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I notice my wife struggles with control issues. Well, on the surface it appears to be more of a struggle between us rather than her struggling for control.

For instance, we’ll be out at dinner and I may select something whereupon she may comment, “I’d NEVER have guessed you’d choose that in a million years.”, using that tone of voice that barely masks her distain. Or while I’m driving, she may feel very much offended when I don’t select the route she’s already mapped out in her head or switch lanes “too soon” or “not at the right time”.

I can understand getting testy with someone who acts dangerously on the road or who acts against one’s recommendations or advice. That can trigger a mood swing in anyone, whether they are suffering from bipolar disorder or not.

But why such behavior over seemingly trivial things?

It took us a long time to figure this one out. Mainly this was my fault for not putting my “male ego” shield aside and really analyzing the conditions when this happened.

And, for anyone suffering from bipolar disorder, this is a “duh” realization, and may well remark, “Of course this is why I act this way”. But for those of us who love and encourage them, this is one of those things that we have to consciously think about until it almost comes second nature.

Basically it is this in one sentence:

From time to time she feels a strong loss of control in her emotional world, and must influence things outside of herself to maintain emotional control.

The key part, the most important part I must remember, is “from time to time”. This is the part that confused me the most about the control issue until fully I understood this part (and reverberating impact) of the statement.

You see, if she ALWAYS needed to help pick out my menu items or ALWAYS needed my toothbrush in a certain spot in the bathroom then I could easily deal with this in my head. Everyone has preferences. I have my own quirky things to deal with and I could work around her fixed preferences like I do with myself and everyone else.

However, in her case (and for many others I suspect), the preference doesn’t always manifest itself, nor in the same way, for a given day or a given situation. It all depends upon the timing of the mood swing and the intensity of it.

Aha.

Now it starts to make sense even if it doesn’t follow a predictable pattern. Neither she nor I can predict when a abnormal control issue will appear between us, but knowing that it is a symptom of her feeling a loss of emotional control can help me walk around it, and can guide her through it.

And it’s a two way street. See, she is not an emotional or intellectual invalid. Her input is honestly (if sometimes frustratingly) given and completely valid. Her sense of style, grooming, décor, diet, are all amazingly appropriate and as a result I am a much more fashionable (and, erhm, healthier) man for it. Same goes for driving directions – I get hopelessly lost (also a mood swing trigger on her part) and she really does help in these situations, even if not always in the most tactful manner.

And we compromise. I’ll try to ask if she has a preference over who should drive instead of always jumping in the driver or passenger’s seat. When we upgraded our car she chose one with a GPS system (if she knows I can’t get lost she doesn’t feel the need to help me choose directions).

It’s definitely workable. Tough for us counterparts because we sometimes have to give up the seat where we are used to sitting in the living room, sometimes take adhoc lessons on which clothing to purchase, or simply have to change what we’re doing in mid-stream.

We who don’t suffer from bipolar disorder don’t always have to give in, because there are times when we simply want to do it our way instead. Or, the decisions they make may not always be healthy or wise. I frequently make my firm but (usually) gentle stand and to her credit, sometimes she accepts it. When she doesn’t it’s up in the air as to how and when we get the differences in opinion resolved.

It’s not a magic bullet, but knowing why the requests from our loved ones come so insistently at the most odd moments does help tremendously.

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You’ll note that my postings have and will contain a sprinkling of references to my faith. I do not intend this as an attempt to prostelyze nor do I do this out of religious stubbornness.

If this encourages you, good. If this angers or disappoints you, please don’t take my statements as a judgment or an assumption that I am narrow-minded. I am old enough and experienced enough to know that my understanding of faith is not the same, nor should it be the same, for everyone.

God is as much a part of my family’s lives as words are a part of speaking or as taste is a part of eating. We can’t go a day without seeing, or looking for, His hand in our journeys. We know He won’t shield us from pain any more than He will shield us from joy or indifference – with this in mind we keep an eye out to ‘see’ Him in all circumstances for comfort in times of pain or to thank Him for the good times.

With that being said, I’ll explain why I think God put us together.

