Michele Gyselinck

 I'm glad this woman left before things got even worse.  This kind of abuser often ends up killing his wife because she left him, or was on the verge of doing so.  I hope that one day she can come out of the closet and no longer have to fear that people will condemn her for choosing life over hell.  It's unfortunate that she didn't see the warning signs before she married the guy because for one, I find it difficult to believe there were none.  But often the victims are in denial and figure the guy will change once they're married.  On the contrary, you often get more of the same.  In an issue of Scientific American Mind some years ago there was a story about a woman who was murdered by her husband when she broke up with him under the title "Love and Death," and in that story of spousal abuse the abuse had begun before the couple got married.  I don't remember when that article was published, but with the title of the magazine and the article people should be able to find it.

I prefer to write out my prayers.  I find it easier to keep track of what I've already "said" that way and avoid repeating the same petitions over and over again in the same prayer.  But then, I've always been a writer.  It's my preferred mode of communication.

 Although we are currently without a full-time pastor, before our last one left in October of last year (2015) he was part of the worship committee, so we did work with him to choose hymns that supported the topics and message of his sermons, and we hope to be able to do this with the next pastor also. In the meantime, since we're getting classical appointments, we strive to contact the minister who will preach when one of us will be responsible for preparing the order of worship ahead of time to give them time to think about their sermon, and to find out what they intend to preach about so we have an idea of what songs to choose.  Very seldom does lighting come into the picture in our church, but when our former pastor was with us Good Friday services were almost always Tenebrae rituals.  That was THE exception to the rule.  Otherwise, I don't recall any service where the lighting had anything to do with the order of service.  Other than to light candles, maybe.  and that usually takes place mostly around Advent and Christmas.

We did most of the work by email.  Still do.  Most of the members work full-time, and some live quite a distance away from Montreal, sometimes even past the Ontario border, so meeting on a weekly basis simply is not practical for us.

 Yes, the U.S.A. are a champion of civic and individual rights, and some, unfortunately, use that freedom to appeal to the worst in human nature.  I don't have to name names. If people have been paying the least bit attention to the news, they will know who I'm referring to.  And frankly, I hope that American CRC people at least, will exercise caution and wisdom in whom they vote for next November, for although the rest of the world has no say in who becomes the next president of your country, your choice will impact the whole planet for at least four years.

 I tried singing in the choir in my church a few times, and it never worked out.  But it wasn't my voice that was the problem.  I was throwing everybody else off key.  So I had to give that up as a way to serve God and find out where my real gifts lay.  It took awhile but now I'm in my right niche. Sometimes you're not doing people or the church a favour by letting them continue in a line they're not gifted for, while other areas are being neglected.  These days I translate sermon power points into French and bake desserts for Community Supper, a ministry of our congregation.  And I have been appointed as Regional Advocate for Classis Eastern Canada.  These would not have happened if I'd insisted on singing in the choir, and no one had told me it wasn't my place.

 1. I don't see why the CRCNA would be immune to high-handed sin where other denominations aren't.  I haven't noticed that human nature was any different in our denomination than elsewhere.  

I remember reading in Philip Yancey's book Grace Notes about his meeting with a friend of his in a coffee shop because the other man was planning to leave his wife and family to marry another woman whom he found more exciting, and as this friend asked Yancey if he could be forgiven for this sin he was knowingly planning to commit, Yancey asked him if he would WANT to be forgiven knowing it would involve repentance.  Is there ANY man or woman in the CRCNA above lusting for someone else to the point of planning to divorce their present spouse and abandon their kids?

 My sympathies to you, Mark, as you mourn the passing of a friend at this time of the year.  Losing touch with friends or loved ones is never easy, but around the holidays it's even harder.  Praying for God' comfort to you and his family.

 Wounded healer rather that walking wounded ? Of course! I needed no explanation for that one.  The walking wounded are in such bad shape they can't help anyone else.  This fate may await caregivers who don't or can't take time off to attend to their own needs and become so drained that they eventually fall apart.  Relatives of people afflicted with degenerative diseases such as Parkinson's or Alzheimer's often experience that because private nursing care is expensive, and governments often cut costs at their expense, so they shoulder most of the care themselves unless they can--and are willing to--place the loved one in a nursing home.  Caregivers of psychiatric patients can suffer this also, and maybe even more than the caregivers of Alzheimer's because it is acknowledged whereas many Christians still harbor the ill-conceived notion that mental illnesses are merely a spiritual problem that goes away if people confess their sins.  At the outset of my illness I confessed all the sins i could think of, both real and imagined, and the illness never went away.  I hope that those who still hold this notion will snap out of it because they're being a burden for those who suffer as well as their caregivers.

I didn't answer that question right away because I wanted to think about it.  Inasmuch as I can I avoid posting outrageous comments on my page, and most of my FB friends avoid it also.  Instead, we tend to stick to reliable sources of information to share.

Since I joined Facebook I've been unfriended by one person who told me I was too judgmental for her taste, and I was shocked because I try hard not to pass judgment on people.  And I unfriended one guy, not because he wrote anything outrageous, but because he was too needy for me emotionally, and I felt unable to give him what he wanted after he scared me.  I had expressed empathy and he was all over me in love when I was nowhere near that.  So I both unfriended and blocked him when he failed to respect my wishes.

As far as truth is concerned, I take my cue from a book by the late Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship, who wrote that just because you think something doesn't make it true.  There are objective standards for truth such as God's Word.  We are sinners, and our motives are not always the most noble. so to claim that what we say or post on FB is true and that those who don't like it don't want to hear the truth is debatable to say the least.  A bit of soul searching would also not hurt before we write some stuff on there.  

Of course, one needs to proceed with caution on Facebook since many don't reveal their true identity on there, so you don't really know who you're dealing with to begin with.  That's why they feel safe to write nasty stuff because they think they can get away with it.  But I would not dream of confronting them about it.  Confronting real friends is dicey, let alone strangers.  I leave that to God.

 Well if that is his experience, so be it, but I don't see why this has to be an either/or proposition.  God may not have protected me from schizophrenia, but He certainly has protected me from other ills.  I find this to be a very selective reading of the Bible because there are plenty of passages that allude to God's protection of His people, especially in the wilderness where His presence as a pillar of fire at night protected them from the cold and predators like lions, and as a pillar of cloud during the day He protected them from the burning heat of the sun. 

In the times of the kings God also protected His people from invading armies as when King Hezekiah went to the temple to pray about threats from the Assyrian king.  

While it is true that God didn't protect his people all the time, especially when they had been unfaithful, we don't have to choose between believing in a God of protection or a God of presence.  I don't know why God allowed him to be sexually abused other than that the Lord didn't stop the Nazis from perpetrating their abominations.  I guess evil is part of the reality in this world, even in the church. Shame on the abusers.