Blogaround

1. The shredder of history and the oldest song in the world (May 2) "To reach the present day, it must be the case that no person or thing destroyed the document—not just in its own time, but also in every year, every decade, every century that followed."

2. This post is about the pruning process I associate with trying to manage the risk of escalation in a conflict. (May 8) "If I'm concerned about escalation in a tense conversation online, sometimes I'll go back over my message draft and try to prune down the number of provocations."

3. Daddy’s Little Interpreter (May 10) Video about a girl in China who helps her deaf father by acting as a sign language interpreter at his nail salon.

And this article, also from Sixth Tone: A Tale of Two Giants: How India’s and China’s Demographics Differ (May 9) "Additionally, India has a much younger population than China. While the median age in China in 2023 is around 39, India’s is just above 28."

Also from Sixth Tone: US Returns Two Stolen Relics Worth $3.5 Million to China (May 11) "According to the district attorney’s office, thieves used saws to cut the antiquities from a tomb in China in the 1990s then smuggled them out of the country. They were then loaned to the Metropolitan Museum of Art for more than two decades by private collector Shelby White, with one of the two never exhibited, 'never cleaned and … caked with dirt.'"

4. LinkedIn to cut 716 jobs and shut its China app amid ‘challenging’ economic climate (May 9) 

5. Revealed: more than 90% of rainforest carbon offsets by biggest certifier are worthless, analysis shows (January 18, via) "The research into Verra, the world’s leading carbon standard for the rapidly growing $2bn (£1.6bn) voluntary offsets market, has found that, based on analysis of a significant percentage of the projects, more than 90% of their rainforest offset credits – among the most commonly used by companies – are likely to be 'phantom credits' and do not represent genuine carbon reductions."

6. The Meltdown of a Gay Bank (March 31, via) "Curtis said there was a big new funding round to toast — but first there were team-building exercises, and they quickly got uncomfortable. For a 'speed-dating' session, managers handed out white labels and instructed employees to fill in their identity, which led to workers wearing stickers that read 'formerly homeless' and 'sexual assault survivor.'"

7. Brief interludes with hideous men (part 1) (May 11) [content note: John Piper] "A man like that is not going to see her as a stranger in need of simple assistance but as a bit player in his own personal dirty joke, or porno, or horror movie, or treatise on divinely ordained gender roles — or even some combination of all of those."

8. Deliver Us (Opening Song) | The Prince of Egypt | TUNE. I've been listening to the soundtrack from "The Prince of Egypt", as one does.

And here's the same song in Mandarin Chinese.

9. Girlhood, Purity and Religious Trauma: A Taylor Swift Study (May 2) 42-minute video which analyzes Taylor's Swift's song "Would've, Could've, Should've", which is (apparently) about her relationship with John Mayer when she was 19 and he was 32.

"Ella Enchanted" Is A Movie About Consent

Ella and Prince Char. Image source.

[content note: spoilers for "Ella Enchanted" (2004 movie)]

I recently watched "Ella Enchanted" and was struck by its message on the importance of consent. Let's talk about it.

Here's an overview of the story: It's a fairy-tale setting, with magic. Ella (Anne Hathaway) is a girl who was given the "gift of obedience" by a fairy- meaning that anytime anyone orders Ella to do something, she is compelled to do it. This is a huge issue because it means she's extremely vulnerable. Anyone who knows about the "gift" can take advantage of her and make her do anything (and indeed, one of Ella's stepsisters figures it out and uses it against her). Really it's a curse rather than a "gift." Ella goes on a journey to get rid of the curse, and along the way meets Prince Char and they fall in love and end up together in the end.

This wasn't the first time I'd seen "Ella Enchanted." I saw it long long ago, back when I was an evangelical Christian, and the lens that I viewed it through was the idea that obedience is a virtue. Yes, when I was a little kid, I was taught by Sunday school teachers/ Christian books/ etc that obedience is a virtue. We're supposed to obey God/ our parents/ rules.

So back then, my evangelical take on "Ella Enchanted" was that in general, obedience is a good thing- but in this story in particular, there were people ordering Ella to do things that weren't good- and it's not okay that her "gift" required her to obey those.

In other words, I thought, obedience is a good thing, but with a few caveats.

I don't believe that any more. I don't believe obedience is inherently a good thing. I don't believe trust is inherently a good thing. I don't believe loyalty is inherently a good thing. Trust and loyalty can be good, but only if there are good reasons why that person deserves your trust/loyalty. As for obedience... I'm having trouble thinking of a situation where obedience is a good thing. Perhaps obedience is only a good thing in the case of a child obeying a parent about basic health/safety things, like "you need to brush your teeth every day." But even that is just a temporary situation; long-term, you want your kid to brush their teeth because they understand the health benefits, not because of "obedience." The only other situation I can think of where obedience is a good thing is if you're in some kind of emergency situation and your leader orders you to do something and there's no time to explain to you all the reasons for it, so you just have to trust that they have a good reason (I guess this is how armies work?). But that requires you to have the kind of relationship where you've worked closely together for a long time and you really really trust that if they tell you to do something, there's a good reason for it. But even in that situation, it's still not really ideal... you should still be held accountable for your actions, and "I was just following orders" is not gonna get you out of trouble, if someone ordered you to do a thing that seemed bad, but you trusted and obeyed them, and it turns out that yes, that thing you did really was bad. So again, it comes back to choosing whether or not to put your trust in someone- and if you choose wrong, that's on you- trust is not inherently a good thing.

So, back then I watched "Ella Enchanted" through the lens of "obedience is a good thing, with some caveats." But this time when I watched it, knowing what I know now about consent, I was surprised to see how strongly the pro-consent message is in this movie. Like, wow, I love this. It makes a lot more sense to view this as a movie about consent, rather than about obedience.

Let's talk about the relationship between Ella and Prince Char. Prince Char has tons of fangirls following him around everywhere, and he is drawn to Ella because she's not like that. She initially doesn't like him because she views him as complicit in the legalized discrimination against elves/giants/ogres, put into law by his uncle, King Edgar. He listens to her- and also listens to an elf and a giant talking about their own experiences under the laws that King Edgar made- and decides to take action to help. And then, the thing that is unique about the way he treats Ella is that he respects her right to consent, unlike anyone else in her entire life.

For example, look at this conversation:

Ella: So, have you seen Slannen? We have to leave. My godmother's on some kind of bender. 

Char: You can't leave now, it's the middle of the night. You have to stay for the party.

Ella: [magically compelled to do what he says] Okay, I'll stay.

Char: ...I appreciate your enthusiasm, but you don't have to stay. I don't want to make you do anything you don't want to do.

Ella: Thank you, Char, for everything. So, I'll see you around? [she turns to leave]

Char: But I wish you would stay.

Ella: I guess one more night wouldn't hurt. [she stays]

I love this so much! At the beginning of the conversation, he can tell she doesn't want to stay- and then when she suddenly agrees to it, he feels like something is off. Consent is not just about if someone says "yes", because people can say "yes" to things they don't want, if they are coerced. He can tell from the way she's acting that she doesn't really want to stay at the party, even though she agreed to it- so he tells her explicitly that she doesn't have to do it. 

He's paying enough attention to her to realize that she's agreeing to something she doesn't really want- and it matters to him. He wants her to be free to do what she wants. Nobody in her life has ever cared about her in that way before. Ella's stepsister Hattie figured out that Ella does whatever she's told, and uses it to force Ella to do things. Random strangers tell Ella to do things and don't seem to notice or care about whether Ella wants to. Even Ella's mother sometimes used the "gift" to control Ella, but for "good" reasons like telling her to practice her musical instrument. (It's not okay that her mother did that.) 

Char is different; he doesn't want Ella to have to do anything she doesn't want- even if it's something he thinks is good. He cares about consent. He tells her, "I don't want to make you do anything you don't want to do"- and that's a big deal. No one has ever told her that before.

