"laestadian, apostolic, gay, lgbtq, ex-oalc, ex-llc, llc, oalc, bunner" LEARNING TO LIVE FREE: June 2011

Friday, June 17, 2011

More Laestadian Boys Acting Out

This time it's Apostolic Lutherans near Duluth, MN. No charges filed, but sometimes a mom just has to assert herself with other people's badly behaved kids. :-)

From Mother of Preschoolers


Two boys . . . got off the bus. The[ir parents are] infamous for their eccentricity, their role in the Apostolic Lutheran sect, their old-fashioned beliefs concerning the roles of women . . . I watched them both flip the bus the bird as it drove away. . . I drove past them.

. . . My lack of appreciation for these two pre-teen boys' antics was probably written all over my face. . . they yelled something unpleasant at me as I drove past them. One boy, the bigger of the two, picked up a rock and actually threw it half-heartedly at my truck.

. . . I will be damned if I was going to let those little punks act that way toward me. I slammed on the brakes and backed up fast.

The looks on their faces were priceless. . . I asked them if they had something to say to me. . . They mumbled "no" and stared at me. I suggested at that point then that they not yell, throw things, or wave a certain finger at any other cars again. This was done under threat of me giving them a ride home so we could all three talk to their mother together and figure out how to solve their little attitude problem.

Sunday, June 12, 2011

Laestadian Teens Arrested for Killing Over 50 Pets

I have it on pretty good authority that the teens charged with the crimes alleged in the story below were OALC:

3 Battle Ground Teens Arrested In Cat Shootings
Teens Accused of Shooting 100 Cats
Battle Ground Bunners
Battle Ground, Wash., Teens Accused of Shooting 50 Cats in Two Months


Armed with a .22-caliber rifle, three teenagers are accused of shooting cats — at least 100 — while joyriding throughout northern Clark County over the past two months, prosecutors said.

Mitchell S. Kangas, 16, Jaren M. Koistinen, 16, and Riley J. Munger, 17, were arrested Sunday evening after a Battle Ground resident reported to police that her 7-year-old cat, Nellie, was shot in the face at 7:30 p.m. in the 700 block of Northeast Third Avenue in Battle Ground. She saw the shooters and described their blue SUV.


A couple of questions:

(1) Did they rationalize that these cats were "sissy" pets, owned by "worldlies" and therefore no better than rodents?
(2) Why are OALC and other Laestadian boys given cars, guns and ammo, along with a disdain for books, sports, arts, music, etc?

Tuesday, June 07, 2011

Occasionally I Think

"Lucien Black," grandson of an Apostolic Lutheran pastor, has a blog describing his journey from faith to atheism. I thought he raised some interesting questions about the Genesis creation / fall story and its implications on the nature of God as depicted through a biblical literalist interpretation of the Bible.

from Why I'm an athiest


First off, one should know that I come from a very religious background. My grandfather has been an Apostolic Lutheran pastor for my entire life, and my mother became "born-again" at some point after getting pregnant. When I was a child, the family would play "Bible Trivia," and I kicked butt because I enjoyed me some Bible stories.

Around about the seventh grade, I started thinking, and one thing that kept going through my head is that the deck was stacked against humanity from the start, if one believed the book of Genesis. God was omnipotent and omniscient, so he knew exactly what sort of creation he'd made, and the consequences thereof. So, here's Adam and Eve, with one rule to follow: don't eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. What follows is well known of course, the "Fall of Man." What got me though is that God should've, indeed must have, seen it coming from the very start, and took no steps to prevent it. There are many that could've been done: don't let Satan in the garden, don't make the bloody Tree, make sure Adam and Eve really are obedient and not prone to disobeying just cuz of a few honeyed words, just to name a few.


Does anyone else remember playing Bible Trivia? I was not the best player, although I could hold my own against most. :-) I was pretty good at New Testament and Pentateuch, but major and minor prophets could stump me pretty easily.

On a more serious note, Lucien illuminates an issue that I think is common with people who leave their original faith for a new formulation of the faith, or even no faith at all. The stories or the meanings behind the stories no longer "make sense."