Dear Gramps:

What about cutting and/or self injury? I know we are supposed to treat our body like a temple, but if it calms your emotions to a bearable state, and seems to help you, is it all that bad? What does the church say? Thank you!

Jane

Dear Jane,

I once visited the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. At the time the painting of Whistler’s Mother, on loan from the Musee d’Orsay in Paris, France, was on display there. The painting is a life-size representation of a woman completely unknown, except by its title. The painting was roped off by a two-inch thick crimson cord suspended from gold-colored posts. On each side of the painting stood an armed guard, to prevent anyone from doing any damage to the painting.

Here is a two-dimensional representation of an unknown person, worth millions of dollars, under heavy guard to prevent anyone from inflicting any damage or injury to it. About the only thing that could be perpetrated would be to mar the surface by throwing something like paint on it, or cutting it with a knife.

The thought occurred to me, “How much more valuable is a real person than just a two-dimensional painting of some unknown being?” It would seem infinitely more appropriate to rope off any individual who may come under harm’s way and post guards to prevent anyone from defacing or doing any injury to that infinitely precious work of art created, not by someone named James Abbott McNeill Whistler (1834-1903), but by God Himself, the Eternal Father of Heaven and Earth.

Does that answer your question?

Gramps