A Close Encounter of the Furry Kind

A few weeks back we joined several friends and participated in the ALS Walk to raise funds for research into the crippling fatal disease (one of our friends is currently battling the illness.) Thousands of people showed up in support of friends and loved ones whose lives had been impacted by the condition. As we gathered with our friends in preparation for the walk, garbed in our matching blue T-shirts, we noticed another group gathering in completely different attire, a group of Furries.

There were about 50 of them, and their costumes were extravagant. Most wore full body outfits, coming as dogs, cats, birds, and cartoon dragons. (I would say it looked like a convention of college mascots except for the fact that college mascots don’t tend to be anime in appearance.)

When the walk began they were at the front, selfie sticks in hand, paw, or claw, and they all walked together. I assumed that were walking in remembrance of a Furry friend who had died from the disease. After the completion of the walk they again huddled together, arms around each other, in a large circle, hugging and consoling one another.

When we completed the walk my wife and I went over to a nearby food truck to get a drink and some breakfast. While we were in a line one of the Furries got in line behind us. He/she/it had apparently broken off from the herd in search of sustenance. We did a very poor job of trying not to stare at the Furry as we bought our food, after receiving it we stood to the side as the Furry approached the counter. Its full body costume was adorned in white fur, topped with the head of a bird. Its beak was yellow-gold, with black fur around the eyes. On its back were two small wings. A tail went out from behind, arching back and up into the air. I think it was supposed to be a cartoon dragon.

“May I take your order?” said the man in the food truck. “Caw, Caw,” the Furry replied. The obviously confused food truck man repeated his question, and the furry cawed back the same reply. It then turned and walked away. Lisa and I looked at each other, and said in unison, “What the heck?” It was an unforgettable encounter with weirdness.

I went home that night and did what any red-blooded internet connected American would do. I googled “Furries.” In the Wikipedia entry on the subject I found a lot of information including this remarkable sentence-

Some furries identify as partly non-human: 35% say they do not feel 100% human (compared with 7% of non-furries), and 39% say they would be 0% human if they could (compared with 10% of non-furries).

What struck me was the word identify. The word has come to be very important in our culture, and has had a profound impact on our politics and our social interactions. We live in a world where increasing emphasis is being placed on how people see themselves, with less emphasis on what they actually are. 

The Furry phenomenon allows us to step back and consider the ramifications of this societal change. As is often the case, taking a thought or process to its extreme can provide important context. Furry identification as part-animal represents such an extreme of self-identification. One can rightly ask, “How much deference and respect am I required to give to someone who identifies as a dog?”

I have first-hand experience with this scenario. When my son was two he went through a dog stage. He was obsessed with the movie 101 Dalmatians. My wife made him a spotted costume for Halloween and he wore it all of the time. When he wore it he went into full dog mode he would often answer our questions with “woof.” It was cute, but after a while it became annoying.

While we tolerated the behavior in our cute little son, I don’t think anyone would expect us to tolerate the same behavior in an adult. It would be rather difficult to care for a patient who responded to my interview questions with barks or chirps!

As absurd as this extreme is, it is informative. It raises the question, “How far must we go to accommodate identity?” A question I will answer in an upcoming post.

Bart

There are no Steps to Success or Happiness

As with most people, I like clear directions. Tell me the steps to take and the boxes to check in order to achieve success and happiness and I will follow them. Unfortunately for me (and everyone else) life does not work that way.

This has not stopped people from trying. A quick search on Amazon for “steps to a happy marriage” results in books declaring marital bliss can be achieved in 4,5,7,8,9,10,12 or 50 steps. (Why would anyone would pick the 50 step process over the 4 step process?). Christian pastors have apparently imbibed the same Kool-Aid, as a Google search for “Sermon steps to a happy marriage” yielded links to sermons declaring 4,5,7,8,10,12, and 17 steps to happiness.

The tendency to search for a secret formula, the hidden recipe, or the magic steps seems to be deeply ingrained into human nature. Which is what made our study of Matthew 9 this last week so surprising. As we reviewed the actions of Jesus described in the passage it became clear to us- Jesus did not follow a process, He did not check boxes. He had a clear mission, but he did not have a set process for carrying it out.

Several healings are described in the passage. A paralyzed man, a dead girl, a hemorrhaging woman, two blind men and a demon oppressed mute boy. For two of them, Jesus says, “Your faith has made you well”, for the other three, no reference is made to their faith at all. Three of them are healed with a touch, the other two are not. Two of the healings occurred because the sick ones personally sought Jesus out, the other two the seeking was done by someone else on their behalf.