By nature, I’m fairly static. I’ll gladly eat the same food every day, take the same bus to work, wear the same style of clothing on a daily basis (if I could get away with it), and talk with the same people. That’s ok with me. My mind has enough going on inside to keep external needs out of the picture. As a matter of fact, too much external stimuli – a crowded convention center, for example, or a noisy restaurant – will make me extremely jittery.

My wife, who, by the way, suffers from bipolar disorder symptoms, seems to be the opposite. Routine is her anathema, the one thing in her life that creates more havoc than anything else.

By now it’s probably obvious to you what I will say next. And you are right. We were put together to compliment each other, to build on each others’ strengths and to work through the weaknesses. This is the same for any relationship of this type, be it man and woman in marriage, friends, lovers, or blood relatives.

Without the canvas, there is no painting. A scattering of bricks and wood is just that until it is crafted into a shelter. A stone without energy put into it can never become a statue. And heeding a guiding hand to put these types of objects together can yield not just a creation, but a masterpiece.

However, it’s not all beauty and wonder. Acids and bases mixed together, like vinegar and baking soda, can yield some shattering results. Yes, it’s fun to watch but it tastes like hell and hurts the stomach long afterwards.

I know that God works through people – the highly visible ones like world and religious leaders, business owners, sports figures, as well as those of us ‘in the trenches’, eking out a living. (Actually, I believe He works through us ordinary folk more often cuz there’s more of us- it’s a sheer numbers game then.)

This is how I find strength to move forward, to keep going. Like during times when I find it hard to get out of bed after a particularly tough night. Or when a phone conversation has warned me that life at home is not all right on a particular day and coming home may or may not be pleasant.

It’s also how I see the fantastic beauty of my wife when she shines, sometimes so brightly I can’t bear to look upon her. When I see her cuddling with the kids and know they are getting the attention they need from her. And when I come home and appreciate the elegant and intricate arrangement of the furnishings when she decides it’s time to rearrange things.

Would I do it again, given a divinely-granted fresh start?

Yes and yes again.

As a matter of fact, I would beg for it, to have her share her life with me again. I am more complete now than I would ever have known, or ever would have known to ask for.

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Thank you all for sharing and being part of this support group. This means more to me than I could have imagined.

I’ll try to share my experiences without sounding to “whiney”, but in my current state of mind I don’t know if I can accomplish this. I’ve had about 5 hours’ sleep in the last 48 hours. But I must share now while the thoughts are fresh.

Maybe others can relate and won’t feel alone; maybe not.

Maybe reading this will help someone who thinks they may have this disorder but is not convinced enough to look for help. As this group can attest to, moods don’t impact just the individual; everyone inside the person’s sphere of influence is involved.

My wife has bipolar disorder symptoms. She hasn’t been to the doctor yet to see if a diagnosis is warranted, so we can only call the shots as best we can. We are relatively uneducated participants, but she and I both know this best describes her condition.

Knowing the issue and living with it are two separate animals. I am so very tired of my wife’s mood swings. Not tired as in ‘impatient’ or ‘not willing to be bothered’ but tired as in a deep, heavy weariness. Christ I’m depressed by association it seems. My moods pretty much follow Newton’s 1st law of motion – once in motion they stay there until consciously acted upon by myself or by someone else’s passing strong emotion. So when she’s hit by a depressed mood my own feelings become dark and I must leave her be for awhile because I’m working on staying functional myself. Usually she rebounds fairly rapidly but I am left stewing in my own juices. Other times I’ll get off the phone with her while she’s very funny and chatty and witty and I’ll come home in a like mind but can’t predict her response if I refer back to the funny conversation we had. Sometimes she thinks I’m clever because I recalled a trivial bit of our earlier conversation, and sometimes this irritates her to no end.

When my her mood swings back and forth sometimes multiple times a day I am often a wreck by morning because I find myself spinning in circles, trying to play catch-up. I know that’s not a healthy approach but some days it’s all I know what to do to keep level. And I say “morning” because many times I’ve done something or said something or failed to do something which will trigger sometimes bizarre and uncharacteristic responses leading to a sleepless night of fussing or tossing and turning on both of our parts. She’s only hit me a couple of times in her sleep but that is enough to keep me sleeping lightly on nights when she’s extremely irritable or when I’ve done something particularly annoying. It’s not an abusive relationship, thank God, and I am thankful for that when I read some of the other postings.

