Movie Camp at Nordeast: Ethical, Cultural Training can be Fun by Dean J. Seal
This week had our second movie camp of the summer, and it was a treat. I used to look down on the task of teaching kids, because I wanted to work in the realm of grown up ideas. But I was wrong to think you can't do both. And as every teacher knows, the pleasure of the work is what the teacher get to learn. And when dealing n the classics, it is always wise to review them on occasion so that you remember what they are saying.
Movie camp is an idea I stole from my wife Kirsten. She started doing movie camps when our kid was in a home school environment. Kids love to make movies, and Kirsten gave them free reign. We still do a secular one every year, and the titles of the two films were "Don't Drink the Windex" and "Volcano Espionage!" Guess which one was done by Boys and which is done by Girls.
The idea here is to gather the kids together (ages 8-13) and do theater exercises to warm them up and get them comfortable. Then after lunch and some running around on the conveniently located playground, I read them several parables. Then they pick one or two and re-write them to make them contemporary. By putting the stories into their own time, they learn that the lessons of the stories are also for their own time. It's one method of learning about the Bible in a way that involves a lot of running around, putting together costumes, learning how to talk like Arnold Schwatzenegger, and going in front of the camera.
We settled on The Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37) , with a touch of the Tax Collector and the Pharisee (Luke 18:9-14). The Tax Collector, you may (or may not) recall, felt bad about what he did and who he was. The Pharisee was proud, boastful about how good he was. We made the Pharisee one of the people who walks by the robbery victim, and we made the Austrian-born Governor of California the other miscreant who would not stop; no other governors stand out enough. The Tax Collector was recast as a Foreclosure Expert.
The Good Samaritan was made a homeless person. She brings the robbery victim to a nice hotel. After two days, the Governor and the Foreclosure Expert come through the lobby. The Expert is guilt stricken, and returns the Deed to the Homeless Person, and gives her money from his last three foreclosures. This adds a Zachaeus element to the closing, which satisfies everyone's sense of justice.
What do the kids learn besides a couplke of Bible stories? Mario Puzo, author of The Godfather, said "All writing is re-writing." In that sense, these classes give kids an essential skill, experience and confidence in the process of writing. Another secular benefit is simple cultural literacy. Stories like The Good Samaritan are at the center of the dominant culture, Christianity. There is also ethical instruction, the surprise that a stranger may be more ethical than the rich and powerful. And then there is the religious instruction aspect: this is how jesus taught. He taught in metaphor, which means there doesn't have to actually be a good Samaritan to make the point of the story. This teaches them to discern the difference between literal and figurative, which should be a remedial task when anyone looks at the content of the Bible.
Two of our students were from a family that does not go to church. I explained thatthte stories are taught in the mode of Aesop's Fables, the Greek stories which carried morals of that tradition. Then we weren't a proselytizing class that would be about selling smething to the kids. It makes the stories of value to anyone, no matter what your tradition is.
To me, it is obvious that the rich and powerful have less morality than the poor, but most people are brought up in America to believe the opposite. They believe that the rich are virtuous and that the wealth 9s an indicator of God's pleasure. They believe the poor are being punished for something- otherwise they would not be poor. They think people are poor because they are lazy, and others are rich because they work hard. All we need to do now is look at Bernie Madoff, Gov. Spitzer, Gov. Sandford, and any number of other headline grabbers to understand that this is not self-evident; it also makes me think the ones who are caught are just the tip of the ethical iceberg. And it shows that Christianity, practiced the way Jesus taught it, is counter to American culture. It is indeed counter-cultural, and Un-American to follow Jesus.
Comparative religion is not taught in our schools, which makes our kids less able to understand other faiths, and also to understand their own. Former President Jimmy Carter just left the Southern Baptist Convention because they still refuse to ordain women; but it's more than that. They teach that women are to be subordinate to men, which leads women to believe their faith requires them to stay with battering husbands. A faith misunderstood can be a powerful force of destruction. As Stevie Wonder put it, "You believe in things you don't understand, and you suffer."
This is why the Movie Camps are not just a nice way for kids to spend a summer day; it is part of a core mission of the Church, our mission to teach our kids to think, and to show them how the Bible can help them to reach a moral and ethical structure of their own, to inform them in the decisions they make for the rest of their lives.
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
The more I see the Less I Know by Dean J. Seal
The More I see the Less I Know, by Dean J. Seal
There's a catchy tune on the radio, and all i can remember is half the chorus which goes, "...every where I go/ the more I see the less I know." (if you know who made that song, drop me a line). This comes to mind because I saw a friend of mine, Peter, at my home church, and he said he passed a test in actuarial work because there isn't anything happening for him in physics. This caught my attention.
I said, "Hey, i was listening to a radio show about the Hubble Telescope, and they said it had changed everything about how we (us, the deep and powerful scientist/philosophers of the universe) how we thought about the universe. What can you tell me?"
A couple things you have to know about the Hubble. It is up there because the telescope in it isn't hindered by our atmosphere. It is in space and can look into space. Second, if it is looking at a star ten million light years away, then what it sees happened ten million years ago. So that means the farther it sees, the farther into the past we can see- that means the closer to the Beginning of Time we can see. Okay? That's pretty amazing on the face of it., Now. What do we get from actually looking in it?
