HIV, Jesus, and Love

I just got done emailing a friend, and I realized that I had used my email to him to unload the kind of thing I normally unload on my blog. So, I'm going to put it here too.

I really enjoy my HIV class b/c it's full of people pumped up about tackling a hard problem like me. It's really nice to be around other people that care about the HIV/AIDS epidemic, that want to talk about it... b/c nobody really wants to hear about it b/c it's depressing. It's kind of like a support group too, b/c we get to recognize together that it IS depressing and it does get hard reading about it after a while, b/c the problem just seems so big and overwhelming. What I don't like about the group is that I get the feeling that I might be the only Christian in there. It was really saddening today, and I get so embarrassed by how culture has twisted Christianity and that many people call themselves Christians and the only thing they might get riled up about is maybe not wanting schools to distribute birth control pills and condoms instead of getting riled up about social justice and doing something about it. this used to bother me while living in the south, b/c i would think about all the people in need that needed to be served and the majority of church goers weren't doing anything. now it bothers me for the that same reason PLUS the fact that it's not a good witness b/c out here people don't claim to be christians and not only that, they don't like christians as a group. like you can actually feel animosity radiating off of them occasionally. and now, the inactivity of christians (or their activity in what i consider to be not so important areas) has totally distorted people's view of christianity. These people here don't know the compassionate Jesus that loved the "rejects of society," that went against social norms and talked to a samaritan woman or stood up for a woman accused of adultery. They don't know the man that said, look you might be "righteous" and follow all the laws but you don't have any compassion and so you have it all wrong. they don't know the man that was infinitely concerned about the "least of these", and they don't know this man's disciples. All they see are christian teachers of the law that are caught up in self righteousness and dont have compassion. when they think christian, they don't associate it with giving, caring, loving... and that made me so sad today listening to people in my class... i didnt know what i wanted to say until after the discussion had passed... even then, they had never said anything truly overtly against christianity and so it would have been awkward for me to start "preaching." i mean, it was the middle of class and we were talking about America's involvement in HIV/AIDS treatment and prevention abroad. It finally lead to christianity b/c Bush claims Christianity and he's the one that's pushing the ABC program, which is abstinence, being faithful, and use condoms... but the program places a lot more emphasis on the first 2, which i believe in, but i believe in equal emphasis on the condom part too for lots of reasons i'm not going to type now. so. the class was very disheartening.

i just wanted them to know that the Way of Jesus is a radical way of LOVE. and yeah, there's things we do and we don't do, but it's in love. because we love God and because we love others.

1 Year

One year and seven days ago I moved to San Francisco. One year and five days ago I was wondering what in the world I was doing here and whether or not I should run back to the South. One year and 4 days ago I was feeling better about the situation (finding an apartment helped). One year ago today marks my official hire date, and one year ago tomorrow marks my first day at work.

This year has been so different for me in so many ways. Being a grown-up is pretty hard work. Plus I moved to a completely different place very far away from home with a very different culture. I learned how to use public transportation. I started my job as a nurse, which is when the learning really begins. I learned how to switch back and forth between night shift and day shift every 4 weeks. I learned that I am week and need support and to be spiritually fed. I learned what it feels like to miss church on Sundays about twice a month because I had to work. I learned what it feels like not to have a church home.

Praise God that year is over!

There were good times too. I think San Francisco is a really neat city, and it's really weird. There are things that I see here that I assume you don't see anywhere else.

Now I'm in graduate school, and I finally feel like I'm not spinning my wheels and completely lost, but I also feel frustrated because school and work consume nearly all of my time. But it's only 2 years. People have done it before. I can do anything for 2 years.

Emotional Wreckage

I am so stressed out right now between school and work... mostly work. Things are really intense and frustrating because we're being audited by the state. I'm so tense, and I find myself walking and realize that my shoulders are all scrunched up towards my neck, and I have to force myself to put them down. I start crying at the drop of a dime.... I turned on a League of thier Own to help me relax a bit before I get down to studying and I started crying when the girls made the team! What in the world is that?! I've seen this movie a bunch of times, and I've never cried at that before. I can't handle this. Hopefully I'll be all cried out soon. It's so draining! I'm tired.

