Symbolic Gestures

So, it's back to work.  As much as I'd like to talk more about the World Cup or my journey on the Appalachian trail with Jack, or just the blessings of a vacation that didn't exactly go as planned.  I've got to talk about Presbyterian stuff.  There was a decision made by the 221st General Assembly that was, in some ways, more controversial than the decision regarding the definition of marriage.  This decision involves Israel, and in today's global political situation Israel is the biggest hot button out there.
The decision was not really that big a deal in the grand scheme of things: divesting the relatively limited investments of the Presbyterian Church (USA) from three US based companies that have been involved in activities that directly profit from the occupation of Palestinian territories by Israeli settlements.  These three companies are: Caterpillar, Hewlett Packard and Motorola.  These are all massive, billion dollar corporations, who are barely going to feel the PC(USA) pulling their investments.
This move is not going to effect any sort of change.  It's not going to change the heart of Benjamin Netanyahu or the people who are engaged in the six thousand year process of "inheriting the Promised Land."  It's not going to cause these corporations to turn their backs on a viable revenue stream.
All it's really going to do is make a whole bunch of people angry and emotional, it's going to damage our relationship as body with our Jewish neighbors who see Zionism as the true expression of God's plan for his chosen people.  It actually puts us in the camp of the minority voices, among the Jews and among our fellow Americans.
But those voices are there, even among Israelis.  Voices that say that the status quo of the relationship between Israel and Palestine is unjust and should not continue.  We have added our two-cents, for what it's worth.  We have thrown in with a very narrow minority of people in the world who support the nation state of Israel, but not unconditionally.
There are people out there who would see Israel destroyed, no doubt.  There are also people who have no problem tiptoeing along the path of genocide in defense of Israeli sovereignty.  We are, as a body, seeking some middle ground, which is mostly what Presbyterians do.  I know, it's not exciting and it makes you think that maybe we've strayed a bit from our Scottish head-banging roots, but the world is complicated, and doing the right thing usually isn't easy.
If you're going to take a stand on something as emotionally charged as Israel's place in the world, you're going to tick some people right off.
The question is: are you angering the "right" people?
If you're challenging people who are clinging to an extreme position, fundamentalists on either the left or the right, you're probably doing the right thing.
If you're stepping outside the simple and doctrinaire solutions that can be compressed into compelling sound bytes, your're probably doing the right thing.
If TV news anchors seem mystified by the whole thing and maybe even a little hostile to you, you're probably doing the right thing.
If you are speaking for the helpless and the powerless, for the dispossessed and oppressed against systems of injustice that have been crushing them for generations... well you're definitely doing the right thing.
This particular action has been brewing for a decade, if not longer.  It is extremely precise and designed to minimize collateral damage.  We're not boycotting Israel, or Israeli companies.  We are not pulling our support from anyone who does business in Israel/Palestine, only from three, American companies, who have been found to profit from very particular ventures that are directly related to the occupation of Palestinian land by Israeli settlers.  It should be noted that we have asked them to stop, but we don't have enough clout.  We have requested dialogue, but important parties involved don't want to talk.
So now we take a symbolic stand, which we only took by the narrowest of margins, because it's really all we can do.
About the only thing you can do in a situation this complicated is look at who is on your side and who is shouting at you.  That will tell you an awful lot about where you stand.

The Fault is in our Gear, and our plans, and a whole bunch of other stuff

The big journey on the Appalachian Trail was only about half as long as planned.  But the first problem was really the plan.  I may have been a little too optimistic.  Thinking that Jack and I could walk over 25 miles in four days on the trail was a bit naive.  It was his first trip on the Trail and my first in over 20 years.  I forgot a lot of things that should not have been forgotten like:
1. Packs are heavy, especially when they're loaded for four days of back country camping.
2. Mountains are high, and the trails that lead up them are often steep, especially on the AT, which is by no means a "beginner" trail.
3. I am not 18 anymore.
4. Jack is only 10.
5. Important pieces of gear can fail at any moment, like this:

That's what I was supposed to sleep in for three nights

Anyway, there were a dozen warning signs that we should turn back, but this one that happened at about 3:00 AM and left me sleeping on a picnic table under (thankfully) a starry sky, was the one that finally made the decision for me.

In hindsight, I should have planned a one, or maybe two night excursion, that was a little less strenuous, but I didn't, so adjustments had to be made.  Thankfully, I am now a grown-up and can (mostly) put my ego on hold when I need to.  I can also find the good in a bad situation, which would have gotten much worse with a little bit of stubbornness.  So here's the good:

1. Jack and I got "out there." It was exciting, it was a challenge, and it was really an amazing experience, warts and all.

2. I saw my son buck up to the hardships of the journey and not cave in.  I was really proud when he said he would go on, I was even prouder when he encouraged me to keep going.

3. I saw my son also appreciate the wisdom of not pushing it too far, even though he wanted to press on, he didn't complain when I told him we would not.

4. I looked up at the stars and had to laugh at how quickly my plans can come to naught, but laugh I did, because I knew that something bigger than me was at work, and I've been around that block enough to find it funny when God dumps me on my ass in the middle of the night.