Peter spoke in the collective We of people who actually know what they are talking about. "First off," he said politely to me, "we used to think that the universe started in a big bang, a big explosion that started in one spot and everything is now moving away from everything else at a uniform speed that is gradually slowing. We don't think that anymore. It turns out things are in clumps, and we don't know why, and they are moving at different rates, and we don't know why, and they are actually moving away from each other at a faster and faster speed."
"Clumps?" That's as far as I got.
""Clumps," said Peter in a warm professional tone. He understood that I knew this was something amazing to not know about.
I moved on. "What about dark matter? I remember reading that Einstein was working on a theory that explained it, and he threw it aside because it didn't make sense."
"Well, what is was was Dark Energy, not matter, and he was on the trail, and he said giving up on that was the biggest mistake of his life. So, Dark Energy is something we didn't know about because we can't really see it."
"It's Dark." I added, feeling pretty smart.
"Yep," said Peter. " We can learn about stars because we can see them. So iDark Energy all over the place, and we really don't know much about that either."
Peter said more, and I'm not sure I got this right either, but I just wanted to lay out a small list of astonishments to make my point. There used to be a time when scientists all thought they had most things figured out, that there wasn't a god because we could explain everything, and that sooner or later everyone would give up this stupid nonsense of believing in supernatural superstitions. God was Dead, they said.
So let's go in the other direction. Molecules are made of atoms; atoms are made of a nucleus plus protons and neutrons. Protons are made up of up quarks or down quarks; up quarks are held together in a gluon field (yes, it comes from the word glue) of vector guage bosons that mediate strong color charges of the QCD... let's just stop here, because we are now talking about things that we cannot actually see or detect, but we can guestimate they exist because of the effect they have on the things we can see.
In other words, whichever direction you go, into the infinate extra-terrestial universe or into the infinate sub-atomic universe, The More We See the Less We Know. It has become, in our lifetimes, an immutable fact of science. The universe, like God and like a human soul, is unknowable.
There is a Scottish Presbyterian Minister named Philip Newell, who is bringing people back to a Celtic spiritality (Keltic, phonetically) and he says we are not so much made By God as we are made Of God. We are made in God's image, of the stardust of the universe. God is energy and matter, as are we and the universe is, and what we are going through is the change from one to the other ad infinitum.
What can we take home from this excercise?
First, no one can pin down what God is, and anyone who says they can should be left alone at the bar as qucikly as possible.
Second, if we can't define God, then we can't define who someone else's God is.
Third, God is all, God is one, God is the universe. This is not in conflict with a loving God. It actually explains a lot. Like, where was God during the Holocaust? God was everywhere in the Holocaust, feeling the pain and suffering of every man, woman and child. That means God feels our pain too, and we are not alone in our pain. We are not too small for God to know us. That makes God's love accessible.
Fourth, if we cannot define God, that does not mean God doesn't exist. We cannot define gluons yet, but we have pretty good notes on its existance. We cannot define dark energy yet, but we can begin to talk about it. And essentially, the spiritual experience is one to be experienced individually. We are neither too great or too small to each have a different experience.
Then where is relgion? Religio is Latin for coming together, and when you come together in a religion it is because you share enough of your beliefs that you can work together; for a wprship service,. or a service work project, or to pray, whatever you can agree on. And it does not mean you all have the same experience or believe the same thing. It means you are sharing the experience of a spiritual moment, and you find it healing, and bonding, and uplifting, beyond our own mortality.
And that means the Great Mystery is going to remain mysterious. And the more of it we experience, the more mysterious it gets.
There's a catchy tune on the radio, and all i can remember is half the chorus which goes, "...every where I go/ the more I see the less I know." (if you know who made that song, drop me a line). This comes to mind because I saw a friend of mine, Peter, at my home church, and he said he passed a test in actuarial work because there isn't anything happening for him in physics. This caught my attention.
I said, "Hey, i was listening to a radio show about the Hubble Telescope, and they said it had changed everything about how we (us, the deep and powerful scientist/philosophers of the universe) how we thought about the universe. What can you tell me?"
A couple things you have to know about the Hubble. It is up there because the telescope in it isn't hindered by our atmosphere. It is in space and can look into space. Second, if it is looking at a star ten million light years away, then what it sees happened ten million years ago. So that means the farther it sees, the farther into the past we can see- that means the closer to the Beginning of Time we can see. Okay? That's pretty amazing on the face of it., Now. What do we get from actually looking in it?
Peter spoke in the collective We of people who actually know what they are talking about. "First off," he said politely to me, "we used to think that the universe started in a big bang, a big explosion that started in one spot and everything is now moving away from everything else at a uniform speed that is gradually slowing. We don't think that anymore. It turns out things are in clumps, and we don't know why, and they are moving at different rates, and we don't know why, and they are actually moving away from each other at a faster and faster speed."
"Clumps?" That's as far as I got.
""Clumps," said Peter in a warm professional tone. He understood that I knew this was something amazing to not know about.
I moved on. "What about dark matter? I remember reading that Einstein was working on a theory that explained it, and he threw it aside because it didn't make sense."
