Who Fits Who Into What Now?

I did some kids' homework for them today. One of my co-workers has two children, a daughter who is 11 and a son who is 12, who go to a Lutheran school. Recently I have been entertained/troubled by some of her school stories. Especially one, that is so ironic it's ridiculous, about her son being accused of plagiarizing a poem he wrote on trust. Her disapproving letter to the teacher and principal that soon followed has led to some serious tension. Then, today, she informed me that her students had to finish a major science project by writing a conclusion that explains "how God fits into their findings." I offered my political pastoral skills, telling her that I could smooth things over for her, even the plagiarism issue, if she would let me do her kids assignment, squeezing God into their project somehow. The following is what I gave her. She says she's going to turn it in.

Of course God has something to do with all of this. God is the Creator of all things right? The phenomena I have observed in my experiments would not have happened if God had not established and sustained the created order. The very elements themselves would cease to even exist if God stopped graciously granting them existence. Be they a block of wood or a grain of salt, they only are because God allows them to be. Furthermore, I believe, no, correction, I know it to be true that neither I, nor you, nor any scientist with multiple doctorate degrees, is capable of properly interpreting these observations I have noted if they do not understand everything involved not as autonomous entities, but as created realities. They (not even the afore mentioned grain of salt) do not exist in and of themselves as a part of some independent secular realm evacuated by God. They only truly exist as they participate in their Creator.

What we really have here is a question of ontology. And I believe that a faulty ontology is the groundwork for the requiring of these paragraphs as a part of this assignment. An ontology that finds its roots in Scotus and Descartes, not in God. In the human mind alone, not in the true Faith that illuminates the human mind.

This ontology has caused you to fear the very science you love. You are afraid that science, if it continues unchecked in the apostate direction it has been heading, will succeed in pushing the God you love into a sphere of primitive susperstition. And this assignment is the best you can come up with to keep the younger generations from sacrificing the Faith on the altar of science.

You probably do not know where this is coming from. You might find these accusations unfounded. Well, here is my foundation: Your underlying ontology is betrayed in your instructions. You said, "Then, in a few short paragraphs, explain how God fits into your findings," instead of saying, "Then, in a few short paragraphs, explain how your findings fit into God." Who can compress God and fit the Creator of the universe into anything? If this is my assignment, I admit defeat.

Reason and faith are not mutually exclusive. Therefore I do not buy into the system, so prevalent even within "conservative" Protestant circles, that allows science as pursued as a secular endeavor to dictate what is real and true and then attempts to corroborate faith with science's findings. This inevitably leads to fundamental shifts that morph true Christianity into a sad (though all too convincing) parody. Of course God has something to do with my science experiment. God has everything to do with it. God has everything to do with everything. My question for you, and I am sure there is a good answer somewhere, is: "What does my science project have to do with God?"

She's checking out a pretty decent charter school.

Five Albums To Listen To In The Dark

Do This! And when you have to time to give the whole album a hearing.

1) John Coltrane - A Love Supreme. Careful, or it might usher you into a form of worship.




2) Meshuggah - I (EP). Just don't call me if you suffer ensuing night terrors.




3) Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. It might take you deep enough to learn something about yourself.




4) Radiohead - Kid A. Ever wish you were somewhere else? Perhaps a paranoid "safety" bunker with your family during war time? I hope not. But it would probably do us a lot of good if more people felt at least a little of what it must be like.




5) Melvins - King Buzzo (EP). Let the repetition drive you insane (in a good way) as you begin to hear things you missed the first 60 times the drum riff assulted you... and then wonder if what you hear is really there. Plus there is a nice suprise guest on the last track.

Remember That You Are Dust, And To Dust You Shall Return

Last night I presided over the first Ash Wednesday service my church has ever done. It was quite a humbling experience; throughout the whole service my sins were exposed. Not just brought to mind, but exposed. Like the way the first sentence of this blog exposes the arrogance that motivated it (I wanted you all to know, or at least sense, that I was the one who proposed and pushed for the observance of Ash Wednesday. To know that I know my Christian Tradition). Last night I was repeatedly shown ways that, as a minister, I attempt¹ to take the work of the Holy Spirit into my own hands and desire, at least some, recognition. My posture, tone of voice, and thoughts (though internal, they are not private; thus in and through them God exposed my sinfulness) all betrayed my pride. Maybe not to all, but it really does not change my soul's standing before God if my students or volunteer staff are fooled.

It must sound strange for a sanctified Nazarene pastor to be talking about his sin. But it should not be. Truthfully, I believe that when we are sanctified, or, as we are being sanctified², confession becomes more and more a part of our lives. This is because as we mature in the faith our sin tends to become less visible. So we do not outgrow confession, but learn more and more how central it is to our sanctification. God uses it to draw deeper, more subtle, and more fundamental sin out of the shadowy recesses and into the purifying light. It is grace, by this means like a beautiful puss that pushes the splinter to the surface so that it can be shown for what it is and extracted.

Last night will stick with me. It was one of those moments that was consumed by what is real. There is nothing false about a convicted sinner, who often sins because he forgets how short and precious life truly is and from whence it comes, with ash on his forehead, marking his fellow penitents (one of whom happened to be his sister) with the cross and urging them to "remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return." So it will not fade into the past but will always be present as I move into the future.



¹I originally typed this word in the past tense. I guess my purification was not completed at the close of last night's service.

²They are the same thing. So really, this sentence is redundant. I emphasized the "are being" because that is part we Nazarenes tend to overlook or de-emphasize in our own spiritual journey.

"I Think I Got 'Em Harry!"

So our Vice-President had a little mishap and shot a 78 year-old man. In the face.

