Why I Worry When Other Clergy Say, “I Want to Be A Household Name.”

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I’m part of an online clergy chat group.images

I don’t contribute to it much, and I don’t always watch it regularly, but it’s usually pretty interesting.  It’s good to have a community, even a virtual one, to share successes and frustrations with.

And yes, it seems that often the same names pop up on the message roll.  And, yes, I wonder if they have work to do and how they have so much time to spend on there.

But today’s posting by the moderator got me thinking.

He began by lamenting how so many in my faith tradition, Lutheranism, are too humble with their work and their writing and their music and their art.  And how we have to start promoting our work and “getting it out there.”  And how we should be “household names.”

And others responded lamenting how we don’t have any Lutheran “Joyce Meyers Ministries” or the like.

And I was lamenting because, although we don’t have any Lutheran Joyce Meyers Ministries, we don’t need any more of those in this world.

Because you have to give up a lot to be a household name.   And I wonder if it’s worth it.

Fr. Richard Rohr isn’t a household name, but I think he’s done so much more for humanity than any televangelist.

Ken Wilbur isn’t a household name, but I think he’s done more for humanity than any “order today and receive a discount DVD set on how to heal your relationships” offer.

Martin Marty is prolific and inspiring, and he’s not really a household name.  Walt Wangerin is beautifully wonderful, and unless you’re Lutheran or really into children’s books, he’s not a household name.

And Ron Strobel, and Kirsten Fryer, and Manda Truchinski, and Josh Ebener….these aren’t household names, but they are ministers who are authentic and doing good work in this world.  And I hope you can check out some of their work.

But I hope they don’t become “famous”…whatever that means.

Because you give up a lot.

I think you give up some ability to live without the trappings of fame and fortune and name recognition and always being forced to do that next best thing.

I think you give up living without the constant burden of profundity.

I think you give up a little of your soul.

Look, I think there are Lutheran clergy out there doing wonderful work.  And I hope people read them, and listen to them, and buy their work, and pray for their work (Jim Honig would be one to check out right away).

I hope they are able to support their families with their work, as I support mine.  I hope they talk about God and Christ in an authentic way and not fall into the trappings of telling people what they want to hear.

Because that’s what you have to do to become a household name.

I hope they don’t become famous.

I hope they don’t get series of book deals that force them to lie about God or their faith, or begin to take themselves too seriously, or come up with “visiting criteria” that places that want them to speak have to abide by (along with enormous speaking fees).

Because we don’t need another Joyce Meyers Ministries, even if its content is different and something I might agree with.

Because authenticity is lost in that.

We need more good people doing the small work.  And if you want to lift that up, go ahead.

Because good people doing the small work won’t, I hope, take themselves too seriously or struggle with profundity.  And they won’t worry that they’re not a household name beyond their own home.

I’m a reluctant Christian sometimes because it’s so easy to fall into the fame trap, and Christians do it so often “in the name of Jesus,” while using obnoxiously large font to plaster their name on the front of all the posters, and fliers, and mailers.

And I wonder if we take Jesus’ call to be yeast seriously if we’re trying to be the whole loaf.

“Atheist Churches” or “It’s Really Just Church…”

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The Huffington Post recently had an article about an “atheist Church” that has begun to meet in the morning on Sundays.601751a-question-mark-on-stained-glass-posters

The 80 or so people that show up come seeking, as the article’s author says, “a sense of community, an uplifting message that will help them tackle the challenges of the upcoming week, and, maybe, the rest of their lives.”  They claim that there is no formal doctrine, dogma, operating theology, formal symbols, or identified sacred texts in this church.

Whether they are called “humanist communities,” “atheist churches,” or “nontheist gatherings,” this is not a new phenomena.  The hype is interesting and growing, for sure, but it is not new.

There have been atheists meeting in church since…churches began.

In fact, the sense of community and uplifting message that these atheists seek is probably, I would guess, what a number of people sitting in the pews seek on a regular Sunday morning.

The difference, of course, is that at this particular gathering in Houston, you don’t actually have to believe anything to show up or belong.

Wait a second…what’s the difference again?

I tell my ministry staff all the time, “People in church pews will put up with a whole bunch of crappy theology for good church programming and entertainment. They will disagree with the pastors and the theology privately as long as the people are nice and the kids programs and small groups are strong.”

I think that’s largely true.  I think at most thriving churches you have about 20% who agree doctrinally with the church, 60% that agree marginally, and 20% that like the music, the lights, the inspirational message, and that their kids feel safe and have a good time.

And I might be being generous toward the marginal percentage there.

I think atheists gather every Sunday at churches around the country, churches known as “Catholic,” “Evangelical,” “Methodist,” “Lutheran,” and even so-called “Bible” churches.  And for much the same reason the people in this article show up: they want inspiration and community.

And this has happened, I think, because churches have largely become another 7-11 for the soul.  It’s a place to get your spiritual Slurpee for the week.

And this is not necessarily bad, mind you.

But if that’s all church is, it’s a waste.

Because a church gathering, and a series of church gatherings over time, shouldn’t only be about you and your spiritual fix.  And it isn’t really only about “us,” either.

It is about a holistic reshaping of the gathered, of humanity, toward the Divine.

I think we’ve taught atheism…and continue to teach atheism…in churches through either tightening the dogma we teach or simply feeding the ego-beast that longs for the spiritual Slurpee.  We haven’t taught it through questioning the virgin birth or the divinity of Christ.  We haven’t taught it through encouraging free thinking or welcoming minority groups.

We’ve taught it by changing the shape of our gatherings to model the ego, rather than allow the shape of our gatherings to mold the ego.

And note: the remedy for this isn’t talking more about Jesus, or asking people to make a commitment to Jesus, or asking people to invite Jesus into their hearts (and really mean it this time).

