now, don't get me wrong
i love havin' a church
keeps the rain off our heads
an' if people want to find us
they know where to look
but the Body ain't the church
any more than the Word is a book
Friday, July 17, 2009
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
your damn fault
your fault i am even out here
isaias; triplet monographs
mouth-burned mumblers
the lot of you
crack-lipped, numb
pustuled prophets
i've shattered not a single yoke
i've taken every one in hand, and
they don't even bend
no light springing forth
no listening ear
just we like oxen dragging ourselves behind us
if you mouth(s) had never been burned
i would be smooth-lipped
maybe gainful, maybe
yoked yet
better if we had not met
isaias; triplet monographs
mouth-burned mumblers
the lot of you
crack-lipped, numb
pustuled prophets
i've shattered not a single yoke
i've taken every one in hand, and
they don't even bend
no light springing forth
no listening ear
just we like oxen dragging ourselves behind us
if you mouth(s) had never been burned
i would be smooth-lipped
maybe gainful, maybe
yoked yet
better if we had not met
Sunday, July 12, 2009
God Out of Bounds: Physical Science
Let's pick this series up again, dust if off, and see where it goes. Next, I've moved down the list a bit and have selected physical science. This feels like an interesting choice - the most often comments we hear in our society from religious folks are basically anti-science, or at the very least deeply suspicious of science. Then we have the more progressive religious minority whispering "But I think science is ok..."
I don't just think that science is OK, I think that science can show us things about God, lead to experiences of transcendence and awe - all whether you are a religious person or not.
The Basics: Physics
Physics on the macro level - you know, the Newtonian world of gravity and electromagnetism and thermodynamics - seems pretty straightforward. Planes fly, microwaves make my dinner and I always throw a baseball in a parabolic arc. You could confuse the world with a huge clock-like machine (and until modern times it was very easy to do so).
If you look closer, though, things are totally insane. Particles teleport around, appear and disappear, and affect each other across distances in ways that allow information to travel faster than the speed of light. At places like CERN, they smash tiny things together at obnoxious speeds and even tinier things break off, surviving for fragments of a second, that only the most sensitive machines we have available can detect.
So when things get really small - when you look very, very closely, not only are the rules broken - the rules don't even mean anything anymore. You're down a rabbit-hole.
What does it mean that so many think God the creator is primarily concerned with rules and their enforcement when we can't even find and understand all the rules that govern physical matter?
Life and its Origins
When we think of God "making" the cosmos, we use metaphorical language based on the best understanding we have of what it means to "make". In Genesis, God "makes" in a way that is described with words referring to metallurgy and blacksmithing, for example, which was the most complicated thing that bronze-age thinkers could conceive of.
Now, when we think about God "making", we have a much wider, more spectacular number of metaphors to utilize. We can go to the limits of our understanding of the age of the Earth and physical life processes and talk about the creation of life in ways never before conceiveable. This is not a threat - it is amazing. This also does not nullify, somehow, the metaphors of the past, like metallurgy or sculpting out of clay. We still do these things too.
Sometimes I sit down and actually try to think backwards through what I understand of the history of life on Earth. Try it - it is impossible, but very moving. Imagine, starting from the beginning moving forward or the preesnt moving back, in a time-lapse montage style, the development of live as you understand it. Back to a time before mammals, to a time before trees, to a time before flowering plants, to a time before bony fish, before sexual reproduction, to a time before multicellular organisms...it is staggering, and for me, a source of intense awe and amazement.
The Universe at Large
We live in the heart of a miracle of scale. The sun's light reaches us in about eight seconds, and knowing that, we have already shattered our normal means of understanding scale.
Turtles All the Way Down
There are things we are struggling to understand. For example, the cosmos may be a web of vibrating, interacting 10-dimensional strings. It may be holographic, projected from a distant limit which contains only pure information. It may be enfolded 11-dimensional membranes. It may be one of infinite universes, each displaying slightly different physical laws, and we are in the only one that could have given rise to us.
In short, we do not definitively know what stuff is made of, or why it is here, or how it came to be. Not at a fundamental level. Maybe this will always be a mystery. I've read the theory that it is impossible to understand the nature of the universe using methods and tools bounded by the rules of the universe. This could be, but the search is sure a lot of fun to follow along with (as much as I can understand it, which isn't much).
This matches my own experience, which is that in order to make sense of my life and my place in the world, I need primarily to have trust. I tire of the current conservative Christian obsession with objectivity, which by definition precludes trust or faith or hope, because it implies certainty.
I don't live in a universe of certainty.
Physical Science as Alien, then Threat, Then Engine for Theology
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win. -Gandhi
At first, theology and physical science were odd bedfellows, but bedfellows all the same. You couldn't account for physical phenominae without making reference to the gods, spirits, or primal spiritual forces which existed in the world.
Over time these two cousins split apart, and at various points in various cultures, they seem to have had a real bloody falling-out. They stopped talking to each other.
This led to them becoming outright enemies. There wasn't enough room in the playground for both of them to play.