Wow. This is fodder for so much comedy. I do not forsee "our Vice-President shot a man in the face" jokes getting unfunny any time soon. Unless the guy dies, but that does not seem likely. So, here are some of the good gunslinging VP jokes I've seen/heard during the last few days. Let's all take a minute to a month or so to laugh at our VP.

(The first bit from the Daily Show has also been posted by both Charlie and Eric, because it is that funny.)

From "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart"

Jon Stewart: "I'm joined now by our own vice-presidential firearms mishap analyst, Rob Corddry. Rob, obviously a very unfortunate situation. How is the vice president handling it?

Rob Corddry: "Jon, tonight the vice president is standing by his decision to shoot Harry Wittington. According to the best intelligence available, there were quail hidden in the brush. Everyone believed at the time there were quail in the brush.

"And while the quail turned out to be a 78-year-old man, even knowing that today, Mr. Cheney insists he still would have shot Mr. Whittington in the face. He believes the world is a better place for his spreading buckshot throughout the entire region of Mr. Whittington's face."

Jon Stewart: "But why, Rob? If he had known Mr. Whittington was not a bird, why would he still have shot him?"

Rob Corddry: "Jon, in a post-9-11 world, the American people expect their leaders to be decisive. To not have shot his friend in the face would have sent a message to the quail that America is weak."

Jon Stewart: "That's horrible."

Rob Corddry: "Look, the mere fact that we're even talking about how the vice president drives up with his rich friends in cars to shoot farm-raised wingless quail-tards is letting the quail know 'how' we're hunting them. I'm sure right now those birds are laughing at us in that little 'covey' of theirs.

Jon Stewart: "I'm not sure birds can laugh, Rob."

Rob Corddry: "Well, whatever it is they do … coo .. they're cooing at us right now, Jon, because here we are talking openly about our plans to hunt them. Jig is up. Quails one, America zero.

Jon Stewart: "Okay, well, on a purely human level, is the vice president at least sorry?"

Rob Corddry: "Jon, what difference does it make? The bullets are already in this man's face. Let's move forward across party lines as a people … to get him some sort of mask."

* * *
Jon Stewart: "Yes, as you've just heard, a near-tragedy over the weekend in south Texas. Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot a man during a quail hunt at a political supporter's ranch. Making 78-year-old Harry Whittington the first person shot by a sitting VP since Alexander Hamilton.

"Hamilton, of course, shot in a duel with Aaron Burr over issues of honor, integrity and political maneuvering. Whittington? Mistaken for a bird.

* * *
The other player in the drama? Ranch owner and eyewitness Katharine Armstrong.

Katharine Armstrong: "We were shooting a covey of quail. The vice president and two others got out of the car to walk up the covey."

Jon Stewart: "What kind of hunting story begins with getting out of your car? As I sighted the great beast before us, my shaking hands could barely engage the parking brake. Slowly, I turned off the A/C and silenced my sub-woofers…"

* * *
Katharine Armstrong: "A bird flushed. The vice president took aim at the bird and shot and unfortunately, Mr. Whittington was in the line of fire and got peppered pretty well."

Jon Stewart: "Peppered. There you have it. Harry Whittington, seasoned to within an inch of his life.

* * *
Letterman: "Good news ladies and gentleman, we have finally located weapons of mass destruction … It's Dick Cheney."

* * *
"We can't get Bin Laden, but we nailed a 78-year-old attorney."

* * *
"The guy who got gunned down is a Republican lawyer and a big Republican donor and fortunately the buck shot was deflected by wads of laundered cash. So he's fine. He took a little in the wallet."

* * *
From "Cheney's Excuses," Monday night's Top 10 list on Letterman: "I thought the guy was trying to go gay cowboy on me."

* * *
Jimmy Kimmel: "It's part of the president's new Social Security plan. Once you hit 78, kablamo."

* * *
"Luckily, the guy he shot was wearing the body armor that never got shipped to the troops."

* * *
Leno: "Although it is beautiful here in California, the weather back East has been atrocious. There was so much snow in Washington, D.C. Dick Cheney accidentally shot a fat guy thinking it was a polar bear."

* * *
"When people found out he shot a lawyer his popularity is now at 92%"

* * *
"After he shot the guy, he screamed, 'Anyone else want to call domestic wire tapping illegal?' "

* * *
"Something I just found out today about the incident. Do you know that Dick Cheney tortured the guy for a half hour before he shot him?"

Some Wilde Quotes

I would like to thank my friend Jarrod Taylor for suggesting that I begin to read Oscar Wilde. I have only skimmed a compilation of what Oxford considers to be his greatest works and done a short online search, but have already come across a number of great quotes, a testament to his genius. Anyone who has coined as many catch phrases and what have become almost cliches has some serious business going on upstairs. Here are a handful of my favorites so far. If you have some others, let me know. I'm all over this kind of junk.

"Behind joy and laughter there may be a temperament, coarse, hard, and callous. But behind sorrow there is always sorrow. Pain, unlike pleasure, wears no mask.."

"...sorrow is the most sensitive of all created things...It
is a wound that bleeds when any hand but that of love touches it,
and even then must bleed again, though not in pain."

"Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not the sitter."

"Morality, like art, means drawing a line someplace."

"...every little action of the common day makes or unmakes character, and...therefore what one has done in the secret chamber one has some day
to cry aloud on the housetop."

"America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between."

"Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months."

"Genius is born--not paid."

"Biography lends to death a new terror."

"Most modern calendars mar the sweet simplicity of our lives by reminding us that each day that passes is the anniversary of some perfectly uninteresting event."
(Italics mine.)

"We're all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."

