This semester, I'm teaching a class on new religious movements and other kinds of religious innovation in the U.S. Over the past couple of weeks we've been reading about a variety of subjects related to how charismatic religious groups relate to outsiders: boundary maintenance and negative feedback, violence, relations with law enforcement, religious freedom jurisprudence, and anticult movements. And then all of a sudden, apopros to things we've been reading about, the Texas state government and the FBI launched the still unfolding raid on the FLDS compound in Eldorado.
I'm not personally inclined to be very sympathetic to the FLDS, but I have been taken aback by what seems an exaggerated, heavy-handed reaction on the part of government. All the community's children taken into state custody? Cadaver-sniffing dogs?! I could end up eating crow, of course, depending on what the raid uncovers, and there's no question that Texas protective services needed to do something in response to the phone call they received alleging physical abuse. (The FLDS appear considerably more concerned about rallying around the accused man and making speeches about religious persecution than they do about expressing concern for the girl and investigating the possibility of abuse.) But I have strong suspicions that underlying this raid is hysteria related to a set of problematic presuppositions that come into play when the FLDS are labelled a "cult": that the group is prone to violence and that members are brainwashed or terrorized or are otherwise not acting as free agents.
Anyway, I wanted to have a discussion with my students about the raid, given its relevance to issues we've been talking about in class. I hoped the raid—and the taking of the children especially—could drive home vividly what's at stake in these issues. I was concerned, though, about whether my own passion about the subject would tend to silence students rather than draw them out—and whether I'd be able to stay coherent or whether my mind and mouth would start jumping all over the place, given how many different issues are involved and all the ways they intersect and connect with one another.
Long story short, I prayed for help on my way in to campus this morning. When I got to the classroom, I sat at the side of the room instead of in front, like I normally do, and had everyone pull their chairs into a tight circle to signal that I wanted this to be a different kind of discussion, more heavily student-involved, destabilizing my own authority as teacher. I tried to clearly subjectivize my own views by laying out some of my own investments in a way I don't normally do (letting them know that my own religious convictions are liberal and therefore I'm naturally inclined to take a dim view of a movement like the FLDS, which is radically conservative in key ways, while at the same time I feel a professional obligation to work against my own biases; articulating my ambivalence about some of the positions taken in our recent readings). I noticed students exchanging glances as I was getting started—"What's this about? Where's this going?" But it ended up being by far our most engaged discussion of the semester, with the greatest number of students participating. I asked them to dispense with raising hands today—just dive in—to keep the discussion flowing more freely between students instead of back and forth to and from me. Lots of views were expressed; students were in conversation with one another; I was detached enough from my own feelings to articulate different perspectives on the issues to keep throwing new light on things.
When it was over, I went to catch my bus home and sat at the stop feeling the rush of a great class session. I haven't felt that in my teaching lately as often as I used to when I was a writing instructor, or when I was teaching ESL night classes. Leading discussions—as opposed to a more performative style of teaching—is hard for me. And as I sat at the bus stop, I thought: I need to give thanks to God for this discussion. And I wanted to do it extravagantly, which meant I wanted to do it publicly. So here goes.
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God of light, Lord of reason, Spirit of truth—
I give thanks for the discussion I led in my class today.
I probably shouldn't even say "I led."
I give thanks for the discussion my students and I had today.
I give thanks that they felt able and emboldened to speak.
I give thanks that the conversation circulated as freely among them as it did.
I give thanks that I articulated what I felt moved to say as clearly as I did.
Thank you for guiding me, both in my planning beforehand and "in the very hour."
I hope that students found the conversation fruitful and thought-provoking.
I pray that it will continue to work in their minds, to deepen their grasp of the issues we've been reading about and their implications.
I pray that today's conversation will help them write better, more sophisticated final exam essays.
I pray for the children who have been taken from the FLDS compound.
I pray that the courts will make wise, just, humane, measured decisions about those children's futures.
I pray for appropriate restraint on the part of government officials as they work to protect the vulnerable.
I pray for a spirit of reason to be shed abroad: in media coverage and commentary, among law enforcement, in public opinion, and among the FLDS.
I pray for FLDS who may be experiencing physical or emotional harm, whose experience in that religious community may involve fear, or doubt, or a sense of being trapped or coerced.
In Christ's name, amen.
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3 comments:
the utah attorney general this “caiaphas shurtleff” got the legislature of utah to raise the age in utah from 14 to 15 because he knew this would allow the law enforcemtn to persecute the people whose religion he opposes.
And what is the difference between 14 yo and 15 yo anyway. one day??
And i can verify that none of the polyg girls are sluts and none have taken the LBT (low back tattoo). this is why they are being persecuted.
the local govrenment devils want all girls to be whores and sluts like their own wives and daughters. It makes them feel inferior when they think of the pure polyg girls but have to look at their own tattooed up whorish women. to be honest, i sympathize with them. those ugly faded tattoos combined with the stench of cigerette butts is a romance killer for sure.
The comment left above is a strange one, but it does prompt me to clarify something. I realize looking back over my post that I didn't say anything about the issue of minors becoming wives and mothers, which has been a recurring theme among outraged commentators in the media (along with a sense of shock that teenagers are being married to much older men). The fact that the FLDS have been marrying girls at an illegally young age is no doubt a major factor in the state's decision to take custody of the community's children.
I would not support an argument that free exercise justifies the FLDS in flouting state laws governing the minimum marrying age (which in Texas is 16 in the absence of special authorization from the courts). If--as seems all but proven--the FLDS have flouted the law, they should be penalized accordingly. At the same time, I'm aware that norms governing the sexuality of people in their teens vary by historical epoch, by culture, and even from state to state within this country. Given a propensity in public discourse toward sexual hysteria, I'm inclined to be wary of automatically labelling the marriage of an adolescent as "abuse." (The APA took a similar line some years ago, sparking predictable, and unhelpful, public outrage.) Issues of adolescent consent are more complicated than most of the public discourse around FLDS marriage practices acknowledges. On the other hand, the marriage of adolescents clearly functions to restrict individual autonomy in ways that offend my modern sensibilities; and the marriage of adolescent girls to older men reflects and reinforces gender disparities that I likewise find offensive. But no simple mandate follows from my being offended by FLDS practices to how I think the state of Texas should be responding.
I know almost nothing about this polygamist sect but if everyone else has a right to have an opinion about them then I suppose that I (who visited their communities, spoke with them to the extent that they allowed it and spent many an hour researching them) have at least as much a right to an opinion as everyone else.
And my opinion is that we are witnessing the largest and most frightening act of government persecution of its citizens in our lifetime.
I don't give a fuck about these Mormons, their "way of life" or their funny beliefs, but they are being persecuted and having their rights violated to an extent I would have thought unimaginable in this country. By not protesting this enraging action, politicians everywhere - on both sides of the aisle - are getting the message that tiny minority communities can be harassed beyond reason... and with impunity.
One fine day, some years in the future, when we might find ourselves to be members of some non-right-thinking community whom everyone else considers "weird" because we don't think exactly as the masses do... and armed men come to kidnap our children in the name of the United States Government, we can look ourselves in the mirror and honestly say that we brought this upon ourselves. We were silent when the mocked and despised Mormons were having their worlds ripped apart and in doing so we gave those with "the money, the guns and the lawyers" all the emboldening they would ever need to continue to violently remake the world in their own image.
mnuez
www.mnuez.blogspot.com
P.S. I wrote of this subject before, including here http://mnuez.blogspot.com/2006/09/arrested-prophet-has-many-sons-but.html
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