Tax Day Irony

While Fox News viewers protested fictitious tax increases today, President Obama is working to simplify our monstrous tax code, and providing tax CUTS for more Americans that ever in the history of our nation. For Fox News and their "tea baggers", the facts don't really matter. April 15th was simply an opportunity to misguide and abuse more hard working citizens. Luckily, the tea baggers, too out of touch with society to realize the dual meanings of that term, fell flat on their face. They seem intent on turning conservatism (something I once identified with) into little more than tricking the working class and religious fanatics into protesting on behalf of corporate greed and tax cuts for millionaires.

Easter - The End of Barbaric Sacrifices

Traditional Christianity has tried to interpret the stories about Jesus' death and resurrection as a final sacrifice to appease the God who demands blood as payment for sins. I can't buy that interpretation. That barbaric theology tried to fit Jesus into the already established Pagan and Jewish forms of animal sacrifice. Instead, I suspect this creative narrative about the end of Jesus' life is meant to offer a final damning critique of the entire system of violent sacrifice. The story exposes the horrors of power obtained through violence. It ends the need for a scapegoat and subverts the controlling powers in the Temple, who held people hostage through their "pay to play" requirements. I love the imagery of the veil in the Temple being torn. That scene frames the entire story as a challenge to power and authority. It suggests that the writers of this narrative no longer acknowledged the oppressive power of the elite ruling class to broker access to community, arbitrate debt payments, and pronounce judgment. The various Easter morning stories suggest that those who are made to be scapegoats are now vindicated and that these people will no longer comply with the vicious cycle of killing and revenge.

Here are a few quotes from Walter Wink's book "The Powers That Be" found in chapter 3 - Breaking the Spiral of Violence.

"Scripture rehabilitates persecuted sufferers. God is revealed, not as demanding sacrifice, but as taking the part of the sacrificed. From Genesis to Revelation, the victims cry for justice and deliverance from the world of violence, where they are made scapegoats. In the cross these cries find vindication."
...
"Once Christianity became the religion of the empire, notes theologian J. Denny weaver, its success was linked to the success of the empire and preservation of the empire became the decisive criterion for ethical behavior. The church no longer saw the demonic as lodged in the empire, but in the empire's enemies. Because society was now regarded as Christian, atonement became a highly individual transaction between the believer and God. The idea that the work of Christ involves the radical critique of society was largely abandoned."
...
"But rebirth is not a private, inward event only. For it also includes the necessity of dying to whatever in our social surroundings has shaped us inauthentically. We must die to such things as racism, false patriotism, greed, and homophobia. We must, in short, die to the Domination System in order to live authentically."

Good Friday?

Jesus, Interrupted by Bart Ehrman

I'm anxiously waiting for my copy of Bart Ehrman's new book "Jesus, Interrupted: Revealing the Hidden Contradictions in the Bible (And Why We Don't Know About Them)". Ehrman's publisher, Harper Collins, has been kind enough to send out a few copies to bloggers for review. I'll be posting a review later this month. Here's the author talking about his new book...



Thanks to Mike Morrell at theOoze.com for hooking me up!