This seems to be characteristic of Jesus. There are several instances in which Jesus is described as healing blindness. In Matthew 9, the blind men called out to Jesus, and followed him, calling out to Him and asking for mercy. It seems that Jesus just kept walking, and that the men ultimately followed Jesus into the house where he was staying. It was only then and there that the men were healed. On another occasion, a blind man called out in the same fashion as Jesus passed by. That time Jesus stopped, acknowledged the man, spoke to him and healed him on the spot.

Similar examples abound in the New Testament. As we discussed the lack of pattern in Jesus’ actions we came to the conclusion that it seemed Jesus was intentionally varying his approach. In so doing he made it impossible for people to put their faith in a process. There is no set behavior that resulted in Jesus responding. The gospel accounts make it clear, it is the person, Jesus, who matters, not a process.

This is a lesson we all need to learn. We need to focus on Jesus, not on process. As my friend John joked Tuesday morning. “If we took away of the books in the Christian bookstore that offered check boxes and processes, the only book left would be the Bible!”

Bart

This is the third post in a series based on insights from my weekly Men’s Bible Study group. Faith based posts are typically shared midweek (this one was a little late), non-religious posts on the weekend. If you want to receive these posts in your email, click on the subscribe link on the page. Comments are always welcomed.

The Importance of Being Dad

A complete stranger sent me an email yesterday. In it she told me the story of how she was disowned by her father. She shared her grief and her pain, as well as her fears of how her father’s rejection might impact her daughter. She wrote to me because she had just read the blog post I wrote in 2014 about being disowned by my dad and felt I was someone who would understand her story.

I get similar emails several times a year from people who in desperation decide to search the internet for answers on dealing with the pain and sorrow of parental rejection. My post “The Day my Dad Disowned Me” is somehow at the top of the page when people enter “disowned by my father” on Google, and as a result over 13000 people have read the post. It still gets 300 hits a month 4 years after it was published.

Last month I received an email from a nurse in Los Angeles, asking me if I could call her about her struggles with her father’s rejection. She said she was looking for guidance and advice, but when I called her it was clear that she was looking more for validation and support. She needed someone to tell her she was okay.

With each message received I ask myself, “Why are people writing me, someone they have never met?” Is it that the post resonates with their own experience or does the fact that I am a doctor causes them to trust my expertise?Whatever the reason, the messages continue to come. Each one reminds me of the importance of fatherhood. Dads have the power to encourage and heal, as well as the power to tear down and destroy. This power does not seem to fade over time, as the messages I receive are from people in their 30’s, 40’s and 50’s. Many are dealing with the pain of being disowned years earlier.

This is a sobering reality, one every father needs to take seriously throughout their life. My children are now adults but my call to fatherhood has not gone away. It is evolving and changing, and I often struggle to understand what it means to be a dad of grown ups, but there is one thing of which I a certain. Being a dad will always be important. I need to love my kids, be there for them, and encourage them.

As I get older I am adding another task. It is my goal to encourage other men to step up to the plate and to excel at fatherhood. It is one of the main reasons I lead two men’s groups. If we are to solve the fatherhood crisis in our nation it must begin with dads encouraging dads. As so many emails have taught me, the cost of failure is simply too high.

• Bart

Jesus wasn't Doing it Wrong

“You’re doing it wrong!”

I always hate criticism, but I really hate being told I am doing things wrong when I know I am doing them right. When patients come in and try to “educate” me on why I should give them antibiotics for a cold or why vaccines are harmful the conversations seldom end well.  I am an imperfect person who occasionally makes mistakes and some questions are appropriate, but I have a hard time when people do not appreciate who I am and what I know.

It is one thing to challenge an experienced physician about how he practices medicine. It is a different thing altogether to challenge God about how He does religion. As foolish as this may seem, it is something Jesus experienced all of the time.

This week in our men’s study of Matthew 9 we reviewed the passage where the disciples of John the Baptist approached Jesus with the question, “How come your disciples don’t fast like we and the Pharisees do?” Implicit in their question was that they thought Jesus’ disciples should have been fasting and were less spiritual because they didn’t, and that as their teacher, Jesus should address the problem.

Jesus answer was interesting. Using the analogy of a wedding celebration, he said, “Can wedding guests mourn while the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast.” Matthew 9:15 ESV

In our study we paraphrased his response by saying, “If the purpose of fasting is to spiritually focus and draw near to God, why would you fast when God Incarnate was with you?”