I must confess I often wonder whether or not I am overreacting to her biting comments when the mood strikes her and she’s speaking “just honestly”. I think I am acting as “normal” as anyone else would but I can’t tell any more. This is one of those moments. I fear I am becoming damaged myself, unable to tell what is true and what is an imaginary truth. I know I must go through some counseling to find an emotional grounding point. We’ve gone to church and events to help socialize and to find a group of people to help with this but it always seems at some point that the demands of outside relationships trigger some kind of mood change and I’m left red in the face explaining to people why she won’t answer any more phone calls or emails or won’t take visitors on a given day, when the day before or the week before she’s been heavily involved in their lives.

Other times I’m left awake mentally dealing with her discards of activity. Overdrawn or not-paid-accounts, consistently near-zero bank balances, commitments made and abandoned, all take their toll as time progresses. Other times (thankfully most of the time) we go to bed quite nicely, like two newlyweds or comfortably funny friends snuggling and spooning together. Those nights I cherish.

I love her so much and we are wed for better or for worse. And the “better” is so good. She’s beautiful, charming, a cunning cook and a tiger in bed when things are great. She has a keen shopping and design instinct and can buy more high-quality stuff for a buck than anyone I know, so the money is usually spent very wisely. During those times I wonder what all my worry is about, and wonder “why do I sound so pathetic in my journals”? Then the pendulum swings and it can be hell going in the exact opposite direction for a few days. I know now that the “good times” are a symptom of the manic phases and the “hell” is the depression phase. I’ve often thought the “negative”, depressed state is the one to avoid but these days the manic state is hard to play with any more. But that may just be my tiredness talking at the moment.

I think the only mood that really is odd is the “neutral” or no-mood time when she has no emotional reaction to anything. You’d think living with someone with mood swings would find this to be perfect but this is really the time I get really anxious. I don’t know why yet but I’m trying to find out why this is a problem for me.

Before our joint internet research I thought I had hooked up with a multiple personality disorder, but knew this was extremely rare, and just attributed her behavior to things I did wrong or failed to do. Now it makes more sense and my self-worth is growing back to where I think it should be.

Yesterday I hit a very emotional realization that was both very funny and severely depressing. I love the Rubik’s cube. It’s a happy game for me. For Christmas my wife gave me a 5×5 cube, which is a step harder to solve than the traditional 3×3 cube. As I was fiddling with the cube my wife remarked how she was happy to give me a challenging puzzle. My response, which came completely from my subconscious (since I was actually focusing on the colored blocks), was “Yep it’s cool, most of it is solved and the trick is to figure out which moves I can do now which won’t break the stuff that’s already fixed.”

As soon as I said it I realized that was how I live my life every day in the shadow of someone with bipolar disorder symptoms. Some days the towels have to be folded just right; other days it doesn’t matter if we have clean towels or not. I can joke and tease her about behavior in a playful – never mean or sarcastic – way (just as I joke and tease about myself) but I find it’s safest to do some exploratory conversation before I do so. I find that the only thing I can really do consistently right is cleaning the kitchen – for some odd reason this room escapes her critique. Not that she asks for and gets a clean and tidy house from me and the kids; it’s just that if I venture into the other rooms to straighten up or arrange the furniture it’s tough to tell when the response is going to be extremely positive, negative, or ignored. The bathroom is an odd place, my things stacked tidy and in order (if I don’t have my stuff in order she does it for me) but her belongings have exploded throughout the room, overflowing the counters and on the floor… Unless she gets in a tidy mood and the bathroom sparkles for a few days. The kitchen is my safe harbor then – when I don’t know what else to do, I tidy up the dishes or wipe down the counters or clean the fridge. I must say we both got a laugh from a scene in “My Cousin Vinny” that echoes my domestic situation. There are other equally intricate layers of activity going on in the house that allow me some breathing room and help her maintain a sense of control. A finely-tuned dance that is fun and agonizing to watch I imagine.