"Well, what is was was Dark Energy, not matter, and he was on the trail, and he said giving up on that was the biggest mistake of his life. So, Dark Energy is something we didn't know about because we can't really see it."
"It's Dark." I added, feeling pretty smart.
"Yep," said Peter. " We can learn about stars because we can see them. So iDark Energy all over the place, and we really don't know much about that either."
Peter said more, and I'm not sure I got this right either, but I just wanted to lay out a small list of astonishments to make my point. There used to be a time when scientists all thought they had most things figured out, that there wasn't a god because we could explain everything, and that sooner or later everyone would give up this stupid nonsense of believing in supernatural superstitions. God was Dead, they said.
So let's go in the other direction. Molecules are made of atoms; atoms are made of a nucleus plus protons and neutrons. Protons are made up of up quarks or down quarks; up quarks are held together in a gluon field (yes, it comes from the word glue) of vector guage bosons that mediate strong color charges of the QCD... let's just stop here, because we are now talking about things that we cannot actually see or detect, but we can guestimate they exist because of the effect they have on the things we can see.
In other words, whichever direction you go, into the infinate extra-terrestial universe or into the infinate sub-atomic universe, The More We See the Less We Know. It has become, in our lifetimes, an immutable fact of science. The universe, like God and like a human soul, is unknowable.
There is a Scottish Presbyterian Minister named Philip Newell, who is bringing people back to a Celtic spiritality (Keltic, phonetically) and he says we are not so much made By God as we are made Of God. We are made in God's image, of the stardust of the universe. God is energy and matter, as are we and the universe is, and what we are going through is the change from one to the other ad infinitum.
What can we take home from this excercise?
First, no one can pin down what God is, and anyone who says they can should be left alone at the bar as qucikly as possible.
Second, if we can't define God, then we can't define who someone else's God is.
Third, God is all, God is one, God is the universe. This is not in conflict with a loving God. It actually explains a lot. Like, where was God during the Holocaust? God was everywhere in the Holocaust, feeling the pain and suffering of every man, woman and child. That means God feels our pain too, and we are not alone in our pain. We are not too small for God to know us. That makes God's love accessible.
Fourth, if we cannot define God, that does not mean God doesn't exist. We cannot define gluons yet, but we have pretty good notes on its existance. We cannot define dark energy yet, but we can begin to talk about it. And essentially, the spiritual experience is one to be experienced individually. We are neither too great or too small to each have a different experience.
Then where is relgion? Religio is Latin for coming together, and when you come together in a religion it is because you share enough of your beliefs that you can work together; for a wprship service,. or a service work project, or to pray, whatever you can agree on. And it does not mean you all have the same experience or believe the same thing. It means you are sharing the experience of a spiritual moment, and you find it healing, and bonding, and uplifting, beyond our own mortality.
And that means the Great Mystery is going to remain mysterious. And the more of it we experience, the more mysterious it gets.
Wh We Aren't Catholic
Why We aren't Catholic. by Dean J. Seal
Growing up Lutheran, I remember learning two absolutes about the faith. First, We Are Not Catholic. Second, you can ask any Lutheran for a ride to the airport because cabs are so darned expensive and a waste of money.
Luther did not address the second Law of Lutheranism, but he spent a lot of energy defining what he did not like about the Catholic Church, and as a practicing Presbylutheran, I still agree with him.
It boils down to faith, and I want to assure you this is not a finely sharpened discussion of splitting hairs. Remember,. Luther was an Augustinian Monk, a Catholic professor famous for his exciting lectures, so this was his daily bread and butter. He practiced also in a church, and one day it came to his attention that some Catholic representatives of the Pope were selling indulgences. This meant that one could pay only to the church for the redemption of sins. You could even pay for someone already dead. It was kind of like bail or a fine. He went postal- actually that would be apoplectic- because then the power to be forgiven was in the hands of humans, and he believed that only God can forgive. He notified the authorities that they had it wrong.
The Catholic Church responded, however, with the rebuttal that Luther had it wrong. The nature of Faith (here it comes) in the Catholic Tradition is that faith is the first step to salvation, that it is the intellectual assent to he truth of the church- that what the church teaches is true, and you take it on faith. Also, this in itself is Not Sufficient; you have to follow it with works of love. The goal is to become "perfected" and while sin makes this hard, it is not impossible. Doing good works and receiving the sacraments makes it happen.
Communion is the sacrament most closely associated with the ongoing perfection process, because it is medicinal. Sacraments bring grace to us, as if we were taking medicine, and it empowers us to resist sine, giving us strength and discipline because we have the power of the holy spirit put into us by this medicine. That is how God gives us grace (unconditional love). Grace changes you from being self centered and turns you out and makes you free to serve God and neighbor.
To Luther, however, this was anything but conditional. Faith is the connection between humans and God. He said if you believed this, you are deceiving yourself. We will never be perfect, . Monks and Nuns love themselves first and only care about being saved themselves. Grace and merit are antithetical. No one deserves God's love, and all the good works in the world don't make you perfect.
