PeaceBang

UUA New York Times Ad

Chalice Chick posted this link to the UUA’s New York Times ad.

I really, really like it. Pretty much what CC said.

Fat AND Fit

Fat acceptance activists have been saying this for years, but it’s nice to see it in print somewhere legit, too. Concept! Fat people can be just as healthy or even healthier than thin people if they’re physically active and fit!! DUH.

I’ve known this experientially for a long time, watching skinny dancers during my theatre years subsist on a diet of cocaine and cigarettes and drag themselves exhaustedly for cocktails after a show, while the heavier singer/actors were boogeying on the dance floor until 2 AM, unaided by drugs. Now when I see a really skinny woman who doesn’t look to come by it naturally, I assume that the poor thing is probably almost starving herself to stay that way. If she’s smoking, I assume she is. Diet Coke isn’t a real elixir of life. Meanwhile I’m tucking into my big meal of fish and grains and figuring we’ll probably see each other in the nursing home at relatively the same age, that she’ll have her ailments and I’ll have mine, and that we’re both going to die of something.

One of my old boyfriends was a total string bean who would run 12 miles without breaking much of a sweat (he’s in his 40’s now and his knees and lower back won’t allow that kind of punishment, but he’s still very thin). His level of “bad” cholesterol was, and is, much higher than mine. Genetics.

Fat phobia is especially virulent in the dating scene, with single American males expressing the entire country’s prejudice in especially hostile, entitled terms. I’ve ranted about this before, but men on on-line dating sites think nothing of equating overweight/fat with slothful or lazy, and many of them say so outright (”I’m looking for someone who takes care of herself” is one of the most common ways to express it — or even “No fat couch potatoes sitting around eating bon-bons.” Let’s hope that *that* particular charmer found himself a thin gal with the personality and character he deserves). Many men specify that they want to date someone who is height/weight appropriate (I see nothing offensive about that) but then go so far as to specify dress size or a number on the scale they won’t go above. The word “petite” comes up a lot. Not athletic or active or sports-oriented, all of which would fairly express a preference for the kind of gal who’d rather go rollerblading than visit the Museum of Fine Arts with ya, but just “petite.” Read: She must be appropriately small. We don’t want our women taking up too much room. She could be an alcoholic, a virago, a total bore, uninterested in anything about the world around her, selfish, totally untalented, unambitious and plain out nasty, but if she’s petite, that must signal some kind of innate virtue. And what virtue is that? The ability not to eat too much and commit the crime of having fat on her body.

So yes, fat is still a particularly feminist issue in America (the multi-billion dollar weight loss industry still promotes its wares overwhelmingly to women over men) but with the obesity “epidemic,” it’s now everyone’s issue.

The more we get the word out that fat people are not necessarily lazy, flabby Death Bombs just waiting to go off in their EZ-Lounge, the better. The general public needs to know that plenty of heavy people are very active, eat well and are just as health-conscious as many thin people (if not more so). And fat people need to have it validated for us that it does matter that we exercise, stick it out through that Zumba class, choose healthy foods and not fall prey to the anti-fat moralism that has been in vogue for the past few decades and which has made fat-bashing one of the last acceptable public prejudices in America.

And if you liked this post, you’re gonna love this blog.

Consolation

Max was pretty upset when his buddy tore up his favorite fleece bone during a recent stay, so when I found this one at The Christmas Tree Shop (”Crap You Don’t Need For Under $10!”), I had to get it for him.

They’re just about exactly the same size. It moos like a cow when you bite the middle and squeaks on the ends. He is very, very happy.*

*And no, he won’t play with Fleecey unsupervised, ’cause I ain’t a fool.

And Then Tonight…

After receiving that contemptuous “come to the Catholic Church, the one true faith” e-mail, I took myself out to dinner tonight to a place I’ve only been to twice. I don’t know what made me go there — I just knew they’d have fresh, healthy food and that I could eat at the bar and read my book with the Sox game in the background.

I wound up sitting next to a really nice couple. We started chatting about my book (The Madonnas of Leningrad), then we started talking in earnest about life and faith, and then the woman told me an incredible story about her family. She wanted some perspective about a suffering relative, I gave it, I was fascinated by her whole complicated and tragic extended family situation and asked lots of questions, we blabbed on and on about family, belief, grief, personality types, rituals of mourning… we went far and wide across the human terrain together while her husband listened kindly, chiming in from time to time, and providing details.

It turned out that it was the woman’s birthday (she is exactly my age), and she said that I was such a help to her and had made the night so special that she and her hub bought me dinner, promised to loan me a book, and also promised they would take me to her favorite restaurant in Charlestown sometime (which sounds totally up my ally — Moroccan cuisine in Boston, who knew?).

