So question to all of you parents out there: When is it okay for a non-parent person, me, step in and do some parenting? Let me give you an example: This past Friday night my mother and I were stopping at a store/restaurant to grab some dinner. We were at the end of the line and there was a couple that had three boys I'd say age 7 and younger that were running around getting into everything. The oldest two boys decided to run and jump at a lady, causing her to fall. This woman clearly had a medical diagnosis that limited her mobility. The boys did not say anything to the woman and went to playing in the cold display case. After helping the lady up and making sure she was okay my mother and I looked to see if the parents were handling the situation. They were not, they were choosing to ignore their children's actions, who by this point were playing with glass drink bottles. Needless to say my mother and I had had enough and asked the two oldest boys to leave the drinks alone and to please find their parents. The boys looked at us and we repeated ourselves. The boys left, of course said how mean we were to their parents and then enjoyed a dinner full of glares and finger pointing followed by "that's the lady who was mean to me." Let me also say that the parents nor the children never went to apologize to the lady who got knocked down. Did I over step my boundaries? I don't think I did because that was wrong of the boys. I believe it was wrong of the parents to 1) allow their children to run muck in the store and then 2) not make them apologize for knocking someone down and possibly causing major harm. The staff of the restaurant later thanked us for stepping in. I by chance ran into the lady who got knocked down and her husband two days later and they thanked me for my help and for redirecting the children. But is it so wrong to step in and do parenting when clearly it's not happening in a situation? Did I really deserve the glares and finger pointing? I don't think I did but then again I'm not a parent so I'm not sure.
In a conversation with a more conservative Christian then me (take in mind I call myself a bed-wetting liberal and I’m also a big time Process Theologian) the person started rambling off scripture quotes (proof texting really) to make a point. I have never claimed to be a great memorizer of anything. And even though I have read the Bible many times and own many copies of the Bible, I am still not a person who can just pull out scripture references in mid conversation. I do have several verses that I turn to and love dearly but I can’t tell you word for word what John 2:5 or Ruth 1:4 says. This got me thinking, why do Christians really feel the need to qualify their faith based on the amount of scripture that they can recite from memory? While it may be very handy to be able to quote scripture in a variety of situations, I believe that this can be dangerous. Proof texting (pulling scripture, from any religion, to support an argument without careful and learned consideration for its cont
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