Luther (and John Calvin, a generation later) defined grace not as a supernatural power communicated through sacraments. It refers soley to God's love as mercy and forgiveness. Faith, then is a trust we have in the heart of God's mercy, not an intellectual assent to the church's teachings. And this is the Good News, the Gospel, that Jesus brings to us: The news that God forgives. Hence you are saved whether you know it or not, whether you recognize it or not. But if you do recognize it, then you are free to act on it in gratitude. Then good works are not tainted as some admission fee to an afterlife; they are given freely from the heart.
Now, here's a p[art that many people miss, especially many ministers. Jesus did not die on the cross to win our forgiveness; God forgives freely through grace, unconditional love. Jesus is there to show that God ha forgiven us. God gives us the righteousness of the Christ, and all we have to do is claim it, even though it is not our own. And without forgiveness, we can be destroyed by guilt.
We can see how this works out in the real world. First, the Catholic Church has only celibate men as priests. This is a teaching of the church hat was not the case int he early church- you can cite the precedent that Peter's mother in law was cured by Jesus as one of his first miracles, so the first "pope" was married. This celibacy rule has many problems, but let's look at two. First, they don't have enough to do communion to people who need it because of the shortage of priests. So the priests bless the substance that they sue for bread (wafers etc.) and then send it out to authorized lay people. This apparently suffices to transfer the power of the Holy Spirit. In my mind it brings up the old saw about the Catholic church: it has more rules than anyone, and it has more ways around those rules than anyone.
The second problem is, of course, the sex scandals of pedophilia. Mel Gibson, the anti-semitic conservative Catholic Movie Star, blamed Vatican 2 in 1962 for the sudden perversion of the priests; but there's plenty of historical evidence that it goes way back. The latest Irish scandals about orphanages goes back several decades, and Catholic boarding schools for native American children stolen from their homes were routinely raped by priests, boys and girls. This went on for years and years. Then when it got tot he general population, the sin of the church was to forgive these men and move them to another place, under the theological assumption that they had been "perfected" by a round of confession, absolution and communion. Transfered to another parish that was not informed of the past history of the pedophile, they raped again. I am not alone in the belief that if women were priests, those guys would have never been allowed to be with children again after the first episode.
But if the core of your belief is that the church is the focus of faith, you have no choice but to follow the rules. Many of those who accused the priests were spat upon and mocked by true believers who understood that the church was being attacked, because for them, the church itself was holy, the focus of their faith, and therefore the priests could do no wrong, and were already so close to sainthood that only the minions of satan could accuse them of something so horrible.
Please keep a couple things in mind as I wade through this. The Catholic Church has some amazing and wonderful things about it. When it works, it is a whirling cascade of love. Several of its institutions have long-standing deeply committed staffs that live out the love gospel for those who cannot fend for themselves. I am not throwing the Baby Jesus out with the bath water.
But we all have to be a part of the solution here. The Catholic church is Christian, and as Lutherans and presbyterians, we pray for the holy catholic church, small c, every time we say the Apostle's creed. In that sense we are part of that church, and can criticize it and encourage it to change. It is not "anti-Catholic" to criticize something you are a part of. As Calvin was a Lutheran, and as Luther was a Catholic, so we are all part of the church universal. We have different understandings of the practice of the faith, even as we have different definitions of what faith is.
Growing up Lutheran, I remember learning two absolutes about the faith. First, We Are Not Catholic. Second, you can ask any Lutheran for a ride to the airport because cabs are so darned expensive and a waste of money.
Luther did not address the second Law of Lutheranism, but he spent a lot of energy defining what he did not like about the Catholic Church, and as a practicing Presbylutheran, I still agree with him.
It boils down to faith, and I want to assure you this is not a finely sharpened discussion of splitting hairs. Remember,. Luther was an Augustinian Monk, a Catholic professor famous for his exciting lectures, so this was his daily bread and butter. He practiced also in a church, and one day it came to his attention that some Catholic representatives of the Pope were selling indulgences. This meant that one could pay only to the church for the redemption of sins. You could even pay for someone already dead. It was kind of like bail or a fine. He went postal- actually that would be apoplectic- because then the power to be forgiven was in the hands of humans, and he believed that only God can forgive. He notified the authorities that they had it wrong.
The Catholic Church responded, however, with the rebuttal that Luther had it wrong. The nature of Faith (here it comes) in the Catholic Tradition is that faith is the first step to salvation, that it is the intellectual assent to he truth of the church- that what the church teaches is true, and you take it on faith. Also, this in itself is Not Sufficient; you have to follow it with works of love. The goal is to become "perfected" and while sin makes this hard, it is not impossible. Doing good works and receiving the sacraments makes it happen.
Communion is the sacrament most closely associated with the ongoing perfection process, because it is medicinal. Sacraments bring grace to us, as if we were taking medicine, and it empowers us to resist sine, giving us strength and discipline because we have the power of the holy spirit put into us by this medicine. That is how God gives us grace (unconditional love). Grace changes you from being self centered and turns you out and makes you free to serve God and neighbor.
To Luther, however, this was anything but conditional. Faith is the connection between humans and God. He said if you believed this, you are deceiving yourself. We will never be perfect, . Monks and Nuns love themselves first and only care about being saved themselves. Grace and merit are antithetical. No one deserves God's love, and all the good works in the world don't make you perfect.