That last phrase usually sends me into apoplexy.

Because more altar calls don’t mean more Christians.  I think many times it means more people assume that Jesus has become their personal talisman, or that they’re “doing the thing that will work” for their lives.

The remedy, I think, is to embrace the diversity of a gathering, and trust that God and God’s Spirit creates unity even in the midst of diversity.

This is why my faith tradition talks about God as a Trinity.  The diversity of the three-in-one.  The unity of the one-known-as-three.

In short, community is not uniformity. And instead of trying to force uniformity through the tightening of doctrine and dogma, or avoid the whole situation altogether through offering inspirational messages that only feed the ego-beast longing to believe that they and they alone are the most important thing in this world and a blessing is just around the corner, lets go back to that ancient understanding of church as a way to enact a counter-cultural gathering that forms a people into a shape more closely related to the Divine.

A shape of support and sacrifice.  A shape that fits into the pain of this world, and accentuates the beauty of God-given life.  A shape of…well…a cross.

Because I have a feeling that these “atheist churches” will soon be voting to excommunicate members who don’t agree with their proposition that “you don’t have to believe.”  This is what happens when you only gather with those who believe the same things you do.  You go solely to get a fix, and when someone seems to get in the way of that fix, you get them out of the way.

Christians do it. Religious people of all stripes do it. Atheists (also, mind-you, a belief system) do it.

Bowling leagues do it.

I’m a reluctant Christian at times because we’ve become either spiritual Slurpee dispensers or a country club for insiders, unremarkable and indistinguishable from other groups who gather around a common mindset or hobby.

And if we continue to do this I think we can clearly see the outcomes: Egoism will become the predominate faith practiced in most churches formerly known as Christian (if it isn’t already), or we’ll just shuffle off into our dwindling camps of uniformity causing the other kids down the block to create their own club house with their own rules, and never the twain shall meet.

All the while the world will continue to turn and it will be worse off  because the churches of consumerism, the cathedrals of militarism, the temple of money, and the gathering of ravenous crowds who believe the new incarnation or product X will save their souls will continue to meet.

And the church, at it’s best, is the counter-cultural movement that can provide a voice against those rising mobs.

See, atheists gathering in churches isn’t really new.  And if that’s surprising to you, then you haven’t had real conversations with your fellow congregation members.

What can be different, though, is how you leave a church.

Do you leave in a different shape?

Yes, you individually.  But more-so you in the plurality.  Because being formed by ancient texts and music and meal and ritual pushes people together so much so that they have to change shape to accommodate the other in their presence, to accommodate the Other in their presence.

And it’s not a uniform shape, and it’s not about getting a spiritual Slurpee that will feed your faith indulgence.

It’s a cruciform shape that changes the way you interact in and with the world.

At least, that’s what it should do.

Christianity Doesn’t Work

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It doesn't work

It doesn’t work

No, it doesn’t.

And no matter how much those smiley mega-church pastors, or those trendy pastors, or those evangelists with their little bottles of snake oil  want you to believe it does, it doesn’t.

Christianity does not work the way your hammer works.  And you may want to hammer in the morning, or in the evening all over this land, but it still won’t work.

It doesn’t do that.

I read a recent article online about a church that was welcoming in their new pastor.  They lauded the pastor as being “energetic and enthusiastic,” claiming that he “grew his previous congregation into one of the fastest growing churches in the denomination.”

No doubt that is an article that tries to get you to think that it works.  It creates energy and enthusiasm, growing and multiplying and expanding.

Expanding influence.  Expanding pocketbooks.

We’re talking about success here.

But Christianity doesn’t do that.  It is not a magic pill that you swallow to become successful.  It does not, as I recently read on the cover of a free evangelical e-book, help you “conquer life.”

In fact, it helps you lose your life.  Christopher Hitchens hated that part about Christianity.  He said it was cruel to expect people to give up their lives in deference to others, especially enemies and those they never met.  This point is about the only point about Christianity that Hitchens ever understood: self-sacrifice and self-giving love is at the heart of the Christian.

And it encourages you to adopt tactics that don’t work.  Forgiveness, for instance, doesn’t work.  It doesn’t automatically repair relationships.  It doesn’t automatically make you feel better or heal your insides.  It doesn’t do any of those things, as a recent New York Times article points out.  Sometimes revenge satisfies more than forgiveness.

And yet, the Christian is called to forgive.  It is but one example of how Christianity doesn’t work in the way the world wants things to work.

Christianity doesn’t work. And that’s going to upset some people to hear it, but it’s true. And I’m a reluctant Christian because so much of our church culture today is about success and numbers and winning and…and about it all working.

The Christianity I practice doesn’t work.  It hasn’t made me successful.  It hasn’t made me wealthy.  It hasn’t made my marriage perfect or my parenting perfect or my manners perfect or my morals perfect.  It certainly hasn’t given me all the answers.  I have more questions then ever.

It has given me a lens, though, to view my work and any successes I might claim.  It’s given me a lens to view my pocketbook and my marriage and my parenting and my manners and my morals.  It has given me a lens to view questions and has encouraged me to ask more questions.

But it doesn’t work.

And quick growth in faith communities, or enthusiastic pastors, or wealthy congregations, or any of these business markers for success are smoke and mirrors covering this truth: Christianity doesn’t work.

Thank God.  So much of what supposedly works in this life is killing us.

And so much of Christianity is about self-sacrifice.  And somehow, it gives life.

“Are We A Liberal Church or a Conservative Church?” or “Give Me a Break…”

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Radical Axis...for those no good at geometry...

Radical Axis…for those no good at geometry…

So, I have to be honest, I really can’t take churches that identify as “liberal” or “conservative” anymore.