Again, this is a perspective from someone who’s just recently gone through a swift and very dramatic mood swing with her. She’s fine now, but discussing these thoughts with her is inviting an accusation of me being hypersensitive. I may be. I guess it’s like when you burn yourself cooking and for awhile anytime you put your hand near any heat source it hurts like hell even if the source isn’t dangerously hot.

Where to go from here? Doctor’s I imagine for both of us. Our kids are getting older and can analyze situations enough to know things aren’t always right, but not yet old enough to keep from absorbing and echoing some of the energy pounding through the house. My work is starting to be impacted as well; I can’t always concentrate as I am frequently tired now or find myself thinking of this issue instead of the work at hand.

I need to help her help herself; we need a balanced home.

John

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Final post from this adventure.

I saw ‘Batman Begins’ last night with my brother and his wife. There was a lump in my throat through many parts of the movie, not because I’m particulatly fond of any of the actors or characters, but because of the city shown in the film.

It was a fluffed, up, tossed about, Canary Wharf on steroids.

Some of the scenes were breathtaking, all the more so because I KNEW in my heart and memories where the ideas from many city shots were taken. I recognised the DLR turn going from Heron Quay stop to South Quay, the more than impressive entry into the Canary Wharf DLR station coming from Westferry, and of course, the One Canada Square building.

There are photos generously posted by fellow travellers here: http://www.freefoto.com/browse.jsp?id=31-33-0

The stay in England has left a permanent warmth in my heart. From the awesome sense of age in the city, to the gleaming towers of new beginnings, to the unique and lovely mannerisms of the native Londoners to the wave of cultures rushing through the City, it’s a breathtaking mix of life that you can’t imagine until you’ve lived the experience.

Thank you, England. You’ve been a kind and thoughful host to me and my family.

To quote one of your sons,
“If we do meet again, we’ll smile indeed; If not, ’tis true this parting was well made.”
Author: William Shakespeare
Source: Julius Caesar (Cassius at V, i)

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Hi all,

Hope all is well there. I’m giving a status of how the house is doing here. When last I wrote there were some to-do items on our list.

Photos

I’ve moved the pics of the house to a new and improved place on my site.

Please log in and take a look. Userid is [—] and password is [—]

Weather

Dry so far, this weekend (Memorial weekend) some rain is predicted but not much, thank goodness.

Exterior/ Windows

The original contractor we had come out has not provided an estimate yet. He was supposed to email something and I called to verify his plans but so far no news.

We called out a second one who did provide an estimate and I’ll scan in the doc and send it along. The photos of the work he will be doing here are on the picture site also, and we’ll put up more to help explain what all needs to be done. His company does a lot of work in the Memorial area and we have seen examples of his work.

I’ll follow up with some photos of places his company has already done, and will ask him to provide references as well. Actually he should be able to do this as well if you ask him to do this.

[—]’ Dad used to run a contracting company who built homes here in [—] so she is very much experienced in the business and is good at weeding out the good ones from the guys who don’t know what they are doing or who are overbidding. She’s comfortable with the gentleman who came over and he was coming up with ways to keep the cost down without compromising on quality or taking shortcuts. She’s also a tiger on the negotiating floor so you will definitely have a good advocate working for you here!!! (I’m glad I married her because I couldn’t afford her help otherwise.)

Exterior/ Backyard/ Patio

[—] has hired a guy to help her clear out the (small) trees and overgrowth coming up from the bayou area to the back decking. She bought some plants and ground cover to keep the exposed dirt from eroding over time. It will look quite lovely when it’s all done and the breeze is nice now. The birds and squirrels love the new look too, and [—] and our youngest [—] spend a lot of time watching the activity through the sliding glass doors.

Master bath / Toilet

We hired a plumber to reseat the wiggly toilet. Unfortunately it was a little more than anticipated (isn’t it always though?). The flange that holds the screws to anchor the toilet to the floor was not replaced when the new floor was set down over the old floor. The flange is supposed to be flush with the floor, and it was no longer flush (pun unintentional) with the floor but actually under the new floor by a few inches – enough to cause the issue. The guy did the work to reseat the flange and finished out the reseating of the toilet. It was a few hundred dollars but we’re covering this cost since I authorized the work without consulting you first.

