Abuse, addiction, Adult Child of an Alcoholic, Altruism, Consequences, Electronic Dance Music, music, Podcast, Recovery, Religion, Trauma

Experience.

I was recently interviewed by InRecovery magazine for a piece on active addiction (shameless plug alert: you should go read it and then leave a comment if you like)
https://inrecovery.com/journey-fun-abuse-dj-fm

Sometimes it just doesn’t feel real to me. I’ve never thought of myself someone whose experience or opinions should be held in high regard by anyone. I’m just one voice among billions. Granted, in the last few years I’ve had things like this published about my journey in recovery in various places. I’ve also been interviewed twice on the Klen & Sobr podcast which was amazing. If anything, I am not anonymous.

But still, I can’t believe that it’s me. I often scoff at the Tony Robbins types. They seem well-intentioned, yet I’m never able to trust whether they truly want to help their audience, or simply like hearing the sound of their own voice. All of this of course speaks volumes about my own insecurities. We are all a work in progress, but I’m no one’s guru.

I also watched “The Defiant Ones” on HBO last week, a 4-part documentary about Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre’s musical and business collaborations, and their long history in the music. I am impressed by their stories. Two guys who literally came from nothing and now sit atop what remains of the music business. The greater the risk you take, the greater the reward I suppose.

I want to say I’ve never been the “starving artist” type, but in truth I was once. Between 1996 and 1998 I wrote and recorded my first album “Breakup.” I was 23 and had limited access to recording equipment, so I had to go into an actual studio and work with a producer to bring my vision to life. Of course, that meant paying for the time – and the money which went to the studio meant money wasn’t going to rent or food.

In fact, I was 3 months behind on rent and had to borrow money from my recent ex-girlfriend to get caught up. I was eating the leftover food my roommates didn’t want, and when there was none of that I was eating microwave popcorn. It sucked. My hat’s off to anyone who quits their job and goes out on a limb for their art. It created an added level of stress that I simply couldn’t handle. I have been attempting to find balance between art and “career” ever since.

Fortunately, my producer was patient with me and he came from a similar musical background and similar tastes. He taught me everything I know. I paid as I could, and “Breakup” became DJ FM’s first album. So many lessons were learned, and so many good things came about as a result of that album. Most importantly I learned the most was that if you want to be a creator – a musician, an artist, a writer – your vision comes first. Like I said, I have never believed that my opinion or my voice mattered to anyone else. Music helped me realize that my voice at least had to matter to me.

I now have a sponsee. One. The only sponsee I’ve had in 8 years of my hit-or-miss recovery. We “worked” together for an entire year, in which he didn’t call and didn’t do any actual work. I was his sponsor in name only. He is from India, and in the process of becoming an American citizen – not an easy journey in the era of Trump. Still, he wasn’t doing the work, so I fired him.

And then he had to leave the country, simply so he could re-enter and get a new Visa. I felt like a piece of shit. This was about the time Trump was mobilizing his travel ban and even though India was not on the list of banned countries, I worried for my friend. Who knows what an authoritarian regime is capable of, even in the United States?

He reached out to me from his home country a few times. We chatted. He asked if I’d be his sponsor when he came back. I told him “we’ll see – it depends on whether someone else comes forward.” I really didn’t know if I wanted to be his sponsor. I was at a point of not caring, because he certainly didn’t seem to care that year I tried to sponsor him. I blamed myself for not being tough enough, not being interesting enough.

Of course, in my mind I know that’s ridiculous. You can only lead a horse to water. What they do from there is up to them, especially in recovery. Those who suffer from substance use disorder are some of the most stubborn and incorrigible people you’ll ever meet. Have you met me in-person?

What happened was remarkable. He came back to the US, and it was as if a fire had been lit beneath him. He asked me twice if I would be his sponsor, and I finally said yes. We have been working together and every time we meet, he thanks me for listening, thanks me for guiding him. I see my experience benefitting another.

