"Not my circus, not my clowns." Old Polish Saying
Well, Lamar od'd in a brothel in Nevada and was in a coma. Khloe rushed to his side, accompanied by various Kardashians. Lamar woke up, they cancelled their divorce action, and he is in rehab. Well.
What should we say? "I'll pray for them." What are we saying? Probably a lot more.
"She's making a big mistake."
"Being on that show probably drove him to it."
"Maybe she's a co-dependent." "Maybe?"
"Do you think it will last longer than Kim's marriage to that basketball player?"
"I am so sick of the Kardashians!"
And on the bright side: "Maybe he'll be scared enough to get sober."
"It'll give the show a big boost." There's a silver lining in every cloud.
We don't need to point out that this is unchristian or even "not very nice." We know that. But we're going to be not very nice anyway. God probably wonders when we are going to get lives.
But eventually we'll get tired of it or at least turn out attention to the next scandal. Do our comments tell us anything about ourselves? Do we think it's good that Lamar didn't die? Are we hoping that they will work things out? What do we think Jesus would say about all this?
The Kardashian goings-on are not our circus. But since we've devoted energy and oxygen to them, we might as well try to learn something.
And we can pray for them.
PS I am never going to say that I have nothing more to say about anything, There's always something.
"Not my circus, not my monkeys." Old Polish Saying
For the past several days I have been trying to write about Kim Davis and Pope Francis. This is at least my third attempt.
I've read a lot of news articles, commented on a lot of Facebook posts, and laughed at a lot of Kim Davis jokes.
I finally decided that the Pope is very charming and charismatic and is probably a very nice man with a very hard job, who is tying very hard to do the very best he can. Unfortunately, he is the head of an organization that considers homosexuality a sin, denies women reproductive freedom and refuses to ordain women.
As the saying goes, that is not my circus. And even though in attempting to follow the teachings of Jesus, I try to love the Pope as I am supposed to love everybody (And I will even pray for him as he has asked everyone to do.), he is not my monkey.
After Pope Francis was criticized for meeting with Ms. Davis, the Vatican issued the statement that “The pope did not enter into the details of the situation of Mrs. Davis, and his meeting with her should not be considered a form of support of her position in all of its particular and complex aspects." (The Rev. Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, in a statement released on Friday morning.)
But the thing of it is that he does support her position, at least officially. By their standards, the Vatican does not need to defend him. But doing so supposedly makes the Church look a little better. And it makes Ms. Davis look much worse, which should make her critics happy. And besides providing the spectacle of Ms. Davis being crushed by the bus she was thrown under, it also dazzles the public with so much rhetoric that we will say, "Yeah, whatever," and get on with our lives, which is what I intend to do.
But first, I'd like to mention something that seems to have been overlooked: Kim Davis has a story. I haven't seen it; I guess People Magazine isn't interested. But I have several questions.
What was her life like before she became a Christian? What kind of childhood did she have?
How did her marital history, which so many liberal people have taken such glee in reciting, affect her? (It is interesting that many of these people have called her fat and homely. But she has had four weddings and three husbands and is still married to the last one; she must have something.)
What did the Pentecostal church offer her and why did she need it?
Did she ever have dreams of getting out of Rowan County, Kentucky? And what is Rowan County like, anyway?
Liberal Christians find it hard to have any sympathy for her, let alone love her as we are taught to. Actually few liberals have any sympathy for her, but the Christians are the only ones who feel they should,
Maybe if we knew her story, we could see her as a beloved child of God -- like us and the tax collectors and prostitutes Jesus ate with.
Ms. Davis is very wrong about a lot of things. But seeing her as God's child and our sister does not make us disloyal to our LGBTQ friends, Ellen DeGeneres, Elton John, Bishop Gene Robinson, and the entire LGBTQ community, or, if we are members of that community, self-hating to ourselves.
I'm hoping that I got this right this time. Now I'm going to post if before a new scandal comes along and Kim Davis is "so fifteen minutes ago."
Then I'm going to get on with my life.
BUT I LOVE YOU ANYWAY.