Let's be honest - in time, physical science won, and the result is a demystified, demogoguish, mechanized, "expert"-driven culture which is totally bereft of meaning, purpose, beauty or awe. That's oversimplifying, but who the heck wants to live in a world of pundits and advertisements and consumption?
Shoot me now. Make it quick.
What I want is for physical science to become an engine for theological inquiry and meaning-making. This is already happening at the fringes, so to speak, but not in the center. In the center, you seem to have a "God of the gaps", ever shrinking, an ostrich method of burying heads in the sand, or a continuation of the pointless animosity between physical science and religion.
My questions for this post are: What resources have you found which connect theology and meaning-making with physical science? What is the most amazing thing you ever learned about the physical world?
I don't just think that science is OK, I think that science can show us things about God, lead to experiences of transcendence and awe - all whether you are a religious person or not.
The Basics: Physics
Physics on the macro level - you know, the Newtonian world of gravity and electromagnetism and thermodynamics - seems pretty straightforward. Planes fly, microwaves make my dinner and I always throw a baseball in a parabolic arc. You could confuse the world with a huge clock-like machine (and until modern times it was very easy to do so).
If you look closer, though, things are totally insane. Particles teleport around, appear and disappear, and affect each other across distances in ways that allow information to travel faster than the speed of light. At places like CERN, they smash tiny things together at obnoxious speeds and even tinier things break off, surviving for fragments of a second, that only the most sensitive machines we have available can detect.
So when things get really small - when you look very, very closely, not only are the rules broken - the rules don't even mean anything anymore. You're down a rabbit-hole.
What does it mean that so many think God the creator is primarily concerned with rules and their enforcement when we can't even find and understand all the rules that govern physical matter?
Life and its Origins
When we think of God "making" the cosmos, we use metaphorical language based on the best understanding we have of what it means to "make". In Genesis, God "makes" in a way that is described with words referring to metallurgy and blacksmithing, for example, which was the most complicated thing that bronze-age thinkers could conceive of.
Now, when we think about God "making", we have a much wider, more spectacular number of metaphors to utilize. We can go to the limits of our understanding of the age of the Earth and physical life processes and talk about the creation of life in ways never before conceiveable. This is not a threat - it is amazing. This also does not nullify, somehow, the metaphors of the past, like metallurgy or sculpting out of clay. We still do these things too.
Sometimes I sit down and actually try to think backwards through what I understand of the history of life on Earth. Try it - it is impossible, but very moving. Imagine, starting from the beginning moving forward or the preesnt moving back, in a time-lapse montage style, the development of live as you understand it. Back to a time before mammals, to a time before trees, to a time before flowering plants, to a time before bony fish, before sexual reproduction, to a time before multicellular organisms...it is staggering, and for me, a source of intense awe and amazement.
The Universe at Large
We live in the heart of a miracle of scale. The sun's light reaches us in about eight seconds, and knowing that, we have already shattered our normal means of understanding scale.
Turtles All the Way Down
There are things we are struggling to understand. For example, the cosmos may be a web of vibrating, interacting 10-dimensional strings. It may be holographic, projected from a distant limit which contains only pure information. It may be enfolded 11-dimensional membranes. It may be one of infinite universes, each displaying slightly different physical laws, and we are in the only one that could have given rise to us.
In short, we do not definitively know what stuff is made of, or why it is here, or how it came to be. Not at a fundamental level. Maybe this will always be a mystery. I've read the theory that it is impossible to understand the nature of the universe using methods and tools bounded by the rules of the universe. This could be, but the search is sure a lot of fun to follow along with (as much as I can understand it, which isn't much).
This matches my own experience, which is that in order to make sense of my life and my place in the world, I need primarily to have trust. I tire of the current conservative Christian obsession with objectivity, which by definition precludes trust or faith or hope, because it implies certainty.
I don't live in a universe of certainty.
Physical Science as Alien, then Threat, Then Engine for Theology
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win. -Gandhi
At first, theology and physical science were odd bedfellows, but bedfellows all the same. You couldn't account for physical phenominae without making reference to the gods, spirits, or primal spiritual forces which existed in the world.
Over time these two cousins split apart, and at various points in various cultures, they seem to have had a real bloody falling-out. They stopped talking to each other.
This led to them becoming outright enemies. There wasn't enough room in the playground for both of them to play.
Let's be honest - in time, physical science won, and the result is a demystified, demogoguish, mechanized, "expert"-driven culture which is totally bereft of meaning, purpose, beauty or awe. That's oversimplifying, but who the heck wants to live in a world of pundits and advertisements and consumption?
Shoot me now. Make it quick.
What I want is for physical science to become an engine for theological inquiry and meaning-making. This is already happening at the fringes, so to speak, but not in the center. In the center, you seem to have a "God of the gaps", ever shrinking, an ostrich method of burying heads in the sand, or a continuation of the pointless animosity between physical science and religion.
My questions for this post are: What resources have you found which connect theology and meaning-making with physical science? What is the most amazing thing you ever learned about the physical world?
