Another corporation-endorsed day to celebrate a group of people.

This Sunday, it's mothers. Despite the rubbish and the fail on occasions, she's been okay. We've managed to have some proper conversations when I've come home from university. I'm still her daughter, but I'm also an adult too, and I think she's starting to respect that.

I got her a weird Egyptian god ornament for the mantelpiece. She loves that kinda stuff. Last year for her birthday, I got her a set of Chinese ornamental vases, and she liked those too. (Thank fuck to the 99p store.) I also got her a card, with some words I thought she might like too. It basically was, "Yay, Mom."

After the thanks and stuff, Mom and my brother (Dave) went to go prepare for church. Dave was like, "Come with us to church, come with us," and Mom was just telling him, "Get ready, get ready."

Now, is this her way of appreciating I don't want to come to church with us, and not really being able to say it directly? Am I being taken pseudo-seriously as an adult? Or was she simply trying to get Dave to shower?

Whatever. I'm not really bothered either way. I feel good today. However, it's not even 9am. Still got plenty of time to make today rubbish. :D

Not everyone's a fan of "Il Papa"...

... and, given all the stuff he's been saying recently, it's not unsurprising.

The Catholic church has such a stubborn policy in Africa when it comes to dealing with HIV/AIDS, and it's one of the many things that just made me realise I couldn't be part of this organisation anymore.

The Pope says, roughly, "Don't use condoms. At all. Instead, stay faithful to your spouse, and/or practise abstinence. Condoms are sinful, and on top of that, they don't work anyway. Condoms also promote family breakdown, and... it's bad. So, just don't use them."

Let's bring some facts in here.

I think that everyone could agree that abstinence, complete and total abstinence, is the most effective way of stopping a sexually transmitted disease. Sadly, not many people will go for that one. And, as for the fidelity issue, people can't stay faithful! People are jerks. We cheat on our spouses. It's just human nature. So, given that people are going to be having sex, and they probably will be doing it with more than one person, we need to make sure there's a way of making sure that, if you decide to pot the pickle with someone who's not your spouse, you won't end up dying.

This is where condoms come in. They're one of the very few things that both stop babies and STDs. (Well, there are femidoms but they're much more expensive to produce, and much harder to use. ) Condoms are quite cheap to produce. Cheap, but not free. Note that there's not a lot of money around HIV/AIDS-ravaged parts of Africa. So, one of the only way they're going to get supplies to stop like condoms is through charity work. Catholic charities like Cafod like to go over and help... and they're not exactly going to be preaching against the Pope's infallible word. And other charities can't help, given they're in largely Catholic areas, where a condom message would either fall on deaf ears or be rebutted with the falsehoods the Church has been telling people.

Condoms are the most effective barrier method. They are not 100%, but that doesn't mean they're not effective. A lot of anti-condom people like to say that they're not completely guaranteed to work. So what? NOTHING is 100% guaranteed.

As for family breakdown? Please. We're just offering people who can't quite control themselves a way not to ruin lives.

At this point, I have to admit that condoms are not the perfect solution either. In places where health education is minimal and inadequate at best, sending over solutions that work in the West has to be thought through. Using condoms can be tricky! Even with all the lessons, and reading the packet carefully, I've still managed to break two. On top of this, basic things have to be told. Such as: don't use it twice; dispose of it in a bin, not a toilet; don't put it on inside-out; blah blah blah. There's a lot of information that needs to be transmitted in order for condom use to be an effective tool in the fight against HIV/AIDS. Information transfer is education. And, health education isn't brilliant in these parts.

So, what do we do? Uganda has managed to curb their problems with a three-pronged attack: promoting fidelity, teaching abstinence, and having condoms as the last defence.

That's what we should do everywhere. Sadly, sticking to Catholic dogma seems more important than the lives of these people.

That's me in the corner, that's me in the spotlight...

I don't think that I'm a Christian anymore.

With some help, I logic-ed my way through things, and I shrugged off Catholicism easily, and realised that, although I have some personal morals and beliefs that coincide with Christian ones, I don't really believe the essential Christian stuff... so, yeah. It's kinda weird. I don't have a problem with being around Christians, or being in the Chaplaincy, and I might start going to Christian Focus Sunday meals again, because I miss the company, but... my mind is totally open. I'm accepting that there's more to my beliefs than what's easiest to do family-wise.

Here's my thoughts about this new section of my spiritual journey...

I want to bring my kids up secular, which I've always kinda wanted to do anyway. Kids are so easily told lies - I tell my 13 year old brother lies which he still believes readily despite the fact he knows I lie. So, is it fair to tell kids lovely stories about heaven and stuff and imprint ideas in their minds before they're too young to say no?

I'm not going back to church. I always used to use it as a place to "recover" from a lapse in faith, which, when I think about it, is totally dumb. I always used to just absorb myself in the ceremony of it all, and sing as loudly as I could because I love singing, and detach myself from the meaning, which isn't the point at all. You're supposed to go to church to pray, and do the Catholic things, believe the Catholic things, agree with the viewpoints and be willing to explain and convince others so that they might "understand" the way you do...

But... I don't think gay people are inherently bad people. A lot of them are very considerate and patient and put up with a lot of crap from people who think they have the moral highground because of whatever thousand-year-old religious text they like to read. And, I don't think abortion's a good thing to do [it's gross and really traumatic] but it shouldn't be banned. I use contraception because I think it's okay to be intimate with someone before marriage and I can't really have kids right now, can I? Terrible idea. :p

I still love Christmas though. I don't like the commercialism, and I can't stand Santa. It's just... what kind of parents tell their children that a weird old guy is coming down the chimney with flying reindeer to give them Christmas presents if they're good, or coal if they're bad? Hell, I might prefer the coal. It's going to be worth a LOT very soon. I don't intend on telling my kids that Santa exists in a literal sense. As a concept, I guess he's okay... unless you are a child that has no other source of present hope except from "Santa"... hmm. Anyway, Christmas.

It's fun, right? You get to eat turkey and stuffing - although you can technically do that every day, you never really do it apart from Chrimble. And, I like playing the piano, and singing the alto parts to all the really old Christmas and Advent hymns, because the music is so beautiful. It's so thoughtful and reflective. Even if you don't believe, you have to love the harmonies.

And, you get to sing the stupid 70s Christmas hits that you still don't hate because you hear them so rarely.

But, Christmas is okay, I guess. It's nice to give people you care about presents. I liked giving D his presents. I like making him happy. :)

So to summarise... I like Christmas, but I don't really *get* it anymore. I'm undecided about Easter. I'll cross that hurdle when I get there, I suppose. I don't mind Christians, as long as they don't expect me to suddenly backtrack all this thinking I've been doing here after quoting a couple of Bible verses.

I guess that none of this is really new to me. I don't believe anything drastically different to what I did when I was 12 or so, getting my First Holy Communion done because Nana said so.

Well... as I said, I keep an open mind. If I rediscover Christianity later, so be it. If I stay here, that's fine. We'll see how it goes...

Until then, I'm just praying [ha!] that I don't get into a heavy religious argument with any non-forgiving atheists [like some of the guys in debating...] cos that's just too much right now.

It's a funny time for all of this, isn't it? Christmas is the second most important celebration of the creation of the Christian faith, after all...