So now I have two new friends, and although I didn’t ask right out, I’m pretty sure they’re Catholic. Not that it matters, but it’s just nice karma if they are.

Reburying Cardinal Newman & My “Altar Call” From A Catholic Reader

This is so sad, such a betrayal of trust, such an insult, so truly tragic.

And on the same subject, or thereabouts, I had an interesting experience yesterday. A woman reader of my Beauty Tips for Ministers blog wrote me a long, impassioned letter about why I should turn away from the sinful ignorance of the Unitarian Universalist church and become a Catholic as she did.

Now, I have been very tired of Catholic-bashing in the UU church for some years now, as it seems to be a too-easily tolerated UU sport in my heavily-Catholic area, and one that does us no credit. So many of our members are come-outers from the Catholic church, it isn’t uncommon for lay sermons or introductions to start — or at least include –some casual put-down of the Catholic past one has left behind. When I am working on drafts with lay preachers and see this sort of thing, I encourage them to speak their truth in a less negative way, and we explore where their sarcasm or hostility is coming from so that they can acknowledge it, honor it, and not feel the need to bring that tone to the pulpit.
In my past six years in this parish, I have tried to speak against Catholic-bashing whenever I hear it by affirming the many beautiful aspects of the Catholic tradition, distinguishing between corrupt ecclesiastical structures and the life of Catholic faith, and reminding critics of the impressive history of Catholic social justice and liberationist theology.

I’d have a hard time mustering the energy to voice that defense today, though.

I said that the letter I received was “long and impassioned.” Actually, that’s not true. It was more like long, impassioned, condemnatory, insulting and hateful, but all of those latter qualities were wrapped up in such pious language and false agape that I wasn’t supposed to be able to ferret them out. God knows the writer herself likely believed she was writing in the spirit of love. But gads — I could smell her fear and loathing of personal and theological freedom emanating from the screen as I read it.

My reaction was interesting. I wasn’t so much angry as I felt genuinely horrified — and to be more specific, psychically threatened. The writer claimed to have my best interests at heart. She called me “honey.” It felt as though someone was advancing on me with a chloroformed rag in hand, ready to render me helpless and unconscious, speaking vicious threats in a sweet tone –trying to hypnotize me into waiting obediently to be delivered into oblivion. It was so, so creepy.

In my several years as a religion blogger I’ve had a good number of off-line letters from readers trying to get me to convert, repent, or just plain shut up. This was by far the creepiest, most misogynist, sex-phobic, deeply self-hating invitation to “come to Christ” I’ve had yet. And because it so insistently claimed that the Catholic Church was my only way to salvation, it left me with a very bitter anti-Catholic feeling. One part of me wants to flush that feeling out of my heart as quickly as possible. Another part of me wants to sit with it awhile, reflect on it, and use this experience as a way to better understand how some of my own parishioners come to my own church so profoundly spiritually wounded and angry.

Remember in the film “Silkwood” after Karen Silkwood had been exposed to plutonium and had to be thrown naked into the shower and scrubbed raw with metal brushes? After reading that letter, I definitely needed a Karen Silkwood scrub-down. And a drinks and tapas date with my Catholic friends to really and truly make it all better.

“Vicky Cristina Barcelona:” A PeaceBang Review

This is a film about how vapid and empty Americans are, and how fiery and passionately alive Europeans are.

That is all.
::curtsy:::

P.S. Rebecca Hall, a dead ringer for the young Barbara Hershey, is so dull you’ll watch her and wonder how she got this job — or any acting job. When you find out that her parents are the genius director Peter Hall and the opera diva Maria Ewing, you can whisper this beautiful little word with me, n-e-p-o-t-i-s-m.

P.P.S. (spoiler alert!)
Scarlett Johansson’s character becomes lovers with both Javier Bardem and and Penelope Cruz and still decides to leave them. Let me repeat that. Javier Bardem AND PENELOPE CRUZ. Both of them. Lovers. Bedmates. Leaves ‘em. That is how you know that Americans are not only vapid and empty, but also just insane.

Oh, and one more thing?
How come Rebecca Hall’s character is getting her master’s degree in Catalan identity but still doesn’t know (as Woody Allen apparently decides to ignore) the major fact that Catalonians don’t consider themselves Spanish, okay, and they don’t primarily SPEAK Spanish in Barcelona, either! They speak CATALAN, for God’s sake. Oh Woody, stick with New York.

That isn’t to say I didn’t like it. I did.

Thanks, I’ll be here all week.

