Wednesday, April 11, 2007

A Fish Across My Butt

There is this pet-peeve that I have that has been gnawing on me for some time and it is this. How people sign their notes, messages, and letters of one kind of another. Since I have been involved with mostly Christian organizations for many years, the closure is usually something like: Jesus loves you, Blessings, In Christ, Your sister/brother in Christ, In His love, God Bless you,.....etc, etc. Well, I have been thinking about these closing remarks as some not so nice messages come through in some of the Yahoo forums I read (not to me, of course) and other places where folks communicate to each other like answering machines ending with, "Jesus loves you!" Knowing some of these people, I would think that Jesus would rather put them over His knee then give them the thumbs up for their "spreading the love" approach. So, what is my problem? Well, I am no angel either, to some extent I could very well be one needing a good thrashing at times, so how could I, with good conscience, sign my literature with something as saintly as: In Christ?

Part of this dilemma comes from my best buddy back in Houston, who told me once that her husband didn't want her to put any type of Christian paraphernalia on the family van, like a fish, or bumpersticker with "Jesus Loves You" on it because it puts a rather high responsibility on the driver to drive nice, not cutting folks off in a hurry, or beeping at slow-pokes (blue-hairs we like to call them). The thought here is that the person we cut off or beep at, or drive recklessly past could be a new, or not-yet Christian and see the fish or other Christian sign and see that as an example of a Christian not behaving very saintly. He didn't want that responsibility on himself because he knows he is not always an angel behind the wheel. That makes total sense to me.

So as a Catholic Christian, wearing a crucifix around her neck most of the time, even during times when I am not exactly the mild-mannered person that I should be; as I leave a room, I might as well have a fish across my butt for the world to see. What do I do?

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Don't be soo hard on yourself!
Ever hear of
"Let he who is without sin cast the first stone?"
::lining up for fish across my butt, too =:o :) ::

Ebeth said...

You are only too kind and I thank you.

Anonymous said...

My hubby said the same thing and wouldn't allow a sticker on our car. It was bad enought when we became Catholics and hung a Rosary from our rear-view mirror. Now we live in Germany and can't have anything on the car... we do hang our rosary though. Lot's of Catholics here in Germany!

Ebeth said...

Annie, Germany! My husband has relatives there in Munich who are Catholic as well.

Don't you just love a husband's wisdom, they are pretty smart when it comes right down to it.

Thanks for your comment!
Ebeth