Advent - An Invitation

So, it's been almost two months since I've blogged here.  I've been busy with a research paper, and blogging for another site, and life in general.  Truthfully, my oath to rein in my verbal attack urges against people of other political and religious convictions has prompted a lot of re-thinking of ideas for posts before I hit the "publish" button, too.  This taking Luther's understanding of the 8th commandment seriously thing is hard work, my friends.  Worthwhile, but tough.

But today, I was reflecting on the beginning of my very favorite season of the church year - Advent.  It's upon us; those of us in liturgical Christian traditions begin, as of Sunday, a four-week season of prayerful waiting, watching, and reflecting upon the coming of the Messiah, which we celebrate at Christmas.  Its very tone has become counter-cultural; instead of the mad rush to Christmas that we see all around us, it's quiet.  Pensive.  Reflective.  Peaceful.  Deep.  It puts Christ, not consumerism, at the heart of this month.  It is, in my opinion, the perfect antidote to the ever-increasing destruction of any sort of spiritual depth in the Christmas season - it's about prayer around a cross rather than presents under a tree.  It's about acknowledging that we are broken people in a broken world surrounded by darkness, who are waiting to see a great light, trusting in God's promises of redemption and healing, instead of pretending that we're all just doing fine and gee, isn't Christmastime just so exciting?

So, my conservative/evangelical friends who, often, tend to see no value in, or have no experience with, the liturgical heritage of the Church universal, I invite you to consider joining the rest of us in celebrating Advent this year.  Get four blue candles and a white one; always light the white one (to remind you of God's never-ceasing presence, even in our darkest times) and light one blue the first week, two the second, and so on up to Christmas eve.  Maybe arrange them, like many of us do, in a nice wreath.  Read some scripture together - at church, as a family at home, on your own - about the promised Messiah (Isaiah's a great place to start), then sing a song together as you light the appropriate candle(s)...I recommend "Light One Candle To Watch For Messiah," but there are lots of great options.  You can look for Advent calendars, that come with daily scripture readings and candy.  There are lots of ways to make Advent a part of your spiritual life...but, please, think about digging in to this rich, beautiful tradition as you look for ways to center yourself spiritually in the real "reason for the season," the coming of Jesus.

Ism Schism, or Where Is the Love?

This has been inspired somewhat, albeit not entirely, by the events of last night - our first presidential candidate debate of the general election season.  My aim here is not ultimately political; as we all know by now, I'm a fairly committed Green Party voter who finds equal numbers of things abhorrent in both parties, and who is a little bitter that the political establishment is unwilling to invite Gary Johnson and Jill Stein to participate in the debates.

But no, this is not about policy or politics, but rather politesse.  While the history of our society is not exactly one written with the words of respectful dissent and compromise, I can't help but feel if we have arrived at a new low in terms of our ability to remain civil in our discourse.  The last three elections cycles have progressively gotten worse in terms of the vitriol being spewed not only by the official campaigns, but by the average citizen.  There's no need to name specific examples; I'm willing to bet we can all list them.  I'm willing to allot plenty of blame to myself; I have not been charitable in my comments, public or private, about any of the Republican candidates.  I hope I have avoided being hateful, but as I think back to thinks I've said about Perry, Santorum, and Bachmann, I'm reasonably sure that I've not entirely avoided that pitfall.

So, today, I repent.  For the next month, while I will not abstain from criticizing the comments or policy positions of either candidate, I pledge to do so in a way that is critical of their comments or policy positions, not of their humanity nor that of their supporters.  Neither Romney nor Obama are the anti-Christ.  Neither of them are likely to be the sole, single individual who drives the U.S. over the cliff; let's be honest, take the long view, and act like reasonable, rational people who recognize that our ruination as a country, if it comes, will be the responsibility of a large number of people, both Democrat and Republican, and that every single one of us as citizens of this nation ought to be allotted a degree of that responsibility due to our collective sins of a variety of sorts.  Obama is not an evil, communist monster set on forcing your grandmother into euthanasia while spending every cent of your child's inheritance; Romney is not a soulless, Mr. Burns-esque type who likes watching the orphaned poor be fed into an ore smelter on closed-circuit tv from the comfort of his marble-floored bedroom.  They are people who have competing ideologies about how best to govern, what makes our nation great, and how best to guide it on the path to further greatness.

And, I will publicly repent from another sin today.  I have, in various ways both public and private, mercilessly attacked sisters and brothers in Christ who hold to conservative, fundamentalist/"evangelical" beliefs.  I've been provoked to do so both from their assault on those of my progressive Christian convictions (and of non-Christians who hold similar values), and by my own life experiences growing up in churches, schools, and a local society dominated by this brand of Christianity.  Most of those life experiences were fairly miserable, laden with guilt, and have required what I would call nothing short of de-programming in order for me to become an emotionally and spiritually healthy Christian and person.

However, if I say that I've forgiven all those who have contributed to that reality, and if I say that I am committed to living in such a way that reflects Christ's love, then I have to cede my right both to revenge and to counterattack.  I do not have a good track record on this, and I will be the first to admit it.  Today, I'm committing myself to change.  I will continue to disagree in matters theological and exegetical with my brothers and sisters on the Christian Right, and I will continue to write and talk about those disagreements, but from here on out, I am going to work my hardest to do so in a way reflective of our shared humanity in the image of God, and of our shared called to be Christ's Body in a world often hostile to its values and message.

It's going to be hard, though.  I know I feel something gratifying about lashing into an opponent; I think a lot of us do.  We enjoy the sensation of feeling like we've destroyed the opposition and made them look like fools.  But, it's time to stop.  I fear if we continue down the path of indulging ourselves that sensation, we will wake up and find both a ruined nation AND a ruined Church.  So, today, I want to become part of the solution, and invite you to think about how you can do the same.  God help us all.

The Least of These

I was walking home from the L the other night, and I started to think about Matthew 25.  Yes, this is why I'm doing a doctorate in New Testament.  Anyways, I started to think about the climax of the chapter, and really of the whole gospel (apart from the Passion narrative), in 25:31-46 - the division sheep and the goats.

I started thinking about what it says - "whatever you have done to the least of these, you have done also to me," Jesus tells us.  By the same token, those divided out as "goats" in the text have the tables turned - because they didn't clothe, feed, visit, etc. the "least of these," they're disowned by Jesus.

I wondered to myself - what if we took seriously the notion that some things that we DO choose to do might put us in the "goat" category?  After all, here the goats are defined by what they have not done.  What about the things we do?

When we disown our child because of who he or she is, have we done that to Jesus?  If we use a racial slur, have we just said that about Jesus?  If we beat a homeless man to death for the thrill of it, was it Jesus that we were kicking in the alley?  If we sell drugs on a street corner, are we pushing dope to Jesus?  If we bomb helpless civilians, have we just obliterated Jesus and his neighborhood?  If we deny poor people access to healthcare, are we forcing Jesus to decide between groceries or prescription drugs?  

Food for thought.

