Category Archives: christianity

Economics, Nationalism, and Justice

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Glenn Beck of FoxNews and Jim Wallis of Sojourners have been in a battle of words of late. This is a recent post from Sojourners responding to another rant by Best, “We Won’t Back Down from Beck.”

The controversy has even made the Daily Show and the Cobert Report. Glenn Beck, on his FoxNews program and his syndicated radio show, over the last several months has taken to trash talk about any religious institution or leader that advocates for “social justice.”  He recommended that anyone who attends a church that talks about social justice needs to leave that church right away.  Of course, even his church (he is Mormon) has publicly stated that Beck does not reflect the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints position on justice.  Yet, he continues on.

All economic systems in this world come from theories of Man.  They all look good on paper, but on the group, well, not so good.  They all fail at one point or another.  When Christians decide that God sanctions one or another of these Systems of Man and demand that all others are therefore ungodly or evil, we get ourselves into all kinds of trouble. Wars, rumors of wars, greed, hording, violence, retribution, ad nauseum, result, despite that each of the Systems during certain periods of time and under certain conditions might actually be the best System to benefit the most people. We tend to attribute to God what fallible people create, and that never ends well.

So, when a Christian-Liberationists demand Socialism or Prosperity-Gospel people demand a form of Laisse-faire Capitalism (and I don’t think Wallis or Beck go to either of these extremes), we are off track.  When someone like Beck demonizes religious institutions and leaders who advocate for justice, he is off track.

What does God require of us, really?  Micah 6:8 gives us a clue:

He has showed you, O man, what is good.
       And what does the LORD require of you?
       To act justly and to love mercy
       and to walk humbly with your God.

I think somewhere in there is a call for Christians to be concerned about justice issues, but that does not mean that we equate an economic or social system devised by Man with God’s will.  The approach we take being in the Kingdom of God is different.  What does Jesus call us to?  Jesus’ call goes something like this (Matthew 22:36-40):

Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” Jesus replied: ” ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

We can believe in Socialism or Capitalism, we can be a liberal or conservative – I don’t care what.  What I care about is whether I and all of us who claim Christ love God, love our neighbor (even our enemy), do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with our God.

Differences

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So, I’m attending the Episcopal Village East (EVE) conference in Baltimore.  I attended the TransFORM East Coast conference in May. I said to a few people as I left Brooklyn that I wanted to see how the two conferences compared with each other.  Here is a first observation: People at TransFORM where tweeting and blogging all through the conference – and it was encouraged by the leadership – while at the first pre-conference session for EVE everyone was writing with pens and pencils on notebook paper.

The people at TransFORM, which describes itself as a “missional community formation network,” seemed to be people of and ensconced in the communities they are trying to reach. The people at this EVE session seem to be those who are trying to learn about the same demographic group of people, but are not of them. Does that make sense?

It is terribly difficult and takes an immense amount of energy to try to understand the constitutional make-up of a different group of people.

On Social Media!

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On Social Media. This is the reality, where are we as the Church in the mix? Do we understand (I mean honesty, really understand) the fundamental shift that is happening and the right and good role the Church can play in both the digital and tactile worlds? For the Cure of Souls? For peace? For an alternative?  How can we be the imago Dei among all of this?

How it’s done!

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stthomas-250.jpgFrom this month’s issue of the Living Church, an article on St. Thomas the Apostle Church in Hollywood, CA.  As the article says, the only Anglo-Catholic parish in Los Angeles.  The article, “Apolitical Inclusion at St. Thomas the Apostle, Hollywood, CA“

In terms of reviving a parish in the Anglo-Catholic tradition (and I simply love the “apolitical inclusion” bit), a couple paragraphs from the article:

“The Rector, The Rev. Elliott Davies, restored the altar to an eastward facing position and celebrates Mass with his back to the congregation in lieu of ‘the bartending position.'”  I love that – “the bartending position.” Continuing, “Ensign recalls UCLA students fascinated by the celebration [Gregorian chant, lots of incenses, etc.]  – as opposed to ‘that old hippy crap our parents like.'”  Out of the mouths of babes. And, continuing, “‘One guy had never seen a pipe organ,’ Ensign said. ‘For us baby boomers what was so meaningful, relevant, and rebellious is so old hat. What’s old is new again.’” [emphasis mine]

