Whatever He said. . . .I Say the Opposite

Tags

1st Amendment, Bryan Fischer, creationism, David Barton, economy, God, GOP, Individual Rights, Iowa, Libya, Muslims, Newt Gingrich, revisionist history, taxes, teabaggers, theology, unions, US Constitution, Wisconsin

This is the GOP mantra, and has been since the day after the 2008 election. Whatever the President says or does or doesn’t do, they immediately say the opposite. It’s the last part that keeps getting them in trouble.

Latest case in point:

Newty (the garden slug) Gingrich just can’t make up his mind on what to do about Libya. When we were doing nothing, he was for the US to step in. When we did, he was against it.

He said we could take care of the whole problem with air-power. Until we used air-power then he said it was a typical politician’s error to think that air power solves all problems.

In the end, Newt admits that his answers to these questions are simply “responses to what the President does.”

Ya see Newt, when the president doesn’t do something, and you say he should, it’s really bad form to then say he shouldn’t have. And then before he has done something, don’t tell him how he should do it, because when he does it, and does it that way, you end up saying he should know better not to do it that way.

Is this an Alzheimer’s moment Newt? Or are you just the hateful vindictive, wannabe that we really think you are?

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Help! Infection alert!

Decontamination areas are being set up all over Iowa in anticipation of the likely bacterial infection set to enter the state.

Tomorrow gadzillions (make that a few dozen) really creepy and crazy people are set to have a day-long conference in Des Moines about who should be the GOP candidate. All manner of sleaze is attending, including M. Bachmann (crazy eyes), H. Barbour (racism is behind me), H. Cain (uncle Tom’s cousin), N. Gingrich (garden slug), R. Santorum (wontcha love me again?), J. Bolton (the stash is my cash), and well others.

All rational humans are urged to get a shower and take the recommended dosage of Tylenol to forestall bouts of insanity. Symptoms include itchy skin, double vision and the uncanny feeling that you’ve been hijacked by aliens. See a veterinarian immediately if you have any of the above.

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I just love ‘strict constructionists. You know who I mean, those folks that want our country returned to its Founding Father principles, the C O N S T I T U T I O N. Now what they actually mean by this is something you might not quite get, if you ain’t one of them.

Cases in point:

Bryan Fischer, AFA leader and all around hater of everything not white and fundamentalist, claims that the 1st Amendment right to freedom of religion, does not include any rights for Muslims, since the FF could not have had them in mind. Why we don’t know, but he says that we give them rights as a “courtesy” only.

David Barton, pseudo-historian and all around wacko nutjob who shleps for the GOP and it’s business elites, has explained that the Declaration of Independence is “nothing more than a list of sermons” which might surprise Thomas Jefferson. Further the Constitution was written directly out of the Bible, and that all leads up to the fact that Jesus was and IS against the minimum wage and well anything that corporate America doesn’t find conducive to racking up profits.

Sadly, people actually get in their cars, travel to auditoriums, sit their skinny butts in chairs, and listen to this drivel, rather than say, pop popcorn and watch Monty Python’s Holy Grail. I kid you not.

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Texas has been in the business of late in revising the history of the US of A, to reflect whatever it wants to be the truth. This is not news. Bill Zedler, Texas Rethuglian legislator, introduces a bill to make it “illegal to discriminate against creationists.” Yes, and next he plans to introduce one that makes it illegal to discriminate against stupid people. In both cases that would be him.  [h/t to Crooks and Liars]

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Discover Magazine has an interesting article, entitled “Does the Universe Need God?” This is an excerpt from a larger article, and there is a link to that. This is a thoughtful reasoned argument, not the usual atheistic meanness that we’ve come to see from to many. I don’t agree with the argument, but I find it cogent and worth considering.

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Ever heard of William Cronon? I hadn’t. No reason I should. He’s a university professor at Wisconsin, and well-respected by his peers in his area of expertise, that being history. He recently did an op-ed piece in the NYTimes on the recent union issues in Wisconsin, and was critical of the Governor and Republicans who would try to take away long-standing collective bargaining rights of Wisconsin citizens.

