The Extremists
So, I suppose it's time to deal with the not so savory folks, the ones who really cannot be defended and who most of us would rather not call brothers. For Christians, I think the best recent example would be the Westboro Baptist church, those of the "God hates fags" protests. These are the extremists. In Islam they are ISIS, the Taliban, Boko Haram, and Al Quaida.
In the last century the left had it's share of violent extremists, in fact, if you count Josef Stalin and Pol Pot, they really did terror on a scale that probably gave Osama Bin Laden a giddy shiver, but extremists tend to be reacting against something, the dominant trend of society or a monarchy or a social order, and right now, most of what Jon Stewart just called "team Civilization" is on a trend towards permissiveness and inclusivity. We are losing a lot of our hangups about sex, drugs and generally embracing a highly relativistic morality. The Islamists call it Western Decadence, and perhaps that's what it is, but it's increasingly hard to say that the attitudes of openness and decreasing our general judgmental attitudes are any sort of a-priori evil.
Where fundamentalists like Pat Robertson or Jerry Falwell might have tiptoed up to the edge of totally drinking the hater-ade, they never advocated violence or some sort of religious pogrom against homosexuals or women who had abortions. There has been violence for sure, but it's done by wing-nuts and criminals, usually in relative isolation, and it was roundly condemned by the fundamentalists. Over time the action of a very few unbalanced individuals has actually led to a relative moderation of rhetoric even among the fireballers, and it has led to a rather dramatic shift in the attitude of John Q. Public. I have this theory that the blatant and abhorrent homophobia of Fred Phelps and WBC, actually pushed a whole lot of fence sitting Christians in the direction of inclusivity, because when they looked at the relative merits of the homosexual community over against the hateful rabble rousing of the Westboro people, they saw pretty clearly where the evil was actually living.
I am hoping and praying that the same thing is taking place within Islam as we speak. If all of this leads to an end to this particular brand of extremist violence, then it will be yet another example of one of those things that is wholly and intentionally evil (think Joseph's brothers or Judas Iscariot), but which God can use in the long view for a greater good.
Unfortunately, there will probably always be extremists, because there's just too much fear and anger out there in the world. Change breeds extremists in some way that may, in fact, be unavoidable.
At the moment, Jews, Christians, Muslims and Hindus all have extremist factions, as do atheists and secular sorts, but for the most part the majority exercises some general control over them. The only case where this is not true presently is Islam, but at the risk of being too optimistic, I believe that the current state of affairs is not a fatal disease, but it is a serious cancer.
Time and exposure are not working in the extremists favor. Just as American Christians have been able to see that the people with the "God hates fags" signs are far more of an abomination to the Lord than some adorable old lesbians getting married in New Hampshire, so I think Muslims are realizing that the extreme demonizing of western culture by a minority of their number is probably not all in good fun.
It remains to be seen whether the majority can abnegate and otherwise delegitimize the hate mongers among them. Here's hoping.
Thursday, January 8, 2015
A Typology: Part Two
The Fundamentalists
I'm going to hold on to a kinder gentler definition of fundamentalist for this section, and I will deal with what I call extremists in another section. Fundamentalists are those who believe that there are certain standards that must be upheld by people of faith, usually moral standards along with some doctrinal positions that they consider essential or "fundamental."
The reason why I separate out fundamentalists from extremists is because extremists are dangerous and fundamentalists are not, unless they become extreme fundamentalists, got that? I hope so, because I don't think I can explain it any other way without just launching into what extremists are and I want to save that for a later entry.
Fundamentalism, in most of it's forms, is a reactionary position. Usually when people are willing to say something along the lines of "we need to get back to the basic essential tenets of religion X," they imply that most, if not all, of their fellow religion X folk have simply lost their way. Their evidence can be manifold: decline in numbers, moral turpitude, nasty disagreements and a host of other possible easily diagnosed (by them) failings. The answer, for fundamentalists, is always simple, or old, and preferably both. If we could just get religion X back to point Y in it's history, everything would be okay, God would cease flaring his nostrils at us in a threatening manner, and we can really start to be the church that Jesus obviously wanted us to be.
Purity is always a tempting salve to the religious conscience. It was for the Pharisees and it is for Fundamentalists. It is also the gateway to extremism.
But in the middle ground Fundamentalism can actually be helpful, after all, who among us couldn't stand to live a slightly purer, more righteous life? Who among us couldn't stand to shake off a couple really persistent sins in our lives? Who among us wouldn't be a little happier if our life was just a bit simpler and cleaner and morally upright?
More to the point, who among us wouldn't like a nice neat definition of our relationship with God?
