thoughts on faith and life by a she wolf in ewe's clothing

I received an email this week from our UCC National office inviting me to contact Kristi Noem to express my LACK of support for the Houses continued cutting of programs that help America’s most vulnerable people. As a Christian who does take the care of the poor and elderly most seriously, I quickly did so. However, truth be told, my emailing Mrs. Noem will most likely do nothing to change her mind.  She and many of her Republican cohorts are determined to further cut food stamps, Head Start, and Medicaid while cutting taxes for the most wealthy.

Currently, Pres. Obama clearly stated his support for marriage equality. A statement that I and many others in the United Church of Christ applauded! But then the discussion from the far right begins. “Our society will be destroyed because God has clearly defined marriage between a man and woman, etc. etc.” My frustration returns.

Does not God clearly state to care for the widows and orphans? Does not God clearly state to feed the poor, clothe the naked, heal the sick?  How about how we treat our spouses? Many quote Ephesians as the scripture for care between spouses and yet, our government then turns around and cuts programs for domestic abuse assistance! Wouldn’t one understand that having the means to feed and clothe our children, having small debt, and feeling safe in our own homes will determine the health of our families whether same gender families or not???

So here is my thought: if a person wants to be against same sex marriage, fine but stand on your own grounds. Stop using the Bible to support your prejudices! This continued use of the bible to define marriage when the bible is very unclear on marriage as well as the fact that the institution of marriage has changed dramatically over the last several hundred years, lets remember that interracial marriages are legal now, while supporting political candidates that clearly are hurting the Nation’s children, poor, and elderly is obnoxious.

In my morning’s reading, I have come across two thoughts, which might appear to be unrelated but as I have pondered these readings, have realized how related they truly are.

Walter Brueggemann, a premier Old Testament scholar, explores how the ancient Hebrew identity and theology places Yahweh, the God of the Hebrews, in tension with the god as seen in the Empire. For the Hebrews, this Empire was Babylon or any other empire that ruled over Israel. The empire, in whatever form it might take, tells the people that their safety and preservation is found in following the empire, in being loyal to the empire, in obeying the empire, etc…”Peace and good will,” the empire says, “is found if you submit to the empire’s demands above everything else and if you have ultimate loyalty to the empire!” Hebrew theology denies this for it says safety and preservation is found only in God. Hebrew theology says our ultimate loyalty should only be given to God even though we must live within the empire. (For more on this, I invite you to read “Out of Babylon” by Walter B.)

Diana Butler Bass, a leading church historian and leading supporter and educator on the emerging church phenomenon, has written a column found in the most recent USA Today. In this article, she speaks of the tension between religious institutions in their current state and the emerging spiritual renewal that appears to be happening in places where it is allowed to flourish. To quote, “But today’s world is different. All institutions are being torn apart by tension between two groups: those who want to reassert familiar and tested leadership patterns — including top-down control, uniformity and bureaucracy; and those who want to welcome untested but promising patterns of the emerging era — grassroots empowerment, diversity and relational networks. It is not a divide between conservatives and liberals; rather, it is a divide between institution and spirit.”

Now a Walter quote, “The deepest theological conviction of Israel in exile is that YHWH continues to be faithful. The concrete consequence of that fidelity is that YHWH is resolved to bring Israel safely back to Jerusalem and to restore the shalom of covenant. This is a remarkable conviction, given the fact that imperial ideology always claims that there is not and cannot be life outside the empire.”

Here is where the rubber hits the road: Religious institutions in their current forms have become a sort of empire and this is on both sides of the theological spectrum. “Bible believing” Christians claim they have the only right belief and if others do not succumb, God condemns. Bible believing Christians state that their form of Christianity is to be submitted to, given ultimate loyalty to. Preservation is by ascribing to their form of right belief.

But liberals are just as guilty for their empire is the bureaucracy of how to do things! What process must a group attend to in order to “govern or structure” itself? What order must be followed to be considered a part of this or that denomination? What paperwork must be filled out or documents drawn up? Succumb to the structure/bureaucracy of the “empire” or we cannot do/be church or even consider you a valid entity within our fellowship.

Both have gotten it wrong. A God breathed life is found beyond an inflexible human driven right belief. A God breathed life is found beyond inflexible rules of order or handwritten methodology of this and that and how to be and do church. I think of the Acts story. The Holy Spirit breathing upon everyone and all begin to speak differently, different ideas, different words, difference and yet they all understand one another. They understand one another in the midst of their own differences and there is no written document to tell them how to do it. There is no creed or orthodoxy. It just happens. All through the power of the Holy Spirit. Imagine that “YHWH faithful” beyond the boundaries.

