Freedom from "ism"?

I have recently felt the need to start writing more about issues that stem from my emergence from the vine thicket of my Christian background. I have come to the view, that it is people who are good and that the doctrines, dogmas and behaviours of the Christian Church may well be driven by things other than the spiritual "truths". The latter may well be the dressing on the windows, closets and boudoirs of the institutional churches and their adherents. Perhaps, indeed, these trappings of the Christian religion may be the carving on the doors which lock Christians in as surely as they lock non-Christians out from what many Christians often believe is grace or that which Jesus often referred to as "the kingdom".


I have been a born again Christian and a leader of sorts withing the Uniting Church of Australia. I would not claim that now. I do not believe in the kind of god promoted by many Christians. I am a skeptic and am what I would call an atheist. I however, do not believe that there is no god, nor do I believe that there is one. I am not a believer, I simply don't know. I am what Jesus might have called a "seeker".

Just as the prefix "a" in front of the word "typical" forms atypical, the prefix "a" in front of the word "theist" forms atheist, which I take to mean, not theist. In my opinion there is no such thing as atheism in which to believe or not believe.


I find the suffix "ism" synonymous with a word such as "door" or "gate", and its use is to divide some ideas or some people from others. If some Christians would find it difficult to embrace Christianism rather than Christianity perhaps they should consider people who don't believe in the kind of God that they do, as people who have atheity. Similarly I wonder how comfortable many people who do not believe in God would feel if they were asked to identify with atheity rather than atheism?


In a similar vein I am not a Christian, I am an" achristian". I find no reason to believe in the concept of a christ let alone ascribe that role to Jesus of Nazareth.


I am, however, a follower or student of Jesus of Nazareth and his reported teaching, something I have found it much easier to be outside of the Christian Church. In my experience, the doctrines and culture of the Church filter experiences of Jesus and his teaching through heavy layers of christology and their own peculiar theistic dogmas.

A New Post and a Return to a New Day

Having left this blog idle for some time I have decided to revive in closer to its' orignal intention, which was to do with spiritual matters. Originally this was to find the synergy between the emergence of my identity as a homosexual or gay person and my spiritual understandings.

Over coming weeks I will refurbish aspects of the blog and continue that which was always a journey, learning to understand the workings of the minds of those who put together these tools of the world wide web.

The blog was originally called Rainbow Pitta because this small bird, a secretive inhabitant of monsoonal vine thickets in the northern Australia was, to me symbolic of my "coming out". Many people who walk through these thickets may not be aware of the Rainbow Pitta. Inspite of its colours it is well camouflaged in its environment. It is, however, curious, and will approach closer to you if you see it, stand quietly and rustle the leaves at your feet.

A place to live

I have come across this short video about having a place to live when you gay and you are old. It seems to have been made about a particular commercial development in the US where a new gay friendly apartment building has been built.

Here is a link to a similare video on IMDB




A Place To Live Trailer - LGBT Seniors in Crisis - video powered by Metacafe

How do you tell whose old then?

Last week I spent two days training for the National Prescribing Service peer educator program on "Quality Use of Medicines" and shared the learning experience with five women. I adored being in their company, loved their wit and was humbled by their intelligence of every flavour you can imagine.

Special mention of T who was 28 years my senior and put me in the shade with her sharpness and focus on the practicality of our task.

I joked to my friends about learning to be an "old" and you know, I think I did.

And what about diversity? Whose old when by my estimation there was nearly a sixty year age span in the group and the youngest would probably be considered as old by the standards of some.

Can we in the gay community look up to our role models? Do we know who they are? I hope so.

Mind the children

So in his Christmas address the Pope says we should get rid of all kinds of child abuse, unless of course they are gay in which case we need to tell them they are enemies of the human race. This is real abuse to impose on a struggling young person the dictum that they are God's enemy just because of who they are. This man is unbelievable, an open mouth on an empty head and a complete antithesis of any kind of loving saviour.