Have you noticed how popular the 12 step programs are? Well they're named because they have 12 FUNDAMENTAL steps, prescribed actions, clear and simple, not necessarily easy, but workable and concrete. They are actually the really good kind of fundamentalism, because they are pretty much the only thing that can truly help people who are addicted to something live without that particular substance or behavior. They have a better success rate than electro-shock therapy, let that sink in... 12 step programs are more successful at helping you kick an addiction than using electricity to basically hit your brain's reset button.
In many ways, I think the sort of fundamentalism of a 12 step program could greatly benefit the church. Notice they don't judge people, they welcome anyone and everyone, even if you're not an addict you can go and they will accept you. Their fundamentals do not prescribe who is in and who is out, they want everyone in, because "in" is life and out is death. Isn't that what the church should be like?
Here's another cool thing about these fundamentalists: you don't need to understand how it works for it to work, you just need to work it. You don't have to spend your time parsing all the cliches, you just work the program, one day at a time. Don't know why God allows Tsunamis, AIDS and ISIS? Doesn't matter just work the steps. Don't get how God is One in Three, Three in One? Doesn't matter just work the steps. This is why fundamentalism is great, you have a freaking list, you have clear essential tenets, you don't have to argue or defend them, they're on the freaking list.
To be clear, I'm not being sarcastic here, I used 12 steps as an example of fundamentalism because I have the utmost respect for what they do, they illustrate why we really need to recover the wreckage of the word fundamentalism, because in many circumstances fundamentalism will save your butt.
Just beware because somewhere down that path there be dragons.
I'm going to hold on to a kinder gentler definition of fundamentalist for this section, and I will deal with what I call extremists in another section. Fundamentalists are those who believe that there are certain standards that must be upheld by people of faith, usually moral standards along with some doctrinal positions that they consider essential or "fundamental."
The reason why I separate out fundamentalists from extremists is because extremists are dangerous and fundamentalists are not, unless they become extreme fundamentalists, got that? I hope so, because I don't think I can explain it any other way without just launching into what extremists are and I want to save that for a later entry.
Fundamentalism, in most of it's forms, is a reactionary position. Usually when people are willing to say something along the lines of "we need to get back to the basic essential tenets of religion X," they imply that most, if not all, of their fellow religion X folk have simply lost their way. Their evidence can be manifold: decline in numbers, moral turpitude, nasty disagreements and a host of other possible easily diagnosed (by them) failings. The answer, for fundamentalists, is always simple, or old, and preferably both. If we could just get religion X back to point Y in it's history, everything would be okay, God would cease flaring his nostrils at us in a threatening manner, and we can really start to be the church that Jesus obviously wanted us to be.
Purity is always a tempting salve to the religious conscience. It was for the Pharisees and it is for Fundamentalists. It is also the gateway to extremism.
But in the middle ground Fundamentalism can actually be helpful, after all, who among us couldn't stand to live a slightly purer, more righteous life? Who among us couldn't stand to shake off a couple really persistent sins in our lives? Who among us wouldn't be a little happier if our life was just a bit simpler and cleaner and morally upright?
More to the point, who among us wouldn't like a nice neat definition of our relationship with God?
Have you noticed how popular the 12 step programs are? Well they're named because they have 12 FUNDAMENTAL steps, prescribed actions, clear and simple, not necessarily easy, but workable and concrete. They are actually the really good kind of fundamentalism, because they are pretty much the only thing that can truly help people who are addicted to something live without that particular substance or behavior. They have a better success rate than electro-shock therapy, let that sink in... 12 step programs are more successful at helping you kick an addiction than using electricity to basically hit your brain's reset button.
In many ways, I think the sort of fundamentalism of a 12 step program could greatly benefit the church. Notice they don't judge people, they welcome anyone and everyone, even if you're not an addict you can go and they will accept you. Their fundamentals do not prescribe who is in and who is out, they want everyone in, because "in" is life and out is death. Isn't that what the church should be like?
Here's another cool thing about these fundamentalists: you don't need to understand how it works for it to work, you just need to work it. You don't have to spend your time parsing all the cliches, you just work the program, one day at a time. Don't know why God allows Tsunamis, AIDS and ISIS? Doesn't matter just work the steps. Don't get how God is One in Three, Three in One? Doesn't matter just work the steps. This is why fundamentalism is great, you have a freaking list, you have clear essential tenets, you don't have to argue or defend them, they're on the freaking list.
To be clear, I'm not being sarcastic here, I used 12 steps as an example of fundamentalism because I have the utmost respect for what they do, they illustrate why we really need to recover the wreckage of the word fundamentalism, because in many circumstances fundamentalism will save your butt.
Just beware because somewhere down that path there be dragons.