[—] took pictures and they are on the photo web site listed above.

Dryer getting hot

Issue sorted. I found the dryer outlet outside by the front door and it was indeed plugged up with the fluff that got past the dryer’s internal filter. The dryer’s happy now as are we. Yay!

Upstairs neighbors

I haven’t gotten round to exploring the attic yet but it’s on my list this long weekend.

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7 May 2005

I’m sitting in a bus in Houston. Yes, that’s Houston, in Texas, USA.

There has been a very exciting and surprising and therefore rushed series of events that brought my family and me back to the States.

Fortunately, my client and I parted on very good terms. No worries, no one was harmed during the process! Although it broke my heart to leave such a nice set of folks who showed me wonderful hospitality during my visit in the UK.

I’ll continue to post items here for awhile, even though technically this is no longer a London blog. However, the transition from
Houston-to-London-back-to-Houston is very much a part of this entire journey.

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Those who travel for a living are quite familiar with this concept, so if you are one of these folks, you can skip this post, as it will be old news for you.

However, I really have to document this while it’s still fresh on my mind.

Some things have changed while we were gone. Now normally we see changes appear over time, construction workers building or tearing something down, storms come and the newscasters talk about the effects of the storm for a few days, and we come to accept the change as it occurs.

Except in the case where one is not here to be part of the change process, and one drives or walks somewhere and gets lost because familiar landmarks are gone or changed enough to be unrecognizable. Now I won’t say who got lost or how many times, but I was quite surprised and am still finding my way ’round as best as I can.

Then there are the things that haven’t changed, which thankfully are more than those that have. The fellow who waits for the bus at the transit center at XX pm in the evenings is still waiting for the bus, right on schedule. The drivers here are still friendly (thank God!), and the Tex-Mex is still horribly fattening but oh so good.

What’s really poignant are those situations where I see old acquaintances* and ask what I’ve been up to:

“I returned from a contract in London last week.”
“Really! Oh how nice, I didn’t know you were gone. I’ve always wanted to go to Europe.” *

It’s like that, isn’t it? One of the most grand, exciting, frightening, and rewarding experiences our family’s been in is really just a footnote to most casual friends. How can you express all of our adventures in a passing conversation in the corridor?

Makes me wonder what the guy next to me on the bus been up to this past year or so…

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* (No they aren’t aged, but our friendships have matured)
** (Yes, I’ve learned there’s a difference between the UK and The Continent.)

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7 May 2005

Texas is Big. Really Big. I never really saw this before until I saw one of the mini-Coopers here scooting down the freeway amongst a set of minivans, trucks and SUV’s. Toilets (bathrooms, in American English) with closets inside the room, and lifts (elevators) that can house a small army.

 Yes, and big in more than just real estate. I’ve never seen so many apple-shaped people before working in the business district. (That one little blonde writer whose column is wedged in The Metro would have a field day here.) I’m certain they were always there but I never thought much of it. I can’t help but get a devilish grin, thinking of how some of these folks would manage a daily commute on the Northern Line to Canary Wharf.

All those stairs and walking (and squeezing into a sardine-can of fellow commuters on the train).

Makes me want to keep up my 40 minutes of walking per day (20 mins to work and 20 back) that I had been doing in London.

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Brrr it’s snowing this week on the Isle. Kids are having a blast; they’ve seen snow before but it’s been so long ago that they can’t remember it.

It’s been since ’92 since I’ve actually lived in the snow so this is a refreshing change of pace.

Not bad, windy as all get-out, but with my new Balascarfa I’m warm as a bug in a rug (but I gotta be careful not to look like a mugger when I wear Option #3).

foto1_5_1[1]foto2_2_1[1]

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Here’s an interesting site for us conspiracy theory nuts who enjoy guessing who’s taking over the world…

http://www.cjr.org/tools/owners/

On this I found, interestingly enough, Disney*, who in my opinion has a track record of changing often-told stories like ‘Hercules’ and ‘Anastasia’ also owns… The History Channel. Eek!

