Okay, so by now you know that I've just been on a posting spree. You gotta love it when I do that. It's one of those, "Oh, hey, I haven't posted anything of import for a long-damned-time so I'm going to make you sit here for two hours to read six entries" kind of things.

*grins*

Okay, so the recent few posts were my paper which I presented just this past weekend, and the post about the phone call with Duncan.

In regard to the phone call with Duncan... Nothing else has happened. No email from him, no phone calls from him, nuthin. I'm not really surprized. It's all good.

Eventually I'll meet up with him and we'll have that whole who-did-what-and-what-did-it-mean conversation. But that might even be a year or more in the future. Hell, it could be ten years in the future. I don't know. I'm tired now so I'm not making a whole lot of sense and I think I might just be typing to see how quickly I can type.

Um, anyway...

*clears her throat*

On to the paper.

The class I took is an intensive course on "apologetics". As far as I knew, the point of apologetics was to state what you believe and why, and to do it in such a way that you would persuade someone to your point of view. That's how the course was explained to me anyway.

So, I spent about six hours total writing my paper, because I didn't start it until last Friday night and couldn't get any "inspiration" until Wednesday night. Since I had to have 10 copies of the paper, it had to be done by Thursday so that I could take it with me Friday for the class.

Anyway... I'm on a new computer and didn't yet know how to make the footnotes thing work. (I have that down now) As I was running out of time, and as my eyes were growing heavy inside my brain, or something, I just decided to go with "good enough".

I spent wednesday night, about six hours worth, working on the paper, getting it smooth and presentable. I poured out my life. I sort of thought of it as an extended diary entry. (that's why I so readily posted it here)

Now, at the class, the point is to read your paper, then have a brief discussion period where people can ask questions and make comments... so that you can defend your paper. For those of you who know me pretty well, you know how fond I am of trying to convert people to my point of view. Heh.

So, a paper with the purpose of conversion... Not my gig. Therefore, I did what I thought would be the most persuasive... I stated what I believed, why I believed it and allowed everyone to see what was in my head.

I got a few different reactions. From the women, I primarily was well received. They commiserated with the negatives of my life and were happy for the positives. They were women, they understood the emotional weight of the paper and were more accepting of it.

The men on the other hand, were not quite as open. *chuckles* My personal opinion is that I scared the males. After all, I didn't write a technical paper. I didn't have foot notes.

Okay... these were the complaints of the males...

First off, I was complained at because I stated that the Holy Spirit was a "power" and one of the men was adamant that I admit the Holy Spirit is a man. *shrugs* I simply don't believe that. If God wants me to know that the Holy Spirit is a "man", I will figure that out in time, but not today. Today, I believe the Holy Spirit is exactly what the name implies... a spirit; a power; a force.

That was the largest argument. The secondary argument was that I didn't include enough scripture.

I know that I included at least four scriptures. I think it was more like five or six, but still...

Anyway, I attempted to reply to that and the men (the same three men) talked over me and over each other, arguing that I didn't include enough scriptures. Finally I broke through and said that I thought the purpose of the paper was to persuade someone who wasn't a Christian.

They nodded dully, almost patronizingly. Then I stated that in my experience, when someone who was not a Christian and, furthermore, wasn't interested in anything even remotely associated with Christianity, was the focus, the last thing they needed was someone spouting scriptures.

I mean, really, if you don't believe in God, are you going to accept the Bible as an authority??? I don't think so.

As I attempted to state this, the conversation got a little heated. Finally I raised my voice and cut off the arguing men stating that they were blatantly wrong.

They were saying that I had to have scripture to back up what I said. They didn't give me a reason for having that back up.

I said that I had had conversations with people who didn't believe in God and didn't believe in the authority of the Bible. the men said that I still had to have scripture to back me up because Scripture was the final authority.

I stated they were wrong. I said that I had had conversations with people who not only didn't believe in the Bible as an authority, but would outright laugh in my face if I tried quoting scriptures at them.

The men didn't agree with my observations so I just dropped the subject. After a moment or two, the men changed their statements from my needing more scriptures, to my needing to have typed out what the scriptures actually stated.

If you read through the long-ass paper (which was three pages short of the requirement) you would notice that I just included the scriptures as reference. The men wanted me to either quote or paraphrase the scriptures.

