my comment is in any way helpful, that's good and if not, you can just ignore it... .

I have spent a long time in conservative Christian circles and I fully agree that they can be very stifeling. I have difficulties with much of the teaching and I pulled my kids out of activities when one of them came home and told me that he was afraid of going to hell . I still keep a big distance between my family and these people but I have realised that those talking and teaching in this particular way do so because they honestly believe what they say! There was no personal malice there (at least the guys I had to deal with) but true concern for those whom they think lost and they are driven by the wish to do good. Now, I am aware that you can mean well and do something really bad in the process but maybe you could try and have a good look at the people who are hurting you and see what their motivation is. If it is the desire to do good (albeit badly done) then maybe it'll be easier for you to react in a positive way and return love and blessings as several here have suggested... Hope you'll find a good way to deal with the situation over time and keep and build up a strong relationship with your children.

[Oneonine]

I suppose the culture you live in inures you to the forms of censorship you've become accustomed to, and other cultures' censorships are made more profound. Especially if viewed from afar. I've lived in both countries. If I wanted to incite religious hatred, I'd do better there I guess, from what you say. If I want to be unpatriotic or pagan, I do better here.

[inis]

Dear Zylah,

the lies in that christian pamphlet are really... well, you know what, in my eyes this would be nearly enough reason to burn a church (joke!!!).

What upsets me most is that those Christians around your daughter play on her very emotions. If she comes in tears to you because she is so much afraid for your damned soul... that is emotional manipulation. And I don't think that calm discussions and informative reading will reach that layer of indoctrination (though it is still necessary to clean up the lies, if possible).

A lot of mothers tend to think that their children should not be molested by the mothers' hurt or negative feelings... personally, I don't share this point of view. If my (still little) child upsets me, I cry in front of him, to show him how important that was to me and how much I'm hurt by his behaviour.

Maybe it would be good, if you showed your daughter your love towards her and showed her your feelings - because you are deeply hurt by the lies of her christian influencers and by your daughters worry about you. If you feel like it, start to cry the next time she comes up to you with incredible lies or a well-meant worry about your soul... let her know under tears that you love her and that it hurts you how she seems to think about you. Can she really believe the woman who gave her love all her life to be a bad person?
Show her how unhappy you are about your estrangement for such reasons (it's normal not to be "best friends" between teenage daughters and mothers, but shouldn't it be about something less poisonous, like a hairstyle or too loud music?). Maybe the word "poisoned" will appeal to her mind as well - it indicates by itself that the problems between you are affected from the outside, by people who normally don't have to say anything in a mother-daughter-relationship.
Try to work out how much you love each other, and try to talk about how you would like to treat each other, and how your reciprocal worries should be uttered and dealt with. Maybe some of her teenage friends are not allowed to go out with boys, because the parents want to protect their daughters from bad experiences? Make clear that you don't want to follow this path of over-protectiveness - but it's not her task to over-protect you as well.

And a last question for you daughter: if she loves you (as she does!) and if it is said in the Bible to honour their parents - what kind of people are they who want to break up that love between you? Isn't it like the bad "best friend" in a teenie comedy who wants to make her friend break up with her beloved boyfriend? What kind of people are those so-called Christians, if they try to destroy love?

All the best to you - I have to finish now, my little one's back from nursery...

[wolfsbane]

Hey Zylah, Hows it going what with All hallows eve coming up fast?
My thought are with you.

[Zylah]

Wow! Hi everyone, I did NOT AT ALL mean to ignore your thoughtful, kind, supportive posts. I have been taken up completely in the whirlwind of this semester, and missed any notification of new posts on this thread. So I apologize for dropping completely out of sight. I really do appreciate all the time and thought each of you puts into this topic; thank you.

Jake and Oneonine, your discussion about the various degrees of civil liberty regarding religion and freedom of speech etc. in our respective countries was fascinating. If you did continue it I hope I can find it.

Thank you also, Oneonine, for your input and ideas about how to handle the situation. I do not doubt they would work in many situations, but the kind of relationship I have with my daughter is usually very honest and open. She's extremely bright and can smell prevarication ten miles away (I know this seems contradictory with the initial problem that provoked this thread - she has one major blind spot, and that is religion); she gets enough emotional manipulation from her father et al - for me to start trying to be sly would not work to improve things with her; quite the opposite. She would know that I was being deliberately condescending, partly because it is quite alien to any of our interactions usually, and she would powerfully resent it. Nor could I honestly blame her. It would result in a loss of trust and communication blockage.