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
The Enneagram in Nine Haikus
depending on how this practice persists, I'll count this as one poem or nine...if you are familiar with the enneagram, you can guess which is which.
ever i balance
see all sides and empathize
fulcrum disappears!
everything in place
someone must divide and see
nothing in between
an open heart cracks
into many smaller hearts
each open always
mirror polishing
i can never see myself
except in success
a perfect lone rose
petals quivering with dew
falling like teardrops
behind battlements
heap upon heap of knowledge
and always i watch
let's each make a deal
if you run then i run; if you
fight then i fight too
what Tiggers do best
bouncy bouncy bouncy bounce -
what was the question?
go ahead, test me
this is me up in your face
i won't hesitate
ever i balance
see all sides and empathize
fulcrum disappears!
everything in place
someone must divide and see
nothing in between
an open heart cracks
into many smaller hearts
each open always
mirror polishing
i can never see myself
except in success
a perfect lone rose
petals quivering with dew
falling like teardrops
behind battlements
heap upon heap of knowledge
and always i watch
let's each make a deal
if you run then i run; if you
fight then i fight too
what Tiggers do best
bouncy bouncy bouncy bounce -
what was the question?
go ahead, test me
this is me up in your face
i won't hesitate
Monday, July 6, 2009
Rick Warren Again
Since we've talked about Rick Warren in the past, and I saw this article today, I thought I'd post it. I think its interesting, and obviously (?) I like it when Warren breaks with his conservative cohorts.
I liked this quote of Warren's:
"It's easier to be an extremist of any kind because then you only have one group of people mad at you," he said. "But if you actually try to build relationships — like invite an evangelical pastor to your gathering — you'll get criticized for it. So will I."
That's a trenchant point I think. If you are an extremist and draw Us/Them lines in the sand, the main ones tho will be mad at you will be the Them. But whenever someone actually tries to make peace and build bridges and forge relationships, they risk both sides, the Us and the Them, being angry at them.
I liked this quote of Warren's:
"It's easier to be an extremist of any kind because then you only have one group of people mad at you," he said. "But if you actually try to build relationships — like invite an evangelical pastor to your gathering — you'll get criticized for it. So will I."
That's a trenchant point I think. If you are an extremist and draw Us/Them lines in the sand, the main ones tho will be mad at you will be the Them. But whenever someone actually tries to make peace and build bridges and forge relationships, they risk both sides, the Us and the Them, being angry at them.
Gamesmanship at the Layman
Carmen Fowler, President of the Presbyterian Lay Committee has published an editorial over at the Layman entitled: "'War,' 'Go Fish,' and 'Manipulation,' in the PCUSA". In it she suggests that the denomination has moved from a game of 'Go Fish' in which we spent all of our time obeying the Great Commission in relative harmony, to a game of 'Manipulation' which is a game I've never heard of, but apparently "can be played by an unlimited number of people as long as you keep multiplying the decks and manipulating the cards." (It sounds like a fun game Ms. Fowler you should post the rules online somewhere!) Writing to the churches of presbyteries who switched their vote from previous amend or delete-b overtures, Carmen Fowler makes it her purpose to inform them that the game has been changed by nefarious agents like The Covenant Network, More Light Presbyterians, and That All May Freely Serve, and if they don't get into the game it will soon become an all out game of 'War!'The letter is charmingly wrong from beginning to end.
First, there was never a time of harmony where all Presbyterians were playing the same game. Ours has always been a communion of knock-down drag-out parliamentarian brawls. See exhibit A:
If it's not one thing it's another that we're fighting about, and the fact that there have not only been divisions, but also reunions makes it rather futile to try and trace the history as the story of a single faithful communion surrounded by heathens. The fact is, we don't agree and we won't. Both sides believe fervently that they are right and there is no way to reliably arbitrate the dispute which everyone will agree to.As for infernal interlopers like More Light Presbyterians... I find it humorous that it is "manipulation" when progressive para-church organizations try to change the Book of Order by assembly, propaganda, changing hearts and minds, and parliamentary procedure, but it is just good old-fashioned democracy when The Institute on Religion and Democracy, Presbyterians for Renewal, New Wineskins, and, of course, The Layman do exactly the same thing, using exactly the same methods. Would everyone please quit playing the righteous indignation card? You make fools of us all. We are all in the same muck and you look like an idiot standing up on a dung hill covered in slime proclaiming yourself purer than the rest of us.
The real failure of the letter, and perhaps the conservative vision, is a failure of imagination. All of the games that Carmen Fowler listed as metaphors for our conflict are Zero-Sum games. They are strictly competitive. One side wins, everyone else loses. Whether we are playing 'Go Fish', 'Manipulation', or 'War' there is no way in which we all win. Which means, it doesn't really matter what you call it we've been playing 'War' all along, because there isn't any other game.
