Wow: this article is astonishing – apparently Mother Teresa spent most of her life in a deep spiritual depression, in which she felt no presence of God and came to doubt his very existence, even while she persevered in this calling she had to serve the poor in India. Consider this prayer of hers, for instance:
So many unanswered questions live within me afraid to uncover them — because of the blasphemy — If there be God — please forgive me — When I try to raise my thoughts to Heaven — there is such convicting emptiness that those very thoughts return like sharp knives & hurt my very soul. — I am told God loves me — and yet the reality of darkness & coldness & emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul. Did I make a mistake in surrendering blindly to the Call of the Sacred Heart?— addressed to Jesus, at the suggestion of a confessor, undated
If you haven’t already read the article, please do so. I’d be interested in others’ views of it – there are no shortage of opinions in the article on what her perseverance through the darkness meant! I am still digesting it...
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was hoping you would find it....
Mostly I just identify with her struggle, and wonder what were her personal reasons for staying in the closet.
I remember reading reports of this soon after she died. I was nearing the end of my christian life. It hit me like a ton of bricks. I remember thinking, "you mean to tell me that I can completely surrender myself to God and *still* not experience the kind of union with Christ that Paul talked on and on about? What, then, is there to the Christian faith? We tell people about the wonderful spirit-filled life, but really it's just bullshit. If Mother Teresa doesn't have it, you can bet your pastor doesn't have it, and you know that you don't." Basically, Mother Teresa's experience is pretty strong disconfirmation of the claims of Johannine and Pauline Christianity. They make predictions: engage in absolute surrender, the crucifixion of the self, standard spiritual disciplines, etc., and you'll be "filled with the Spirit", the result of which is a sense of deep union with God and "living water flowing from one's inmost being". Well, if *anyone* has sought to test this prediction, it's Mother Teresa. And guess what? The prediction failed.
Okay, here's my first set of thoughts.
This "absence" or withdrawal of God is described by some as a mark of spiritual maturity, almost as a seal of approval from God.
It happened to me once, in college. I had had this really intense few weeks of fellowship with God, this almost tangible thing. And then, poof, one day it was just gone. It was dark, black, empty. And I couldn't figure out why. My Campus Crusade discipler gave that very explanation for the absence - it was because God wanted to trust me even more, to follow him even when I didn't feel him.
But now what I'm wondering is, what's Biblical about that? Are there examples in the New Testament of God's withdrawal, as a sign of approval or as a test, or whatever? I'm kind of with exapologist right now, in that what's the point of drawing close to God if in fact God doesn't draw close to us? Isn't THAT the promise of the Bible?
Right now that kind of seems like an extra-biblical justification; a way to keep people from leaving the church when they realize that even when they do everything 'right'...God still doesn't show up.
I agree, of course. Not even for Mother Teresa was Christianity "a relationship, not a religion."
Paul promises that the sanctified life is one of joy and peace in the Holy Spirit. Jesus is depicted in John's gospel as promising rivers of flowing water flowing from the inmost being of one who comes to him in discipleship -- no more inner "thirst".
Contrast these claims with the words of a women who lived 66 of her years in unyielding abandonment and devotion to Jesus: "My smile is a mask, a cloak that covers everything"; "Such deep longing for God — and ... repulsed — empty — no faith — no love — no zeal. — [The saving of] Souls holds no attraction — Heaven means nothing — pray for me please that I keep smiling at Him in spite of everything."
The constrast is jarring.
To me, this illustrates three important but easily-forgotten things:
1. Unassailable popular wisdom only remains unassailable so long and is sometimes based on a lie;
2. Doing good (even a lot of good) isn't the door through which we can know God;
3. I can't judge who knows or doesn't know God for anyone but myself because nobody but God and ourselves know us in our secret hearts.
And Slapdash, God's "withdrawal" as I and others I know have experienced it, is different from this in two ways: it lasts for a limited time, and it is a feeling or sensing that is withdrawn so that a fuller knowing may be born. I don't think we have in the Bible any precedent for a life-long groping in darkness. David asks God, in Psalm 51 to "restore unto me the joy of my salvation". He suffers depression and fears that his relationship with God has been severed, but he comes again to worship God with better knowledge. He learns the truth of those who wait on what they know of God through the darkness: they may faint, be weary, and fall, but they will renew their strength, and rise up with wings as eagles. (Isaiah 40:31)
We may witness Peter's night of overwhelming doubt and fear, but he too returns with a stronger, deeper knowledge of the Christ of God. Never again does he shrink from acknowledging who Jesus is, even in the face of death.
