What an eventful week it has been. In case you spent the week stranded on a deserted island or have been out with the flu, one of the leaders of the Ordain Women movement was excommunicated from the LDS Church, the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld Judge Shelby's ruling overturning the gay marriage ban in Utah, and the United States Supreme Court ruled in favor of Hobby Lobby's challenge of the contraception mandate in Obamacare, among other things.
So many strong emotions about it all. So very many. And, sadly, a great deal of contention as a result.
Yesterday after church, I unfortunately found myself involved in a rather contentious conversation about one of these topics, and it was a horrible, ugly, empty feeling. It was not a situation I had sought out nor one I was happy to be a part of, and I'm embarrassed for both myself and my friend's sake that it ever occurred.
Your very own Angry White Loner has blogged about this friend before. He's one of those people who, as President Hinckley once said, has left the Church but cannot leave it alone. He also seemingly falls into the category, as one institute teacher of mine called it, of "toxic personalities"—people who are impossible to please and who place the burden of their happiness on everyone and everything else around them. On everyone else, that is, but themselves.
After this conversation ended, I made the decision to unfriend this person from Facebook—that is, until I discovered that he had unfriended me first. Well, so be it.
This doesn't mean I will go out in public in disguise just to avoid this person, nor will I rev the engine of my car like Cruella DeVil should I see him crossing the street. In fact, I told him I hoped we could meet someday and that I could take him to lunch so that we could talk things over in person. I also told him I would be praying for him and that I would look for him at future social activities involving others of our age/married status.Nevertheless, cutting ties with this person on social media, which is far too intertwined in all of our lives, was the right thing to do—for me, at least. Even the great Nephi reached a point that he had to move far away from his brothers Laman and Lemuel, because it had become dangerous for him to remain in their presence—both physically and spiritually. He still loved and forgave his brothers, yet he and his crew packed up and got the heck outta there.
At the same time, my heart breaks for this friend. The bitterness inside him has grown like a cancer, and he seems not to see it in himself. He has lost his testimony, has left the Church, and has replaced it with . . . apparently only vitriol, hatred, cynicism, blame, and, above all, misery.
What do you do with a friend like that? I don't know. But I'm going to figure it out, one day at a time.
In the meantime, I'm going to rededicate myself to accentuating the positive. Even an Angry White Loner can work at this. In spite of the whirlwind that the last week was, there is still goodness and beauty out there to be sought after, as we read about in the 13th Article of Faith. I'm glad to have you who are reading this as friends, because you more than likely wouldn't be reading it if you didn't consider yourself to be a friend of mine. Otherwise, I would just be some plumb loco quack philosophizing into the nameless void. And that, if it were true, would be utterly ridiculous.
I'm grateful to be surrounded by so many people who build up rather than tear down, which is what real friends do and is also, in its essence, what the gospel of Jesus Christ is all about. I'm grateful to have the opportunity to work on improving my own weaknesses and imperfections, some of which were made all too clear to me recently.
I'm a work in progress. We all are. How lucky I am to have such good friends along with me to enjoy the ups and downs of the ride.
It is very hard to cut those ties sometimes, especially if they have been a good, solid friend in the past. but there are times that it must be done. I had to make that call a year and a half ago, for the same reasons. A former dear friend had become bitter, spiteful, full of anger and vitriol. Had left the church, come back and left again, and was starting to tell me i was stupid and naive for maintaining my beliefs. There was much I was willing to put up with, and then the talk started turning threatening. That day all ties were cut on my end. I sent out one last communication stating why I was no longer able to allow this person in my life, wished them the best with their life, hoped that one day, years from now, they'd understand and things would change enough that maybe we could again be friends, but that it wasn't going to happen any time soon. Lines had been crossed. I have received several angry missives since then, which has re-enforced that I made the right decision, no matter how hard. A year and a half later, I still miss the friend I once had, but I do not miss what that friend had become. Our lives can be hard and complicated enough without inviting avoidable contention.
ReplyDeleteso, hugs and support from me :)
Thanks, Davina. Sounds like we have had a very similar experience.
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