Saturday, December 16, 2006

To the recent story/link requestor

Please note that our scope is limited to stories about Christian online communities. This is not a blog on which disputes about non-Christian religions, or political issues, are appropriate. Because your request in no way conforms to the purpose of this site, I will not post anything about the writer you referenced, nor will I post any links to his or your sites. Please understand that this decision is in no way a denouncement of or an agreement with the author you wrote about. What reading I did at the linked site in your message (so that my decision could be an informed one) was interesting; I have certain opinions on these topics. However, this blog is definitely not an appropriate venue for discussion of them.

Of lies and forgiveness: Update on CCC Yahoo public list

One would hope that the lies would burn themselves out and those telling them would surrender their spirit of bitterness up for the Lord to heal. But as with so many lies, those caught up in them become more and more consumed by them. Virtually every post at CCC is obsessed with ridiculous strawman about egalitarians, attributing to us just about every evil imaginable. Several members there insist on feeding an old grudge against an egalitarian author they insist on calling the "Borg Queen." CHRISTIANS DON'T DO THAT. STOP IT, for CHRIST'S SAKE--PLEASE!. Here and now, as your sister in Christ, I call on CCC to stop tolerating such outrageous sin in your midst.

CCC members also continue to bring up specific things they apparently refuse to forgive about people CCC leaders have removed from their list. And yet they publicly judge egalitarians, claiming that we refuse to forgive! It appears to be far easier for them to condemn egalitarians, even though since they refuse to have any association with the egalitarians they judge as unforgiving, so they don't actually KNOW we are aren't forgiving, than to forgive egalitarians for the long public list of real, imagined, and blatantly invented sins allegedly committed by egalitarians.

Hear this, here and now, CCC: I, an EGALITARIAN, FORGIVE YOU--SOMETIMES DAILY--EVERY SINGLE TIME YOU'VE EVER LIED ABOUT US. It's hard work, but I do it. Your false witness against me and what I believe in, has no power over me, but it clearly has poisoned you. I urge you to to seek God's help in overcoming the very natural human tendency to lie about one's opponents, and cease this ongoing falsehood. WE ARE YOUR CHRISTIAN BROTHERS AND SISTERS! Your continued lies about us are horribly detrimental to your witness as disciples of Jesus Christ. You are better than this. We are not your enemies. It grieves my heart that you continue to portray us as though we are. I believe you are absolutely mistaken about patriarchy being a godly thing, but I would never usurp Christ's prerogative to deny that you belong to him, as you continue to claim about your egalitarian Christian brothers and sisters.

Forgiveness doesn't mean we sweep under the rug what has happened. It means that we let go of the hurt others have genuinely caused us, so that it no longer controls us. I suspect that if these CCC members would dare to do that, they'd realize that we egalitarians bear them no ill will. We won't, however, ignore the fact that they are still unrepentant in their lying about us. Forgiveness fades into toleration of relationship-destroying sin if we ignore that ongoing sin.

I pray for you, each and every day, not specifically that you would recognize that mutual submission in church and marriage is biblical (though it is and I would rejoice in that), but that you would come to reflect Jesus Christ on the CCC public list. I also pray that your false witness about us egalitarians would cease. Actually, the latter would be a fruit of the former.

Oh, just in case you are tempted to speculate, I am not "the Borg Queen," nor does the Christian sister you wrong with that mischaracterization know that I've posted this. Who I am, doesn't matter. That you stop with the blatant insults and lies, matters a whole lot. I'm counting on you to show your fellow members and readers a better picture of our Lord.