Jesus: Not the Universe's Most Eligible Bachelor?

Pardon the title, but I couldn't help myself.

The past few days have thrust a wee bit of controversy into the midst of the Christian community...and with that, a chance to learn a little bit!  The controversy: a 4th century fragment of a papyrus manuscript that apparently makes reference to "Jesus' wife."  For the whole story, check here: http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2012/september-web-only/jesus-said-to-them-my-wife.html

So, before we get all hot and bothered here, let's establish WHAT WE ACTUALLY KNOW rather than jumping to conclusions and wanting to damn all modern scholars and their satan-inspired ways, ok?  What is said, and thus what we know:

-The fragment appears to be authentic to the 4th century rather than some sort of modern forgery inspired by The Da Vinci Code.
-The fragment is Egyptian and in Coptic; this suggests, but far from proves, that this text fragment could be connected to the very sizable Gnostic community in Egypt during the Early Church era.
-The document is a fragment - 33 words on 14 incomplete lines.  It's not conclusive of much of anything, other than that at least some early Christians thought that Jesus was married.  That doesn't mean Jesus was married.  It doesn't mean that this idea was mainstream.  It does, however, mean that at least some people thought this.

This is along the same lines of the "Jesus' tomb" discovery from a few years back; see http://abcnews.go.com/International/jesus-tomb-controversy-rages-archeologists-explore-2000-year/story?id=16111993 if you need a refresher.  That is, it's a tempest in a teapot; people sensationalize the news because they know it will get a rise out of some people.  Hardcore atheists will get all excited because it makes Christianity and the Bible look "less true," and hardcore conservative Christians will get huffy about it and start decrying the worthlessness of modern scholarship that would even consider something like this manuscript.

So, here's where we have a teaching moment.  An important one.  The circle-the-wagons approach to defend against "secular" modern scholarship and its "anti-God" agenda misses one really rather key point - most of what we know about our scriptures have come down to us through the witness of a variety of manuscripts, many of them fragmentary.  There is no copy of the whole Bible dating back to when we think much of it was written.  For the sake of ease, we'll focus on the New Testament.  Our best guess is that the earliest of the New Testament's books, some of Paul's letters, were being written in the 50s AD; we figure that the youngest books (some of the general epistles and Revelation) probably came around at the end of the First century or early in the Second.  Our oldest COMPLETE COPIES of any of these are older - we don't have a complete New Testament manuscript that is older than the Fourth century (Codex Sinaiticus).  And...that one is missing some familiar verses, and contains the Epistle of Barnabas and sections of the Shepherd of Hermas, two popular early Christian writings that were ultimately not included in the official canon.  Prior to the discovery of Sinaiticus and some other very old, complete manuscripts (Codex Vaticanus being the other HUGE one), our go-to text was a document known as the Textus Receptus, which Erasmus compiled in the late 15th and early 16th century based off the best Greek manuscripts of his time.  Before that, we didn't do much with the Greek and Hebrew, really, since the Catholic Church maintained that the ONLY valid biblical witness was the Latin Vulgate, which was a late 4th century translation into Latin from the Greek and Hebrew mostly by St. Jerome, and which included the Old Testament Apocrypha.

In order to arrive at an idea about what the oldest, most original texts of the New Testament originally said, we have to take a look at the large amount of fragmentary manuscript evidence - we've got pieces from everything in the New Testament.  From there, we have to compare all of them and make educated decisions about what makes the most sense as being the original text.  This is a difficult, arduous process that a biblical scholar can devote an entire career to helping do.  What we've arrived at through modern scholarship is a better, more faithful text.  This where I have to disagree with my KJV-only sisters and brothers - the King James is based, for the New Testament, off the Textus Receptus...which, contrary to what many KJV-only folks maintain, is not some sort of magical whole Bible from way-back-when.  It was a compilation, too, but one done before scholars had access to any of these wonderful, really old (and thus closer to the original) manuscripts and fragments.  If your choice is a translation based off of compilations, would you rather have the compilation that reflects the oldest (and thus most original) documents, or the one put together by a scholar who lived hundreds of years before any of those manuscripts were even discovered?

So, back to our new fragment - what do we do with it?  It's not from any canonical book of the Bible, or even from another known early Christian writing, so ultimately it's a historical curiosity and piece of evidence proving that at least some people in the early Church thought Jesus was married.  It's not going in the Bible.  It's not changing anything in the scriptures.  It's a historical artifact; no more, no less.

None of this is meant to challenge anyone's faith.  At the end of the day, reading the Bible requires a certain amount of trust, no matter who you are or which translation you're using - trust that God has, does, and will continue to speak through a document in which flawed human beings have been entrusted with its penning, preservation, and presentation.  Trust God.  Trust that God speaks through the scriptures...but don't turn them into an idol.  Don't say things about them that they themselves don't say.  Be wise and discerning.  Listen for God's voice in them.  Think about them; study them; meditate on them.  But please, please, PLEASE - don't use them for what they're not, belittle the faithful women and men who engage in scholarly study of them, or craft a faith for yourself which is so fragile that a piece of papyrus from the 4th century becomes the most threatening thing in the world.

Red Fish-Blue Fish, or, Why "Conservative," "Moderate," and "Liberal" are the worst labels for Christians EVER

So, I was talking with Colleen a few nights ago, and the subject of the categorization of "conservative," "moderate," and "liberal" Christians came up.  We were trying to figure out which particular camp we belonged to, and I found myself struggling a little bit with trying to nail that down.

The subject's stayed on my mind since then, and as I was trying to go to bed last night, I realized why it perturbed me so much.  It's because that sort of labeling for Christians makes ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE.  AT ALL.

Bear with me here.  First off, we need to unpack just what each word means.  This is what Mr. Webster's dictionary has to tell us...the definitions shared are the ones most relevant.

CONSERVATIVE:  3.  "Tending or disposed to maintain existing views, conditions, or institutions; traditional"

MODERATE: 3. "Professing or characterized by political or social beliefs that are not extreme."  Also, 1. "Avoiding extremes of behavior or expression; observing reasonable limits; calm or temperate."

LIBERAL: This is the place where definitional realities get messy.  The most relevant are 4. "Not literal or strict; loose" and 5. "Broad-minded; especially: not bound by authoritarianism, orthodoxy, or traditional forms."

(Thank you, http://www.merriam-webster.com)

So, there's what the dictionary says.  The connotation that each word carries in describing the Church...sometimes a little different.  And usually totally depends on how you self-identify.  For example, someone who identifies as a "conservative Christian" probably would define "moderate Christians" as "middle-of-the-roaders; lukewarm (and about to be spit out by Jesus); wishy-washy; afraid to take bold stands," and would probably define a "liberal Christian" as "an oxymoron; not real Christians; deceived by Satan and followers of false doctrine."  Pardon me if I'm making assumptions or putting words into others' mouths, but as someone who grew up a self-identified "conservative Christian," this is the framework within which I thought.