And, funny enough, Time Warner, the company who brought us the rather bizarre ‘Batman’ movies and the cool ‘Matrix movies, also recently performed an acid mod on Bugs Bunny’s descendants, making an anime version of Toontown**. They also own a publication called ‘Progressive Farmer’. Makes me wonder what they plan to do to tomatoes as well.

loonatics_group[1]
* See http://cbae.nmsu.edu/~dboje/papers/DisneyTamaraland.html for an interesting analysis of Disney as a storytelling force in today’s world

** See http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/features/3045502 for more info on this topic.

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Ok I’ve been spending too much time with the TV on nearby at home.

The guy sitting across from me is from Egypt and sounds just like the man running the ‘Punching Dummy’ from the ‘Master of Disguise’ movie. You get to meet the ‘Punching Dummy’ guy at the end of the movie.

Then, there’s a local lady a few desks down who sounds like one of the characters from the ‘Teletubbies’ show, especially when she answers the phone. (“Hallooo… uh oh… Goot Byeee…”)

It’s hard to keep a ‘stiff upper lip’ around here sometimes. I’m certain my slight Texas accent doesn’t help them either…

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Ho boy it just hit me how difficult it would be to learn how to drive in the UK after moving from the USA.

Not the driving-on-the-opposite-side-of-the-road thing, or even the driving-through-a-roundabout thing.

It’s the stick shift.

Think of it… you’re used to smoothly shifting up and down the gears, around turns, from stoplights, up and down hills, etc.

Using what? Your RIGHT arm. Now, you’d need to relearn the process using your LEFT arm.

For people slow in the head like me this could take some time…. and would be quite the exciting challenge.

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Hi all,

Normally I don’t send long emails. But today’s sequence of news blips I monitor came up with an interesting collection of items.

I’ve attached three after my signature, in the order in which they came in my inbox.

My reactions were firstly, measured happiness with the first story, disturbed shock and anger with the second, then sadness and resolve in the third.

To me this is a reminder that we must be always aware of how God lives in our lives on a daily basis, and how the devil wants to interrupt that relationship.

[Soapbox speech starts]

Our kids must also be reminded of this message since their personal history is much newer than our own. For instance, it may not be a big deal to our kids to use pop stars in a Nativity scene. Certainly the power of God does not live in the mannequins or the arrangement of the scene. But bringing popular celebrities into the story of Jesus’ birth does trivialize the Christmas story and the kids aren’t aware of that.

Brings to mind a Christmas special we watched on TV for a popular cartoon called ‘Recess’ (“Recess Christmas: Miracle on Third Street”). Since it is a Disney product I expected that it would not bring much in the way of evangelical Christian messages but I was really upset when the finale of the cartoon kids’ Christmas play (which told us how much Christmas means to all of our hearts) began with Druids, proceeded with Kwanzaa, had a kid dressed as a Jewish menorah, and ended up with Santa Claus and other religious symbols all dancing on stage and singing. Hmmm seems the only major religion not represented was, uh, Jesus Himself, the reason for the CHRISTmas season in the first place. It didn’t help that the ending shot was of five of the kids laying on the ground making snow angels, forming the shape of an upside-down pentagram. I am NOT joking or paranoid, watch it for yourself when it comes on TV.

[Soapbox speech ends]

Whew had to get that out of my system, thanks for listening (reading?).

Love,
John

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http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/ap/20041209/ap_on_re_us/believing_atheist
Famous Atheist Now Believes in God

Thu Dec 9, 4:57 PM ET
U.S. National – AP

By RICHARD N. OSTLING, AP Religion Writer

NEW YORK – A British philosophy professor who has been a leading champion of atheism for more than a half-century has changed his mind. He now believes in God — more or less — based on scientific evidence, and says so on a video released Thursday.

At age 81, after decades of insisting belief is a mistake, Antony Flew has concluded that some sort of intelligence or first cause must have created the universe. A super-intelligence is the only good explanation for the origin of life and the complexity of nature, Flew said in a telephone interview from England.

Flew said he’s best labeled a deist like Thomas Jefferson, whose God was not actively involved in people’s lives.

“I’m thinking of a God very different from the God of the Christian and far and away from the God of Islam, because both are depicted as omnipotent Oriental despots, cosmic Saddam Husseins,” he said. “It could be a person in the sense of a being that has intelligence and a purpose, I suppose.”