But there are other kinds of games. There are individual achievement games where each person competes against their own previous best. This kind of game is like sanctification. There are cooperative games wherein all the players work together against a central mechanic of the game. This kind of game is what our denominational life is like - we are really only competing against human nature and our sad tendency for conflict. We either all win or all lose together. There are games of pure imagination where the only victory condition is 'everyone has fun.' This, I think, is the kind of game God really loves and it is what the Church is like at its best.All sides agree that God is playing this game with us, and God is going to win. What conservatives fail to realize is that it is not a zero-sum game. There will be no losers in this fight, because the victory condition is 'everybody gets to play.' God is playing until everyone takes their place at the table. God is playing until everyone joins the fun. God is playing until everyone realizes that there are not a limited number of invitations to this game and so there is no need to elbow and shove and try to secure your place by pushing others away. In fact, the more you fight the more clear it is you haven't realized what game it is we are playing here. This is not 'Go Fish' or 'Manipulation' and it is most certainly not 'War.'
This is 'Christianity,' so quit trying to "win" and just start having fun.
Sunday, July 5, 2009
haiku reflections on our bike ride today
flock of pelicans
how like our leaders; swarming
and jostling for fish
and at the outskirts
dainty-wading water birds;
delicate, graceful
watch the commotion
everywhere would be quiet
if we could let be
i go panting past
clattering from gear to gear
i can't help but think
how like our leaders; swarming
and jostling for fish
and at the outskirts
dainty-wading water birds;
delicate, graceful
watch the commotion
everywhere would be quiet
if we could let be
i go panting past
clattering from gear to gear
i can't help but think
Saturday, July 4, 2009
Ask, Tell
In honor of the 4th of July, I am stealing this from a friend and reposting it for your consideration.
On Tuesday, a military board told Lt. Dan Choi -- an Iraq War veteran and Arabic linguist -- that it was recommending his discharge from the Army for "moral and professional dereliction" under the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy.
Despite this setback, Lt. Choi is not giving up. Bolstered by more than 300,000 signatures to letters of support calling for the repeal of DADT, Dan is now taking his fight to repeal the discriminatory "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy to Congress.
Dan needs your help as soon as possible. The sooner DADT is repealed, the sooner he can return to service.
I just signed the letter below to Speaker Nancy Pelosi that Lt. Choi is going to personally deliver to her. The letter is being launched on Lt. Choi's behalf by the Courage Campaign, Knights Out and the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network.
We need Speaker Pelosi to take leadership now and speak out publicly in favor of current legislation in Congress that would repeal the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy.
More than 50,000 people, including me, have signed Lt. Choi's letter in just a few hours. Will you join me in signing it and urge your friends to do the same? Just click to add your name:
http://anonym.to/?http://www.couragecampaign.org/RepealDADT
Thanks!
---Text of HR 1283: Military Readiness Enhancement Act of 2009 for the interested: http://anonym.to/?http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.1283:
On Tuesday, a military board told Lt. Dan Choi -- an Iraq War veteran and Arabic linguist -- that it was recommending his discharge from the Army for "moral and professional dereliction" under the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy.
Despite this setback, Lt. Choi is not giving up. Bolstered by more than 300,000 signatures to letters of support calling for the repeal of DADT, Dan is now taking his fight to repeal the discriminatory "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy to Congress.
Dan needs your help as soon as possible. The sooner DADT is repealed, the sooner he can return to service.
I just signed the letter below to Speaker Nancy Pelosi that Lt. Choi is going to personally deliver to her. The letter is being launched on Lt. Choi's behalf by the Courage Campaign, Knights Out and the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network.
We need Speaker Pelosi to take leadership now and speak out publicly in favor of current legislation in Congress that would repeal the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy.
More than 50,000 people, including me, have signed Lt. Choi's letter in just a few hours. Will you join me in signing it and urge your friends to do the same? Just click to add your name:
http://anonym.to/?http://www.couragecampaign.org/RepealDADT
Thanks!
---Text of HR 1283: Military Readiness Enhancement Act of 2009 for the interested: http://anonym.to/?http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.1283:
last night's mare
i woke up with a little mumbled cry
brought the dog upstairs
in concern
going back in time
bullet popping back out of the front of my skull
swallowing what i said the moment before
please don't shoot me
the man in the coveralls moonwalking
back out of the abandoned bathroom
up the ominous stairs
i try to make sense in reverse
confused; the alarm
late to the game
i think i was supposed to learn something
i don't know what it was
brought the dog upstairs
in concern
going back in time
bullet popping back out of the front of my skull
swallowing what i said the moment before
please don't shoot me
the man in the coveralls moonwalking
back out of the abandoned bathroom
up the ominous stairs
i try to make sense in reverse
confused; the alarm
late to the game
i think i was supposed to learn something
i don't know what it was
Friday, July 3, 2009
This is My Kind of Funk
Here are my own 21 Theses, built around Funk's order and choice of topoics. I am putting my theology where my mouth is. Enjoy!
Theology
1. The universe has meaning and human life has purpose. Human beings are meaning-finding and purpose-finding machines. I'm actually pretty sure we could not even experience a meaningless universe, or go through our lives seeing them as literally meaningless. The question is what meaning? My society, in aggregate, gives one answer. Pillage the world, hurt your enemies, dull your mind and then you die. That is the default. What I call "God" embodies another way.