Luther (and John Calvin, a generation later) defined grace not as a supernatural power communicated through sacraments. It refers soley to God's love as mercy and forgiveness. Faith, then is a trust we have in the heart of God's mercy, not an intellectual assent to the church's teachings. And this is the Good News, the Gospel, that Jesus brings to us: The news that God forgives. Hence you are saved whether you know it or not, whether you recognize it or not. But if you do recognize it, then you are free to act on it in gratitude. Then good works are not tainted as some admission fee to an afterlife; they are given freely from the heart.
Now, here's a p[art that many people miss, especially many ministers. Jesus did not die on the cross to win our forgiveness; God forgives freely through grace, unconditional love. Jesus is there to show that God ha forgiven us. God gives us the righteousness of the Christ, and all we have to do is claim it, even though it is not our own. And without forgiveness, we can be destroyed by guilt.
We can see how this works out in the real world. First, the Catholic Church has only celibate men as priests. This is a teaching of the church hat was not the case int he early church- you can cite the precedent that Peter's mother in law was cured by Jesus as one of his first miracles, so the first "pope" was married. This celibacy rule has many problems, but let's look at two. First, they don't have enough to do communion to people who need it because of the shortage of priests. So the priests bless the substance that they sue for bread (wafers etc.) and then send it out to authorized lay people. This apparently suffices to transfer the power of the Holy Spirit. In my mind it brings up the old saw about the Catholic church: it has more rules than anyone, and it has more ways around those rules than anyone.
The second problem is, of course, the sex scandals of pedophilia. Mel Gibson, the anti-semitic conservative Catholic Movie Star, blamed Vatican 2 in 1962 for the sudden perversion of the priests; but there's plenty of historical evidence that it goes way back. The latest Irish scandals about orphanages goes back several decades, and Catholic boarding schools for native American children stolen from their homes were routinely raped by priests, boys and girls. This went on for years and years. Then when it got tot he general population, the sin of the church was to forgive these men and move them to another place, under the theological assumption that they had been "perfected" by a round of confession, absolution and communion. Transfered to another parish that was not informed of the past history of the pedophile, they raped again. I am not alone in the belief that if women were priests, those guys would have never been allowed to be with children again after the first episode.
But if the core of your belief is that the church is the focus of faith, you have no choice but to follow the rules. Many of those who accused the priests were spat upon and mocked by true believers who understood that the church was being attacked, because for them, the church itself was holy, the focus of their faith, and therefore the priests could do no wrong, and were already so close to sainthood that only the minions of satan could accuse them of something so horrible.
Please keep a couple things in mind as I wade through this. The Catholic Church has some amazing and wonderful things about it. When it works, it is a whirling cascade of love. Several of its institutions have long-standing deeply committed staffs that live out the love gospel for those who cannot fend for themselves. I am not throwing the Baby Jesus out with the bath water.
But we all have to be a part of the solution here. The Catholic church is Christian, and as Lutherans and presbyterians, we pray for the holy catholic church, small c, every time we say the Apostle's creed. In that sense we are part of that church, and can criticize it and encourage it to change. It is not "anti-Catholic" to criticize something you are a part of. As Calvin was a Lutheran, and as Luther was a Catholic, so we are all part of the church universal. We have different understandings of the practice of the faith, even as we have different definitions of what faith is.
Calvin at 500
Calvin at 500 by Dean J. Seal
John Calvin is famous for many things, like predestination, the Total depravity of humans, and putting a guy in jail for smiling at a baptism. Modern Calvinists don’t actually follow (or do) any of those three things, but we are still stuck explaining them. Allow me to explain.
First, you should know I grew up a Norwegian Lutheran (not Swedish or German, for God’s sake). That’s a pretty dour line of theology right there. After several years of abstinence, an agnostic atheism, my wife and I decided we wanted some sort of spirituality to counter the overwhelming materialism and selfishness of Manhattan. We ended up at a Presbyterian church because of the great preaching and the emphasis on education.
Here’s the kind of funny spiritual cultural joke: Homer Simpson’s church is Prebsylutheran.
So anyway, you might say, what’s the dif? We’re all on the same team, aren’t we? Don’t we read the same Bible and quote the same guy and have Christmas on the same day?
Well, yes and no. And here we start looking at the hair-splitting we call theology, or the search for meaning in the interpretation of these texts.
I’ll try to be brief, but here’s a rundown to make it complicated before it gets easy. Luther was a Catholic, an Augustinian monk who wanted to reform the church, not start a new branch. Calvin was a Lutheran, and also a lawyer, and in setting out to define the methodology of the church he disagreed with a little of what Luther said, which the Lutherans saw as too far gone. Consequently, Calvin’s theology is called Reformed, even though Luther started the Reformation, because he was reforming the reformation thoughts of Luther.
Let’s go deeper before we come back up. The Roman Catholic Church likes to frown on the Lutherans for breaking up the church, but in fact the first schism in the church was between the Roman Church and the Orthodox Church. Originally, the Orthodox churches had one patriarch for each major city, and they met on occasion t come to some consensus about how things should run. As Constantine was the Roman Emperor who made the empire Christian, and he moved the capitol to Constantinople (where else?), Roman bishops were a little ticked off. They decided that Rome had been the center of the world for several centuries, that Paul and Peter died there, and that they should be first among equals- in fact the Bishop of Rome should be calling the shots. That was the first break, when the rest of the patriarchs told them no dice.