My Birthday

This is me at my costume birthday party. Can you guess who I was suppose to be? The pose is just me being silly and not at all a part of the costume. The shaw isn't part of the costume either.

so

There's a new guy at work. He's really hot. And nice. We made friends.

He's gay.

Oh the woes of living in San Francisco!

Question

Can we really say that God guides us somewhere? I mean at the end of the day, it could definitely be our own selfish (or unselfish) desires that have led us to whatever conclusion or place. One person feels like God led her to sell everything and give to the poor, and the next person feels like God led her to the perfect house to buy with 5 bedrooms and 3.5 baths. One person feels like God is leading him to stay in America and another person feels God leading him to live in Asia. God leads one person to the perfect shade of blue SUV and another person to the perfect university or the perfect church or the perfect... whatever. If I chose to do something and then do it, can I really say God lead me to it?

I think

that there are many decisions and paths we can take, and God can bless us in a variety of ways. He can enable us to venture in many directions without a certain direction being wrong.

I think

that I get a little uneasy when I hear people saying that God led them to something or made something happen, because I often don't feel like I see a whole lot of God in the choice. It's not that I see satan in the choice.... but I see some filters that the person is wearing, and the person is choosing something because she wants it. Not because God wants it (even though he can still bless it), but she wants it.

I guess we all do it in different ways....

I'm more inclined to say after the fact that God opened whatever doors, but that might just may be my own desire to see the situation as such.

So when is God really leading, and when am I really leading?

1 Cor 2:9

"No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him."

cool.

Romans 15:13

"May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

I like that verse, and I wish it for you and me today.

Zimbabwe

This article, Secret Lives, in The Observer Magazine has an awesome article about what's going on in Zimbabwe. Please read and look at the pictures!

What happens

when 10 or 20 yrs of your life are gone from your memories? What happens when you can't remember where you live and who takes care of you? What happens when you think your husband is still alive, when you don't recognize your only son? What happens when you can't figure out why you're somewhere or where you're going on a walk to? What happens when you can't even go out to dinner because it messes up your routine so bad that you can't remember basically anything for days? What happens when you can't remember your grandchildren or great grand children? What happens when you realize that your biggest fear is coming true? Do you realize that it's coming true? Are you really aware that you are losing your mind, your memories? Does your mind race in confusion and fear when you can't figure out which room you live in or why no one is coming to get you? Or is it nicer and you just blissfully don't know what's going on? I think it's scary, and I think you just don't talk about it because you're embarrassed, and you know that you should know what's going on. I think that it must be one of the most terrifying things that could happen to you. If it was your body going bad you could at least look forward to dying and going to heaven, but when it's your mind going bad, you can be trapped in complete confusion for years.

I miss Ganny. She's been forgetful for most of my life, but I remember the times when I could hang out with her, and she might repeat stories you've heard a million times in your life, but she generally would not repeat the same story in a visit or would only repeat it once. Last time I saw her she was like a broken record that you couldn't get to stop. She was literally finishing a sentence and then starting the same one all over again. I'd try and change the conversation to get her on a different track, but it was really hard. It's hard to spend time with her now. It's frustrating. It's sad. And I haven't even been around her lately, when she has been completely confused and doesn't know where she lives or who people are.

My parents must be really strong. I want to be like them. I hope that they don't ever need the kind of care that Ganny needs, but if they do, I wanna take care of them. Granted, I'll be moving them to Africa so I can do that, but I guess they won't know the difference at that point anyways. :)

A World Away???

Can you imagine?

Read this article from the New York Times:

Influx From Zimbabwe to South Africa Tests Both

Can you imagine an inflation rate so high that you suddenly find your monthly salary worth $2? I can't. I can try, but I'm sure that what I'm imagining as I type on my computer on my couch while watching TV in my comfy apartment is nowhere close to the reality.