Well, that pissed off the GOP, and it, the state GOP that is, has launched a legal action to get to his e-mails to uncover whether they can prove that he’s been active in protests. This all aimed to of course intimidate and discredit him. This is what I guess the GOP calls democracy. We call it Joe McCarthyism. How low can you limbo Wisconsin GOP? [h/t to Daily Dish]

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I know you all read Moe at Whatever Works, and I’m stealing this “entire” post, but she posts usually several a day, so please don’t miss her stuff. She does a great job of keeping us all aware of all the nefarious goings on, everywhere. But this is precious and so true:

“Other than telling us how to live, think, marry, pray, vote, invest, educate our children and, now, die, Republicans have done a fine job of getting government out of our personal lives.”
                                                         – Editorial Page, Portland Oregonian 

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It’s leftovers today!

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Disarming In a Cheeky Sort of Way

Tags

Affordable Health Care, climate change, Elizabeth Taylor, Entertainment, fundamentalism, GOP, Herman Cain, Islamaphobia, religeous extreme right, Sarah Palin, science, science education, social issues, teabaggers, theology

“Sarah Palin is going to Israel next week on a fact-finding tour. She wants to find out things like where is it and who’s their king. She says she’s very excited to visit the Wailing Wall, because whaling is illegal in Alaska.” – Jay Leno

About the only thing I’ve seen reported about Sarah and her trip to “create some foreign policy cred” is that she claims to have “lots of Israeli flags” which she displays everywhere. Like in the powder room, and the breakfast nook, ya know, just to remind herself of her close ties with her home away from home.

Oh yeah, and don’t forget that Israel is necessary because of that Armageddon thing, and all the Jews will either convert or die. She believes that too. But that plays no part in her “we are all Israeli’s” love fest. For a Christian, doncha wonder why she didn’t bother to visit any Christian sites while there?

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By the by, the Christian wacko right thinks the Christian left is starting to be a force. That must be good news. I’m guessin’ they don’t see it that way. In a video and accompanying text, TIkkun gives a good summary of why the right extremists don’t think that it’s a good idea to care for the less fortunate in this country and tax a few more of the outrageously rich in order to do so.

Again, I always come down on the fact that their “theology” is so damned convenient for them. It keeps their money in their pockets, “because God wants it there.” God is for justice and there ain’t no justice in feeding and tending to those who are deemed “lazy and deserve their status.”

Theology of convenience is almost never good theology. In fact it ought to be a rule, if I find God’s call easy and right up my alley, it’s probably not God’s call.

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You no doubt have heard of the passing of Elizabeth Taylor at the age of 79. Ms. Taylor was truly one of the giants in the old studio system. She was a giant of a talent, and it should not be forgotten that she was one of the first to come out for funding for AIDS research. She did that when it was still highly unpopular.

As with most of you, she was part of my life since I had one. Most all of these icons of the silver screen are gone now. But a few remain.

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Big Think has a good article on the difficulty the science community has in conveying its “science” to the outlying public. Traditional methods of “education” are often seen as elitist and snobbish arrogance. A new approach is essential of the public is to be informed and to find reason to adopt scientifically generated claims such as climate change that require adoption and implementation.

This issue is critical since Republicans in the House are busy trying to undue everything the EPA is doing these days, all based on their “climate change is a theory that hasn’t been proven” rhetoric. They have even gone so far as to want to declare that carbon dioxide is not a greenhouse gas. (Moe at Whatever Works reported on this today.)

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If you remember, the GOP and all its crazier element was determined to stop Affordable Health Care a year ago. They screamed, they ranted, they raved. They prophesied the end of the world, the end of civilization as we know it, the end of democracy, death to countless people, the death of industries and on and on.