A Typology: Part One
In the wake of any terrorist attack, some of the first things we hear are the insistent voices that cry out: "This is not what Islam is about!" To which I am sympathetic, because as a Christian, I find myself sometimes classified in broad strokes, and lumped in with people I would rather not call brothers (though on my better days, I work within my soul to do just that). I am aware that, within Islam, there is great diversity, there are people who love peace and believe that Allah calls them to be beacons of hope and light, and there are people who want to destroy the infidel and believe that Allah calls them to do just that, and there are people on pretty much every stop between those two extremes.
I don't know Islam or Muslims as well as I probably should, given that we share an ancestry, but I do know the Church and Christians, specifically I know the American Church and American Christians. I found myself humming an old Sesame Street song as I got ready for work this morning, Who are the people in your neighborhood. And it gave me an idea for a series of blog posts, I'm going to do some generalizing and sorting and write a series of character sketches of general types of people that populate the pulpits and pews of the American Church. I'm going to specifically try and not have any of these be character assassinations, and I'm not going to ever pick on one person. If I find myself writing about a type that has only one representative in my mind, I'm going to stop and zoom out and start over.
So this, I guess, is the disclaimer: none of these are about you, at least not you specifically. Each person, in reality, is more unique than any categorical descriptions could really do justice. Also, I'm going to try and be funny, at least funny in my own sense of the word, because in addition to recognizing the diversity of any body of people, we also need to be able to laugh at ourselves. The more serious the business, the more important good humor is. As I mentioned before, people with no sense of humor are dangerous types who like to shoot cartoonists for being offensive.
To get off on the right foot, instead of skewering some type of person I really don't like very much, I'm going to start with a type of Christian that I actually like:
The Old School Liberal
If I was going to have a dinner party, I would want lots of these folks around. They are liberals from an age where liberal meant something besides MSNBC's audience, and in fact had very little to do with a political affiliation. Reinhold Neibuhr and C.S. Lewis are OSL, and they have been embraced by many, who in this day and age consider themselves dyed in the wool conservatives. This type of liberal might also be considered an enlightenment or modern thinker, meaning that they value rationality and the work that we call apologetics, reconciling Christian faith with scientific truth and social movements. Old School liberals might be unabashed adherents to the social gospel and have no trouble whatsoever with theological discourse taking place in the ivory towers of academia, so long as the work of the Church was still done among the poor and the disenfranchised.
In fact, the thing that makes them "Old School" is the assumption that, in fact, the work of theology, the rather difficult and obtuse arguments that happen within the bounds of Christian Orthodoxy, are best left to those educated and conversant with the long dialogue of faith. One does not engage a neophyte Christian believer in a conversation about the soteriological implications of the monophysite controversy, however, one might read and struggle to understand those implications for the history of the church and the formation of the doctrine of the Trinity, to which one subscribes, but which one knows must not be held too tightly.
You usually feel more intelligent, and rather more faithful after a good conversation with an OSL, because they are generally Socratic teachers, and most of them (at this juncture in history) have been around the block a dozen times. They will ask you questions and lead you into the truth (or at least to their point of view of the truth), so that you feel like you've made the journey yourself, and in some sense you have.
Can they be arrogant? Yes.
Cant they be condescending? Definitely.
Will they use words you have to go look up later? You can be pretty sure of that.
But the thing is, in my experience, which is certainly colored by the fact that most of my real world exemplars of OSLs are all old enough to be my grandfather or grandmother, it often comes across as gentle advice from a wise elder rather than a harsh critique from an authority figure.
How does one distinguish a really top shelf Old School Liberal from say, your garden variety Old Blowhard (a non-church specific type)?
I would offer that it is probably the presence of questions, some of which may not be entirely Socratic in nature. The best of Liberal-ness is generally found in the willingness to question and examine one's most deeply held assumptions and convictions. Liberals who fail to do this, or lose the ability to do this can become as rigid and fundamentalist (in a bad way) as any conservative. One gets the feeling with a true OSL, that the dialogue is truly a two way communication. They may be more experienced and more educated than you, their perspective and understanding might seem daunting, but they will be listening and watching to see if there is something they might learn from the eyes of youth, this sort of practice has become part of their nature.
They may challenge you on your own assumptions about things, and if that bothers you, or you cannot accept it from that particular person for reasons of personality conflict, you probably will not enjoy your time with them, but in my opinion, that will be your loss.
I don't know Islam or Muslims as well as I probably should, given that we share an ancestry, but I do know the Church and Christians, specifically I know the American Church and American Christians. I found myself humming an old Sesame Street song as I got ready for work this morning, Who are the people in your neighborhood. And it gave me an idea for a series of blog posts, I'm going to do some generalizing and sorting and write a series of character sketches of general types of people that populate the pulpits and pews of the American Church. I'm going to specifically try and not have any of these be character assassinations, and I'm not going to ever pick on one person. If I find myself writing about a type that has only one representative in my mind, I'm going to stop and zoom out and start over.
