Category: vaguely

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What I figured out Christmas 2013

Winter can be a difficult time for me. The cold and the oppressive darkness make me feel so down. I’m affected by light and by the lack of light. I’ve known this about myself for a while now. Even knowing this though, in winter I would wonder specifically about my relationship with God. I have heard messages in churches and from individuals who would talk about the perfect peace and joy God could offer. Every year I would struggle to feel happy during the winter and every year I would wonder if there wasn’t some major point I was missing.

This year I can finally say that I wasn’t missing anything. This year at Christmas I felt happy. It wasn’t because I read the bible more or prayed or obeyed God to a fuller extent. No. It was other stuff. I worked some things out by talking to people, I solved a few puzzles about how my brain processes stuff, and I realized that one of my migraine meds has been giving me mood swings and got that straightened out. And this year I was happy.

It makes me want to tell people. Because there must be other people like me who can’t get it. There must be other people who are trying to read the bible and pray and are getting nothing from it. There must be other people who think they are stuck in sadness because they are too faithless. This year I felt better. I did not find it in the places I was told to look. God did not reach down to help me, except perhaps in that he gave me friends and resources to figure this stuff out. And some of it (like the migraine thing) was at random. How many people will never find any answers and will have to deal with sadness always? Don’t get me wrong, if you do find happiness through worship or prayer or bible reading, that’s great. But saying this can be the case for everyone is wrong and should stop. I don’t mean this post to be a downer; I really am happy that some stuff finally helped me out a bit. I just wish I hadn’t sat on my hands so long wondering which thing I’d been doing wrong that I wasn’t getting to God.

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What I figured out Christmas 2013

Winter can be a difficult time for me. The cold and the oppressive darkness make me feel so down. I’m affected by light and by the lack of light. I’ve known this about myself for a while now. Even knowing this though, in winter I would wonder specifically about my relationship with God. I have heard messages in churches and from individuals who would talk about the perfect peace and joy God could offer. Every year I would struggle to feel happy during the winter and every year I would wonder if there wasn’t some major point I was missing.

This year I can finally say that I wasn’t missing anything. This year at Christmas I felt happy. It wasn’t because I read the bible more or prayed or obeyed God to a fuller extent. No. It was other stuff. I worked some things out by talking to people, I solved a few puzzles about how my brain processes stuff, and I realized that one of my migraine meds has been giving me mood swings and got that straightened out. And this year I was happy.

It makes me want to tell people. Because there must be other people like me who can’t get it. There must be other people who are trying to read the bible and pray and are getting nothing from it. There must be other people who think they are stuck in sadness because they are too faithless. This year I felt better. I did not find it in the places I was told to look. God did not reach down to help me, except perhaps in that he gave me friends and resources to figure this stuff out. And some of it (like the migraine thing) was at random. How many people will never find any answers and will have to deal with sadness always? Don’t get me wrong, if you do find happiness through worship or prayer or bible reading, that’s great. But saying this can be the case for everyone is wrong and should stop. I don’t mean this post to be a downer; I really am happy that some stuff finally helped me out a bit. I just wish I hadn’t sat on my hands so long wondering which thing I’d been doing wrong that I wasn’t getting to God.

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On Stewardship

One of the concepts in Christianity is a thing called stewardship. It’s something we are supposed to value and one of our jobs as good Christians is to be good stewards. But the term and the concept can be really obscure. I rarely hear the term explained well, and have yet to get a satisfactory lesson on the Christian concept of stewardship. In fact, different Christians seem to explain the idea in sometimes vastly different ways. So I’m going to do my best to break it down here on my own.
A steward is someone who manages someone else’s money or other resources. So it involves both sound management and taking care of stuff that doesn’t belong to you. I guess we could call this responsibility, but there seems to be more to it than that. Otherwise we would just call it responsibility. Sometimes stewardship is equated with giving, especially in terms of money. That’s fine, except we already have a term for that too: generosity. I’ve also heard the explanation that all our gifts are from God and we need to remember that they are ‘on loan to us’. To some this explanation means we should always be feeling humble before God who is everything and has everything. This doesn’t seem super useful to me, especially if it messes with self-esteem. Another way to look at the ‘on loan’ aspect is to let it remind us we are to be using our gifts and resources for the things God would want. For me that means we need to be doing stuff to help people.
What I seem to be getting at here is two-fold. First the nature of what we have is God-given, so when we use our resources and talents, God expects us to be striving for certain things and avoiding other things. This is as simple and as complex as doing good and not doing bad. Since I’ve already spent time on this blog getting into good and bad, I’m going to move on to part two.
The second piece to stewardship is proper management of the resources we have. Resources people have can include just about anything from time and energy, to money and stuff, or talents and skills. Managing resources means making the best use of what you have, and usually it involves finding ways to increase and reach further. Stewardship of a business would entail growing the business. So our goal is not to spend our energy doing stuff until we are tired and broke, but to manage our resources so they perpetuate and grow to do more good. This I think is at the heart of what a good lesson on stewardship needs to teach. The reason this kind of concept is so hard to grasp is the fact that it involves choosing to do some things and choosing NOT to do some things.
Some examples are in order I think.