5. I'm getting better at taking a hint.

6: Oh and this:

Movement of the People

Think of a ship, an old metaphor, I know.  The ship has some problems and has been drifting through unfamiliar waters for quite some time.  Some in the ship think a drastic overhaul, which includes all sorts of modern advancements is the only way to really move forward.  Others think that modifying the boat in ways that were never thought of before are heresy of a sort and will ultimately lead to an unstable craft, doomed for Davey Jones Locker.  Over the course of time it becomes apparent that the two opinions are more or less deadlocked, until a few modifications are painfully made, and some of the purists leave in a huff, claiming they have found a better boat, a boat with fewer problems, that is faithful to the good old designs.
This leaves the craft, somewhat worse for wear, in the hands of those who are willing to move forward into uncertainty and adapt, maybe even sacrificing some of the distinct features that once made the ship the great vessel that it used to be.  They're scared by what they now seem to have the freedom to do, and they're a little sad that so many of the former crew no longer feels they can call the vessel home, but they're pretty sure the ship is not going to sink, at least now that they can finally do the things they have felt were necessary for so long.
You have probably seen through the parable by this point and know that I am talking about my denomination: the Presbyterian Church (USA).  From the outside, whether you celebrate it or not, you will note the rather bold decisions that the 221st General Assembly has made this past week.  They have decided, after several false starts to adapt our polity to allow freedom of conscience on perhaps the biggest hot-button issue facing most main-line churches today: marriage equality.  This is an even hotter button in the church than it is in secular politics, because we have this troublesome book that refers to same gender relationships as "abominations," and no matter what you do to explain that away (and some people have done some pretty solid explaining), the words remain and they are stuck in some pretty persnickety places in both the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures.
At the same time, for Christians, we have this guy named Jesus, who constantly talks about how we need to love each other and forgive sins and be forgiven, and heal and be healed, and he seems to have a way of dealing with rules that doesn't get too hung up on black and white interpretations, but which does give great weight to the Scriptures of his ancestors.  We can't really follow Jesus very well if we just throw the book out the window, but...
This is where it gets difficult.  Some people in the church don't think that there should be a "but..."
I have to admit, it gets a little worrisome to me as well.  I can make a good intellectual case that we need to interpret what God is doing by the standards of the world we actually live in rather than the world of the bronze age world of tribes and kings.  I can also feel that we need to interpret what God is doing through the stories of those who have felt oppressed and denied their basic humanity at the hands of a church that is supposed to love them and proclaim the grace of God into their brokenness.
But in the end, I probably can't convince anyone who wants to hold on to those old words like "abomination" that they ought to think any differently.
I have lived through this debate about what the church should do with regard to these issues since I was in seminary.  I have changed my opinion, I would say I have grown, but that runs the risk of being pejorative towards those who feel the way I used to feel.  I used to feel that this issue was a crux on which would hang the very future of the church.  I used to feel that God might just get so fed up with us constantly disregarding the rules that he just gave up.
Then I spent ten years preaching the Gospel and ministering to God's people, many of whom felt (many of whom still feel) the way I used feel about this issue.  I began to see this disconnect between the message of grace in the gospel and the desperate clinging to rules.  I saw that God is really quite interested in forgiveness and really only has a use for conviction where it leads to repentance and healing.
But I cannot impose that on people who honestly feel that there's more to it than that, because then, I'm not walking what I'm talking.  It grieves me to see people I love, "Take a Stand," by saying, "NO!" when I really believe that the way of Christ is to say, "YES!"  But I also understand that grief is a part of the Christian walk of faith, and so I guess I ought to just live with it.
I am proud of my Church in this moment, because after decades of searching for the faithful path, and several false starts the 221st General Assembly finally did something really hard, they said, "yes, if you please."
I feel we need to understand that the actions of GA did not impose on congregations or clergy any action that would violate their conscience.  The only thing it did was allow those who have heretofore had to violate either their conscience or church polity, a way to avoid that dilemma.
The only thing that has been imposed on those who disagree with these actions is the duty of remaining in community despite those disagreements.
I have read a variety of responses so far, and there is hope that maybe we will be able to navigate these waters together.  The grieved side has said that they expect we will eventually see the destructive nature of the choice we have made.  The victorious side has said that they will try to be gracious to the dissent and sensitive to the hurt that has been caused.  At least a few people are saying the right things.
On the outside though, and I understand that external judgment of the church is rightfully seen with a suspicious eye, we are being praised and noticed, not just for the content of the decision, but for the graciousness of the process.  I have to admit, watching the way GA made its choices, you could easily forget how contentious the past few decades have been.
That's not for nothing.  We are a witness to the Gospel, and for better or worse in the age of mass media, public image counts for a whole lot.  Nobody was much impressed by those times where we hemmed and hawed and deferred the issue.  We didn't look faithful to the standards of righteousness, we just looked like a bunch of stuck old prudes who were out of touch with the world they were working in.
You could look at this as caving in to the values of the world, or you could look at it as adapting to the reality of the world we have been called to serve.
Which is the right approach?
I don't know yet, this decision still has some ground to cover before it's done.
If you're grieved, please try to stay with us, we do need your voice
If you're happy, don't gloat, stay humble and live in grace.
If you're not sure, wait and pray with us please.