Diamond Ring

I'm tired of hearing a girl say that she's not "technically" engaged, because Johnny can't afford the ring yet. What in the world is that?! She only loves him enough if he can afford a diamond ring?

Second, I hate that the first thing we want to do is look at the ring when we find out a girl got engaged, as if that's the most important part of the engagement. I do it too. I feel awkward if I don't ask to see the ring, because that's the expected reaction.

Third, it feels wrong for me to expect to wear a $2000+ ring on my finger when people are starving to death today. I guess I could say that about any of my possessions really. I'm just targeting the diamonds right now though.

My roommate and I went to MythBusters last night, and this is what we found:

"The first recorded instance of a man giving his bride-to-be a diamond ring was in 1477, when Archduke Maximilian of Hamburg gave one to Mary of Burgundy. However, this was only an occasional occurrence among royalty and the extremely wealthy — hardly what would be called a tradition. It wasn't until the 1930s, when the South African diamond company De Beers tried to boost sales by working with Hollywood starlets and movie studios to promote the concept of presenting a diamond ring as part of a marriage proposal, that the idea started to catch on. In 1947, De Beers launched their highly successful "A Diamond Is Forever" marketing campaign, and convinced men that they needed to spend two to three months' salary in order to present their intended with a suitable engagement ring. Today, approximately 75 percent of engagements include a diamond ring."

Giggles and Tears

Where are the Christians?

Where are the Christians? Where are the DISCIPLES of Christ?

They seem to be far removed from many problems in this world.

They seem to be filling a pew on Sundays.

Their churches locked up during the week. Empty.

It seems to be an exception to the rule that a church be heavily involved in outreach during the week.

It seems to be out of the ordinary if a church is committed to helping the "unloveable."

We’re too busy picking out new clothes to wear to church. We’re too busy.

From my book, 28 Stories of AIDS in Africa:

There was a woman in Zimbabwe that had AIDS. She went to a Church of Christ. But when her story talks about her dying of AIDS, it says that the only support she had was her husband and children. It didn’t mention the church at all, except to say that she had been a member there. Her extended family had completely rejected her. It didn’t say that the church had rejected her, but the lack of mention in the story leads me to believe they weren’t around. If they had been around in the way Jesus was, then the story would have been quite different. It couldn’t have helped but mention the disciples of Christ that had stepped up and lovingly supported this family in their time of need if that had been the case.

This happens every day.

As Christians, we don’t like the tough situations. We just want to go to church, sing some songs, and act like we don’t have problems, and we certainly don’t want to hear about anyone else’s problems, lest we be obligated to give much of our precious time.

I’ve been reading again and again about heroes of social causes. People that stood up when others were being treated unjustly, inhumanely. These people said it wasn’t okay. These people wanted to love on the people that were being rejected by society. These people cared enough to dedicate their LIVES to caring for these people. A lot of these people that I have read about were not Christians. They weren’t Christians, but they still cared about people. Yet Christians, that are supposed to have this higher calling, that are supposed to do unto others as they would have them do unto them, these people that claim to be followers of the Christ, do nothing. We do nothing. Week after week.

God forgive me for my complacency! It kills. It kills spiritually. It kills physically. Each day I remain silent, each day I do nothing, each day I remain inactive, I am making a decision AGAINST those that are suffering.

I want to GO!

I just got done reading an article on the Doctors Without Borders website about how there just aren't enough medical professionals to get ARVs (antiretrovirals) to all the people with AIDS that need them. In just one district they're treating 7,000 people and need to increase it to 10,000, but they can't b/c they don't have the docs and nurses to distribute the drugs. The report I was reading covered Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique and South Africa. I'm also still reading my book, 28 Sotries of AIDS in Africa. I read about 100 pages on the plane last night, and I get SO frustrated! I can't wait to start grad school so I can hurry and finish it and GO! I looked up a list of the poorest countries in the world. They are as follows:

aneki.com
Poorest Countries in the World
Rank, Country, GDP - per capita
1 Malawi $ 600
2 Somalia $ 600
3 Comoros $ 600
4 Solomon Islands $ 600
5 Congo, Democratic Republic of the$ 700
6 Burundi $ 700
7 East Timor $ 800
8 Tanzania $ 800
9 Afghanistan $ 800
10 Yemen $ 900

Can you imagine making $600 a year?!

