What Is Normal?

I was watching a movie on the telly today - 'Family Stone'. It was about an American family and their relationship with each other. It looked like a disfunctional family to me.

The son brought home his girl friend to meet the family and declared his intention to marry her. After the scene where he manages to convince his mother that she is the one, somehow he falls for her sister instead! The girl friend manages to get herself drunk with his brother and in the end they both end up together. They have a mute son who happens to be gay and has a black man as his boyfriend. At the end of the show, they are seen with a black baby! The producers of this movie have managed to make it look like this is a typical American family! What crap! This is the power of the American media. They can change anything and make it look good in a very subtle way. It permeates the very fabric of our society and people like Elton John will be telling us what is right and what is wrong!

When we got married and wanted to have children, my greatest fear was that our children might not be normal. Normal in the sense of missing limbs, hole-in-the-heart, blind or even mentally retarded. This was our greatest fear. We are thought to pray about it and leave the rest to God. Whatever the outcome, the child will still be ours and we will learn to love and accept the child in whatever condition. This was not an empty promise but a commitment.

We thank God that we have two normal and healthy boys. As they grew, I still had that nagging feeling about other things like 'homosexuality'. I don't have to worry about that now. I will never know how I would have tackled that problem if it had surfaced. We learn from the bible that the union is between a man and a woman and the two shall be one. Then only can they have a family and there is procreation. Call me puritanical but this is what I believe. Some people would say it may not be 'cool' and very archaic, but this is normal to me and good enough for me and my family.

Mentally Challenged

On some mornings I go to this Chinese coffee shop behind my house for breakfast. They have nice steaming 'char siew pow' available very early in the morning. I usually have one 'char siew pow' with a cup of coffee. As usual, I was at that coffee shop having my breakfast and I noticed a Chinese girl sitting at a nearby table having her bowl of noodle soup. I have seen this girl many times before at this shop and also at one of our local churches that help to look after and train the mentally challenged.

She has money to pay for the breakfast and knows how much change she should get. I was wondering what would happen to people like her if there was no one to give money for the daily needs. She doesn't work and so doesn't have a steady income. Her parents are probably giving her pocket money. What will happen to her if they are not around? It will be a sad story.

The Trinity Baptist Church in this city has set up a center to help people like her to learn a trade through which they can earn some money. The church also collects old newspapers and other stuff which can be sold for re-cycling and the money from this helps to support this center. This is a very good community service that the church is providing besides the dialysis center that they also operate. I feel that any church today that talks about evengelism without having a program to help the needy is not going to make an impact. Visiting the old folks home once a year is not it.