First Impressions (8 + 9)

[elizabeth_hoot]

I've discovered that I don't hate religion, per se, just mine. Um, yay.

But seriously. A teacher explaining that there has only ever been one universally accepted model of marriage until now as the lesson to be learned from Abraham's family is so horrifically wrong that, in retrospect, it starts coming around the other side. That family tree is the

Comments

[lady81bird]

Honestly, pardon me if I offend you, but...

I f you hate your religion wouldn't it make sense to choose another? There are plenty of different paths to God (Goddess, World Spirit, Nature, Higher Power - whatever you feel comfortable with) out there and if you hate a religion it's clearly not yours, as in not right for you. And I don't believe the higher power particularly cares about what path you choose if you do it with faith and happiness.

Um, sorry. Just a thought, you know.

[elizabeth_hoot]

No, it's okay - I'm not offended.

The thing is that I'm not spiritual, really. I don't believe or disbelieve much and I definitely don't know, so I'm not motivated to seek after a god. Religion-as-doctrine is eh, okay, I'm a cafeteria Christian anyway; religion-as-practice, though, is where the hateful stuff is at. Unfortunately, it's also where my family and the culture I was raised in are, and I don't have enough conviction of its wrongness and/or basic courage to leave. (If I did, though, I'd rather just stay out of all of them. So there's that.)

[lady81bird]

I would like to say something comforting to you, but I really don't know what to say. I hope you will find a way to feel good about religion someday

[beatrice_otter]

She ... tried to use any family in the Bible (particularly the OT!) to claim that there's only one true family type? And particularly the Patriarchs and Matriarchs, who were polygamous? o.O

There are modern-style nuclear families (one wife, one husband, plus kids, each nuclear family living alone), but they are vanishingly rare. There are a few more monogamous families, but mostly embedded in systems where multiple generations lived together in the same household, so you lived with your grandparents, parents, husband, kids, brothers, sisters-in-law, cousins, nieces and nephews, etc. And there are quite a lot of polygamous families, and some levirate marriages, and some polygamous levirate marriages, etc., etc. To claim that there is only one true family type, you have to be really, really dedicated to ignoring most of what the Bible actually says on the subject of family. And I say this as a pastor-in-training

[elizabeth_hoot]

I'm personally agnostic, but I've always liked the Bible, so looking at the sheer quantity of types of marriage and then shoving that into a post-WWII box of What Family Is just bewilders me. Honestly, I think that a whole ton of the Bible has to be ignored for a lot of what I was taught, growing up. And particularly modern takes on Jesus are ... very disconcerting. And very ahistorical, IMO.

Thank you about the proposal - I dreaded it for months on end for that very reason but, since I wanted this to be a retelling and not an .... AU-AU, I needed to have it. Hence the not-proposal!

Oh, and thank you about my fic! I've recc'd yours a few places, so it's very flattering. :)

I wrote a ton of Austen fic back in the day and have quite a few SW stories, too, but there are a few for other fandoms. The rest of FI and all but the very most recent of mine are up on AO3 here. I am also a compulsive tagger, so the fic I post here (apart from au_bigbangs, I almost always post here first) should be under this tag.

[beatrice_otter]

Aha! I have found First Impressions at AO3, and therefore know your name there and can find your fic easily.

[elizabeth_hoot]

Heeeeh, I am clearly not quick enough!