2. The doctrine of special creation has been magnified by the discoveries of the scope of the earth in time and space as well as the history and functions of life. Our cosmos, drawn within the lines of the limits of our imagination, is always revealed to be shocking and amazing to each successive generation. I take this as evidence that it came to be through forces and mechanisms that will eternally be outside our understanding. That's pretty damn special. And here we are, apparently able to appreciate this cosmos more than any living creature.
3. Death is natural. So is rape. So is war. To say that death is the enemy is to say something that is true for every person who grieves. Everything we say in the face of death is simply intended to blunt its edge as it cuts us to our core. Is this a punishment for sin? (The "wages" of sin?) If we see sin, in part, as enmeshment in an eternally unsatisfactory world full of pain and suffering and want an injustice, then yes, I think one could say that. What the world pays everyone, for all of their efforts, in the end, is death. This is natural, but it is also tragic, and we seek for things that we hope will transcend our deaths.
4. The Bible is full of instances where God is demonstrated to be unpredictable. Job puts to rest the idea that the righteous are protected from suffering and Jesus and the prophets reverse this entirely, saying that the righteous are promised suffering in a world gone wrong. So will we find an algorithm to determine when, where and how God will intervene? Can we find the on-switch for God's action in our lives? Of course not. No one ever will, and looking will always be fruitless. But is the guy who attributes overcoming addiction to the intervention of God a lunatic or a liar? Possibly neither. If God has no impact on our lives whatsoever apart from our conscious volition, then we need to retire theology forever and find something else to talk about.
5. Prayer is a broad term for a technology of spiritual practice. It is a technique, and a vague one at that. A huge weakness of Protestantism is the loss of the monastic tradition and the majority of ancient spiritual practices that have sustained Christians for millennia. We need to reach back for the broad array of practices that we have forgotten, and build new practices as we find we have needs in a world that is unlike any in the past. If people choose to ask God to intervene, then what good is it to stop them or put them down? I've had a few experiences myself where coincidence and bias don't seem to quite cut it. It just saddens me that our rich heritage of spiritual practice has been reduced to a laundry list whispered to God.
Christology
8. Heather Reichgott challenged me here, and I'll go halfway. I think that acknowledging Jesus as coming from Mary's sexuality, at least in part, is important. It also is interesting that men were not involved at all except as a foster parent. I still don't like the virgin birth because I believe it does denigrate sexuality as a dirty thing that cannot really have touched Jesus. If Jesus is human, then he had to come from the same messy, fun stuff we all came from - or as I see it, no deal.
9. Its the classic neon sign, flashing in the urban night; the roadside sign in hand-painted letters on a country road: Jesus Saves. If this is not true, then we quit now and find something that will actually help us become whole. Historically, we've called that "Saving" atonement, something Jesus did at a particular time and place in the past, has done throughout the history of the cosmos from beginning to end, past and future, and seeks to get us to participate in with every moment of your life and mine. For me, penal sub atonement doesn't come anywhere near to covering that.
10. The resurrected Jesus teleports around and passes through crowds, appears and disappears. Clearly the resurrected Jesus, even in a very literalistic reading of the Gospels, was not just Jesus' same body walking around with the same properties other bodies have. The resurrection is a thing, at its core, that we cannot understand fully. We are just like the first disciples and apostles - Paul in particular. The resurrection is something we experience, something we participate in, with our whole lives. Even if a modern nurse could step out of a time machine and do a full physical exam of the risen Jesus, I don't think the resurrection would be affected one bit. If it would be, then it is not the resurrection depicted in the Gospels.
11. Apocalyptic elements have not been part of the main "Christian agenda" for a while now. Well, I guess there's "Jesus is coming, look busy" type evangelism, or fear-of-Hell evangelism, but a lot of even conservative evangelical types look down on this as simply leveraging self-preservation to get people into the pews. I'm fine with tossing that part out. To lose all of the apocalyptic, though, would mean we also have to lose, say, the thoughts and words of Martin Luther King Jr. I am not willing to "expunge" that. When, mere days from his assassination, MLK says he has seen the promised land, he is talking apocalypse. He is talking about the turning of time, the bending of the arc of the universe. Who cares about Jesus floating in the sky and pointing at us in judgement at the end of history like a work of Baroque art? When I read MLK's words, I shiver in my bones, because I know the apocalypse is coming.
God's Domain according to Jesus
14. For Jesus, God's domain is a realm without social boundaries. In that realm there is neither Jew nor Greek, male nor female, slave nor free, homosexual nor heterosexual, friend nor enemy, liberal nor conservative, insider nor outsider, rich nor poor, less nor more abled, gendered nor transgendered...
15. For Jesus, God's domain has no brokers, no mediators between human beings and divinity. There is a state of atonement, when separations fall, even separations between us and God. In the end, we are all in God. We are Christ's body in the perfected sense of God's purpose culminated.
16. For Jesus, the rites of entry into the domain of God are open to all regardless of the things that separate us from each other in other domains. If you can have water dumped on your head, you are in. If you eat bread (or another fruit of the earth for those allergic to wheat or something) then you are in. And now you have to deal with, as family, everyone else who has water dumped on them and who eats food. Good luck :)
17. In the kingdom, forgiveness is reciprocal: individuals can have it only if they practice it. Forgiveness is the hallmark of restorative justice, in contrast to retributive justice.