John the Baptist, rotting in prison, sent his followers to ask Jesus if he was really the one they were waiting for. Jesus didn't tell them to tell John "yes, and don't worry"; because he knew that feeling flees under stress. Instead, he spoke to John's intellect, and what he knew of the Scriptures. "Jesus replied, "Go back and report to John what you hear and see: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor. Blessed is the man who does not fall away on account of me." (Matthew 11:4-6)
I don't know anything about Mother Teresa, but I do know God.
Hi JennyPo,
I'm not sure I'm following you here:
Re:(1): what is the false wisdom you refer to here?
Re: (2): You know the issue under consideration is *sanctification*, not *justifcation*, right? Grant that justification comes through faith. But the issue is that the NT promises union with God and sanctification as a result of offering ourselves as living sacrifices. But Mother Teresa did this, and still, nothing. That brings us to
(3): Perhaps, then, you doubt that she never had the sort of faith that leads to justification?
***2. Doing good (even a lot of good) isn't the door through which we can know God;*** (jennypo)
Can you define what you mean by “know” and describe what you think the door is? What, then, in your view, is the purpose of doing good?
I think what is so remarkable about Mother Teresa wasn’t so much the good she did for a neglected population as her heart, her very motivation and desire to love and serve God.
These published letters of hers are the closest any of us will get to seeing her heart; and based on the snippets of them contained in the Time article, they speak only to someone who loved God, and who desired nothing more than to know God. I have never been under the impression that Mother Teresa did good in order to win God’s approval: it was always a response to God.
***3. I can't judge who knows or doesn't know God for anyone but myself because nobody but God and ourselves know us in our secret hearts.*** (jennypo)
I have always appreciated your unwillingness to judge others, but I must say in this context that seems almost like a cop out: here we have someone for whom every bit of evidence suggests that she sought God, loved God, was contrite, aware of her own sinfulness, humble, answering a very explicit and clear call from God – not trying to impress him with her actions and do-gooding. And God was not present to her.
You say your experience of these dark moments has always lifted, and you offer similar biblical examples. What I hear you saying, or seeming to say, is something along the lines of “well, Mother Teresa’s experience doesn’t fit with what’s supposed to happen when you draw close to God…so…well…gee…I can’t judge her…and I certainly can’t know whether she knew God or not… but…“
I guess it’s the not-quite-stated implication that maybe Mother Teresa didn’t know God that bugs me. It bugs me not “because she was such a do-gooder that obviously she was in God’s grace” but because her heart seemed completely intent on knowing God.
The way you are writing about it suggests to me that you're avoiding the very real possibility that God in fact turned his back on one of his children, for decades. And that really doesn't square with that fairly mainstream Christian axiom: "draw near to God, and he will draw near to you."
I don’t know if this is the place to mention that I worked with the Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta a few years ago, but if Mother Teresa was anything like the sisters I got to meet and work with, there is no way I will ever question her heart or intentions in seeking after God.
Exapologist,
I studied journalism for a couple of years before changing majors. In my first article, I wrote, "Shelley believes..." My prof used this as an example to the entire class and ranted for quite a while. "Don't tell us what she believes. You can't know what she believes! You only have the right to tell us what she says!" I never forgot this.
By "popular wisdom" I don't mean a false wisdom, but the kind of belief (right or wrong) that is commonly held and generally not open to verification or even challenge.
I was referring to the fact that up until quite recently, most of us were quite sure we knew what Mother Teresa's beliefs and experiences were in relation to God. Most of us would have pish-poshed anyone who even questioned our assumptions.
There are any number of such assumptions in the world. A movie is being made in India just now that questions the "saintliness" we have so long attributed to that wise man of history, Gandhi.
It's fine to make such assumptions, but we ought not base anything important on them. In our knowledge of everything, even God himself, we must accept the challenges of reason and experience, and rely upon our best powers of knowing on every level - body, mind, and spirit.