Maybe some people would view it like "If they're forcing Ella to do something bad, that's bad. But if they're forcing Ella to do something neutral or good, well, that's fine." Char does NOT believe that, and that's a big deal. Char truly believes in consent, and I LOVE IT. 

Similarly, typically in conversations about consent, people are only thinking about it in terms of sexual situations- "If they're forcing you to do something sexual that you don't want, that's bad. If they're forcing you to do something non-sexual, well, whatever, not a big deal."

Because yeah, I think this is very important: when I'm talking about consent here, I don't mean in terms of consenting to sex. I think the concept of consent applies in all kinds of situations. It's weird that people seem to only talk about consent when they're talking about sex.

And I love how the movie showed so many different situations where Ella's obedience "gift" was a factor. Her beginning a romantic relationship with Char was just one small aspect of it. Consent should be about everything, not just relationships/sex.

Also, at the end of the movie [spoilers!], when the king had ordered Ella to kill Char, and she was holding the knife trying to stop herself from going through with it, and she ordered herself, "you will no longer be obedient" which finally freed her from the curse- it seemed a little too easy in my opinion, but at the same time, that is how it works in real life. The real-life equivalent to Ella's obedience curse is being a person who just does what other people want you to do, without any awareness about what you want yourself, without believing that your own desires matter. And the way to break out of that is by taking control of your own life, knowing yourself, knowing what you want, confidently pursuing what you want. Changing your thinking so that you believe that your own desires matter.

In real life, yes, the change really does have to come from inside you.

Another observation about "Ella Enchanted"- there were a few characters who figured out that Ella would do whatever anyone told her to. Ella's stepsister Hattie figured it out, and then she told King Edgar. And there's a scene where Hattie suspects that this is true about Ella, so she asks her to do some weird things in order to find out if it really works (and later another scene where King Edgar also does this). And it felt SO REAL, the way Ella is so terrified as she realizes that these other characters have figured out her weakness. Realizing that these people (who probably have bad motives) know that they have the power to make her do anything they ask. That's terrifying. The power dynamics of it.

And one more thing: Ella's mother ordered her to never tell anyone about the "gift", because obviously Ella is incredibly vulnerable if anyone finds this out. Overall, perhaps it was a good thing that her mother gave her an actual magically-enforced order to never tell anyone; otherwise, at some point she may have been magically compelled to reveal it against her will, and her mother's order protected her from that. But also, Prince Char knows something is wrong and is really trying to help her, and she's not able to tell him about the problem. It would have been better if she was able to at least tell him part of it- like "I'm under a magic spell that forces me to do specific thing X" (only mention the specific thing that's currently worrying her- don't mention that this would be true of literally anything that anyone tells her to do, that's just way too vulnerable).

This reminds me of how, because there are societal factors that make it harder to freely consent, society sets up other guidelines to try to correct for it, but those other guidelines introduce new problems. For example, people worry that teenagers are too young to make good decisions about sex- so then they teach abstinence-only sex-ed. Instead of giving teenagers good information and advice on how to make good decisions, adults just make a lot of rules. And maybe these rules do protect from certain risks (protect your daughter from rape by never letting her go on a date), but they cause other problems (encourages your kids to hide things from you/ won't come to you for advice/ they get sex-ed from bad sources instead). Similarly, Ella's ability to consent has been taken away, so Ella's mother "protects" her by also taking away her ability to consent, but in a different way. Maybe it's good that her mother did that, because Ella wasn't able to protect herself, but still the entire situation is so wrong. Wouldn't everything be so much better and healthier if everyone could know their own desires, communicate them clearly, and make their own choices rather than being pressured into anything? (Easier said than done, though- there will always be societal factors making this difficult.)

So anyway, I love everything this movie has to say about consent. It works a lot better if we view it as a movie about consent, rather than obedience.

[content note: abuse. If you want to skip it, scroll down to the image of Ella's martial arts pose as she fights off bandits]

And speaking of situations which are about consent but people wrongly think they are about obedience- well, I have to talk about John Piper's advice to women who are abused by their husbands. (Background info: John Piper is a big-name conservative Christian pastor who believes it's super super important that wives have to "submit" to their husbands, and women should never be in leadership over men because that would be against their God-given nature or something.)

Piper was answering the question "What should a wife's submission to her husband look like if he's an abuser?" (2009 youtube video) He gives a bizarre answer which assumes the issue is that the husband is ordering the wife to do something that God says is a sin. (He gives the example of a husband wanting his wife to participate in group sex.) As if it's about obedience, and the correct order of obedience for a woman is obey God first, and her husband second (and her own desires don't factor into it at all). He then says if it's a different type of situation, "if it's not requiring her to sin, but simply hurting her" then she should "endure" verbal abuse and being "smacked one night" and then go to the church for help.

He's viewing it like it's all about obedience. What are God's rules for this? What is or isn't a sin? What's the right way to get help while still obeying the "submit to your husband" rules? But that's all wrong- it's not about obedience, it's about consent. People deserve to not be abused. People have a right to stand up for themselves. It matters what you want; it's not just about if something is a "sin" or not- if it's not a "sin" but you're still not okay with it, then you absolutely have the right to not consent to it.

(Yeah... you may be wondering why I'm bringing up this one guy's bad opinion from 2009. If you're not connected to evangelicalism and have never heard of John Piper, I'm happy for you. But I used to be in that world, and I viewed him as a trustworthy Christian role model, and really bought into what he said. I truly believed that my own desires and my own suffering didn't matter- all that mattered was, am I sinning or not? am I putting God first? am I obeying God correctly? After you get out of that ideology, it takes a long time to even understand what your own desires are. And actually, immediately after getting out of that ideology, the concept of consent on its own is not that helpful because it relies on you knowing what you want. Hmm this is something I could maybe write about more in another post, if y'all are interested.)

(See also: Libby Anne's responses to Piper's statement, here and here.)

Ella fights off a group of bandits. Image source.

And maybe, to some extent, teaching obedience is the opposite of teaching consent. Obedience says that you should do what an authority figure says- for example, parents, teachers, pastors, boss, God, husband if you're a woman- simply because that's the correct order of the hierarchy, and your own desires don't matter at all. Consent says that your body, your possessions, your time, your emotions, your money, your life plans, all these things belong to you. You should figure out what you want, and make your own decisions. For things that belong to you, it's right and good that you should do what you want- that it should solely be your decision. There's nothing virtuous about handing control over to an authority figure, in the name of "being a good kid" or "obedience" or whatever.

In summary: Now that I know about consent, I recognize the very strong pro-consent messages in the movie "Ella Enchanted" (whereas I never noticed this before, viewing it through an evangelical Christian lens, believing that obedience is a virtue). Prince Char actually cares about what Ella wants, and genuinely doesn't want to force Ella into anything she doesn't want to do. It's not about if the thing she's forced to do is "good" or "bad"- it's inherently wrong for her to be forced into anything, regardless of what it is. Even when she agrees to do what he says, he feels that something is wrong and suspects that she doesn't actually want to, and he explicitly tells her he doesn't want to force her into anything she doesn't want. In that situation, it would have been easier for him to just let her do what he wanted, since she agreed to it- no one could blame him, right? But no, his concern is not meeting minimum standards of human decency so that other people won't judge him. He truly believes that Ella should not be forced into doing things that she doesn't want. This is what it means to truly value consent, and I love it.

---

Related:

Let me tell you about a fanfic that reminded me of my marriage 

6 Ways Purity Culture Did NOT Teach Me About Consent

Tickling, Consent, and The Way It Works 

When the Teacher Says, "Don't Look at Your Report Card"

Blogaround

1. A Landlord ‘Underestimated’ His Tenants. Now They Could Own the Building. (posted May 6) "'A lot of us didn’t know what harassment meant or what intimidation meant,' said Ms. Waterton, who works for a printing company. 'We didn’t realize that some of the stuff that was happening were tactics to get us to leave.'"