Funny thing happened on the way to its second year, not a one of those things has happened. NOT A ONE. Yet they are still predicting it will. Yes, probably true, and the sun will expand incinerating the earth. Just give it enough time. It certainly will.

Media Matters has even more great quotes. This stuff is really fun to read.

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My dad was a pretty much life-long racist. He progressed from the N word to black, but he could say black in a way that left little doubt what he truly thought. I remember on one of his last hospital stays, when he was near death that he was less concerned that one of the attending doctors attempting to help him was an African-American. He was simply grateful at that point to be alive.

Herman Cain, Republican and wanna be president, expressed relief that his surgeon was a Arab Christian and not a Muslim. This kind of ugliness cannot go unaddressed, and We are respectable negroes does just that. Read it.

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What’s on the stove? Homemade pizza.

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• Bethlehem a step too far for Palin’s Israel visit (independent.co.uk)

Wisdom Wisps

Tags

Essays, God, philosophy, theology, wisdom

I think about wisdom. Perhaps more than the average person. It’s hard to tell. It’s not something that is a great conversation item.

Some years ago, I realized that perhaps more than anything else, I’d like to be wise. Wise in the sense that people wanted to listen to me.

But I’m not wise, nor, I suspect, will I ever be so. You see, the people who I consider to be wise listen more than they speak. And I’m the antithesis of that.

I’m convinced that wise people become wise because they listen. They absorb the wisdom nuggets of others. They also read a lot. I read a good deal, but not a lot. Not as much as I should.

I consider Socrates wise. But he was wise in realizing that he didn’t know much. His wisdom was, through questioning, showing others that they didn’t know very much either. In some sense, he invented the idea of true serious thought, deeper than the surface–probing, winding, turning, backing up, circling.

It’s hard not to think of Buddhist monks and Indian yogis as wise. They sound wise. Perhaps it’s because they say things that I don’t quite get, and I equate wisdom with statements that puzzle me. So, I’m not sure.

Lots of people, mostly dead, seem wise to me. Henry David Thoreau for instance. He said two things I never forgot:

“Most men live lives  of quiet desperation.”

I think that is one of the truest and saddest things I’ve ever read. We all live encased in armor, a total mask. Presenting ourselves as “normal” when inside I suspect most of us are very unsure of most everything. And that frightens us.

“I went to the woods to live deliberately.”

I don’t think you have to go to the woods, but every hermit, every monk, everyone who is serious about their spiritual journey knows that isolation is essential, if only for a few minutes a day.

Thomas Merton was wise I believe, but perhaps in some sense what we define as wise is that which we believe is true. For the same reason I think Lakota healer and visionary, Nicholas Black Elk was wise.

The bible speaks a lot about wisdom, and addresses wisdom as female. Sophia. That’s a nice thought, wisdom being the female aspect of God. Yet, I don’t think of God as having “aspects.” I see God as an integrated whole, a singleness, not a duality or triad. These are human constructs designed to help our minds understand the transcendent quality of the Godhead. At least so I believe.

The dictionary suggests that wisdom is the ability to discern what is right and true. Philosophically it is defined as the “best use of knowledge.” The problem with this, is that again, it seems to be in the eye of the beholder.

A Cameroon proverb says of wisdom:

The heart of the wise man lies quiet like limpid water.

That seems to confirm that wise people aren’t big talkers.

We watch a television show called An Idiot Abroad. It’s produced by Ricky Gervais, a real favorite of mine, and is about the travels of his friend “Karl”. Ricky refers to Karl as a moron, an idiot. We were unsure of watching, since we surely had no desire to laugh at the goings on a person who had mental defects.

That was not the case. Karl is completely normal mentally. He’s just a simple home town boy, sent a travel across the globe. And he says rather funny, but often quite wise things.

“It’s better to be an ugly person and to look at good-looking people, than to be good looking and have to look at ugly people. “

Isn’t that true? Karl drops little pearls like that. Yet, Karl is not wise by any standard I know.

Which means that even rather simple average people can drop a wise bomb from time to time.