Besides, I am constitutionally incapable of sophisticated strategizing of this kind, LOL - my picture is next to the word 'gullible' in the dictionary; I turn bright red and fumble words and all kinds of ridiculous things when I start trying to role-play, unless it is understood by everyone that's what I'm doing. (Even then, it's a dubious prospect, lol.)

Jake, thank you for your kind and supportive words. It means a lot from someone as intelligent and level-headed as you are; and I appreciate that you can identify with the kind of climate that produced this situation. I think you and DJ are right, it is a very common climate in our society. That's some comfort as well, since obviously everyone here managed to grow toward their own true paths regardless of influence - although the rebel tendency mentioned by Jake, to become some manner of opposite to whatever our own parents were, is intriguing and no doubt formative in psychosocial development on some level. Oddly, I don't usually see that manifestation of the religious climate here, however. Maybe it's a difference between actual brainwashing and normal parental influence; but that again may be my own bias.

Inis, LOL about burning a church - thank you for posting. What you say is encouraging because I do actually cry in front of her when this happens, but I'm embarrassed to admit , not because I make any conscious decision that it's ok or a healthy part of emotional and intellectual honesty - just because I can't help it! It does help as far as maintaining a certain level of trust between us that we're both being as transparent and without duplicity as we can. At times it has the effect of annoying her, and at times we both end up crying and angry at each other, which effectively ends the discussion for a time. What I'm seeing now is that it's possible to return to the discussion once we've both cooled down; which is good all around. So basically the entire process takes more time than my average American upbringing has taught me to accept - everything should be INSTAMATIC, dammit! But in reality deep emotional/spiritual discussions can take a very long time to thoroughly happen; and it's best done with the assistance of the intellect to make it as objective as possible (which isn't very). Anyway Inis, thank you again - it sounds like you're doing an excellent job with your little one. Every blessing to you both

Heike, I'm really glad you decided to post. Thank you for your thoughts and suggestions; they are really appreciated. I thought about what you said, because in all honesty I do usually give fundamentalists the credit of really believing they're doing what Divine Mandate directs. You're very right, a lot of them do truly mean well - my daughter is one of them. One of the things that I think is troubling me in her case is that her being so utterly bamboozled is very out of character for her. When I mentioned that I'm the definition of gullible, I could also have mentioned that my daughter is exactly the opposite in most cases. As I said above, she has this one huge blind spot, and no others that I've ever discerned.

That said, there are also many, many fundamentalists who do not mean well. They honestly believe what they're saying, and they truly think they have a Divine Mandate, but their motivations are much more sinister. Cotton Mather of the infamous Salem Witch Trials in Massachusetts is a bona fide example. He and many others like him, both historical and modern-day, use their Divine Mandate as a way of gratifying their sadism. This is the kind I grew up with. Let me qualify that by saying that age has mellowed my parents a lot, and my ex-husband is not a sadist. He does hate me, because I embarrassed him and because I have destroyed a measure of his sense of control. He wants to get the kids away from me because he wants to have control back; I believe that's part of why he remarried less than a month after our divorce was final. He wanted to get back the way he believes life should be - he is in charge and only answers to his equally crazy god. This harassment of my beliefs is a part of his ongoing massive campaign to manipulate the kids into deciding they don't want to be with me - my daughter is old enough to make that decision, and my middle son is almost there. The little one is gullible like his mom and rather easy to manipulate, but I have the courts on my side in his case.

I try not to be gleeful about it, too much at least, but I'm happy to report that he fell into his own trap a few weeks ago. He told my daughter and me completely different stories in almost the same breath via text messages, not thinking it would ever be discovered. However, I was driving and could not look at my phone, so it all came out. My daughter saw that he was blatantly telling lies in order to manipulate her and me in a situation, and she completely exploded. Jake (my fiance) and I sat in the car while she took her phone outside, several feet away, and we still heard her ripping him a new orifice in his nether regions; I was shocked, but I couldn't help giggling the whole time. Oh, he so deserved it. In the end she refused to go with him that weekend or see him at all.

Karma's a bitch, but she's a fair bitch. I thanked the Morrighan later, LOL. So I do believe the situation is progressing toward some kind of solution that is equable; she is not as prone to believe her father since that incident. She calls him a liar to his face, not angrily but very calmly, when she explains to him why she is questioning something he tells her. There have apparently been other incidents of which I was not aware, so she has no trust in his honesty at this point. She still loves him, which is good and which I would not seek to change.