Similarly, a "moderate Christian" would probably define the others as being extremists, and a "liberal Christian" would have a similar view on "moderates" as "conservatives" profess, and then would view "conservatives" as the ones distorting the Christian message.

OK, so are you with me so far?  Good.  Now that we have a feel for what the words mean, here's why I think it's bogus to try and cram people into these so-called camps.

FIRST REASON: You need a framework for the conservative-to-liberal spectrum.  Specifically, are you talking about doctrine, or social views, or worship practices, or what? Your average evangelical church probably holds to doctrine that would be, by some, considered "traditional" (more on that in a minute), and probably holds conservative social views, but has extremely "LIBERAL" worship practices that are non-liturgical and not in conversation with the long-held traditions of Christian worship.  On the flipside, your average Episcopal church in the Northeast probably has rather more "liberal" theology and social views, but is quite "CONSERVATIVE" in its worship life in comparison to, say, an Assemblies of God church in the South.  Without a defined framework, these definitions end up with the same issue as a physics problem that doesn't have a set frame - it's impossible to find an adequate solution.  Is Trinity Church in Boston "liberal" or "conservative?"  It all depends on what aspect of their life as a faith community you're looking at.

SECOND REASON:  Many people who see their theology as "traditional" don't have much of a sense of the depth or breadth of what has been put forward as orthodox theology in the course of Christianity.  Most who identify as "conservative Christians" probably mean that their doctrine is soundly biblical, and that of "moderates" and "liberals" is less so (if at all).  I have a few issues with this.  One, the "traditional doctrine" espoused by a lot of these groups is explicitly Protestant, so the Catholic and Orthodox churches are totally left out in the cold...and quite frankly, if anyone can claim to have old, traditional Christian doctrine, it's the Orthodox.  Two, the "traditional doctrine" usually referenced also excludes almost all historically mainstream Protestant doctrine, as well as most of the Radical Reformation (e.g. Mennonites).  Three, the "traditional doctrine" typically referenced is a North American amalgamation of Baptist and Congregationalist theology from English groups, which were themselves mixtures of Radical Protestant, Reformed, and Anglican influences.  Insisting on this as "traditional" or "biblical" at the expense of about 90% of the rest of Christianity is really rather narrow.  By the same token, "conservative" factions within Lutheranism, Presbyterianism, Catholicism, etc. do the same thing, just with different "traditional" theology.

That creates this issue - who, then, gets to define what is or is not "traditional, biblical doctrine?"  A Missouri Synod Lutheran would argue that orthodox Lutheranism counts, but that Southern Baptists are heretics; a Southern Baptist, meanwhile, would take a look at orthodox Lutheranism and have just about the same reaction.  And then what do you do with those of us who are confessional Lutherans (and thus adherents of some pretty "traditional" doctrine, but also believe in the importance of non-traditional ways of doing biblical study and criticism, have more progressive social beliefs, etc?) on this spectrum?  Does my having "conservative" AND "liberal" convictions mean that I come out in the middle as a "moderate?"

THIRD REASON: This is maybe more of an expansion of Reason Two, but regardless, I also find it problematic in this whole definitional boondoggle that we forget the breadth of beliefs that are, in fact, classified as "traditional."  There's been a lot of talk about Rob Bell and universalism over the past few years; how many people have mentioned that Christian universalism has been around at least since Origen in the 3rd century, and that a very good biblical case can be made for it?  Whether or not that case is the proper interpretation is another question, but it's within the range of at-least-defensible biblical interpretations.  Either way, it's been around WAY long enough to be "traditional," and has always been present in the Church.  Call it heterodoxy or heresy, but it's not some new, modern phenomenon.  My point here, though - does that make Origen a "liberal," even though he was about as serious a "conservative" as possible on lots of other issues?  Do we even think those terms have value in describing a Church Father?

FOURTH REASON:  We muddy these waters even further when we move past orthodoxy and on to orthopraxy - "right actions" instead of "right beliefs."  Is someone like Rick Warren, who has a "conservative" theology around salvation, the nature of the Bible, and certain issues, truly a "conservative" since he also pushes pretty heavily for ecological and economic justice, both of which are pretty "liberal" values?  Does that mean he balances out to being a "moderate?"  Is a hardcore Southern Baptist in Alabama who composts and voted for Obama (this presumably suggests their ethnicity...) a "conservative," a "moderate," or a "liberal?"  Or, what about a theologically "liberal" UCC-er who drives an SUV, disowns their gay child, and voted for Rick Perry?  What are they on this spectrum?

I think all of this is my way of saying that this categorical mania is a uniquely North American craziness.  We just HAVE to put ourselves into broadly over-defined categories that mean absolutely nothing, don't we?  Let's please stop doing it in the Church.  I may disagree, rather heartily, with some of my Southern Baptist friends from my hometown, but at the end of the day, we are all in the same camp - the Body of Christ.  Let's stop finding ways to use our ignorance to accentuate our differences, and let's start actually working together as that one Body to do God's work in this world.

And now for something completely different: Spicy Shrimp Orzo

So, my last post was about as heavy on the serious sociopolitical reflection as they come.  Today, how about something a little lighter to take into the holiday weekend, even if life itself continues to feel every bit as heavy if you've been reading the news?

As we all know, I love very few things more than playing around in the kitchen; lest we forget, it was a closer call than one might imagine between seminary and culinary school.  I love cooking.  No, it's more like: I LOVE COOKING.  All caps.  Super love it.  I can't imagine being unhappy in my kitchen; it's my refuge from a crazy world.  I've come to love it even more since I started gardening; now, I feel connected to my food from ground up, quite literally.  It's how we're SUPPOSED to be eating, dear people - close to the ground, close to home where possible, actively co-creating with God in our gardens and in our kitchens.  It sounds odd, but sometimes, I like to think of the thud-thud-thud of my chef knife against my bamboo cutting board as I mince garlic and onion as a hymn....sing to the Lord a new song.  Minus the loud boiling test-tubes.

So, in my kitchen-play/kitchen-prayer (food as spiritual discipline, anyone?), I've been making this recipe lately.  It's been partially in response to Colleen's mom sending me home with a generously-filled bag of salsa peppers (a hybrid similar to a Fresno pepper in color, size, and heat) that needed to be used, partially in response to my tomatoes going bonanza, and partially because everything in it is just pretty damn tasty.  So, here's how to whip up some Spicy Shrimp Orzo - a little heat, a little creamy, and surprisingly full of things that are good for you!

You'll Need:
1/4 standard size box of Barilla orzo (it's the little pasta shaped like grains of rice)
2 Tbs goat cheese
1/2 small-to-medium red onion, finely chopped
1 clove of garlic, minced
1 salsa pepper (or Fresno, or jalapeño), seeded and finely chopped
2 small tomatoes (or 1 medium-to-large tomato), diced
8-10 medium-to-large shrimp, peeled and deveined
1/2 shot of brandy
olive oil
salt and pepper

Get the pasta water boiling; be sure to salt it once it's boiling!  As the water heats, drizzle olive oil into a saute pan (a nice, big one; you'll be putting everything in it) over medium-high heat; add the chopped onion and peppers and let saute for 4-5 minutes before adding the garlic and tomato.  As the vegetables saute together, add the orzo to the water.  After adding the orzo, put the brandy in the saute pan and let it reduce (cooks off the alcohol and enriches the flavor).  Add the shrimp, stirring regularly to ensure they cook regularly.  Once the orzo is done, drain it, then add it to the saute pan, lower the heat to low, and then add the goat cheese.  Stir until all the goat cheese has melted.