I can't really know anything about Mother Teresa except what is verifiable: what she did and what she said (or wrote). What she did is a wonderful thing, but according to the article Slapdash highlights, she didn't have the relationship with God that WE assumed she had. It is neither within my right nor my power to tell you what kind of relationship she did have with God, or whether or not she has been justified by the blood of Jesus Christ. I wouldn't even try to guess for myself based on an article with some excerpts of her writings and a bunch of opinions about what they mean.
But I do know my own heart and my own experience. I know that I am full of some of the same loveliness I saw in Mother Teresa and also some of the same gnawing darkness we have all recognized in any criminal you care to mention. Despite not having done lived my life in the beautiful way it appears she lived hers, I know that my forgiveness and my standing before God is not due to any surrender of my life to him, nor is it due to any amount of the "right kind of faith".
Rather, God has promised in the Bible to forgive, on the basis of his Son's sacrifice, the sin of "whoever" is willing to trust that sacrifice. That's me.
You can't know that I'm forgiven. You can't know that I do have the kind of peace that if Mother Teresa didn't warrant, then I certainly don't deserve. You can't know that I know God better than I know my mother and He knows me. Only I can know that.
You may (and I won't blame you if you do) think me a dreamer or a fool or a liar, but in the end, only God and I can know about God and me. And only God and Mother Teresa know about God and Mother Teresa.
But if I'm going to doubt my knowledge of someone, it'll be Mother Teresa, because I know God. Well enough to trust the destiny of my eternal soul on him.
***But if I'm going to doubt my knowledge of someone, it'll be Mother Teresa, because I know God. Well enough to trust the destiny of my eternal soul on him.*** (jennypo)
It's funny you say that, because I almost ended my last comment by saying that if I was going to doubt anybody, it's God, because Mother Teresa is a human being that we have access to, can understand, that I've rubbed shoulders with people in her community. And God? Well he hasn't exactly behaved in "relationshippy" ways with me, to the point that I can't say with any kind of certainty that I know him, or ever knew him EVEN during times when I was sure I knew him.
This thread is interesting to me too, because I'm tempted jennypo to ask you how you *know* you know God and what makes it real and not just a subjective emotional experience... A few years ago I could have said with equal confidence that I knew God. But perhaps that is ground that we've tread elsewhere, or that would be a bit too much of an aside here.
I'm going to be responding to various comments here.
**It was dark, black, empty. And I couldn't figure out why. My Campus Crusade discipler gave that very explanation for the absence - it was because God wanted to trust me even more, to follow him even when I didn't feel him.**
I have a huge problem with this explanation, because this isn't how you develop trust. If you wanted your spouse to trust you even more, would you suddenly retreat? I would say no, because that's not how trust is developed. Or is that you'd develop trust with a child?
**You say your experience of these dark moments has always lifted, and you offer similar biblical examples.**
I think part of the problem in using the Bible to provide these examples is the type of examples, though. For Peter, if one takes all the accounts as true, he saw Jesus crucified, and then he saw a risen Jesus. The proof that Jesus offered to John the Baptist was the lame walking and the blind seeing. Those would be huge in leading someone out of any sort of darkness.
But we don't get those today at all. Instead, we get almost emotional reactions to any sort of "dark night of the soul." A feeling of peace, or feeling uplifted. Those dark nights in the Bible got physical answers. We don't see that today.
**she didn't have the relationship with God that WE assumed she had.**
Actually, if we're to go by her letters, it doesn't seem like she had any sort of relationship at all. A relationship requires a consistent response from the other side. She had spurts, but most of it seemed incredibly painful.
Jenny,
**I know that my forgiveness and my standing before God is not due to any surrender of my life to him, nor is it due to any amount of the "right kind of faith".
Rather, God has promised in the Bible to forgive, on the basis of his Son's sacrifice, the sin of "whoever" is willing to trust that sacrifice. That's me.**
But in trusting that sacrifice, doesn't that mean that you've surrendered your life and have the right type of faith?
**I'm tempted jennypo to ask you how you *know* you know God and what makes it real and not just a subjective emotional experience... A few years ago I could have said with equal confidence that I knew God. But perhaps that is ground that we've tread elsewhere, or that would be a bit too much of an aside here. (Slapdash)
I understand that this would be a bit of an aside here, but the question is real and valid and deserves my best shot at an answer, so I'll post it to my own blog.