Flew first made his mark with the 1950 article “Theology and Falsification,” based on a paper for the Socratic Club, a weekly Oxford religious forum led by writer and Christian thinker C.S. Lewis.

Over the years, Flew proclaimed the lack of evidence for God while teaching at Oxford, Aberdeen, Keele, and Reading universities in Britain, in visits to numerous U.S. and Canadian campuses and in books, articles, lectures and debates.

There was no one moment of change but a gradual conclusion over recent months for Flew, a spry man who still does not believe in an afterlife.

Yet biologists’ investigation of DNA “has shown, by the almost unbelievable complexity of the arrangements which are needed to produce (life), that intelligence must have been involved,” Flew says in the new video, “Has Science Discovered God?”

The video draws from a New York discussion last May organized by author Roy Abraham Varghese’s Institute for Metascientific Research in Garland, Texas. Participants were Flew; Varghese; Israeli physicist Gerald Schroeder, an Orthodox Jew; and Roman Catholic philosopher John Haldane of Scotland’s University of St. Andrews.

The first hint of Flew’s turn was a letter to the August-September issue of Britain’s Philosophy Now magazine. “It has become inordinately difficult even to begin to think about constructing a naturalistic theory of the evolution of that first reproducing organism,” he wrote.

The letter commended arguments in Schroeder’s “The Hidden Face of God” and “The Wonder of the World” by Varghese, an Eastern Rite Catholic layman.

This week, Flew finished writing the first formal account of his new outlook for the introduction to a new edition of his “God and Philosophy,” scheduled for release next year by Prometheus Books.

Prometheus specializes in skeptical thought, but if his belief upsets people, well “that’s too bad,” Flew said. “My whole life has been guided by the principle of Plato’s Socrates: Follow the evidence, wherever it leads.”

Last week, Richard Carrier, a writer and Columbia University graduate student, posted new material based on correspondence with Flew on the atheistic www.infidels.org Web page. Carrier assured atheists that Flew accepts only a “minimal God” and believes in no afterlife.

Flew’s “name and stature are big. Whenever you hear people talk about atheists, Flew always comes up,” Carrier said. Still, when it comes to Flew’s reversal, “apart from curiosity, I don’t think it’s like a big deal.”

Flew told The Associated Press his current ideas have some similarity with American “intelligent design” theorists, who see evidence for a guiding force in the construction of the universe. He accepts Darwinian evolution but doubts it can explain the ultimate origins of life.

A Methodist minister’s son, Flew became an atheist at 15.

Early in his career, he argued that no conceivable events could constitute proof against God for believers, so skeptics were right to wonder whether the concept of God meant anything at all.

Another landmark was his 1984 “The Presumption of Atheism,” playing off the presumption of innocence in criminal law. Flew said the debate over God must begin by presuming atheism, putting the burden of proof on those arguing that God exists.

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http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/nm/20041209/od_nm/italy_nativity_dc
Furor Over Scrapping of Christmas Play

Thu Dec 9,11:44 AM ET
By Philip Pullella

ROME (Reuters) – An Italian school’s substitution of a Nativity play with Little Red Riding Hood so as not to offend Muslim children has raised the Vatican (news – web sites)’s ire and sparked debate on how much traditions should change to accommodate immigrants.

The episode was the latest in a series in recent weeks which made headlines as overwhelmingly Catholic Italy comes to grips with an ever-growing Muslim population which some see as a blessing for the economy and others as a threat.

Pope John Paul (news – web sites), in a message for the Catholic Church’s World Day of Migrants, weighed in indirectly, saying Christians had to respect cultural differences but had to proclaim the gospel and defend traditions.

Last week, a public elementary school in the northern city of Treviso decided that Little Red Riding Hood would be this year’s Christmas play instead of the Christmas story.

The teachers said the famous tale was a fitting representation of the struggle between good and evil and would not offend Muslim children. The school’s traditional nativity scene was scrapped for the same reason.

In another school near Milan, the word “Jesus” was removed from a Christmas hymn and substituted with the word “virtue.” In Vicenza province an annual contest for the best Nativity scene in schools was canceled.