She does not see through the things her church leaders say quite as easily, however; but I have more hope now that she will be able to shake off the brainwashing effect eventually.

Thanks again, everyone, you have all been a tremendous encouragement to me.

[wolf560]

Hello Zylah...

I have remained silent, kinda watching until now....
Many posts (and all good ones btw) have been made with suggestions for you which I somewhat agree with.

What has not been posted is the effect of your children's FRIENDS and SOCIAL NETWORK.
You mentioned a Youth Bible Camp, and some other adults that are posting on your daughters FB page. This shows that your daughter is already in "Hip-Deep".

Let me say first; my wife and I raised two children in a VERY Religious Area with Sunday morning school bus programs all around us. They would come like ice cream trucks to take our children away for "Blessed Bible Study Programs" which would last all Sunday long. My wife is a Witch and I am a Druid, which caused enough problems with the local Wiccans all by itself. The neighbors were all VERY RELIGIOUS (Defined as nutzoid Bible KOOKS..!!!)

This was not the problem my daughter and son faced however, and no amount of candles on the altar or peaceful meditation made any difference.

The problem was my daughter and son were confronted in school for not going to this, and then confronted even more after they decided to go just to get the tormenting to stop.

What I see at issue is the fact that your daughter (at least) is exposed to this torment over and over again. They are made to feel that either you or your husband are "Wrong" and there is not greater emotional harm than that to a developing mind. The parents are supposed to be this great infallible pair of mentors that children grow up respecting and loving unconditionally. Your husband broke that trust, and is continuing to pressure the children into choosing between the two of you.

Explaining your beliefs may help you in the short run, but unfortunately this is not going to end until you can get your ex-husband to back off somehow. Nothing you say will make any difference at all against the "Word of God in the Bible". They will continue to turn to Exodus 22:17 and say "blah blah blah...suffer a Witch to live..." You cannot allow the situation to come down to Dogma or religious explanations of one Faith against another. Do not try to use any book or reference against the Bible at first, it is just too powerful a symbol. If you can get your daughter to talking about scriptures in a critical light later on maybe, then yes....

It has to come down to you and your children acting as a complete unit; a family. This wall, if set, will keep all the others from harming them most of the time. It will also hopefully set your children in the pattern of seeking your advice and support. This is the role that the Pastors wife is attempting to set herself into; the "loving parent".


Unfortunately (again) I can suggest only one thing; Is it possible to put some permanent distance between you and your ex-husband? If the visits become merely an every now and then thing where your children are not bombarded with "how evil you are"...
Maybe if there were some way to get that Church (and/or the Pastors Wife) to back off from trying to usurp your authority with your children.

I am saying all of this only in an attempt to give some advice....
The best thing will only begin to happen when your daughter blocks the Pastors wife from commenting on her FB page. But I suspect that is a long way off in the future.

Your children might be having to deal with their peers at some level and this only makes this situation worse in many cases.

My children are now 25 and 23 and are Buddhist and Agnostic respectively.
They had a hard enough time with BOTH parents supporting them.

Just keep talking to your children and reassuring them that you have not lost your mind, your way , and most importantly you have not lost your "Soul". For my children, it was the sudden realization that my wife and I were better, more helpful people than the entire Church network combined. We gave freely both monetarily and of our time and services to anyone in need. We did not say that much negatively about the Christians and they saw the rampant hypocrisy in the actions of all the Christians around them. They walked away of their own accord....

I wish you and yours only the best, and I hope it all turns out the best.

[Huathe]

Zylah,

How long were you and your ex-husband married? I know this is a personal question but this is a quite personal post. Were you Pagan or Christian when you and your now ex husband met and married? If you were pagan when you met than he would really have no right to say anything about your beliefs since he would have had to accept them at the start when you met.

I am sorry about your situation. It is rough. In situations of divorce, kids are the biggest victims. My ex-wife left me 6 years ago. My daughter is 14 and still has trouble with it. The fact she is autistic only makes things worse. But religious strife is not one problem we have.

[Dendrias]

Jake, thank you for your kind and supportive words. It means a lot from someone as intelligent and level-headed as you are;

?

For my children, it was the sudden realization that my wife and I were better, more helpful people than the entire Church network combined. We gave freely both monetarily and of our time and services to anyone in need. We did not say that much negatively about the Christians and they saw the rampant hypocrisy in the actions of all the Christians around them. They walked away of their own accord...