Sometimes people refer to a young child as a “very old soul.” I’ve never met one myself, but I assume that they mean that the child says things that are wise “beyond his years.”

The Contrarian is wise a good deal of the time, about a lot of things. He’s worth listening to. He once met a kid, still a teenager who had quit school. He found it worthless. He left home, and made his way as best he could. Most of his time he spent in the library, reading. He was probably wise then, and no doubt is even wiser today.

I know a couple of my Internet friends, one I’ve known a long time, another I’ve just “met.” Both write exquisitely. Tim, many of you know, from Straight-Friendly. The other is Paul and many of you may not yet visit his blog. You should it’s called Cafe Philos. They make me think, more than I want to sometimes.

I think wise people have an open mind. About everything. Nothing is sacred, so to speak. Everything is up for grabs. Some things, over time, are probably true, but the door is always a bit ajar, just in case something new comes along that causes a need to re-evaluate.

I’m good at this too.

Now if I could only shut up long enough to work on that listening thing. With Lent approaching, I guess perhaps I’ve found at least one of my Lenten practices. How about you?

Related Articles

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Luke: A Theological Commentary

Tags

bible, biblical studies, Book Reviews, Justo L. Gonzalez, Luke, theology

Today I review the second in the new Belief series published by Westminster John Knox Press. Luke: (Belief: A Theological Commentary) is written by Justo L. González.

Again, I give my deepest thanks to WJK for giving me the opportunity to participate in reviewing this extraordinary series.

If Plachter’s book on Mark was excellent, this  second offering by González, meets that standard in every way. While Plachter perhaps placed more emphasis on the exegetical-historical aspects of the gospel, González focuses a bit more on the theological implications of Luke to our world today.

In the end, this seemed most right to me. Quoting Gustaf Wingren:

All good interpretation of the Bible is contemporary. If it were not so, it would not be good. . . .The Bible is not on a par with the subsequent interpretation; it is above it, as the text is antecedent to the commentary. And the interpretation is always an interpretation for the time in which it is written or spoken.

There is also a distinctive flavor of liberation theology which permeates the text. This also seems logical to me, since any fair reading of Luke renders the conclusion that Luke portraits a Christ who favored the poor and the marginalized as the true inheritors of the Kingdom of God.

Paramount in González’s theology of Luke is that the evangelist emphasized above all that Jesus’ teaching was one of the “great reversal.” His teachings were indeed revolutionary to his world. His was a world of power held by Rome, of patriarchy, of Temple priests and church hierarchy. His teachings again and again told of the coming Kingdom where none of this would be so.

The poor, the marginalized, the unclean, the unwanted, the unworthy, the sinners, the children, the women–all these would find a new world in God’s Kingdom, one in which those who were served would serve, those first would be last, those most religious and pious would often find themselves judged less than the most simple of the country folk of Galilee, that most marginal of lands.

In fact, Mr. González suggests that if one were to remove all the “reversal” stories from the text, there would be few pages left.

Perhaps the most stunning theological commentary comes with González’s explanation of the Paralytic. He shows how Luke weaves a story of how the teachers and scribes, the Pharisees sat around listening to the teachings of Jesus. The friends of the lame man could not get through the crowd of the listeners to reach the Healer. The end up opening the roof to lower the man to Jesus inside.

González reflects on these “circles” about Christ that we as church construct. We sit as pious listeners before the Word. We block the way for those who come in need of healing and comfort.

“Today, just like then, there are lame people who cannot reach Jesus, because access is blocked by the numerous and tight circles, circles of religious leaders and wise and profound theologians, circles of ecclesiastical, academic, and social structures. . .”

He points out that these people are not necessarily bad, but in their zeal to be at the forefront, they (we) block the way of others. We are cautioned to open the doors to those who are marginalized outside the circle. These are the people Jesus most came to help.

Of special importance to me, are the continued references to Jesus’ table hospitality. Too many of our churches set themselves up as arbiters of who is invited to the table of Christ. Any fair reading of Luke, suggests this is a grave error.