And I know that’s saying a lot since many consider the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, my church body,  to be “liberal, mainline, Protestant.”

If we are that, then we’re in trouble.  We will, as a denomination, die if that is the case.

And we will die because a church cannot be rooted in God but worship a principality like a party platform or a political ideology.

We need to be a radical church.

Radical churches don’t flow with any political ideology, and yet they understand themselves to have a voice in the public square.

Radical churches understand that hunger can be temporarily alleviated through food pantries, but that systemic change only happens through hunger awareness, advocacy, and systemic upheaval.

Radical churches understand that talking about violence has less to do with “rights”, and more to do with how the Prince of Peace might call a Christian to respond.

Radical churches take seriously personal responsibility and communal responsibility.

In short, a radical ethic would be: our responsibility is to our neighbor and our neighbor’s responsibility is to us.  This cyclical nature of Christian ethics should lead not to a party platform but to a subversive way of living in the world.  We do not separate into sheep and goats, but rather once separated, jump over those lines to stand in solidarity with those who have been unjustly labeled.

Labeled either way.

“Wall Street Fat Cats” are just as labeled as “Free-loading Takers.”  Yeah, we hate to acknowledge that, but it’s true.  Us/them dichotomies don’t seem to be in Jesus’ language.

So why has the church so easily adopted us/them stances?

Because we love being correct.  And for us to be correct, someone else has to be mistaken.  We easily adopt imperial language and imperial ideologies for this reason, and then we get sucked into name-calling, trench digging, wall building, and campaigning.

And then we count the votes of who is with us and who is against us.

What if a Christian understood their obligation to communal ethics as challenging both the label makers and those who have been given labels?  What if being the voice of the poor and the marginalized also included an anti-demonization clause?  That is, even those who call names cannot be labeled, lest they then become the marginalized.

Radical Christianity understands that “Those without sin should throw the first stone,” while also reminding everyone to, “go and sin no more…”

What would such a church look like?

I don’t know.  I don’t know that I’ve seen one.

But I do know that radical churches don’t rely on lock-stepping with any party or ideology, and they understand that difficult topics will raise eyebrows and don’t get too anxious about it.  They may disagree internally about specifics, but can agree that Christian responsibility leads us to discuss these things honestly and seek to take action on them.

And they agree that they can’t just pray over issues.

We should not pray any prayer we’re not willing to be the answer for.

And that’s scary to think about.  It’s radical to imagine.

The Christian church needs a break.  We need a break from “liberal” or “conservative” labels, and if you’re proud of that label being associated with your church, I would challenge you to rethink that pride.

Perhaps you’re muddying the waters.

And if you’re proud of the fact that your church doesn’t get involved in ethical arguments, I would challenge you there, too.  If you haven’t been accused of being political, I have to wonder what you’re thinking when you pray for change.  An ideology of non-confrontation is no more helpful than a political monicker being attached to your name.  I think you need a break, too.

Perhaps you’re muddying the waters.

I’m a Reluctant Christian at times because we have become too eager to be powerful in the ways the world tells us we need to be powerful.  We’ve adopted corporate business models and political platforms in the attempt to be relevant.

And we need to be radical.

We need to reclaim a radical Christianity.  And maybe that means that churches don’t get a tax break anymore.  After all, if we’re beholden to Caesar, we’re more likely to play by imperial rules.

And maybe that means that pastors don’t get tax breaks anymore. That’s radical.

And perhaps “faith-based initiatives” refuse government money from now on.

That’s radical to think about when so many people are trying to do so much good with that money…

And yet, we’ve muddied the waters.

Maybe we need a break.

It’d be radical…but I’m pretty sure no one ever accused Jesus of being ordinary.

“Beating Swords into Plowshares” or “Yes, I Want To Take Your Guns”

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Image

I should be honest.  I don’t want all of your guns taken away.  You can keep your hunting rifles and shot guns; guns you use for sport.

And I know that puts me at odds with some people, even people within my own congregation.

But I want to take away your handguns.  And I want to take away your assault rifles.  And I want to take away your high capacity clips*.  And I want to take away your ability to sell your guns to anyone you want.

I do; I have to be honest, I do.  And there are reasons.

The number one reason is because I’m about to have a baby. And in 2012 we had over 500 homicides in Chicago.  In the past month alone we’ve had half a dozen shootings in my neighborhood, most before 10pm.

I walk to Starbucks before 10pm.  I walk to the gym before 10pm.  I walk to the 7-11 before 10pm.  And when we have a baby, we’ll walk with the baby.

And I want your guns gone because I want my baby to live, along with everyone else who wants an ice cream fix at 9pm.

And I know there are gun safety classes.  And I know there are locks for gun cases, and safe handling procedures.

I get that.  But I also get that we could offer tank-driving courses…it doesn’t mean I’d like for just anyone to be able to buy a tank.

And I understand that we’re having a discussion about rights, and about ownership, and about the freedom to do what one pleases.

But my baby has a right to live.  So does yours. They have a right to walk down the street.  And I’m not worried about you shooting my baby; that doesn’t worry me.  I’m worried about that other person shooting my baby.  With your gun.

That worries me.

And I have to be honest, I’m not sure how a Christian can interpret Isaiah 2:4 without questioning ownership of weapons that can cause death on a massive scale, which I think we can recognize as war:

God shall judge between the nations,
    and shall arbitrate for many peoples;
they shall beat their swords into plowshares,
    and their spears into pruning hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
    neither shall they learn war any more.

The prophet is talking about nation rising up against nation; I see that.  But when you live in Uptown…

…or Kenwood…

…or Albany Park…

…or Inglewood…

…or any place you find dividing lines…

…people choose their nation.  War happens.