Starting very simplistically, say you own a forest of 100 trees that can be made into 100 packs of paper. You cut down all 100 trees and help 100 needy schoolchildren have books. You just helped a lot of people! But now you have no more trees and can’t help anymore kids until more trees grow. On top of this, you have only the seeds from the cut down trees to use for regrowth. If those seeds should fail you have no more to work with. Better stewardship might involve saving some trees for generating seeds, cutting branches off instead, or coming up with a way to use just the leaves for paper.

Next a more realistic example. Heifer Project is a charity that I’ve collected money for in the past. They have programs that help struggling families in poor countries by teaching them about farming and raising livestock. They also give animals to the families they help. This type of project could help more people faster if instead of animals, they bought rice and gave that away, BUT that kind of help is short-term. Spending the extra money to actually purchase and give away an animal is a longer lasting help that perpetuates itself. Usually the family is asked to give back to the program by donating the first offspring of the animal they were gifted to help another family in need, furthering the resources even more. This is good stewardship.

For my last example I want to get at the usage of time and talents. And I’m going to borrow from my absolute favorite TV show right now. Yes, I am about to synopsize The Aquabats Supershow; specifically episode 2 of season 2. This episode is also available on YouTube (which is how I saw it). The beginning of the episode details the return of the Aquabats from space. They are heroes who have saved the world, but don’t remember anything about it. Once they regain their memories they offer to help everyone with everything. From cats in trees to pickle jars that won’t open, they want to help, however the crowd decides they aren’t helping enough and chases them for a song-montage-sized chunk of the episode. In the end the Aquabats realize they can’t help everyone with every little thing. This, I think, is a stewardship lesson. If you have a talent for something big- like saving the world- it might not make sense for you to spend all your time doing smaller things. Time and energy are finite and good stewardship entails using both wisely. Again I’m seeing the lesson is not simply what to spend time doing, but what NOT to spend time doing. I think we need to balance both in order to practice good stewardship.

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Still Practicing Love

I’m still practicing love. Some people say it’s easy to love. I say it’s easy to try to love. For me, love doesn’t mean simple affection. Love means always looking out for someone’s best interests. Love means putting yourself on the line to see that this happens. Love means taking care of others at the cost of your own comfort. It would be easy and cozy for me to lie in bed Tuesdays when I’m supposed to be volunteering at a food pantry. It feels good to yell when I’m angry and figure out who deserves that anger from me. It feels good to spend and buy expensive things for me and just me.
But love, as I see it, is getting out of bed to help others. Love is NOT sharing anger regardless of your made up system of ‘deserves’. Love is buying the nice toys for Christmas for kids you’ve never met. Ok that last one is not too hard. Actually I have a really great imagination and love going in my mind and ‘seeing’ the look on their faces when they open presents. But you still have to get out of bed for it on a day you wanted to order in for sushi.
Love is hard. And I’m still practicing. Especially regarding anger.

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On being part of a group

I’ve been wondering recently about the impact it has when one joins a group. So if I decide to attend RandomAnyChurch regularly, what happens?
As a member of the group, I become RandomAnyChurch. I will listen to what they say and observe what they do. I will behave they way they behave because I want to fit in. I will see many things the way they see them and say similar things to what they say. I am RandomAnyChurch.
At the same time, RandomAnyChurch becomes me. I am now in the group and I contribute. Their makeup and structure changes to reflect my additions. They do new things that were old things I did. They adopt some of my idiosyncrasies. RandomAnyChurch is me.

