the devil wrote the sinner's prayer...

…and accepting jesus into your heart as your personal lord and savior? that was the devil’s idea too. and i have to say, those two inventions of his were pretty darn clever. what better way to keep million and millions of people from actually and sincerely seeking god and truth, when you can trick them into thinking that all they really need to do is to avoid hell and get their one-way ticket to heaven by saying a simple 10 second prayer? ‘Lord Jesus, I confess that I am a sinner. I believe Jesus died on a cross and shed his blood for me. Come into my heart and save me, I pray. In Jesus's name, Amen.’ BAM! guaranteed a spot in heaven! now you can freely go back to your business of ravaging this earth (since it’s going to hell in a handbasket anyways and will be replaced by a New and Better Earth, of which you will be a Mighty Ruler because you said a 10 second prayer). and the poor and the homeless? who cares about them! didn’t the apostle paul say if you don’t work, you shouldn’t eat? let ‘em starve then! and the sick? you just need faith the size of a mustard seed and you’d be healed no problemo. and if you’re not healed and you die? well, you’ll be in a better place anyways. that is, if you say the sinner’s prayer before you’re dead. otherwise, you’re going to hell.

let me tell you something. i spent years—YEARS!!!—feeling like a total fake because i had never said the sinner’s prayer. i had never accepted jesus as my personal lord and savior. i thought for sure, i’d go to hell if i died. and i worried about hell a lot. i mean, i could barely stand taking a shower in rotten-egg-stinkin’-well-water on retreats in wisconsin…how the hell was i gonna stand roasting in a fiery lake of burning sulfur for all of eternity?

so why am i bringing all this up? well, i just got through reading a heretic’s guide to eternity by spencer burke, founder of the emergent community theOOZE.com, and not too long before that i read the last word and the word after that by brian mclaren. i wish i’d read these books years ago (although they weren’t around back then). i could’ve saved myself a lot of guilt and fear and shame.

i was given a prerelease copy of a heretic's guide to eternity by someone over at theOOZE, as were other bloggers, to encourage us to read and review the book. i don’t like doing book reviews, so i’m not going to go into details. there’s plenty out in the blogosphere by now, i’m sure. and i know spencer will get a lot of flack for this book. it wasn’t an easy book for me to read, and i’m not even a card-carrying member of the christian folk. i don’t know that i agree with EVERYTHING he wrote, but the part about GRACE…that part resonated with what’s in my heart. here’s an excerpt:

“Grace is a miracle because it is not controlled, structured, shaped, or handed out by human beings or their religions. Grace is not the result of what we could ever plan or calculate. Grace belongs to no one but God, and because of that, it belongs to us all. Grace says that nothing is sacred and everything is sacred. Grace shakes the world, catches us by surprise, and knocks us off our feet. It is the miracle of miracles.

I believe that Jesus was full of grace and truth, and he is greater than the Christian religion that claims him. When the Bible tells us we will be his witnesses to the ‘ends of the earth’ after the Spirit has come upon us, it does not mean that we force Western religion on others. It means that we are invited to bear witness to how Jesus would nurture and affirm the expressions of God’s grace in our world today. Grace is the gift we get to share and celebrate with each other. Grace is the key that unlocks the kingdom. Grace is life. Grace is hope. Grace is the future.

This is mystical responsibility: questioning, listening, and living in grace.” A Heretic's Guide to Eternity by Spencer Burke and Barry Taylor, p. 215

that’s all i feel like saying about the book right now.

you know, there are a lot of books written on the subject of theology, and there is a whole lot of dialogue going on on the internet and at various conferences. the emergent movement has been pushing the boundaries of the church and pushing a lot of people’s buttons who are outside (and some inside) the emergent community. i’ve read some of the arguments on both sides, and they sometimes use these big words that i don’t understand and can’t even remember let alone even spell. i don’t know what all the fuss is about. i’m not big into theological debates. jesus never said you needed a sound theological background to be one of his crew. in fact, he always seemed to indicate that it was gonna be little kids who got it right before the grownups did.

so the way i see it, the whole gist of what jesus was getting at, and has been getting at, is so simple that little kids will get it no problem. no need to debate. no need to deconstruct. no need to delineate. it’s we grownups who make it all complicated and convoluted, and for the same reason most grownups can’t see the world of magic that little kids so often can, we miss the whole point altogether.