So this, I guess, is the disclaimer: none of these are about you, at least not you specifically. Each person, in reality, is more unique than any categorical descriptions could really do justice. Also, I'm going to try and be funny, at least funny in my own sense of the word, because in addition to recognizing the diversity of any body of people, we also need to be able to laugh at ourselves. The more serious the business, the more important good humor is. As I mentioned before, people with no sense of humor are dangerous types who like to shoot cartoonists for being offensive.
To get off on the right foot, instead of skewering some type of person I really don't like very much, I'm going to start with a type of Christian that I actually like:
The Old School Liberal
If I was going to have a dinner party, I would want lots of these folks around. They are liberals from an age where liberal meant something besides MSNBC's audience, and in fact had very little to do with a political affiliation. Reinhold Neibuhr and C.S. Lewis are OSL, and they have been embraced by many, who in this day and age consider themselves dyed in the wool conservatives. This type of liberal might also be considered an enlightenment or modern thinker, meaning that they value rationality and the work that we call apologetics, reconciling Christian faith with scientific truth and social movements. Old School liberals might be unabashed adherents to the social gospel and have no trouble whatsoever with theological discourse taking place in the ivory towers of academia, so long as the work of the Church was still done among the poor and the disenfranchised.
In fact, the thing that makes them "Old School" is the assumption that, in fact, the work of theology, the rather difficult and obtuse arguments that happen within the bounds of Christian Orthodoxy, are best left to those educated and conversant with the long dialogue of faith. One does not engage a neophyte Christian believer in a conversation about the soteriological implications of the monophysite controversy, however, one might read and struggle to understand those implications for the history of the church and the formation of the doctrine of the Trinity, to which one subscribes, but which one knows must not be held too tightly.
You usually feel more intelligent, and rather more faithful after a good conversation with an OSL, because they are generally Socratic teachers, and most of them (at this juncture in history) have been around the block a dozen times. They will ask you questions and lead you into the truth (or at least to their point of view of the truth), so that you feel like you've made the journey yourself, and in some sense you have.
Can they be arrogant? Yes.
Cant they be condescending? Definitely.
Will they use words you have to go look up later? You can be pretty sure of that.
But the thing is, in my experience, which is certainly colored by the fact that most of my real world exemplars of OSLs are all old enough to be my grandfather or grandmother, it often comes across as gentle advice from a wise elder rather than a harsh critique from an authority figure.
How does one distinguish a really top shelf Old School Liberal from say, your garden variety Old Blowhard (a non-church specific type)?
I would offer that it is probably the presence of questions, some of which may not be entirely Socratic in nature. The best of Liberal-ness is generally found in the willingness to question and examine one's most deeply held assumptions and convictions. Liberals who fail to do this, or lose the ability to do this can become as rigid and fundamentalist (in a bad way) as any conservative. One gets the feeling with a true OSL, that the dialogue is truly a two way communication. They may be more experienced and more educated than you, their perspective and understanding might seem daunting, but they will be listening and watching to see if there is something they might learn from the eyes of youth, this sort of practice has become part of their nature.
They may challenge you on your own assumptions about things, and if that bothers you, or you cannot accept it from that particular person for reasons of personality conflict, you probably will not enjoy your time with them, but in my opinion, that will be your loss.
Wednesday, January 7, 2015
Aujourd'hui tout le monde sait que Charlie
Yesterday, I had no idea who or what Charlie Hebdo even was.
Unfortunately, today I know, for all the wrong reasons.
I may have mentioned before that one of the biggest problems plaguing certain types of fundamentalists is that they have absolutely no sense of humor.
Looking at a brief collection of some of the magazines satirical cartoons, I notice that there really isn't a very good analogue for what they did in the United States. I would say they're kind of like MAD magazine, but what they do is a little more hostile and serious than Alfred E. Newman. There are things in their portfolio that I find explicitly offensive, and I don't really get offended too easily.
Even in the times that I have been deeply offended, even in times when that offense has been in the name of my God, I would not consider storming a magazine's office with an assault rifle and mowing down the "infidel."
Not because I can't get hopping mad about things, but I'm rather mystified by the mindset that thinks you should kill people over crudely drawn cartoons.
Yes, I am aware that the men who did this do not represent Islam as a whole.
Yes, I am aware that Christians have burned, hung and disemboweled people for blasphemy.
Yes, I know that was not that long ago.
But I am not willing to say that, because violence happens, we must accept this sort of thing.
Getting offended is generally not a productive thing. You can be challenged, you can be angry, you can strongly disagree, but when you, as they say, "get your nose out of joint," you will have a hard time acting in a rational and constructive way.
You know what offends me? Violence, poverty, injustice.
