Crazy Faith, Adoption and Zombies

Brianne Bilyeu, , ,

Here are a couple of odd signs that have caught my attention over the past couple of days:

Seen on the back of a car in a parking lot.

Short version: No arguments here.

Deeper version: I think this might be a reference to Susan William Smith’s Crazy Faith: Ordinary People, Extraordinary Lives. According to one of the reviewers, the book “challenges ordinary people to let God use them for impossible tasks. Such submission requires “crazy faith,” knowing God will bring success even when the task seems impractical and illogical.”

*blink blink*

This is one of the many reason why I’m not religious. Tasks that seem impractical and illogical aren’t something in which I want to engage, well, ever. This is a repackaging of the idea that if you believe hard enough, you can make good things happen. This appropriation of the word “crazy” is not cool (I’d like to see the word fall out of use), and just because you admit something is “crazy” doesn’t justify that you’re doing it.

And what happens when Crazy Faithers (hey – that’s not me. They’re owning it, right?) fail at their impossible tasks? Spoilers: They don’t blame God for failing to hold up his end of the bargain; they blame themselves –> I must not have tried/prayed hard enough. God has other plans for me. God didn’t really want me to accomplish that, and  now I’ve finally realized that I was focusing on the wrong thing all along. Praise God for opening my eyes!

It also looks like Alison Krauss has a song by the same title; I’m not sure if there’s a relationship between the song and the book.

Orphans – No Fees!

Short version: No fees!? Are they frickin’ puppies? Can you imagine the conversation: “Oh, honey – can bring them home? They’re free!”

Deeper version: Are fees really something that are keeping people from adopting teenagers? And not just one something, but apparently the biggest something since that’s the only factor the sign is focusing on.

I know nothing about adoption practices and policies, and I’m not the target audience for this sign. So if fees really are the big thing that is keeping people from adopting teenagers then I thank the Hennepin County Adoption Program’s marketing department for teaching me something new. However, adopting a child seems like it would be a pretty big commitment that would necessitate a lot of planning. I would think that the fees which are part of the adoption process would be but one small item on the longer list of considerations when one is looking to adopt.

Have any of you adopted? Is this sign less ridiculous and potentially offensive than my initial impression?

And finally, the most awesome sign that I’ve seen this week: 

Giant inflatable advertisement for this weekend’s Zombie Pub Crawl on the corner of 35W South and Washington Avenue.

Short version: Duuuuuuuude!

Deeper version: http://zombiepubcrawl.com/2012/

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Crazy Faith, Adoption and Zombies

About the author

Thoughts from a Minneapolis-based nerdy, liberal, humanist progressive on topics such as science, skepticism, religion, atheism, critical thought, politics, and local and global humanitarian and equality efforts. Biodork <3's geek culture, groan-inducing puns, world travel, cultural exchange and sharing and listening to stories.
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232 thoughts on “Crazy Faith, Adoption and Zombies”

  1. ImaginesABeach
    Reply
    1

    It’s hard to find adoptive parents for teenagers. According to the Minnesota Department of Human Services website, currently around 400 children under State guardianship are waiting for families immediately. Most are between 6 – 18 years old, and many are part of sibling groups who need to be adopted together. If there is a family out there who has considered adopting an older child, but is thinking that they cannot afford it, maybe this is enough to have them look at it more seriously. And maybe just putting it out there is enough to make someone who has never considered adopting an older child think about it.

    I can’t come up with any argument that this is a bad thing.

  2. embraceyourinnercrone
    Reply
    2

    So sad that I don’t live in Minnesota! Cuz Zombies! And I couldn’t go to the Boston Zombie Run for your lives 5K either, maybe next year. http://www.runforyourlives.com/

    About the Crazy Faith, I prefer to call it Magical thinking, or “CLAP HARDER” it didn’t work because you don’t BELIEVE ENOUGH!

    As far as adoption is concerned my parents were long term foster parents and also adoptive parents, I don’t know the exact costs for adoption but judging from the Department of Children and Families web site it would probably run 500 -1000 dollars to cover legal fees and Home Study costs, in our state my parents did get help with some costs as they were adopting a older child with some health issues. I don’t know how it works everywhere. Most states in the US try not to separate siblings, which is good but it makes the adoption of older kids that much more unlikely if they are not only children.

  4. F
    Reply
    4

    “challenges ordinary people to let God use them for impossible tasks. Such submission requires “crazy faith,”

    When everything looks like a nail…

    I was gonna ask what the heck the “diamond” on the cross was about, but I assume it has to do with the book. Or something. “Crazy faith” is hardly the uncommon phrase.

    Similar name, no relation: http://crazyfaithministries.blogspot.com/
    WTFLOL.

    Are fees really something that are keeping people from adopting teenagers?

    Oh, gawd no. It’s the paperwork. They’re just trying to distract you with the “no fees” thing.

  5. pipenta
    Reply
    5

    About seemingly impossible and irrational tasks, I think it’s like this, it’s like those bullshit entrepreneurial (you don’t want to know how many times it took me to spell that, which is, I think, telling) that get people pumped about about starting up their, I dunno, poutine truck or their door-to-door honey badger pet grooming franchise. There are stats, ask me not from where I would pull them, because it will take some brainstorming to remember where, but there are stats that show that unrealistically optimistic people have a higher success rate than realistically pessimistic people do. That is to say, some days the great steaming piles of shit that life can be are more than people can take and keep chugging on. So if you can go to some seminar by a guy with big teeth and an expensive suit, or if you can just put ya faith in Jeebus or whatever, you can keep going. If you were a sentient salmon and you looked up that damn river, at the fishladders and the waiting bears and fishermen and the bloated bodies upstream, mightened you just say fuck it and swim out to sea instead? These are valid questions. It’s all about motivation. This is where the saying, whatever floats your boat might come in, except that religion gives you a sieve for a hull.

    And also, though they tell stories about people accomplishing difficult things because of their amazing faith, they tell the stories in magazines and news and internet cuz everyone loves a winner, you don’t hear about the losers.

    Just like the lottery. And praying probably has about the same odds. If you gave every person who played the lottery about two screentime seconds to say, “I lost.” you’d have to watch four years without bathroom breaks to hear them all. Or some such numbers.

    Oh you don’t want to threaten to take away their magic feather. How else will they FLY?

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