“St. Thomas has a tradition of social activism in the surrounding area, including among the homeless in Hollywood and gay and lesbian residents in West Hollywood… But Proposition 8 [California’s marriage amendment] has never been preached about,’ Ensign said. ‘Preaching is always gospel-centered and Scripture-based.  We’re here to worship Almighty God.  If you want to be political, join a political group.'” Did we hear this!  In the Anglo-Catholic tradition of social activism, the parish tends to the needs of those disadvantaged and marginalized, yet they recognize that their focus is to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ and to worship Almighty God, not to be a political action committee or a social service organization.  The Good Works happen because the people are taught to love neighbor as the love themselves, but tend to their relationship with God first.

“‘I got suckered in by Fr. Carroll Barbour,’ Ensign admitted.  ‘Urban legend goes: in the early 1980’s St. Thomas was downgraded to mission status.  The bishop called Fr. Barbour in – then in his late 50s, and serving in Long Beach, with a checkered past, a history of alcoholism – and said, basically, it was make or break for both.’

“‘He took the parish Anglo-Catholic in theology, teaching, and ritual, and threw the doors wide open,’ Ensign said. ‘He held his ground when parishioners left, then went to work.  There was little money, no answering machine, let alone a secretary.  No organ, no choir.  Just a mock English gothic building in a so-so location.’

“‘He was a little guy from North Carolina; a real jackass,’ Ensign said. ‘But he was no-nonsense, and a real priest.  Not a social worker, or politician; always humble by the altar.  The priesthood was most important in his life.’
“‘He was a broken man.  He often said, ‘God loves broken things. We break bread, and broken people are ready to listen,’ Ensign recalled.'”

Making Decisions in the Church

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Over the last few decades, within the institutional Church (and my Church, The Episcopal Church), the way we as the Church have made decisions about our beliefs, our advocacy, and our governance has become increasing influenced by the prevailing sociopolitical cultural patterns.  The result has been an increasing dependence on arguments resting squarely within a secular, psycho-therapeutic, and civil-rights based ethos, rather than by the means given to us in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  I know this is really nothing new, but the extent to which this now occurs within both the conservative and liberal Church structures has overwhelmed even our conceptions of what the Gospel compels us to do. 

By being so overwhelmed with secular, sociopolitical ideologies, we have lost our ability to present to the world a different way being together, of resolving conflict, and of making decisions for the common good.  We within the Church alienate and marginalize like the best of them, even as we declare, at least on the surface, that we are all about inclusion and welcome and the common good.  Do people seeking a different way find anything worth considering in the Church, today?

When I hear that the Church should do this or that or be engaged in one thing or another, too often the reasons given sound more like justifications devised by social-justice organizations, overly sensitive psychotherapists, or political action committees rather than from a body of people who place at their center the commands of Jesus.  The central characteristic of all decision-making within the Church should rest squarely, and in most cases exclusively, on the two great commands of Jesus:  1). Love God with all of your being; and 2). Love your neighbor as yourself.  Both 1 & 2 must be emphasized, because #2 is not possible in and of our human selves without #1.  For a long while now, and I can only guess due to an overactive need for affirmation by the secular culture, we have moved increasingly along a trajectory that tries to relativize or relegate #1.  This doesn’t work, and over time experience has proven that it does not.

For example, it seems that in our fighting against injustice, the way we conduct ourselves is justified by Latin American infused Liberation Theology, which is based more on Marxist ideology than on Jesus’ command to love our neighbor (at least as it is worked out on the ground).  Loving one’s neighbor requires us to put our lives on the line for the person subjected to the injustice, but the reason is not for political liberation within a geopolitical state.  On the other side, when we suggest that something like free-market Capitalism should be championed by Christians, because of the belief that the State should stay out of the affairs of individual citizens (in this case, expressed in the economic enterprise), we more often than not base the arguments on such things as personal greed, materialism, or consumerism rather than a desire for the betterment of both the common and the individual good – as well as for the benefit of our competitors.