Buon appetito!

An Open Letter to the People of the U.S.

My fellow Americans,

Please stop this.  I opened up the Tribune app on my iPad this morning (coffee and the morning paper for the 21st century), and the top two stories greeting me - a shooting outside the Empire State Building which killed two and wounded ten more, and NINETEEN shootings in my beloved Chicago overnight.  Please.  Let's stop killing each other.

And, for the love of God, let's start having a mature conversation about this.  Conservatives, nobody wants to take away your all of your guns.  There is not going to be a civil war if Obama is re-elected.  That big panic in 2008, when many of you went on a gun-and-ammo buying spree before Obama's inauguration?  You can still buy all of those things.  OK, yes, some of us would like to see military-grade assault weapons taken off the market, but let's all be honest - you don't need those to go hunting, or really do much of anything other than go into movie theatres and shoot scores of people.  That's why they're assault weapons - they're designed for that.  Creeping tyranny will not take over because you do not have enough AR-15s in your woodshed to arm a platoon of counter-insurgents.  Conspiracy theories look just as bad on reasonable people who lean right-of-center as they do on oddball left-wingers who think that Wall Street and the military are colluding to take over the country and set up death camps in the desert for all the liberals, atheists, people of color, and homosexuals.  Start acting reasonable, stop believing everything that big money NRA lobbyists throw out at you, and let's have a conversation about how, perhaps, we DO need reasonable gun control policies so that law-abiding citizens like you can own guns without having to fear for your lives in public when somebody packing more heat comes along.

Liberals, stop acting like every conservative and/or gun owner is some sort of Wild West caricature who wants to walk around with "a big iron on his hip" to be more macho.  OK, there are probably a few of those types out there, but not many.  Let's agree to make the reasonable assumption that 95%+ of gun owners are hunters and people who enjoy target shooting and, ok, yes, probably do feel safer with a gun in their home, but also have no intention of using it.  Let's also acknowledge that the 95%+ of those people are not the inbred hillbilly redneck stereotypes that many liberals like to perpetuate, and that many of them are reasonable, educated people who happen to like hunting deer, shooting clay pigeons, and keeping their guns securely locked up in a secure location.  A person who owns a gun is not some sort of primitive, lesser person who doesn't know better; a person who owns a gun is a person who owns a gun, probably for a very legitimate reason, and is probably smart enough to handle that with appropriate responsibility.

And, all of us - let's stop talking only about gun control as the solution.  I absolutely, 100% agree that we will be safer as a nation if we ban sales of assault weapons, if we require all firearms to come issued with an ID number (like cars) to facilitate ease of tracking the source of illicit firearm sales, if we close gun show sale loopholes that make it easy for people to buy mass numbers of firearms and then sell them on the black market to people who would NOT otherwise legally be able to purchase a weapon (a common practice in Illinois, and probably plenty of other states), and if we come up with reasonable restrictions on where and how one can carry a gun in public - contrary to conservative belief, conceal/carry laws are NOT proven to improve public safety.  After all, all three states which have seen mass shootings this summer have them.  However, we can have a conversation about this, and we as a nation can reach sensible compromise positions that will promote our general welfare - I believe this.  I'm willing to talk.

But, we also need to do some soul-searching and have a conversation about why we're in this mess to start with...and it's not only because guns are easily accessible.  While easy access to guns is a fueling factor for gun violence, people don't just shoot other people simply because they have a gun and can use it.  We need to start talking about why our inner city communities have become jobless hellholes full of drugs, gangs, and guns and devoid of opportunities for employment and any real sense of hope.  Why aren't we having that conversation?  Why, as a city here in Chicago, are we willing to bend over backwards to create white-collar jobs in the Loop for Motorola and Boeing, but seem utterly incapable of creating community-based jobs initiatives in places like Englewood and Garfield Park?  Why are we willing to be complicit in the transformation of Detroit into a post-apocalyptic wasteland in which a person a day is shot to death on average, and where pizza deliveries after dark require an armed guard in the car, if the pizza place is even willing to DO deliveries after dark anymore?  We seem to be alright with letting go of all our manufacturing jobs while blaming our unions for daring to ask that employees get fair wages and a good standard of living; have we not sowed the wind and started to reap the whirlwind by stripping places like Detroit and Gary of jobs that allow people some sense of upward mobility, or at the very least decent standards of living?  By killing our working middle class, we're killing all of the rest of us...sometimes far too literally.

And, why is it so thoroughly difficult to obtain mental health care?  Why do we create a culture that views mental illness with suspicion, as if it's not disease but is something that should just be toughed through?  Would you just try to "tough it out" against cancer?  No?  Then why on earth should people have to "tough it out" against bipolar disorder or schizophrenia?  Why do we treat mental illness as if it's not illness, but personal choice?  Why do we not have nearly enough programs for people who suffer from mental disorders, or who need support in recovery from addiction?  Why do we in the Church do an especially bad job of this?  We condemn millions of people to lives of misery and instability, and then seem shocked when a very few them lash out violently against a world that offers them no support or love.

Please, let's have a conversation as a nation about this.  Let's stop judging each other, let's stop distorting each other's words, and let's stop jumping to irrational conclusions and resorting to jingoism and mockery.  Let's have a legitimate national discourse on why we lead the developed world in violence, and for the love of God, let's please find a way to stop this.  Please, let's stop killing each other.

"Bring on the roasted potatoes!"

The foodie/wanna-be chef in me loves this.  LOVES this.  Some of it is because somebody out there is brilliant enough to turn Julia Child clips into a really rather catchy bit of electronica, which alone is worth the price of admission.  But, there's more to it than that.

I think a big part of my love for this is coming from the fact that it is a beautiful celebration of a woman whose life is a living testimony to how we can take the incredible gifts we're given by God and share them with the world.  She could have just celebrated being an amazing chef, ran restaurants, and made a fortune without giving a thing back to the world, but Julia Child chose instead to show everyone that, yes, you too can cook.  You don't have to be wealthy, or have two tons of free time, or a culinary degree to be a world-class chef.  You can eat amazing food at home; you can build community around a dinner table, no matter who you are or where you are.  That's the whole ethos of Julia Child - like the chef in Ratatouille (my favorite Pixar film...surprise surprise), "everyone can cook!"

And, isn't that what our gifts are for - to share with the world, to show others that they, too, have gifts that are useful for building the Body of Christ, building community, building a better world?  Would that we were all Julias, sharing what God's given us to build up others and leave the world better than we found it.