Out There

Next week boy child and I will be taking our first hike together on the Appalachian Trail.  We're both pretty excited and a little nervous.  The AT is forming a sort of connective line through my life.  I did my first stretch with my Dad and a group from church when I was about 14.  The trail was really my first experience of adult life, when a friend and I did a stretch right after high school graduation, sans parental supervision.  Now I'm taking my son.  It's part of the journey of fatherhood, it's part of the journey of physical well-being and part of the journey of spiritual renewal.
I'm not even sure that "through-hiking" is really a dream of mine, though I will admit the idea is striking.  I just can't wrap my mind around taking almost six months to hike all the way from Georgia to Maine.  That type of immersion just maybe doesn't fit my personality.  I am a fan of the phenomena of leaving and returning.  I am fascinated by the processes of preparing to leave and going "out there," but I'm equally fascinated by the physical and emotional processes of returning home.
I find that, while there are certain "re-entry" problems, journeys generally leave you with a deeper appreciation of home.  I have already begun to consider the creature comforts I will be temporarily giving up next week: showers, air conditioning, a bed, a toilet, food that doesn't have to be re-hydrated, I know I will miss a significant portion of the World Cup.  And there are also the more relational things, Cate will be with my parents in New Jersey, Michele will be home, probably wondering what to do with herself without all of us to keep her occupied, our family will be separated in a way that has, up to this point, been extremely rare.  Jack and I will be "out there" together.  I'm not really 100% sure that either one of us is really ready for this, but I know we need to do it.  I need to get him away from all the electronics and toys, and he needs to get me away from this thing called grown-up life.
He's a sturdy kid, and he soldiers pretty well, but I know that backpacking always puts your resolve to the test.  You have to climb and carry and endure, I am looking forward to being proud of him.  That is an act of faith, to trust a ten year old to face adversity, and to know that in the end his endurance will be rewarded by mountain streams and spectacular views and the feeling that pretty much nothing else can bring quite like the feeling of self-reliance that comes when you walk out of the wilderness and back into civilization.
The prep work is done, the route is planned, the gear has been carefully selected.  I was going through Jack's pack the other night, and I found that he has been thinking in his own sort of way, he had his flashlight, compass and the stuff I had told him to pack, he also had stashed a few "Jack" things, some gum, a few Legos and various other little nonsense.  To a 10 year old, necessity has a different definition, but then again, he comes from a long line of over-packers.
For me, one of the spiritual components of this sort of journey is the need to simplify; consider what I really need, plan for contingencies, but not go overboard.  I tend to want to go all decked out with enough gear to live off the land for a month, and so I constantly have to ask myself: are you actually going to use that?  Is it worth its weight?
That's a question we need to ask ourselves all the time, but which our comfortable modern lives usually don't require.  It is a question that can be asked of things, but also of relationships and obligations.  It's a question that I think is crucial to ask of the church: are we worth our weight?
But I digress, I'm talking about backpacking here, I think.
I have this hope, an expectation really, that this trip will be a moment Jack will remember for a very long time.  I also hope that it is the first of many of these journeys for us as father and son.  Jack is just a bit too young to go on the Camino with my Dad and me next year, but I think that journey will probably be in our future as well.  I wonder how these times away will be during those teenage years, when maybe he doesn't want to go so much, or in those young adult years when he's just too busy.  Yeah, I can hear Harry Chapin in the background right now too... "the cat's in the cradle and the silver spoon, little boy blue and the man in the moon..."
Maybe I'm being too sappy, maybe not.
Time to get out there and find out.

The Word of the Lord...