When we argue for emigrant reform, when we argue for full inclusion of gay people, when we argue for strengthening and sustaining the family, when we champion sustainable agriculture, when we advocate for low-wage earners, as we champion individual freedom and individual responsibility, as we campaign against hatred, prejudice, and bigotry, when we call for reform of any kind, as Christians the only foundation upon which all these arguments or positions should be based is upon those two great commandments.  Social-action groups make their arguments based on individual “civil-rights” language and concepts.  Arguments based on individual civil-rights are not the arguments of the Church. They automatically lead to alienation and tend to not change the hearts and minds of opponents. The Church works to change hearts and minds, not to enact or enforce a myopic and often trendy political-correctness.  Loving one’s neighbor as one loves him or her self is upon what we base our positions, our arguments, and our advocacy.

In the Church, if I use civil-rights based arguments that a woman or a gay person has the “right” to be a deacon, priest or bishop, I have already lost the case with regard to the Gospel.  I have already alienated and marginalized groups of people with whom I disagree.  No one has the “right” to be a bishop, priest, or deacon – not matter what gender, ethnicity, sexual-orientation, race, etc.  “Rights” based language does not change hearts and minds and does not preserve unity.  There are losers and winners – or rather, there are just another and different a set of losers and winners.

I am not suggesting a mushy sentimentality when I speak of loving one’s neighbor.  It is very, very difficult to love an opponent, even more so an enemy.  No matter what decisions or statements we make, some people will be put-off or offended.  We cannot always help how others will respond, but we can help how we act, respond, and react. To abide within the two great commands of Jesus necessitates humility, a willingness to understand the other side of issues and arguments, and the willingness to compromise when needed for the benefit of all, and even for the other.  We can be strong and vigorous in our advocacy, championing of things, and in our arguments – no need to be a welcome mat – yet our concern is always for the betterment of not only the ones or the issues we support, but for our opponents as well.  We, those who call upon the name of Christ, should consider the wellbeing of the other before we consider ourselves.

Philippians 2:1-16

If you’ve gotten anything at all out of following Christ, if his love has made any difference in your life, if being in a community of the Spirit means anything to you, if you have a heart, if you care– then do me a favor: Agree with each other, love each other, be deep-spirited friends. Don’t push your way to the front; don’t sweet-talk your way to the top. Put yourself aside, and help others get ahead. Don’t be obsessed with getting your own advantage. Forget yourselves long enough to lend a helping hand.

Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself. He had equal status with God but didn’t think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Not at all. When the time came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human! Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly humbling process. He didn’t claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death–and the worst kind of death at that–a crucifixion.

Because of that obedience, God lifted him high and honored him far beyond anyone or anything, ever, so that all created beings in heaven and on earth–even those long ago dead and buried–will bow in worship before this Jesus Christ, and call out in praise that he is the Master of all, to the glorious honor of God the Father.

What I’m getting at, friends, is that you should simply keep on doing what you’ve done from the beginning. When I was living among you, you lived in responsive obedience. Now that I’m separated from you, keep it up. Better yet, redouble your efforts. Be energetic in your life of salvation, reverent and sensitive before God. That energy is God’s energy, an energy deep within you, God himself willing and working at what will give him the most pleasure.

Do everything readily and cheerfully–no bickering, no second-guessing allowed! Go out into the world uncorrupted, a breath of fresh air in this squalid and polluted society. Provide people with a glimpse of good living and of the living God. Carry the light-giving Message into the night so I’ll have good cause to be proud of you on the day that Christ returns. You’ll be living proof th
at I didn’t go to all this work for nothing.

Millennial Generation (that’s ‘Y’ to you)

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Here is a pertinent paragraph from the Wikipedia entry for “Millennial Generation.”  This observation/assertion is that the Millennial’s generational thinking and attitude and ascetics that run quite counter to the whole counterculture and anti-establishment nature of the Baby Boomers. 