You know who I think we ought to defend? Children, the poor, the old, the defenseless and the marginalized.
God is not on that list. God is perfectly capable of handling Godself in a scrap. I'm rather certain that God is going to have some unpleasant things to say to those gunmen, who killed in his name, and I suspect he will be rather more kind to the godless scoffers who have arrived, rather unexpectedly.
From a spiritual point of view, people that do this sort of thing think that they can do God's work using the Devil's tools, and that's a BIG mistake. The sort of thing that happened in Paris this morning is basically a lose-lose-lose situation for the offended parties. First of all, it's not going to stop journalists and satirists from doing their thing, if anything it's just going to give them more ammo, and a greater sense of vindication for mocking you.
Second of all, the world is, all of the sudden, going to pay a lot more attention to what they say about you. You have just given a magazine that had very little in the way of international audience, a sudden surge of notoriety. Now the world knows about Charlie Hebdo, and the world feels empathy for Charlie Hebdo, even if they were offended by Charlie Hebdo, they're now much more offended by your bloody killing in the name of your god.
Finally, you have sold your soul to the spirit of violence, hatred and all that is contrary to the creative love of God, and that is what Satan really is. When you attack defenseless people in the name of god, you are not serving God, you are serving the opposite of God. You are not vindicating God's righteousness, you are a slave to evil.
Today, I will pray for the godless critics of religion at Charlie Hebdo, and I will pray for the Satanic men who tried to silence them. I will leave the vengeance and the justice up to God.
Tuesday, January 6, 2015
A Big, Small, Wonderful, Mad World
Do you know that people are actually surviving Ebola in Africa? Yep, even with a mortality rate of 75-80% depending on who you listen to, some people live through it. Which creates a whole new set of problems, which are pretty much head-scratchers to most of us. Apparently, there's a stigma around people who have survived Ebola, even after the hospitals have declared them disease free, they may not be welcome back in their villages, because, you know, death juju or whatever.
I'm going to try not to be patronizing here, but I may not succeed so give me grace.
Africa is an amazing place in a lot of ways. It tends towards being the land that time forgot. Of course, there are eruptions of enlightenment, there are deep traditions of art and music and there are wonders, both natural and human, but there is also a lot darkness.
With HIV/AIDS and Ebola, it turns out that the ignorance and fear of the people is a major vector of the disease. People with Ebola symptoms are resistant to head to the hospital because they apparently believe that it's actually the disinfectant spray in ambulances and hospitals that is the cause of death, not the Ebola Virus itself. It reminds me of the rather troubling story of people who believed they could be cured of AIDS by having sex with a virgin, which of course resulted in a lot of rape, and compounded rather than slowed the spread of disease.
Fear is the mind killer, and if the minds in question have been functionally isolated from much of the progress that has been made in the world over the past 100 years... behold a perfect storm of ignorance.
As the survivors of Ebola begin to emerge from the hospitals they are being greeted with suspicion. Many of these survivors are young, because young people were probably healthier to begin with and they heal better in the long run. There will be a wave of orphans, not doubt that will join with the orphans of AIDS and Genocides and overall the situation just seems like it's going to get worse before it gets better.
In other words, there is not a viable option for these people that will now be shunned from their home communities. The sort of society that exists in much of Africa is much more interconnected and inter-reliant than many of us in the west can really imagine. The people in these villages need each other to survive, they're very far from the isolated nuclear family units of Europe and America.
Ignorance and fear must be counteracted in the wake of Ebola and HIV as much as they are in the path of the oncoming storm. Work is being done, explanations are being made, and my prayer for Africa is that the people will listen.
The forgiveness and reconciliation work that is being done in Rwanda is what gives me a glimmer of hope. The orphans of the genocide are being cared for by the people of Rwanda, The public and ongoing act of reconciling between victims and perpetrators of violence is long and difficult, but it is being done.
As much as I wish that the people there would learn from our scientific and rational way of dealing with things like Ebola, we can learn something from them as well. We can look at the effect of fear and ignorance and learn to root it out, yes, but we can also learn a lot about resilience and community, and picking up the pieces.
While it may mystify me that so many people can believe that disinfectant is more dangerous than Ebola, it should probably be of greater concern that I/we are so poor at showing forgiveness and grace.
We can be so protected by technology that we begin to feel invulnerable, but we're not above being blinded by fear. I worry that if we ever do experience a pandemic like what is happening in Sierra Leone, we might not be so easily pulled out of the darkness of our own fear.
As Jesus taught us, it is good to remove the log in our own eye before we try to take the splinter out of someone else's. Even if the other person appears to have a log in their eye, it is always good to consider what you might learn from their predicament. This requires empathy, this requires some difficult self reflection, but if you're going to help, it just has to be done.
