I Don't Fit In Church

Richard Beck is a professor and experimental psychologist. I find his blog very enlightening. Last week he created a post that explains why many people like myself are uncomfortable in church. The bottom line is that "church people" just don't like to dig for answers. They tend to be the types of people who are comfortable with short answers to over-simplified questions. I never leave a conversation at church with a feeling that we have even scratched the surface, let alone made any progress. Instead, I always leave church feeling unresolved and unsatisfied. Cliche phrases and buzz words make me curious but more often, they make me uneasy. Church doesn't appear to be a place designed for curiosity.

Richard has also written an entertaining post about the Left Behind craze called "Why The Anti-Christ is an Idiot".

Intelligent Design on Trial

NOVA will air a special called “Judgement Day – Intelligent Design on Trial” November 13th at 8PM. The show will unpack the important case of Kitzmiller v. Dover School District which was reported to be a 6 week trial of testimony regarding evolution and intelligent design. Here are a few excerpts from the transcription which is also available online.

Q: Why is this topic—and the teaching of evolution—so important?

Paula S. Apsell[Senior Executive Producer of NOVA]: Recent polls tells us that 48 percent—almost half of all Americans—still question evolution and still believe that some kind of alternative should be taught in the public schools. What happens when half of the population doesn't accept one of the most fundamental underpinnings of the sciences? Evolution is the absolute bedrock of the biological sciences. It's essential to medical science, agriculture, biotechnology. And it's critical to understanding the natural world around us.

We're a country built on our command of the sciences and technology. But we now face a crisis in science literacy that could threaten our progress in these areas and ultimately threaten our quality of life. So, at NOVA and at Vulcan, we feel that understanding the importance of evolution, and enhancing science literacy in general, are more crucial than ever.

Dr. Kenneth Miller [A biologist testifying on behalf of evolution]:The whole idea of intelligent design is a confession on the part of its advocates that they actually can't get any evidence at all in favor of a designer. So what they resort to is the notion that it's either evolution or it's design. And if evolution right now, today, cannot explain everything, that lack of a complete explanation amounts to evidence for the other side.

Thank you Michael Westmorland-White for posting information about the show. Michael is a Baptist minister in Kentucky who has just made a series of well written posts about Creation and Evolution that includes a detailed exegesis of both Genesis creation myths (you did know there were 2 right?). His blog represents all the best qualities of the Baptist faith tradition.

God's Warriors

CNN will air a special report for the next 3 nights containing 6 hours of material by Christiane Amanpour about religious fundamentalism. She was on Larry King tonight discussing the project and it does sound interesting. The report will focus on Jewish, Islamic, and Christian fundamentalism and their impact on the world.

Only a small percentage of religious extremists actually become violent, but during the interviews tonight I couldn't help but wonder how much blame should be shouldered by the moderates and progressives in each religion that stand by and watch their faiths high-jacked by extremists. For example, should moderate Christians be blamed since they insist on leaving ideas of after-life and judgement in their faith if they realize that those views lead to extremists taking those beliefs too literally? At what point do you realize that certain religious ideas are prone to being used to support violence, racism, exclusion, and sexism and decide to stop spreading those views. How do you "combat" the ignorance of fundamentalists without creating deeper division and becoming a religious warrior yourself?

Emerging Christians often talk about creating a diverse community that embraces all views (even fundamentalists), but I often wonder if that is sustaining the problem. I'm torn about where to draw the line and how to balance the protest of fundamentalism with the desire to create unity and an open inclusive conversation. I'm not really sure about the answer. Maybe this report will shed some light on the problem. I agree with Christine Amanpour when she says the answer is enlightened leadership and it has worked in places like Bosnia and Ireland where there was once little hope for reconciliation.

Repent, the Shopocalypse is near!

Thich Nhat Hanh Interview on NPR

Thich Nhat Hanh is a Vietnamese Zen monk, poet, and peacemaker. He cofounded the An Quang Buddhist Institute, the Van Hanh Buddhist University in Vietnam, and Plum Village, a Buddhist training monastery in France. He is the author of many books, including Being Peace, The Miracle of Mindfulness: A Manual on Meditation, and Fragrant Palm Leaves: Journals 1962–1966. I've mentioned a couple of his books here on this blog.

Greg Deloach at FBC Augusta recently pointed me to this podcast of a wonderful interview with Thich Nhat Hanh by Kristia Tippett in the archives at Speaking of Faith.

When I read or hear this man, all I can think about is how poorly I listen to the people I love. He challenges us to develop compassion by truely listening to the suffering of others. The podcast is a little long, but well worth the time.

Kill Or Convert, Brought To You By the Pentagon

Operation Straight Up (OSU) along with several professional actors like Steven Baldwin are now distributing "freedom packets" to the American soldiers in Iraq. These packages include copies of the video game "Left Behind: Eternal Forces". If you haven't seen the game yet, you should know this is a game which depicts Christian military forces killing non-Christians in an apocolyptic science fiction type environment. To win the game, players must kill or convert all the non-believers left behind after the rapture. Do we really want these people trying to brainwash our soldiers and filling their minds with this type of sick distored bullshit?

