My Leisure Suit Education
January 4, 2006
Christine Rosen who I like and respect has written a new book - My Fundamentalist Education. I came across an intriguing review in OpinionJournal. It doesn't sound as if she is very charitable.
I grew up resisting the leisure suits, jumper dresses, no make-up and long braided hair of my fundamentalist friends. I prided myself in short skirts, stylish hair and tasteful make-up - and yet still a Christian. Pride is the word. I judged by outward appearances - they judged me by outward appearances. Whether it is dress, smell or color of our skin how easy it is to judge on outward appearances.
It sounds like Christine Rosen received an excellent education. She has gone on to write insightfully about sex differences, eugenics and religion. She has learned the Bible, was taught to love reading, honed her writing skills. Her fundamentalist education served her well. Faced with today's public schools and politically correct educational mandates I believe she would make similar choices for her children.
Next time a visiting preacher has on a dated suit, a tie with a lapel pin that is so 60's, and talks about his modestly dressed children I hope I can open my Bible and ask the Holy Spirit to open my eyes and heart to the Word of God.
Update: A good book about the legalism that Christine Rosen is rebelling against and that is food for thought for everyone is David Swavely's Who are you to Judge?, reviewed here and here.
Missionaries, Trick-or-Treating and Chavez
November 1, 2005
In a bizarre linkage - I think we need to protest Hugo Chavez's decision to order all U.S. - based evangelists and missionaries to leave Venezuela immediately. He is accusing them of being CIA spies and exploiting the mineral rich tribal areas.
Chavez is also asking all of Venezuela to ban trick-or-treating and Halloween costumes. He said it is a "gringa" custom that is part of the U.S. culture of terror.
I know its too late - but I hope we all sent our kids out trick-or-treating last night. Don't feel guilty, you were protesting Chavez!
Buffing up the College Resume
April 21, 2005
Todays Wall Street Journal's article " For High Schoolers, Summer Is Time To Polish Résumés:"(subscription required) is not news to those of you who have high schoolers. For me - this is scary and expensive! The article highlights what I've already heard around town. Super-achieving teens need to polish their elite college applications with psuedo-volunteer trips. Mind you, these are not real missions trips - they are trips where kids pay $7000 or more to bike the alps, kayak in the South China Sea or explore the Great Barrier Reef. Of course they spend a few days, or hours - painting schools, playing with children, cleaning up poor neighborhoods to rake up those community service hours.
I'm beginning to learn the college application game. My friends tell me I must start now (my son is in 7th grade). First, I need to buff up his summer resume by working on his foreign languages and get him "used to community service". By 8th grade I need to have his entire summer mapped out - maybe a semi-rugged bicycle tour of the Canadian Rockies, or an adventure trip hiking and rafting the Grand Canyon. It can fun, but it's time to show character building summers. By 9th grade, I better start interviewing PSAT prep firms, and narrow down my $25,000 college admission counselor. Than in 10th, it is full-court press - every minute, every activity, every move planned until ADMISSION day.
This new plan casts a new light on my summer hopes. I was hoping my son could spend his summer on the church youth group mission trip to Voice of Calvary and really learn to care and serve those in need. If time permitted he could attend Worldview Academy and began to build a Christian worldview that would serve him in college and beyond. Of course, I hoped he would earn some spending money and learn the value of work at the local grocery store (baggers are hired at 14). - that would help in the character building department. Then, there is the pool, town baseball, chores around the house and family vacation. These are our summer dreams.
Ramping up his spiritual, physical and academic resume for college admission is going to take some work. I was hoping that during the year, he would remain involved in the church and the church youth group, attending Bible study and youth missions activities. In town, he would continue working toward Eagle Scout with his Boy Scout troop - helping out with regular community service. Baseball and basketball, whether intramural or local would fill his physical exercise requirements. Studying hard, refining research skills, loving his learning would round him out academically. Most of all - he would seek the Lord's will for his every minute, every activity, every move.
As for college admissions - we would seek God's will, apply to the schools that seem best, and trust God. I wonder if God only works through College Admissions Counselors????
Plants Grown Up
January 31, 2005
This morning my 12 year old son did not want to go to school. He had spent the weekend on a school sponsored ski trip and was exhausted. He'd come home and was in bed by 8:30 pm and had a good 9 hours of sleep. Matt informed me that LOTS of kids were staying home and sleeping in.
Later - I found this was true. Many students didn't show for school.
I think there are two ways of looking at childhood. One is that childhood is a protected time with special privileges and few responsibilities. This is characterized by "your only a child once", "let children be children", "soon they'll be adults, and they won't have this chance", etc...
The other way is your child is a young plant, a seedling. He must be cared, nourished and provided for. He also must be pruned occasionally and shielded when the sun gets too hot. But basically he is a plant waiting to grow up. It is a continuum.
Biblically, I feel parenting should draw from the later philosophy. Our responsibility as parents is raise young men and women of God. There is no magic switch to adulthood that happens when you cannot sleep in, you must be responsible, you must deny yourself for a greater good. These lessons are learned slowly from birth on - just as a seedling is nourished to maturity.
In Psalm 1 David speaks about the blessed man who is "a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers."
Right now I have to put my young plant to bed so he does not wither tomorrow - that whatever he does he prospers - because he is growing up to be a Blessed Man.