Time and time again, as González points out, Jesus welcomed the sinner to the table, and did not require any repentance as a condition to the invitation. He teaches that we should be inviting those who cannot repay our offer, instead of those who will extend a return invitation to ourselves.

González powerfully reminds us that:

“All too often  Christians have claimed control of the Table as if it were ours, and not his. We decide whose belief is sufficiently orthodox to share Communion with us, who is sufficiently good and pure, who belongs to the right church. . . .Rather than inviting those who seem most unworthy and cannot repay us, we invite the worthy. . .”

There is example after example of gentle, and not so gentle reminders to us as readers, that the Gospel of Luke calls us to a discipleship that is not easy, and not comfortable either. Luke tells of a Jesus who comes not preaching so much an afterlife of bliss but a life offered that is truly life. A full life, filled with the Spirit, faithful to God, bearing the cross of discomfort with the joy of knowing that we are doing God’s will as did He who was his image.

At the end, Mr. González ponders the church of tomorrow. And as we see a decline in the Western Church and a rise in the church of the South, the African, and the East, we see new thinking, new interpretation. We see reflections through the eyes of the poor and the marginalized. He asks:

“. . .could it be that God’s great gift to the worldwide church today is the growing church of the poor, who are teaching us to read the Bible anew? Could it be that God is using the last, the least, the poor, and the excluded to speak once again to the church of the first and the greatest?”

Is this the final reversal? Such questions as these do we ponder as we read this most excellent book. Do buy it. You will not regret the decision.

Creation and the God of Abraham

Tags

bible, big bang, Book Reviews, cosmology, creatio ex nihilo, creation, History, philosophy, science, theology

I am deeply indebted to Cambridge University Press for their kindness in sending me a copy of Creation and the God of Abraham, edited by David B. Burrell, et al.

This is an amazing book, to put it quite simply. It is a difficult book, especially if you are not learned in science, philosophy and theology. But I promise you, if you take the time to explore and read carefully, you will come away with a wealth of new understanding and knowledge.

The question is posited: Is there a place for the doctrine of creatio ex nihilo, and with it a logical explanation of the God of Abraham that is consistent with modern philosophy, science, and theology?

Quite a question. A group of scholars, spanning all three “People of the Book” religions, and  including philosophers, scientists, historians, and theologians, set out to ponder together this foundational issue at the Vatican Observatory. Each of the participants then wrote a chapter in their area of expertise, and this book is the collection of that conference.

Editor David Burrell, calls it a “feast prepared” for the reader. And I concur.

Creatio ex nihilo is the concept of God creating out of nothing, and it has come to be foundational to all three Abrahamic faiths. Early chapters explore the history of the development of the concept. It was not self-evident from Scripture, since  it is arguable that the Bible speaks to an initial watery chaos. But it too speaks of an all-powerful deity, and over a period of one thousand years, the doctrine was fleshed out and refined.

Authors Ernan McMullin and Janet M. Soskice take us through the scriptures and philosophical development from Aristotle through Augustine, Philo and Plotinus  in the search for a fully formed theology of creation, one that comported with our understanding of a God that was both omnipotent and intensely involved with creation.

Of course, for Christianity, Aquinas becomes the standard for the theological underpinning of creatio ex nihilo. David Burrell explores this aspect. Others then look at Aquinas in the light of the Enlightenment philosophers, and from the great Jewish minds, Maimonides and Crescas.

At times, it is easy to get lost in the language used. Philosophy always has its unique definitions of words we know and think we understand. Most assuredly we must be careful. I can state that I no doubt understood a good less than was conveyed, yet I can unequivocally say with patience, I came away understanding Aristotle, Scotus, Hume and Kant better than before I started.

Jewish and especially Islamic philosophy was quite new to me, and I had more difficulty with explanations from the authors covering them. Daniel Davies section on Maimonides and Crescas was difficult but highly enlightening.