Read the full article at The Nation. Thank you Bruce Prescott at Mainstream Baptist for posting a link to this article.

Great Posts for the Week...

I highly recommend this post on one of my favorite blog sites by Real Live Preacher. He also provided a link to one of the most honest and open posts I've read in a while here.

The best post may be this starling video called Rapture Ready: The Unauthorized Christians United for Israel Tour. It is scary and highlights the problems we are facing in our foreign policy today.

F**** Taxes!

Corey Pein at the Metro Spirit put together another great cover story last week. If you haven't read it then please read the full article which highlights many of the problems behind the fair tax initiative that is so popular in conservative circles. The FAIR tax that is supported by goofballs like Neal Boortz should be called the UNfair tax because it would be an extremely regressive tax system aimed at reducing taxes on the wealthiest Americans and creating a much higher average effective tax rate for working class tax-payers.

The article does a good job of pointing out several problems but missed the most compelling argument against the "fair tax". I really wish more people were educated about our tax system and I wish the article had gone further to explain about the structure of our marginal tax brackets. Many people assume that because their tax “bracket” may be 25% or 28% that a 23% sales tax would be a lower tax. That is NOT true. Most middle class people pay no more than about a 10-15% effective tax rate because of the marginal structure. If you are in the 25% bracket then only your last few dollars are taxed at that highest rate while the bulk of your income is taxed at a much lower rate. Deductions, which are mainly available for the wealthiest tax-payers, also play a huge role in flattening out what is supposed to be a progressive tax rate structure but is actually often flat or even regressive.

I think a brief description of marginal rates and a few statistics on median effective tax rates would have been enlightening for the audience of this article. If you are not sure about your effective tax rate, then try this handy online tax calculator. It will give you a decent estimate and it may surprise you. A couple earning 100k per year and having 1 child and an average mortgage currently pays around 10% tax after a few deductions. So unless this couple invests more than 50% of their income to avoid the sales tax then their taxes would go UP under the fair tax plan.

Three Poisons

Tikkun is a wonderful cross cultural progressive faith magazine. One of its contributors is the well know progressive Rabbi Michael Lerner. This month it has an article about the Three poisons - greed, ill will, and delusion as they have been institutionalized in our society.

If the article seems a little weird at first for a non-buddhist, then please get through the intro and get to the guts. It is worth the effort and is something that you don't need to be a Buddhist in order to understand. The principle is universal and relevant for all of us. One of the most interesting points is how delusion is institutionalized in our society through the media organizations.

Each of us lives inside an individual bubble of delusions, which distorts our perceptions and expectations. Buddhist practitioners are familiar with this problem, yet we also dwell together within a much bigger bubble that largely determines how we collectively understand the world and ourselves. The institution most responsible for molding our collective sense of self is the media, which have become our “group nervous system.” Genuine democracy requires an independent and activist press, to expose abuse and discuss political issues. In the process of becoming mega-corporations, however, the major media have abandoned all but the pretence of objectivity.

A New Abraham and a New Earth

Real Live Preacher has published a great post about the problems with religious exclusivity. As always, his post is emotional and challenging. Please read the whole post. Here is a sample:

At some point don’t you start listening to the spiritual stories of other people and find the beauty and the common ground in them? At some point don’t you realize that our myths are delicate, like environments? The oldest ones are very fragile, and many have already been lost. At some point don’t you come to understand that these things are worth saving?

Is this Blasphemy?

A group of Atheists have launched a campaign to encourage people to make a video of themselves renouncing the Holy Spirit then posting the video on YouTube.com. I give them credit for creativity and passion and I even understand why they are upset with religion.

I find it hard to blame them for their reaction but I feel it is a lack of education about Christianity that leads them to their conclusions. What they are rejecting is a poor image of God that Christianity has suggested is the only possible image of God. I like Marcus Borg's response to atheism. He says, "Tell me about the God you don't believe in. I probably don't believe in that either".

It is unfortunate that Christianity has only given people 2 choices: A) believe the literal and absurd view of the supernatural or B) become an atheist. There are more than 2 choices in this debate.

Also, I think the makers of this challenge misunderstand blasphemy. Denying the literal existence of a literary metaphor is hardly “blasphemy”. Accepting the Holy Spirit is not something you do by speaking, it is something you do by living. The Holy Spirit is not a human being. It is a symbol that represents compassion and specifically the type of compassion that Jesus embodied which involves self sacrifice. To commit actual blasphemy against the Holy Spirit you would need to reject all compassionate behavior and feelings. In a sense, every time we reject an opportunity to be compassionate we commit blasphemy. These people need to do more than speak a phrase if their goal is blasphemy. A life of blasphemy is a life that rejects compassion as a transformational feature of humanity. For instance, I find it interesting that this group is holding a blood drive and seems to support very compassionate minded causes. Sincere blasphemy against the Holy Spirit would mean rejecting their own blood drive or maybe even abandoning their own children or doing something fundamentally against the idea of compassion. That might get you an "A+" for blasphemy. It seems if these people are willing to start a blood drive then they are already incarnating the spirit of Christ (i.e. they are being compassionate at their own expense).