Some of what I’m doing in my travels is looking for the churches that have philosophies that appeal to me, and programs that are wonderful. But some of what we need to consider is the changes we bring to the group as we join it. Everywhere I go, I make something happen. Minor, major, gigantic, or imperceptible- it does something. This applies to everyone looking for a group of any kind. And I think openness to change is an important quality I really need to start paying attention to. Because when we join a group we become the group and the group becomes us.

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Works, Grace, and absolutes

So one of the churches I visited recently spoke again about works and the false doctrine of being saved by works. I’m not sure I agree. I don’t think it’s exactly false to think good works are putting you on the right track with God. But my view on it is somewhat complicated.

Works vs. Faith/Grace itself is complicated. First, does faith save or does grace? Ostensibly one needs faith to get grace. But some schools of thought imply that Jesus came to save all, and by dying saved everyone through grace. Confused yet?

Putting Faith and Grace aside for now, I want to talk about works. We are taught to believe works alone do not save. Every branch of Christianity I’ve ever heard of holds this to be true. Catholics are sometimes accused of trying to obtain salvation by works, but in reality the Catholic Church doesn’t teach this. It seems to be a common misconception based on the heavy focus on works pervasive in the Catholic church. When the idea of works dominates, people wind up seeing it as some kind of divine scorecard which they mark each time a good deed is performed. This can be really limiting, because it boils goodness down to a mathematical equation. It creates worry that one is never good enough. How many good deeds does it take to obtain heaven? It also allows those leading an immoral life to feel themselves safe as long as they visibly give enough money to charity. It doesn’t speak to emotional or metal states. It doesn’t need one to have good relationships. Works-based salvation only requires works.

I have also seen churches that take this too far in the other direction. When the focus is intensely on salvation regardless of works, works may fall to the wayside. People begin to see themselves as permanently saved, without a works requirement, and may ignore opportunities to do any works. Without requiring or even focusing on works, any person can then claim to be a saved Christian and expect others to see them as them righteous. If one has faith and expects works to naturally flow from that, it might make that person feel justified in being lazy. If God wanted works out of me they’d just pour out naturally, right? If they don’t, and I know I’m saved, it must be ok with God. This type of thinking is also problematic.

So how do we maintain a balance? I think it happens when we stop dealing in absolutes. The talk should never be whether works are the best thing to be extolled or the worst thing to be ignored. There will be a few people who don’t do works on their own and won’t push themselves to do them unless they are reminded. These people need to hear about the importance of works. Then there will also be those who do only works and drive themselves crazy trying to be good enough for heaven. These people need to hear about faith and how it is enough, so they can relax and stop worrying. And it’s ok too, to throw in a few messages about emotional well-being and good relationships with others. If you believe, AND do good works, but snap and shout at others, that’s not great.

Faith/grace and works aren’t the end. And they aren’t competing football teams. Churches need to stop treating them like absolutes and remember to balance what they preach. Because the church is a mosaic of individuals; all different. That means there’s no simple way to boil down every important lesson to a few key words, and we shouldn’t try it.

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Historical perspective on baptism

I’m reading a book with tons of good information on Christian beginnings; early practices, first leadership, and the like. One interesting section deals with baptism. Early Christian baptism was something of a drawn-out affair- really an initiation. Those wishing for baptism in the 200’s had to go through a three year trial period in during which they were scrutinized for good behavior. Certain professionals were denied outright: actors, governors, magicians, and prostitutes. Near the end of the three years, initiates would be exorcised daily by laying on of hands. The day before baptism was to take place, they fasted and held an all-night vigil. Then at dawn they would head to the spring. Those getting baptized removed their clothes and got anointed with oil for another exorcism. Then a deacon washed them each three times for all three parts of the trinity. One more dose of oil for thanksgiving, and the baptism was complete.

Adults were most commonly baptized, but kids too sometimes joined. Cyprian was pro-infant baptism. He seemed to think it would help new babies stay away from sin. Tertullian was anti-infant baptism. To him, baptism was far too serious a choice for someone else to make for you. He even worried that parents and sponsors might bring damnation on themselves if the child grew up to reject the baptism.

For early Christians, baptism differed from other cult initiations in that it was considered universal. If one was baptized in a Christian church, that baptism stood for every church he might visit. Pagan groups generally required re-initiation into the local chapter.

