I've never been a member of a church where the lead pastor didn't have a M.Div. Usually, if they were an associate, they were working on theirs & moving along to their own church after finishing. I can see issues with someone without the education not knowing how to handle pastoral care & so much more. Seminary is about far more than biblical knowledge. And the tangent of women leaders.... I've been a member of ELCA, UMC, and Univeralist churches. Women are equal to men.

Still, with an out of town visitor, even standing dates would expect it to be different that week.

I would expect with out-of-town company that things would be different. And that she might even just skip your weekly date. I would expect that she would ask her cousin what the cousin wanted to do.

Legally, he has to vote based on his permanent residence. If he's living on his own & not in college, that's where he sleeps. College students can still claim their parents' address as their permanent address. There are also exceptions for the military.

Kitten is not a compound word. Butterfly is a compound word. I thought this about both of them & then googled to verify.

Hoping you get some good input here. I'd very much like to know the same things.

WOW! That's awful to hear he is prejudiced against people just because they are wealthy. Just WOW. That would be akin to someone with money saying they love a place because there are no poor people there. And before anyone rears their heads, I get that people choose where they live based on many factors, including money. I've just never heard someone say such a thing out loud.

Laughable is a good way of putting it.

Oh, definitely. It's come up IRL conversations more lately because of the book & other things the famous person said. And the people who are truly offended by the suggestion that they must be Appalachian if they're from Middletown.

My response was to this, by livetoread. And NO, the culture today is NOT culturally similar. If you ask my friends who grew up there, it wasn't 20-30 years ago, either. I don't know people there from further back to ask them. But it's a topic here, especially with a political figure implying it's something it's not. : Livetoread's comment: See, I'd quibble about Middletown, OH. Sure it's not technically Appalachian, but it's full of people who are from there, if that makes sense. When the steel mill was thriving, lots of people from KY and WV moved to Middletown to work at the mill, but maintained their family connections back home, often driving back on the weekends. When the mill cut way back, they stayed, but the town has suffered quite a bit. I'm guessing a pretty sizable part of Middletown is from Appalachia, even if one or so generations removed, and culturally it certainly fits the negative stereotypes of other Appalachian towns with similar problems. ETA unlike some other cities and towns around the area which absorbed Appalachian migrants into a more SW Ohio culture which is more rural midwest in flavor. Edited 2 hours ago by livetoread

Sorry, but this is in my area. Very close, as my job often takes me there. And we eat/dine there. Middletown 2024 is making a comeback. And no one living in Middletown considers their area a part of Appalachia. That's like saying if a group of people from Georgia transplanted there then it's a Georgian area. People often go visit family back "home." That doesn't mean their new home is now part of their old region. The people I know who live in Middletown are quite offended that people are saying that they are in Appalachia or are hillbillies.

It sounds like you know which is more important to you. Just own it & move on.

That's a choice... you can choose to do the big show or do the conference. Despite what your brain may say, it's a choice.

Not Middletown, Ohio...

That's really cool. I haven't seen those before.