Happy Days

Yes, President Ahmadinejad. Charlie Brown and I both stand with you in saying:

Peace on earth and goodwill to all!

RadioShack and a Thief

I had an interesting thing happen to me today. I went to try and make a return at RadioShack, only to leave the store after being accused of stealing the item I was trying to return!

On Saturday, April 1, I went into the local RadioShack with my dad to purchase something that I needed. My dad paid for it with his credit card because he wanted to give it to me as a wedding gift. Well, I decided to return the item because I realized that I don't actually need it, but I didn't have the receipt. I thought that even without the receipt they could scan the item and see that it was purchased from their particular store, and credit my dad's card.

Apparently, I thought wrong.

The store manager of 14 years (or at least that is what his name tag said) was the man I spoke with and after explaining the situation to him he walked away for a moment. He returned shaking his head and said that he could not do anything for me. I asked him why not and he replied, "You don't have any proof that you actually paid for this item, and we are missing two of them." He said this without making any eye contact with me, and his tone of voice implied in an obvious way what his words were not saying. I then asked him, "Are you accusing me of stealing this item?" He said in response "Well what do you expect me to think? We are missing two of these exact same items, and you walk into my store with one asking for money back with no proof at all that you paid for the item, and look at yourself."

I was shocked, to say the least!

I admit that I am in need of a shave and have some shaggy hair, but over the past month I've been accused of looking like Jesus more times then I can count, not a thief! I guess the Jesus look wasn't helping me today!

I then asked for the name and number of the manager's supervisor and told him that I felt it was completely inappropriate for him to accuse me of stealing from his store, especially in light of the fact that all of this was taking place in front of about 15 customers. He then raised his voice and said that he would do no more business with me and that if I wanted to try and walk out of his store with this "unpaid for item" that I could go right ahead and try to do that. By this point all of the other customers were watching me, the apparent thief. So I again asked him for the name and number of his supervisor (he hadn't given it to me yet) and he wrote it down for me on a card. I took the card and began to walk out, and he mumbled something under his breath. I turned around and told him that I didn't catch what he said and he said back to me, "Go ahead and call my supervisor, you can call him right now if you want but I doubt that you will do that given the circumstances."

I left the store and called my dad to see if he still had the receipt, which he does. So I guess I can still get the 30 bucks back if I want, but this has pretty much gone beyond that now.

I'm still trying to figure out if I'm thankful that this happened or not. In some ways I am. This experience allowed me to in a very small way experience what many minorities face every day.

Unwarranted discrimination, simply because of an outward appearance.

It's a shame that we live in a society and culture that discriminates against people simply because of how they dress or their skin color, etc.

I probably won't be making to many purchases from RadioShack in the near future...

Peace,

M.P.

To Have or Not to Have

So here we go - my first post as a married man!

Seeing how I've been married for 10 days now, I thought it would be appropriate to touch on a topic that married couples involved in full time ministry will inevitably encounter: the choice of whether or not to have children and the effect that this will have on their involvement and roles in full time ministry.

I've had several conversations over the past few years about this, and it seems that my thoughts aren't exactly in line with what a lot of evangelical (and definitely not catholic) Christians believe.

My wife and I have decided to remain childless for a season, and possibly forever, in order to focus our attention more fully, with as few distractions and restrictions as possible, on the ministry in which we believe God has called us.

I am under the opinion that as believers we are called to willingly lay down all of the rights that we seemingly believe we have, in order to more fully follow and serve Christ, having children being one of them. I believe that there is a place for some married couples to commit to remaining childless, in order to more fully focus on ministry.

I do believe that having and raising children is a ministry in itself, but I also believe that raising children and family-life have become to elevated of a thing in our present western evangelical society and culture, at the expense of pioneering new and challenging ministries.

The choice to remain childless is huge, but isn't it one that Christian married couples who are involved in full time ministry should be open to considering? I am under the opinion that if we truly want to see the Gospel spread and take root in the most dark and difficult places on earth, it will take some married couples being willing to remain childless for a period of time in order to pioneer ministries in these areas and places.

More posts on married life to come soon, but in the meantime I'd love to hear any of your thoughts regarding the idea of Christian couples remaining childless in order to more fully focus on ministry.

Peace,

M. Pascal