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Pope on atheists, Vatican on atheists

The Pope had some words about those folks who do good but aren’t Catholics. He cited a story from the new testament. In this story the disciples hear about a group doing good works. The disciples don’t know who these people are except that they aren’t them, so they tell them to stop. Jesus corrects them saying, ‘No let them do good. It’s ok.’ Pope Francis said that we must meet other people in our world who are doing good and not restrict it to Catholics. Then (this is huge) he said that all are redeemed by the blood of Christ- “even atheists”. Yeah, he really said atheists. He then reiterated that it’s up to all of us to do good together and not reject anyone doing good because Jesus died for all of us –everyone.

Since the pope delivered these remarks suggesting that atheists might obtain salvation, the Vatican has come out with a statement changing clarifying what he said. Atheists, apparently, have salvation only if they choose to accept it. Otherwise they belong in hell. Dan and I have been wondering what the internal politics are like inside the Vatican and if perhaps the hierarchy isn’t as top-down as I thought. Is the pope being paralyzed by his own institution and the traditions therein?

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JC Superstar

So I like the album Jesus Christ Superstar alot. At this point it’s the only Easter tradition I repeat every year. I was listening to it all holy week, culminating in divvying up the parts and singing the entire thing through with an atheist friend who also loves the musical. It’s basically a passion play disguised as a rock opera. Or a rock opera disguised as a passion play. Musically I find the thing pretty outstanding. Spiritually speaking its a good way to connect me to the story of Easter.

You get to feel the rawness of the emotions coming from Jesus as he struggles with his impending destiny, the anger of Pontius Pilate as he deals with this nuisance of a ‘king’ who won’t even defend himself in the face of death, and the openness of Mary Magdalene as she encounters a man who is complicated far beyond the usual men she has dealings with.
I could muse at length upon her story. The bible doesn’t say much about her; popular cultural belief is that she is a reformed prostitute. JC Superstar hints at the latter and that is how I tend to think of her. I wonder about her untold background. How did she come to her profession? Was it a choice or out of necessity? Does she long for a way out or is she using her self-employment as a shred of independence which most women would have no access to? Obviously she is important to Jesus, perhaps closer than the other apostles. Considering Jesus in more human terms, it’s possible he was in love with her. She seems to wonder so herself. But they do a good job making Jesus an enigma. Does he love her or is he on another plane she cannot quite touch?

JC Superstar does an incredible job fleshing out the story of Jesus and Judas. Written off in the gospels as merely a thief, Superstar paints Judas as a worrier, concerned that Jesus is going to doom them all. He sees the way the priests take notice of Jesus-rabble-rouser and he fears for all their lives. He seems to believe turning Jesus in will result in a slap on the wrist for him. He is shocked that they plan to have him killed. The Judas of JC Superstar is convinced he’s doing the best thing available to him. It’s interesting how this means Judas could actually be the closest one to Jesus. I seem to remember this being the plot of the gnostic gospel of Judas- that Judas is really Jesus’ closest friend. In the gnostic version of the story Judas is the only one who understands that Jesus needs to die so he can rise again. This makes Judas a more heroic figure. In JC Superstar he is more tragic, not understanding the terrible consequences turning Jesus in would have. You really feel for Judas, wondering if it all could’ve happened some other way that wouldn’t have destroyed him.

But my favorite interactions by far are those between Jesus and Pilate. Pilate is intensely angry, perhaps because the Jewish leaders put him in such an impossible spot by demanding that he punish someone whose crime is iffy at best. Perhaps Jesus’ sense of calm determination is too much for Pilate to fathom and pushes his frustration to the limit. Pilate has some of the slickest, suavest, and evilest lines in the musical. He is charmingly terrible, almost as if he’s toying with Jesus, until he snaps and shouts out “Die if you want to, you misguided martyr!” Pilate’s part is always the best to sing; first because it is musically awesome, and second because it allows one to act very nasty and not actually cause harm. It gives me something of an excuse to feed impulses I might have to be mean. But hey, I’m doing it for Holy Week so God has to be cool with it!

I think pretending to be Pilate also brings us back to our humanity- that same humanity that Jesus took onto himself. That same humanity couldn’t handle Jesus’ ideas and had him put to death. Sometimes I think Jesus died because of our sins, simply in that our impulses to kill and have power were the reasons he died. That’s in all of us. Jesus died to show us it’s time to take that away. We can stop being terrible to each other and we can help each other more than necessary. I think that’s a decent way of looking at it.