18. The kingdom is a journey without end: one arrives only by departing. It is therefore a perpetual odyssey. Exile and homecoming are the true conditions of authentic existence.
The canon
The language of faith
Theology
1. The universe has meaning and human life has purpose. Human beings are meaning-finding and purpose-finding machines. I'm actually pretty sure we could not even experience a meaningless universe, or go through our lives seeing them as literally meaningless. The question is what meaning? My society, in aggregate, gives one answer. Pillage the world, hurt your enemies, dull your mind and then you die. That is the default. What I call "God" embodies another way.
2. The doctrine of special creation has been magnified by the discoveries of the scope of the earth in time and space as well as the history and functions of life. Our cosmos, drawn within the lines of the limits of our imagination, is always revealed to be shocking and amazing to each successive generation. I take this as evidence that it came to be through forces and mechanisms that will eternally be outside our understanding. That's pretty damn special. And here we are, apparently able to appreciate this cosmos more than any living creature.
3. Death is natural. So is rape. So is war. To say that death is the enemy is to say something that is true for every person who grieves. Everything we say in the face of death is simply intended to blunt its edge as it cuts us to our core. Is this a punishment for sin? (The "wages" of sin?) If we see sin, in part, as enmeshment in an eternally unsatisfactory world full of pain and suffering and want an injustice, then yes, I think one could say that. What the world pays everyone, for all of their efforts, in the end, is death. This is natural, but it is also tragic, and we seek for things that we hope will transcend our deaths.
4. The Bible is full of instances where God is demonstrated to be unpredictable. Job puts to rest the idea that the righteous are protected from suffering and Jesus and the prophets reverse this entirely, saying that the righteous are promised suffering in a world gone wrong. So will we find an algorithm to determine when, where and how God will intervene? Can we find the on-switch for God's action in our lives? Of course not. No one ever will, and looking will always be fruitless. But is the guy who attributes overcoming addiction to the intervention of God a lunatic or a liar? Possibly neither. If God has no impact on our lives whatsoever apart from our conscious volition, then we need to retire theology forever and find something else to talk about.
5. Prayer is a broad term for a technology of spiritual practice. It is a technique, and a vague one at that. A huge weakness of Protestantism is the loss of the monastic tradition and the majority of ancient spiritual practices that have sustained Christians for millennia. We need to reach back for the broad array of practices that we have forgotten, and build new practices as we find we have needs in a world that is unlike any in the past. If people choose to ask God to intervene, then what good is it to stop them or put them down? I've had a few experiences myself where coincidence and bias don't seem to quite cut it. It just saddens me that our rich heritage of spiritual practice has been reduced to a laundry list whispered to God.
Christology
6. I think that Jesus Christ changes everything. Jesus is an eternal, ineffible and incomprehensible paradox that as Christians we are to embody, even without really understanding most of the time what it is we're getting ourselves into. Would we dare do so if we really understood? Would we line up to be crucified the way we line up to shake the preacher's hand after the sermon? Doubt it. I do not think we should ever surrender a transformative mystery we are called to live into for the sake of a comprehensible, domesticated, just-another-teacher.
8. Heather Reichgott challenged me here, and I'll go halfway. I think that acknowledging Jesus as coming from Mary's sexuality, at least in part, is important. It also is interesting that men were not involved at all except as a foster parent. I still don't like the virgin birth because I believe it does denigrate sexuality as a dirty thing that cannot really have touched Jesus. If Jesus is human, then he had to come from the same messy, fun stuff we all came from - or as I see it, no deal.
9. Its the classic neon sign, flashing in the urban night; the roadside sign in hand-painted letters on a country road: Jesus Saves. If this is not true, then we quit now and find something that will actually help us become whole. Historically, we've called that "Saving" atonement, something Jesus did at a particular time and place in the past, has done throughout the history of the cosmos from beginning to end, past and future, and seeks to get us to participate in with every moment of your life and mine. For me, penal sub atonement doesn't come anywhere near to covering that.
10. The resurrected Jesus teleports around and passes through crowds, appears and disappears. Clearly the resurrected Jesus, even in a very literalistic reading of the Gospels, was not just Jesus' same body walking around with the same properties other bodies have. The resurrection is a thing, at its core, that we cannot understand fully. We are just like the first disciples and apostles - Paul in particular. The resurrection is something we experience, something we participate in, with our whole lives. Even if a modern nurse could step out of a time machine and do a full physical exam of the risen Jesus, I don't think the resurrection would be affected one bit. If it would be, then it is not the resurrection depicted in the Gospels.
11. Apocalyptic elements have not been part of the main "Christian agenda" for a while now. Well, I guess there's "Jesus is coming, look busy" type evangelism, or fear-of-Hell evangelism, but a lot of even conservative evangelical types look down on this as simply leveraging self-preservation to get people into the pews. I'm fine with tossing that part out. To lose all of the apocalyptic, though, would mean we also have to lose, say, the thoughts and words of Martin Luther King Jr. I am not willing to "expunge" that. When, mere days from his assassination, MLK says he has seen the promised land, he is talking apocalypse. He is talking about the turning of time, the bending of the arc of the universe. Who cares about Jesus floating in the sky and pointing at us in judgement at the end of history like a work of Baroque art? When I read MLK's words, I shiver in my bones, because I know the apocalypse is coming.