Besides, she helped the OSS (precursor to the CIA) during World War II, including helping on a project to develop shark repellant.  Really: Julia Child's Shark Repellant

If that doesn't make you a professional badass, then I don't know what does.

Pissing Against the Wall, or Why I Love the King James Bible

If you have taken the time to slog through that entire video, bravo - it's 4 and a half minutes of one of the best/worst sermons I've ever encountered.  Best in that it is memorable and invaluable as a source of comic relief; worst in all other regards.

However, it makes use of one of the more, shall we say, colorful examples of the King James Bible's brilliant usage of the English language...and I'm not being facetious when I say brilliant.  OK, "him that pisseth against the wall" is perhaps a smidge ridiculous, but the KJV is one of the three most important works in the history of the English language, right up with the works of Shakespeare and The Canterbury Tales.  That trio made the modern English language - it cannot be denied.

And...I love the King James.  There, I said it.  I am about to embark on a Ph.D. in New Testament, fully aware of the (in many instances) poor quality of the KJV as a translation of the original languages, fully aware of how its translators lived long before the wealth of early manuscripts that have been discovered in the last century and a half and thus had to make do with the Textus Receptus (which is a relatively poor version of the New Testament that strays significantly from what is likely to be the earlier, most original text)...and I get that.  I don't make extensive use of the KJV as a scholarly tool.  It is not the primary text I sit down with for my sermon prep.  But...I love it just the same.

There is a majesty and timelessness to the King James that no other translation of the scriptures in English possesses.  It is beautiful and poetic; much more than most modern, much more accurate translations, the King James Bible SOUNDS like holy scripture.  Perhaps that's because of several centuries of social conditioning to expect scripture to sound like the King James, but nonetheless, when I hear the King James, I hear the voice of centuries of faithful people joined with the words on the page.  Maybe it's the historian in me.

I mean, let's compare - the 23rd Psalm from KJV versus the 23rd Psalm from the NRSV (used in most ELCA congregations) and the CEB (the most recent, most intentionally modern translation).  For the record, I deeply appreciate all three of these translations.

KJV: 

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.  He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.  He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.  Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.  Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.  Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.

NRSV:

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.  He makes me lie down in green pastures; he leads me beside still waters; he restores my soul. He leads me in right paths for his name’s sake.  Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no evil; for you are with me; your rod and your staff— they comfort me.  You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.   Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord my whole life long.

CEB:

The Lord is my shepherd.  I lack nothing.  He lets me rest in grassy meadows; he leads me to restful waters; he keeps me alive.  He guides me in proper paths for the sake of his good name.  Even when I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no danger because you are with me.  Your rod and your staff— they protect me.  You set a table for me right in front of my enemies.  You bathe my head in oil; my cup is so full it spills over!  Yes, goodness and faithful love will pursue me all the days of my life, and I will live in the Lord’s house as long as I live.

See the difference?  Feel the difference?  The NRSV is much more accurate to the original text, and the CEB feels more like natural, 21st century North American spoken English...but the King James feels sacred and timeless, and there is NO contest as to which has more literary value.

All this said, I would never introduce the KJV as the primary text for Sunday worship.  NRSV or CEB all the way...I'd even contemplate the ESV over KJV because, even though I find the ESV's intentional lack of sensitivity to gendered language (which then renders certain parts of the text LESS accurate in contemporary English), it maintains a sense of the poetic nature of KJV while still being in modern English, and has used more recent presentations of the original Greek New Testament than the Textus Receptus.  KJV, for all its timeless beauty, is still not the translation which is closest to the original texts, and I value that for public proclamation.

But...think of what a poorer language English would without having been shaped by the KJV!   In an age where txtspeak is murdering the beautiful intricacies of English, I wish I could put a KJV and copy of the Complete Works of Shakespeare in every single house and mandate that everyone must spend 15 minutes a day reading each of them.  As a family, at that...teach your children well.  

So, I invite you - join me in a crazy challenge.  Fifteen minutes a day with King James, starting at Genesis 1:1 and not stopping until Revelation 22:21.  Slogging through it.  Sticking with it.  Not caring about how long it takes, but just reveling in the joyful challenge of it, and celebrating when it comes to a glorious end.  Let's do this; let's grow our faith AND our depth of appreciation for the English language!

More Senselessness

Yesterday, I talked a little bit about the horrific shooting at the Sikh house of worship in Wisconsin.  I contended, maybe a little boldly, that racism and religious hatred is so widespread that the amount of public outrage over the massacre has been muted, especially in comparison to the movie theatre shooting in Colorado a few weeks ago.

Today, we have exhibit B that racism and religious hatred is on the wax in this country.  Dateline: Joplin, Missouri - the same community devastated by a huge tornado last year.  The town's mosque and Islamic community center was burned to the ground last night; this is the second fire to hit it in less than two months.  The first fire was confirmed arson thanks to video surveillance; the video cameras were destroyed in last night's fire, but arson is again suspected.  

This, of course, isn't the only mosque flap in recent memory.  Since 2010, a mosque just outside of Murfreesboro, Tennessee has been hit with legal challenge after legal challenge just to open its doors - it's set to do so.  In the meanwhile, they've been victims of all sorts of vandalism.  And then, of course, there's the whole "Ground Zero Mosque" debacle.

I am not Muslim.  I have no interest in becoming Muslim, Sikh, Jewish, Hindu, Shinto, Mormon, Pastafarian, Methodist, or anything other than what I already am.  But, even with my Lutheran identity firmly established, I still don't get why on earth we can't, as a nation and as Christian citizens of a nation which gives religious freedom to all its people, live and let live when it comes to the existence of non-Christian religious communities.  OK, we don't see eye-to-eye on plenty of key theological issues with Sikhs, Muslims, and others. But, if I have the right to go to my quirky little Lutheran church on the corner of Fullerton and St. Louis, then then why do we work so hard to deny neighbors of other faiths that same right?  

And why, dear Jesus, do we attack them?  Is this some sort of twisted notion of evangelism - if we burn their mosque, then they'll come to our church and find Jesus?  Can we not grasp the seemingly easy concept that not everyone with a turban is Muslim, and 99.9%+ of Muslims aren't terrorists, but are instead people like the ones next to you in your church pew who just want to make a living without having their place of worship turned into charred ruins because they don't believe that Jesus is their savior?  Have we decided that, somehow, we're God's new avenging angels and are called and entitled to burn the infidel?  Have we ever considered that the sort of attitude that undergirds the shooting in Wisconsin and the arson in Missouri are in no way, shape, or form different than the sort of attitude that drives groups like al-Qaeda?

I just don't get it.

Senseless

Details are starting to emerge about our latest mass murder, this time at a Sikh place of worship rather than in a movie theatre.  The shooter: former military, connections with white supremacist groups.  The victims: people of South Asian heritage (Punjabi, presumably) gathered for worship and a meal.