2. The Lightyear Timeline Makes NO Sense | Pixar Film Theory (posted May 6) I LOVE watching the Super Carlin Brothers trying to shove every Pixar movie into "The Pixar Theory." I just love it SO MUCH because it's EXACTLY like biblical apologetics. As Ben Carlin says in the youtube link above, "Because also, don't worry, we're gonna make it work, no matter what they throw at us. That is the game." Wish I could read a Christian apologetics book that was that self-aware and honest.

3. The Grimness of American Individualism (posted April 26) "These were celebrations of the most macabre kind; sheer, unbridled relief at not even having to pretend to give a fuck about other people—little kids, immunocompromised folks, disabled folks, workers in public-facing jobs, just anyone who doesn’t want to get any sicker than they have to be—anymore."

4. The Lost Letters of Saint Paul, and How They Were Lost (posted May 5) [content note: genocide] "Those letters would have been lost when Jewish quarters were burned out. In contrast, no such massacres are known in Corinth, Philippi, Thessaloniki, and the other centers where letters were preserved."

5. So I saw this article at Church Leaders, John Piper Imparts Wisdom From His Five Decades of Ministry and an Article He Wrote Titled ‘Missions and Masturbation’ (posted April 22), with a link to the Desiring God article Piper wrote in 1984, Missions and Masturbation. That was 40 years ago, he would probably not write it exactly the same way now, so I'm not picking on Piper specifically, but I want to say this- It's very clear to me, as I read this article, as an adult, that he was writing about his own personal problems, and claiming that it's the same way for everyone. And how wrong that is.

I'm struck by the fact that, if I had read this when I was a teenager, back when I didn't know anything, didn't know what a clit was or anything, I would have totally viewed it like, this writer is an objective, authoritative, trustworthy Christian role model who teaches us important truths about why masturbation is sinful and dangerous. (And I did read things like this, back then, and I did view them that way.) But now I read it and I'm like... wow... it's so revealing, how immature he is, how he's broadcasting his own personal creepy masturbation issues to the world, claiming that everyone has the same problems he does and that's why masturbation is always bad for everyone, wow he should be so embarrassed about this.

And... Is that how it is? Are the creeps with weird sexual hangups vastly overrepresented among teachers of Christian "sexual purity"? (Specifically, the "weird sexual hangup" we see in this 1984 article is the idea that it's not possible for a man to treat women with respect, if he masturbates regularly.) While people with normal healthy sex lives, who don't follow the church's rules about "don't have sex before marriage" and "don't masturbate", they don't go around talking about it loudly at church, because they know their own personal life is none of your business. 

That's... not good. But it would explain a lot.

Blogaround

A baby wearing an Ironman costume. Image source.

1. TobyMac’s Oldest Son, Truett, Has Died at Home (posted October 24) Oh no.

2. Why I Was Forced to Resign from Southwest Church (Indian Wells): Pastor Gerald Sharon’s Story (posted October 24) "One of the people who had signed up was a gay man, which caused panic among the elders and leadership staff. ... So they instructed the staff to put his name at the bottom of the list and to tell him, 'There is a long waiting list and we just haven’t gotten to you yet.'"

3. theological foundations: trauma theology (posted August 8) "Trauma theology helped me see all that, revealing it all in an intuitive, natural way. I can see it everywhere now, too– in every single one of Jesus’ healing miracles, when Moses flees Egypt, the interactions between Paul and Barnabas, or Mary Magdalene at the Tomb."

4. Trump Tweets Faked Photo of Hero Dog Getting a Medal (posted October 30) This is odd.

5. This tweet from @ToriGlass:

This is extremely important.

If you have a food or travel budget for Thanksgiving, you need to be giving at least an equal amount to Indigenous people or orgs

Otherwise just don’t participate in colonizer holidays. I’m not even kidding. https://t.co/ULvhWqFf4O

— Tori Williams Douglass (@ToriGlass) October 21, 2019

6. John Piper: Scare the Bejesus Out of Your Children (posted October 29) Ah yes, my reaction was the same as Libby Anne's: "What in the blazes is this."

Nobody Tell John Piper To Have A Good Weekend

Clipart image of a man leaving the office. Image text: "Have a great weekend. I hope your code behaves on Monday the same way it did on Friday." Image source.

I came across this video on Desiring God, by John Piper: God Demands Our Delight: Foundations of Christian Hedonism, Part 2. Actually, I found it because my twitter friends were commenting on an extremely effed-up tweet from Desiring God, which said "God cares more about your happiness than you do. He is so serious about your joy that he threatens hell if you refuse to find it in him." and linked to that post. Everyone pointed out that this tweet is describing an abusive relationship.

So I rolled my eyes and thought I might as well watch Piper's video and see if his abusive nonsense is worth responding to. Well, as it turns out, the video isn't about God threatening us with hell at all. It's not anywhere near as horrifying as the tweet made it sound. Actually, it's a video where Piper claims that we are "commanded" to "rejoice in God" and shows us a whole bunch of bible verses that say so.

And I'm watching this video, thinking, "this is just bizarre." He keeps pulling up verse after verse that says things like "Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth" and says "this is a command." Over and over, Piper tells us "this is a command."

What?

This is so strange.

What? How can you read verses saying to "rejoice" and think those are "commands"? The writers are just very happy and inviting other happy people to share in their happiness. It's not about ordering people to act happy- that doesn't make any sense. Emotions can't just be manufactured just because you think you're "supposed to" feel a certain way. Like, what on earth?

Does John Piper hear the song "celebrate good times, come on" at a wedding and think that's a command? If he tells a friend about his upcoming vacation and the friend says "have a safe trip" does he think that's a command? In first grade, when the teacher told the kids their homework over spring break was just "have a good break", did John Piper think that was an actual homework assignment and he would be in trouble if he had a crappy spring break?

Like, I don't even know what to say about this. Usually when I respond to stuff from Desiring God, it's something that's abusive and dangerous. But this is just weird. Why on earth does he think those bible verses are "commands"?

I guess it's because he views the bible as a list of commands we need to follow. And believes in a God who wants to control every little tiny detail of everyone's life. And because he follows an ideology which policies people's emotions- we're required to feel certain feelings, and we're not allowed to feel certain "sinful" feelings.

That's just ... odd.

-------------------

Related:
"The Authority of Scripture" is One Hell of a Drug
John Piper Said "There Are No Innocent Children" and I am Not the Least Bit Surprised

In Which John Piper Doesn't Tell You To Find A New Job

Liam Neeson on the phone (from the movie "Taken"). Image text: "Post doc job search- I have a very specific set of skills." Image source.

So the Lord laid a burden on my heart to respond to bad theology from Desiring God. Here's an article on that site, written by John Piper: How to Serve a Bad Boss. The advice in this article is just... not good. Mostly because it NEVER mentions anything about "maybe if you're unhappy with your job and your boss isn't treating you right, you should think about getting out of there and finding a new job."

It's a short article, so I'll just go through and respond to the whole thing [all italics are from the original]:

Rendering service with a good will as to the Lord and not to man, knowing that whatever good anyone does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether he is a bondservant or is free. (Ephesians 6:7–8)

Consider these five things from Ephesians 6:7–8 in connection to your job.

1) A call to radically Lord-centered living.

This is astonishing compared to the way we usually live. Paul says that all our work should be done as work for Christ, not for any human supervisor. With good will render service “as to the Lord and not to man.”

This means that we will think of the Lord in what we are doing at work. We will ask, Why would the Lord like this done? How would the Lord like this done? When would the Lord like this done? Will the Lord help me to do this? What effect will this have for the Lord’s honor? In other words, being a Christian means radically Lord-centered living and working.