I'm going to try not to be patronizing here, but I may not succeed so give me grace.
Africa is an amazing place in a lot of ways. It tends towards being the land that time forgot. Of course, there are eruptions of enlightenment, there are deep traditions of art and music and there are wonders, both natural and human, but there is also a lot darkness.
With HIV/AIDS and Ebola, it turns out that the ignorance and fear of the people is a major vector of the disease. People with Ebola symptoms are resistant to head to the hospital because they apparently believe that it's actually the disinfectant spray in ambulances and hospitals that is the cause of death, not the Ebola Virus itself. It reminds me of the rather troubling story of people who believed they could be cured of AIDS by having sex with a virgin, which of course resulted in a lot of rape, and compounded rather than slowed the spread of disease.
Fear is the mind killer, and if the minds in question have been functionally isolated from much of the progress that has been made in the world over the past 100 years... behold a perfect storm of ignorance.
As the survivors of Ebola begin to emerge from the hospitals they are being greeted with suspicion. Many of these survivors are young, because young people were probably healthier to begin with and they heal better in the long run. There will be a wave of orphans, not doubt that will join with the orphans of AIDS and Genocides and overall the situation just seems like it's going to get worse before it gets better.
In other words, there is not a viable option for these people that will now be shunned from their home communities. The sort of society that exists in much of Africa is much more interconnected and inter-reliant than many of us in the west can really imagine. The people in these villages need each other to survive, they're very far from the isolated nuclear family units of Europe and America.
Ignorance and fear must be counteracted in the wake of Ebola and HIV as much as they are in the path of the oncoming storm. Work is being done, explanations are being made, and my prayer for Africa is that the people will listen.
The forgiveness and reconciliation work that is being done in Rwanda is what gives me a glimmer of hope. The orphans of the genocide are being cared for by the people of Rwanda, The public and ongoing act of reconciling between victims and perpetrators of violence is long and difficult, but it is being done.
As much as I wish that the people there would learn from our scientific and rational way of dealing with things like Ebola, we can learn something from them as well. We can look at the effect of fear and ignorance and learn to root it out, yes, but we can also learn a lot about resilience and community, and picking up the pieces.
While it may mystify me that so many people can believe that disinfectant is more dangerous than Ebola, it should probably be of greater concern that I/we are so poor at showing forgiveness and grace.
We can be so protected by technology that we begin to feel invulnerable, but we're not above being blinded by fear. I worry that if we ever do experience a pandemic like what is happening in Sierra Leone, we might not be so easily pulled out of the darkness of our own fear.
As Jesus taught us, it is good to remove the log in our own eye before we try to take the splinter out of someone else's. Even if the other person appears to have a log in their eye, it is always good to consider what you might learn from their predicament. This requires empathy, this requires some difficult self reflection, but if you're going to help, it just has to be done.
Monday, January 5, 2015
What does regret mean?
My dog is an idiot. And I'm not just talking about your run-of-the-mill dog type behavior, I mean his brain turns off the instant he smells something or sees something he wants to chase. He's some sort of Labrador mix, and I have been working for most of his 6+ years under the delusion that, like other Lab-type dogs I've had, that he is going to calm down and become the really wonderful companion sort of animal those dogs were after their exuberant puppy-hood.
But he's not, he's apparently got some sort of hound DNA in there and he's a chaser, a nose to the ground, I'm not stopping until it climbs a tree, chaser.
Zeke's life with us started with the promise of a "free" puppy. I know darn well there's no such thing as a "free" puppy, there are only puppies with no up front cost, usually because the owners of said "free" puppies are desperate to get rid of them. His mother was a nice enough black labbish dog, who the owners claimed was a purebred, despite what the white markings on her chest and feet would seem to indicate. Now I'm not a dog snob, my best friend growing up was a mutt of such indeterminate parentage even guessing at pedigree was laughable. And I'm also not a moron when it comes to dogs, I have managed to more or less train the aforementioned mutt (with my Dad's help), I have trained our one "high class" pedigreed animal, a Chocolate Lab, to the point where she was absolutely trustworthy around small children and the only negative to having her around was in being a tripping hazard and the occasional episode of flatulence.
In fact, we got Zeke with the reasonable expectation that he would be socialized into the pack by Maggie and mirror her truly wonderful family style. Also, we had kids who held puppies and pretty much had to have one. I knew when I said we could go "look at the puppies" that we were going to get a puppy. I went in, at least partially, with my eyes open.
But knowing better only makes regret even worse.
