Tuesday, July 30, 2013
De-escalating the Cycle of Fear
Kenetha J. Stanton writes that she grew up as a Christian fundamentalist “to the core.” In this article for Whosoever, an online magazine for LGBT Christians, she says: “As I continue to sit in this space of witnessing the worldviews of each side, I see so much legitimate fear from everyone involved. Fundamentalists fear the destruction of their faith, which has no room to bend. LGBT Christians fear mistreatment, injustice, and condemnation for not living within the rigid molds that others have created for us. Those are all real fears, but those fears are causing us to be even greater threats to one another, which just escalates the cycle. The only route to softening those fears is through compassion for the fear that the other is experiencing.” Learn more about Kenetha: Kenetha is a new member of EEWC-Christian Feminism Today and has many more words of wisdom and healing to share. Be sure to visit her website, A Kintsugi Life: Becoming strong at life’s broken places, where she talks about the Japanese art of Kintsugi, which “repairs broken pottery with seams of gold” in such a way that the pottery is made more beautiful than before it was broken. Kenetha sees this art as a fitting metaphor for a way of “dealing with the broken places that life gives all of us.”