Umm, I don't really think this a helpful way to conceptualize job responsibilities, but, eh it's not that bad so I guess I won't say too much about it. Probably it's possible to imagine you're actually working primarily for God rather than for a company, and have that not necessarily lead to unhealthy things. Eh. Sure, I guess. Personally, though, I don't think it's a good idea, because it adds a whole extra unnecessary person into the system and puts your focus in a weird place, which could cause you to not accurately see the situation.

2) A call to be a good person.

Lord-centered living means being a good person and doing good things. Paul says, “With a good will [render service] . . . whatever good anyone does.” Jesus said that when we let our light shine, men will see our “good works” and give glory to our Father in heaven (Matthew 5:16).

Yes, I agree with this one. Be a good person.

3) Power to do a good job for inconsiderate earthly employers.

Paul’s aim is to empower Christians, with Lord-centered motives, to go on doing good for supervisors who are not considerate. How do you keep on doing good in a job when your boss ignores you or even criticizes you? Paul’s answer is: stop thinking about your boss as your main supervisor, and start working for the Lord. Do this in the very duties given to you by your earthly supervisor.

Items 1 and 2 didn't mention anything about working for a bad boss, so I just assumed they are about average normal work situations, and sure, whatever. They're definitely not the advice to give someone working for a bad boss, but that didn't seem to be their target audience, so it's fine. But this one here, item 3 on Piper's list, is where we start getting into what to do if you have a bad boss.

And this here is BAD advice. Just keep "working for the Lord", if your boss "ignores you or even criticizes you"? What?

Okay, over here in reality, here is some advice: Maybe you can get them to treat you better, maybe by talking to them or some other influential person in the company. Or maybe you determine that your boss is sort of bad at dealing with people but it's not necessarily harming you; they are still doing their other boss duties good enough, so it's not ideal but you can at least accept it. You don't have to like each other, but at least you can coexist. Or you see if you can transfer to a different manager, or start looking for a new job entirely. Just a few suggestions I thought of off the top of my head. Obviously some of these will not work in some situations. You have to examine your own situation and decide what the best course of action would be.

But no, Piper wants us to just pretend it doesn't matter that your boss is treating you wrong. Just sort of try not to care about that, and force yourself to believe you are "working for the Lord." This is terrible advice.

4) Encouragement that nothing good is done in vain.

Perhaps the most amazing sentence of all is this: “Whatever good anyone does, this he will receive back from the Lord.” This is amazing. Everything! “Whatever good anyone does.” Every little thing you do that is good is seen and valued and rewarded by the Lord.

And he will pay you back for it. Not in the sense that you have earned anything — as if you could put him in your debt. He owns you, and everything in the universe. He owes us nothing. But he freely, graciously chooses to reward us for all the good things done in faith.

Umm. No, this is terrible advice.

So Piper is saying that if you just keep doing the right thing, even when you're in a bad situation, good will come of it. This is just NOT TRUE, and it leads to people wasting so much time and emotional energy.

For example, when I was in college, there was a website that kept track of how many credits each student needed to graduate, and I noticed there was an error on the website- it said I had not taken a class that I actually had taken. So I sent a polite email to somebody about it. I got some polite response back that didn't really reassure me, and the website continued to claim I had not taken that class. A semester later, or a year later, I emailed somebody about it again, and got another "eh I'm sure it's fine" response, and nothing changed.

And I'm thinking, yeah it's easy for you to say "it's fine" when you're some administrative person in some office and this doesn't affect you, but this is my degree and this could potentially turn into a huge problem that stops me from graduating. I would like this problem solved.

It got closer to when I was supposed to graduate- maybe 1 semester or 1 year before graduation. And I concluded that my sending-of-polite-emails was not working. Maybe I was sending them to the wrong person. So I had to DO SOMETHING DIFFERENT, see. Eventually I ended up going and talking to someone in person about it, and they DID get the website changed so it had the correct information. Good. And I graduated with no problems.

But if I had followed Piper's advice? Well, yeah, it wasn't my fault I was in that situation. It was someone else's mistake. I did nothing wrong. And I politely sent an email to point out the problem. Which is the right thing to do in that situation. And... if I was following Piper's advice, that would be it. He doesn't say anything about "look at reality and the results of your actions, and if you're not getting the results you want, you will need to try doing something different." No- his advice is literally the opposite. To people in a bad situation, he says to just keep doing what they're doing. Just be secure in the fact that you are doing the right thing, you are doing nothing wrong, and that's all you have to think about.

If you buy into this ideology, there's no way to notice "hey this is not working, therefore I should try something different." You're supposed to just force yourself to not care that it's "not working." You're doing the right thing, so God will handle the rest.

Hey, people have emotions. You can't just force yourself to not care. I remember how ANGRY and STRESSED OUT I was about this problem, so angry because that wrong information was there FOR YEARS and nobody seemed to care. Back before I realized I needed to try something different, that sending polite emails to this one unhelpful person was never going to solve the problem.

In reality, it doesn't matter that it's not my fault, and that I'm "doing the right thing." The reality is that if this problem didn't get solved, I would be the one who suffered for it. Of course that's not fair, but that's how the world works. And so I need to understand that that's the reality I'm dealing with. And that the person I emailed was not the right person who could/would actually solve the problem- which is also not my fault, but reality doesn't care about that. I need to actually see the reality of the situation and figure out what to do from there- not just naively "do the right thing" and feel good about how none of it is my fault, and trust that that means everything will magically be okay.

But the advice and morality lessons I learned in church (and other Christian sources, like VeggieTales) were always about abstract "virtues" that we should apply to our lives. There was no mechanism to actually examine a situation and understand all the practical aspects of what was happening, or realize what I'm doing is not working so I should change my behavior. I'm learning that VeggieTales morality doesn't fit with the real world, and now I believe in what I'm calling "boundaries morality" instead. I had to figure this all out on my own. It totally goes against what the church taught me.

I'd like to point out that in Piper's article, he doesn't say that if you just keep doing good, that means the situation will get better. He says you will be "rewarded by the Lord" but he doesn't say what that reward will look like or when it will come. Perhaps you will only get the reward in heaven after you die. So nobody can accuse him of claiming that following this advice would actually solve the problem.

I'm here to tell you you don't have to live that way. You don't have to just "do the right thing" and let injustices happen to you and try to have faith that you will be rewarded someday because it was other people's fault rather than yours. You don't have to let computers claim that you never took a class that you actually did take. You can STAND UP FOR YOURSELF. You can make a plan about how best to navigate the situation and solve the problem. Yes, I know it's not fair that you should have to do that, because it's not your fault you're in that situation- BUT THAT IS HOW THE WORLD WORKS. And life is so much better when you take steps to solve your own problems, rather than waiting for God to "reward" you.

(I gotta put a disclaimer on that, because I'm a feminist and I know it's bad when people try to tell marginalized people to just work harder or have a better attitude or whatever, and that will solve their problems- without trying to do anything about the systemic injustice that caused those problems in the first place. I'm not talking about people who are stuck in a bad situation with no options because of systemic injustice. I'm talking about how evangelicalism trained me to not even look for what options I had.)

When I read Piper's advice in item 4, about how you should just stay in a bad situation but keep "doing good," I think of how the church tells women in bad marriages to just submit to their husbands more, just be an even better wife, just keep praying for him, and then magically it will fix your marriage. And people get stuck there and waste years of their lives. Just naively believing that because they're "doing good", good will come of it. No, it does not work that way. They're just wasting their time and their emotional energy, and it's not going to solve the problem. You are valuable and you deserve to be in a better situation- so get out when you're able to get out. There's nothing good or virtuous about continuing to stay and suffer in a bad situation.

One last thing about item 4: Gotta love how Piper finds an opportunity to tell us God "owes us nothing." Wouldn't want people to misunderstand his article and think that they deserve good things. Piper thinks we all deserve to go to hell, and God is well within his rights to just kill you at any time for any reason.

5) Encouragement that insignificant status on earth is no hindrance to great reward in heaven.