Zeke is a nice enough animal, and that's really his saving grace, otherwise he has very few redeeming qualities. He smells, and it's not a smell that can be cured with regular bathing. He is irredeemably wild, even if it is in a friendly, exuberant way. He is both defiant and painfully submissive, which is weird, because it's hard to know if you're going too far or not far enough with correction. I am a believer in the form of discipline that dogs use on their own pups, a firm grip on the scruff of the neck and bit of a shake. It worked wonders with Maggie, she clearly deferred to my dominance, and (after the puppy years) I very rarely had to yell at her or discipline her in any way, and I could pretty much trust her to do what she was supposed to do, at least until we got Zeke, he was actually a bad influence on her, pretty much the opposite of what I had in mind.
Zeke's not getting the hint. He knows when he's gone wrong, but he doesn't change his behavior. It's been getting to me temper wise, because it's been over six years. In that time, I have come to regret our decision to get him in the first place. I have never regretted owning an animal before, even the cat that we had to hide during our apartment years. He's not dangerous, in fact, if anything he's too friendly with other people. He's a good companion on walks and he is always pretty happy, but here's the thing: I feel like I have utterly failed as his pack leader.
My failure started the minute I decided to bring him home. It continued when I didn't really sink the time into training him that he needed, because he was difficult and seemed oblivious, and because I had human children that needed more attention and because I thought my dear Maggie would get him in line (I think she regretted my decision more than me).
I believe that owning an animal is a lifetime commitment. For better or worse, I am stuck with Zeke and Zeke is stuck with me. I'm not giving up, because for his own well being he needs to get it under control, or else I'm going to be scraping him off of someone's bumper. So I'm going to try a different method, and if that doesn't work, we'll go for something else.
The reality is that it's not going to be all that long before old age calms Zeke down, but in the mean time I am treating this as a lesson in regret, and living with regret.
You can regret all sorts of things, some of them are big life decisions others are just dogs or a tattoo, but the spiritual process is kind of the same, you have to accept, and love and grow somehow or other. Or else you're just stuck. Zeke and I have been stuck for too long.
But he's not, he's apparently got some sort of hound DNA in there and he's a chaser, a nose to the ground, I'm not stopping until it climbs a tree, chaser.
Zeke's life with us started with the promise of a "free" puppy. I know darn well there's no such thing as a "free" puppy, there are only puppies with no up front cost, usually because the owners of said "free" puppies are desperate to get rid of them. His mother was a nice enough black labbish dog, who the owners claimed was a purebred, despite what the white markings on her chest and feet would seem to indicate. Now I'm not a dog snob, my best friend growing up was a mutt of such indeterminate parentage even guessing at pedigree was laughable. And I'm also not a moron when it comes to dogs, I have managed to more or less train the aforementioned mutt (with my Dad's help), I have trained our one "high class" pedigreed animal, a Chocolate Lab, to the point where she was absolutely trustworthy around small children and the only negative to having her around was in being a tripping hazard and the occasional episode of flatulence.
In fact, we got Zeke with the reasonable expectation that he would be socialized into the pack by Maggie and mirror her truly wonderful family style. Also, we had kids who held puppies and pretty much had to have one. I knew when I said we could go "look at the puppies" that we were going to get a puppy. I went in, at least partially, with my eyes open.
But knowing better only makes regret even worse.
Zeke is a nice enough animal, and that's really his saving grace, otherwise he has very few redeeming qualities. He smells, and it's not a smell that can be cured with regular bathing. He is irredeemably wild, even if it is in a friendly, exuberant way. He is both defiant and painfully submissive, which is weird, because it's hard to know if you're going too far or not far enough with correction. I am a believer in the form of discipline that dogs use on their own pups, a firm grip on the scruff of the neck and bit of a shake. It worked wonders with Maggie, she clearly deferred to my dominance, and (after the puppy years) I very rarely had to yell at her or discipline her in any way, and I could pretty much trust her to do what she was supposed to do, at least until we got Zeke, he was actually a bad influence on her, pretty much the opposite of what I had in mind.
Zeke's not getting the hint. He knows when he's gone wrong, but he doesn't change his behavior. It's been getting to me temper wise, because it's been over six years. In that time, I have come to regret our decision to get him in the first place. I have never regretted owning an animal before, even the cat that we had to hide during our apartment years. He's not dangerous, in fact, if anything he's too friendly with other people. He's a good companion on walks and he is always pretty happy, but here's the thing: I feel like I have utterly failed as his pack leader.
My failure started the minute I decided to bring him home. It continued when I didn't really sink the time into training him that he needed, because he was difficult and seemed oblivious, and because I had human children that needed more attention and because I thought my dear Maggie would get him in line (I think she regretted my decision more than me).
I believe that owning an animal is a lifetime commitment. For better or worse, I am stuck with Zeke and Zeke is stuck with me. I'm not giving up, because for his own well being he needs to get it under control, or else I'm going to be scraping him off of someone's bumper. So I'm going to try a different method, and if that doesn't work, we'll go for something else.