Children Obey Your Parents

I am currently sitting at my desk at my second job (Ministry doesn't often pay the bills) and am about to go insane with boredom. Things are so slow here that my co-workers and I have spent the last five hours killing time on the internet. I would like to share with you a little treasure I found during this time. It's a poem. It's a really bad poem. I left all the spelling and grammar errors alone. They're part of the fun. Here it is. (Seriously, it's abysmal)

Jenny was so happy about the house they had found.
For once in her life it was on the right side of town.
She unpacked her things with such great ease.
As she watched her new curtains blow in breeze.

How wonderful it was to have her own room.
School would be starting, she'd have friends over soon.
There'd be sleep-overs, and parties; she was so happy
It's just the way she wanted her life to be.

On the first day of school, everything went great.
She made new friends and even got a date!
She thought, "I want to be popular and I'm going to be,
Because I just got a date with the star of the team!"

To be known in this school you had to have a clout,
And dating this guy would sure help her out.
There was only one problem stopping her fate.
Her parents had said she was too young to date.

"Well, I just won't tell them the entire truth.
They won't know the difference; what's there to lose?"
Jenny asked to stay with her friends that night.
Her parents frowned but said, "All right."

Excited, she got ready for the big event
But as she rushed around like she had no sense,
She began to feel guilty about all the lies,
But what's a pizza, a party, and moonlight ride?

Well, the pizza was good, and the party was great,
But the moonlight ride would have to wait.
For Jeff was half drunk by this time.
But he kissed her and said that he was just fine.

Then the room filled with smoke and Jeff took a puff.
Jenny couldn't believe he was smoking that stuff.
Now Jeff was ready to ride to the point
But only after he'd smoked another joint.

They jumped in the car for a moonlight ride,
Not thinking that he was too drunk to drive.
They finally made it to the point at last,
And Jeff started trying to make a pass.

A pass is not what jenny wanted at all
(and by a pass, I don't mean playing football).
"Perhaps my parents were right ... maybe I am too young.
Boy, how could I ever, ever be so dumb.

With all her might, she pushed Jeff say away:
"Please take me home, I don't want to stay."
Jeff cranked up the engine and floored the gas.
In a matter of seconds they were going too fast.

As Jeff drove on in a fit of wild anger,
Jenny knew that her life was in danger.
She begged and pleaded for him to slow down,
But he just got faster as they neared the town.

"Just let me go home! I'll confess that I lied.
I really went out for a moonlight ride."
Then all of a sudden, she saw a big flash.
"Oh God, Please help us! We're going to crash!"

She doesn't remember the force of the impact.
Just that everything all of a sudden went black.
She felt someone remove her from the twisted rubble,
And heard, " Call an ambulance! There kids are in trouble!"

Voices she heard.... A few words at best.
But she knew there were two cars involved in the wreck.
Then wondered to herself if Jeff was all right,
And if the people in the other car were alive.

She awoke in the hospital to faces so sad.
"You've been in a wreck and it looks pretty bad."
These voices echoed inside her head,
As they gently told her that Jeff was dead.

They said "Jenny, we've done all we can do.
But it looks as if we'll lose you too."
"But the people in the other car?" Jenny cried.
"We're sorry, Jenny, they also died."

Jenny prayed, "God, forgive me for what I've done
I only wanted to have just one night of fun."
"Tell those people's family, I've made their lives dim,
And wish I could return their families to them."

"Tell Mom and Dad I'm sorry I lied,
And that it's my fault so many have died.
Oh, nurse, won't you please tell them that for me?
The nurse just stood there — she never agreed.

But took Jenny's hand with tears in her eyes.
And a few moments later Jenny died.
A man asked the nurse, " Why didn't you do your best
To bid that girl her one last request?"

She looked at the man
with eyes so sad.
"Because the people in the other car
were her Mom and Dad."

I laughed out loud and gagged simultaneously upon reading the ending. I think I will share this with my youth group next Wednesday.

"So children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right -"

"Yeah, because it's the first commandment with a promise."

"Good. You know what that promise is?"

"What?"

"If you don't you will murder them and then die slowly."

"Oh."

"Now go in peace to serve our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ."

Cherishing The Moments That Are Absorbed By What Is Real

I just finished watching Grizzly Man by Werner Herzog. It's a profound documentary about Timothy Treadwell, a man who's desire to make peace with his own soul and find a place to belong led him to live with grizzly bears in Alaska for 13 summers. Why did he stop at the unlucky number 13? He didn't really have a choice. He definitely would have spent more summers there, but at the end of the 13th, one of the bears ate him.

What makes this film brilliant and so beautifully haunting is the honesty humanity with which it deals with such a difficult protagonist. Herzog does not begin to attempt to make Treadwell a black and white hero. The film shows his life to be a messy one. Treadwell ended up going insane, and Herzog does not try to pretty this up. Neither does he exploit it by turning him into a two dimensional crazy person for comic effect or added eerieness. Herzog doesn't even romanticize Treadwell's love for nature. Where in nature Treadwell claimed to have found love, perfection and oneness, Herzog, in a voice over of a close-up of a grizzly's face, confesses to seeing only "the overwhelming indifference of nature." (Which seems to be the interpretation supported by at least one of the bears whom Treadwell served for 13 summers.) What Herzog does is show a man going to extremes to try and find something worth living for.

Treadwell found it increasingly difficult to see anything real in another human. He could not find intimacy and belonging in the human world. His way of dealing with this was to sink into madness, and create in his mind a oneness with the grizzlies and their habitat that was not there.

Herzog does not demean Treadwell for this. He treats his search as what it is, tragic, beautiful, human, something we can all relate to and learn from, and, most important for Herzog, honest (though his solution was not - thus the tragic part). For Herzog the world is not unified in God, or love, or harmony, but chaos and violence, and he sympathizes with any person who looks honestly at this chaos and retreats into insanity.