The Lord will reward every good thing you do — “whether he is a bondservant or is free.” Your supervisor may think you are a nobody — a mere bondservant, so to speak. Or he may not even know you exist. That doesn’t matter. The Lord knows you exist. And in the end no faithful service will be in vain.

Ughhh. If your supervisor really doesn't care about you that much, maybe find a new job where people appreciate you? SERIOUSLY. Why on earth would you just try to tell yourself "that doesn't matter", if you have a chance to get out?

In this whole article, Piper never once says anything about your happiness, or getting into a situation that's good for you. Instead, it's all about how to stay in a bad situation and force yourself to not care when people mistreat you. Because in Piper's ideology, we don't matter. All that matters is our obedience to God, and how we are glorifying God. It's like it never even occurs to him to mention anything about pursuing your own happiness. He really doesn't care about that. It's not a priority at all in his belief system.

That't the end of Piper's article. Coincidentally, I read another post this week about somebody with a bad manager, so I'd like to talk about that. The post is What can I do about doing badly on an impromptu coding test?, posted on Workplace Stack Exchange by a user named Cloud:

I have been at my organization for around 18 months. I took a technical programming test (basically a C# kata of sorts) in the interview and flunked it. However, they said they liked my attitude and could see I had other skills (outside of .NET) and so agreed to hire me. I agreed to accept on the condition I received the support and training required.

The short story is the last 18 months have been very dramatic. I've had personal issues with my manager and have struggled to complete some work (and also successfully completed work within my skill-set) and feel I haven't learnt from the team as I hoped I would.

I have been studying for around 5 - 10 hours a week in my free time and feel I have improved my C# / .NET skills by a decent amount since starting.

Yesterday, my manager came to my desk, asked me to close all applications and turn off my internet connection. He then inserted a flash drive into my machine and said I had 30 minutes to complete a programming challenge. It was the same one I was given in the interview (I hadn't attempted it since).

There were 9 'stages' to the challenge. I believe I could have completed all of them but due to the time constraint I only managed 3.

In a follow up meeting, I was told that a 33% success rate is not good enough and that I need to show significant improvement in the next 6 months.

I feel that this kata didn't represent my learning, it was very niche and I didn't get to demonstrate all of the things I've learnt that were outside the scope of the challenge.

What can I do to show 'significant improvement' from here? I have asked what I should be learning specifically but just get told 'it's your career, you decide', which frustrates me.

Cloud here is in a bad situation. Their manager says they need to "show significant improvement in the next 6 months", so Cloud feels quite worried and asks for advice on "What can I do to show 'significant improvement' from here?"

And the response? Here's the top answer, written by a user named Twyxz:

The way your manager has sprung this test no you is completely unfair and clearly an attempt to prove that you are not able to work here when realistically the time restraint was likely too short and the notice was non-existent. The way he approached you was outright rude to begin with.

Your best choice here given your past experience and current situation is to spend the next 6 months continuing as you are and starting a job hunt. Look for a new job as the way you are being treated is unacceptable and you should not have to tolerate it.

Your manager has:

1. Not told you what to improve on which is completely unfair especially when you're trying to.
2. Specifically targeted you with a test (potentially triggered by something else)
3. Given you bad training and caused issues in the past.

The bottom line is Get out of there ASAP!

Your manager is targeting you and is doing anything he can to get you fired without breaking any rules per se.

YES. Cloud wants to know how to improve so their manager will be happy with them, but the other users in the forum recognize that's not going to happen. The manager is treating them in a way that's completely unprofessional and unfair, and there's likely nothing Cloud can actually do to please him and keep from getting fired.

You don't stay in a situation like that. You get out.

(Isn't it nice to read some reality-based advice, not written by John Piper? Love it.)

To me, Cloud sounds very young, like maybe this is their first job and there are a lot of things they don't understand about how "the real world" works. (Sounds a lot like me when I first started working as an engineer.) They don't understand what a manager's job is- a manager should give feedback on your performance, and they should give you training if there are skills you need to learn. They shouldn't wait 18 months and then suddenly tell you you're not doing good enough. Cloud seems ready to blame themself, and thinks they can fix the situation if they just try hard enough to improve. But that's not how it works. And the other posters explained that it's not right for your manager to treat you that way, you deserve better, this isn't a situation you can fix, so you should look for a new job.

But I can imagine someone with an evangelical background, equipped with nothing but Piper's "you're working for the Lord" advice and VeggieTales morality lessons (like me...), being told by an authority figure "you need to show improvement in the next 6 months" and naively believing it. Staying in that situation because it never occurs to them to think about other options, or because of simplistic Sunday School lessons about "quitting is bad." Just trying to obey what the authority figure says, just trying to work hard and "do good" and trust God that it will be okay. And then 6 months later suddenly getting fired and being COMPLETELY SHOCKED and devastated and blaming themself.

They never taught us how to recognize when a situation is bad and GET OUT. It was always about how to try to change other people's behavior and solve the problem, or how to help yourself accept the situation. It was always about "doing the right thing", picking the right "virtue" to apply. I was never told to prioritize my own health and happiness and just GET OUT because IT'S NOT MY JOB TO FIX OTHER PEOPLE. (Boundaries!) No, I'm supposed to say to "set a good example" and be "the only bible they'll ever read."

And sometimes I think, well that's because I was just a little kid when I was taught these things, and kids don't really have the option of getting out of a situation they don't like. Their parents make decisions about where they go to school, where they go to church, what friends they see, what extracurricular activities they do, and so on. So sometimes I think maybe it makes sense that I was never taught about how to recognize an unhealthy situation and get out. But then I read things like Piper's article, which is definitely for adults, who HAVE THE OPTION to send out their resume and find a new job, and not once does he say anything about "consider looking for a new job" or anything about getting yourself into a situation where you'll be more happy and healthy.

I've embarked on a quest to review all the VeggieTales movies, and there's a lot I criticize about them. And sometimes I think, well this is just a movie for kids, they had to simplify things, that's why the advice comes across badly. But... when I reached adulthood, I never got an updated version of those things. There was never a Sunday School lesson on "you know how we said don't spread rumors? Well actually here is a more nuanced perspective on when it does or doesn't make sense to repeat information you've heard about another person."

And John Piper's article about "How to Serve a Bad Boss" ... it's not any more grown-up than "VeggieTales: The Ballad of Little Joe." The advice is the same. Just keep doing the right thing, and even though you're being treated badly, God cares, so eventually you'll be rewarded.

You don't have to live that way. Just because some authority figure tells you "you have to do XYZ" doesn't mean it's true. Look for your other options, and get out if you find something better. It's not your job to stay for the sake of people who aren't even treating you right. You deserve better. You deserve happiness. But of course John Piper doesn't believe that.

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Related:
From "Virtues Morality" To "Boundaries Morality"
I knew Desiring God ideology is spiritual abuse, but wow.
Christianity Taught Me I Don't Matter

Blogaround

A white cat with a strawberry on its head. Image source.

1. The Problem With Rape Kits (posted March 8) [content note: rape] Oof, this is hard to read.

2. Battle lines form over social justice: Is it gospel or heresy? (posted September 6) "Statements that dismiss social justice send a message that the ongoing marginalization many minorities still experience and struggle against is of no concern to their fellow Christians. Or to God."

3. The New Hip Churches are Fooling Google. They Pop Up as “Gay-friendly” — it’s a Hoax. (posted September 17) "Ask the lead pastor “Do you perform weddings for gay couples?” If the answer isn’t, simply, “yes,” … if it begins with a lengthy prelude like “Now that’s complicated issue, let’s step back for minute to unpack it,” you have your answer: NO."

4. Pando, the Word’s Heaviest Organism, is an Ever-Growing Witness of an Ancient Earth (posted September 18) Cool!

5. Pixar Theory: How Dante being an Alebrije EXPLAINS everything! (posted September 6) "It resolves every single piece of plot convenience in the entire film."