For the Church, this means that those who are still convinced that to save the Church is to get rid of everything that was (standard theology, doctrine, traditional architecture or music or language or liturgies and on and on) are now acting not for the future welfare of the Church, but for the perpetuation of their generational ideology.  My experience with younger people suggests that even things like “inclusive language” is passe – particularly among the women.   When we think about how to form or re-form the emphases or methodologies of the Church for future generations, we must do our best to truly understand emerging generations.  If not, we will once again “miss the boat.”  We’ve missed the boat so often… 

Here is the paragraph:

In some ways, the Millennials have become seen as the ultimate rejection
of the counterculture that began in the 1960s and
persisted in the subsequent decades through the 1990s.[62][63]
This is further documented in Strauss & Howe’s book titled Millennials
Rising: The Next Great Generation, which describes the Millennial
generation as “civic minded,” rejecting the attitudes of the Baby Boomers and Generation X.[64]
Kurt Andersen, the prize-winning contributor to Vanity Fair writes in his book Reset:
How This Crisis Can Restore Our Values and Renew America that many
among the Millennial Generation view the 2008 election of Barack
Obama as uniquely theirs and describes this generational consensus
building as being more healthy and useful than the counterculture
protests of the late 1960s and early 1970s, going as far to say that if
Millennials can “keep their sense of entitlement in check, they might
just turn out to be the next Greatest Generation.”[65]
However, due to the global
financial crisis of 2008-2009, at least one journalist has
expressed fears of permanently losing a substantial amount of Generation
Y’s earning potential.[66]

The American Church

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“We shouldn’t reconstruct the Christian faith into an advancement of the American way of life, which I feel is the great sin of the American church today.” –Gordon Fee (Professor Emeritus, Regent College, Vancouver) [source]

I remember listening to Gordon Fee during a Chi Alpha Fellowship retreat years ago when I was working in campus ministry.  Frankly, I don’t remember anything he said, but we all liked his book.

This quote is very timely.  I concur with Fee concerning the idea
that the American church of both the religious right and the religious
left has allowed itself (themselves) to be co-opted by American
socio-political systems and agendas. This has produced an institutional
church that to the general public, particularly among younger
generations, looks more like the crass American political system rather
than the “love your neighbor as yourself” ideal of Christianity – at
least as Jesus summed up in his two great commandments.  This has also
produced a deficient Christian experience in this country among too many
adherents.

We cease to be the imago Dei (the image of God) within our
surrounding society when we allow ourselves to be so diminished and
corrupted.  We experience a deficient form of the life in Christ when we
do so.  The question may well be:

When are we, individually and in the aggregate, going to reclaim the
relational experience promised by the texts of the Christian faith so
that we are re-formed in humility into to the imago Dei in order to be a
compelling witness of an alternative for the people we encounter
everyday?

Christianity = Truth? Really?

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Isn’t it true that Christians are supposed to seek truth?  That means that seeking truth
must be independent of what makes us feel good, or makes us feel secure,
or superior, or valued, or respected, or accepted, or included, or
anything else, frankly.  If we seek truth, truth must rule the day, else our lives are a lie.

The Perils of “Wannabe Cool’ Christianity

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Like most of our culture these days, Christianity in the U.S. is undergoing a great deal of change.  There is a lot of angst around the changes within our culture and society that show that we are no longer a predominately Christian nation (implicitly or explicitly).  In addition, our current church culture caters to a philosophical and theological perspective that proving itself to not be very popular among emerging generations.

This article from the Wall Street Journal, entitled “The Perils of ‘Wannabe Cool’ Christianity‘, touches on some of the machinations going on within the Christianity right now in order to try to be “relevant” with changing culture and young people.  As the author concludes, this jump to trendiness and shock value will probably not work for much longer.

From the article:

Statistics like these have created something of a mania in recent years, as baby-boomer evangelical leaders frantically assess what they have done wrong (why didn’t megachurches work to attract youth in the long term?) and scramble to figure out a plan to keep young members engaged in the life of the church.

