The Fear of a Name

There’s this guy at work. I’ve talked about him before. So here’s what happened.

We were sitting at lunch and somebody brought up reality shows, then somebody mentioned Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. Then somebody mentioned this one episode where they build a new house for a family who had adopted 15 or so children, many of whom have various disabilities. (Note: Because I don’t know the details of this particular episode, from here on out I’ll be talking about it as a strictly hypothetical situation where a couple adopts 15 disabled/special needs children.) We all agreed that these were very good people and admired their selfless and loving actions towards these kids. I couldn’t help observing, however, that since a new house was apparently necessary, the parents seem to have taken on more than they could handle. I said that I thought it was a little irresponsible, both socially and personally, for them to have done that – the excess of children made it difficult for them to sufficiently care for each of them the way they needed and deserved.

Well, my fellow laborers thought that I was a heartless pig after this comment. They interpreted “irresponsible” as “bad parents” and when I said the parents couldn’t care for them efficiently, they thought I was saying they hadn’t done anything to better the kids’ lives. Now that was not at all my intention, but before I got the chance to explain that, someone (knowing my Christian faith) reminded me that Jesus tells us in the Bible to give up our worldly belongings, to pick up our cross. At this point, the guy I mentioned at the beginning of this story abruptly stood up and said, “Well, I’m leaving.” The very mention of the Bible made this guy leave the table and the conversation (which was a shame because he agreed with me about the parents). How does someone get to the point where the discomfort at the mention of a book is so great he has to remove himself from the conversation? It just baffled me.

After that, I pulled the guy who brought up the Bible and more fully explained my position – that is, that these people’s hearts were clearly in the right place, but that they were ultimately unable to give the kids the lives they deserved because they had adopted so dang many of them, and that that was ultimately irresponsible. I also mentioned that although we are told to pick up our crosses and are expected to suffer for Christ, the crosses we bear should not cause others to suffer on our behalf. We were cool.

But I still can’t get over that one guy. I mean, it’s consistent with so many other things about him – he doesn’t laugh at comedians, people who professionally make people laugh, because to him, “they’re all the same.” (He doesn’t even laugh at Demetri Martin. I mean, does a person who can’t laugh at Demetri Martin even have a soul?)

I guess I don’t really have anything more to say on the matter. It just confuses me how someone gets to that point. To be so worn out with the idea of religion, when you aren’t even exposed to it all that much. But then, my real question is probably more like how do we wear people out with religion before we even get the opportunity to expose them to spirituality?

Just things I’ve been thinking about.

(And by the way, if anyone disagrees with what I was saying about the hypothetically huge family, let me know, and I can try to explain myself a little better.)