This is an act of violence every bit as pointless, stunning, and horrific as what happened in Colorado just a few weeks ago.  The body count is lower, but so much is the same - a gunman entered what is supposed to a perfectly safe space and killed innocent people.  In this case, we have a presumed motive - these were people of color murdered in cold blood by a man who seems to have believed that only white people authentically count as people, and that everyone else is inferior.  I don't know much else yet - if the gunman thought that Sikhs were "terrorists" simply because "all them A-rabs look the same," or what.  

I do know some things.  First, Sikhism is the 5th-largest religion in the world, and the average U.S. American had probably never heard of a Sikh prior to yesterday.  Almost nobody knows that their religion is monotheistic, that they were a popular reaction against the excesses and snobbery of the clerical classes of both the Hindu brahmins and the Muslim moguls which began to coalesce roughly concurrent with the Protestant Reformation in the West, that the center of their faith is a sacred book of poems about God which has been mostly set to music.  Their traditionally distinct appearance - beards, well-maintained long hair typically beneath a blue turban, silver bracelet - usually get them labeled in this nation as "Indian," "A-rab," or worse.  They are our neighbors, and we know nothing.  Of course, Islam is the 2nd-largest religion in the world, with Buddhism and Hinduism rounding out the top five (Christianity is on top in the numbers game)...and how much does the average person know about any of those, for that matter?  Other than that, of course, they're not white people religions.

I also know that the outpouring of grief and rage I've seen over this one in the world of social media has involved a conspicuous lack of grief and rage from conservative Christians.  For that matter, the number of people posting about this latest shooting has been almost nothing compared to the Colorado massacre.  Part of it is that the average person can more closely relate to going to the movies than going to worship at a non-Christian house of worship.  To a certain extent, the violation of the the movie theatre's safety is more immediately jarring, as at least houses of worship of all kinds have been targets in the past.  I get that.

But, I think there's more to it than just body count and the novelty of a mass murder at the movies.  I quite frankly think that most white Christians in this country are more disturbed when people who look like them are killed in a movie theatre than when non-Christian people of color are killed at worship.  I think subtle (or perhaps overt, for a minority of people) racism and religious exclusivism are at play here.  Again, I say - I think most of us in the church care a whole lot more about what happens to white, middle class, "God-fearing" people than to non-Christian people of color.  It doesn't matter that they were gathering for worship, much like how a Christian church would be gathering on a Sunday; they're not right enough with Jesus, and don't look like us, so they probably had it coming.  The shooting was  a senseless act of violence...but so is the sheer silence of white people of faith.  Every bit as senseless, and in its own way, every bit as violent.

One Big Damn Puzzler

It's the name of one of my absolute favorite novels - everybody should go to amazon.com now and buy a copy of One Big Damn Puzzler.  Do it.  NOW.

OK, now that you've bought it, and hopefully read the wonderfully funny, moving, and thought-provoking tale of cross-cultural experiences that makes one wonder about the nature of charity, justice, and civilization, we can take up that conversation.  Oh, wait, you just now ordered the book and it didn't instantly download into your brain?  Well, crap.

Ridiculousness aside, the book addresses just those themes, with the central question that lingers for me being perhaps one of incredible importance - what does it mean to be committed to justice in a cross-cultural context?  How do I, as a white U.S. American, authentically stand in solidarity with others in the world who have been wronged by the U.S. government or U.S. economic interests when those very people who have been wronged hold to a different idea of justice?  What if my idea of justice in fact poses a greater threat to their well-being than the initial injustice did?

In the novel, the people of the island have been victims of atrocities from a now-defunct U.S. military base - most notably, a rape and dozens of injuries from land mines.  A do-gooder lawyer from the U.S. comes to seek redress for the islanders, but he doesn't get that providing financial reparation for a society that uses yams as their de facto currency is likely to cause more harm than good...and it does.  The artificial limbs formerly used to replace mine-shattered legs are, by the end of the book, used to replace amputated limbs of the island's many diabetics, as the influx of cash and goods from the U.S. (like Coca-Cola and junk food) destroys the formerly healthy way of life on the island.

In its heart-breakingly funny way, the book is a cautionary tale for all of us who proudly bear the label liberal or progressive in this world, and who care about issues of international justice.  When working for justice, make sure the cure isn't worse than the disease itself - stand in solidarity, be a voice...but dear God, keep your eyes open and listen to the people.  There's no solidarity without authentic dialogue, and without solidarity, there's no justice.

Of Waffle Fries and Marriage Rights

So, I am really in the thick of the Chick-fil-A hulabaloo.  I worked for a summer at said fast food chain, selling chicken sandwiches and waffle fries.  Now, I'm a straight ally of the LGBTQ community living in Logan Square, the Chicago neighborhood that has now moved into the spotlight as one of our aldermen has promised to block the building of a new Chick-fil-A (the city's 2nd franchise) on Elston, just east of the Kennedy Expressway.  Alderman Moreno, and now Mayor Emanuel, are saying that they have no interest in allowing a franchise run by a family who flaunt their "Christian family values" and donate unapologetically to groups that work against gay marriage.  Mayor Tom Menino of Boston is also joining in, pledging to keep Chick-fil-A out of Boston and, in particular, off the Freedom Trail.

So, my two cents.  First, the Cathy family (who own Chick-fil-A) are most assuredly and unapologetically opposed to gay marriage.  And probably civil unions, adoption rights, partnership benefits, and God only knows how many other things when it comes to LGBTQ people.  This is, of course, defended as being traditional "family values," which is essentially the argument that Ozzie and Harriet had the only sort of acceptable family structure, and everyone else is sinning.  I should point out that the scriptures provide a wide variety of family models, most of which would be abhorrent to the average 21st century U.S. American of any religious background.  Lest we forget, things such as polygamy, concubinage, the seizure of women in war for forced marriage, and all kind of restrictions on women's rights are "biblical."  They don't jive nearly as well with the New Testament family codes...but then again, most arguments against homosexuality come from the Old Testament.  Life is complicated, and exploring this topic is not the principle focus of this entry.

All that said, I'm not shy about identifying myself as a straight ally who supports full rights, of every sort, for all people regardless of their sexual orientation.  I DON'T think a couple of cherry-picked verses that are ripped out of their historical context and aren't being properly interpreted through the Gospel ought to guide our convictions about whether or not LGBTQ folks are entitled to the same rights as the rest of us.  I have no interest in giving my money to the Cathy family just so they can donate it to a cause I find abhorrent.  I won't spend a cent of my money at Chick-fil-A until I can rest assured that my money won't go toward the continued denial of basic freedoms to people who love people of the same gender.

However, I will confess that I have some serious issues with denying people permits to build their businesses because of disagreement over how the corporate management of the company donates their money.  On the one hand, I would love to see Chick-fil-A get shown up.  I would love not to have a Chick-fil-A in my neighborhood.  On the other, I do wonder about the First Amendment here, and object to political action like this in protest over the values and political donations of a given corporation when that corporation at least follows the laws and does not discriminate in its hiring practices or against clients.  Like I said, I find it abhorrent...but I really do wonder if the best way to address that is a permit denial.  It IS a limitation of freedom of speech; what will the nation look like if we start making all our business permit decisions based off how the politicians issuing them feel about the stated political beliefs of the business owner?  I really do think that's the wrong road to go down because it DOES limit freedom of speech.  I'd rather we mobilize and not give them a dime of our business.  That's MY freedom of speech in action.