...it’s hard to become like a child, to admit that you don’t know the answers or even the question, to trust someone else to take care of you, to see the good and beauty all around, to hope and dream big, to allow someone to lift you on their shoulders, to cry freely when you skin your knee, to love lavishly without fear of rejection, to be filled with awe by simple things, to believe in magic...and maybe only a kid can be innocent enough to receive so freely a gift as mindbogglingly extravagant as god's love and grace, to just receive without feeling the need to do something to EARN it, to just receive without being afraid of LOSING it...

speaking of korean...

...the 11th annual chicago korean festival was this weekend. now, my exposure to all things korean is usually limited to my mom and her cooking once a week, so i figured it was important for the family to trek out to the festival and let cadence have a taste of her partial heritage.

...we got to see a performance by il kwa nori, a chicago area traditional korean percussion ensemble. their name means 'work and play' in korean, and the nomenclature is quite appropriate for them. i love the syncopated rhythms of traditional korean music and dance. cadence loved it too and clapped and danced along.

...we also got to see the jesse white tumblers perform, and they were absolutely breathtaking. there was a huge crowd of spectators who were only too happy to ooooh and aaaah and clap enthusiastically for these young acrobats. jesse white himself (who happens to be secretary of state for illinois) was there as well. it was quite the thrilling performance and captured cadence's attention for at least a good 5-7 minutes.

my brother jim and ted's bro dave and dave's fiance becki joined us at the festival, and we got to eat some spicy korean food. there was a group of middle-aged to older-than-middle-aged korean men sitting in a circle of chairs on the sidewalk adjacent to the food vendor where we sat down to eat. there were about 10 empty soju (rice wine) containers strewn about their approximate vicinity, and they seemed perfectly content, smoking like chimneys and just shooting the breeze. i thought it was quite amusing.

after dinner, becki and i got huge bowls of potbingsoo, a korean dessert made of shaved ice, sweet red bean, a variety of fruit, and ice cream. i thought that was the best part of the festival, food-wise. it is the perfect dish for a hot summer night, and although it was pretty cool for august in chicago, it was still yummy and refreshing.

...we were about to go home for the evening, when we heard some emo-ish popish punkish music coming from the modern stage. we decided to check them out, and it was a band called quarter mile. cadence loved the music, and she was dancing up a storm. there was a runway off of the stage that had been used for a fashion show earlier in the evening, so we put her on top of the runway and she put on her own show for us. if you have broadband internet, you can see a video clip right here. otherwise, you'll just have to catch her when she starts headlining her own shows.

"do i look korean now?"

...this is cadence wearing a hanbok, the traditional korean dress. my mom borrowed it from a friend because she wanted photos of cadence in it. i felt kinda bad putting her in the thing cuz it's about the scratchiest material you could imagine.

...she would only stay in it barely long enough for me to take a few shots, but at least it was long enough to appease my mother.

…sometimes i wonder whether i should do more to expose cadence to korean culture. i mean, she spends a good amount of time with my mom, who always brings us korean food when she comes to watch cadence while i’m working from home one wednesdays. my mom speaks to her in korean a little bit, but so far the only word cadence has learned is ‘gim’ which is the word for the dried seaweed that is a staple of korean food. cadence LOVES the stuff, and i can usually sneak all kinds of food wrapped up in gim into her mouth.

...i have to admit that even though i’m full-blooded korean, there’s so much i don’t know about my own culture. i think i’m going to have to do some research so i can tell my daughter about how our family line goes back hundreds of years to some ancient dynasty. i just have to figure out which dynasty that is…i wonder if wikipedia will suffice for such a research project?

happy world breastfeeding week!

ok, today is the last day of world breastfeeding week (august 1-7th), and i've got something to say. and don't stop reading this post because the thought of (or just the word) breastfeeding embarrasses you. breastfeeding is a social justice issue. if you care about the poor, you should care about breastfeeding.