The reality is that it's not going to be all that long before old age calms Zeke down, but in the mean time I am treating this as a lesson in regret, and living with regret.
You can regret all sorts of things, some of them are big life decisions others are just dogs or a tattoo, but the spiritual process is kind of the same, you have to accept, and love and grow somehow or other. Or else you're just stuck. Zeke and I have been stuck for too long.
Thursday, January 1, 2015
Round and Round
Having learned a few things about our personal preferences over the years, we finally just stayed home on New Years. No parties, no gatherings, nothing. We watched the thousands of people gathered in Times Square from the safety of our television and not once did I regret not "being there."
To tell you the truth, it's sort of heartening to see a totally secular holiday become as contrived and overwrought as the religious ones. Thankfully, we're still reeling from the conspicuous consumption of Christmas that we haven't yet started any obligatory New Years gift giving.
All is quiet on New Years day.
While it is entirely a mental attitude, it does rather feel like a clean slate, a fresh calendar, a new cycle of stuff happening. What's the first brush stroke on the canvas, the first mark on the clean sheet of paper? Is the beginning really more significant than any other day of the year?
Probably not.
But this is all part of our human existence in linear time, we mark passings and we celebrate these annual cycles. I don't know exactly why, but I do know it has been going on for a very long time, and has attestation across cultural and geographical boundaries. Since we first started observing the sun, even when we thought it was a big chariot ridden across the sky by a god, we have noticed that its behavior was rather predictable and we ascribed some sort of meaning to its cycle.
Bam, you have a culturally significant event, which people can share and celebrate should they so choose. And you also have a rather widespread feeling of starting over again.
Michele and I watched Silver Linings Playbook last night while we were waiting for midnight to strike. It was one of those movies which might loosely be called a comedy/drama or maybe even a romantic movie, but there was something weird about it; it made me kind of tense for a good part of the movie.
The main character, played by Bradley Cooper, was a man fresh out of an institution after suffering a violent breakdown precipitated by discovering his wife's infidelity, and nearly beating the man to death. As it turns out he has been bipolar for most of his life and is now forced by law to deal with that reality. I have to give Cooper some serious credit for his job in playing this character, he manages to capture the seriousness of the problem, and the really problematic behaviors associated with it, without destroying the empathy you have for the character. You want to smack him sometimes, but it's out of a desire to help him see the obvious truth.
It ended up being a good movie to watch on New Year's Eve because it is essentially about a couple of very broken people finally getting a clean slate. You can't help but be happy for them. There are no guarantees that everything is going to be fine in the future but you are left hopeful, that maybe this year will be better than the last.
Isn't that why we have probably celebrated cycles and new beginnings for so very long?
To tell you the truth, it's sort of heartening to see a totally secular holiday become as contrived and overwrought as the religious ones. Thankfully, we're still reeling from the conspicuous consumption of Christmas that we haven't yet started any obligatory New Years gift giving.
All is quiet on New Years day.
While it is entirely a mental attitude, it does rather feel like a clean slate, a fresh calendar, a new cycle of stuff happening. What's the first brush stroke on the canvas, the first mark on the clean sheet of paper? Is the beginning really more significant than any other day of the year?
Probably not.
But this is all part of our human existence in linear time, we mark passings and we celebrate these annual cycles. I don't know exactly why, but I do know it has been going on for a very long time, and has attestation across cultural and geographical boundaries. Since we first started observing the sun, even when we thought it was a big chariot ridden across the sky by a god, we have noticed that its behavior was rather predictable and we ascribed some sort of meaning to its cycle.
Bam, you have a culturally significant event, which people can share and celebrate should they so choose. And you also have a rather widespread feeling of starting over again.
Michele and I watched Silver Linings Playbook last night while we were waiting for midnight to strike. It was one of those movies which might loosely be called a comedy/drama or maybe even a romantic movie, but there was something weird about it; it made me kind of tense for a good part of the movie.
The main character, played by Bradley Cooper, was a man fresh out of an institution after suffering a violent breakdown precipitated by discovering his wife's infidelity, and nearly beating the man to death. As it turns out he has been bipolar for most of his life and is now forced by law to deal with that reality. I have to give Cooper some serious credit for his job in playing this character, he manages to capture the seriousness of the problem, and the really problematic behaviors associated with it, without destroying the empathy you have for the character. You want to smack him sometimes, but it's out of a desire to help him see the obvious truth.
It ended up being a good movie to watch on New Year's Eve because it is essentially about a couple of very broken people finally getting a clean slate. You can't help but be happy for them. There are no guarantees that everything is going to be fine in the future but you are left hopeful, that maybe this year will be better than the last.
Isn't that why we have probably celebrated cycles and new beginnings for so very long?
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