I'm going to give you and exerpt from my book 28 Stories of AIDS in Africa by Stephanie Nolen:
"...Winstone gave a young woman named Jennifer the happy news that her TB had been successfully treated, she responded by bursting into tears: without TB, she would no longer qualify for a weekly parcel of soya powder and beans, the only source of food for her three children. 'When I went home I couldn't sleep,' Winstone wrote about those days. 'I felt terrible. What was the use of setting up Kara Counseling in Kabwe if the people wished they had AIDS so they could get a few cents? How could we fight TB if patients felt happy to be sick so they could get a few pounds of soya powder? What the fucking hell was I doing here?' He thought about his most recent speaking tour in the US, where he was told about a cat with kidney problems on dialysis, saw massive sport utility vehicles with built in DVD players, heard that the leading epidemic in the country was obesity. 'And here I am stuck with Jennifer and Joyce in my little office as they wish they had the most serious and fatal disease [AIDS] to have hit the world so they can get 80 cents every week.'"

So that's what's on my mind today. All the need in the world, and I'm still stuck here in SF, waiting to start grad school. I CAN'T WAIT TO FINISH GRAD SCHOOL AND GO!

Ashton and the half dead frog

Haven at his Best

Terrorism

So, I'm a little confused... who are the terrorists??? the U.S.? the Taliban? NATO?

I just got done reading this article in the NY Times: Civilian Deaths Undermine War on Taliban.

Here are a few quotes from it:

[“You have a bag of capital — that is the good will of the people — and you want to spend that as slow as you could,” said the American military official. “We are spending it at a fearsome rate.”]

This statement enrages me!!! People's LIVES are not bags of capital!!! This is basically saying that killing the civilians off slowly is okay, because we'll still have the people's goodwill as a whole!

[“If we still have civilian casualties, it can be used by the opposition groups to the government to encourage the people against the government and against the international community,” Dr. Samar said at a recent news conference. “That’s why we are concerned, and we ask the international community and the Afghan government to be very, very careful.”]

We shouldn't be concerned about the casualties only because the people will oppose the government! We should care because they are PEOPLE!

[A senior Bush administration official said American Special Forces units were conducting an operation in the valley in late April. After the Taliban pinned them down in a firefight, the air strike was necessary, the military official said. “It was the only way to extract our guys,” the official said.]

So "our guys" are more important than the innocent men, women, and children that had to be bombed in order to extract "our guys."

I'm so sick thinking about all the people in Afghan that are caught between NATO, the U. S. military and the Taliban. Basically there is no where safe to turn. On every side they are surrounded by trigger happy men, ready to end your existence at the drop of a pin. I don't know what the right answer is to fighting the Taliban... but replacing one evil for another is not okay. Killing innocent people is not okay just because it's in the supposed name of freedom. These people are not free. They are slaves to fear, a fear that is coming from every direction. I know in war there are always casualties... but more now than ever, war seems stupid! How are we supposed to fight an enemy that does not have a front line, that is mixed in with the people, and oh yeah, they're willing to strap bombs on themselves just to kill you! It seems that the only way to win that type of war is to show them a better way. Some might say that that is impossible. That those people will never listen. Maybe that is true. But maybe we should give them an opportunity. We certainly cannot change their minds by trying to kill them. And we're only creating more people to rise up against NATO and the US army by harming civilians. Villages are actually rising up to fight the soldiers (and good for them for trying to protect their families), because they are fed up with the military coming and raiding them when there is no Taliban there. They don't want to live life harassed and in fear. I don't know what would happen if we just stopped all of the military involvement. I don't know if the Taliban would take over. I don't know if it would be better or worse for the Afghan people.