I do feel like these types of campaigns could produce some valuable changes in religion. Maybe it will be a wake up call to Christianity, but more than likely it will lead to further polarization and conflict. I'm not sure what makes me more sad, the reaction of these Atheists or the Christian theology that created their reaction.

The Future of our Souls...

I recently stumbled across this amazing blog by Richard Beck, Associate Professor and Chair of Psychology at Abilene Christian University. His site is a wealth of knowledge.

Here is just one small portion of a post he has written about the conflict of traditional Christian theology with neuroscience as we seek to understand faith in an error of post-Cartesian Dualism...

1. This is the growing view in the modern world. Neuroscience is making Cartesian dualism untenable. In short, in the coming decades Christian reference to the "soul" will seem quaint and charming. Like speaking about the tooth fairy or Santa Claus.

2. We are currently training ministers to go out into a post-modern and post-Christian world. Well, that's great. But let me make clear a challenge that bible professors are wholly overlooking. We are sending ministers out into a POST-CARTESIAN world. And, I ask, are these ministers being prepared for THAT? How quaint that we are training people to go out to reason in the world with notions as charming, to the listeners, as the Easter bunny.

3. Neuroscience, like evolution before it, is setting up up for a titanic struggle between faith and reason. And this one will be much, much worse. The soul itself is at stake. But what if Christianity looses this battle as it has with evolution? What if the soul is removed as a legitimate category of discourse? How will theology need to adjust?

(Finish reading the entire series of articles here)

We have seen Christianity struggle in our lifetime with the conflict between the Biblical myths of Genesis as more and more "average" lay-people are educated in the areas of science. Centuries ago scientists had to struggle with these choices as they clashed (often violently) with the church, but in the last century the same struggles have been thrust on all of us as this knowledge became more widely available. Imagine the impact as more of us are made wise by the discoveries of neuroscience. What sort of stickers will Christian parents place on science text books when they more blatantly teach that the "soul" is a product of brain function not a divine "ghost in the machine"? This is more reason for Christianity to look for a purpose beyond belief in unbelievable things and return to the roots of our faith which are a more meaningful and lasting purpose in community (liberation from captivity), peace (return from exhile), justice (forgiveness) and transformation (rebirth/resurrection).

Barack Obama

The Obama Campaign has put together a great site. You can create a profile, blog, build groups, send messagees, and it even some fundraising tools (that wasn't a surprise)...

The official Danutz for Obama'08 blog... http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/blog/danutz


Watch his announcement speech. I highly recommend it...
http://capitolconnection.sitestream.com/obamaforamerica/livewebcast.htm

Kiva.org

Thanks to my friend Don Harris, I've found this great site that allows individuals to fund micro-loans to the working poor around the world. It only took me a couple of minutes to get 2 loans setup. This could be more addictive than on-line poker!

www.kiva.org

Cast Your Vote...

Vote for your top contemporary theology books...

http://shrinkinguni.blogspot.com/2007/01/best-contemporary-theology-final-vote.html

My top 5 are:

1. Marcus Borg, The Heart of Christianity: Rediscovering a Life of Faith
2. The Prophetic Imagination by Walter Brueggemann (not on their list)
3. William Placher, The Domestication of the Transcendence
4. Peter Rollins, How (Not) to Speak of God
5. Brian McLaren, A Generous Orthodoxy

Single most important book in the last 25 years for me:
Living Buddha, Living Christ - Thich Nhat Hanh

Tomorrow I'm leaving for St. Simons Island to hear Marcus Borg and Barbara Brown Taylor speak for a couple of days. I'll be at the January Adventure conference until wed.(januaryadventure.org). I'm not 100% sure what it is that draws me to Marcus Borg's books but I guess he articulates my view of faith better than any other person that I've met. I'll never forget the first time I read one of his books. I actually couldn't get past the first chapter. I felt like a heretic for even reading it. Deep inside I knew he expressed everything I've always felt about the Bible, but I didn't want to admit it. Now his books are like home to me. His books liberated me from years of spiritual and intellectual bondage. His clear and articulate interpretation of scripture saved and then transformed my faith. I hate to think where I'd be without him.

Great resource online...

I've found a great online resource with free downloadable audio on a variety of spiritual topics. The introduction to karma was great. Also I'm using the guided meditations everyday now. They really help to guide your practice session without getting in the way.

http://freebuddhistaudio.com/