Remember this; the Pope is still called the Bishop of Rome. He is also called the Pontiff, which comes from pontifex, which was the high priest of the Roman pagan gods who were responsible for the power of the Empire. So the Catholic power structure was born, in rebellion to the other churches, and it set itself up on a model based n the Roman army. That accounts for the structure and the authoritarian modus operendi.
Why do i bring this up? Because it is key to the Roman Catholic understanding of Faith. On the Catholic Church, faith is defined as assenting to the church’s teaching. This is very much specific to the existence of a structure, in understanding the church as the Body of Christ on Earth, and thier teaching, big surprise here, supports this idea.
The Lutheran (and Presbyterian) definition of faith is trust that God is merciful to sinners. This is a much more direct relationship to God for us humans. We don’t have the church as a mediator.
How do these differences work themselves out? Let’s start with Luther’s other revolution; he translated the New Testament into German, so that anyone could read it. The Catholics were against that, and stayed against it up until very recent times. Thier idea was that the Bible is easily misinterpreted, that the individual would get it wrong, and as a friend of mine put it, the priest was saying, “Put that down! Shut that book! I’ll tell you what you need to know!” It was the church’s job to teach, and it was the human’s job to have faith that God would be teaching through the church.
Luther thought this was wrong, because the church made so many mistakes. The selling of indulgences, where you can get remission from sin by paying the church money as a penance, was what galled Luther to the breaking point (the Romans are bringing that back, by the way). The Roman Catholic Church was using that money to build St. Peter’s Cathedral, the one where the Pope says mass and makes his speeches, where the Sistine Chapel is. The next time you see that building and that art, as beautiful as it is, remember they paid the price with the fracturing of Western Christianity.
Luther came back with the idea that it was faith alone, not the church, which gives us redemption and salvation. It’s the Good News, the Good Spell, the Gospel, that tells us of the love and mercy of the Creator God.
I’ll get farther into the differences between Lutheran theology and Catholic theology in the next blog. We need to touch on Calvin before his birthday week is up. Forgive me for dramatically oversimplifying; remember Luther told us to “sin bravely” knowing that God is merciful. Wikipedia’s summation suffices here:
We may summarize the three uses [according to Luther] as follows:
1 To restrain external evil...
2 To show us our sin (pedagogical, theological, ...or convicting use [or as a] mirror).
3 To show us God's character and will as a rule and guide to holy living, empowered by the Gospel alone (didactic use) or (rule).
Reformed view
In his Institutes of the Christian Religion, the Reformer John Calvin likewise distinguished three uses in the Law. Calvin wrote: "That the whole matter may be made clearer, let us take a succinct view of the office and use of the Moral Law. Now this office and use seems to me to consist of three parts."
1 By "exhibiting the righteousness of God, — in other words, the righteousness which alone is acceptable to God, — it admonishes every one of his own unrighteousness,... convicts, and finally condemns him."
2 It acts "by means of its fearful denunciations and the consequent dread of punishment, to curb those who, unless forced, have no regard for rectitude and justice."
3 "The third use of the Law. . .has respect to believers in whose hearts the Spirit of God already flourishes and reigns. . . . For it is the best instrument for enabling them daily to learn with greater truth and certainty what that will of the Lord is which they aspire to follow, and to confirm them in this knowledge. . ."
Lutherans freaked about point number 3, that one could use the Bible to guide one’s actions. To Lutherans, this was unknowable, and also a centering of behavior on Works’ Righteousness, that you could earn your way to salvation through your own power. To Calvin, it was self evident that those who felt they were in the power of a loving God would look for ways to live out the scripture’s guidance.
In my mind they both make sense and aren’t mutually exclusive; but in the days of yore, things were very much either/or. Either Luther was right about works Righteousness and we shouldn’t seek special knowledge and grace though our own efforts; or Calvin was right that grace is a gift from God and we should be motivated by it to do good in this world.
Let me close with a bit of a surprise: Both Calvin and Luther believed in predestination, that one’s salvation was known by God, determined by God, and out of our hands. It’s the Calvinists and the Reformed movement that got attached to it because that became a problem when some more reformed Dutchmen began to break off from he Reformed movement (note: at this point the Catholics say, why did you all break off from he Roman Church? Just to make smaller and smaller churches? And the Protestants say, why did you break off from he Greeks? So you could speak Latin?).
These differences, while occasionally infuriating and seemingly quibblesome, as also the rules that guide our churchs, thier preaching and their actions. The core issue here is that we are all theologians, we are all philosophers, and some of us have had the chance to study them and some of us agree to take the word to the experts. But we still have to decide which expert we listen to. Is it the Pope? Or is it your local parish preacher?
Or is it God? Or is it you?
John Calvin is famous for many things, like predestination, the Total depravity of humans, and putting a guy in jail for smiling at a baptism. Modern Calvinists don’t actually follow (or do) any of those three things, but we are still stuck explaining them. Allow me to explain.
First, you should know I grew up a Norwegian Lutheran (not Swedish or German, for God’s sake). That’s a pretty dour line of theology right there. After several years of abstinence, an agnostic atheism, my wife and I decided we wanted some sort of spirituality to counter the overwhelming materialism and selfishness of Manhattan. We ended up at a Presbyterian church because of the great preaching and the emphasis on education.