This is Africa

This entry is not, in fact, a commentary on the atrociously hot weather we've seen in Chicago this summer.

No, I've had West Africa on the brain these last few days.  I recently read Whiteman by Tony D'Souza, which is a fictionalized account of the life of a U.S. American volunteer in northern Cote D'Ivoire during the beginning of the civil war that was going on while I also happened to living next door in Ghana.  The book, which is worth tracking down and reading, dwells some on the subject of belonging (he's the white man in an all-black village), loneliness (and the things which it drives us to do), and reconciling privilege (he can leave the violence) with belonging (but he doesn't know how to leave and go to a home that's not home anymore).

It's taken me, in my mind, back to my own four months (a comparative blink) in Ghana, and the places around the region my travels took me.  Mali has been especially on my mind lately.  Since it's gotten very little attention in the U.S. media, a brief recap of the past few months...

-Mali is a large West African nation, 2/3 of which is sparsely populated desert.  Most of the national population is black, sub-Saharan African - groups such as the Bambara, Malinke, and Dogon, with nomadic Peul populations, as well.  There is a significant Tuareg minority; these are a nomadic desert people who are ethnically and culturally more like the Berber people of North Africa...the average person from the West would describe them as being similar to Arab people.

-The Tuareg have always felt isolated and persecuted by the Malian government, which is dominated by the black population.  They've taken up arms in the past against the government in hopes of forming a separate state.

-In the winter, the Tuareg launched a new uprising - a much better armed one than in the past thanks to many Tuareg serving as mercenaries in Libya and obtaining arms left over from the conflict there.  The Malian military was being trounced.

-In the spring, some Malian military officers staged a coup, removing the long-serving (and democratically elected) president. They blamed him for the military failure, accusing him of not giving them adequate weapons and supplies to fight the Tuareg.  The African Union, and rest of the world, immediately condemned the coup and threatened the military government with total isolation and possible intervention if they didn't step down.  A provisional civilian government has since taken over, but with the specter of the military junta weighing heavily over them.

-In the meanwhile, the Tuareg effectively took over the northern half of the nation; much of their success came through allying themselves with militant Islamist groups interested in creating a Sharia-led Islamist state.  The international community refuses to recognize their new "nation," which is now racked with in-fighting between the Tuareg nationalists and Islamists.  However, the international community is reluctant to get involved, as the largest regional power, Nigeria, is beset with religious strife of its own and is afraid that fighting the Islamists will result in Nigeria's own Islamist militants declaring an all-out war on the government.

So, now you know the story.  I spent two weeks in Mali, roughly half of which was with the Tuareg in the yes-it's-a-real-place city of Timbuktu.  And...Timbuktu's disappearing.  Its new Islamist masters disapprove of the presence of tombs, shrines, and monuments to Muslims of other times and of other strands of Islam, so they're destroying them.  The Tuaregs who I stayed with in Timbuktu may very well be among the fighters.  One of the models of democracy in the region is now a shredded mess.

And...it's heartbreaking.  I love West Africa, and there is perhaps no harder thing to love in this world.  Every step forward seems paired with a step back...or two, or three.  Sometimes, it comes from internal problems; more often, it's the by-product of foreign meddling, colonialism by another name and with less accountability.  God, help us.

A Game of Thrones, or Indecision America 2012

So, we all know I'd never get political, right?

Oh, please.  I breathe politics.  So, of course, presidential election year is a time when I'm hyperventilating, as it were.  It doesn't help that we're faced with the current slate of candidates.  The back history of this blog reveals a lot of harsh criticism of President Obama coming from this disillusioned left libertarian; I still hold that most of it is deserved, even if I'm willing to recant that my electability concerns have been put to rest by the overwhelmingly awful cast of corporate-funded cretins put up by the Republican Party.  That all said, I just hope to be proven wrong that a second Obama term will be marked by less kowtowing to big money and its political agents.

Then, there's Mitt Romney.  Aside from the fact that the man has the raw charisma of limp spaghetti, the thought of him as president is chilling to me, and rightly so.  Let's put aside the obvious areas of incompetency shown by Romney in foreign policy (which are being put on display for all the world now as he takes a tour of Europe and the Middle East), and stay away from speculation.  Let's look at what is verifiable fact.  This is a man who has...

-Reminded us that "corporations are people, too, my friend."  The notion of a business interest being defined as a person is repugnant to me, and all other sentient beings, especially since we all know that this is merely a legal way of allowing corporate entities to donate money in politics without limit or accountability.  It's legalized corporate bribery - and the man who would be king is a big supporter of this.

-Will not release tax returns.  Everybody does this when running for president.  We like to know that our presidential candidates are willing to keep their financial dealings on the up and up...and like to keep their money invested in the nation which they, ostensibly, love like nothing else and would make tremendous sacrifice to serve.  The evidence suggests that Romney's chief loyalties lie with personal profit, not national loyalty.  Why else hide the documents that would shed light on this?  Furthermore, we all know he's in an income bracket that makes even the fairly wealthy Obamas look like the Clampitts before they struck oil.  We even know that the tax exemption on his wife's prize horse is higher than the average household income in the U.S.  I don't suspect he has the interest of the little man in mind; I frankly suspect that he wouldn't even know what price a box of pasta goes for at a grocery store.

-Made his fortune in finance.  The list of the biggest donors to each campaign was released this week; Obama's is a mixed bag, while Romney's big money donations have almost all (9/10) come from finance.  You cannot tell me that Romney will not be Wall Street's stooge in office.  He knows this world from the inside, as he made a fortune in precisely the kind of dodgy financial dealings that most of the rest of us see as the PROBLEM in our national economy, not its solution.

I have no intention of voting for either of them (Green Party!), but if the biggest threat we face as a democracy is the empowering of superwealthy business interests in the political system, then Romney is the last person in the field who is fit to occupy the White House.  Crony capitalism needs to stay a part of our nation's past; please read Twain's The Gilded Age for a look at what things might look like if we keep on this course.  We serve a God who consistently shames the wealthy and powerful and chooses the poor and weak; we've got to follow in that path if we want to see justice in this land, and world.

Pulpit Safety Belt

The good folks at Emanuel in Dayton got me one of the best graduation gifts imaginable - a pulpit safety belt.  You see, Kevin the klutzy pastoral intern made a definite impression on God's faithful people on internship by falling out of the pulpit on my sixth Sunday.  The best part - I had mentioned, in the sermon, my utter lack of any sort of discernible coordination.  If that is not proof that God has a sense of humor, and that it is a sick one, then I don't know what is.

