Hi everyone
I was going to jump on here and write an upbeat-yet-reflective piece about how this is my last day as a 20 year-old, and tomorrow i will be 21. Except I just spent the last 20 minutes writing a reply to all the responses on my Lesbian mums on Play School post and now I'm not in an upbeat, reflective mood anymore.
I shouldn't write about political stuff on here... shouldn't even mention it, because then people with stronger opinions than me challenge my view, which is usually ill-founded or at least not thought out in detail. I'm not big on confrontations, even small ones. I'd much rather be silly and tell jokes and just be friends with everyone. I think it's foolish to think that I can live life that way, and probably unwise to not have a strong basis for many of my views but.... I don't know.
See? I just proved my own point.
I even get like this with things that I am very passionate about and do have strong and well-founded opinions on. Christianity, for example, I know quite a lot about and have very strong views on a variety of Christian topics. But when I read discussions in the forums about it, with different people bringing different views, passions and experiences head-to-head I shy away from the discussions. Because I don't want to get caught up in all the emotion that goes with arguing. I want any reply that I give to be well-argued, factual and backed-up, and desperately don't want to fall into the trap of the condesencion, patronisation, nastiness and pity-seeking that so often seems to go along with those sorts of discussions. Then not only do I not reply, but I let myself get upset by other people's unfactual views or experiences which they mention that have hurt them.
The other part about arguing about Christianity that I don't like is that in many ways I don't see the point. If the main basis for believing what you do is because you have an encounter with God, then you can't argue people into believing what you do. Your own belief is based on experience, not an argument, so how can you expect someone else to be different?
.... Is that a cop-out? Am I just making excuses for not wanting to talk to others about God? But I'd much rather live by example and show God's love through my actions and let God show Himself that way.
Ok, I don't really hate the forums. And don't not reply to this post, because I like getting replies! But there are aspects of them which frustrate me. In the most part, I think it's that I frustrate myself, and the forums and the people on them just remind me of that fact.
Carry on posting,
Tegan