Meet Ups

Have any of you ever attended a MeetUp? I’m a big believer in social networking as a positive way to create instant community, so I try to attend them a few times a year at least. I like the democratic nature of these things: loosely organized, open to anyone, very reliant on people’s flexibility and good will. Sometimes the organizer is a dingbat and fails to make the group easy (or possible) to find. Sometimes you wind up on a sort of blind date with one other person who shows, even though eight people said they’d be there. Sometimes it’s a great, rowdy time. Sometimes it’s a great, rowdy time that turns into a depressing display of alcoholism and loneliness and you have to back out the door and make a run for it. Sometimes the movie/music/dancing/event is awesome, sometimes it’s dull or pretentious, and sometimes you drive around looking for parking for so long you give up in frustration and go home.

I still want to attend local Spanish language MeetUp but I haven’t gotten up the nerve. The folks who sign up for it seem to be nearly fluent and I’m nervous that I’d sit there sucking down sangria and thinking of grammatically-correct phrases five minutes after someone asks me a question or directs a comment my way. “Si! Muy bien!” ::staring down at my burrito:::

But this new Meetup looks right up my alley. I think if you do it right, you probably don’t even have to find parking… you can just attend on the astral plane. I wouldn’t even have to wash my hair.

Friday Cat Blogging

“Kid, you got fleas. How about if I throw that ball for you and you run after it? And just keep running?”

Table Fellowship and the Flow Between Deep and Shallow

A minister gal pal came over for dinner the other night and our conversation ranged from church systems to family systems to dogs to the the food we were eating. And then after dinner we hung out in the living room with the Red Sox game on the television and pored over hair magazines. It was totally 8th grade, and I loved it. It’s wonderful to have friends you can travel all that emotional terrain with with such ease.

With so much of horrific and momentous news barraging us every day, it can be tempting to believe that we have to spend our entire evening discussing the Russian invasion of Georgia or the latest church shooting or risk being thought (or thinking ourselves) irresponsible citizens of the world.

The thing is, no one can live that way. We need a balance of the deep and the shallow — the thoughtful and the more frivolous. But it’s challenging to find that balance. I don’t know about you, but I have an “inner accuser” who chastises me for switching gears when the weight of the world is too heavy on my heart. The accuser is always putting my inner fun kid into the naughty corner for saying, “Enough with the sad stuff, can we tell jokes now?”

As I get older and maybe a teeny bit wiser, I listen to the accuser less and less because I have learned that immersing myself in the details of the world’s pain does not actually make me a more effective presence for love and healing within myself or anywhere else. What a revelation! And you know where I learned it?

Around the table. At meals with friends.

Because of my interest in Jesus’ ministry of table fellowship, I started to pay close attention to the way that my friends or congregants and I flowed comfortably from subject to subject in our time of being nourished together. With no agenda for our discussion and no obligation to stay focused on a particular topic, we never do. We range freely. There is a natural exchange of energy: peaks of excited, over-flowing chatter segue into moments of comfortable silence or listening to one voice, thinking, considering, chewing. If someone broaches a tragic topic we dwell there, hold the immensity of feeling together for awhile, then move on as the feeling moves from grief to hope (and doesn’t it always do so when friends are together?). Next on the conversational menu might be mutual counsel or strategizing. Then opining; each taking our moment on the soapbox on an issue of common interest. And inevitably, laughter. Silliness. The joyful relief of being together even as things feel that they’re falling apart around us.

I remember reading about cafes that stayed open and busy in Sarajevo during the Bosnian crisis. With bombs literally falling around them, people needed to gather for conversation, a cup of coffee or a drink, a game of checkers, a song. Unsafe? Absolutely. Perhaps an expression of fatalism or rebellious nihilism? Very possibly. But these people knew, as we do as well, that just as surely as humans must courageously face the evil in the world, they also must turn away from those evils on occasion and have a game of checkers, tell a joke, or wile away an hour looking at hair style magazines.

One year at General Assembly I just happened to meet up every morning with one of my deepest-thinking colleagues at the hotel restaurant. We would breakfast together and talk and talk — often talking right through a program we had planned to attend. Our conversations were deep and our reflections serious, but also full of irreverence and laughter. During those breakfasts, my friend said two things that were so hysterically funny I wrote them down on a little pad that I just rediscovered today. So, for your appreciation:

“I believe that love and Christian humility are the way to world domination.”

(With a piece of bacon in his hand, musing on why Christianity became the world’s largest religion) “It has all the moral grandeur of Judaism, plus bacon.”

Ten points if you can guess the speaker!
Those two remarks may be my favorite evidence for the argument that we are just as “deep” when we’re laughing as when we’re sitting in solemn assembly. Tell ‘em PeaceBang said so.

Yea, I Think He Was

http://wonkette.com/401833/was-bush-falling-down-drunk-at-olympics

P.S. Mrs. Bush swiftly informed the president that he was holding the flag backwards. Photo by Getty Images.