The Christian Skeptic

History will tell you that humanity's solution for everything is war. We're all so very different and we all think we're right, so it makes sense to band together with like-minded souls and cleanse the world of any divergence from our norm. Unfortunately, some have denigrated the sacrifice of true, fallen soldiers by applying the term to less significant conflicts: culture wars, drug wars, there's even a war on marriage. But in the case of the latter, the weapon isn't a sword or a gun; it's a dictionary. That's right, people are up in arms because, apparently, there are people trying to redefine marriage.

This is ultimately the problem that many folks have with gay marriage. The religious right was fine with the gay community when they were relegated to the dark corners of society. You know, in their seedy and squalid bars and clubs like animals. But now that they're out in the light of day like real people seeking marital privileges--our marital privil…

Before Facebook and memes, knowing a person's worldview took intuition and people skills. But now, everyone wears their views like badges. Which makes it easy to tell if someone is a conservative or a liberal based on what they share and like.

On the one hand, it's great to know your friends' opinions on just about anything. People are fragile so it's helpful to know what topics someone might be sensitive to. On the other hand, it's turned social media into a battleground. And there's a lot of peer pressure to demonstrate your partisan loyalty through as many inconsequential statuses as possible.

But it's no more beneficial to polarize the issues than it is to polarize relationships. I'd even go so far to say that those who ardently identify as either conservative or liberal are enslaved to one of two ideological fallacies: either nothing changes (conservative) or everything changes (liberal). Which is precisely why I refuse to identify myself as eithe…

I've made it clear how cynical a person I am. My wife often laughs at the difference between us because she can readily do a "trust fall" backwards into my arms. Whereas I cannot. Sure, you might say that's due to the fact that she's 6 inches shorter than me and my 230 pounds would probably pulverize her if I tried. Then again, I find it funny how many reasons I have for not trusting people.

For kids, security is found at home with the family. And for me, mine was shattered when I was 15-years-old. My parents got divorced, my church family talked about us behind our backs, and my trust of people in general plummeted. I got depressed and suicidal. My life sucked so who could blame me for becoming insular and misanthropic? I was a cold, hardened jerk who couldn't encourage those around me because I was too self-involved with my own story. But I'm not alone. Every day, people justify their behavior with their history.

We do this to avoid the fact that we'…

I'm not easily embarrassed. This is largely due to how little I regard what other people think of me. Or simply, how little I regard what other people think (just being authentic over here). But being married will teach anyone that there are some people whose thoughts we ought to care about. And not just because it's considerate. Because, otherwise, people will try to make us care.

Maybe I just have no shame, but that hasn't stopped folks from trying to give it to me. How many times have you heard the phrases, "You ought to be ashamed of yourself!" or "Have you no shame?" They're usually said out of utter exasperation that you or I would not only commit whatever it was, but would do so without caring about whatever it is they care about. Which raises an interesting dilemma in the human experience: you can't make someone feel something they don't.

I can't care about everything and I can't know everything (which, for me, is admitting a…