I have received a few responses to my letter refuting the notion of hell all of which have assumed that I am unaware of the gift and demand of the gospel. All have assumed that I am unaware of the reality that the center of existence that I choose to call God has expectations on how humans are to relate to themselves, others, the earth and to God.  This could not be any further from the truth for you see I grew up on the streets mostly in Southern California. These streets were filled with misdeeds, brokenness, wounds, at times radical violence and sin all acts that I was guilty of. All acts that others around me were guilty of. To assume that my belief that God does not send anyone, murders, rapists, etc. to hell is not based upon an unawareness of there being sin in this world for I have seen sin that many have only witnessed on the drama of TV.

However, my turning my life around was not due to an instant in which I saw myself as a “sinner in the hands of angry God.” Rather it was based on seeing how dangerous my life had become for myself, for those I loved, and for the creation itself, but each one of these moments of clarification were never based on fear of what God would do to me in some after life for I had enough fear of what I could do to myself.

These moments of clarification came because of God’s warm mysterious touch… a touch of love so wonderful and one that I had never experienced before. These moments came due to the beauty of life itself and the present day hope that can come when a person falls madly in love with something other than one’s self. They came because the sacredness of life based in love of God and others which in turn comes to a healthy love of self and all of this brought me the desire, the hope, the strength to change the way I saw the world…a world desperately loved by the force of life that I have come to know and understand as God.

Yes, I try to live my life now with a sense of intellectual and spiritual integrity and authenticity, but I do this not because I am unaware of my own and others sin. I know that in order to make changes in one’s own life, one has to have the integrity to look within, but again this is done not because one will be punished in some notion of eternity, but rather because it makes the world a better place for us and for our children.

One letter referred to God as a parent who ultimately sends a child to hell or heaven. I find this idea rather inane for as a parent of five children some who have had their own sins to battle and while I know that sometimes parents allow children ultimate freedom to make choices good and bad and face the present day consequences of these choices, I can never imagine sending any of my children, no matter what the sin, to an eternal place of punishment.

Finally, I believe that this disagreement is one based on fundamental differences: the interpretation of scripture and the life of Jesus. Both of these go beyond the scope of this venue, but I will leave you with one final thought. I wonder what would happen in our communities if fear of hell was eradicated and sacrificial love of one another took its place.

Misunderstandings about the Muslim tradition are extreme within the US. Thus, in an attempt to build a bridge between Christianity and Islam, the Anew UCC will be beginning a series of six DVD’s “Discover Islam.” If interested in learning more, please give me (Kristi) a call 605-999-9361.

Remembered this book “The Dark Night of The Soul” by Gerald May. Decided to read it again. Found this quote: “the dark night is a profoundly good thing. it is an ongoing spiritual process in which we are liberated from attachments and compulsions and empowered to live and love more freely. Sometimes this letting go of old ways is painful, occasionally even devastating. But this is not why the night is called “dark.” The darkness implies nothing sinister, only that the liberation takes places in hidden ways, beneath our knowledge and understanding…..Mysterious as it may be, there is something wonderful at the heart of our existence, and it is about nothing other than love: the love of God, love for one another, love for creation, love for life itself.”

Isn’t it funny how the dark night in which we are liberated from attachments leads us to love more freely? Love doesn’t possess….why do we have to keep learning this? Love lets go and knows that all things, people, places, life belong to God and in our letting go, we love….

I am not a big fan of the “theology of the cross” especially in the sense of believing that “Jesus died especially for ME.” I feel it can create feelings of grandiosity in some peoples lives. I do; however, believe that there are crosses and resurrections that take place within our lives as we seek to become more fully human or seek to live more fully into the possibilities of our lives.

Crosses can be anything that need to die in order for something else to be born. Things like thought patterns, destructive behaviors, relationships, belief systems and even jobs. Dying to something we hold dear is painful. It takes intentionality and letting go and then opening ourselves up to whatever the love of the universe has in store for us next.

Its important to celebrate the things we let go while seeing how they have made us into better people. Every experience teaches us something about ourselves and the places we live. It’s also important to grieve the things we die to, because they become an intimate part of who we are.

Being able to fully embrace our crosses allow us to fully embrace our resurrections.

Once again, we can tell its an election year and the “pro-life” people are gearing up to stop any sort of reproductive choice.

Maybe it is time to move beyond the labels of pro-life pro-choice and begin to see a greater issue at work beneath. I quote, “The pro-life versus pro-choice paradigm reifies and masks the structures of white supremacy and capitalism that undergird the reproductive choices that women make, and it also narrows the focus of our political goals to the question of criminalization of abortion” (Smith, 2005).