The way I was raised, and after most of the trauma that took place in my early teenage years, I spent most of my first 36 years of life feeling like I’d been permanently punched in the gut by god. Alcohol and drugs eventually numbed the pain of that sad worldview, but what I’ve learned is this: your vision matters. Your experience matters. Your voice matters. I would’ve never understood this without recovery.

You have to believe in you, first.

addiction, Consequences, music, Recovery, Suicide, Trauma

Goodbye, CB.

This is Christy B, CB for short.

The picture above was taken at her birthday party in August 2006, several years before I first found recovery. We were both graphic designers and had worked for the same company – in the same office – for almost 3 years.

I learned last that Tuesday that she’d committed suicide.

It was completely unexpected, and a reality check for how fragile the human spirit is.

Two years prior to our meeting, I had moved to Baltimore, MD for a relationship and a job (really, just the relationship – the job was simply a means to an end). After 6 months, I’d lost both, and my drinking spiraled out of control. Then 9/11 happened, and I returned to North Carolina, tail tucked between my legs. Back in NC and living on unemployment, my drinking continued. I was about to go bankrupt, had been arrested for my first DUI, and was in a deep depression.

Fortunately, I found a job with a company in Wilmington, NC in August 2002. I moved there in haste simply to have enough money to live and go into credit counseling. Six months after moving, one of my oldest friends from college wrecked his car driving drunk and passed away. A year after that, the Wilmington company ended up going bankrupt. Things were looking up, I had managed to get back on my feet, and my license had been restored. But I needed a job – again. I felt like life simply wouldn’t cut me a break.

In It was December of 2003, fortune smiled on me and I started freelancing for an ad agency in Raleigh called AdStreet, and with the promise of a full-time job moved back to Raleigh and became roommates with an old high school friend. Raleigh is where I grew up, so for me it was a relief to be in familiar surroundings, with people and places I knew.

When I first started working for AdStreet, the company was headquartered in what was an old warehouse, with makeshift dividers and sheetrock put up to make it feel more like an office. The “art department” (four graphic designers, myself and Christy included) worked in a 15×15 room with terrible climate control. We were all in the trenches together though, and we couldn’t have been more different. Being a graphic designer in a smaller urban area is like that. Raleigh isn’t New York. You take what you can get, and you end up meeting pretty much everyone. Sure, I could’ve moved to New York – and it would’ve eaten me alive.

I went out drinking night after night with these people. I had a weekly residency at the hottest new lounge in Raleigh, and sometimes they would come out and dance. Of course, I didn’t think of it as “active addiction.” I was free. I was back home and making a living after 2 years of non-stop crisis. I was paying down my credit cards, paying my bills, doing what I needed to do. I was grateful to celebrate with my co-workers, and it was always legitimately fun. We joked, we laughed, we argued. We went to lunch together. As frustrating as it could be sometimes, I’ve never been closer to my co-workers, before or since.

As companies sometimes do, we bought a brand new building and moved into it. It was ill-advised – we could’ve stayed in the same place and done just fine. The two owners split after the move, and the company changed names. It would still be AdStreet to me, but things had changed.

Christy and I now shared an office alone. We introduced each other to new music, we joked about *really* random things. For instance, the time I’d found a factory sealed coffee creamer container that had no cream. We kept it and laughed about it daily. We shared each other’s personal struggles and occasionally got on each other’s nerves. We went to concerts together. One was a free VIP pass to see Coldplay in 2005, a band I would’ve never given a second about until I saw them live. Even better, all our food and drinks were free.

I ended up leaving AdStreet in 2006, but Christy and i stayed in touch. Once 2007 rolled around though, and I began experimenting with drugs other than alcohol, I left all my old friends behind.

Christy had her share of trouble to deal with in my absence. A series of bad boyfriends (one of them horrible), money issues, and a move to Austin, TX to “start anew.” Much like my move to Baltimore, it sounded like everything had fallen apart around her, so she “came home.” At a dinner in late 2013, after coming back from my relapse, she confided in me that her drinking had taken a turn for the worse. She said she now “got me” and understood on some level what it must’ve been like for me. I told her that if she thought she had a problem, I could help her. We never talked about it after that.