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Acceptance and why I like Star Trek

I’m going to post about an episode of Star Trek the Next Generation AND before you stop reading remember that everything on this blog is vaguely religious if not overtly religious. Also I guess spoiler alert? But you should really have watched them all by now.

So, the episode in question is called Hollow Pursuits and I recommend you show it to your welcoming committee. The plot goes like this: Mr Barclay is a member of the Enterprise crew, but close to very few people. He is awkward, nervous, and makes a lot of mistakes. Several members of the crew begin to call him Broccoli behind his back. This person on the outside seems like a klutz, a hazard, an idiot- does the captain fire him? Does he call him in for a strict reprimand? No. Because in the future those who are different, those who don’t fit, those who may even have social awkwardness to the point of mental illness are accepted and treated normally by society. At the captain’s prompting, the other members of Barclay’s team start to give him some slack. They open up and start to try and understand him. This actually doesn’t seem like it’s that easy for them, but they get there.

Barclay feels so isolated that he has created a fantasy world in which to feel safe. He’s not engaging others partly because he doesn’t know how and partly because they are not engaging him. If you notice, one of the first things his supervisor Geordi does is let up his expectations. It’s really the first step in Barclay beginning to trust him. Rather than treating Barclay as a commodity, Geordi begins treating him like a friend. And Geordi doesn’t just make nice with a polite smile and questions about Barclay’s weekend. Geordi actually takes the time to try to find out what makes Barclay tick. Any church welcoming committee would be well advised to think about this one a bit. It is easy for us as people to limit our contact with one another to polite smiles and questions about work or school. The challenge is that if we really are to know each other, we have to go beyond that. We cannot simply expect showing up at church, smiling, then leaving to be enough. If the group of people meant to put newcomers at ease has no more than a surface connection with old members…that is bad. There need to be plenty of opportunities for current church membership to bond. The pastor should take the lead making visible connections with members old and new. The welcoming committee should be directed to do the same. Welcoming is not something that happens overnight and relationships have to grow. Having visited a lot if churches just once I’m starting to notice this rapport among members can create a noticeable vibe.

Back to our Star Trek episode- Barclay opens himself up a crack and shares with Geordi that its actually really hard for him to be with other people. None of them seem to understand him and that makes him feel lonely and isolated. Geordi begins to see that Barclay has some real issues. Again it’s noticeable that instead of dismissing him as a weirdo and trying to distance himself, Geordi tries to help. He really wants Barclay to be more involved, to feel like a member of the team and to address some of the issues that stop him from participating within his comfort zone. Geordi understands that it is part of his job to bring Barclay into the group in a real way and he encourages others to treat him with respect.

So, now that Barclay has a little encouragement he’s all better right? No. Actually when the pressure is put on Barclay (an extra hard task is given) he retreats to his fantasy world again. Geordi has to find him and pull him out. But since Geordi has decided to take the role of friend, he questions and further encourages Barclay rather than giving up on him or reassigning the task. It occurs to Geordi more fully here that Barclay may need the help of a counselor, so he requests Barclay meet with the ship’s counselor. He doesn’t foist Barclay off and abandon him though. He makes it clear Barclay is still an important member of the team. Geordi puts it as follows: after Barclay claims the unreal friends he’s created are easier to deal with than his reality, Geordi replies by saying, “I need you out here.” It is a personal appeal on Geodi’s part which encourages Barclay to continue working and ultimately save the day. As it turns out, Barclay is a bit of a genius once he can relax and work through his ideas. Because the captain, Geordi, and the rest of his team were willing to give Barclay a chance (Geordi actually gave him several) he found a way to shine. They discover the real value he offers once they look past his oddities. I think this is a great lesson for groups of all kinds, but especially church groups. Jesus would have been considered a bit wacky in his time, but those who got close to him grew to love him even for his oddities. My Star Trek example Mr Barclay is a man with what I’d guess is a social anxiety or personality disorder. He could be called mentally ill. How many people in Jesus’ world would have said the same thing of Him?

I think this also speaks in some ways to the amount of play the words “mentally ill” have gotten recently because of our societal discourse on guns. It’s not a great idea to create a box labeled “The Mentally Ill” and assume everyone inside is violent and dangerous. I wouldn’t place Mr Barclay and Jesus in such a box. I guess what I’m saying is that we need to be careful of over-categorizing; especially if it leads to dismissing people we haven’t yet gotten to know. We need to be open to those we meet in our church and out of it because there may be someone amazing waiting, who just needs a chance from us.