Past Tense, Present Progressive

Growing up exclusively within fundamentalist and Christian Patriarchy circles, I only heard about two kinds of parents: "godly" parents who spanked their kids, and "worldly" parents who let their kids run wild.  As usual, there was no middle ground and no ability to adapt the method to fit the parents or the child. Now, as an ex-fundamentalist parent , I'm learning to dig up and reject false dichotomies like this one that were deeply ingrained in my thinking.  I'm starting to develop a perspective of parenting that is less simplistic, more balanced, and more informed by child psychology, biology, linguistics, and statistics. There is a name for the perspective that resonates most with me: it's called positive parenting or gentle parenting.  I'd like to share a couple of my favorite online articles on the topic with you, and I hope to find more good reading on the topic from your recommendations. Positive Parenting Is Not Permissive Parenting  ...

Sierra from The Phoenix and the Olive Branch has just started a very interesting series about sexuality, structured around survey questions of participants who were influenced in some way by fundamentalism or Christian Patriarchy.  It's very encouraging to see that people who grew up with the strictest beliefs about sexuality are capable of becoming more accepting and open-minded as adults.  I was very happy to be able to participate in the series; I hope you'll read it along with me and add your voice to the conversation! Sexuality Project: Sierra's Introduction to the Project Sexuality Project: The Participants' Introductions Sex Education and the Body, Q. 1 --feelings and attitudes toward your own body Sex Education and the Body, Q. 2 --dealing with puberty Sex Education and the Body, Q. 3, 4, 5 --sex education received from family, church, and reading Sex Education and the Body, Q. 6 --first time hear...

One of my favorite Christian bloggers, the Slacktivist , posted an excellent discussion on how access to information is changing Christianity.  It is very appropriately titled " The Evangelical Bubble Cannot Be Sustained , Part 1 and Part 2 ."  Here is a quote: To keep the insular bubble of the evangelical subculture intact has always required some defense mechanisms. “I slammed the encyclopedia shut,” Latebloomer writes, and then, as trained, she “mentally explained away the data as yet one more humanistic attack on God’s obvious truth.” That’s the standard 1-2 combination for those determined to defend the bubble: 1) Keep the walls up and the encyclopedia shut; 2) Inoculate against potential glimpses of “disruptive facts” that get past the perimeter with a mythology of conspiratorial persecution. But such defenses were never wholly effective, even in the past, when the media threatening to pop the bubble with disruptive truth-telling were mainly libraries and distant...