God's Domain according to Jesus
12. The Gospels are chock-full of Jesus' suspicion of the essential character of neighbors. It is not about trusting your neighbor, it is about loving your neighbor even when s/he is a certified asshole to you all day long. Even given the guarantee that you will be hurt by others, you are never to hurt in return. That is not a trust ethic, that is a nonviolent ethic. The domain of God is ruled by one who gave up all the trappings of power that we expect and was tortured and executed at our hands. Think of any human government, ever. The domain of God is not that.
14. For Jesus, God's domain is a realm without social boundaries. In that realm there is neither Jew nor Greek, male nor female, slave nor free, homosexual nor heterosexual, friend nor enemy, liberal nor conservative, insider nor outsider, rich nor poor, less nor more abled, gendered nor transgendered...
15. For Jesus, God's domain has no brokers, no mediators between human beings and divinity. There is a state of atonement, when separations fall, even separations between us and God. In the end, we are all in God. We are Christ's body in the perfected sense of God's purpose culminated.
16. For Jesus, the rites of entry into the domain of God are open to all regardless of the things that separate us from each other in other domains. If you can have water dumped on your head, you are in. If you eat bread (or another fruit of the earth for those allergic to wheat or something) then you are in. And now you have to deal with, as family, everyone else who has water dumped on them and who eats food. Good luck :)
17. In the kingdom, forgiveness is reciprocal: individuals can have it only if they practice it. Forgiveness is the hallmark of restorative justice, in contrast to retributive justice.
18. The kingdom is a journey without end: one arrives only by departing. It is therefore a perpetual odyssey. Exile and homecoming are the true conditions of authentic existence.
The canon
19. The canon is the collection of writings that have, historically, connected people with God and helped them grown in wisdom and understanding. Throughout history, the Church has made use of other writings, words and practices which are not found in the "canon" of the Bible, and the Church will continue to do this. It is right and good to do this, and we should just be honest about it. "Canon" means "we consistently, across time and space, find a way to God there".
The language of faith
21. In continually articulating who we are and what we are about, we should continue to use the full breadth of human written expression found in the Bible - paradox, hyperbole, exaggeration, metaphor, simile, aphorism, epistle, narrative, poem, song, allegory, folktale, martyr cycle, instruction, debate, drama, liturgy and so on, as well as the fuller variety of human expression including music, visual arts, and dance which go beyond a literal text and express meaning in new ways. Our language should be as limitless as creation.
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Honduras, Iran, Democracy & Nonviolence
Recent events in Honduras and Iran sparked a few thoughts.
It's interesting how completely and uncritically we've come to accept the association "democracy = good". When political events occur in foreign countries our press, our politicians, and our public seem to immediately decide that the side which appears more democratic is obviously in the right. I don't disagree that democracy has a lot going for it, or that dictatorships have a lot of flaws, but it is worth it to point out that the historical examples of Athens, Rome and even America prove that democracies are plenty eager to engage in imperialism, militarism, and all sorts of horrors we usually associate with dictatorships.
From my theological perspective all government is doomed from the outset. It relies on the use of force to maintain control. A democracy is just as much a part of the world of nations that God will abolish with the coming of his kingdom as a dictatorship is.
Does that mean these things are equal? Not at all.
I think, if there is a reason to preference one side or another it is about that issue of coercion and force. A democracy, at the very least, voluntarily restricts itself in the ways it will use force over its own people (not over other peoples though). If I were to support one side over another in Iran or Honduras it would be in the end a choice about which side were willing to set aside force the most.
When the President of Honduras was captured he immediately issued a statement urging the people of Honduras to protest nonviolently. In Iran, much of the focus on the resistance has been on the degree to which it has been nonviolent. There seems to be a consensus that the refusal to employ force is the very quality which bestows legitimacy on the movement. The moment that protesters start throwing molotov cocktails is the moment that Ahmadinejad or Vasquez will look less like villains for "squashing" the rebels.
The question of proportionality still comes into it. Most people will probably still side with the green movement in Iran even if it turns violent just because it will be significantly weaker than the military might of the establishment. There is no question, though, that a violent uprising would lose some legitimacy in many people's (including mine) eyes.
Taking a long view, democracy or dictatorship, it doesn't really matter. All governments are fading institutions doomed to extinction by God's reign of peace. In the interim however, there is a reason to preference democratic governments where those democracies are self-limiting in their use of coercive force. The legitimacy of a political movement comes from its willingness to refuse to achieve its ends by violence.
It's interesting how completely and uncritically we've come to accept the association "democracy = good". When political events occur in foreign countries our press, our politicians, and our public seem to immediately decide that the side which appears more democratic is obviously in the right. I don't disagree that democracy has a lot going for it, or that dictatorships have a lot of flaws, but it is worth it to point out that the historical examples of Athens, Rome and even America prove that democracies are plenty eager to engage in imperialism, militarism, and all sorts of horrors we usually associate with dictatorships.