A year or two ago, she messaged me on Facebook. While the message seemed legit, it was somewhat incoherent and almost seemed like she was trying to express that she had feelings for me. We had never dated, and I certainly never saw her as anything other than a good friend. I asked repeatedly if she was alright, if she’d been drinking. I really didn’t need to ask – I knew.

That was the last time we talked, beyond commenting on one another’s Facebook posts.

And then last Tuesday, it was too late.

I want for it to not be too late. I don’t even know how she did it, or what tipped her over the edge. I don’t hold anger in my heart, I don’t blame or judge her. I’m simply sad, and I miss her.

The world is an emptier place without you CB.

If you can see me CB, you know everything now. You see everything I’ve thought and done. Yes, Barb and I were going out and kept it secret from virtually everyone. It was a wonderful few months. You know now. I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you.

Her nickname for me was “Johnny Dollar,” after an old beach music song her mother frequently played as a child.

I don’t know where you are, but I hope that your strong faith led you to the place you were promised.

And I hope it is a quiet place.

❤

addiction, Adult Child of an Alcoholic, Consequences, music, Recovery, Religion

The Codependent Love Songs of the 1970s.

I’ll be getting back to my sober DJ story soon enough, but for my first post of 2017 I wanted to share something a bit different.

Tommy Rosen, the founder of Recovery 2.0, shared a video on his Facebook page after his morning meditation which entailed pop culture, movies, the 1970s…the effect that those things have on children, and relates it to how he became an addict:

At first when he began talking about movies, he kinda lost me. I was thinking, whatever. Then he said something that made my jaw hit the floor. “You know what I grew with in the 1970s, if we’re really gonna be honest? I grew up with the codependent love songs of the 1970s.” Feels. (And doesn’t that sound like the title of one of those Time-Life greatest hits CDs?)

I remember the ballads, especially of the late 1970s/early 1980s. So many songs about unfulfilled and unrequited love. I remember hearing Dan Fogleberg’s “Same Old Lang Syne” as a 7 year old and crying…kids know. Kids understand more than you realize. I remember my mom teaching class late one night and not knowing when she would come home, and then hearing “Your Song” by Elton John. Balling. Missing my mom. (I was a sensitive little kid, I’ll admit. Not much has changed.)

I also remember the movies of the late 1970s and early 1980s. If you saw the animated movie “Watership Down” as a kid, you know what I’m talking about. The movie “Kramer vs. Kramer” with Dustin Hoffman came out in 1979, and from the clips I saw on HBO it seemed that divorce was an epic event, with a big soundtrack, courtroom drama, parents yelling at one another and at the judge. Anytime I met a kid in elementary school whose parents were divorced, I felt deeply sorry for them. I imagined them in court with their parents, watching it all go down, and then having to take sides.

And then my parents actually divorced. And there was unfulfilled love, and anger, and infidelity and substance use between them. But other than the relatively few fights I saw – bad as they were – it was a very quiet process from my perspective. My dad told me my mom was moving out while I was watching Saturday morning cartoons. I never once set foot in a courtroom, never talked with an attorney. In fact, my mom told me that she had me live with my father because she knew that she was incapable of taking care of a child – that she thought he would’ve been better for me.

Like drunkenness, I learned that divorce too was very, very different from what was portrayed in the media. I accepted my mom’s version of the story for a long time, until I myself found recovery. I saw men and women, young and old, who’d just recently had their children taken away because of alcohol and drugs. I watched them in 12-step meetings claw, and grasp at every straw they could to hang on to sobriety, to get visitation back, to get their kids back, to be in their lives again. These were, by-and-large, people who didn’t have educations, people who simply did the best they could with what they had, some with extensive criminal records. Never in all my life had I seen a parent fight harder for their children.

You see videos of mothers and fathers in war-torn countries being re-united with their children after being separated, after being refugees for a decade, two decades, with no hope of ever seeing them. And a miracle happens and they are reunited. They are falling on the floor in tears, and the children are too. Wailing, weeping as though their lives depended on it.