And they defend their nation.  Sometimes with your gun.

Or when we have people who have an imbalance in their brain, or who have unending despair to the point of delusion, or who become paranoid to the point of insanity, or who are just plain assholes with nothing to lose, they become a nation of one against the world.

And they defend their nation.  Sometimes with your gun.

And despite what the arguments might claim, I cannot conceive of how more guns make us safer.  I want teachers to teach, not to shoot.  I want playground attendants to watch the monkey bars, not scope out targets.

I want tools to fit the situation.  Teachers teach.  Playground attendants monitor the playground.  They fit the situation. A handgun is a tool for only one situation: killing a person.

They’re designed to do that.

And I’m well aware that a hunting rifle can kill, as can a shotgun.  I’m also well aware (because I’ve hunted) of the amount of time it takes to reload, to use, their bulk…

Not the weapon of choice for someone with ill intent.

As a father, as a pastor, as a Christian who takes Isaiah 2:4 seriously, I don’t want to let you keep your gun.  I’m sorry.  I really do sympathize.  Freedom is important, we must be a free people.

But my baby must be free to live.

And I know this problem is bigger than you having a gun.  It’s about mental health support, and about poverty, and about wellness.

It’s about the fact that we teach violence.  As Isaiah says, “we shall study war no more…” except funding for cancer research by the government versus military spending was roughly 5 billion to 144 billion in 2008.

So please, stop saying we’re a Christian nation.  When this statistic changes we can talk about that claim…

We teach violence with our pocketbooks.  We call it defense, but it is violence.  And I’m not saying we don’t need to defend ourselves; what I am saying is that we should call a thing what it is.

Defense spending is paying money to learn war.

And in learning war, we teach war.

And then we wonder why people shoot other people.

And I’m a reluctant Christian at times because I often hear people make the case that somehow the freedom to buy and sell firearms is connected to the freedom that God desires for the nations.

Read Isaiah 2:4.

Yes, yes, I know there are other scriptural examples of God supposedly encouraging nation to rise up against nation.  But the prophets are the conscience of the people, and despite what historic redactors might want you to read, Isaiah speaks a word of honesty.

We must beat our handguns into something else; we must beat much of our defense spending into something else.

And I know you’re reluctant to do it.  But I’m asking you to do it for my child, and your child.  I don’t care if he/she has the right to own a handgun, but I want them to have the right to live, to go to school, to walk down the street without being shot.

We can start unlearning war.  And perhaps a good way to do that is by making the tools for war unavailable to just anyone.

After all, tools should fit the situation…

*Apparently “clips” are different from “magazines” according to responders (see below).  Needless to say, I’ve only hunted with shotguns, and haven’t had to use these items.

On Death and Christmas Eve

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In those days a decree went IMG_1595out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. 2This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. 3All went to their own towns to be registered. 4Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David. 5He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child. 6While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. 7And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

In “those days…”

Those days.

I wonder when “those days” are supposed to be.

I have “those days.”

Those days when everything seems to be amiss.

Those days when it appears that love has hitchhiked to the next county and isn’t coming back; when loneliness has set in to the point that darkness seems like it will never leave.

Those days when the world has turned all around to the point that up and down are no longer real directions because I don’t recognize where I am in life, let alone which way is positive and which way is negative, which way leads to life and which to death.

In “those days…”

In those days of Jesus’ birth there was peace.  Pax Romana, we call it, the “Roman Peace” brought on through imperial domination.

Rome won all the wars.  It forced people to be peaceful…according to the Roman definition of “peace” which sometimes involved people being hung from crosses or eaten by wild beasts for sport.   Not exactly a Christmasy sentiment…

In those days of Jesus’ birth counting people was the task at hand.  How many are here?  We have to have the numbers if we’re going to assess how much people are worth, after all.  Your taxes were directly dependent upon your citizenship and status.

In those days people’s worth and wealth were directly connected.

That, in many ways, doesn’t only sound like “those days”…it sounds a lot like “to-day.”

Luke’s beginning to this most memorable reading sets us squarely in place.  I imagine he’s expecting us to land in the first century when Quirinius is governor of Syria.

But it also sets us squarely in “those days.”  Those days when it seems like there’s nothing left to us and everything is going cold.  Where we try to force ourselves into a peaceful state, only to fall back into darkness.

Much like the cold of Christmas Eve night.  Much like the darkness of Christmas Eve night.

I’ve spoken about this before, but it’s worth repeating, Christmas Eve reminds me a lot of our other big late-into-the-evening-I’m-so-sleepy-why-am-I-here? service: The Easter Vigil.

Because this, too, is a vigil.

The Easter vigil is where we await the resurrection, where God brings life out of death.

But Christmas Eve is a different sort of vigil.

Instead of waiting for resurrection, on Christmas Eve night we await a death.

Now, I know that might be surprising to hear, especially because Christmas is all about babies being born and cookies frosted and ringing bells and warm feelings.

But, trust me: this waiting for a death is a good thing.

Christmas Eve we keep vigil, waiting for the Emmanuel, the God-with-us, once again, so that “those days” can die.

Those days when we feel unloving and unloveable.  Those days when we feel we aren’t worth it.  Those days when we fear that our lives are purposeless, that our existence is accident, that our only hope is in our hands or in our emptying bank accounts or in…nothing.

Those days when we try to force peace upon our lives but fail as we’re devoured by the beasts of greed, fear, anxiety and hung on the cross of our ego…

On Christmas Eve we light a candle, we celebrate the silence of the night as “those days” gives out one last gasping breath and we remember that those days are gone if the Nativity story is true.

Joy to the world.  Joy to you and me.  “Those days” are gone.

God rest ye merry gentlemen and gentlewoman, “those days” have only the power we allow them to have because their real power is gone.