From my theological perspective all government is doomed from the outset. It relies on the use of force to maintain control. A democracy is just as much a part of the world of nations that God will abolish with the coming of his kingdom as a dictatorship is.
Does that mean these things are equal? Not at all.
I think, if there is a reason to preference one side or another it is about that issue of coercion and force. A democracy, at the very least, voluntarily restricts itself in the ways it will use force over its own people (not over other peoples though). If I were to support one side over another in Iran or Honduras it would be in the end a choice about which side were willing to set aside force the most.
When the President of Honduras was captured he immediately issued a statement urging the people of Honduras to protest nonviolently. In Iran, much of the focus on the resistance has been on the degree to which it has been nonviolent. There seems to be a consensus that the refusal to employ force is the very quality which bestows legitimacy on the movement. The moment that protesters start throwing molotov cocktails is the moment that Ahmadinejad or Vasquez will look less like villains for "squashing" the rebels.
The question of proportionality still comes into it. Most people will probably still side with the green movement in Iran even if it turns violent just because it will be significantly weaker than the military might of the establishment. There is no question, though, that a violent uprising would lose some legitimacy in many people's (including mine) eyes.
Taking a long view, democracy or dictatorship, it doesn't really matter. All governments are fading institutions doomed to extinction by God's reign of peace. In the interim however, there is a reason to preference democratic governments where those democracies are self-limiting in their use of coercive force. The legitimacy of a political movement comes from its willingness to refuse to achieve its ends by violence.
Dear Douglas,
DEADLINE EXTENDED:Triple your gift!
Become a member today and your gift will TRIPLE to help safegaurd America's wild places.
I have some good news and some bad news.
The bad news is that we are still $100,693 short of our matching gift goal. But the good news is that our generous friends have offered to extend the deadline and triple all online donations for the next 48 hours!
Click here to become a member and see your gift go three times as far. Your gift of $25 or more will include all the year-long benefits of membership.
This special, online-only offer gives you one last chance to step up to the challenge and make TRIPLE the difference with your gift.
That means:
Your $25 gift becomes $75
Your $50 gift becomes $150
Your $100 gift becomes $300
With your help, the House last week passed historically significant legislation to address global warming, but we face a tough fight in the Senate.
At the same time, we must convince the Obama Administration to overturn Bush-era policies that would lead to oil and gas development in Utah's Red Rock Country and Alaska, oilshale development in Colorado and the West, and logging proposals for Oregon's ancient forests.
The work we do together has never been more important.
TRIPLE YOUR GIFT NOW by donating to help make sure our American wilderness weathers these threats and stays wild.
The clock is ticking on this unprecedented, online-only 3-to-1 matching gift offer.
I hope you will give generously. Thank you for all you do.
Best,
Bill Meadows, PresidentThe Wilderness Society
To unsubscribe or update your address and account information, please visit your subscription management page for The WildAlert at: http://action.wilderness.org/wilderness/smp.tcl?nkey=86bb7d6r07x3x5iw&
The Wilderness Society's mission is to protect wilderness and inspire Americans to care for our wild places. As a subscriber to WildAlert, you join more than 410,000 Wilderness Society members and supporters in protecting and restoring America's wild places.
DEADLINE EXTENDED:Triple your gift!
Become a member today and your gift will TRIPLE to help safegaurd America's wild places.
I have some good news and some bad news.
The bad news is that we are still $100,693 short of our matching gift goal. But the good news is that our generous friends have offered to extend the deadline and triple all online donations for the next 48 hours!
Click here to become a member and see your gift go three times as far. Your gift of $25 or more will include all the year-long benefits of membership.
This special, online-only offer gives you one last chance to step up to the challenge and make TRIPLE the difference with your gift.
That means:
Your $25 gift becomes $75
Your $50 gift becomes $150
Your $100 gift becomes $300
With your help, the House last week passed historically significant legislation to address global warming, but we face a tough fight in the Senate.
At the same time, we must convince the Obama Administration to overturn Bush-era policies that would lead to oil and gas development in Utah's Red Rock Country and Alaska, oilshale development in Colorado and the West, and logging proposals for Oregon's ancient forests.
The work we do together has never been more important.
TRIPLE YOUR GIFT NOW by donating to help make sure our American wilderness weathers these threats and stays wild.
The clock is ticking on this unprecedented, online-only 3-to-1 matching gift offer.
I hope you will give generously. Thank you for all you do.
Best,
Bill Meadows, PresidentThe Wilderness Society
To unsubscribe or update your address and account information, please visit your subscription management page for The WildAlert at: http://action.wilderness.org/wilderness/smp.tcl?nkey=86bb7d6r07x3x5iw&
The Wilderness Society's mission is to protect wilderness and inspire Americans to care for our wild places. As a subscriber to WildAlert, you join more than 410,000 Wilderness Society members and supporters in protecting and restoring America's wild places.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)