There is approximately 13 days untill Christmas Eve as I write this and soon we will be entering a new year. Not everyone celebrates Christmas, it can be a high level anxiety holiday for some of us who are vulnerable and surely emotions run high this time of year if there are unfulfilled dreams or unresolved conflicts in our lives. The bible has given hope to many throughout the centuries, but we live in a world where even the good we find written in those pages can be used for self-fulfilling agendas or reasons, where those who truly see the person and meaning behind those pages, see beyond the hate that so many in today's world use it for. But I am not hear to use the bible to condemn sinners because I am one of them, and I'm sure the founders of the church felt the same way. In today's Protestant society there are some people who call themselves Christians who look down on the disenfranchised, instead of integrating us in their society. I am one of those people that this happens to on a regular basis, and like all bullying in our world, it hurts to be on the opposite end of the yard stick when all you are trying to do is be accepted in your society.
The stigma that I personally deal with is painful enough, but when the church uses it to puff themselves up and look down at us, we take it as if God is doing the abuse spiritually. There is a general attitude that those with a disability are less than human, it has always been this way. But I believe that those who are being put down by society or the church, obviously not all churches need to speak up, because we have a voice and it is about time that it get heard. I recently became a published author for the second book in a series called "Hearts Linked by Courage" published by IC Publishing, the author being The Canadian Mental Health Association York and South Simcoe. I have not suffered my whole life from this disease, but my illness is being treated. there is no cure for some forms of mental illness and the stigma that comes with this disease is hard enough to live with. But when people in authority use us to make point, by elevating themselves, it hurts the cause of the poor and outcast, and creates an environment of hate, and pride in the ones who are using us as a spiritual example.
We have come a long way in reducing mental health stigma, and what most people forget who do not have a diagnosis, is that mental health is a human problem, not just a problem relegated to one sect of our society. I think the majority of good hearted people get it, we really have come a long way, and this goes beyond political correctness into what does mental health really mean. There is a great true life story in the book that I mentioned earlier, where one of my fellow authors addresses what I am so poorly trying to say in her story. People suffering from mental illness, are no different from those not suffering. I remember very well my life and my memories, before, and I have the same soul (thoughts, will, and emotions) that I have always had, and that is why it hurts when people talk about us in ways that are demeaning and inflammatory
Like everyone else I dream, I love, I eat, I sleep, I pray, I believe in God, I have faith, I have hopes, I have emotions, I hurt, I have a body, I have a soul, I can hear, I can see, I can taste, I can touch, I can smell, and I can fall in love. I am just as much a human being as you are. thank you very much. It even feels funny writing these words, because I believe in a heaven and I believe in a hell just like a lot of you do. My desire as a Christian is to see God face to face, and to live my life here on earth in His Grace and Glory and favour, just like you do. What makes me different from you is nothing. Yes, it is true that God might be near to people like me, but even before, I believed in God, and God was and is still very close to me.
So if you are reading this, and you are saying to yourself that the disenfranchised are somehow less human than you, than think again. God came for all people, and the shepherds that the bible talks about on the night that Jesus the Christ was said to be born, were no less human than you and me. I am a Catholic, and in the Catholic church we like to think of faith as a mystery sometimes. There was something mysterious on the night that Jesus was said to be born in the bible, and that mystery is called faith. The angels announced the birth of the Saviour of the world, and God just so happened to choose some shepherds in the process. There was nothing special about the shepherds, and by the way the bible doesn't tell us why God chose them.
To me and the rest of the world, God is still a mystery and so is my faith in Him. Faith was never meant to be fully understood or explained. It is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen, and I believe real faith will always be that way. I thank God for my Catholic faith, and I believe.
The stigma that I personally deal with is painful enough, but when the church uses it to puff themselves up and look down at us, we take it as if God is doing the abuse spiritually. There is a general attitude that those with a disability are less than human, it has always been this way. But I believe that those who are being put down by society or the church, obviously not all churches need to speak up, because we have a voice and it is about time that it get heard. I recently became a published author for the second book in a series called "Hearts Linked by Courage" published by IC Publishing, the author being The Canadian Mental Health Association York and South Simcoe. I have not suffered my whole life from this disease, but my illness is being treated. there is no cure for some forms of mental illness and the stigma that comes with this disease is hard enough to live with. But when people in authority use us to make point, by elevating themselves, it hurts the cause of the poor and outcast, and creates an environment of hate, and pride in the ones who are using us as a spiritual example.
We have come a long way in reducing mental health stigma, and what most people forget who do not have a diagnosis, is that mental health is a human problem, not just a problem relegated to one sect of our society. I think the majority of good hearted people get it, we really have come a long way, and this goes beyond political correctness into what does mental health really mean. There is a great true life story in the book that I mentioned earlier, where one of my fellow authors addresses what I am so poorly trying to say in her story. People suffering from mental illness, are no different from those not suffering. I remember very well my life and my memories, before, and I have the same soul (thoughts, will, and emotions) that I have always had, and that is why it hurts when people talk about us in ways that are demeaning and inflammatory
Like everyone else I dream, I love, I eat, I sleep, I pray, I believe in God, I have faith, I have hopes, I have emotions, I hurt, I have a body, I have a soul, I can hear, I can see, I can taste, I can touch, I can smell, and I can fall in love. I am just as much a human being as you are. thank you very much. It even feels funny writing these words, because I believe in a heaven and I believe in a hell just like a lot of you do. My desire as a Christian is to see God face to face, and to live my life here on earth in His Grace and Glory and favour, just like you do. What makes me different from you is nothing. Yes, it is true that God might be near to people like me, but even before, I believed in God, and God was and is still very close to me.
So if you are reading this, and you are saying to yourself that the disenfranchised are somehow less human than you, than think again. God came for all people, and the shepherds that the bible talks about on the night that Jesus the Christ was said to be born, were no less human than you and me. I am a Catholic, and in the Catholic church we like to think of faith as a mystery sometimes. There was something mysterious on the night that Jesus was said to be born in the bible, and that mystery is called faith. The angels announced the birth of the Saviour of the world, and God just so happened to choose some shepherds in the process. There was nothing special about the shepherds, and by the way the bible doesn't tell us why God chose them.
To me and the rest of the world, God is still a mystery and so is my faith in Him. Faith was never meant to be fully understood or explained. It is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen, and I believe real faith will always be that way. I thank God for my Catholic faith, and I believe.
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