We wish you a merry Christmas because “those days” are impotent.

So forget about whether or not the Nativity is factually real in all its glorious, romantic detail.  Theologically it is real in the most true sense of the word!

Because in “those days” God saw fit to show humanity, show us, that we have purpose enough for God to take on our form and show love.  That we are deliberately and wonderfully made in our existence.  That our hope is not in our hands or our emptying bank accounts, but in the hands of the small babe on that night when heaven was emptied so that the earth might know the fullness of God’s love.

Christmas Eve celebrates that those days are gone, and new day has begun.  A day full of God’s grace shown in the smallness of kicking legs and infant cries; a grace so vulnerable that even you and I can approach it with the assurance that it does not harm but only helps.

Such is God’s nature; such is God’s grace.

That night, light a candle to the death of those days.  And as we pass that flame from one candle to the next, we’ll create new light with all of our waxy ends, reminding us that the darkness of those days is dispelled on Christmas Eve night.

The night of the newborn baby.

The night of the new light.

The death of “those days.”

Merry Christmas.

Dem Bones…

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On the eve of All Saints we do what we love to do: play dress-up.

And it is just play.  Theologies and theologians that glorify Halloween as “Satan’s Day” aren’t good students of history.

That being said, the gore that is often associated with this day doesn’t appeal to me.  I’m a fan of horror flicks; I love a good scare.  But I’ve seen enough real blood in hospital rooms, ER’s, and elsewhere to not need the fake stuff.

But Halloween and All Saints also conjure up in me thoughts about life, mortality, death.

I find myself singing the spiritual

“Dem bones, dem bones, dem, dry bones…”

I’ve written previously about the importance of having  funeral at the time of death.  I still feel that it’s supremely important to honor and celebrate life by acknowledging, grieving, and honoring death.

Yes.  Honoring death.

Not as something to revere or worship, but as something to peer into as mystery.

I live with a biologist.  Carbon returns to carbon; it’s nature’s way.  As I’ve said at every funeral liturgy I’ve ever presided at, “ashes to ashes, dust to dust.”  We certainly shouldn’t labor under the delusion that somehow death is unnatural or evil.  I can understand how some people may come to this conclusion reading certain parts of Genesis and Romans.  Yet there are other sections of scripture, the Lazarus story in John for instance, that give another glimpse at death.

In that story Jesus “tarries” a while…not preventing Lazarus’ death.  One wonders why he might want to.  But in raising Lazarus, what Jesus does is dispel the fear of death.

This idea, I think, is something that the religious individual can grasp tightly.  Death is not to be sought; surely we are not masochists (at least, not most of us).

But neither is death to be feared.

The fear of death is all around, though.  In skin-products that promise ageless beauty.  In caskets lined with gold…perhaps because, the thought is, we can take it with us.  In medical procedures that prolong breathing but cannot prolong life.

We fear death, and we have made a market on that fear in the buying and selling of death-killers.  Surely the market is the death of our modern souls.

Hear now from Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel about the wisdom we can mine from the mystery of death:

The greatest problem is not how to continue (living) but how to exalt our existence.  The cry for a life beyond the grave is presumptuous, if there is no cry for eternal life prior to our descending to the grave.  Eterenity is not perpetual future but perpetual presence.  God has planted in us the seed of eternal life.  The world to come is not only a hereafter but also a herenow.

Our greatest problem is not how to continue but how to return. “How can I repay unto the Lord all his bountiful dealings with me?” (Psalm 116:12)  When life is an answer, death is a home-coming. “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of the saints.” (Psalm 116:15)…This is the meaning of death: the ultimate self-dedication to the divine.  Death so understood will not be distorted by the craving for immortality, for this act of giving away is reciprocity on our part for God’s gift of life.  For the pious…it is a privilege to die.

My wife gave me a note that someone passed her on the street.  It’s in the shape of a “1 million” dollar bill, and it has written on it, “The million dollar question: Where will you be after you die?”

Such conversion tactics are wasteful in the “throw this away for me” sort of way.  Theologies that only point toward heaven are useless.  If the goal of this life is to get somewhere else, why bother?

My response to the giver of that note would be, “The million dollar question isn’t where will I be when I die, but how have I lived?”

And if I have a million dollars, or perhaps one dollar, that might make heaven a reality for someone here in this existence and I fail to do it, then I have been negligent in my life.

I do not fear death, nor do I seek it.  I trust in the promise of heaven, but my home is here.  And may I do my part to bring heaven to this reality, trusting that what awaits me after my last breath is God’s eternal presence…something I’ve never been separate from.

And at my last breath, I imagine I’ll pray the same prayer that I’ve prayed at every funeral I’ve presided at with all “dem bones” in my body,

May God support us all the day long till the shadows lengthen and the evening comes and the busy world is hushed and the fever of life is over and our work is done.  Then in mercy may God give us a safe lodging and a holy rest and peace at the last.

Amen.

“Political Pandering” or “I Have Issues with ‘Issues'”

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I hate election season.

I love election season.

I kind of love to hate election season, if I’m perfectly honest with myself.

For some pastors it is truly a struggle to stand in a pulpit and say…anything.  They struggle out of fear.  There is a fear that connecting the faith with the life of the body politic will illicit the dreaded “email of political shaming.”

Luckily, I don’t get many emails like that.  But I have colleagues who do.

I keep emails that I get telling me that I’m too “political” in my sermons in a special folder.  It’s tentatively labeled “Trash”…but I may change it to “Inconsequential.”

Funny enough, it’s the same folder where I put emails that deride me for not being political enough in my sermons…

It’s not that I discount what people are saying in those emails; I take them seriously.  But I don’t see a way around preaching the way I do.  I think we’ve screwed up our definitions on what is a “political” issue and what is a “faith” issue.

