Religion and reality

I've been reading Sam Harris's book Letter to a Christian Nation. I read it a few years ago but decided to pick it up again. It's funny how different things jump out at you when you're in a different place in your life. When I read the paragraph below it screamed adoption at me.

"One of the most pernicious effects of religion is that it tends to divorce morality from the reality of human and animal suffering. Religion allows people to imagine that their concerns are moral when they are not - that is, when they have nothing to do with suffering or its alleviation. Indeed, religion allows people to imagine that their concerns are moral when they are highly immoral - that is, when pressing these concerns inflicts unnecessary and appalling suffering on innocent human beings."

The zeal of the religious to stop abortion may make them appear to be coming from a morally superior place - in the eyes of other religious people anyway. For many the morally correct stance is not to allow contraception. Then add to the list the abstinence only education for teens who are dealing with raging hormones and there you have the mix that creates the perfect environment for the religious to press their concerns and push the adoption agenda. Talk about inflicting unnecessary and appalling suffering on innocents! The unwavering faith in what the religious authority has to say allows people to simply wear blinders when it comes to the results of following those dictates. Why else would the BSE be allowed to be continued for so long? How could people who are normally loving and compassionate people, be duped into believing that sending girls away and forcing them to live without their children is the best solution for an unplanned pregnancy? So many people claimed that family is everything yet could send their pregnant daughters to go live among strangers to deal with such a traumatic experience on their own. That is truly a divorce from reality. The sad thing is these attitudes still continue today which is why adoption in it's hideous form still continues today.

"You believe that your religious concerns about sex, in all their tiresome immensity, have something to do with morality. And yet, your efforts to constrain the sexual behavior of consenting adults - and even to discourage your own sons and daughters from having premarital sex - are almost never geared toward the relief of human suffering. In fact, relieving suffering seems to rank rather low on your list of priorities. Your principal concern appears to be that the creator of the universe will take offense at something people do while naked. This prudery of yours contributes daily to the surplus of human misery."

This is the shame that created so much pain for so many millions. This belief, combined with the idea that only a married couple - defined as one man and one woman - is capable of raising healthy children, continues to cause pain for many more adults and children. This is another huge divorce from reality. Sadly many women are still raised in these beliefs and think they're doing the right thing when they hand over their babies for others to raise. It's only after the fact, and sometimes decades after the fact, that they wake up from the delusion of  "adoption is wonderful". In the meantime their children are living with the day to day reality of being an adoptee. The trickle down consequences of adoption continues for generations and it all stems from the belief that sex without a certificate of marriage is bad.

If the religious were really pro-life they would welcome new life regardless of the marital status of the mother. If they were really pro-life they would do all in their power to keep sacred the bond between a mother and her child. If they were really pro-life they would make sure that a new child is taken care of within their own natural family. If they were really pro-life they would do all in their power to prevent the suffering of living human beings, not just blastocysts. The suffering caused by adoption is immense yet the blinders are still on thanks to the immense power of religion to turn something natural and beautiful into something dirty and shameful. Equally as shameful is the adoption industry that uses people's beliefs in these ideas against them in order to acquire babies to sell and line their pockets with the cash.

Reflect Here

"To the women who worked in the Magdalen Laundry Institutions and to the children born to some of the members of those communities ~ reflect here upon their lives"

The above paragraph is taken from a plaque that's mounted at a convent in Ireland. Many of you know of the Magdalen laundries but unfortunately too many people have no idea these places existed. For the estimated 30,000 women and children who passed through those convents in the 150 year history of the laundries, their stories should be told.... and told.

I worked in my studio all weekend and I think I've finally finished this piece. It's in memory of the Magdalens. As you know I'm working on a series of paintings about adoption and in the course of my research I learned about the laundries. When I learned of this the first thing that came to mind was -it's just a matter of geography.

It's simply a matter of geography that I didn't end up in one of those laundries. I was raised Catholic. So were these girls in Ireland. I was pregnant without being married. So were the girls in Ireland. The last of these laundries didn't close until 1996, my daughter was born in 1980. The girls who were there because they were pregnant had their children taken from them at birth. The same happened to me. What the geography did save me from is the physical abuse - the long hours of servitude and the beatings. For that I'm thankful.

It wasn't that long ago that women and children were being treated as slaves, and in some countries, it's still happening. Why were they treated this way? For the simple reason that they were human, they were female and they were not allowed to experience that which is perfectly natural. If she did, and if she carried the evidence of her actions for all to see, she must be hidden and punished. Some became prisoners because they were deemed too pretty - how dare they, they might attract the attention of some poor boy who can't be trusted to control his urges. We must save him from himself by punishing the girls. Some were forced to work as servants because they were raped. Again, where was the boy's responsibility in this. It was all her fault so she was to be locked up until she was purified of her sin, or until a male relative came to get her released. For some, the day of their release never came. They lived their entire lives there in the convents and there they died. They lived their lives being abused by the very people who proclaimed to live for God's love and were supposed to be expressing God's love. I included the image of a pope's mitre in the painting because as the leader of the Roman Catholic Church he is the head of state of Vatican City and as such the crimes of the Magdalen Laundries are on his head and the heads of the popes before him.

Today, as I was on my way home from the store, I passed a church sign that said "Flee from sexual immorality". Flee? I found that kind of humorous. Are we to run screaming in the opposite direction? And what exactly are we to flee from, who's definition of sexual immorality? Who gets to decide what is moral behavior and what isn't? We are sexual beings, it's just a fact of biology. We express our love for each other in a physical way. Can't we decide for ourselves what is sexually healthy? Can't we base those decisions on our own judgements and not take the word of another human who may or may not have their own hang ups about it? I think our inner compass is perfectly capable of figuring out what's right and wrong without blindly following the dogma set down by the men of centuries past.

Some of you may be familiar with Stephen Fry, the actor and comedian. Last year he spoke eloquently at a debate about whether or not the Catholic Church was a force for good in the world. In part of his talk he was referencing the church's teachings on homosexuality, AIDS and the use of condoms but I thought what he said was also relevant here.

"It's the strange thing about this church, it's obsessed with sex, absolutely obsessed. They will say we with our permissive society and rude jokes are obsessed. No, we have a healthy attitude. We like it, it's fun, it's jolly. Because it's a primary impulse it can be dangerous and dark and difficult. It's a bit like food in that respect only even more exciting. The only people who are obsessed with food are anorexics and the morbidly obese and that in erotic terms is the Catholic Church in a nutshell."

The tragedy of the laundries is a result of a cruel society and a harsh, judgemental church. When will people move beyond this? When will churches stop shaming people for simply being human?