6. Is it a Sin to Take Showers? (posted September 23) "[INITIATE YOUTH PASTOR VOICE] But teens lemme get real with you. Isn’t that how sin works, amen?"

7. Pastor: Christians Should Skip the Weddings of Couples That Had Premarital Sex (posted September 25) Well would you look at that. John Piper seems to think everyone's unmarried sex life is his business. This is my surprised face.

8. Somebody DIED, Pat Robertson (posted September 15) "The mind boggles at just how lacking in compassion someone must be to think that any god would rather spare some business buildings than a dozen lives and thousands of homes." And THIS is why I don't pray any more.

Blogaround

Big manatee and baby manatee. Image source.

1. I Tried to Befriend Nikolas Cruz. He Still Killed My Friends. (posted March 27) [content note: guns, murder]

2. I've been listening to Pink's "F***ing Perfect" as a spiritual practice.



3. In Age of School Shootings, Lockdown Is the New Fire Drill (posted 2014) [content note: guns, murder]

4. Boys Often Don’t Recognize When They’ve Been Sexually Assaulted (posted March 8) [content note: descriptions of sexual assault]

5. Inclusive language for worship and preaching (posted March 28) "Avoid associating Christianity or discipleship with things such as: Being soldiers / Being in an 'army' / War"

6. Power grab by China's Xi Jinping: President for life? (posted March 5) So Xi Jinping is trying to be president of China forever. I haven't really been following this so I don't know the details, but some of my friends here are very concerned. And they said it's a really sensitive topic, we shouldn't talk about it in public, and it's not safe to post anything about it on Chinese social media- your posts will get *mysteriously* deleted.

7. Shorter John Piper: Women Can Be Possessions, or They Can Be Prey (posted March 27) [content note: sexual assault, domestic violence] "Individuals like Piper have created an imaginary past where men chivalrously “took care of” women, and women in turn smiled sweetly, with nothing more to worry about than caring for their children and decorating their homes. That time did not exist."

Blogaround

Shuri, from "Black Panther." I love her because she's a scientist. Image source.

1. Film Theory: Black Panther's Economic CRISIS! (posted February 20)

2. Time's Up For Politely Anti-LGBTQ Christianity: The Truth About "We Want to Be Known By What We're For, Not What We're Against" (posted March 13) "In other words, while he was very much against the LGBTQ community, he simply didn’t want to be known for that."

3. Mike Pence: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO) (posted March 18) Really interesting for me, as an ex-evangelical, to hear John Oliver talking about Focus on the Family and James Dobson, as if his audience will certainly be shocked by how wrong their ideology is. Yeah, their ideology is terrible, but feels so incredibly normal to me. I grew up reading Focus on the Family magazines and books, believing all their bullshit about how "the homosexual agenda" was trying to destroy "the family."

Also, when watching the video clips of Pence avoiding answering questions, did anyone else get a very creepy evangelical "let's grab coffee instead of answering whether gay sex is sinful" vibe? And the way he acts when asked questions, as if to say, "oh it's so sad that you are missing the point so much, asking me these questions that don't have any relevance to anything", ugh soooo creepy.

(See also: This post I wrote in 2016, Don't Let Pence's Shady Use of Language Fool You. He is Anti-Life.)

4. Patriarchy doesn't "protect" women: A response to John Piper (posted March 20) PREACH!

5. Can this robotic fish fool real fish into revealing their secrets? (posted March 21) This is so cool!

They Prayed About It (a post about the #NashvilleStatement)

A bunch of people praying in a prayer circle. Image source.

Last week, the Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood published the Nashville Statement, which contains all the typical evangelical talking points about how same-sex marriage is a sin and being transgender isn't really a real thing. (And I'd like to give a special shoutout to Article 10, which says that anyone who disagrees with this anti-queer ideology isn't a real Christian.) It was signed by John Piper, James Dobson, Russell Moore, Al Mohler, Marvin Olasky, Francis Chan, Christopher Yuan, and other big names in evangelicalism.

This anti-queer ideology is unloving, destructive, un-Christlike, evil, and literally deadly. I want to affirm that queer identities and relationships are perfectly valid, and that queer people are in charge of their own personal lives and don't need cis straight allo pastors telling them what to do.

And another thing I want to say: They prayed about it. And it makes me sick.

I used to be evangelical. I know how these things go. When a bunch of Christian leaders have a meeting, they start out the meeting with prayer. And all major decisions need to be prayed about, and you shouldn't go ahead and do it unless you feel like God is saying yes.

In that culture, if somebody tells you they plan to do something, and you think it's a bad idea, you can ask, "Have you prayed about it?" If they haven't prayed about it, that means OF COURSE they shouldn't do it. And they should feel ashamed that their decision-making process didn't involve prayer.

(By the way, here are some of the signers of the Nashville Statement teaching that big decisions need to be guided by prayer: John Piper. J. I. Packer. Wayne Grudem. John MacArthur. And I'm sure we could find more. This is an extremely important belief for Christians of the personal-relationship-with-God persuasion.)

So here's how it happened: A group of nice Christian leaders got together and prayed that God would guide them and help them, and that they would act according to his will (yeah they believe God is a he). And then they wrote this vile abomination that is the Nashville Statement. And discussed it and spent a lot of time making it just exactly right, so it was something they could all agree to. Probably they each prayed in their heads during the meeting too. And they signed the statement, feeling confident that it's what God would want them to do.

Because, you see, when you pray for God's guidance, and you're honest about your motives- sincerely desiring to honor God rather than any sort of "selfish" motive- and surrender the whole decision-making process to God, like "God I will do whatever you say, even if I don't like it, even if it's hard, even if it's unpopular"- if you do all that, and then you have a *feeling* like "yeah, this is the right thing to do," that is from God. That's God "leading" you. (Like, you can't be 100% sure; there's a possibility it's not actually from God, but you gotta "trust God" and go along with it.)

They believe God wants them to do this. To preach this hateful ideology which tells queer children that God hates them.

That's disgusting. I don't know about you, but I have a bit of a gag reflex...

But enough speculating about the writers of the Nashville Statement. Let me tell you about my own experiences. Back when I had a personal relationship with God, I spent TONS of time praying about decisions. Dedicating myself to God constantly, always wanting to be totally open to whatever God wanted me to do. And there were times when I had discussions with people about religion, on facebook or over email, and while writing my replies I would stop and pray and really really carefully consider exactly what I wanted to say- and because of all this prayer and the confident feelings that came with it, I very much believed that I was doing what God wanted me to do.

Sometimes they were discussions about sexuality. And I gave all the standard hate-the-sin-love-the-sinner answers. And I was so careful about how I worded it, wanting to be loving and kind, covering everything in prayer. And I wrote what God led me to write.

(When people were upset about what I said, because it was the standard hateful evangelical ideology that says I'm in charge of telling gay people what they are or aren't allowed to do in their own personal lives, I was sure it wasn't my fault. I had prayed about it so much; surely what I said was good, and the people who were angry about it were in the wrong.)

God told me to write those things. God told me I was being good and loving. And then I found out how incredibly evil and destructive those beliefs are.

I ask you this: Can a relationship recover from that?

I made myself totally vulnerable to God, and he used me to hurt queer people (and all other groups of people that don't have the "correct" doctrine). I trusted him; I truly believed that if queer people would only follow those teachings, they would be much happier. But it turns out that was all a lie. So I ended that relationship.

I'm never going to do that again. I'm never going to make myself vulnerable in front of a god. I'm never going to surrender all. I'm never going to lay out all my emotions, desires, and plans for a god to judge. I'm never going to say "not my will but yours be done." I'm never going to worship again. I'm never going to "have faith" and just go along with what a god tells me even if it seems like a bad idea.

I now make decisions based on my own conscience and extensive research into the various options. I don't give God a say. Even the thought of taking a quiet moment to pray and ask for God's direction is triggering for me. Because of what he did. Because of how he took advantage of me.