Though I obviously do not share Herzog's worldview (I respect it as the most truthful one that does not know God) I was deeply touched by his film. It plunges deep into a troubled soul and offers no simplistic, cardboard answers, yet still left me with a deeper appreciation for life. I can relate to a world whose search for truth in others results only in consternation because it no longer knows how to look for or recognize the Imago Dei in another. I've been there. Truthfully, some of me still is (as long as we fight, parts of all of us are).

This film made me especially grateful for my fiancee. For the fact that I, unlike Treadwell, have someone with whom to share and live out the real, the self-sacrificing love and faithfulness of Jesus Christ. It made me appreciate the oneness that God is creating in us. It made me want to call and leave ridiculous messages on her voice mail so she can laugh at my expense. It made me cherish the moments we share that seem incredibly real. Like last summer when we sat together on the sofa and I held her in my arms and looked at the clock then closed my eyes and stuck my nose in her hair and just tried to really live in the last eight minutes we had left to celebrate our third anniversary. Those eight minutes are still real. Or the times we argue without the fear that our disagreements will lead to separation. Or the time I bore my soul to her and shared my deepest secret. It was a brutal moment. But it was honest, vulnerable, safe, and godly. It was not a happy moment. It was a real one.

Why is it that people like Treadwell are unable to find the oneness they seek in other people? It is not that people like my fiancee and I are better or know how to see what is real because of our own merit, but because what is real has found us. I hope more people like Timothy Treadwell are not left to escape into madness, but see that they too can be found by what is real.

Politically Correct language Is Indeed Political, But Far From Correct.

In truth, all language is political. This is because when writing or conversing, there is more going on than the communication of whatever base information the words stand for. There are numerous different ways in which the same basic thing can be said. The words that the writer/speaker uses are specifically chosen, in part, because the writer/speaker is trying to communicate something about themselves. Their rhetoric reveals not only what group said person identifies or is attempting to identify with, but can also reveal how said person feels about whatever group may be their subject and/or whatever group they are addressing.

Example: I work with teens. Say I am at a youth camp and approach a group of boys who obviously like emo music very much to introduce myself.

If I say, "Hey guys, sweet hair. I like the way you shoot it to the right when it gets in your eyes too much (cocky smile). That was a Death Cab song you were playing there on your acoustic guitar right? (Wait for them to nod in silence) Sweet. Nice stickers on that guitar too, how they're all crooked and unbalanced. Especially that one. I'm glad you're doing your part to combat the Nazi message... I'm Wil, what are your names?" I reveal myself to be someone who fears becoming out of touch with age, nevertheless has become slightly out of touch and tries to combat this by keeping up with popular music trends and watching Napoleon Dynamite to learn the current acceptable way to say "cool," but who realizes this and hates it for it's shallowness and therefore tries to make himself feel like he's above it by slipping in some sarcasm. I also care, at least on a shallow level, for these teens, am open to their culture, and want to be accepted by them.

On the other hand, if I walk up to them and say, "Hey, I knew you punks were gonna be trouble. Lunch started fifteen minutes ago, why are you loiterin' around here? ...Who am I? You can call me Sir. Come on. Now! Don't just look at me like I got tinkle on my pants. And afterwards I got some clippers back in my cabin, I'll have the little lady cut that hair. Between that and those tight jeans you look like a sad, pretty little girl. Come on! Move! Maybe if your pants weren't so tight you could keep up. Shameful, showing all you got through your denim like that. Used to be the girls I had to get onto for not coverin' up what God gave 'em. Now it's you little boys too!" I reveal my ignorance of and/or dislike for teen culture and that I care little for these particular teens and whether or not I am accepted by them. In fact, I probably harbor something personal against all cool kids their age and will soon be the subject of creepy little government post cards that my new neighbors will receive whenever I move.

The examples are infinite, but the point was grasped long ago. The words chosen communicate much about the communicator and their position toward their subject and audience.

Admittedly, in a situation like this, the above judgments may not be accurate. Maybe the second guy does care. Maybe a lot. Maybe he does have a gruff but still innocent concern for decency. Maybe he's just having a bad day. Maybe he did just trickle in his drawers a little and at this moment he's self-conscious and embarrassed and his words came carelessly out of emotion. But when politically correct language is used, especially in writing and public discourse, it is not careless but intentional and calculated. Some of it (not all, but some) is so ridiculous that it would be virtually impossible for anyone to use it on accident (poor = economically disadvantaged?). The question begging to be asked is why the person using the PC language is doing so? The answer, more than employing it for the benefit of poor people and folks in wheelchairs, is to communicate something about themselves. And what they are telling us usually isn't true.

What they want to convey is that they are nice and care about these people. That they really are trying to make things better for them. Sounds sweet. But it's not. In reality politically correct language is almost always patronizing, lazy and selfish. It allows the person using it to feel like they have been a part of a real solution without requiring them to actually do anything. And those who supposedly benefit from the new moniker see right through this in a way that only the often-patronized can.

As David Foster Wallace (good writer, check him out) says in his essay Authority and American Usage:

I strongly doubt whether a guy who has four small kids and makes $12,000 a year feels more empowered or less ill-used by a society that carefully refers to him as 'economically disadvantaged' rather than 'poor.' If I were he, in fact, I'd probably find the Politically Correct English term insulting...(because)...like many forms of vogue usage Politically Correct English functions primarily to signal and congratulate certain virtues in the speaker - scrupulous egalitarianism, concern for the dignity of all people, sophistication about the political implications of language - and so serves the self-regarding interests of the PC far more than it serves any of the persons or groups named.

The language might be nice, but nice is shallow. Nice is not necessarily concerned for what is actually good. In fact, when it is used to pacify those suffering and simultaneously cloak inaction, nice is downright evil.