Perhaps he is doing the world a favour and showing us the poverty of spirit of the fat cats of the Church of Rome,, who put him where he is. This man is a heartless bureaucrat, nothing more nor less. He hides his faux pas behind the flavour of the decade, child abuse , an opportunistic and cynical refuge for a rabbit on the run. No mention of the centuries, if not millennia of on-going abuse by the Church. With this man in the top job God needs no further enemies.

It is time for the Church of Rome to take stock of itself, it can no longer go around spouting what God wants when it can't even carry off the slightest semblance of morality. There are any number of people standing on street corners pontificating much more convincingly than the Bishop of Rome. The Pope speaks not for God but for himself and the vested interests that vested him his position.

I do not intend this to be an attack on people's religion I wish only to denounce a very human man who attacks the very love of God and dresses his attack in the fancy robes of deceit and in the process undermining the faith of the faithful. I just don't think that kind of behaviour was on the job description.

I think the Church might find it was Jesus who taught by his life that if you engage with people as they are you will approach more closely to the kingdom. But of course the Church has other ideas. And I say to the church and the laity, when will you allow yourselves to truly engage with humankind as did the man of Nazareth?

The Pope gets in a cheap shot at homosexuals

I was at a military concert the other night put on a professional government funded band of the Australian armed forces. An item on the program was played badly. Why? A reasonable question I think. These were professional musicians paid for by the tax payers who were present. It was unforgiveable in my opinion to offer something which the person who put the program together must have realised was not up to par.

And so to the Pope! His comments on homosexuality, saying it was as big or bigger of an issue for humanity than saving the rainforest were beyond the pale. This is the head of the Church of Rome who we expect, if nothing else to be a consummate professional. This may have been a small part of his address to the Curia but it should not have been performed, it was badly scripted. That is, unless he truly meant it. The apologists are at it already saying it was a mistranslation of his words, it was but a small part of what he said or, tellingly, it was a mistake.

To me the interpretation is clear. I expect the head of the Church of Rome to mean what he says and his words are thus way beyond the pale. In the lead up to Christmas, surely a time when God supposedly endorsed humans by at least assuming human form. Instead the Pope says God made a mistake but hides his comments by saying it is homosexuals who are making the mistake and perverting God’s purpose. The timing is way out because the teaching of Jesus, unfiltered by the later dogma of Rome, offers no support for the Pope in his attacks on homosexuals. His comments are destructive of human kind bringing only division and dissent, not healing and conservation in any so-called human ecology that he pretends to promote.

This is totally unforgivable. The Pope’s message is clear, homosexuals are perverting God’s plan. Forget the clap trap about being homosexual is OK provided you don’t act like one. Try that as being a Catholic is all right but acting as one is something else again. The Church of Rome is preaching hate pure and simple. They deserve to be condemned from the top man to the bottom woman.

This is Christmas for God’s sake and we get hate from the Pope. Yeah right! Wrap it up in tinsel and let a fat man deliver it and no one will notice!
Read also:
ABC News
CBC News
Telegraph

Christmas is also a new frog

Litoria caerulea, a green tree frog from northern Australia emerging as a neophyte from our garden pond

The annual death that is Christmas

A familiar empty feeling has crept into my bones. I ‘m not sure I felt it on my first Christmas in 1947 but it is anaesthetically clear on my sixty second in 2008. This is the fag end of the year for me and as I look back it seems that it was always so. Each year I live in denial until sometime around the twenty third of December I suddenly realise my word is rapidly dying. You would think I would have learned by now to prepare for it, to expect it, to manage it better. But no, suddenly I realise that I can’t talk to people, I can’t email people because they are not listening and not watching.

It is the shock of it more than anything. It’s not that I begrudge anyone one a few days or even a few weeks of disappearance. It’s realising that I have no defence, nowhere to go, nothing to do but to put myself on hold like everyone else.

Perhaps it is a sign of getting older that my realisation of this annual death is getting more disturbing. It doesn’t seem to have helped that I have retired from the workforce. I might expect that this could make me immune from slow-downs in the normal business of existence. But it seems not.

I haven’t told my partner about this yet as he is looking forward to his few days of other existence. There is no point telling him anyway as this lethargy is in the very air and independent of lovers, family, friends and acquaintances and in some ways is finely tuned by their proximity.