You see, currently the issue is making abortion illegal. The result of that will be women seeking abortions in back alleys and if caught getting criminal punishment for them. It will not take into account why a woman would choose to terminate a pregnancy…maybe she is in an abusive relationship and fears that bringing a child into the relationship will only harm the child…maybe she already lives under the poverty level and she knows that her financial options are limited in caring for the child…maybe she already struggles with addiction…maybe she is alone….maybe she is afraid….maybe she looks around and everywhere she thinks she might find hope and help she instead finds condemnation and judgment….and we think we can solve these issues by making abortions illegal???

Lets look beneath the surface and begin to explore the societal corruption and (i hate to say it) SIN that we have within our country and then lets work to lessen abortions by creating a society in which women do not feel it is their only choice.

In a conversation with a friend this morning, I spoke of my uneasiness when I hear people talking as if we do not need one another…I hear so much that is based on the attitude of “we take care of our own and only our own” and it makes me sad.

You see I don’t believe that humans are meant to be separated by geographical boundaries or ethnic boundaries or socio-economic boundaries or religious boundaries, because I believe that the only way we can truly know ourselves is by being in relationship with one another across the human made divides. I believe that the only way I can be human is if I listen to, love and respect the mother who has had to make a choice, a choice that was one of the most difficult of her life. I believe that the only way I can be human is if I listen to, love and respect the Muslim who lives in a third world country. I believe that the only way we, any of us, can ever fully be human is when we learn to listen, accept, and love the person who is the complete opposite of us without condemenation or judgment or feeling like we are better than them. You see I believe that the only thing we humans truly have going for us is that we can take care of each other and not just those who live in my state, but also those who live beyond.

I say this in response to being called names by those who claim to love the Jesus that I, even I a liberal progressive pastor, love.

How are we to fully become the world that truly emulates the Realm of God when we continue to create borders between us…even borders of states?

I have continued to read the striking responses to my editorial regarding the lack of a consistent biblical family value aligning itself with the 1950′s American model. At first, I must say, I became frustrated with the inability to explore the idea with any educational or theological integrity, but then I realized something. This is not a theological issue for it has become an issue of the overzealous pride of the American people. This has become an idolization of the idealized American family and somehow the truth of the scriptures and of God have gotten lost.

In the quest to prove that the American family is the apple of God’s eye, the conservatives are even using the liberals rhetoric of placing the texts in the proper historical and social context, which if they were doing properly, they would see there that the social customs of antiquity are just as complicated as those today. Family systems are not cut from a mold nor have they ever been. They are messy, conflicted, passionate, and hold much variety.

The Bible is a beautiful book that shows the complexity of what it means to be human as we seek to live as people of God, but in our attempt to force it into a conservative twentieth century worldview we have pushed it from being such and made it into our own justification to think of ourselves more highly than we ought.

As the prophets shared the images of how and where God worked within the world, how and what the true foundations of society were, they spoke of justice, generosity, restoration and building bridges, they spoke of walking humbly…they did not speak of an idealized family system as the foundation of any society.

This conversation has once again helped me come to the realization that America is an empire and as all empires do, it will fall. It will fall because of its pride, its vanity, its selfishness. May God lift up the lowly in our place.

Dear Editor, over the past several days, I have read the panicked responses to my editorial. People have criticized my education, suggested that I have no family values and more. What shakes the faith of so many when someone suggests that God might not fit in “their box” of understanding? They become aggressive and forceful and at times rude while claiming to have the clearest understanding of God who really surpasses any true human containment.

It seems that any refutation that the beloved ideology of fundamental conservative Christianity is not an accurate understanding of the Biblical texts or Christianity itself sends people into hysteria. My question is “why?”

Is God in these minds so small that God cannot include and embrace greater and deeper understandings? Is God in these minds so small that God must be contained in the box of literalism that has really only been on the scene for maybe 400 years but before then there was a willingness to seek the creativity, ingenuity, imagination and the ambiguity of the biblical stories.

At a recent event featuring Amy Jill Levine, an orthodox Jew, historian, and New Testament scholar, she spoke of King David being a fictional character created for the Hebrews as they sought to understand their particularity and call as God’s chosen people. A lady behind me “gasped!” How could King David not be “real.” It means that everything must be a lie if one element of the Biblical story is found or understood to not be literal truth.

Has this society become closed, so dense and so unable to live within something greater that we have to claim a word by word literal reading and a dogmatic understanding of how God lives and moves among us?  Do we have to throw out all reason, logic, and experience to hold and believe that God can move among us in diverse ways?  And that maybe the point of the Biblical stories are not to make us dogmatically hold on to every word being a “fact” but rather to open us up to greater and greater meanings and truths then that Jonah was really swallowed by a whale and if someone tries to refute it, then shoot, my whole faith falls apart?

I truly wish that Christians could come to the table and take about how our beliefs, our educations, our experiences all diversely teach us about this great God that we have without condemning and name calling. Maybe we could learn something more about God if we did.