My mother and father were both highly educated people. If I’m to believe my mother, she was invited to join Mensa at one point. Neither had criminal records. Even with all that, I began to feel once again like I had been “given up,” in early recovery, at age 36 after over 20 years had passed. The feelings stay there. You can’t deal with them until you face them head on.

You have to wonder what kind of force is so powerful that it decimates the instinctual bond between a parent and child. It’s not alcohol, it’s not drugs. Those are just symptomatic. As Tommy is noted for saying (and I agree 100%), the root of addiction is trauma. The trauma that occurred in my mother’s life when she was young, which was in turn a result of trauma that her parents had, and so forth. At no point did anyone put the brakes on it, because our “no crying in baseball” culture doesn’t believe in feelings – talking about them, expressing them or recovering from them. One county in Georgia even banned schools from teaching mindfulness because of the influences of “eastern religion.”

Look at who we elected president, for god’s sake.

(no, we didn’t elect dan fogelberg)

When you experience divorce, suddenly everything that happened before you see through a new lens. Nothing was right, everything was wrong. Of course the whole thing fell apart. Dan Fogleberg was right. “She’d like to say she loved the man, but she didn’t like to lie.” And any happy song immediately became a lie. Hearing all those old songs made me even more emotional than they had when I was a kid, so my tastes gradually shifted away from even 1980s pop to the angriest, loudest music I could find. It was my only defense mechanism.

(the loudest, angriest music I could find…)

Alcohol and drugs came much later, because watching my mother did make me afraid of their power for a time. But I was addicted to all sorts of things before that. Credit cards. Relationships. Materialism. Even the anger that I carried with me I was addicted to, in a way, because it was mine. It was something no one could take from me. Like the NIN classic Head Like a Hole, “no you can’t take it, no you can’t take that away from me…head like a hole / black as your soul / I’d rather die than give you control.”

Tommy concludes with observations about the media our kids are seeing today… “I’m not even sure what’s going to happen to our children today…the jury is not in yet, we hope that we can get our kids excited about the magic of life without dooming them to… a life of seeking through the outside world to create some bizarre reality…” The jury is still out. We don’t know.

I agree with what Tommy is saying. I also agree that I am 100% percent responsible for my actions. I can’t blame anyone but myself for what I did in active addiction, and I certainly don’t blame pop culture. What I do believe is that art, music, and media are a lens into our culture, an expression of it’s own reality. It may seem bizarre, and frightening, much like the gangster rap of the early 1990s was to suburban parents. But our art tells a story about us.

And if it’s any indication of what we’re feeling as a culture, I give you a lyric from one of the most popular songs of 2016…by the Chainsmokers:

“I think I’m losing my mind now

It’s in my head, darling I hope

That you’ll be here, when I need you the most

So don’t let me, don’t let me, don’t let me down”

Adult Child of an Alcoholic, Altruism, Consequences, Election, Religion

On Trump, and Religion.

The election of Donald Trump has pretty much stopped me dead in my tracks from blogging about either music or recovery. I’ve had a few sleepless nights, like many folks, and am trying to come to terms with everything. In the week or so since, a lot has happened, so I’d like to focus on one particular event.

My girlfriend – one of the most kindhearted and non-confrontational people I have ever known – posed a question on her Facebook page (always a dangerous move) after the election. Essentially: how could a person who identified as a Christian support a candidate like Trump, whose hate-filled rhetoric ostensibly goes against everything Jesus taught?

Before going further, I have a history with Christianity that I need to come clean with.

–

Following my parents’ divorce, I became depressed. I was failing the 8th grade, I was shop-lifting, I was lying about everything. Rather than put me in therapy, my father and I started going to church (as much for him as for me). My dad has always hated doctors and I’m guessing this was the only solution he could understand or trust. In any case, when I turned 16 I began going to a different church with some of my friends. I wanted a church of my own to go to. I accepted Christ (i.e. “got saved”) at this church, and my freshman year in college I became a member.