Everything about the Nashville Statement calls into question the very concept of a "personal relationship with God." Because I've been there, and I've done bad things in the name of God, while extremely confident I was doing a very good thing for a very important mission that might not make "worldly" sense. If prayer and devotion to God can drive someone to do something so hateful, then it is absolutely not okay to give highest priority to prayer and devotion to God while making decisions.

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Related: My Identity was in Christ

Christianity Taught Me I Don't Matter

A potter forms a clay pot. Image source.

Here's a post from John Piper: What Does It Mean That God Will Glorify Me? And How? This post is not unique, there is nothing in it that shocks me, it's pretty standard Piper ideology. But I'm blogging about it here because there are people- good evangelical Christians- who don't believe me when I say the church taught me I don't matter and that I'm still struggling with the damage that teaching has done to me, that it was one of the main causes of my depression a few years ago.

Here are the receipts.

In his post, Piper is answering a question from a reader about a bible verse where Jesus instructs people to seek glory from God. The reader asks, "How do we balance this with desiring to glorify him? What is the difference (and the link) between me glorifying God and God glorifying me?"

To answer this question, Piper explains that people glorify God in a completely different way than God glorifies people. People glorifying God is about "making God look like what he really is"; God glorifying people is about "making us into what we are definitely not; namely, beautiful and glorious in his image." So from the very first sentence of his answer, Piper says that people are NOT "beautiful and glorious," that God glorifies us by changing us to be more like him (Piper's god is male), by covering up our true identity, whereas we glorify God by clearly showcasing God's true, glorious nature.

This is what I was taught in church. I am naturally, intrinsically awful and worthless. Don't imagine that I'm reading something into Piper's post that isn't there; later in the post, he says, "We aren’t intrinsically beautiful. We are intrinsically abhorrent in our rebellion against God." The only way I can stop being so "abhorrent" is by believing in Jesus, who will then change me to make me more like him. I can't just be myself; no, I need Jesus to cover up my true nature, to make me into something different. To hide who I really am- that's the only way I can be valuable and beautiful. I often heard Christians say we want people to "look at us and just see Jesus." We reflect Jesus. And Piper talks about that same idea in his post, using the words "being conformed to the image of Christ."

(Yes, I have heard Christians claim that this isn't about losing your identity and becoming a mindless drone; instead, God enriches your own natural personality and abilities when you submit your life to God, and this is the only way you can really, truly be the unique person that you are. Yeah okay, this doesn't help, it still teaches that you suck without God.)

Look at this bit:

No one can love God and not want to be conformed to the image of God. But we will always want our glory to be derivative. We will always want our glory to be reflective, not original: reflective of the original.

Reflective, not original. He's saying there's nothing in your intrinsic nature that's good or glorious; the best you can do is reflect God. Also, wait a second, I love God but don't "want to be conformed to the image of God"- at least in the sense that I understood that term as an evangelical. I belong to me and I make my own choices. I don't believe in "I surrender all" or anything along those lines.

And what's even more horrifying is the purpose of all this "being conformed to the image of Christ." See, it's not about you. According to Piper, you are a tool that God uses to display his glory. You don't matter in and of yourself; you are a means to an end. Don't believe me? Here are some quotes from his post:

"Jonathan Edwards makes a very big deal out of the point of the universe being the creation and preparation of a bride for his Son."

"He makes us beautiful and, therefore, our beauty reflects his primary power and grace and beauty as the Creator of our beauty."

"God does not intend for his Son to have an ugly bride."

Let's take a minute and unpack that last one: "God does not intend for his Son to have an ugly bride." (The church is sometimes referred to as "the bride of Christ.") First of all, note the misogny- there's an unspoken assumption that it's not okay for a bride to be "ugly," that women John Piper considers "ugly" aren't worthy of marriage, that their husbands deserve better. I know that terms like "beautiful" and "ugly" are being used here metaphorically to represent goodness or something, but the way he phrases this one sentence- "God does not intend for his Son to have an ugly bride"- is meant to convince readers by appealing to their sense of "oh wouldn't it be just awful for a man if his bride was ugly."

Second, that sentence makes it all about God and his Son, with the bride as nothing more than something for the Son to "have." What she wants doesn't matter- God is only interested in making her good enough for his Son. And that's the Christianity I was taught: I don't matter, I'm only good for whatever Jesus wants to use me for.

This is what they taught me: It's all about God. By myself, I'm worthless, I'm so sinful God is too horrified to even look at me. I need God to cover up who I really am and replace it with Jesus. And God does that to get glory for himself. To please himself. Yes I end up better off, satisfied in God and all that, but that's not the point. My happiness isn't important; it's just a byproduct of the real goal, which is glorifying God. I don't matter. I only have value if God takes over my life and changes me so I'm more like Jesus.

"It's all about God" was the entire foundation of the ideology I used to believe. I believed it was wrong to care about my own needs or pursue my own happiness; that would be "selfish" and wrong. (That's why someone wrote to ask Piper about this in the first place- they read a bible verse where Jesus tells people to seek glory for themselves, and were immediately confused as this contradicts everything they had been taught about "selfishness.") I was supposed to "put God first" all the time, and then God would take care of my needs. "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength," and all that. Always, everything, totally devoted to him. By myself I don't matter, I'm just a tool whose purpose is to glorify God. My entire life is just a means to an end.

You can see this anti-human ideology in one post after another on John Piper's website. I used to believe every bit of this. I lived it every day. And I still haven't recovered.

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Related: "The Authority of Scripture" is One Hell of a Drug

Merry Christmas From John Piper

Three things I would like to show you:

First, an article from John Piper, where he addresses the question, "Is It Sinful to Be Pregnant Before Marriage?" which includes this quote:

That there would be a stigma that attaches to pregnancy outside of marriage is, I think, a good thing.

Second, this picture:

Mary, Joseph, and a donkey. Image source.

Third, this excerpt from a post I wrote in 2014, It wasn't like that for Mary. Maybe it's never like that.

Mary had agreed to all this, telling the angel, "I am the Lord's servant." But how on earth could God do this to her? God was making her into the kind of woman she had always judged.

"Doesn't God know," she wondered, "that people would judge me, and they'd be right! It's right to judge a girl who gets pregnant. We put people into categories, pure or impure, and we do it because God commanded it.

"How can this be?" she had asked the angel. How could God make her into a symbol of something dirty? She had done nothing wrong. She was just trying her best to follow God.

People would never listen. They already know that it's automatically sinful to be unmarried and pregnant. But it wasn't like that.

"The Authority of Scripture" is One Hell of a Drug

John Piper. Image source.

[content note: abusive theology, miscarriage, John Piper]

Well here's a horrifying article: Did My Lust Cause Our Miscarriage? In it, Pastor John Piper responds to this question: "Pastor John, did God cause, or would God cause, my wife to miscarry our child because I have a struggle with lust and pornography? I have a lot of guilt right now, and I don’t know how to think about God’s discipline and punishment for my sin. I’m very confused, please help."

Wow. Ah man. Yeah miscarriage is awful, I'm so sorry for your loss, it just sucks. Or rather, that's what a decent human being would say. In contrast, Piper doesn't offer any words along those lines, nothing even acknowledging the question writer's pain and trying to comfort him. Nothing. Instead, the article is about sin and God's discipline and something he keeps calling "the gospel" but sure as hell ain't good news.

And also, a decent human being would say NO. Don't blame yourself. Porn does not cause miscarriages, and it is just heartbreaking to imagine someone actually seriously wondering that... wow, to live with that kind of guilt, that kind of uncertainty, oh my. No, don't blame yourself. That's just terrible. But nope, Piper doesn't say anything like that. He explains that yes, it is possible that God killed your child as punishment for your porn use. We don't know if that's the real reason or not, but sure, it could be. ... Geez, how can you do that to someone? How can you put that kind of guilt on someone? This is abuse. This is abuse.