*shrugs*

Those were the arguments. Those were the bad comments they had about my paper. That the Holy Spirit was a "man" and that I should have had more scriptures / quoted the scriptures I used.

*shrugs again*

If you were in a sane, normal frame of mind, how long do you think those two objections would take? Even to give a little debate time to them. Ten minutes? Twenty?

Try almost two full hours.

*laughs quietly*

After the first half hour, the women were starting to hush the men in gentle, subtle ways.

All the while, my Mother is getting more and more pissed off.

See... the men weren't just stating their objections, they were saying that I was wrong, that what I wrote was wrong. And, they were saying that I wasn't really acting like a Christian/writing like a Christian. They were upset because I hadn't tried to convert them.

*chuckles quietly*

I was asked what I meant when I'd written that I wasn't called to a ministry of conversion. I stated that it was simple... I believe that it is not my job to convert other people to my point of view.

They could not accept that.

Mom was there, seething. She felt furious because she brought her daughter to this class and wound up watching the men attempt to attack and devour me. *shrugs*

I stopped Mom from yelling a few times. I asked her not to react to the men.

This is what I believe happened.

I believe that the paper I wrote was very, very powerful. It is my life, raw, poured out for twelve pages. It is my heart dumped out upon the table. It is filled and comprised of emotion at every turn.

I believe that the emotion of my paper hit the men hard. I believe that they were expecting a logical, non-emotional paper and what they got was an ocean of emotion thrown in their faces.

I believe they didn't know how to handle that.

Secondly, I believe that some of the things I said in my paper hit them on a gut level, but subconsciously. I believe, and I could be very, very wrong about this, but I think that when they read the comments I made about "off-the-rack" Christianity, that they associated with that.

Why do I think this? Because the three men who had the volitile responses were all ministers. One was a pastor, one was a youth pastor and one was the instructor of the class who is a youth counselor.

I think these men were hit with so much emotion they had only two choices... collapse under the pressure, or attack.

Of the males I know (some females too, I'm generalizing here), the largest number of them are almost completely unable to accept such a load of emotion and not believe they have some responsibility... I think they were of the opinion that they had to respond with either tears/compassion (a man's no-no in this kind of situation) or kill something.

As I tried to explain to my Mother...

You've seen those commercials where two guys are talking and they have a bonding moment... you know, they actually have some kind of emotional connection. Then, they discover they had an emotional connection and they can't deal with that. They jump back, their voices drop to a low, bass rumble and they talk about something very "guy" orriented. "How 'bout them bears" kind of thing.

I think the attack from these men at class was the almost-polite version of "how bout them bears".

I really, really, really want to believe that what the men were saying didn't bother me. While I was there, I was pretty tough. I didn't burst into tears or run crying from the room. I didn't crumple into a ball. I let them attack again and again and again.

I defended myself quietly but firmly.

But, I think I have this cold today because of the attack, and as a result of Mom's rage.

I think that my body has recognized ........... There's a whole history here in this next few lines... if you don't "get it", that's okay. It's kind of complex and I'm not sure if I'll even say it right.

I think that my body recognized the attack for what it was... an attack. I think that the resultant weakness (completely debilitating cold) is from the fact that the men (persons in a genetic role of protection and defense) were attacking the core of me.

I think that when I stopped fighting their adamant demand that the Holy Spirit was a man, I accepted the attack, didn't just reflect it.

Kind of like I got cut in the fight. It's not a serious wound, it's just painful and slows me down for a little bit.

Then, because Mom was so enraged, even though she didn't turn her anger upon me, I think that it rubbed off on me. We have that kind of symbiotic relationship anyway.

To use the getting cut in a fight thing... Mom's rage would be like a grain or two of dirt which got into the cut... it's still not a fatal wound, it's not even a serious wound, it's just more uncomfortable and may be a little infected for a day or two.

I think that's why I'm so damned sick. It's the reaction to the psychological violence of Friday night.

*shrugs*

Anyway, I'm tired and now I really have to go potty. Not that you needed to know that, but I'm tired and have been typing this for about half an hour or so and I'm sick and stuff like that there.

I'd explain more but I just had to cough and the black spots haven't stopped flying about the periphery of my vision yet.

Until next time...

Peace unto thy hearts.