Increasingly, the “plan” has taken the form of a total image overhaul, where efforts are made to rebrand Christianity as hip, countercultural, relevant. As a result, in the early 2000s, we got something called “the emerging church”–a sort of postmodern stab at an evangelical reform movement. Perhaps because it was too “let’s rethink everything” radical, it fizzled quickly. But the impulse behind it–to rehabilitate Christianity’s image and make it “cool”–remains.

and the conclusion:

If the evangelical Christian leadership thinks that “cool Christianity” is a sustainable path forward, they are severely mistaken. As a twentysomething, I can say with confidence that when it comes to church, we don’t want cool as much as we want real.

If we are interested in Christianity in any sort of serious way, it is not because it’s easy or trendy or popular. It’s because Jesus himself is appealing, and what he says rings true. It’s because the world we inhabit is utterly phony, ephemeral, narcissistic, image-obsessed and sex-drenched–and we want an alternative. It’s not because we want more of the same.

Read the whole article!

The Imago Dei Initiative doesn’t seek to employ trendy artifacts that become so 5-minutes ago in 2 minutes flat, but seek to understand and receive the enduring, ancient Faith experienced in new ways.  We seek to understand and experience the enduring faith and learn how to pass it on.  We seek to find simply ways of living the profound Faith in ways that get to the heart of the longings of emerging generations in every changing contexts.

This is your brain on iPad

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ere is an interesting article from the New York Times.  Entitled, Digital Devices Deprive Brain of Needed Downtime, the article describes findings concerning the affect of digital technology and its constant use on the brain, particularly on the brain’s ability to actually learn, to form permanent memories, to synthesis what has been inputted previously, and to be creative.  Devises like the Blackberry, iPhone, iPad – the entire digitial cornucopia – are used to fill up even small amounts of downtime. Our purpensity to not simple be is a real hindrance to our own well being, it seems.  We are coming to the point where we allow no downtime, no time to “clear our heads,” and we are robbing ourselves of simple rest. Perhaps we are even hindering our own ability to effectively learn. 

What does this do to feelings of tranquility, our ability to not be bored, or our ability to actually engage with people in ways that are deeper than relational “sound-bites”?

“Almost certainly, downtime lets the brain go over experiences it’s
had, solidify them and turn them into permanent long-term memories,”
said Loren Frank, assistant professor in the department of physiology at
the university, where he specializes in learning and memory. He said he
believed that when the brain was constantly stimulated, “you prevent
this learning process.”

HANNOVER, GERMANY - MARCH 02: A man, wearing ...

Image by Getty Images via @daylife


At the University of Michigan,
a study found that people learned significantly better after a walk in
nature than after a walk in a dense urban environment, suggesting that
processing a barrage of information leaves people fatigued.

I’ve often thought that a growing and now significant hindrance to our faith and relationship not only with God but with one another revolves around our inability to be still, quiet, alone with our own thoughts, and simply be with someone without the need to be entertained or occupied. 

A strategic triumph of the Enemy of our Faith is to so distract us that we no longer give time to sit quietly with God, to study the contemplate the Word of God, or meditate on what it all means for life and love.  We cannot know God without being still, but if we are so conditioned and culturally malformed to avoid those times of stillness and quiet, we will never know the depth of relationship that is possible with God.  We will not know the depth of relationship that is possible with one another, but rather we allow ourselves to be conditioned for the superficial and the temporary.

We in the Church will need to be intentional and determined to give ourselves to periods of downtime, quiet, and stillness.  We, as followers of the Christ, will need to be examples to a world that will grow weary of this form of life.  When people begin looking for an alternative, will they see examples of a way of life that doesn’t shun technology but also is able to singularly focus for a lengthy period of time on the person sitting across from us, a life that is content and at peace without distraction?  What will be the witness of the Church?  Will people see the imago of God and an image of life that is substantially different and compelling for a good alternative, or will be look just like everyone else? 

This will be a coming mission of the Church – to reintroduce to the human experience, in the U.S. at least, examples of real, tactile relationships, a peace that comes from within and not determined by outside circumstances or influences, creativity, and a whole list of other things.  This is a common proclivity to the human experience from time beginning – we do harm to ourselves.