Conservative politicians and Churchmen blasted the moves.

“Are we losing our minds?,” said Reforms Minister Roberto Calderoli, an outspoken member of the populist Northern League. “Do we want to erase our identity for the love of Allah?”

The Vatican, still smarting from its failure to win a reference to Europe’s Christian roots in the continent’s new constitution, said Christians should hold their ground.

“It is a perfect example of how not to respect the presence of different people, in this case our Muslim brothers, by annihilating our own identity,” said Bishop Agostino Marchetto, head of the Vatican’s department for migrants.

“We have to accept others but others have to accept our identity,” he told reporters.

The Vatican has been waging a battle to keep Christ in Christmas. Wednesday it harshly criticized a Nativity scene in London which portrayed soccer star David Beckham and his wife Victoria as Joseph and Mary.

Cardinal Camillo Ruini of Rome went on national television event Wednesday to issued a battle cry over respect for traditional Nativity creches.

“These things can seem small but the spirit behind them is radically wrong and can have very heavy consequences on our young people,” he said.

Italy, with a population of 57 million, is home to an estimated one million officially registered Muslims, making Islam the country’s second largest religion. But social services groups say the number is much higher and growing.

The controversies have divided Italian Muslims, who are trying to integrate themselves in a Catholic country where they have found jobs.

“Those Christmas plays are like forced indoctrination,” said Abdel Smith, one of Italy’s most outspoken Muslim leaders, who has launched legal battles to take crucifixes from school walls.

But Hamed Shaari, head of a major Islamic cultural institute in Milan, said it was “senseless” to change the words of a Christmas song that has 2,000 years of tradition behind it.

“It’s great that people are aware of our feelings but traditions should be respected. This way, we can respect ours as well,” he said.

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http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/nm/20041209/od_uk_nm/oukoe_pope_devil
Vatican university takes on the devil

Thu Dec 9, 1:48 PM ET

By Philip Pullella

ROME (Reuters) – Forget the new “Exorcist” film, the Vatican (news – web sites) is offering the real thing.

A Vatican university says it will hold a special “theoretical and practical” course for Roman Catholic priests on Satanism and exorcism in response to what the Church says is a worrying interest in the occult, particularly among the young.

This year, Italy was gripped by the story of two teenage members of a heavy metal rock band called the “Beasts of Satan” who were killed by other band members in a human sacrifice.

The deaths horrified Catholic Italy, with pages of newspapers given over to descriptions of the black candles and goats’ skulls decorating one victim’s bedroom and witness statements of sexual violence.

The Regina Apostolorum, one of Rome’s most prestigious pontifical universities, said in a statement on Thursday that such episodes should be seen as an “alarm bell to take seriously a problem which is still far too underestimated”.

“In the last few years there has been a lot of interest in Satanism and it develops because of the media. It’s not that the devil is in the media, rock and roll or the Internet but the media can be damaging when it is used the wrong way,” Carlo Climati, one of the professors of the course, told Reuters.

“For young people, interest in Satanism can start with a CD, move onto the Internet. From there, it sometimes develops into home-grown, seemingly harmless things like going to cemeteries but sometimes can lead to murders, as we have seen.”

The two-month course, which begins in February and will be limited to priests and advanced students of theology, will include themes such as Satanism, diabolic possession and “prayers of liberation”.

Satanism, the statement said, aimed to sow confusion among the young and promote a world without moral rules.

According to some estimates, as many as 5,000 people are thought to be members of Satanic cults in Italy with 17- to 25-year-olds making up three quarters of them.

Interest in the devil and the occult has been boosted by films such as “The Exorcist” in 1973 and this year’s “Exorcist: The Beginning”.

In 1999, the Vatican issued its first updated ritual for exorcism since 1614 and warned that the devil is still at work.

The official Roman Catholic exorcism starts with prayers, a blessing and sprinkling of holy water, the laying on of hands on the possessed, and the making of the sign of the cross.

It ends with an “imperative formula” in which the devil is ordered to leave the possessed.

The formula begins: “I order you, Satan…” It goes on to denounce Satan as “prince of the world” and “enemy of human salvation”. It ends: “Go back, Satan.”