That's it, isn't it? Show that deeds are more than words. Don't preach water and drink wine. Chapeau, wolf560!

[wolf560]

... She's bright ... ( she has one blind spot, and that is religion)... maintaining a certain level of trust between us... She does not see through...her church leaders ...as easily,

Your daughter sounds a lot like mine, and we were decidedly 'hands off' with her and her developing spirituality. She eventually saw through both the church and its leaders "faith & beliefs" and set her own course (Buddhism). What my daughter found to have the most comfort was her knowledge of the Bible. This became her "best defense" and I catch her even today using it occasionally.

The best thing I ever heard her say was "...if you look at the New Testament you see four 'Gospels' but did you know that until 325 A.D. there were FIFTY ONE?" Did you also know that the Gospel of John was not accepted until nearly 100 years after the Synoptic Gospels?" She would then ask "What happened to all the followers of those other Gospels?" The answer is of course that the Church burned the texts and killed as many of the followers as they could find.

Keep to the level you are at with your daughter, the Bible is full of contradictions. What people end up believing is "the essence of the message" and not the message or its adherents specifically. They have to do that because the words themselves are confusing and without merit or justice in many cases.

...he remarried less than a month after our divorce was final....

This disturbed me the most actually, and not for your husband but for the hapless woman that agreed to marry him so quickly. I wont get into it, but I really felt sad for her since she is about to undergo what you just survived....

[Willowhawk]

Oh, Zylah!

I just read the same tract-- someone left it in a toilet stall at the grocery store (best place for it, I say!). It was a real howler-- fortunately, I was able to show my kids and laugh it off. I took it to my (Christian, but thankfully not fundie) husband as well-- Goddess bless him, he's woefully undereducated about our beliefs and practices, but he's getting better!-- and merrily deconstructed it for him. I'm fortunate; he is open-minded and tolerant, and *wants* to understand. We're still ironing out the kinks, but thus far our interfaith marriage seems to be going well.

My ex-husband (and father of my children) is Pagan, but he was raised by virulently fundamentalist Church of Christ members, and they still refer to me as "that daughter of Satan who stole our son away." My former MIL is the worst-- she has told my kids outright that I, and by extension, they, are headed straight to hell, and that she prays for us ceaselessly. Since my ex has moved away, his mother (who lives 200 miles from us)has accused me of keeping her grandchildren away from her-- and, to be honest, yes, I am! I have no plans to expose my children to that poisonous, horrible woman who degrades everything I've taught them. If she could do nothing but keep her religious views to herself, I would reconsider my position, but she "can't not talk about Jesus." So-- stalemate. I'm sorry for it, but I'm their mother and I choose not to expose them to such negativity, even from their grandmother.

Their stepdad's family is Christian-- traditional Southern Baptist, not particularly rabid, but we haven't "come out of the broom closet" with them yet. I'm a little worried about it, actually... they're intelligent and well-educated people, but quite entrenched in their worldview, and I very much doubt that a Druid daughter-in-law and Pagan grandchildren fall into their paradigm!

Anyway... I'm not sure what all that was about-- just commiserating, I suppose. I wish I knew something useful to tell you... I can send prayers and all blessings, though!

peace of the grove,

Willow

[wolf560]

I just remembered something else...

My in-laws are mostly Assembly of God (extreme Pentecostal fundamentalists) and most know of my non-Christian views. I told them that I was a 'Celtic Shaman', and that while I do not believe in their faith or Deity I do believe in the "sanctity of the human spirit".

When I was asked about this I explained that I believe everyone has an obligation to both themselves and their 'community' to establish and maintain a good set of morals. I defined this as 'living within whatever community and contributing somehow' as well as 'being true to ones self and whatever we find important in our life'. What was important in my life was the raising of my children at the time, so setting an example that we could all live by was of paramount importance.

When I was actively confronted with "You will burn in Hell" or "you have sentenced your children to Hell"... I asked them why their benevolent God would punish us? I asked them to compare what I was doing as far as community involvement and assistance to people in need. I asked them if even they could say that they were being helpful and/or contributing to anything outside of themselves. It did not take long for them to realize that I was always helping people around me, regardless of their beliefs and that we contributed frequently to both animal and women's shelters. They began to question some of their own church Elders and eventually left me alone (again, probably because I knew more about their religion than they did).