So, as a little nod to one of my more memorable homiletical acrobatic acts, they presented me with a "pulpit safety belt" in a frame.  It's going to hold a place of honor in my office here; it only seems right that everyone coming into my office be made aware that Pastor Kevin can't be relied on for good bodily coordination.

But, as I think about, there's a lot more to the idea of having a pulpit safety belt that thrills me, inspires me.  I WANT to be the kind of preacher where the safety belts need to be fastened, seats and tray tables in their upright and locked positions.  The Gospel isn't safe; why should its public proclamation be any different?  I want to deliver the goods, so to speak; I want the word of Christ crucified and risen for us to resound not just on Sunday morning, but every day.  I long to see it at work, transforming this sad, broken church/neighborhood/city/state/nation/world/cosmos.  I don't want our - my - public proclamation to be just another limp, impassive, unrelatable bit of bad theological pabulum that in no way, shape, or form speaks good news to our brokenness in the interest of being comfortable, safe, or "relevant."  I find it tremendously ironic that in our effort to be comfortable, safe, and "relevant," the Church usually comforts itself into a stupor, undermines its own security, and ceases to say a single meaningful thing to a world that is hungry for the Gospel.

Of course, I'm also reminded of Paul's words in 1 Corinthians 2, in which he talks about how the success of the Gospel in Corinth had nothing to do with Paul's skillful proclamation, but everything to do with the Spirit acting with power.  Maybe that drive toward stupor-like comfort, false safety, and fake relevance are quelching that Spirit.  Maybe our great failure in the pulpit is in deciding that we know better than God, and that our knowledge tells us to pull our punches rather than confront the world's brokenness that encompasses so much of who and what we are.  Maybe we need to stop playing it so safe to spare folks from the whiplash of the Holy Spirit's moving, active work among us, and instead tell people to buckle up, because God is here, and God isn't driving the speed limit.

Queen of the Sciences, or, the Theologian Strikes Back

This is a hill I'm willing to die on.  I am not going to pull my punches on this one; proceed with caution.

I was sweeping earlier and, despite all my best efforts to be mindful and live in my present experience, I was thinking about the struggles that I've faced as someone who is both an intellectual and trained theologian going on to doctoral work in New Testament, and a person of faith awaiting call as a pastor.  There are two camps that have been particularly a thorn in my flesh - those who aren't "religious" and think that all I've done is waste my brain on "Jesusology" (which isn't a REAL academic discipline), and those who come out of fundamentalist/evangelical traditions and do not understand what academic theology is and assume that I must, of course, agree with them in their ultra-literal butchering of the scriptural witness.

Both camps need to be called out - the former simply for not grasping the fact that theology is, in fact, a rigorous academic discipline and not just "Jesus loves me" fluff, and the latter...oh dear.  The calling out of my sisters and brothers in rather more conservative traditions must be for creating the sense in broader society that Christianity equals stupidity.  The former attitude irks me; the latter infuriates me.  I will try to keep it under control.

So, first - a word to those who do not think that theology is a legitimate academic field of study.  How many ancient languages did you have to learn for your law degree?  I had to learn two for my M.Div.; by the time I have my Ph.D., I'll have had to prove competency in both of those, plus two more languages of academic study.  Neither ancient language uses our alphabet, by the way, and one of them isn't even Indo-European.  Then, with those two languages, I am asked to be able to analyze, with deep knowledge of historical and social contexts contemporary to the writing of each of 66 separate documents (most of them anonymous or by multiple authors and editors), the entirety of the Bible.  I also have to be conscious of how to read them in a way that encourages and inspires people's sense of faith - academic knowledge of them as historical objects or works of literature isn't enough.  

Of course, to be able to do that, I need to be a well-trained writer and public speaker.  I also need to have an incredible depth of grasp of the entire history of Western thought - a good grounding in philosophy, the sciences, history, and literature is essential.  I very specifically have to be an expert in 2,000 years' worth of religious, spiritual, and theological reflection in the Christian tradition.  I also cannot be ignorant of other religious and spiritual traditions, so while becoming an expert in Christian, and especially Lutheran, thought, I also have to be at least conversant in the theology and practice of other major world religions.

Did I mention that, in addition to these things, I also have to be an ethicist?  And a teacher capable of providing instruction to everyone from cradle to grave?  Oh, and I also function as a non-clinical counselor - gotta have a good grasp on psychology, both in terms of theory and counseling practice.  The road to my degree could be paved ten times over the papers that have been written and the pages that have been read and, at the end of it, every person in ministry is a polymath capable of doing everything from discussing the relationship between process theology and the general theory of relativity down to fixing the church's toilets.  You can take your MBA and shove it where the sun don't shine if you'd still like to argue that my degree isn't "really" a degree.  Yes, it is a vocational degree - so is an M.D. or a J.D., and I don't see people lining around the block to discredit them.

That all said, I now have to address the body of folks who are, while a good lot of folks on the whole, are just the same responsible for me having to rant just to prove that, in fact, theology is an academic discipline.  Fundamentalism has so infected the soul of U.S, American Christianity that, unfortunately, the average person outside the Church has no idea that not at all Christians aren't conservative evangelicals.  It breaks my heart that my sisters and brothers in more conservative traditions have been so successful in dumbing our faith, and themselves, down to this point.  Christianity GAVE BIRTH to the university, furthered the expanse of the arts in the West, supported so many different academic developments...and now has become a by-word for ignorance and deliberate denial of logic and reason in the name of supporting a literal reading of the Bible which the Bible itself, at no point, advocates or supports.

Yes, I said it - there is not one verse in the scriptures that says "the Bible is without error and should be taken literally."  You can play the "all scripture is God-breathed" argument from the Pastoral Epistles, but the definition of inspiration used by fundamentalism is NOT one found in the scriptures, nor in Christianity until after the Reformation - the permutation of it most popular in this country didn't emerge until the 19th century.  Check it if you don't believe me.  Perhaps I speak too strongly, but belief that the Bible is 100% without error is heresy because it ascribes perfection, which is only held by God, to a product of human hands - even if they were inspired by God, people were involved.  It cannot be perfect, and viewing it as such creates such an intellectual nightmare for anyone with a modicum of intelligence or sense that it has, and will continue, to destroy the Church's witness to anyone unwilling to check their brain at the church door.

I say all of this as someone who grew up with this.  I grew up with people whose idea of a science curriculum was anti-scientific and rooted in the indoctrination of its students into knee-jerk, lock-step literal biblical creationism.  Guess whose faith is smaller and weaker - the person who worships the Bible rather than God and cannot accept anything other than a literal 6 day creation account, or the person who reads the Bible and grasps the heart of its message of salvation by grace through faith in Christ and is still able to see the value in evolutionary theory?

I've been harsh, probably too much so...and for that I apologize.  But I cannot keep my silence - the deliberate and willful ignorance which fundamentalist Christianity forces upon its adherents is despicable and contrary to the Gospel...and destructive to the ultimate health and well-being of God's faithful people and their call in this world.  I just can't keep quiet in the face of that anymore.