The former pastor of that church had this to say in his blog, about his early experiences as a young minister founding a new church:

“While I was in the ministry, I was deeply troubled by the ability of otherwise intelligent people to tenaciously embrace beliefs that were patently absurd…For example, there were those who believed passionately that the world was only 6000 years old, despite incontrovertible evidence to the contrary. Others would walk confidently into my office and tell me that God had told them the future, making specific predictions that never came true. Undaunted, they would confidently make even more outlandish prognostications, ones that would eventually prove false, as well. Nevertheless, they still refused to re-examine their belief system…

The most salient example of this phenomenon was the small group of faith healing aficionados in the congregation. Some of them carried vials of olive oil with them to dab on the foreheads of ailing people before proclaiming them healed. When the “healed” person later died, they would simply move on to their next patient, insisting that death was a form of ultimate healing, one that ended all pain and suffering, and that their prayers had been answered after all. It amazed me how quickly (and conveniently) they forgot that their prayer had been for the person to be restored to health and go home to their jobs and families, not to be taken immediately to heaven. If they felt uncomfortable with this obvious discrepancy, they never said anything about it to me. Rather, when I questioned them about the effectiveness of their methods and the genuineness of their healings, they explained away the facts and doubted my faith.”

I experienced my own disillusionment within that church. While working as a youth field staffer, one of my responsibilities was phone duty. We maintained a list of all the kids who came to the church regularly, and tracked from week to week who was in attendance. If someone had been there the week before, but was absent that day, we were to call the number they provided us with to check up on them. I was about as good at cold-calling for Jesus as I was selling fruit for my high school marching band, and hated it to the core.

For that matter, so did most of the parents I called. They would say, “He/she is home. They didn’t want to go. Why are you bothering us?” And that’s a very pleasant way of rephrasing it. They would then ask to be removed from the list. In fact, most of the parents who left their kids with us didn’t seem too interested in whether or not it was religious in nature. They just wanted to get their kids out of the house for an hour or two and not be bothered.

I heard and saw this sentiment expressed over and over again by many of the kids I talked to – “kids” who were barely 3-4 years younger than I was. As if I had any business spiritually mentoring anyone at that point in my life. But I was the one they talked to. Everyone else told them to “read the bible.” I would actually tell them my *life experience* – what we call sharing our “experience, strength and hope” in 12-step recovery. Telling someone to “stick their nose in a book” is no different than Dr. Jan’s “I love you, go away” ACOA message. When you’re on the receiving end, it’s not easy to parse.

To be fair, the kids didn’t seem too unhappy to get out of the house. Quite a few of them would walk to the back of the building and smoke weed or do “whippets” – either aerosol cans from the grocery store, or whipped cream canisters containing N20 – which create a 30-60sec long “head-rush” when inhaled. Once, the youth pastor called the police on a kid. It was probably only the second time in my life I’d seen someone using substances other than alcohol. Behind a church. So much for being sheltered.

Then the youth leaders began to question my music choices. As I’ve said in previous blog entries, the early 1990s were a great time to be an angry young man. And legitimately, I had a lot to be angry about – I just kept up the illusion on the outside that I wasn’t in any pain. I attended bible study, church, did well in the classes I was motivated to do well in (really not too different from my attitude in high school). I’d pull up in the parking lot listening to Alice In Chains, or Pantera, or Slayer, or some of the early industrial rock I had discovered like KMFDM. Many of them would try to introduce me to Christian bands which were “soundalikes,” just with religious lyrics. I always preferred the old hymns, sung by a choir, played on an old pipe organ.

The final nail in that coffin was when a youth minister approached me after finding out I’d gone to Lollapalooza in 1993. She took me aside and told me, flat out, that she didn’t think Jesus would’ve gone with me. I was completely taken aback and enraged. I stopped wearing preppie clothes to field staff meetings. I started wearing my hair down instead of in a pony tail, started wearing my metal t-shirts, and kicked my feet up on chairs during the meetings. And then I simply stopped going. I think I might’ve mentioned to one of the other field staffers that I was contemplating it – but really I was there, and then i wasn’t.