...so this is a screen shot of the most emailed yahoo news stories as of some time on friday 8/4...i thought it was interesting that two of the headlines had to do with breastfeeding, and they seemed to be contradictory from just reading the titles.

the first one refers to this article. some folks got really flustered when the parenting magazine Baby Talk published on its cover a photo of an infant nursing on a very prominent boob. apparently, some people find the image of a nursing boob offensive, even if no part of the nipple is even exposed. the article quoted a survey in which more than half the people polled are opposed to women breastfeeding in public.

this is sad, folks, that the majority of our public would prefer to not be exposed to what they perceive as such a shameful thing as a nursing mom and her infant. it's sad because i am convinced that this is a result of ignorance regarding the important benefits of breastfeeding, an ignorance happily perpetuated by infant formula companies who shell out tons of money to hospitals that pass out free diaper bags (full of cans of formula and coupons for formula) to expecting and new moms. what's even more sad (and thoroughly maddening!) is that this in clear violation of the World Health Organization's International Code of Marketing Breast-milk Subsitutes which states:

"Manufacturers and distributors should not provide, directly or indirectly, to pregnant women, mothers or members of their families, samples of products within the scope of this Code." ~Paragraph 5.2 (page 10)

what's even sadder? this is the 25th anniversary of the WHO's code, and the U.S. isn't even CLOSE to enforcing it. i know i got my free diaper bag from Enfamil (owned by Bristol-Myers Squibb) on my very first OB-GYN visit, and i got even more when i left the hospital after cadence was born.

such unethical marketing of formula can be devastating to infants in developing countries for a number of reasons:

• "When newborn babies are given bottles, they are less able to suckle at the breast. This can lead to breastfeeding failure. The baby is then dependent on commercial formula milks.
  
• When mother and baby return home, the milk is no longer free. At home parents are forced to buy more milk, which in some countries can cost more than 50% of the family income.
  
• The expense of baby milks affects all members of the family, as less money is available to feed other family members.
  
• Because formulas are so expensive, they may be overdiluted or the baby may not receive enough food, leading to malnutrition.
  
• In developing countries, a bottle-fed child is up to 25 times more likely to die as a result of diarhhoea than a breastfed child.
  
• The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 1.5 million infants die around the world every year because they are not breastfed." ~Free Trade or Fair Trade, INFACT Canada (emphasis mine)

even here in the U.S., the lack of education on breastfeeding and illegally aggressive marketing by formula companies has the most detrimental effect on low-income mothers, as found by a study done by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO):

“Too few U.S. infants breastfeed, according to national recommendations, and breastfeeding rates are even lower for infants on WIC [Women, Infants and Children, a federal nutrition program for low-income women and children up to age 5]…If rates do not increase, many mothers and infants will continue to miss out on the health benefits of breastfeeding. This is particularly important for low-income children, who often have less access to health care and poorer health. The United States will also spend billions of dollars more in avoidable health care costs.” ~ BREASTFEEDING: Some Strategies Used to Market Infant Formula May Discourage Breastfeeding; State Contracts Should Better Protect against Misuse of WIC Name, U.S. Government Accountability Office (Report #GAO-06-282)

and the really, really sad part is that the benefits of breastfeeding (to both mother and child) are numerous and invaluable, and most people don't know about it because of the lack of education that exists. so if you don't know what some of the benefits are, please click on this link here and read about just 101 reasons. even if you're a guy or you're a woman with no intention of bearing a child or you're already a mom and you formula fed or you're already breastfeeding or breastfed your children...the more people are informed, the more they will be encouraged to breastfeed or to support their loved ones who breastfeed or want to breastfeed.

the 2nd article that refers to breastfeeding on that yahoo most emailed news screen shot is an example of one such benefit--reducing anxiety into childhood for breastfed kids. read the whole article here.

it's no wonder that the World Health Organization and UNICEF have worked hard for a number of years to promote breastfeeding, especially in developing countries:

"Breastfeeding is an unequalled way of providing ideal food for the healthy growth and development of infants; it is also an integral part of the reproductive process with important implications for the health of mothers. As a global public health recommendation, infants should be exclusively breastfed for the first six months of life to achieve optimal growth, development and health. There after, to meet their evolving nutritional requirements, infants should receive nutritionally adequate and safe complementary foods while breastfeeding continues for up to two years of age or beyond. Exclusive breastfeeding from birth is possible except for a few medical conditions, and unrestricted exclusive breastfeeding results in ample milk production." ~ Global Strategy for Infant and Young Child Feeding, The World Health Organization (Paragraph 10, emphasis mine)

i don't consider myself a lactivist. i don't secretly judge women who bottlefeed their infants in public. even if i had never been able to breastfeed cadence, i would still feel the same way about breastfeeding, and i would feel the same way about formula companies. i have a number of friends who wanted so much to breastfeed but weren't able to, and it is for them that i will do my part in educating my little sphere of the public about breastfeeding in hopes that there will be an increase in support for women who want to breastfeed, not just in the medical community or the attachment parenting community, but in the public at large.

my hope is that no woman would choose to formula feed as a result of just not knowing. my hope is that no woman would have to try desperately to comfort her hungry and screaming infant in public because she is too embarrassed to nurse in public. and most importantly, my hope is that if enough people are informed, we as a society will not allow the poorest among us, whether here in the U.S. or abroad, to be duped into choosing formula-feeding over breastfeeding because of unethical marketing or because the mother's jobs do not provide the flexibility to continue nursing after returning to work.

now, is that too much to ask???

weekend update

...i have been waiting for MONTHS for cadence to fit into these shoes, a gift from caleb and kathy, and the day has finally come. here's a close-up shot of these totally awesome shoes. i remember when we got them that cadence's feet looked so tiny next to these shoes. i thought it would take forever for her to grow into them. and now she does, and that makes me all sentimental...

sunday was our monthly grandma day. ted's brothers jason and david accompanied us to visit grandma carol. she was delighted to spend time with cadence, whom she refers to as her little angel in all written and verbal communications, and cadence reciprocated by being on her most adorable behavior AND counting "one, two, free, four, fie!" all by herself. so now grandma carol thinks cadence is not merely an angel, but a smart angel at that. i have to admit, i was a little surprised by the sudden display of intellectual prowess as she's never done that for me. go figure. she must know who's supplying half her wardrobe and toys.

...after grandma carol's, we met up with vikki and mackenzie at grandma sophie's (yia yia's). we got to meet vikki's boyfriend mike, who seems like a very nice fellow. i just hope we didn't scare him off. ted and dave can act like such little kids when they're around cadence and mackenzie.

...vikki brought mackenzie's kiddie pool so the girls could cool off in the afternoon heat in yia yia's backyard. cadence was suspicious of the water, though, and wouldn't do much besides dip her feet.

...ted and dave managed to get more wet than cadence, who would start crying if she happened to be anywhere near the line of fire of their splashes and hose sprays. i had thought that seeing mackenzie play so rambunctiously in the water would encourage her to be a little more adventurous, but not today.

...yia yia had just gotten back the night before from two weeks in reno, where her nieces yiot and liz live. she still managed to cook us all a yummy spaghetti and italian sausage dinner, and vikki provided strawberry shortcake for dessert.

...ted and dave and mackenzie spent a good hour or two using a flat square seat cushion to play a crazy game that can only be described as sculpturary--pictionary in 3D using only the aforementioned seat cushion. you'd be surprised at the different shapes you can mold out of a plain old seat cushion. mike must have thought we were nuts...

anyhoo, it was good times all around, and i didn't even think about missing the pitchfork music festival. cadence always has so much fun on grandma days that ted and i don't have to worry about looking after her. she loves following mackenzie around, and even when we're all eating around the dining table, she's happy to just roll around on the floor singing to herself without demanding any attention from any one. it's a nice break for ted and me.