I'm on vacation this Sunday, so I don't have to preach for the first time in a good while.  But you kind of get in the habit of working through Gospel texts, and this week Jesus says some stuff that is fairly likely to tick a lot of people off, at least if they're paying attention.
Matthew 10: 24-39 is a sort of random collection of prophetic sayings.  They're prophetic, not because they predict the future, but because they call people to a different mode of thinking.  In fact, some of these sayings are so very difficult that you will often witness some of the more peculiar hermeneutic gymnastics, in order to explain exactly how these things can have meaning.  People who are otherwise firmly in the literal camp when it comes to understanding scripture, get a little nervous when Jesus starts talking about persecution and the sword that will separate us from the people who are dearest to us.
The phrase "family values," is often held as sacred in the political and religious life of this nation, however, Jesus says here that the cross is going to stand in direct conflict with that.  We make idols of our family.  We sacrifice ourselves and our children on that altar.  How often does family trump God?  I know it has for me, I take my duty as a father every bit as seriously as I do my duty as a Pastor, and I have promised myself that if the latter and the former are in conflict, then my kids come first.
Guilty as charged.
I rationalize this by convincing myself that God has given me this family and that I am called to be part of it.  I try to avoid those contrived hypothetical situations where the two things would be at odds, and I simply thank God for the grace that allows me to be both an idolater of my family and a disciple of Jesus Christ.
I hope that I never have to make a choice of one over the other.
I do know that my desire for my children is to raise them up to know and follow Jesus, and maybe this is the way through the dilemma.  I want to make disciples in my own family, I want them to see how my own discipleship makes a difference, and that, I suspect, means that I need to love them with all my heart, and demonstrate how that works, so that they can understand, "through a glass darkly" how God loves them as well.
There is danger for us, in understanding Jesus' teachings as being a refutation of the good and healthy aspects of our humanity.  This path leads us to gnosticism.  To understand our relationship with God as the primary source of all other relationships, is exactly the opposite of that.  Our relationship with God establishes a pattern for our other relationships.  At least, it should work that way.
In the discussion of the language we use for God, whether we stick to the traditional masculine forms or whether we try learn to include references to God that are either feminine, or gender-neutral, the issue of calling God, "Father," is often at issue.  Some people have good, or at least generally positive experiences with their actual fathers, but some people have been abandoned, abused or otherwise damaged by their actual fathers.  Thus the word, "Father," carries unfortunate baggage that then gets transferred to God.
This is a prime example of getting it backwards, our notion of God as a loving, merciful, just and holy, ought to inform our worldly vision of what a true father can and should be.  To allow our broken experience of men who may or may not deserve the title of father to shape our idea of what God is, is the very essence of idolatry, it is making an image of a god who is not God.
What Jesus is challenging here, and pretty much everywhere, is precisely that sort of spiritual backwardness and the quagmires of sin they lead us into.
It is indeed dangerous to deny sin, because in denying you compound its power.  But it is also dangerous to give it too much control, to use the brokenness of a fallen world as your framework for your relationships and your understanding.  The solution to the problem is suggested by Jesus here: flip the situation, act like there is nothing that will separate you from God, do not hold anything more dearly than your relationship with God, and then your other relationships will most likely follow that pattern.
Honestly, without being absurd or insane, name a situation where God would call you to actually harm your children.  Bringing them to church, even if they don't want to go, making sure that worship is part of the pattern of your life, even if it means giving up some worldly pursuits, these are not destructive things, they are things that form lives in the proper balance.
God loves children, and you can be pretty sure that if you feel that it is the will of the Creator to neglect or do harm to a little one, you are probably way off base.  Families are our best and most intimate opportunity to love one another as God loves us.  They are the places where we understand agape, the self sacrificing type of love that seeks the good of the beloved above the needs of the self.
Because they have this connection with that sacred sort of love, they can become powerful idols, but it doesn't have to work that way.  We find by losing and in losing we find, it doesn't make intuitive sense but it is the way God actually works most of the time.

The American Way

I was watching the United States play Ghana in their first game of the World Cup.  Ghana has been the team that basically stamped their ticket home from the last two World Cups (2006 and 2010).  The fact that a small African country has been such a bane to the mighty US of A, was a rather stark reminder that we are not the best at everything.  We may be the only remaining superpower, we may dominate the Olympic games in many regards, but in the Beautiful Game, we are still wannabes.
The US won yesterday, but it was ugly.  You got the feeling that Ghana was really the more talented team, but they just couldn't get a break.  That happens in sports sometimes, and it's pretty cool when it breaks in your favor.  Alexei Lalas, who was the red-headed wild man of the US team when they first started making some noise in the 1990's, who is now one of the main soccer talkers on ESPN said that the game was a typical American soccer match: grinding, nail biting, hang on through sheer guts kind of game.  In other words, it was not the Beautiful Game, which is played by the likes of Brazil and Argentina, where there is as much artistry to the play as there is raw athletic talent.
I wonder if Ugly is perhaps the norm for this nation of ours.  Maybe it's new, maybe not so much.  I look at the way things have gone for us on the global stage of late.  Our involvement in Iraq seems to have pretty much come to nothing, as now ISIS, a group that Al-Quaeda thinks is too Fundamentalist, is taking over city after city and waving a torch around a part of the world that is nothing less than a huge powder keg.  We are going to leave Afghanistan, with a mere prayer that somehow the Taliban will not quickly return to power.  We have bled and died in those places, but we may leave with nothing more than some jagged scars.
Our American style: winning through sheer determination and brute force, does not appear to carry the currency that it did in WWII.  Probably because we're not fighting the same enemies. The military actions, from Korea to Afghanistan seem to be trying to teach us that understanding may be more valuable than superior technology and training.
Let's look at Iraq for instance: the Sunni and the Shia have been at each other for centuries.  At different points we have painted the Sunni as the good guys and the Shia as the bad guys, but it's nowhere near that simple.  We liked Saddam Hussein (Sunni) when he was our ally against Khomeni (Shia), but eventually we saw that Saddam wasn't exactly a good dude, so we had to fight him, twice.  All the while Iran was laughing their turbans off and saying, "see we told you so." To us and to all the Sunni who thought that the US was really on their team.
Through it all we have held on to this illusion that the lines drawn in the middle east by colonial powers somehow mean anything.  The nations: Iraq, Iran, Syria, are actually not anything like the Nation that we call home.  They express their patriotism towards tribes and religious sects, not towards the creations of European minds.  That's why they will so readily kill each other, and that's why dictators and supreme rulers of various types can flourish there: because an iron fist is the only way there is going to be peace.
Our policies and procedures in that part of the world have been over matched, like the US Soccer Team taking on Brazil: we might win for a moment but it will have to be ugly and expensive and sooner rather than later the order of things will snap back into place.
Some pretty smart people are saying we need to stay the heck out of there, let them fight it out, let them draw their own lines and try to do things their way.  The downside of that is that a lot of innocent people are going to suffer and die, but that has been a reality with our way as well.
I feel like there are more important wars to wage, like the struggle for equality and human rights, but we absolutely discredit ourselves as humanitarians when we bomb people back into the stone age.
We've shown that we can win ugly, but it's only a momentary victory.  Maybe we need to learn to win beautifully.