So, I tried to write the above as if I agreed with war, just maybe not that particular war and it's tactics, but the truth is that I'm a pacifist, and I know that most people do not share that view point. So of course, my opinion is that war is never good. You can bring up WWII and other wars and I will tell you that I don't know. I don't have the answers. And yes, I do think that Hitler needed to be stopped, but based on Christian principles, Hitler could have been stopped long before everything got started. So what does a pacifist do when Christian principles weren't used in the first place, when everything has already gone to crap... I don't know. I haven't been a pacifist for that long. I'm inclined to say in my non-pacifist part of my mind that you fight back. But I don't think that a lot of the wars going on today are like WWII. I think that they are really different. And so, WWII is already done and over with, but we're dealing with terrorists that will stop at nothing to kill innocent people. They are exalted in their deaths. How do you fight that with guns? Maybe we're hoping that eventually we will kill them all off and there will be none left? But I think that as we try and kill them all off, we are daily creating more terrorists that maybe never would have become that had they not had to live a life in fear of the U.S. military. I dunno. Just some thoughts.

SHY

In my family I’m the shy one. Seriously, I am. I know if you’re reading this and you’re not related to me then you’re thinking no way! But I have told many of you this before. I’m actually quite shy. I have to force myself to do a lot of the things I do. However, I am distinctly NOT shy if I feel like someone around me is shy. In those cases I am more than willing to step up and do whatever it is that needs to be done or said. I’m actually quite vocal in those situations. However, if I know someone else around me will do what needs to be done (like my dad) then I greatly digress… maybe that’s why there’s such a large discrepancy between my friends and family’s perceptions of me. In my family I am the baby, and so they’ll take care of me. I mean, it’s not like I’m “babied;” they actually do a great job of bullying me into being not shy, but I naturally do not what to have to be the responsible one. Now, if I’m with a bunch of friends and a phone call needs to be made or if I feel like one of them has been wronged in any way, I’m on top of the job. I’m the one that will step up and want to take care of business. My present roommate laughs at me, because I seem to end up in conversations with strangers, but she has no idea how shy I am! If she could only see my sister and brother in action! I wish that I had never met a stranger, that I could warmly engage any random person in a meaningful conversation. But I can’t… or I don’t. I suppose I could. The world is full of shier people than me, and probably a lot of them are wishing that someone would be friends with them. Actually, I’ve become quite aware of that fact ever since I graduated from ACU and even more so now that I live in a city that’s simply full of people that have recently relocated. People are starving for relationships.

I haven’t done a good job of being a part of this city since I moved here. I did for the first three months, but not since then. I travel as much as I possible can, and therefore I’m out of town A LOT. You can’t deepen friendships when you’re out of town as much as I am. I can’t really be a part of church, because I only get 2 Sundays off a month, and I’m always out of town on one of those Sundays. So, I only attend “my church” 1 Sunday a month. Of course I get to go some Wednesdays and some Fridays, but I’m not consistent in that either. I also haven’t volunteered since my first 3 months here. It’s just really hard to get involved in anything when you’re always working or traveling. But I recognized this fact about a month ago, and I’m willing to live with it for now, because I’m far away from my loved ones, and soon enough I won’t be able to travel to see them. But in the mean time, I really do miss having that church family. I really do miss having best friends living near by. I miss having family not too far away. I ache to feel comfortable when I go to church. I ache to have a place that I volunteer at regularly. But I guess right now I ache more to see my family and friends in other parts of the country and hemisphere.

I met a girl on the bus a while back. She was really nice and we exchanged numbers. She had only been in the city for 2 months, and so, probably had even fewer friends than I. Well, I dropped the ball on that one. It’s been about a month now since that encounter, and I have yet to call her to hang out. Shyness got in the way. I got the feeling on the bus that she wanted another friend even more than I do right now. She was really interesting too, and we could’ve probably been great friends, but now it feels a little awkward to call because it’s been so long. Maybe I will this coming week.

Sorry this posting was kind of a ramble… but I wanted to post because it’s been a while, and well, this is what popped out of my fingertips.

Exciting news: My roommate and I bought rollerblades and are going to go on our first rollerblade expedition EVER on Sunday afternoon! I’ll be sure to post pics! :)