Skip to main content

Posts

The White Supremacists, Sovereign Citizen, Alleged Domestic Terrorist and Fundamental Baptist who was actually... M y  MOTHER!   She wasn’t’ really a terrorist-- at least not in any physical sense of the word.    ALTHOUGH, she could be a terror to dissenters in her own charming, devious ways.   A police officer/ friend of hers informed her that her name appeared on a domestic terrorist list. No doubt, it was due to her  active membership in a militant-type, 'patriot' group.  My Dear Mother was also vocally sympathetic to the extremest of the extreme groups, (think Ku Klux Klan) which seemed to share far too many common ideals with the Patriot group in which she was whole-heartily devoted and financially comitted. My petite, 5 ft. 2 in. mother had obviously been radicalized.  It actually began when she was a teen growing up deep in the heart of Sugar Land, Texas, but it was not evident in her religious/political ideologies until she was in her late...
Post a Comment
Read more
Recent posts
NOTE:  This is an older post I wrote 10 years ago this month and during Trump's first run for the presidency.  I  am now witnessing enough of the motivations I had suspected during his first presidency come to fruition in his second presidency, that I feel validated in those suspicions, unfortunately.  Whether anyone I expressed those suspicions to before have reconsidered, now that we have a second look at Trump's self-proclaimed intentions,It is apparent that more have actually reaffirmed their support of Trump.  I should know better by now.  I have seen the very same thing happen on a much smaller scale, with church being the setting.  My intention at this time is to reveal how my extreme, right-wing conservative political and fundamentalist Baptist history as a child, adult parent and as an aging adult has convinced me to  embrace a more authentic position on all those former dogmatic positions.  To those people I know, who have similar b...
Post a Comment
Read more

Fundamentalism and Family Trauma

Bunyon Oco Norris Painted by a good friend of his oldest daughter,  Pauline  My grandfather’s name was Bunyon Oco (Bill) Norris.  He is my mother’s father who influenced and directed the fundamental Baptist beliefs under which I was born and reared.  “Papaw” as he was known to his grandchildren, was named after John Bunyon (1628-1688), author of the Christian allegorical classic, “Pilgrim’s Progress” as well as several other controversial Puritan Christian writings.  Both of my grandparents left a profound influence on my life in very different ways, but my Papaw’s influence was the most penetrating because of his commanding, often invasive fundamental Baptist beliefs and his extreme conservative political positions.  My family lived in the house my parents had built on 2 ½ acres of property Papaw had sold them. It was right next to he and “Mamaw,’s” house—the house he built with his own hands. My mother lived there with them from her early teen years unt...
Post a Comment
Read more

And Now For Some Good Stuff

  It took us a long time after leaving to decide which of our former beliefs we still believed to be true and right, and which ones were just... crazy.   The illegitimate feelings of guilt and shame attached to all those beliefs and practices will probably plague us for life.     Although we immediately abandoned the most extreme standards we only practiced because they were required of us as leaders, plenty of them hung on for a while.   The reason it took so long probably had to do with the degree with which these regulations became a test of genuine spirituality. Why would any truly committed believer object to abiding by rules their preacher established to guard the ‘purity of his church?    This was the subject of many, many sermons.      The Preacher required all teachers and other leaders (including us) to sign a paper detailing rules we were expected to obey to continue in any leadership position. This included piano pl...
1 comment
Read more