After Braxton was born, I was so excited to be a mom that I kind of let everything else go by the wayside.... but I have since realized that this is not good for Braxton, or myself (especially in the sanity department!). And one of the things I love to do is read -- so re-joining myself to a book club has been one step in the right direction for me!
For January we read the book Amazing Grace: William Wilberforce and the Heroic Campaign to End Slavery by Eric Metaxas. It's a biography about William Wilberforce (1759-1833), who I had never heard of (and to make myself feel better, neither had some of the other women in my book club). However, he turns out to be quite an extraordinary man who works tirelessly to end the slave trade within the British Empire, and eventually he even accomplishes the abolition of slavery there. He also worked with James Madison (who I have heard of!) in working towards the abolishment of slavery in the United States, which came much later.
Anyway, this man is just amazing! It took him 25 years to have complete success in his endeavors - but he kept on working tirelessly for all those years! And to top it off, he had poor health! He did have lots of good people helping him with this cause, but it gives one some hope on what we can do with enough determination - no matter our circumstances!
I would recommend reading the book. It wasn't the greatest book I've ever read, but it does give one inspiration on how to truly live like a Christian. The hardest thing about the book was that there are so many details and people with similar names that I started getting them confused. However, there is also a movie out, which I haven't seen yet, but supposedly will really help in reading the book.
As part of our discussion last night, Emily (the one who chose the book and led the discussion) brought up how our society is similar to what the British Empire was like during Wilberforce's time. There was little regard for the poor; religion was a social thing; and basically everyone lived for themselves.
It may not be quite that bad in our society today, and her main concern that she brought up was the increasing availabilty of pornography, and the ease in accessing it, and the ability it has in ruining lives. We discussed how a lot of sexual predators started looking at pornography, and how it becomes so addictive that people quit living their lives. Emily mentioned 4 different lives/familes that she personally knows falling apart because of an addiction to pornography. One of the people Emily mentioned was a college student who flunked out of school because he was so addicted!
We talked about how we wished the government would take action against the pornography companies like they did the tobacco companies. It was mentioned that for some odd reason, most people view pornography as the "norm" and are not recognizing it as an addictive habit.
After leaving book club, I wanted to throw up from hearing all the statistics and disgusting things that this industry is causing. And then I wanted to take Braxton and find some way to make him stay my little baby boy forever so that he never has to deal with this! However, we all know he will grow up, and if this trend continues it will only become more and more available to him. Emily has 8 boys that she is worried about, along with 2 girls who she wants to see marry good men!
I had to leave book club early so I don't know what they decided to start doing, but I know it's time for me to do some research. We have got to put an end to it. It will probably always exist in some form - it has for a long time. But seriously, does it have to be a click away for some poor unsuspecting person - especially our children?
Emily just emailed me the link to Townhall.com with an article about just simply enforcing the laws against pornography. The article is called Hard-Core Pornography Isn't "Free Speech". It's a great read that will get you fired up!
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