What does all this mean then for me, as a Christian? Well, I use politically correct language (as you can tell by the absence of gender specific pronouns in the above unless I am referring to a specifically named person). In some ways it is important. The way in which we talk about things influences the way we think about them,* but it is not enough to just change the way we think about those who suffer. We need to change the way we act towards them. Let's quit patronizing them with nice titles so we can feel good about ourselves and actually do something for them. The love of God cannot be separated from the love of our brothers and sisters. And I am guilty of this.

So what am I going to do? Or am I just preaching? Doing exactly what I am condemning and thinking that simply writing this is enough? I hope not. And if I do not let you know in a later blog how I am, in some way or another, trying to actually do something, you have the right and responsibility to reply to this blog and call me a self-righteous, patronizing hypocrite.



*Which is exactly why I refuse to replace "poor" with "economically disadvantaged." Poor should be a terrible word, but not to insult the poor. It should stir something in their brothers and sisters that moves them to loving action. "Economically disadvantaged" makes poverty sound too much like a permanent spinal chord injury or something. Something unfortunate, but something that the average person can do nothing about. So instead of helping we "commiserate" from a distance and leave the work of aiding our so called "commiserator" to some specialist.

Requiem

Last month I started this blog with the story of Amy's grandmother. At the time it seemed that she would not live more than a few days, but I guess everyone underestimated the woman. She held death off for another month (making her total time spent in a coma just over four years), but eventually, as we all will, lost the battle with mortality. Today was her funeral.

There is no situation like a funeral to make us realize how dependent we are on God for life and hope. We can push death out of our minds for years at a time, but eventually we will come face to face with it, and at that moment we must all acknowledge that we are powerless to overcome death on our own. For Christians though, we have the hope and assurance that death has indeed been overcome and that we ourselves may participate in the resurrection of the dead. God did not leave Christ in the tomb, and he has promised not to leave us there either.

There is one moment from today that I already know has been permanently burned into my memory. It was during the viewing, while I was contemplating the bodily resurrection that Scripture promises, and I saw Amy's grandmother draw breath, rise, and leave her coffin behind. (Another is any moment that involved the presiding Priest, Father O'Brian. This man's personality was straight comedy. In one sense it was a relief. He unintentionally elicited a laugh from even the saddest in attendance. In another it was kind of disappointing because I find the Catholic memorial liturgy extremely significant and beautiful, but this was all eclipsed by Father O'Brien's demeanor. He would best, but not quite, be described as Stuart Smalley on Prozac after a thousand hours of sensitivity training reading a bedtime story to a four-year-old. At one point, in this voice, he abruptly stopped everything, sustained a histrionic silent pause, then reminded all attending to "Breathe...Just breathe.")

As expected, the most uncertainty surrounds Amy's grandfather. He has spent six to eight hours of every day for the last four years caring for his bedridden, semi-conscious wife. Now he does not know what to do with himself. He said today, "The last four years I've lived knowing that at any minute the call could come. Now I live knowing that it has come."

I can only imagine what that must be like. There are many people attending to his needs, occupying the vast amounts of free time that threaten him, feeding him, listening and talking to him...but if you do not mind, please pray for him. His name is Bob Long.

I recently bought Mozart's Requiem. That was a nice, brusque, post-modern shift in topic huh? Don't worry anyone reading this with other than post-modern tastes (is anyone reading this?); hopefully this will tie back into the overarching line of thought before you give up on coherence and move on to another website.

If you do not know, a requiem is a mass or composition for the dead (Already getting back on track). Now for most today a service or prayer for the dead any time after the funeral seems outdated and superstitious (And I would bet that even the prayers offered during most funerals asking God to recieve the deceased into his kingdom are much more for the comfort of those still living than they are for the dead loved one). And I admit that in some ways I fall into this group, but this CD is beautiful, moody and haunting. No matter what else I pop into my CD player I cannot escape it. So I gave up trying to escape it and started thinking about Christian prayer for the dead (which reaches back into our tradition a great deal).

I soon remembered a time last spring when I was sitting in Christian Worship class. It was one of those rare moments when my attention was not riveted on the words of Dr. John Wright (John, if you happen to be reading this, I promise those moments were rare...or at least intermittent). My attention was quickly recovered though when he said, "...and that is why medieval Christians had no problem praying for the dead." But it was too late, and I thought, "Dang. That sounded interesting. I wish I had been paying attention."

So I went back and re-read the book John was teaching from, Torture and Eucharist by William Cavanaugh, and I think I found the passage that led to the discussion that day. In chapter five Cavanaugh discusses a Christian conception of time, and how it has been lost over the last couple hundred years. He says on page 222:

The medieval Christian conception (of time) is marked by..."Messianic time," that is, the simultaneity of past and future in the present. Representations of biblical figures in medieval dress strike the modern observer as odd, but medieval Christians did not imagine they were separated from the past (or the future) by a wide gulf of ever-advancing time. The biblical figures were "contemporaries," connected to the present through divine providence.

In short, he says that the difference is that after the enlightenment time began to be understood according to human experience and reason. To a human, who only experiences time as one confined by it, time seems to be like a chain that is linked horizontally by cause and effect. To a Christian, on the other hand, time is understood in God, who is not limited by time, but is its Master. In God, Christians understood events in history not as vastly separated by horizontal links, but close and even overlapping because of their vertical links to God. That is why Christ's death is still effective and was able to reach back to the fall, and why Christians have a real hope in the Second Coming of Christ. It has already happened, thought we have yet to experience it first hand.

Now to graft this little excursus fully back into the original line of thought. I have already asked you to pray for her grandfather, and even though I may not completely understand how it can do any good (because I still exist as one within the confines of time), and if it does not offend your enlightened, rationalistic sensibilities too much, please pray for her grandmother as well. Pray that she would know God's mercy and partake in his salvation. Perhaps God honors our prayers before we even pray them, yet still wants us to offer them. Her name is Patricia Long.