Leadership

A Fundamentalist group, though it may not kill anyone, although it may not strike anyone, is violent.  The mental structure of Fundamentalists is violence in the name of God.

-Pope Francis, Interview with La Vanguardia

The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) is going to get down to business this week.  We're going to argue about some pretty "hot" issues: Israel/Palestine, Marriage Equality and a number of other things that will probably draw headlines.  There are liberal and conservative slants on just about any issue, and sometimes the arguments of people who disagree with you can really ruffle your feathers, and set your teeth on edge.

But honestly, one of the things that I'm most proud of in the peculiar corner of Christian faith that I call home, is that honestly we don't really have any Fundamentalists.  We have some idealogues to be sure, but the last time we had any group that really strongly identified as Fundamentalist (the early-mid 20th century), they meant something rather different by the word Fundamentalist than the sort of thing the Pope is describing above.

Back then, the Fundamentalists, in the Fundamentalist/Modernist controversy, simply wanted to hold on to a few (actually only five) basic tenants of the Christian faith in the face of what they perceived as the creeping relativism of liberal Christianity.  The argument still resonates through many of the debates that will take place in General Assembly even now.

While the movement was actually rather more complicated the "Five Fundamentals" are:

1. The inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture (emphasis mine)

2. The Virgin Birth of Christ

3. The belief that Christ's death was an atonement for sin

4. The bodily resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth

5. The historicity of the miracles of Jesus

Now you will perhaps notice, if you're a Christian of some variety, that most of these points, with perhaps the exception of that rather crucial word "inerrancy," are decidedly non-controversial, even though we have been living for almost a century under the dominance of the liberal-modernist mindset.  Sure, there are those out there that will argue against any of the above and still want to subscribe to a sort of rationalist Christianity that focuses primarily on the ethics of Jesus' teaching, over and above any of the "super-natural" elements of the story, but most Christians believe that the Scripture is indeed inspired.  That Jesus was born of a virgin, that, in some form, his death was an instrument of atonement for sin.  We certainly believe in the resurrection, and at least give a passing nod to the idea that the miracles were real, even if we don't really bank too much on the fact.

During the controversy, there were some heresy trials and a whole lot of really ugly disputation, much of of it entirely opaque to the eyes and ears of laypeople.  In the end though, the death toll was zero.  The number of people tortured in dungeons and broken on the rack: zero.  The number of people imprisoned and publicly beheaded: zero.  The number of bombs dropped, other than some verbal bombs laid down by the likes of Harry Emerson Fosdick: big fat zero.

In a rare historical moment, it seemed that human beings could argue about things, perhaps even things of ultimate importance, without killing each other.

Yes, I agree with Francis, Fundamentalism has an inherent violence to it, but that makes it all the more impressive that, in such a heated moment, the violence was restrained to the world of words.

Outside of Christianity, we have not reached this point as a species.  The situation in the world is such that Fundamentalists are rightly feared, because they are willing to kill and die for their ideals and their theology, and they do not see that it is madness.  Fundamentalism can dominate a situation, even when it's adherents are a distinct minority, because they think they have clarity and that clarity gives them passion and purpose.  Whether it is Al-Quaeda, ISIS or the NRA, Fundamentalists have a fervor that gives them power.

And we have them in the PC(USA), on both sides of most of the issues.

Of all the things that might scare me about GA, of all the things that might frustrate me about the discussions we have and the way we have them, one thing I'm not worried about: we won't be shooting,  hanging or blowing each other up.  Way to go Presbyterians!

Getting Houses in Order

I read this.
It broke my heart.
I went to my daughter's school to watch her get some awards.
My heart broke open even wider.  Seriously, I was almost weeping in an elementary school awards ceremony.  I was so glad, even with all the stupid things that we do as a country, that the room was full of little girls who are going to get an education, and grow up without ever having to wear a burkha or feel like they are inferior to boys.
I have a problem though.  I can't be happy about my daughter and her friends without feeling terribly guilty about all the little girls in Afghanistan who are going to grow up without a snowball's chance in hell.  I can't help but feel my stomach knot up when I hear about those women who have suffered so much and come so far to gain a foothold on what we would consider "basic" human rights, and who are now about to be thrown back to the savagery of the Taliban.
Yes, I said, "savagery," and yes, I know it's judgmental, and no, I don't care if it's judgmental.  Someone needs to judge.  More people need to judge about the kind of despicable evil that grips large segments of the world's population.  As a white, middle class, American male, I am actually the last person who needs to judge, I'm the one whose best solution involves, bombs, Marines and drones.  I'm the one whose sense of liberty and justice can be and often is, imposed at the point of a rifle.  I'm a dangerous judge.  I'm also a father, who is generally opposed to war, but when I read stuff like what I read above, I'm fighting mad.  It actually makes me think that we shouldn't leave Afghanistan, not because of terrorists or national security, but just because someone needs to protect those women from their own men.
I hear all the time about how Islam is a religion of peace, and I've tried really hard to trust that statement, and I understand how extremism can turn even the best foundation violent (Lord knows Christianity has been used that way from time to time).  I also hear quite a bit about how Islam treats women, with the possible exception of the most modern, westernized forms. I remember that women are also made in the image of God.  I understand that Muslims don't want western "christians" imposing our way of things on them.  I get that they are the ones to put their own house in order, I believe that's how it should be, but the stench of this sort of evil is wafting out.  Honor killings, child brides, women denied their basic humanity in so many different ways, all in the name of some god?
I guess what I want is the people who have standing in the situation, namely the men of Islam, to stand up for their mothers, wives, sisters and daughters, and stop allowing them to treated as pawns and property.  It is profoundly dishonorable to allow the vulnerable to suffer in these sorts of ways.  I would really appreciate it if we could figure out another way to go about tackling this problem, a way that doesn't involve guns and bombs, and Americans trying to play hall monitor to the world.  That's just not working out too well, but neither is letting the Taliban, kidnap, rape and kill teenage girls.  Neither is keeping 50% of the world's Islamic population completely oppressed.
I'm going to do what I can to keep my house in order, I'm going to vote, I'm going to work, I'm going to do my best to raise my daughter in a world where she has every opportunity to live fully and equally with her brother.
I just want to let you know that what is happening to girls on the other side of the world breaks my heart.
Stop it already.
Happy Father's Day.