The second half series of chapters moves into the scientific realm, and cosmology. This is an area that I have some lay familiarity with, and I could follow the arguments and evidence much easier here.

One of the more interesting chapters is that by Simon Oliver, who as a theologian, explores the idea of the Trinity and motion and emanation. He continues  through to Newton and cosmology. Again, hard going, but worth the effort.

Perhaps the chapter by William R. Stoeger, S.J. was the most useful for me. His explanation of the Big Bang and cosmology was the best synopsis I’ve encountered. I am reasonably well-versed in this area yet, he explained the early Planck era in a way that truly cleared up a lot of fuzzy thinking on my part. His conclusion that creation ex nihilo and the current quantum cosmological models of creation are not alternatives creations but complementary was well shown.

His discussions of time was particularly useful and illuminating to the lay mind. Science can only take you through successive regressions in time, and this is never-ending, whereas creatio ex nihilo does posit  a God who is self-evident, self-sustaining, and  is the basic ground for all existence.

“. . .God, instead enables and empowers creation to be what it is–and both ultimately endows and supports all the processes, regularities and processes of nature with their autonomous properties and capacities for activity. Thus God as Creator does not substitute for, interfere with, countermand or micro-manage the laws of nature. They possess their own integrity and adequacy, which God establishes and respects.”¹

For me this was thrilling, for it stated what I had deduced in some manner myself. It has been my journey to examine the God defined to me with the world that exists, as I see it, and then to mesh these two things. Stoeger comes closest to voicing my conclusion, certainly with greater eloquence.

One minor error was located in Simon Conway Morris’s chapter, What is Written into Creation? He pointed out that certain elements were “essential to life.” Phosphorus was one of them. As we learned a few days ago, that is no longer true. A bacterium in a lake in California replaces phosphorus with arsenic in its DNA sequencing. Obviously this is no fault on Mr. Morris’s part.

James Pambrun’s discussion about free will and sin were deeply important and I thought well explained and convincing. I found Thomas E. Tracy’s contribution wonderfully beautiful in its concepts. God’s act of creating is at once but never-ending, since he continually acts “through” his creation, under the concept of double agency.

Of course, I am only setting out the barest of understanding of these issues. All these authors are experts in the field they are addressing. Finally we circle back to Aquinas:

In the life of Christ, God learns as a human being in order to grant human beings divine sight. In the grace of the Spirit, human beings receive the sight of God through learning to see themselves as God sees them.²

For Aquinas, God is the ultimate scientist.

This is an expensive book. It is a difficult book for those unschooled in these disciplines. But, it is a beautiful, rich feast for those willing to explore. You will learn many things I promise you, and if you too desire to know God, much will be found here to ponder.

_____

¹ pg. 173

² pg.  242

Driving Off the Cliff

Tags

DADT, Democrats, evolution, fundamentalists, GOP, life, McCain, Obama, Pauline theology, religious right, science, scientific integrity, tax cuts, theology

As we speak, the Senate is voting on two tax bills. Both are failing of course, since the GOP is holding tough with its demand that the rich get even richer. They take care of their own.

Sadly, this might have turned out differently had the White House not waved the white flag almost immediately after the midterm elections. Emboldened, the GOP knows that it cannot really fail since the President apparently doesn’t have the stomach to do as the American people ask: actually fulfill a campaign promise to end the tax cuts for the rich.

As we have said before, Obama can win this if he holds the line and lets the GOP argue that it is better to increase the deficit by 4 trillion in order to protect the buying power of the likes of Paris Hilton and as Think Progress suggested LeBron James. Where are the jobs after 10 years of tax cuts for the rich? I ask ya?

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One of the things we expected from this Administration, was scientific integrity returned as the standard of doing business. Obama promised that scientists would be free to do their work and report their findings without being edited. A policy statement was authorized. To date, no such policy has been forthcoming, and a significant number of scientists in the FDA and AG, report being urged to exclude or alter information. Read about it at New Scientist.