My former pastor concludes his blog entry with this…
“But illusions need not be of a religious nature. As a pastor, I was merely in a position to observe closely the resistance to objective reality that existed in some devout people.”

What I began to see in the ensuing years was that “resistance to objective reality” becoming more and more widespread, specifically among devout people.

My father – a professor of counselor education – had in his toolkit a puppet called DUSO the Dolphin. DUSO was an acronym which stood for “Developing an Understanding of Self and Others.” For some reason I had this image of my dad sitting in an elementary classroom, talking to children with a hand-puppet. It always made me smile, thinking of him talking in funny voices and being kind to little kids. I don’t know if he ever actually did that, but it seems DUSO became a “desperate threat.” From the New York Times, 1993 (my sophomore year in college):

“The most frequently challenged curriculums in public schools across the country no longer involve sex-education programs or classic novels like “Lady Chatterly’s Lover,” according to a national anti-censorship organization. The new battlegrounds are elementary school self-esteem programs whose imaginary central characters include a blue dragon named Pumsy and a dolphin named Duso.

“Local groups, relying in many cases on information distributed by conservative religious organizations, have challenged “Pumsy in Pursuit of Excellence” in at least 35 school districts around the country, said Matt Freeman, a spokesman for People for the American Way.

“Uproar over the program, which is used in about 17,000 schools, has also provided a key issue for grass-roots religious organizations seeking to place their candidates on local school boards, Mr. Freeman said.

“Opponents of Pumsy and similar self-esteem programs, which in part are anti-drug measures and are thus mandated for districts receiving Federal money, contend that children are being introduced to Eastern religion, the occult, ‘New Age’ spiritualism and relaxation techniques they characterize as hypnosis.”

(Did you catch that? ANTI. DRUG. MEASURES. Take away a child’s ability to center, mediate and be at peace and they will be at-risk for drugs and alcohol, especially in poor neighborhoods. Of course, they’ll run right into the arms of the church when they’re desperate – which is exactly what was intended.)

It would be another 10 years (2003) before I’d ever darken the doors of a church again. I had lost a relationship and a job, was teetering on the verge of bankruptcy and desperate. I listened to what my father had always said, and found a new church home upon moving to a new city for a job. I had also just been convicted for the first time in my life of DUI, so if I’d been smart I would’ve chosen to go to a 12-step meeting and quit drinking. Instead, I stumbled upon another evangelical church whose members referred to themselves as “sippin’ saints.” It is no lie when they say that an alcoholic can find the drinkers anywhere they go.

This church had its own brand of extremism. In Bible studies one of the texts that was taught was “Answers in Genesis,” the Young-Earth Creationism program created by Ken Ham (yes, THE Ken Ham of the Bill Nye vs. Ken Ham debate back in 2014). Also, many of the churchgoers I ate Sunday lunch with would heckle the openly gay and lesbian couples they saw on the street. I could not abide this. I wouldn’t be a “jerk for Jesus,” nor would I hurl insults at people in whom I saw no wrongdoing.

After finding a job in my hometown a year and a half later, I moved back and haven’t attended a church since. I also got sober during that time and found a spiritual life far more rich, accepting and tolerant than any I found in an established “church.” I cannot over-emphasize how much of a role sobriety played in my becoming clear-headed.

————

Now that you understand my biases, I return to my girlfriend’s genuine Facebook post.

One of her former church friends posted the following rant in response (not edited for spelling, grammar or contradiction):
“It has been prophesied by many that this is where he [Trump] is supposed to be at this time. He is far from perfect as many Christians are. He did give his life to Christ several months back. The media and Hillary have made him out to be something he is not. The “racist”, “womanizer” & more. He is the closest candidate aligning with God’s wills. As paster Mike spoke about on Sunday. Abortion is not of God. That simple. She is for it. He is against it. We need real drastic change and Christians have been coming together and praying for it. He is going to bring it. Check out some prophecy videos online. Some recent and some dating back a ways. He wants people here legally. He wants to change our economy. He wants to protect our lives from terrorism. Unfortunately. . The majority of illegal immigrants are Hispanic. The majority of terrorism comes from Muslims. So we need drastic radical change. Its not going to happen over night and I feel he will give opportunities to become a citizen the right way…And the woman… not women.. he called all those names was only.. Rosie O’Donnell. That was many years ago after she bad mouthed him publicly…Rich Vera .. John Paul Jackson .. CK & Mike Thompson .. and Kat Kerr .. All well known prophets.. all said the same.”