Here’s the kind of funny spiritual cultural joke: Homer Simpson’s church is Prebsylutheran.
So anyway, you might say, what’s the dif? We’re all on the same team, aren’t we? Don’t we read the same Bible and quote the same guy and have Christmas on the same day?
Well, yes and no. And here we start looking at the hair-splitting we call theology, or the search for meaning in the interpretation of these texts.
I’ll try to be brief, but here’s a rundown to make it complicated before it gets easy. Luther was a Catholic, an Augustinian monk who wanted to reform the church, not start a new branch. Calvin was a Lutheran, and also a lawyer, and in setting out to define the methodology of the church he disagreed with a little of what Luther said, which the Lutherans saw as too far gone. Consequently, Calvin’s theology is called Reformed, even though Luther started the Reformation, because he was reforming the reformation thoughts of Luther.
Let’s go deeper before we come back up. The Roman Catholic Church likes to frown on the Lutherans for breaking up the church, but in fact the first schism in the church was between the Roman Church and the Orthodox Church. Originally, the Orthodox churches had one patriarch for each major city, and they met on occasion t come to some consensus about how things should run. As Constantine was the Roman Emperor who made the empire Christian, and he moved the capitol to Constantinople (where else?), Roman bishops were a little ticked off. They decided that Rome had been the center of the world for several centuries, that Paul and Peter died there, and that they should be first among equals- in fact the Bishop of Rome should be calling the shots. That was the first break, when the rest of the patriarchs told them no dice.
Remember this; the Pope is still called the Bishop of Rome. He is also called the Pontiff, which comes from pontifex, which was the high priest of the Roman pagan gods who were responsible for the power of the Empire. So the Catholic power structure was born, in rebellion to the other churches, and it set itself up on a model based n the Roman army. That accounts for the structure and the authoritarian modus operendi.
Why do i bring this up? Because it is key to the Roman Catholic understanding of Faith. On the Catholic Church, faith is defined as assenting to the church’s teaching. This is very much specific to the existence of a structure, in understanding the church as the Body of Christ on Earth, and thier teaching, big surprise here, supports this idea.
The Lutheran (and Presbyterian) definition of faith is trust that God is merciful to sinners. This is a much more direct relationship to God for us humans. We don’t have the church as a mediator.
How do these differences work themselves out? Let’s start with Luther’s other revolution; he translated the New Testament into German, so that anyone could read it. The Catholics were against that, and stayed against it up until very recent times. Thier idea was that the Bible is easily misinterpreted, that the individual would get it wrong, and as a friend of mine put it, the priest was saying, “Put that down! Shut that book! I’ll tell you what you need to know!” It was the church’s job to teach, and it was the human’s job to have faith that God would be teaching through the church.
Luther thought this was wrong, because the church made so many mistakes. The selling of indulgences, where you can get remission from sin by paying the church money as a penance, was what galled Luther to the breaking point (the Romans are bringing that back, by the way). The Roman Catholic Church was using that money to build St. Peter’s Cathedral, the one where the Pope says mass and makes his speeches, where the Sistine Chapel is. The next time you see that building and that art, as beautiful as it is, remember they paid the price with the fracturing of Western Christianity.
Luther came back with the idea that it was faith alone, not the church, which gives us redemption and salvation. It’s the Good News, the Good Spell, the Gospel, that tells us of the love and mercy of the Creator God.
I’ll get farther into the differences between Lutheran theology and Catholic theology in the next blog. We need to touch on Calvin before his birthday week is up. Forgive me for dramatically oversimplifying; remember Luther told us to “sin bravely” knowing that God is merciful. Wikipedia’s summation suffices here:
We may summarize the three uses [according to Luther] as follows:
1 To restrain external evil...
2 To show us our sin (pedagogical, theological, ...or convicting use [or as a] mirror).
3 To show us God's character and will as a rule and guide to holy living, empowered by the Gospel alone (didactic use) or (rule).
Reformed view
In his Institutes of the Christian Religion, the Reformer John Calvin likewise distinguished three uses in the Law. Calvin wrote: "That the whole matter may be made clearer, let us take a succinct view of the office and use of the Moral Law. Now this office and use seems to me to consist of three parts."
1 By "exhibiting the righteousness of God, — in other words, the righteousness which alone is acceptable to God, — it admonishes every one of his own unrighteousness,... convicts, and finally condemns him."
2 It acts "by means of its fearful denunciations and the consequent dread of punishment, to curb those who, unless forced, have no regard for rectitude and justice."
3 "The third use of the Law. . .has respect to believers in whose hearts the Spirit of God already flourishes and reigns. . . . For it is the best instrument for enabling them daily to learn with greater truth and certainty what that will of the Lord is which they aspire to follow, and to confirm them in this knowledge. . ."
Lutherans freaked about point number 3, that one could use the Bible to guide one’s actions. To Lutherans, this was unknowable, and also a centering of behavior on Works’ Righteousness, that you could earn your way to salvation through your own power. To Calvin, it was self evident that those who felt they were in the power of a loving God would look for ways to live out the scripture’s guidance.