Let's look at some quotes from this horrifyingly abusive article:

Whatever he means [by "struggling with porn"], I am glad he calls it sin, which he does, because Jesus takes this sin so seriously, he uses a horrible picture to describe the warfare against it — and the worst possible warning against failure in the war.

Here is what he says: “If your right eye causes you to sin” — so he is talking about lust — “tear it out and throw it away.” What? With a screwdriver? This is gross. This is horrible. What? Your fingernails? “For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell” (Matthew 5:29). So, tearing out the eyeball is the most horrible description of the nature of the warfare, and hell is the most horrible warning of failure in the warfare. So, I doubt that any of us has ever overestimated the danger of failing to fight lust. And I am glad that our anonymous questioner has called it sin and is feeling bad about it.

In other words, God would rather you tear out your own eye than lust. Yeah, the bible does say that. (Or... something like that, but it's definitely possible to interpret it in a less abusive way than what Piper is doing here.) So we have a God who hates our natural sexual desires SO MUCH that he would like us to damage our bodies in whatever way is necessary to get those desires to stop. HOLY CRAP this is abusive.

(Also, did you catch that bit at the end? Piper is "glad ... [he] is feeling bad about it." Yeah, that's exactly the way the Christianity I learned totally didn't care about anyone's mental or emotional health. You "sinned" so you should feel bad. This teaching is so incredibly abusive and destructive. This is literally the reason I had depression a few years ago.)

Or, we can add with trembling: He may see us in need of such protection from temptation that he takes our life. That is what it says in 1 Corinthians 11:29–30, “Anyone who eats and drinks [the Lord’s Supper] without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died.” Fallen asleep means died. “But when we are judged by the Lord” — that is, put to death — “we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world” (1 Corinthians 11:32). That is breathtaking. In other words, death, the death of a saint, the death of one who is perfected, the death of one whom he loves, the death is the discipline of deliverance from condemnation. God takes him out so that he will not be taken out by the devil and by sin and go to hell. So yes, the Lord disciplines, and his ways are not to be trifled with or made little of.

WHAT THE HELL IS THIS. God sometimes kills people because he's sure they're going to fall victim to "temptation"- God would rather have you dead than let you sin. HOLY SHIT. This is... wow. This is abusive as hell. I spent 20+ years in the evangelical church and I never heard anything like this. I mean, yes, there it is in 1 Corinthians, I know, I've read that passage. But I never heard anyone at church say "sometimes God kills people so they don't sin." Yes, the church explicitly preached that everyone deserves to go to hell and suffer forever; I'm not shocked at all when I hear Christians say things like that- but I am shocked by what Piper is saying here. This is just a whole new level of DISTURBING.

May that discipline come in the form of harm, even death, to others that we love, as well as ourselves? And the answer is yes, it may. This was certainly the case with David’s sin of adultery [sic] and murder with Bathsheba and her husband. Nathan the prophet said to David, “The Lord also has put away your sin” (2 Samuel 12:13). And then the next thing, “Nevertheless, because by this deed you have utterly scorned the Lord” — and surely that is what pornography is — “the child who is born to you shall die” (2 Samuel 12:14).

So, I would certainly say in my own life — now hear this carefully — I would certainly say in my own life the most painful and humbling disciplining from the Lord has regularly been though the pain and suffering and sometimes death of those I love, rather than through any blows against my own body. Oh, that we only suffered in our own body. This has been the way the deepest Christians have always thought about the losses through the death of those they love. Jonathan Edwards preached numerous sermons about the way the Lord disciplines a church by taking away a godly pastor in death. Edwards’s godly wife Sarah spoke about kissing the rod of God in the death of her 54-year-old husband — a rod of discipline that she felt more than anyone. She called it a rod of God on her back. And she kissed it.

So Piper is saying yes, God might kill your loved ones to punish you for your sin. Just like God killed David and Bathsheba's baby. (So... God is not very "pro-life," huh?) And we're supposed to accept it and "kiss it." HOLY SHIT THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH SWEAR WORDS AVAILABLE.

I don’t know whether our friend who wrote this question lost his child in miscarriage as a direct discipline from God because of his pornography. I do not know. He does not know.

Oh my god. How can you say this? How can you say this to someone who is grieving and blaming himself? "Yeah, actually it might be your fault, yes." Oh my god. I'm ... holy shit.

Piper treats this as purely an abstract theological question, as if he was asked, "In a conservative/Calvinist interpretation of the bible, does God ever kill people to punish sin?" It's like he doesn't even notice that this question writer is devastated and overwhelmed, and how incredibly damaging it is for him to wonder if maybe it's all his fault. Can you imagine what this man is going through, emotionally and psychologically? Piper doesn't even try to imagine. It's like he doesn't think about how his theology affects actual people. None of that matters to him. It's all about unshakeable loyalty to every single word in the bible.

So, what our friend must do in this confusion — he says, “I am confused.” Okay, so I am saying, what he must do in his confusion is stop fretting about whether his pornography was the direct cause of his miscarriage. He should stop fretting about that. He will never know for sure the answer to that question, short of some direct revelation. Whether he knew it was or wasn’t, the lesson remains the same. The Lord gives and the Lord has taken away. And God’s merciful design for our friend is that he worship. Blessed be the Lord (Job 1:21). Worship more deeply the way Job did.

In other words, yes, God did choose to "take away" this potential child. We don't know if the reason was to punish this guy for using porn, but Piper says yes, it was God's doing. And so you should worship God. You should love the God who kills your family members, who hates you and your sin so much that he wishes you were dead.

THIS IS ABUSIVE AS HELL. Oh god. Oh geez. I'm... I know what Piper believes, and this is totally consistent with all of it, but I'm still shocked. I never expected to hear anyone say something like this so explicitly. And it's not even an abstract hypothetical- this is a response to a real person who is really experiencing a lot of grief and guilt. This is the response: yeah maybe it is your fault. Yeah God decided to kill your child, and you need to respond by worshiping God.

Here's the thing: Piper cites bible verses- about Jesus telling his disciples to tear out their eyes, about Job, about David and Bathsheba, about the Lord's supper in 1 Corinthians- and he's not wrong. The bible does say that. There are bible verses that say God killed someone's family members to punish their sin or make some kind of point, win a bet with satan, whatever. (See also my post about the worst bible story.)

Yes, the bible does say that. And Piper is so focused on the bible- or rather, on his interpretation of the bible- that he doesn't even realize how completely anti-human and evil this ideology is. His commitment to believing and valuing every single word of Scripture leads him to tell a grieving man "yes, God killed your child, and it's totally possible that it's your fault." How can you say that to someone?

Strangely, Piper doesn't mention that part in the bible where Job's "friends" told him God killed all his children to punish him for his sin and then God showed up and was like "SHUT UP ALL OF YOU, HOW DARE YOU SAY THAT" [slight paraphrase of Job 38-42]. Strangely, he doesn't mention that time when the disciples saw a blind man and asked Jesus "Who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" and Jesus was like "NOPE." Or when Jesus preached that victims of a disaster were not "more guilty" than others.

So yes, the bible contains a bunch of different perspectives on the reasons behind suffering. If the most important thing in your life is devotion to the exact words of the bible- if the bible is your idol- then yes, you would come to the conclusion that God may have caused a miscarriage to punish someone's sin, and they need to respond by worshiping God. But if you have at least one molecule of human compassion, you will see that any God who would kill a child to punish someone else's sin is not worthy of worship- and that a person grieving a miscarriage needs love and support, not a mountain of guilt baptized in religious bullshit.

What I'm saying is, "the authority of Scripture" is one hell of a drug. It causes people- who would otherwise be kind and loving- to respond to tragedy with the most shocking, despicable, abusive, anti-human crap, and then feel like they're doing a good thing, they're standing up for God, they're "speaking the truth in love."

I'm shocked. I really am shocked. Piper's words are literally spiritual abuse. And his God is a monster that no one should worship.