In Jesus’ response, and in the verses that followed, Jesus made it clear that the old ways of religious thinking and acting were inadequate, and that things were different in the kingdom He was bringing. Jesus told a culture that celebrated external religiosity that their old ways and habits needed to be reexamined.

Lest there be any doubt, Jesus followed his words by acting in a way that was new and strange to them. He was approached by a religious leader whose daughter had just died. The grief-stricken man pleaded with the Savior, “Come and lay your hand on her, and she will live.”

The presumptuous request of the man would not have been lost on the audience. He was asking Jesus to touch his dead daughter. Touching a dead body would render a person spiritually unclean and barred from temple worship for 7 days. Religious teachers of that day would never do this. Being clean was too important.

Jesus was not like the other religious teachers. His actions revealed a different set of priorities, Matthew wrote that “Jesus rose and followed him, with His disciples.” Spiritual cleanness, shallow skin deep righteous, mattered little compared to the life of the girl and the love of her father. Jesus immediately went to see the child. (And ultimately healed her and brought her back to life.)

Jesus willingness to be considered “unclean” in service to others was further demonstrated as he traveled to see the dead child. As he walked along a woman with a “discharge of blood for twelve years came up behind him and touched the hem of his garment” believing that even this small touch of Jesus would be sufficient to heal.

As dramatic as it was for Jesus to be willing to go to the dead child, the woman’s actions similarly defied cultural explanation. Jesus’ decision to touch the child would be His, the resultant uncleanness His to bear, a consequence of his personal choice. The woman, ceremonially unclean and separated from others, had no right to render another unclean by her touch. The duration of uncleanness was shorter than that for touching a dead body (one day instead of seven) but her imposition of uncleanness onto a Rabbi, a religious teacher, was extremely inappropriate. No one would have faulted Jesus if he had taken offense at the woman’s actions. Jesus instead reacted with His characteristic grace. The woman was healed, and Jesus validated her by saying, “Your faith has made you well.”

In his words and responses Jesus demonstrated that serving God is about loving people, not about religious rituals. This lesson is still relevant today. We have a tendency to think we know “how it is done”, to rely on traditions and to judge others based on those traditions. When we do, we are no different than the Pharisees Jesus so often corrected.

Bart

Being Right, Doing Wrong

Doing the right thing has always been important to me. As my children grew up two of my most oft repeated sayings were, “Never count the cost of doing the right thing” and “The right thing and the easy thing are almost never the same thing.”

For most of my life doing right has been ego protective for me. I think it has a lot to do with my upbringing. I grew up in a highly critical home with mockery and put downs an essential part of my upbringing. Parental abuse can destroy self esteem and I defended myself against it by working hard to be and do the best I could. In my head I countered negativism by telling myself, “You did the right thing.”

This thought process has persisted throughout my adult life. At times it has led to me to stand alone, even against superiors who had the ability to harm me professionally. I could handle the thought of harmful repercussions, what I could not handle was facing myself in the mirror if I compromised my values. This commitment served me well in the vast majority of circumstances.

This commitment to doing right may sound noble but it isn’t. In many ways it was self-serving. There is more to doing right than being right.  Doing right isn’t just about what we do, it is about how we do it.

I was reminded of this last week when I made the mistake of reviewing old patient reviews online. While my reviews are for the most part very positive some of my older reviews are quite harsh. More than one patient described me as “arrogant” or “condescending.” As I read the reviews I came to a difficult realization. Some of these patients were probably right. I have no doubt that there were times that I was so focused on being right that I forgot to be kind, to listen carefully, to understand or to empathize. While my diagnosis and treatment plans may have been “right”, my incomplete communication and sense of compassion wasn’t. The reviews left me with a sense of sadness. I wish I had done better, had been better.

Reading these reviews left with a renewed commitment to not only do right, but to do rightly. At times this may involve treating patient fears and not just their symptoms. Other times it may require listening to unjustified criticism, responding to unreasonable demands or allowing unjustified anger to go unanswered. Being right does not give me the right to point out every wrong I see in others.

I am learning that I am called to not only be right, but to be righteous. As the prophet Micah so beautifully said, “He has shown you, O man, what is good and what the Lord requires of you- to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.” Mercy refers to treating people with kindness even when they are in the wrong. Humility leaves no room for arrogance when I am in the right and demands that I put the needs of others before my own.

By the grace of God I can say that I am a better man than I was many years ago. May he give me the grace to become a better man with each passing day.

Bart