Poverty is not a political issue.  It is a faith issue. It is an ethical issue.  It has just been politicized.

Dignity for the marginalized is not a political issue.  It is a faith issue. It is an ethical issue.  It has just been politicized.

In many respects, how we care for our sick, our elderly, our children, our indigent…these are not political issues. They are faith issues.  They are ethical issues.  They have just been politicized.

I love election season because it has the potential to be an intellectual exchange of ideas that results in action.

I hate election season because it invariably turns into a steaming pile of vacuous rhetoric with sides parading issues as if they and they alone are the standard bearer bringing awareness to them, and that they and they alone care about them.  The opposition not only doesn’t care, but hates the issue and those that hold it dear.

Typical political pandering.

And then I rise in the pulpit on Sunday and say things like, “The early church held all things in common…” (Acts 2:44), or “And Jesus healed the paralytic who was cared for by his friends…” (Mark 2:1-12), or “Joseph and Mary fled with Jesus to Egypt, where he was kept as an immigrant in a strange land until the age of…” (Matthew 2:13)

And what I receive in return are emails that accuse me of preaching socialism, endorsing free health-care, and taking sides on immigration issues.  In effect, those emails are insinuating that these issues are political in nature, and that I’ve made them into faith issues.  Unfortunately, that’s a reversal of reality.

And then I hear issues of personal morality, particularly how we love and how we reproduce, take the stage in spectacularly religious language that seems to drip from pastors mouths in the pulpit laying the bedrock for party platforms.

I wonder if those pastors get emails.

The message is that personal morality fits within the church walls and the political sphere.  Communal ethics, however, are purely political and have no place within the church walls.

Let us not make the mistake of thinking that social issues are God’s good news for a suffering world.  As a Christian I see God’s good news as Christ himself and the work that he did/does in the world for humanity.

But let us also not make the mistake of thinking that we come from a tradition whose sacred texts have no commentary on ethical issues.

I’m a reluctant Christian sometimes because we have a schizophrenic relationship to just how our sacred texts can be used in public life.

To ensure freedom of religion we must have a political process that is free from religion; this is true.

For me, this means that a particular candidates faith tradition, whether it is Christian, Mormon, Muslim, or Atheist, doesn’t affect my vote.

(In our current political season, I care that Romney is a Mormon about as much as I care that Obama is a Christian: I don’t care.  Not one bit)

It means that you cannot use the word “God” to get votes, either in your party platform or in your stump speeches.

It means that if you pick up a baby on the rope line, it better be because you’re checking to see that she’s within the weight ratio for her age, and not to show that you value “faith and family.”

But while we must have a political system that is free from religion, I’m not sure how we can have a religious tradition, that seems to focus intently on how to live together, free from commentary on issues that have been politicized.

My faith is integral to how I treat my neighbor, and how I hope society treats my neighbor.  And to ensure that I keep my faith integrated into my practices, I need a preacher and a church that looks at scripture and civilization together in such a way that we acknowledge personal and communal issues within the church walls.

And I need candidates and political parties who are not opportunists. I need candidates and political parties who don’t look at moral issues through the lens of political manipulation.  I need candidates who shun the vacuous political rhetoric of vote-getting and take up the prophetic leadership voice of one who speaks truth to power even as they seek it.

No more political pandering to my faith, please.

But can we dare to speak about issues in church and not assume that we’re pandering politics?

I don’t know, but I don’t know how to stop doing it.  I have issues with issues.

And if you have an issue with this post, feel free to send an email.  I’ll put it in my special folder…

“The Broken Record,” or “The Trouble with Church…”

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“The trouble with church is…” or, “If only we would…”

I hear those phrases a lot when people start talking about church.

It’s like a broken record.  Everyone’s agenda is either blamed as the cause or heralded as the cure for whatever is wrong with “church.”

I’d like to hit the needle on that record player for a second.

It’s not that I think organized religion doesn’t have issues.

Man, does it have issues.

Huge issues.

And in many ways it needs to follow the path of Jesus and die a bit so something new can be raised up.

But I think that many times the reasons we give for churches and communities having “trouble” (however you define that word) are pretty lame.  I think we’re pretty good parents, but pretty lousy doctors, when it comes to church dysfunction: we know something is wrong but can’t diagnose it.

Myself included.

But I think I’ve identified some things that might be food for thought.  There are others, of course.  Other responses, other questions, other diagnoses.

The following are my top five; you probably have your own.  Feel free to share them.

So, here are 5 of my responses to 5 of the reasons I hear most often when it comes to “the trouble with church.”

# 5: “The trouble with church is that we don’t have a ‘contemporary’ service.”

Hey, have whatever style of church service you want.  We have a couple different worship styles where I serve.

But if I were to guess, I’d say that the trouble with your church is not that you don’t have a “contemporary service” (whatever that means).  The trouble is that people aren’t connecting with the service that you do have.

The relevance of religion can’t be assumed in this day and age.  I think the common person walking around today downloads apps on their phone for two main reasons.

1: they feel they need it.

2: they think it’s interesting.

That’s why I download the apps I do (and my wife hates the “flashlight” app…mostly because I use it to find the bed late at night if she’s gone to sleep before me).

So why do you do services at all?  Why do you need them?  Why are they interesting/insightful for you?

Do people even know why you’re doing what you’re doing?  Do they see the deep connections that are present?

Do you know?

People talk about “relevance” when it comes to church all the time, but I think they want to do it abstractly and with the wild assumption that everyone thinks “church” is necessary.

But in the concrete, what does it mean to sing communally?  What does it mean to read ancient texts together and hear someone reflect on them?  What does it mean to join your voices in prayer, refocusing yourself on the needs of the world and those who are ill?  What does it mean to eat a communal meal where everyone is invited forward and no one leaves without something?