Connections

So God created humankind in his image,

in the image of God he created them;

male and female he created them.

-Genesis 1: 27 (NRSV)

Spoiler alert: I'm going to step all over the sermon I'm writing for Sunday, so if you like a surprise, and you're going to GSPC on Sunday, stop reading.

I was mulling over the connection between Genesis 1 and the Gospel according to Matthew's "great commission."  It seemed like there should be something, but I just couldn't figure out what it was.  Then it hit me: it's me, or rather us, humankind.

For better or worse, Genesis is an unavoidably anthropocentric account of creation.  This is the primary reason why people who want to hold on to a literal interpretation of Genesis have so much trouble with the theory of evolution.  Because in evolutionary theory, humans aren't really that special, we're just higher primates who have developed language and technology to their advantage in the survival of the fittest contest that is natural selection.

In Genesis though, we are made in the image of God, we are extensions of the being of the Creator, God's signature.  To me this carries some weight. After all what good, evolution wise, does it do us to write poetry or create works of art?  How does it help us survive predators or fight off disease if we write sweeping and beautiful poems about what happened, "In the beginning?"

We do that you know.

If you know me, or if you've read my blog during the Ham on Nye debates, you know that I have deep problems with those who want to read Genesis as a science text.  But I love Genesis 1, it is actually one of my favorite parts of the Bible because it sets the stage for everything else, not in a literal: this actually what happened sense, but with a very important concept: God has made us for a specific purpose, to be a part of, and actually to be caretakers (stewards) of the Creation.

To look at Genesis as simply an explanation, rather than a creative expression, is probably going to lead you to miss the point.  I love to lean on God's sovereignty when things get tough.  I love to put my faith in the reality that God will not let me go, when I feel utterly inadequate.  It is actually a little bit scary to think that God made everything that is and then put it in our hands.  But that's what God did.  Everything was very good, and then he called us in to give it all a name, and he put us in charge!

Sheer madness.

I think we've adequately proven that we can't be trusted.  We allow greed and selfishness to run us, we constantly create new idols and go running back to old ones, we even make up stupid rules for ourselves and then break them.

But God has doubled down on trusting us.

Jesus came and did some things, for a very short period of time.  He taught a handful of people, who were, quite frankly, not the best and brightest, about the kingdom of heaven, and what it's actually supposed to be like; then he left.  He said, "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations..."

As much as we would probably love it for God to show up and take charge of this mess, it doesn't seem like that's the plan.  Acting as though it is, keeps getting us into trouble.  We think that we can go on pretty much as we have been, acting in self interest, destroying our world and stepping on our neighbors, and we think that having faith means believing that someday, God is just going to ride to the rescue.

That's destructive.  It's why the early church fathers really didn't want to even put Revelation in the book in the first place, not because it's bad, but because if  you read it the wrong way, it gives you some really bad ideas.  Like: just sit back and wait, don't worry, Jesus is coming back soon!

Don't bother trying to work for a better world, sin is too big a problem, you'll never fix it, you just need to wait on God.  Where on earth did we get this idea?  It certainly wasn't from the Bible.

Sure, there are moments where there's a deus ex machina (hand of God) moment.  Sometimes the Red Sea was parted or a crucified man was resurrected, but for the most part the story arc is in the awfully precarious hands of some pretty flawed people.

When we pray: "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven," we should stop thinking that's the future tense.  It's not wishful thinking, it's a call.  It's the object of our prayers, our deeds and our very lives.  We are the Body of Christ, we were made in God's image, and we are the ones chosen to do this thing.

Too often, we have used the notion that the world is not our ultimate home as a justification for sitting on our hands while it all goes to pot.  I know it seems like a big job, and there are just so many problems.  God is not impressed with our excuses, instead he rather insistently asks that we get to work.

The covenant with Abram was to be a blessing to the nations.

The commission of the disciples was to bring the good news into all the world.

Whether you think that this plan just happened 6000 years ago or whether you believe, as I do, that it has been in the works for billions of years, it still tells us that God is pretty good at sticking to a plan.

I wouldn't look for him to change it any time soon.