Dog

So I just got a dog. I still have not decided on a name. It is a toss up between Cheyenne and Layla. What do you guys think?

If you want to see more of her, click here.

No Worship on Christmas?

I want to continually guard against my natural tendency to make every post on this site a rant. Though quite often warranted, I do not think they do as much good as I wish they did. So let me begin with something positive.

No. Something better than that. Let me begin with some grace.

After all, we are in the season of Advent, and where is grace seen more clearly than in the story of God becoming man to reconcile his beloved yet rebellious creation to himself? Nowhere. Grace animates the story and uses it to give us a tender hug or a punch to the gut (depending on our need). This is a season of joy and hope, because in it we look to the coming of the Christ in history, celebrate the way he is faithful in continuing to come to us today, and anticipate his coming again.

So think on this, and for now, be happy and joyful. (No this sentence is not redundant. It's nuanced.)

Are you both? Good.

Enjoy it for a moment...

Now...can I move into the next portion of this post and kill some of your happiness while sustaining your joy? I hope to do both.

If it were not for God's action in the incarnation (Christ's becoming man) we would not worship as we do. This is obvious. But it does us good to repeatedly think about what this means. Without Christmas we would not know God's fullness as seen in Christ. We would not know reconciliation with God through his faithfulness and blood. We would not be able to gather together with all people, regardless of their nationality, personal history or economic standing, to worship the Creator of us all.

We would know neither peace nor love.

We would not know beauty or grace.

We would not be able to offer ourselves in sacrificial worship to the One whom we were created to worship and in whom we find our true identity.

We would have no hope.

What is more important to a Christian than this?

Leisure time, apparently.

Several churches in the Phoenix area, and, most likely, a few churches in whatever area you live in are doing the same thing (unless you live in the Vatican or an "underdeveloped" country or a country where Christians are persecuted or...heck, pretty much if you live in America or someplace like it), have cancelled their Sunday morning worship services this year because it falls on Christmas day. This makes about as much sense as Stallone making Rocky VI.

Christmas is one of the highest Christian holidays. We should be gathering in our local churches for worship on Christmas no matter what day of the week it happens to fall on. This is like canceling worship on Easter.

"But it's inconvenient and takes away from holiday time with my family. I only get so much time off of work to relax you know."

Good point. I can relate to how terrible it is to be inconvenienced.

Oh, but wait. It was probably pretty inconvenient for Christ to leave his Father, shed his glory and take a human body, and hang from a cross for the very people who put him there. So strike that. After further reflection I have decided that that is not such a good point after all and that I cannot (or rather choose not to) relate.

Besides, it is not even a point that should have to be made. We should be flocking to worship joyously and willingly. Everything that is not worship should be seen as inconvenient and part of our old, worldly lives. Lives that we have left behind.

Further, on the subject of time with our families, every believer is now part of the same family (Matthew 10:37-38; 12:48-49). Do not neglect this heavenly family that we get to fellowship with here on earth. If you want to have some time with your immediate, earthly family (which is a good thing to have, do not get me wrong), there are how many hours left on Christmas after noon dismissal? Take that time to better explain what you are celebrating on Christmas to your children after they have ravished their presents (and no, what you are celebrating is not their thankfulness to you and appreciation for all the money you spent on them). As good as that might seem, we are, in fact, reveling in salvation. Pure and mind blowing.

What is happening here is so terrible because it is more of a threat than all the politically correct language and legislation working to make everyone call this by the non-religion specific term "holidays." Or everyone trying to take "Christ" out of Christmas. They may not have to anymore. We might do it for them.

This is Christians celebrating a different Christmas. A therapeutic, commercial Christmas that gives Toys 'r Us and Microsoft more to celebrate about than it gives to Christians. Ask Bill O'Reilley. (Thanks to Eric, I believe, who brought that clip to my attention somewhere or other.)

This is true Christmas: the gospel. Jesus has come and comes now and is coming again. Let us live this joy. Not cancel it.

If your church has cancelled worship on Christmas, do not go and berate your leadership. Set an example of faithfulness. Find a place to worship. My Church's doors will thankfully, and with thankfulness, be opened.

Anesthesia

Last Saturday started out well. I got a call late Friday telling me that my Xbox 360 was ready and waiting at my local EB Games store. A nice surprise, considering I had resigned myself to waiting at least another two weeks since I was one of the irresponsible people who did not pay for theirs until October. Without a hint of complaint I asked for an explanation. It seems that someone with better things to do with a couple hundred dollars who was on the list for the first shipment cancelled their order and my name got bumped up. So Saturday, right at 10 am, when the store opens, I was on my way to pick up hours upon hours worth of diversion. Though soon, my heart and mind, that were already numbed by the anticipated presence of the Xbox 360, would be sensitized by something bigger and upsetting happening in the world around me.

To get to my EB Games store I drive by a Home Depot. It is not uncommon to see a dozen or more Hispanic men standing in the parking lot outside this particular Home Depot waiting for someone to pick them up and give them a job for a day or two, pay them under the table, drop them back off, and then ignore them the next time when they only stop by for some masking tape or wood glue.

Saturday was different though.

As I approached, I noticed that the crowd was four or five times larger than usual and, curiously, 90% white. Then I remembered the three page flyer that had been put on the windshield of my car a few days earlier by the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps calling for a protest of this day labor site. The opening paragraph of this flyer read:

Are you tired of illegal aliens taking jobs away from American citizens? Are you tired of hearing about our schools and hospitals being overrun and underfunded due to illegal aliens tying up our system? Does it make you sick to your stomach to see American companies hiring illegal aliens? Can't get to the border to stand a post but want to do something in your own community? This is your calling...

