Hotashi

I’m going to a wedding this Saturday for a cousin I haven’t seen since I was a few months old. I don’t know if you can really count that as our last encounter since I was passed out for the most part. The bride is white-American so it should be an interesting wedding. Especially since it’s supposedly in a small rural town…we shall see how things go. I must say that I’m a little apprehensive about encounters with towns people or even other guests at the weddings. I really hate being stared at as some exotic specimen or ridiculed by individuals who still hold outdated racist beliefs. But I will try to keep a positive mind and hope that my family and I will have a pleasant time. I also intend on taking notes for when Jack and I start planning our wedding.

read comments (2)

Note: This post is in reflection to North American expectations of legitimizing a marriage. Therefore this post is targetting self-proclaimed Christian readers. Other issues regarding marriage and legitimate marriage are not intended to be underlying messages in this post. They deserve their own space to be discussed.

I mentioned before that I had gone through an angry period where I would get enraged for reasons that I didn’t fully understand. I’m happy to say that for the most part I don’t have any rage issues. They still strike me from time to time, but it definately isn’t as overwhelming as it used to be. And really, what is wrong with being angry? I’m very grateful for going through that period because it made me let go of a lot of crap that I held onto. A good portion of this was many of my ignorant, conservative views. These views weren’t so much specific situations (although sometimes it was), but it was more a perspective and a worldview that needed to be changed. It has been an ongoing process for many years, and it is only recently that I’ve started to articulate my frustrations with values I have been socialized with.

Of these values include a perspective of what it is to be a Christian. It really bothers me that many Christians in North America (I would rather not generalize about all Christians since the majority of my experience has to do with North American Christians) do not understand that despite their siblings in Christ sharing the same or a similar theology with them, that this theology is expressed culturally. The way you interpret the Bible is relative to your position in the world. The way people interpret the Bible is in response to their need to understand their world. A woman understands the world differently than a non-woman (notice I did not say man - I did that on purpose). A non-White person understands the world differently than a White person. A working-class person understands the world differently than a middle-class, upper-middle-class, and upper-class person. To think that there is a universal understanding of God’s word is just nieve. God is absolute but we are not. We understand things through the blinders in our life. And those blinders are constricted by our “race” our ethnicity, our gender, our age, our sexual orientation, etc. Our standpoint determines how we interpret God’s word.

So with this, what makes us think that we can determine what constitutes as a marriage ceremony? If Jack and I choose to move in together and live the rest of our lives that way, how is that any different than getting “married”? If Jack and I were to go through a socially acceptable ceremony (according to “Christian” standards and legal standards), but we decide not to live under the same roof and continue with a happy relationship, does that make us any less married? Would I be less married if I didn’t wear my wedding ring (another culturally expressive tradition), or if I didn’t change my surname (yet another culturally expressive tradition)? Would Jack and I be any less Christian if we did not get married in a church or by a Christian pastor? Would I be a bad Christian if I chose to walk down the isle by myself, or with Jack by my side, or not at all? What if I wanted to wear a green dress? Would my chastity be questioned? Who decides these standards and why should I conform to them? Who is anyone else to tell me what is acceptable for my marriage to be legitimized? Why should I care what anyone but God thinks? If He recognizes my union with Jack, then who is anyone else to tell us that we are not married?

Wake up! These are all cultural. They way you interpret Genesis 2:24* is based on your culture. You cannot look at this verse and say that constitutes a specific type of living arrangement or a ceremony that defines a marriage. Does the way you declare a marriage validate one type of ceremony over another? Does the amount of money one spends on such a ceremony determine how legitimate their marriage is? Does the number of people who are witnesses legitimate it? If one uses a term other than marriage, such as a union or a partnership, does it make it any less of, or different than, a “marriage”? If you go through the wedding ceremony but do not sign the legal documentation required are you any less married before God’s eyes? If the government or society refuse to acknowledge your marriage are you any less married in God’s sight?

The way you constitue marriage is relative to YOUR understanding of marriage. So think long and hard about how your own ignorance and ethnocentricism is preventing you from seeing people the way God sees them. Wearing a white wedding dress, walking down the isle, moving in together after an “official” or “socially recognized” ceremony, exchanging wedding rings, etc. are NOT Christian. They are culturally constucted traditions used to legitimate a marriage. And what I have to say to those traditions is that they are not part of who I am. For the most part they are oppressive, sexist, and Eurocentric. So fuck them. I will not conform to such bullshit. As far as I’m concerned, Jack and I are already married.

*Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

read comments (0)

I heard this joke a few days ago and thought it was funny.

There are three rings in marriage.
1. The engagement ring.
2. The wedding ring.
3. The suffering.

read comments (5)