Way Over Yonder in a Minor Key

There ain't nobody that can sing like me,

Way over yonder in the minor key.

-Billy Bragg and Wilco, Mermaid Avenue songs by Woody Guthrie

I've noticed a peculiar thing: sad things catch on.  It's not really a surprise.  People are always more honest in hospital rooms and funeral parlors.  I suppose there's something in me, with my Scotch-Welsh ancestry that gets rainy days and funeral dirges.  I know that some of my best work has been at funerals.  Maybe I'm just one of those people that sings best in a minor key.

It's not the worst talent in the world to have.  It may not get you invited to many gala cocktail parties, but it does get you into some very vulnerable places in the lives of people who are sometimes complete strangers.

Just out of curiosity, I looked back over the page view statistics for my blog over the past three years, every one of those blogs that has a high count is about something tragic.  Random observations about church and kids do fair to middling and no one pays much attention the ones where I get all theological, unless there's an emotional punch to it somewhere.

It would appear that y'all out there on the old interweb, like a good gut-punch.

Truth be told, I do too.  I want to read about things that have gravitas, things that make you feel something.

Glib observations are easier, but they just don't do much but bubble over the tongue like diet soda.

Angry tirades can be entertaining too, but chances are the things that make you mad and the things that make me mad are just a little too different.  And anger tends to make folks communicate poorly.

But I just can't stay that deep all the time.  Sometimes you have to write about normal things so that you don't become one of those cliches, the writer who just can't deal with actual life.

The hunger is out there though.  Maybe it's because so much of what we deal with in life is trying to keep us shallow and focused on things, instead of on relationships and the inevitable pain that comes with being vulnerable enough to care about other people.

It's been years since I enjoyed a mindless comedy of the variety that Hollywood turns out en mass.  Why?  Well they're mostly vulgar and they consist of people having misadventures.  Even if I don't give a hoot about the character, especially if I don't particularly like them, I have a hard time laughing at their mishaps.  It's actually made worse by the way that most of these pieces of so-called cinema, have incredibly predictable, formulaic endings, where everyone learns how not to be such a big jerk.

I appreciate more and more the honesty of the old comics, like the Marx Brothers or Abbot and Costello, they were telling you a joke, they did not require your empathy, in fact they would prefer if you didn't feel their pain, just laugh at their jokes.

The fact that people consume the sort of entertainment that they do these days is, I think, related to the hunger for significance, and also to the fact that it often requires a tragedy to produce that significance.  You can watch a lot of TV and many movies without once ever running across something that really stirs the soul.  When things do get deep, the work is touted as profound, even if it says very little of coherent value or even slight novelty.

I guess the value of the minor key, is the slight shift off of what is expected.  I suppose it is supposed to be salt and leaven, and maybe that's why works so well in the church.  Maybe we have been competing with an entertainment industry that has mastered shallow.

Perhaps we should try going deeper, going minor, going slightly off the rails.

Maybe that's the itch that needs scratched right now.

Tracking

The memory is a weird place.  You can go along for a while and not think about something, you get busy with other things and time just seems to blur out the details.  Then Michele talked about one of her co-workers going to a kindergarten graduation for her granddaughter.
For some reason or other that made me think back two years, to another kindergarten graduation, which also happened to be the very last day a certain little girl spent in this world.  And just like that, I get to remember again.  I could write about it... or not... but I feel like if I don't I'm just running away from the horror.  So I'm going again into the darkness.  If you don't want to read about it, stop here and go look at pictures of kittens or something that makes you feel good.
This is in honor of a little girl whose smile felt like a gift.
Sarah was shy.  Most of the time she hid behind her Mom, holding on to her leg and peeking out at all the strange people.  I make it a point to try and notice kids, even if I'm going about my grown-up kind of business.  I make a face or a funny noise by popping my finger in my cheek.  I do it because I remember from somewhere in the past, what it was like to be invisible, to be a nuisance, to be in the way, and I don't think kids should ever have to feel like that.
I don't get pushy about it, I just let them know that I see them.  I know, I'm big, and I have a beard and I have a official type job that puts me up in front, and all those things can seem scary to kids.
I knew Sarah had some real dark things in her little life, her Mom and Dad weren't getting along, and most of the time she was just being pulled this way and that.  And she was such a little elf that you wanted to put her in your pocket and protect her from every bad thing, but I couldn't.
I would have told her that there were no such thing as monsters, and that would have been a lie.
I would have told her that life was so big and so full of possibilities, but kindergarten was all she got.
Kindergarten and a few hours at home playing with her barbies, before the darkness in her father got the best of him, and took the rest of her life away from her.
It was one of those things that forces you to believe in evil, not just brokenness, evil.
In the end, because she was a precious thing, too precious to give up, he took her away from all of us.
And that's the real tragedy: twisted love that could not let her graduate into whatever came next... separation... divorce... first grade.
Her smile is still more haunting than the Mona Lisa.
I'm glad I took the time to notice.
Here are your balloons again, I'm sending up thoughts and trying hard to make them happy:

I Guess that I Just Don't Know

I am wiser than this man, for neither of us appears to know anything great and good;

 but he fancies he knows something, although he knows nothing;

 whereas I, as I do not know anything, so I do not fancy I do. 

In this trifling particular, then, I appear to be wiser than he, 

because I do not fancy I know what I do not know.