"I spoke as if my very heart was in love with God — tender, personal love," she remarks to an adviser. "If you were [there], you would have said, 'What hypocrisy.'"
I have had the audacity to question God himself, and so I will voice my question of Mother Teresa, despite the fact that, based on the evidence of what we have done with our lives, I am of a lower order than she, and by rights, ought not to voice such a challenge to a woman who is higher than I. My question, then, is this:
Does it not appear that the person who wrote these words was admitting that she was not being honest?
I cannot and will not say that Mother Teresa did not know God. I will say, and I have this right since my statement is backed up by the Bible, that if she did not know him, it was not the fault of a God who sacrificed himself, giving his own Son, so that she might know him.
**What, then, in your view, is the purpose of doing good? (Slapdash)
People have many reasons for doing good. Some do good because they seek to become good. Others seek the acclamation of others, or escape from the condemnation of their own consciences. Others wisely see the natural benefits of doing good.
I see the purpose of doing good as the submission of myself in the only fitting response to the Supreme Good, who is God.
The question you didn't ask, Slapdash, is "what is good, or the Good?"
I am sometimes deeply ashamed when people admire something that I do as "good", when I know within myself that the action they see is motivated by something that is not good, not love. I have done things that others have admired as "good" with hatred or selfishness or resentment or pride or greed in my heart. They might have been fooled, but God was not.
Jesus said that there is none good, save God. There is no Good that is separate from Love or Truth.
Mother Teresa, admittedly the best of the best of us, was, if you believe the TIME article, a liar. This doesn't take away from the good things that she did or the beauty of her life, nor does it mean that she didn't know God, but it makes her testimony (as we know it) of the character of God untrustworthy.
Might the woman we call Mother Teresa have been over-passionate in her descriptions of her own feelings, both in private and in public? Perhaps. Might she have been misunderstood, either by her friends or by us? Perhaps. This fact remains: both our knowledge and our lives leave us flatly unable to judge her. We may only commend and admire what she has done. All else may be known and judged only by God.
No matter how high we are on the "good" scale, it's not going to get us to a place where we can meet God. Even the highest and best of us may not know God without doing as you are doing in admitting your doubts and questions, Slapdash, and being honest before him.
**But in trusting that sacrifice, doesn't that mean that you've surrendered your life and have the right type of faith? (Heather)
It is true that I knew (as far as I could know) that God existed before I believed what the Bible said. At the time I was nine years old, so my best requirements for knowing then were naturally somewhat different than what they are now.
The surrender of my life, however, is something that I am still - 23 years later! - struggling to do. Faith is something that is growing in me, but at times, recedes. Yes, I know that God is, but I don't always put my trust in him.
Faith is NOT believing that God exists. Faith is trusting the God that exists. Your faith can't reach any farther than your knowledge. I can only have ANY faith in God BECAUSE I know that he exists. If I didn't know that, then what I'd be left with is a wish, a hope, or a speculation - not faith.
***But we don't get those today at all. Instead, we get almost emotional reactions to any sort of "dark night of the soul." A feeling of peace, or feeling uplifted. Those dark nights in the Bible got physical answers. We don't see that today. (Heather)
The "dark night of the soul" is an absence of the sense of God's presence, an absence of peace, so how can the answer we get be a feeling of peace or uplifting? I wouldn't call that God - I'd call it a mood swing. And I'd look into regulatory medications.
No, the answer I got from God in my very darkest night is the answer John got - an answer to the intellect. I was forced to hold on to what I knew rationally and from experience until my "sense" of God's presence was restored and my knowledge unified again. Thinking is always higher than feeling in God's economy.
Heather,
One more thing about "faith": If, for some reason, I withdraw my faith in God. If, even, I doubt his existence and call myself an atheist, I am still forgiven - not according to me, but according to Him. That's why I can say it's not based on my faith, even though without faith in him I wouldn't ever have trusted him.
My forgiveness is a done deal. I know it, even if no one else does. And if I stop knowing it, it doesn't change.
Jenny,
**The "dark night of the soul" is an absence of the sense of God's presence, an absence of peace, so how can the answer we get be a feeling of peace or uplifting? I wouldn't call that God - I'd call it a mood swing. **
If the dark night itself is an absence of peace, which is a feeling, then why wouldn't the answer be a restoration of that peace? That's what the fruits of the Spirit entail, with one being peace, and others being joy, love and so forth. Those are feelings. Jesus said he was giving his peace to people.
