[Faith-talk] update on my friend in Iowa

Maureen Pranghofer maureensmusic at comcast.net
Tue Jan 20 20:54:33 UTC 2015


Hi
You're right on.  Thanks for the good post.
Maureen


-----Original Message----- 
From: Brandon A. Olivares via Faith-talk
Sent: Tuesday, January 20, 2015 1:00 AM
To: Debby Phillips
Cc: Faith-talk,for the discussion of faith and religion
Subject: Re: [Faith-talk] update on my friend in Iowa

Debby, yes you are right. But the manner you go about doing such is vital. 
Again I don’t want to discuss the specific situation because it’s been 
discouraged here, but simply the reaction. And the coldness and even 
harshness I witness just doesn’t seem loving. Again of course there is a 
right way of going about things, but no matter what, I think we all, 
Christians or non-Christians, are called to approach it in a loving way. I 
have no doubt that that’s exactly how you do it, because that’s the type of 
person you appear to be. But regardless, it’s something for us all to 
consider.

I’ll give an example, just to try to separate the discussion from its origin 
a bit. Christine and I know someone who we believed needed advocacy. His 
family told us that he was being refused services. Initially we went in 
assuming they were right and didn’t simply have blinders on. We tried to get 
him help, even got to know him on a personal level a bit. But as we did so, 
we got more information about that situation. He had a low IQ, so his 
educational requirements were quite different. The services he was 
attempting to receive wasn’t fitted to his circumstances and cognitive 
abilities. His family still refuses to see that, but so be it.

Anyway, point being, we still did our best to approach him and his family 
with love and concern. We explained the best we could the reasons he wasn’t 
meeting with success in the avenues he was pursuing, and suggested some 
alternatives. Sometimes we had to set boundaries, because he would call all 
hours of the day and night, and so that was something we had to deal with 
respectfully. But my point is, we didn’t just turn a cold shoulder. We got 
the information we had to, and proceeded accordingly, as objectively as we 
possibly could. And we set the limits that had to be set.

There are always two sides to every story, but neither side is generally 
totally unwarranted. Each side has its valid points. So we can’t just turn a 
cold shoulder and say that’s it. As civilized human beings, we need to help 
how we can and back off where necessary, all of it done as much as is 
possible with love and compassion.

Love has many different faces. Sometimes it is accepting. Sometimes it is 
rejecting. Sometimes it is sympathetic. Sometimes it doesn’t allow for 
excuses. But you can always tell what’s really underneath it all. That’s 
just my point.

---
Peace,
Brandon

Awaken To Silence <http://www.awakentosilence.org/>: Awaken To The Silence 
That Has Always Been Within You

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> On Jan 19, 2015, at 11:05 PM, Debby Phillips <semisweetdebby at gmail.com> 
> wrote:
>
> Brandon, were you asking this of RJ or or everyone? I will tell you this. 
> I do, as a Christian believe in advocacy, but the person who needs the 
> advocacy needs to be part of the process, ask me, or accept my invitation 
> to help, but they must also be involved in the process.  Often when Jesus 
> healed people he told them to pick up their mat and go home, or similar 
> things.  Jesus once asked the man laying beside the pool at Bethesda, "Do 
> you want to be healed?" That struck me as very interesting.  Because I 
> think if that guy had said, no, I don't want to be healed, Jesus would 
> have left him right where he was.  As it is, the guy said, "When the 
> angels come to trouble the water I don't have anybody to help me into the 
> pool." I believe in advocacy, but I do not believe that we should just 
> walk roughshod over people's feelings and desires.  Now, when people have 
> no voice, because they cannot even speak for themselves enough to say they 
> want help, that's a little different.  I will tell you, without going into 
> all the nasty details, that my husband's family is in the midst of just 
> such a thing, and I'm involved in it as much as I can.  If I had my way, 
> I'd be doing some face to face confrontation, and I'd probably mess 
> everything up.  Sometimes you have to be careful about how you do things. 
> I can't just go in with guns blazing (not literally).  But you know what I 
> mean.  And I might make things worse by doing so.  So I'll do what I can 
> in the background, and if I feel that the time has come to confront, I 
> will.  But for now, I'm letting the process go forward in a legal manner. 
> Peace,    Debby and Neena

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