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For a different prospective on DADT: The Reaction asks: What do Bulgaria, Jordan, Poland, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and the US have in common? Go read the article and see. Oh oh, yes, we do have friends in low places.

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Ethics Daily reports that a slew of right-wing Christians leaders met a couple of months ago at a Dallas airport to work out how to get rid of Obama and install a right-wing friendly president in the Oval office. Scary rundown of names.  (H/T to Ahab at Republic of Gilead.

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Don’t know if you caught the big news from NASA. Life as we know it, has well, you know, C H A N G E D. It’s a subtle point, but once “gotten” its like huge. It’s like Star Trek! Okay, thoroughly confused? Let me ‘splain. (Remember I told you a couple of years ago, that most anything can be explained or understood via an episode from Star Trek?)

The Enterprise went to investigate a mining colony on a dead planet. Miners were turning up dead. What they discovered was that the planet was not dead, but a silicon-based life form was doing fine there, except that miners were killing the “eggs” of the mother Horta.

Once they made contact, they patched up the wounded Horta with some cement which worked just fine, and everybody got along famously.

The point is, that we have so far only identified life as being carbon based. And that requires a number of other elements to be viable. One of those elements is phosphorus. Trust me on this, I just read it in a book I’ll be reviewing for you next week.

Anyway, in a lake in California Mono, to be specific, a microbe has been found that doesn’t have any phosphorus in its DNA. Rather it has arsenic, yes you heard that right. It’s a bacterium that is different from any life form on this planet. No idea how it got here either.

What this means is that when we turn on the telescopes and scan for the stuff we think means life, we can’t just stop at the carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, sulphur, nitrogen and phosphorus, but must also scan for arsenic. What is life just got a whole lot broader. The possibilities are well, huge.

I feel all warm and cozy now, sure that surely we are not alone. A little alien may be among us, or perhaps even in our carbon based environment, other types of life can arise. Who knows? Science is wetting its pants and agog with excitement. But they get excited about a new species of newt too.   (Note the link is to the post of Dec. 2–I have loads of trouble with this reader feed)

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See, there are theologians and biblical scholars. And then there are wannabes. I’m one of those. But in this category, theology,  there are Wannabes and wannabees. I’m the latter. John is the former. If you are feeling all theology-y, then drop over and read what John has to say about how Paul acquired his theology on the road to Damascus. (pssst. it probably didn’t happen there, since Luke is probably not giving a historically accurate account of Paul’s travels here, but it assuredly happened to Paul somewhere!)

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If’n you want to see a psychoanalysis of Mr.’s McCain and Obama, then Crooks and Liars is your choice. Lots of interesting commentary from varied sources, make these two almost equally delusional.

***

We got about two solid inches of snow. We can get out. We tidied up the bird feeder and put the “open” sign up. The dogs are sleeping. The cats are sleeping. I’m being a good wife and cooking liver ‘n onions for my husband. Don’t mind eating it, just hate fixin’ it. Going to church tomorrow. Lookin’ for some college football to watch. Havin’ ham for Christmas. Reading a lot these days, publishers have been kind. That is a tour of my synapses, known as roamin’ round the noggin.

Laters.

Related Articles

• Keith Olbermann Reports On Alien Life Discovery, Totally Pwns NASA in Star Trek Knowledge (mediaite.com)
• NASA’s Press Conference On Alien Life (geekologie.com)

Jesus Was Just Wondering

Tags

Catholic, Christianity, faith traditions, progressives, right wing evangelicals, social justice issues, theology

I assume that Jesus understands us better than we understand him. At least I hope that’s true. Otherwise, . . . well, I’d rather not think about it.

Still, I imagine sometimes that even Jesus picks up the phone after watching his super HD TV, dialed in on Fox or the Chinese equivalent for state-supported “news.” Dialing 4-6-3 (G O D), I over-hear this:

“Yo, Dad, how goes it? Say, have you been watching channel 3845? (E V I L)

“No?”