I have resolved to keep breathing the moribund air, allowing it to infiltrate my lungs only in so far as it need to cling to the hope of emerging into life again next year when I can relax and move on.

Perhaps the tropical low moving across the Top End will stir the Batchelor air bringing rain and storms to distract me from my forced hibernation?

Australia supports UN Statement on human rights and non-discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation or gender identity

In the UN General Assembly on 18 December 2008 an important statement supporting the human rights of gay and lesbian people was read and signed by 66 nations. I am posting it here as it is not easy to find the full text of the statement in news reports.

Statement on Human Rights,

Sexual Orientation and

Gender Identity

We have the honour to make this statement on human rights and sexual orientation and gender identity on behalf of signatory States.

1. We reaffirm the principle of universality of human rights, as enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights whose 60th anniversary is celebrated this year, Article 1 of which proclaims that “all human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights”.
2. We reaffirm that everyone is entitled to the enjoyment of human rights without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status, as set out in Article 2 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Article 2 of the International Covenants on Civil and Political, Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, as well as in article 26 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
3. We reaffirm the principle of non-discrimination which requires that human rights apply equally to every human being regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity.
4. We are deeply concerned by violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms based on sexual orientation or gender identity.
5. We are also disturbed that violence, harassment, discrimination, exclusion, stigmatisation and prejudice are directed against persons in all countries in the world because of sexual orientation or gender identity, and that these practices undermine the integrity and dignity of those subjected to these abuses.
6. We condemn the human rights violations based on sexual orientation or gender identity wherever they occur, in particular the use of the death penalty on this ground, extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, the practice of torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment, arbitrary arrest or detention and deprivation of economic, social and cultural rights, including the right to health.
7. We recall the statement in 2006 before the Human Rights Council by fifty four countries requesting the President of the Council to provide an opportunity, at an appropriate future session of the Council, for discussing these violations.
8. We commend the attention paid to these issues by special procedures of the Human Rights Council and treaty bodies and encourage them to continue to integrate consideration of human rights violations based on sexual orientation or gender identity within their relevant mandates.
9. We welcome the adoption of Resolution AG/RES. 2435 (XXXVIII-O/08) on “Human Rights, Sexual Orientation, and Gender Identity” by the General Assembly of the Organization of American States during its 38 th session in 3 June 2008.
10. We call upon all States and relevant international human rights mechanisms to commit promoting and protecting human rights of all persons, regardless of sexual orientation and gender identity.>
11. We urge States to take all the necessary measures, in particular legislative or administrative, to ensure that sexual orientation or gender identity may under no circumstances be the basis for criminal penalties, in particular executions, arrests or detention.
12. We urge States to ensure that human rights violations based on sexual orientation or gender identity are investigated and perpetrators held accountable and brought to justice.
13. We urge States to ensure adequate protection of human rights defenders, and remove obstacles which prevent them from carrying out their work on issues of human rights and sexual orientation and gender identity.

Australia was a signatory to the statement and I find this a matter for some pride.

The United States refused to sign it, apparently in case it cut across the rights of each state to legislate against things like gay marriage. The Vatican said that the statement went too far and placed other, unspecified rights in jeopardy. The Vatican made its own statement which in my view is a vague and thinly disguised opposition to the rights of homosexual people.

So much for the leadership of the land of the free and the exposure of the moral bankruptcy of the Vatican as more concerned with protecting its own peculiar views than emphatically speaking out against human rights abuses and environments where people can be detained tortured and even executed for their sexuality regardless of the criminal law.


A full list of the signatories is as follows:
Albania, Andorra, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chile, Colombia, Croatia, Cuba, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Ecuador, Estonia, Finland, France, Gabon, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Guinea-Bissau, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Mauritius, Mexico, Montenegro, Nepal, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Paraguay, Poland, Portugal, Romania, San Marino, Sao Tome and Principe, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Timor-Leste, United Kingdom, Uruguay, and Venezuela.

Rainbow Pitta re-emerges

Perhaps the rainbow pitta has found its colours and has decided to venture from the depths of the forest to the depths of the world outside the forest. Shall we see?