-Socrates, in Plato's Apology

Often the wisest answer, and almost always the most courageous answer is: "I don't know."

Not knowing is the beginning of a journey, and is therefore much more exciting and has so much more potential than any other way to address a question.  Claiming you know when you don't is hypocrisy, and has dangers to be sure.  Actually believing you know when you don't can be catastrophic.

Foregone conclusions often stand directly in the way of progress, and certainty often blinds us to the truth.

I read a lot of books, blogs, articles, tweets and tumblrs about what is wrong with our society and particularly with the societal institution called the church.  Folks these days are raising some very good questions, making some insightful observations and in the process glimpsing, here and there, what seems to be a way through this postmodern slump.

I am challenged and inspired by the questions on a daily basis.

And I am profoundly disappointed in the prescriptions and answers.

I catch myself straining forward for those answers sometimes.

When they come, I feel this sinking sensation: it's just the same old thing, the same old tired combination of institutional hocus pocus and hopeful (naive) insinuation that we're just a nudge away from things actually changing for the better.

When I get to that place, I usually go back and find the spot where the writer should have ended with a question mark, instead of pushing forward to a period. That's where I find the value.

It's a constant struggle though, because not knowing things is uncomfortable for me.  I have never been very happy with simple acceptance of the status quo, or "because I said so."  I have issues with "the way we've always done things."  I just don't always have the time or the energy to fight the inertia.

So I keep reading the voluminous commentary, the impassioned arguments and the surefire strategies to turn things around.  I'm really hoping that somehow, someway, somewhere, somebody has figured it out: relevance, vitality, basic survival, anything but the long slow decline.

I find myself wishing for a Pentecost or resurrection moment, where there is this radical event that changes everything.  Something may be coming, but I doubt very much if we'll see it before it gets here.  Up until the day of Pentecost the disciples were in a funk, they didn't know what to do.  Their only good ideas were tied up in an old vision of Zion and a miraculous return to the good old days.  They were waiting for answers and living with the same old questions.

What happened was rather unexpected, they could not have seen it coming.  The Spirit showed them something that did not fit their ideas of how things are supposed to go.  They began to ask new questions and perhaps more importantly started moving forward without a solid set of answers.  The who, what, when, where and why of the church were just going to have to be hammered out as they went along.  Over the centuries though we allowed "careful" thinking and all manner of practical considerations to convince us once again that answers are the key to what Jesus meant when he said, "you are my witnesses."

Do we need to get reacquainted with the phrase, "I don't know?"

An Ecclesiastes Kind of Feeling

All is vanity.

-Ecclesiastes 1:2

I sometimes wonder if folks who hold the attitude that the Bible is the instruction manual and rule book for human existence have ever actually read Ecclesiastes.  Perhaps it's some flaw in my nature, but I find that I have a lot of Quoheleth days.  Quoheleth is a transliteration of the Hebrew word that is used for the author of Ecclesiastes, it means preacher or teacher, depending on your emphasis.

Here's what a Quoheleth day feels like: you wake up in the morning and you realize that you are probably going to do the same sort of things you always do.  You might accomplish some things, and you might leave things undone, but ultimately it's not really going to matter, because the universe is a really big place, and really what can you do but simply try and handle what's right in front of your nose.  All things considered, it's better to do good than evil, but, if we're honest, we probably will get up to a little of both, and somehow, someway we're going to have to answer for that reality.

God will judge, but don't expect him to play favorites.  God's love seems to extend to everyone equally, and it doesn't really rescue us from any of our own nonsense until all is said and done and we're back to being dirt in the ground.

Knowing that fact doesn't make you powerful, it just gives you the only perspective that makes any sense, and so it's a good place to start.

Any time I hear someone claim that religion is crutch or for the weak minded, I know that they have not read Ecclesiastes carefully enough.  Anytime I hear Christians use happy little platitudes like: "If God brings you to it, He'll bring you through it," or other such bulletin board nonsense, I suspect that they have not wrestled with the notion that, "all is vanity."

There are very few three word sentences that pack such a punch.  "All," everything, life, death, love, hate, hope, despair, faith, doubt, "all," is vanity.  Vanity is empty and self absorbed.  Vanity is thinking that the universe revolves around your life.  Vanity is being too impressed with your own intelligence, talent or beauty.  Vanity is thinking that somehow anything that you do matters in the least.  It's all just "chasing after the wind."

It's startling to me that a person who believes such things, also believes there is a God who is somehow active in all this futility.

But he does, in fact, it seems to be the only thing that matters even one little bit.

The funny thing is that this Quoheleth, far from being in bondage to the crushing emptiness of nihilism seems remarkably free to engage life on some fairly admirable terms.  He is set loose in a world without false boundaries.  It is a world where suffering is expected, but so is joy.  It is a world where there is no need to get terribly twisted about all the things that happen under the sun.  They've happened before, they'll happen again... do what you can to be a person who enjoys life, and who lives in peace with others.

How does he get there?

He does somehow stay connected to the idea: even though all is vanity, we have a purpose.  It may be small, it may not always rise up on eagle's wings, but it's always there, something always matters, just usually not the thing that we think.

How does one start with the notion that "all is vanity," and end with the prescription that the really important thing is to just take life as it comes and try to make the best of it?

Because you really don't have any other options.