“Well, let me tell you and maybe you can explain why. . . .”

I figure a lot of stuff down here just befuddles even Jesus.

I read the other day that Marko Rubio was a Catholic but went to a Baptist church most of the time. That seems weird. Then I read that the NOM’s (National Organization for Marriage) main man, Brian Brown, is a former Quaker turned Catholic. That seems even weirder.

I noted, when I was a frequenter of Catholic Answers Forum, that some of the most vociferous “orthodox” types were former Baptists and Seven-Day Adventists. Now converts are more orthodox than the mainstream, that’s clear, but this goes beyond being orthodox, this goes to a self-righteously expressed proclamation against the poor, gays, women, and other marginalized groups.  I daresay most of them don’t like the Catholic position regarding immigration one bit. They are for war and for the death penalty. They consider social justice issues the heresy of the modernist lefty Cafeteria Catholic.

The only difference between themselves and the self-styled unchurched interpreter of “what the bible says,” is that  these Catholics mine the bible and encyclicals and Vatican documents for sentences and paragraphs to justify their arguments.

Frankly, what we find is that the right-wing of the Roman Church is most simpatico with the general home of fundamentalists–Southern Baptists. It seems that those who are “teaching” these new converts turn a blind eye mostly to their propensity to embrace biblical literalism and a failure to embrace things like universal health care, global warming, and even evolution. It seems more, that anyone who will sign on the dotted line, is okay. Just don’t ask too many questions.

I don’t know how other denominations are doing with this. I know the The Episcopal Church has been painfully working through a growing split between the left and right. And Presbyterians, Lutherans, and Methodists all have, are, or will be, doing the same.

The truth is, that most members in all these denominations are moderates. Most that leave their churches do so for no church, or another,  because they are tired of the warring they see.

I frequent NCR a lot, and read a significant number of the articles there. The comments are always the same, mostly supportive of the article or writer, but always with a few who warn of dire consequences if we continue to listen to voices of the progressive left. The Church is either on the perfectly right track and needs to go further, or is dangerously off track and in need of a rescue if it is to survive.

Indeed, many on the far right of the Roman church openly wish that we progressives would leave, even if it means that their church is drastically reduced in numbers. Is this true of other denominations? I have no clue. But I wonder.

Is it the right who cannot stomach “others” in their midst because it makes them uncomfortable in their well-ordered theology? Or is it the left that finds the right an unacceptable drag on the business of getting on with the Kingdom’s agenda of feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting the imprisoned? It’s hard to know.

Are there as many “new” conservative churches as there are “new” Catholic denominations. or new Methodists? Are well equally running away from each other?

If we are, they we are both to blame. This hardly comports with “loving neighbor” as Jesus for saw it. I mean Jesus scandalized his world by consistently eating and drinking with all the “wrong” people, all the “others” of his land.

It seems to me that it’s not supposed to be easy. If it were, humans would have realized the efficacy of it long ago and done it. It’s hard to work with those who continually threaten to throw a monkey wrench into the works. Ask any congress person and they will be happy to tell you about gridlock.

Compromise forces us to release our own desires and focus on incremental progress as being marginally better than no progress at all. Not something to throw a party about, but something to feel some satisfaction about.

Are there those in your congregations whom you find embarrassing for their views? How do you deal with them? I know that these Catholics whose political and social views I frankly abhor, are most difficult for me to embrace even in prayer.

 I frankly cringe when I read that some awful hatemongering right-winger like Bill Donahue or Brian Brown is a Catholic. They model Catholicism to an unknowing spectrum of America and the world. A lousy model, but a model nonetheless.

Do you find some “spokespeople” in your faith tradition embarrassing? Do they make you cringe? If you don’t, then need you ask if you are in a tradition that has become lazily easy for you? Is that bad?

I think Jesus wants to know what we think. Have you talked to him lately? I think he wonders about us, and perhaps it means we should wonder about ourselves.

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