Letter to our pastor on spanking - Page 3

[rainy32]

what a beautiful, well written letter. I really hope that you get a positive and thoughtful response from your pastor!

[Attached Mama]

Originally Posted by dulce de leche

I am sorry that it took me so long to respond to this. I just now had a chance to read your blog, and I am unable to come up with words to say how wonderful you are. Wow. I wish that we had been able to include your blog in our original letter, but we will certainly direct others to it. Thank you so, so much for what you have written. I especially like the way that it goes beyond the issue of spanking into other aspects of graceful parenting. Would you write a book? I would buy it if you did, and probably extra copies to pass out to people. Thank you again!

I was trying to write a book, but couldn't do it fast enough for people who were asking me questions, so I decided to blog it. I do hope to publish it as a book sometime later. So glad you found it helpful and please do direct people to it. I just started it a few wks ago and am eager to get word out about it. Thank You!!

So anyway, what happened with your pastor? Did he respond?

[dulce de leche]

No response yet. :sigh: I'm not sure if that means that he is thinking deeply about it, is really busy and hasn't had time to respond, or disagrees but doesn't want to debate. However, I imagine that if it were simply that he remains unconvinced he would at least send a generic "You raised some interesting points" response. Of course, I may have just sent it to the wrong email address. I will definitely share a reply if we get one!

Even if he never read it, we have been so encouraged by the people who have read it and responded.

[leewd]

Dulce - I've been watching this thread hoping for an update. If you ever get a reply, I'm sure we would all love to hear.

Thanks!
--LEE

[PaxMamma]

truly a christ-inspired letter! any response yet?

[PikkuMyy]

Wow - I'm not a Christian but that letter was spot-on, and so well written and eloquent, and gentle, to boot!

I think Attached Mama's point about needing more exegesis is important, and perhaps you might want to follow it up with a few more texts from the bible with her link.

[Attached Mama]

still hoping you get a reply....

[sofiabugmom]

I'm not a Christian either, but I wanted to respond ... that letter was very well written, well thought out and researched, and just plain wonderful. I hope you get a reply from your pastor soon.

[TirzhaZ]

That was absolutely beautilful. I know, I know. Everyone keeps saying the same thing, but I wanted to chime in anyway. I am printing it out and sharing it with my mother. She will LOVE it as she is very against spanking. I can't wait to hear your pastor's response. Thank you for sharing this with us.

[PaxMamma]

just bumping b/c i really want to know...so do you think you're going to get a response, or what?

[Wugmama]

Did you get a reply?

[embers]

Have you considered hand delivering it to him, in a nice envelope? He may say "I got your e-mail" and you can reply something like "Well, I never got a response, and this is a very important topic for me as a member of this church, so I thought that I could hand deliver it to you and make personal contact at the same time". Sometime face to face and written letter is harder to dismiss than an e-mail. It may seem more "real".

Great letter. May I copy it, modify it a bit to make it more personal, and send it to my husband's parents and other relatives? They are all highly conservative pentecostal Christians, but are also very educated and intellectual. They may get a lot out of that letter.

[november21]

Beautiful

BEAUTIFUL.

Personally yes I would hand deliver it to him, in addition to this if I did not get a reply, I would personally make as many copies necessary to put under the windshields of every church member in the parking lot while services were in session. To teach such thinking, that's the kind of thing that makes Christians look bad. YES I AM A CHRISTIAN.

[Wugmama]

I sent your letter, via email, to all of the pastoral staff (6 or 7 people) at my ex church with a note on top saying someone had sent this to THEIR pastor after the pastor advocating hitting children, and that I thought the letter was worth passing along (after all, isn't national child abuse prevention week upon us?).

That was about 24 hours ago, and I just got one response from the older woman pastor, who said she chose to parent her children a different way, but could see the points of the letter.

~Tracy

[ThreeBeans]

Originally Posted by Wugmama

That was about 24 hours ago, and I just got one response from the older woman pastor, who said she chose to parent her children a different way, but could see the points of the letter.

~Tracy

Well. WTF? :

[dulce de leche]

Wow--I was just going to look up the thread, and here it was already bumped! Dh just told me that we had used the wrong email address, so we decided to modify it a bit with some of the suggestions here and another point that dh wanted to add. We will do so and let you know the response.

[ThreeBeans]

Originally Posted by dulce de leche

Wow--I was just going to look up the thread, and here it was already bumped! Dh just told me that we had used the wrong email address, so we decided to modify it a bit with some of the suggestions here and another point that dh wanted to add. We will do so and let you know the response.

Oh...OOOPS!

I'm glad it was user error that led to the mistake and not the pastor ignoring you though

[The4OfUs]

Originally Posted by Wugmama

I just got one response from the older woman pastor, who said she chose to parent her children a different way, but could see the points of the letter.

~Tracy

: I hope the OP gets a more positive response, and that maybe some others you've sent it to have more positive responses. Sigh.

[leewd]

Originally Posted by The4OfUs

Originally Posted by Wugmama

I just got one response from the older woman pastor, who said she chose to parent her children a different way, but could see the points of the letter.

~Tracy

: I hope the OP gets a more positive response, and that maybe some others you've sent it to have more positive responses. Sigh.

I actually consider this a very positive response. She acknowlegded that the letter-writer had made a good point. This is a wonderful place to start a dialogue.

[purple_kangaroo]

If you are modifying the letter, you might want to consider some of the points made in this thread to add: http://www.mothering.com/discussions...d.php?t=726290