The flyer also encouraged participants to bring their own homemade signs with slogans like "Viva la Migra." I kid you not. That was an actual suggestion. And if you do not find that small and degrading then you probably should not read the rest of this post.

As I slowed the car to take in as much of the scene in as I could, I tried to figure out why I was so troubled by it all. Then I began to think about how the second greatest commandment, to love your neighbor as yourself, without question, still extends to illegal aliens, and how I could see no love in the protester's actions.

God's love is not restricted by borders or international law, even if the person or persons in question are lawbreakers. (Remember the thief on the cross?) As Christians we cannot be content to love these people only on short-term missions trips, or by shipping our old and unwanted clothing to them in boxes. When they are here it is our chance to love them face to face on our homeland. To Christians it is more of an opportunity than a threat.

I do not pretend to know how to handle this situation on the level of national policy (but here is someone, not that I agree with everything they say, who seems to at least be trying to do so in a much more tender way http://www.humanebordersblogged.blogspot.com). In fact, it is funny to me how every time I bring something like this up most of my Christian friends assume that I am evaluating things from the sphere of national politics. I am not. I am just trying to figure out what it means for us to act like Christians in every part of life. While I do not know how to fix the problem through our government, it seems to me that there must be a better way to go about this than by dumping all of the blame for our problems on the poor who are simply seeking a better life. Do we have to demonize them and set ourselves physically against them by protesting their presence to their face? I wonder how the American flags, which we are told stand for liberty and opportunity, that were being waved by the protesters looked to the immigrants standing on the other side of the lines.

Why do we think that things will be so much better for us if we keep the poor at a safe distance? One of the signs held by a gruff, grey bearded protester read, "Mr. President, they did not die for open borders," and had pictures of fallen soldiers' helmets hanging lopsided from rifle butts. Funny how we are willing to sacrifice the lives of American soldiers to liberate Iraq and create and jump-start their new economy, but not sacrifice here on our own turf for Mexican immigrants. I guess Mexico will just have to wait its turn for us to come and fix them.

I am not saying I expect the United States to open its borders. I am not even saying that I think that would be practical. I am saying that as Christians we are not called to be practical but to live as Christ lived. And if we were to do that our love and compassion would not be limited by borders or frightened by the invasion of what we perceive to be "our space." (Because we know that it all belongs to God anyway.)

Why is it so hard for us to see people whose worldly citizenship rests in another country as fellow human beings, created and loved by the same God that created and loves everyone in like measure, when they are labeled "illegals?"

Yes, it is sad if an American suffers or dies because our healthcare system is tied up by illegal aliens. But it is just as sad if the alien is turned away and suffers or dies so that an American citizen can receive treatment. I do not hold any American life to be worth more than the life of even the poorest Mexican. Furthermore, I find it hard to believe that all of these problems named by the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps find their source in illegal immigrants anyway. I think it much more likely to find the source in a much more wide-spread and pernicious problem, human greed and selfishness. Perhaps if some of the school districts with Taco Bells and Pizza Huts in their cafeterias and double-decker tour buses carting around their clubs and sports teams were to share with the poorer districts that are "overrun and underfunded due to illegal aliens" we could better handle the strain, help educate them, and give them hope for a better future.


It makes me sick to my stomach to think that we would rather send these people away to live in abject poverty (do we really believe that anyone would leave a comfortable life, anywhere near comparable to our middle-class existence, to work as an illegal day laborer?), rather than to sacrifice for them. It makes me sick to think of our healthcare system (as corrupt and filthy rich as it is in some areas) sending the poor away to receive terrible care, if any at all, in Mexico. This is selfishness on a wide-spread, corporate level. A sin that undoubtedly both stems from and trickles down to invade individual hearts.

I thought all this. Then, with my windows up, I drove on to get my Xbox 360.

An Open Letter to the Internet

Dear Internet,

Why must you continually make it so difficult for me to starve the passive-aggressive high school bully still living inside of me by tossing me tasty morsels such as this?

http://www.vaccc.com/home.html

Sincerely,
Wilson Ryland

Fear Mongering

The fear machine is out of control. Those who created it (or at least think they did, because fear is, at its source, a byproduct of sin, which pre-dates the modern media by a little bit) now can only hope to exploit its effects while narrowly escaping being consumed by fear themselves. The news creates more anxiety than all the horror and suspense films we watch combined, because, unlike the villains on screen, these may actually exit the realm of television and mangle our bodies, steal our purses or, worst of all it would seem, threaten our "freedom."

This scares us, and we eat it up. Tell us about terror. After all, who wants to wake up to the flash of a weapon of mass destruction with their flesh peeling off their bones like layers of dried glue from the hands of a kindergartner? Tell us about war, for war makes us safe. Right?

The public cannot get enough bad news, and it seems there is more than enough bad news for the media to report.

I just went to the bank to deposit a couple of checks. During the five minutes I spent there I learned three things from the plasma televisions mounted on the wall behind the tellers.

1) A fourteen-year-old girl is considered a victim, not a suspect, in the murder of both her parents. Her eighteen-year-old boyfriend did it.
2) The Voluntary Human Extinction Movement (V.H.E.M.T.) is a legitimate movement (to steal their own terrible pun, they are a vehement movement) that wants humans to stop breeding so as to eventually die out and allow earth to heal itself. Check out their website at http://www.vhemt.org. It's actually rather interesting. They believe in abortion, but "only when someone is pregnant." Ha ha. And they portray a phantom-like human form as a future companion to a dinosaur and a dodo. It is nice to finally see a human extinction movement with a sense of humor.
3) A fifteen year-old was abducted and sold as a prostitute over the internet for several weeks before the police found her.