Are you talking about these things?

I really don’t think that Christians today can fail to have the conversation on why the worshiping community is important, but so many churches aren’t having that conversation at all.

Not even amongst the people that do show up at church.

Change the style all you want.  Unless the deeper conversation is happening, I don’t think it’ll go anywhere.  And then you’ll just have someone come up to you and say, “You know what the trouble with this church is? We don’t have a “traditional” service…”

#4: “The trouble with this church is that we don’t have any young people.”

Yeah, this is a problem in some ways, just like a church with only young people is also a problem.

But energy isn’t generated by age; it’s generated by mission.

If your church doesn’t see a growing group of disciples, my guess is that the group that is there is unclear about what it’s doing there in the first place.  A church that understands itself (much like a person who understands themselves) works best because it knows where it is going.

Where is your church going?  Have you discussed it?

Many times I’ve heard people lament the absence of “young people,” and I think to myself, “So, you’ve already identified what you don’t have…but what do you have?  Where are you going?  Yes, you’ve talked about what you were, but who are you now?”

Know thyself and you will grow thyself.

Or, if not, if you come to understand yourself as a community best served in joining others in service through disbanding and moving your energies that way, then do so.  If people aren’t coming into your community, go out and join theirs!

#3: “The trouble with church is that this pastor doesn’t work enough.”

I know lazy pastors, just like I know lazy accountants, bankers, plumbers and politicians.

But I find that most pastors that are accused of being lazy are actually just burned out.

And they burn out because we’ve stopped hiring pastors to help us be church, and just expect them to do church for us.

Perhaps the trouble is that the pastor doesn’t feel supported.  I have colleagues who don’t even feel liked!  They are simply another reminder to the congregation that they are not who they once were in the roaring 50’s when the beloved pastor reigned over an era of pew-packing popularity, mostly due to the fact that American culture and the church had aligned themselves in an unholy union that we’ve only just recently been able to divorce ourselves from.

It’s unpopular to say out loud, but I feel much of the exodus of this generation from the pews of their parents can be traced back to those boom days when this hemisphere thought that Jesus was waving an American flag…

If you think your pastor is lazy, ask yourself if you’ve taken them out for coffee to chat about what’s going on in their life.  If you do, I’d bet that you’d find a calendar so packed that they’re demoralized before they rise out of bed in the morning because there is absolutely no way they can turn the ship around by themselves with so many issues to attend to…and that they’ve been trying to for far too long.

#2: “The trouble with church is that I could use my time better doing something different on a Sunday morning.”

I hear this one most often from people who aren’t in a faith community.  I can understand their point.

Sunday morning seems, by and large, to still be a time of relative inactivity in this hemisphere.

For right now.

Youth soccer and dance is starting to invade into the Sunday morning schedule, though…and they’re just the first in what, I imagine, will be non-stop programming.

I think this is a cultural problem, by and large, although there are some steps that churches can take to change this.

We, as a culture, or over scheduled.  And we’re teaching our children to be over scheduled, too.

In polling the people of my church community on why they attend, what feeds them, a large percentage mentioned the peace and quiet that Sunday morning hour offers them.

Which means that they’re sleeping through the sermon…

But, I find myself seeking the same thing: an escape from the over scheduled, hectic pace.

That, in and of itself, has a positive psychological impact.

As a person of faith, I happen to believe there are other positives too: a connection with the Divine, connection with intentional community, re-connection with a self that is lost within a sea of calendar appointments.

But if we find that Sunday morning is the only time that we have to ourselves, I don’t think church is the trouble.

To borrow an old cliche: are we living to work or working to live?  Are we taking time to examine our lives, or just gasping for breath between sprints?

I think there is a deep spiritual problem with a life that is so over-crowded that intentional community feels like another thing on the “to-do” list.

When done well, I think, intentional community gathered around the things of the Divine can be the generator that helps us tackle our to-do lists.

#1: “The trouble with church is that it just brainwashes you.  God isn’t real, anyway.”

Again, I usually hear this from people outside of a faith community.

Although, I do have to say that there are plenty of brainwashed people within the church who behave as if God isn’t real…

I think a typical reaction to a statement like this is one of defense.  I’ve heard many people, who truly care about another person who has this opinion, go into a litany of “proofs for God”, eventually collapsing in a fit of tears.

Because proofs for God are dead-ends, and nothing brings a person to tears with such intensity as the realization that your worldview isn’t shared by everyone…and that they may have some pretty good reasons for thinking the way they do, too.

Churches have a history of being, and many still are, places where brainwashing happens.  But so are movie theaters, concert arenas, political conventions, book clubs…the list is extensive.  Group think can happen anywhere if two or three are gathered, I guess.

Because of this, I think that this reason deserves some careful consideration by those Christians whose knee-jerk reaction would be to challenge it out of hand.

We don’t want to be places of brainwashing, do we?

Do we?

I hope and think the point of an intentionally community gathered around God would be to ask better questions: about life, existence, how scripture informs our days and weeks, about justice and the path of the Christ.

And I think that intentional communities like a church can be places that de-program cultural brainwashing when it challenges you not to live for greed, but to give of yourself for the life of others.  Or when it challenges a community to not seek glory, but rather stand with the oppressed.  I think our culture tries to brainwash us all the time with mixed signals that only confuse us: buy this, reject that; eat here, follow this diet plan; give money here, divest there.

In fact, I think that our culture tries to convince us that God is real, and that God is us.

But there is another way to live.  A way around shared experience, intentional Divine connection.  A way of song, prayer, meal.  A way where the reality of God isn’t always assumed, but arrived at through communal interaction where we find God most present.

