No, Thank You.
Or, The Duggars Might Be Crazy, but at Least they Love Jesus.
I have been watching the Jon and Kate plus Eight marathon for most of the parts of today that I wasn’t asleep for. (I took a benadryl this afternoon, and didn’t fare well.) But anyway, I was mostly watching it because I think they do good things with and for their kids, and with all the stuff that’s been in the tabloids, I really worry about them. I hope that neither parent has been unfaithful, and really, trust that they weren’t, and pray that the media firestorm leaves them relatively unscathed. Really, I worry about people I don’t have anything to do with far too often. I guess that explains the rampant sucess of reality television.
But, anyway, that isn’t really what I wanted to talk about. While I’ve been watching TLC all day, advertisements for the new season of 18 kids and Counting have been interspersed. I have an admittedly somewhat ridiculous obsession with this abundant, conservative, sheltered family that bears no resemblance to my childhood experience. I’m even friends with cousin Amy Duggar on facebook, no joke.
I think to some degree I have always thought that the Duggars were a little crazy. When I talk about them people always have something derisive to say, and often, I agree. They homeschool their kids, and I’ve often declared my disdain for homeschooling. Their kids don’t have a lot of academic ambition, and their daughters all want to be housewives with a gajillion kids of their own. Also, they encourage their kids to not kiss until they’re married, and while I’m all about abstinence, that’s not something I can buy into. Further, I proudly proclaim no desire to have my own children, even though I love hanging out with kids.
So, I was watching a few seconds of what is coming in the next season, and I realized they are doing this not because they are nutters, or because they’re trying to brainwash their own Mormon-esque society, but because they believe in God’s perfect plans for their lives. They believe that God will give them the right family, and that he will provide what they need. In that regard, I think they probably have more faith than I do. I don’t want to have kids for many reasons, including fear that I will screw them up, and they’ll be either adulterous axe-murderers, or they will end up like me, and like books and art and music more than people. But the Duggars know they can’t screw up so bad that God can’t fix it, and that he sees a bigger future than they can imagine.
So, while I might disagree with the Duggars’ pastor, and think Jesus turned water into actual wine, and not grape juice, I don’t think they’re crazy to want to have as many kids as God will allow. Some people can’t have kids at all, and want them, and somewhere, God is in that too; so, I see the rationale that if you can have kids, to keep going until you can’t because each one is a miracle.
I don’t know if I have any big expansive conclusions to this post, except to say that I appreciate that kind of faith, and I think it’s a good thing, and that’s pretty much it.
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