Setting the example and living by that example was for our children's benefit, but it is also the main reason why we live in peace with our in-laws now.

Our children were (briefly) exposed to this hatred (best word I can think of) by their in-laws. Both of my children were under 14 yet both of them responded immediately with several key points causing their cousins to run to their parents asking them about the Gospel of John. The parents actually asked me to explain it at the Family Reunion to a group of about 15 mixed parents and children. I told my kids later on that I felt like a Druid of old leading a discussion about ethics and morality and "old tyme religion" LMAO

[MiriamSPia]

I'm not sure how to tell you this. I think that sounds really tough! I personally suspect they would probably hate me as well: I do both Christianity and druidry...but trying asking your daughter questions is probably good.

Presently my son disagrees with me about the existence of God: I believe there is; he believes there is not but we have discussed it openly and I hope it not part of an undertone of intense argument...but certainly total disagreement.

It sounds like the religious difference was too much for your marriage. That's probably not easy. I've had 3 legal husbands myself, and that doesn't cover all the ground there is at all. I'm single at this time, but not to the most extreme: I believe single includes a wide spectrum from practically married to various types of dating to varying degrees of serious intentions all the way down to the extreme of being totally solo; no lover, no dating partners...nothing, probably also not even looking for a relationship.

[RainCloud]

(this is actually my first post on this forum, I think haha)

As a stepdaughter who's real mother never stood up for her, just keep standing up for your daughter and do what you think is right. My mom could complain at me all she wanted that she didn't like how my stepmom was raising me but that never helped the situation. Your situation is a little different, but its a similar idea. Just be honest with your daughter and continue standing up for her rights and she may not come around this year or next but she probably will by the time she leaves for college. Best of luck to you!

[lavouivre]

wow, that post made me so angry with your ex and his wife!!
I would do different things:
1- talk with ex-husband and confront him - not on religion - but on his power issue. He probably resents you for having custody of the children and as you say yourself tries to be back in charge as he can, but that's no excuse to try to paint a devilish picture of you as the mother. If this confrontation is too much for you alone, bring your friend with you as support. Prep yourself so that any discussion sliding back to religion is avoided at all costs. Because I believe the problem here is not so much religion as "being in charge of the children", taking over. Religion is a pretext or he wouldn't have tried to manipulate with the text messages.
2- get to know the Bible and its contradictions in order to counter-attack with cool logic. read it again, it is really going to make your job easy as it is self-contradictory and not even your husband can reprove your quoting it
3- since they get your daughter enrolled in religious groups and week end activities, bring your daughter to events that will do the counter-attack for you: movies about christian massacring right and left or other religions doing good things(The Mission, Agora, Gandhi); live discussions about authors/lectures on philosophy, about religion and atheism/paganisme/the rest of the world; book reading and commenting (God is not Great and all the Joseph Campbell books about comparative religions); or some pagan gathering (upcoming East Coast Gathering in September 2012); etc.
4- Continue to tell other wife to back-off your daughter FB wall, and tell her you will also pray for her to open her mind.
5- I am very emotional too and understand exactly how you can cry and not help yourself. So be it. Don't go against your own nature. Just say the truth of why you cry, why you are frustrated, why you think/feel that religion is the pretext for your ex to allow all the sour feelings after the break-up to surface. So that your daughter can understand that there are actually two problems, not one. Not just religion, but also her parent's feelings about who gets custody.
6- introduce your daughter to other religions. Begin with the fundamental ones, because they exclude each other. Islam, other forms of christianism (catholicism, orthodoxism, etc), judaism. Then go to shivaism, taoism, buddhism etc. She will soon understand that many religions think they hold the truth. If she is reluctant at first, you can alsways tell her "know your ennemies" to get her started.
7- Tell her that to you, your daughter counts more than anything else, even religion, that you love her and always will, whatever her choices. She is the most important thing and that you will never shut her out even if religion was telling you to do so. That will put some perspective on the topic. Tell her you don't want religion to come in between your love for each other, and it shouldn't.
8- I don't believe in turning your cheek and sending back love. Sometimes, "si vis pacem, para bellum" or if you want peace, prepare for war. Druids were also warriors when there was no other option. So don't hesitate to tear the veil when they are spreading lies like in the Samhain pamphlet. And never tire of doing it, because they will never tire on their side

Just a few random ideas. I am GLAD that your husband was caught in the act by your daughter HA !