After all, I can’t force somebody to see the reality of God anymore than I can force somebody to see that I love them.  It takes relationship to come to that realization…and relationships that are coerced, hampered by knee-jerk reactions or blind allegiance don’t often go very well.

The Church has a lot of trouble; that can’t be denied.  But I’m not sure it has to do with service style, age demographics, pastor efficiency, timing, or group think.

Those excuses play like a broken record.  I think that any church who listens to those excuses will never be able to move the needle and get on their way with mission.

I think most of the time the trouble with church starts with the individual who finds the problem.

Myself included.

And I know I need a community with an eye toward the sacred to help me dig that out.

“The Bible Is Not a Self-Help Book” or “Please Stop…”

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Rob Goodman recently wrote an excellent article critiquing Rick Warren, “Smiley” Osteen, and the like for their “self-help” theology.  The main instigation for the article was Rick Warren’s new “Daniel diet” based off of the Daniel story from the Older Testament.

Yeah, that guy who fell into the lion’s den.

Warren supposedly mined the depths of scripture to come up with this plan loosely taken from the section of Daniel where the book’s title character refuses to eat the king’s food in their place of captivity (thereby avoiding the appearance of consenting to the godless ways of his captors).

It’s a good story.  And it may actually hold some diet advice…for lions.

But, as Goodman points out, it’s a story about identity and resistance and trust.  Not about dieting.

So why is Warren using it as a diet guide?

Warren plays into what I think is one of the most dangerous trends in Christianity that has still, inexplicably, continued since the Enlightenment.

The Enlightenment did wonderful things for humanity in many ways.  It also has some negative consequences, one of the chief ones being that we now only see something as “truth” if it correlates to “fact.”

I’ll go out on a rhetorical limb here and say that the statement, ” ‘Truth’ and ‘fact’ are always synonymous,” is simply…not true.

But, in Warren’s view the two must be the same, which means that the Bible must be “fact” and the home of all fact, or else the authority of the Bible is laid to waste.  Basically, it’s a story of the Christian who rails against the Enlightenment because of what it has done to the authority of the religious community thereby perpetuating Enlightenment thinking by buying the primary premise.

Yeah, it’s that age-old story, that old chestnut, where, as Paul rightly says, someone (in this case Warren) “does not do what (they) want, and only does what (they) do not want to do.”

And so for Warren, the Bible is not only the authority on how the world was created (Genesis 1-2), why there are different languages (Genesis 11), what you should think about social issues (scan Leviticus and the Epistles and pick one), and how you should vote (wait…that’s not in there), it also must be the authority on everything else including dieting.*

Because if the Bible is reliable, it must be infallible and inerrant and the home and locus of all that is necessary for knowledge as a primary document.

And you spent your money on those Encyclopedia Britannica books…

I’ll cut right to the chase: the Bible wasn’t written to give you a diet plan, to save your marriage, or to help you make money.  In fact, if you go to certain places of scripture you might find that you’re given permission to eat anything (Acts 10), or that you can hate your family (Luke 14), or that God intends for you to be penniless and poor (Matthew 19).

Like that advice?  It’s probably not good for the purposes that I intended to use it for.  But it has about as much merit as the basis for Warren’s diet plan.

That little move, where you take a section of Scripture and use it to proof-text a point or position is actually just taking it out of context.  It’s a popular move, to be sure.  I mean, what adds weight to a cause more than the very voice of God?!

But it’s not honest.  And, dare I say, it might be breaking the second Commandment (from the Protestant Decalogue).  “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain,” has little to do with cursing (although, from a previous post you’d think that that’s all it means).

It actually means that you shouldn’t take God’s name “uselessly.”  You shouldn’t associate God with things that God has no association with.  And so, if you believe that the Bible was more dictation than experiential writing, or if you think the infallibility and inerrancy of the text come from the very will of the Divine, I’d tremble in my boots before I use the Bible as back-up to most anything, let alone a diet plan.

I tremble doing it myself, and I don’t think the Bible is inerrant and infallible!

I tremble because, well, scripture is important to me.  It is sacred.  And as something sacred I hate seeing it belittled to the point of Jenny Craig and Seattle Sutton.

I do think that what we eat and how we care for our bodies is important, and Godly work, and I believe it can say something about our core convictions (hence why Chick-fil-a won’t be getting a dime from this pastor’s pocket anymore).

There are times when I can get insight into an issue from the Bible.  Many a sermon is based on this.  But that’s taking the Bible into my context.  Warren, and those who routinely do this, mistakenly assumes the Biblical context is this context.

Suffice to say, I don’t think the Bible has a diet plan for me.  And I don’t think it has a plan to get me rich.  And I don’t think it has a plan to get me buff (Sampson comes to mind here…and I can’t grow much hair on my head).  And I certainly don’t think that Solomon is a good example of a successful marriage.

The Bible doesn’t do that.

I do think it contains stories of people who have had experiences with God powerful enough to talk about them.  I think it contains glimpses of my faith heritage.  And I think it contains the best, most beautifully engaging story I’ve ever read in the person of Jesus.  I think it’s instructive for devotion and faith.

Really, the only thing close to a diet plan I hear from the scriptures is from the book of  John in chapter 6 where the Gospel writer has Jesus talking about him being the “true bread from heaven” that the world lives on.

But, as a Christian who takes Scripture seriously, I’m entreating the Christian world to stop with this nonsense of looking to the Bible like one might look to an encyclopedia.

The Bible wasn’t written to be your self-help book.

But, it does have beautiful stories, letters, poetry, and history that just may change your life.  So please, do help yourself to it.

*If, perhaps, Warren does not believe that the Bible holds dieting advice, but is just using it as a basis to help sell the product, that would be the definition of the word “despicable.”