I do not mean to downplay the severity of any of these stories. They (at least the first and third) are terrible, and I pray that the victims will find hope and healing in Christ, but this blog is not about how bad the world has gotten. You hear that enough. Even at the bank. Rather, this is a call that echoes the words of Christ. Christians, do not be afraid.

The world and the rulers of this age want us to live in fear, but we must not, for Christ has overcome the world. Not only did Christ overcome the world, but he also created a space for us to live free from its death and tyranny (even though we remain in the midst of the world). This space is the Church, and no one, not even terrorists, can threaten the freedom we have in Christ. Christ is the ruler of this space. He is our King. All authority and power belong to him. This statement is simple enough, and is one that most Christians would immediately agree with. What seems to be difficult is discerning how this plays out in our lives.

The problem is that when we allow fear to rule we grant certain authority that belongs only to God, to those who have no right to that authority. Christ's kingdom is not limited to some abstract, "spiritual" realm. It is not simply a kingdom comprised of souls. It certainly does care deeply for our souls, but it extends to our physical bodies as well. Christ is ruler of all and Christ cares about human bodies.

So, what does this mean for us today? A lot. One application the Church has not been afraid to speak in authority about is sexual purity. Christians, guard your carnal treasure. But for an application that is often avoided (because talking about politics in many churches can be as awkward and frightening as trying to converse with your parents about your carnal treasure) let's return to the news media and the controversy over torture.

Sen. John McCain (R - Arizona) has sponsored a bill containing amendments that would ban torture by U.S. forces. Vice-President Dick Cheney has made several attempts to exempt the CIA from McCain's bill and said at the outset of our new war on terror that "A lot of what needs to be done here will have to be done quietly, without discussion, using sources and methods that are available to our intelligence agencies...so it's going to be vital for us to use any means at our disposal, basically, to achieve our objective," (Italics mine) and, "we have to work...the dark side, if you will."

Is terror wrong? Yes. Are their terrorist actions evil? Without a doubt. Should Christians be concerned with terror? Again, yes. But stories of secret CIA prisons around the world, from which persons permanently disappear, in which persons are tortured and denied habeas corpus, and America's refusal to register detainees in foreign prisons with the Red Cross etc., should also concern us. Terror can be scary, but we must not allow fear to cause us to approve of torture, nor to turn our head the other way when it happens.

This is not meant to cause dissention. This is not to side with or criticize any one political party. This is just an attempt to hold everything up against the gospel, and thus to show ungodliness for what it is, wherever it may be found. This is just me trying to live out the call of Jesus Christ in every aspect of my life.

If one of our own brothers or sisters in Christ is found in sin we are to hold them accountable. Why then do we hesitate to call sin "sin" when it is found in a political party or politician we happen to side with? Are we that afraid of being called unpatriotic? Christians should be a voice for Christ, not what we perceive to be the nearest thing. We represent truth, what is best, not next to best, and the best thing out there should be (and, I would say is, though she has her shortcomings) the Church of Jesus Christ, not the Republican nor the Democratic party.

If we allow fear to rule (whether it be fear for ourselves, fear for others, or, most likely, fear for both) then Christ is de-throned. This then leads us to give our assent to actions that are intended to guard us from that which we fear (terror) but do not line up with the life of Christ (torture). Evil should be engaged, but as Christians we must not sink to fighting evil with evil.

A Truly Broken Place

"The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places."
- Ernest Hemingway in ‘A Farewell to Arms’


I have been fighting inertia in getting my blog up and running, but today Amy (my fiancée) provided the push needed to set me in motion when she said something to me that was too beautiful not to share and that epitomizes what I want this thing to be about. Before I get to that though you need some back-story.

Amy’s grandparents had their lives radically altered four years ago due to medical malpractice. Her grandmother was given a shot that many people are brutally allergic to. Standard procedure is to watch a person for fifteen minutes after the shot is administered, that way, if they do turn out to be allergic to the medicine, an antidote can be easily administered and thus save a lot of people a lot of trouble. Amy’s grandmother was left alone in a room with the door closed for forty-five minutes after she was given the shot. She turned out to be one of the not too infrequent ones who are allergic to the medicine. She has been in a coma for the last four years.

Amy’s grandfather was a hard man. It has been amazing to witness the transformation in him as taking care of his wife has become his life. To see the harshness turn to tenderness. The self-centeredness into concern for another. This has been the sweet in this, the incredibly bittersweet.

Now, forty-seven months after this initially happened, it looks as though Amy’s grandmother will not live through this week. The family is gathering, preparations are being made, and Amy’s grandfather is beginning to wonder what his life will become when he no longer has someone to take care of.

Now to what Amy said to me today. She said, “I don’t even know if my grandmother can think in the way we understand thinking to be, but I wonder if she can look back on the last four years of her life and say, ‘I have lived a good last four years.’”

I have to admit that the last few times I went with Amy to visit her grandmother and saw here there with here eyes wandering all over the room or rolled back up into her head and machine tubes jutting out of her as she frequently hacked and choked on the phlegm her body produced to attack the plastic foreign object stuck in her throat, I wondered, “What kind of a life is this?” Now I see that perhaps it was a beautiful one.

In her brokenness she helped bring about some wonderful and miraculous changes in the life of her husband. She, in a very real way, gave him a new life. One that a shallow glance might see as heartbreaking, but one that below the terrible surface is real and brilliant. Her recent life was amazing and virtuous because it was completely lived for the good of another, and lead the other to live in the same way. Is that not as Christ lived? Was Christ’s life not both beautiful and heartbreaking?

It is unsure what Amy’s grandfather’s life will become once his wife is gone. Not even he knows what he will do. But what is certain is that God will bring life and strength out of the brokenness that will come with her death just as he did in the last broken place of their lives.

In Broken Places

Working on it...