**God's presence was restored and my knowledge unified again. Thinking is always higher than feeling in God's economy. **
But earlier you've made statements that the sense of God's love, of knowing that love and living that love, is one of the most important elements of life. Intellect is nothing compared to that love, and even with intellect, Paul did chide those who relied on the intellect, in terms of the world dismissing the cross in its wisdom, and so God saved through the "folly" of the cross. The whole point of the first few chapters in 1 Corinthians seems to be that knowledge of God goes beyond the intellect, and can actually go against the intellect. Human intellect didn't seem to work for him, but it was a wisdom given from God.
**Faith is NOT believing that God exists. Faith is trusting the God that exists. **
Except belief and trust are tied together. Part of trusting something isn't based 100% on knowledge, but on belief gained from that knowledge. And one of the latin words for faith, 'assensus' does mean believing a claim/statement to be true. Now, this has been overrused in many circles, as holding to the right beliefs. It does also mean "fiducia," which is the trust in God, "fidelitas," which is fidelity and "visio" or "vision."
**I will say, and I have this right since my statement is backed up by the Bible, that if she did not know him, it was not the fault of a God who sacrificed himself, giving his own Son, so that she might know him.**
Jenny, I know what you're saying, and that you aren't using this as a method of attack and that this is how you'd follow your worldview, but I would be very careful with statements such as these. Most of the de-conversion stories I've read were incredibly painful for people, as they struggled from a devout Christian to not believing in good. It was a very hard, very long struggle for them, and this response would be too close to saying that it was either their fault, or they were never a Christian in the first place. You may say that your statement is supported by the Bible, but what's essentially telling those who have de-converted is that their experiences don't count, because you're using the Bible to interpret them, rather than listening to what they're saying. It's too close to the blaming the victim mentality.
And I'm not attacking you -- but I have seen a lot of people get angry over statements such as these, because of how it treats the person's life.
Mother Teresa, admittedly the best of the best of us, was, if you believe the TIME article, a liar. This doesn't take away from the good things that she did or the beauty of her life, nor does it mean that she didn't know God, but it makes her testimony (as we know it) of the character of God untrustworthy.
I wouldn't call Mother Teresa a liar. She seemed like she was trying to be loyal to her spiritual experiences even though those experiences had ceased. She seems to have held onto hope much longer than most of the rest of us would have.
She might have been afraid to publicly change her beliefs. She might have felt embarrassed to do so. She might have feared the opinions of those who would call her weak and faithless.
Using the label "liar" is too simple.
Personally, I identify with her struggle, as I have said. I reached and reached, trying to feel the love of God. Others expressed how they could feel God's love for them. It was never that way for me. He was always a stranger no matter how much I pleaded for his love.
I eventually realized that a father who would estrange himself from his child despite the child's longing for his love is not the kind of father worth knowing.
***The whole point of the first few chapters in 1 Corinthians seems to be that knowledge of God goes beyond the intellect (Heather)
Heather, I'll happily agree with you here. The knowledge of God goes far beyond the intellect, but that knowledge is spiritual, not sensual. It's not a warm fuzzy feeling.
***And I'm not attacking you -- but I have seen a lot of people get angry over statements such as these, because of how it treats the person's life. (Heather)
I think you inadvertantly do those you speak of a disservice in assuming they are so naive and so little concerned with truth. A search for Truth may include questioning the foundations of the Bible, but a person intent on Truth isn't going to accept a TIME article as sole testimony for God's character.
I am certainly not out to make people angry or cause offense where there has already been too much, but I think that what you miss here is that many of the people who have left the comfort of their beliefs have done so on the premise that it would be dishonest not to. They have had to own up to their questions and their lack of belief, even though they and others have been hurt, because honesty and truth are more important.
***I wouldn't call Mother Teresa a liar. (jonathan blake)
I wouldn't, either. I was just pointing out that the TIME article does. I'll agree that the evidence of her life and her other communications points to her being something else - misunderstood, perhaps, but my point was really just that - none of us knows.
Of course, we all want to believe that Mother Teresa, and Princess Diana, and Gandhi, and Winston Churchill, and even Jesus Christ, were the people we want them to be. They may very well be, but our wanting doesn't make it so.