My response:
“People are often subject to confirmation bias – the human tendency to use new information or evidence to give validation to our existing beliefs. It is no more evidence of God’s will than me running into the street and claiming that *i* had a vision. There is no such thing as prophesy – you have been sold a bill of goods by people attempting to profit on your sincere faith (of which I have no doubt). Jesus says it best in Matt 7:15-20 “Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes nor figs from thistles, are they? So every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So then, you will know them by their fruits…I promise you, not today, not next week, not even when Trump is sworn in…but soon, you’ll know him by his fruits. And when you do, see it for what it is, and don’t dismiss it. The message, the lesson, will be right there plain as day.”

Her response (verbatim):
“The prophets that have made these prophecies are not false prophets. Im sorry you have never had an encounter with the Holy Spirit to know that prophesy is very real and it is one of the 5 fold gifts of the spirit from God. These well known prophets all heard from God that Trump would be in the White House. Whatever preconceived notion that you have of Trump from the media is false, right along with a little less than half of this country. I have first hand seen prophesy come to pass…Trump is not a racist. He wants people here legally. That includes all races. Most illegals just happen to be Mexican. ALSO Muslim is not a race.. it is far fetched that he wants Muslims out.. but unfortunately.. the majority of terrorism comes from Muslims. sooo we got to do what we got to do to protect us.. The US.. The media made him look racist. Trump did not mock the reporters disability. Look it up!!!…Mainly.. Trump gave his life over to the Lord recently and thats what is most important. JUST WAIT and see.. you have no choice but to.. or you can just move out of the country :)”

For my girlfriend, this was not the end of the story. She plays piano for a small church (a paying gig for her, nothing to do with faith of any kind), and after the most recent service, an attendee who had seen her Facebook post approached her saying, “I’m one of the ‘basket of deplorables’ who voted for Trump” and proceeded to chastise her – despite the fact my girlfriend voted for neither Clinton nor Trump. She came home in tears after the service, and is now considering leaving the job.

My former “paster” from the 2nd church I attended also posted a snide comment on my timeline the day after the election, saying that now I would know how he’s “felt for the last eight years.” Take note, this is not a white working-class individual. This is a straight, white male who came from considerable privilege, who clearly also believes that Trump is the fulfillment of some modern-day prophesy.

“Or you can just move out of the country.” Smiley-face.

Go to hell and God bless.

This is what it’s come to. I love you, go away.

So I now pose my own question(s) for the religious right, those who voted for Trump despite his hateful rhetoric, despite his clearly immoral behavior (behavior which they’re all-to-happy to point out in candidates from other political parties), despite his clear love of money.

First, how do you account for the Apostle Paul’s statement to his followers in Romans 12:18?
“If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men.”

Live peaceably, with ALL human beings. Seems like a pretty clear message.

What about Matthew 5:9, one of Jesus’ beatitudes?
“Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.”

There’s that word peace again. And the people who make it seem to be pretty important!

Or what about Jesus driving the money-lenders from the temple in John 2:13-16:
“And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. And he told those who sold the pigeons, “Take these things away; do not make my Father’s house a house of trade.”

If you believe that Trump is prophesied to bring about the 2nd coming – a man who has been interviewed sitting on a throne of gold in his high-rise in Manhattan – then I hope you’re prepared to allow the money changers back in.

Because in my estimation, you too have betrayed your faith…and for far less than 30 pieces of silver.

My Last Stand.

Tag Archives: faith

Goodbye, CB.

On Trump, and Religion.