lifesong
Everyone needs compassion
Love that's never failing
Let mercy fall on me
Everyone needs forgiveness
The kindness of a Saviour
The hope of nations
Saviour, He can move the mountains
My God is mighty to save
He is mighty to save
Forever author of salvation
He rose and conquered the grave
Jesus conquered the grave
So take me as you find me
All my fears and failures
Fill my life again
I give my life to follow
Everything I believe in
Now I surrender
Shine your light in
Let the whole world see
We're singing, for the glory
Of the risen King
Jesus, Shine your light in
Let the whole world see
We're singing for the glory
Of the risen king
Thursday, August 05, 2004
-9:44 pm
Quotes of the day (from Mr. Colman Chua):
The Maori tribe of New Zealand originated from Mao Zedong (???!!!)
Mao Zedong means “Considerate Cat” in English translation.
Ask Sumin if she’s from the Philippines lah. (A demonstration of racism).
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I’ve learnt quite a lot in SS today. Mr. Chua started lessons with doing a mind map of the disadvantages of Multiculturalism. When he got the part about it decreasing gender equality, he told us two real life stories of how women were horribly mistreated in Pakistan. Evidently, Pakistan is historically a patriarchal society and still is today. Since males are valued and respected more than females, it seems that the former is empowered to mistreat the latter. In the case of the following story, even females can turn against one another.
When she turned 16, there was this young Pakistani girl who was married off to an 18 year old Pakistani guy. The husband loved his wife very much, but day by day, the girl's mother-in-law grew to dislike her (probably because the son was paying more attention to his wife than his mother). The mother-in-law would constantly complain about the wife to her other sons, and was rather hostile to her. The wife bore with it without a word because she was very close to her husband and didn't want to upset him.
One day, the husband came over her to Singapore to work. Left alone in Pakistan with her mother-in-law, the wife was oblivious to her mother-in-law telling her son that she was unfaithful, when she was not. The mother-in-law was infuriated that her son would remit money from Singapore back to only his wife, and not her, plotted to do something about it. With the help of her other sons, they dragged the girl into the kitchen, and with an axe, proceeded to chop off both her legs. In a bid to stop the bleeding, they dipped the struggling girl's amputated legs into a pot of boiling oil. Outside the house, the girl's brother and a few other relatives heard her screams of pain and rushed into the house to stop the brutal attack. The girl survived the vicious assault but the worse thing was, that the only form of justice the mother-in-law and her sons received was
ONE month jail. When a UNIFEM official interviewed the Pakistani authorities, they said "We can't do much about it because this is accepted in our society."
Out of over 1000 over cases of domestic violence against females in Pakistan,
only 2 gets heard in court, with
1 going through the full procedures of a court trial. This is the sad truth of reality. To us, it might just be a distant occurence, far from our safe home in Singapore. But we must realise at the same time how blessed we are to be born into a society were females are thought of as equals (generally). We do not face the risks that a paternalistic society might bring with it- with people being empowered to make life and death decisions for females. My heart really goes out to those women in the Middle East and I feel furious anger for those who have harmed them. But right now, I can't really do much to help except pray for God's protection over them.
Also another interesting point came up during the discussion of France's and Germany's joint decision to ban the wearing of the tudung in civil and schooling institutes. However, it is not written in the Koran that Muslims
must wear the tudung; it is only included in cultural laws made by Man. The irony here is that there is another religion is stipulated to wear a headdress- can you guess who? It is written in the Bible (Corinthians, Colosians, Leviticus, Nehemiah) that Christian women must wear a head covering. We don't even know about this commandmant, much less wear a head piece. Ironic isn't it? The people who are supposed to be wearing a head dress don't do so themselves, but expect other races to do the same. This is very puzzling as to why no clarification and review has been done on the rules throughout the years. If we were to say that we regard the rule because it only applies to that old era of people, does it mean that we also do not reject homosexuality, which is not condoned of in the same book of the Bible. Before we set out to judge others, I think we ourselves as Christians must be clear about our own rules first. Simple logic isn't it? Except that we don't make logic with that whole issue of it ourselves.
Please keep an open mind even after you read this. Don't let this affect your impressions/ perspective of things. Sometimes, I must admit that ignorance is bliss. Now after discussing this at length with Mr. Chua after lesson, I don't think I'll be able to sleep peacefully tonight.
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