Jenny,
**The knowledge of God goes far beyond the intellect, but that knowledge is spiritual, not sensual. It's not a warm fuzzy feeling.**
Is that how you see peace? Or joy or love? I don't. When the Bible refers to those emotions, I tend to see them as something going far beyond the concept of emotions. A calm, grounding encounter that goes beyond words. Like the love a parent has for a child -- I don't see that as a warm fuzzy feeling. It's like meeting someone who is so spiritual that they exude this extraordinary sense of calmness, or love. That's not a feeling.
**but I think that what you miss here is that many of the people who have left the comfort of their beliefs have done so on the premise that it would be dishonest not to. **
No, I realize that. My warning came from the fact that by saying that it's not God's fault that they didn't find God, it comes across as telling the person they didn't search hard enough. And that's often connected with telling people they weren't really Christians in the first place, or that they were "ensnared" by sin, and that's why they didn't find God. I know you only meant it in reference to MT, but if you had said this to someone who was struggling with this search, painfully, and finally said that God wasn't there ... I don't see the person taking it well, because it would be like nothing the person said sunk in.
I'm not saying you said the latter two things -- but I've seen the not-God's-fault used in connection with those two, and that's why I said what I said. It didn't relate to seeing someone as naive, or thinking that the Time article would be tell anything of who God is.
Mother Teresa was a complete bitch.
just kidding.
All this according to what was in Time Magazine? Yikes. Slapdash, don't you write things one day, look back a year later and say..."I was way off and didn't even mean that."
Who's to know the extent of MT's suffering. Not Time Magazine that's for sure. Written and spoken words aren't a good indication of the mystery of one's life, no matter who's doing the yapping.
I'll tell you this. If I became a monk or a priest I bet I'd feel more lonely and unhappy. I bet that if I gave all my money away I'd get hungry and pissed.
Simple logic. Extrapolate what you will from Paul and crazy church people. I feel what I feel when I feel it and I'm not keen on pretense. I just believe in God and trust that whatever I feel, as long as I've done the right thing, is alright. Even if it sucks balls.
by the way, this is a fantastic blog and I'm going to be here alot to annoy all of you.
***All this according to what was in Time Magazine? Yikes. Slapdash, don't you write things one day, look back a year later and say..."I was way off and didn't even mean that."*** (flipthecomposer)
Hi Flip -
Sure, I've certainly looked back on things I've written with a different perspective. I'm not sure I've ever thought "I didn't even mean that" though.
As to MT, sure if she had written of such darkness for a couple of weeks or months, this wouldn't be a big deal. The big deal is that this woman felt an acute absense of God for 50 years. 50 years! She didn't appear to look back on previous writings and slap herself on the forehead and say "boy, was I off!"
jennypo's comment that MT was a liar really jarred me.
I started thinking about this silence MT kept about her struggle (except to her confessors)...and here's the word that came to mind: stoicism.
And by that I mean "stiff upper lip"; "not a complainer".
And I wonder if this is a quality that's on the wane these days. (not to overgeneralize or anything!)
I mean, starting this blog has been a way of getting all of these thoughts and questions out of my head and out there into space, into contact with other people. I didn't want to keep it quiet anymore. And I think many of us applaud this "honesty" with where we are, with being "up front" with our questions, doubts, etc.
This trend seems to be pretty new, generationally speaking, no? I mean, my mom is totally of the "do all things without complaining" school. And my grandparents were of the Depression era, accepting of hardship and difficulty in ways that we Gen X, Y (and beyond - what generation are we in now?) people just don't relate to.
I think I have a point in here somewhere. I guess it's the extent to which we today try to surface and discuss problems & stresses we face versus how older generations dealt with their problems - arguably more internally. And that MT seems to be of that stoic school that just didn't want to burden others with her own issue.
***It didn't relate to seeing someone as naive, or thinking that the Time article would be tell anything of who God is. (Heather)
Heather, I'd like to apologize. I didn't mean that to sound quite as accusing as it did.
Forgive me...
:^)
Jenny,
**Heather, I'd like to apologize. I didn't mean that to sound quite as accusing as it did.**
I understand, and you're forgiven. Things like this are tricky topics to begin with, and we're stuck in a "toneless" medium.
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