In my mind they both make sense and aren’t mutually exclusive; but in the days of yore, things were very much either/or. Either Luther was right about works Righteousness and we shouldn’t seek special knowledge and grace though our own efforts; or Calvin was right that grace is a gift from God and we should be motivated by it to do good in this world.
Let me close with a bit of a surprise: Both Calvin and Luther believed in predestination, that one’s salvation was known by God, determined by God, and out of our hands. It’s the Calvinists and the Reformed movement that got attached to it because that became a problem when some more reformed Dutchmen began to break off from he Reformed movement (note: at this point the Catholics say, why did you all break off from he Roman Church? Just to make smaller and smaller churches? And the Protestants say, why did you break off from he Greeks? So you could speak Latin?).
These differences, while occasionally infuriating and seemingly quibblesome, as also the rules that guide our churchs, thier preaching and their actions. The core issue here is that we are all theologians, we are all philosophers, and some of us have had the chance to study them and some of us agree to take the word to the experts. But we still have to decide which expert we listen to. Is it the Pope? Or is it your local parish preacher?
Or is it God? Or is it you?
Forgive Us Our Debts
Forgive us our debts by Dean J. Seal
Christians love to fight. We seem to be able to fight over anything. I think the Hundred years War was about the different viewpoints on Communion between Catholics and Protestants. Good thing to be killing each other about, innit?
Another example. I have a son, and we say the Lord's Prayer together almost every night. He learned the Lutheran way, somehow, and I still go the Presbyterian Way. He justifies his take on theological grounds, that God forgives sins; I justify mine on text analysis and metaphor. The true translation is "forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors" and this is especially true now. What if we did forgive debts? I read somewhere that before the latest crash, up to 30% of the profits of Corporate America was on interest and debt service, so this reading is going to make many Corporate Christians uncomfortable. Sins can be kept off the books.
So every night when we get to that part, he pipes up a little louder "... forgive us our SINS..." and I say "... forgive us our DEBTS..." and we then continue on in ecumenical harmony.
What is the dif?
I think it is important to know that taxes, loaning and debt service was how the Roman Empire financed its wars, and was a huge piece of motivation for conquering people. They hired Tax Farmers to go out and collect money from people, and if they couldn't pay they would have to borrow money. Now remember, taxes in the Roman Empire were not about building schools and creating parks. They were about national defense and building hghways, but that part was about posting armies in your town to keep an eye on you. And although they built highways, and had a postal system that actually worked better than what Europe has now, the main point of taxes was to enrich the Governor and the Roman Senate. So the goal was not necessarily to rub out your business, because then you couldn't pay taxes . The goal was to squeeze you, though, and it you got too far behind, they could take your land. Oops.
So when Jesus was saying "forgive us our debts" he was making an economic statement. A lot of what he taught came out of economics. Give money to anyone who asks. Loan money to those who cannot pay you back. Give something to God, even if it is your last two copper coins. Invite to dinner people who cannot return the favor. Render to Caesar that which is Caesars, and render to God what is God's. And don't get the two mixed up. Forgive us our debts was both fiscal and metaphorical.
The metaphorical content is clear as well. If you are in debt to someone for a favor, you want to pay them back. If you forgive me my debt to you, fiscal or non-fiscal, I am freed to move on in my life. But if I am trapped by a sense of indebtedness, it becomes a drag, an anchor on me.
This is actually the core of the Good News, the Gospel, that God loves us enough to forgive us our indebtedness to God. To me, the idea of forgiving our "sins" leaves a lingering sense that we are sinful, which we are, but I don't think we have to obsess over it. My Norwegian Lutheran upbringing was focused on making us feel bad about ourselves all the time."Don't make such a big deal of yourself." "Oh, so now you're all hoity-toity." "Who do you think you are?" My new understanding is that God created us in God's image, male and female he created us, and he saw his Creation and said it was Good. And when we fail God, and are indebted to God, God forgives us this debt. It is a cleansing forgiveness. At that point we should feel good about who we are, and go on in a life of joy. Jesus asks us to live life abundantly. That doesn't mean making ourselves as small and miserable and as invisible as possible.
God forgives both sins and debts, and we need to do likewise. Otherwise we are like the manager who was forgiven a debt and then threw people who owed him money into a debtor's prison. I don't know if you have ever asked a Christian to forgive you a debt, but it is not a pretty sight. The look reminds me of someone saying, "Don't you quote scripture to me!" We need to forgive, because we have been forgiven. We need to not hold differences against each other, even if we know the other person has it all wrong, because we may find out later we were the wrong one, on another occasion or even the one that is in dispute. And because God has forgiven us, we have the wherewithal to forgive others.
So the next time you find yourself disagreeing with another person of faith, find a way to silently forgive them for disagreeing with you. It's a way to acknowledge the debts you have been forgiven.
Christians love to fight. We seem to be able to fight over anything. I think the Hundred years War was about the different viewpoints on Communion between Catholics and Protestants. Good thing to be killing each other about, innit?
Another example. I have a son, and we say the Lord's Prayer together almost every night. He learned the Lutheran way, somehow, and I still go the Presbyterian Way. He justifies his take on theological grounds, that God forgives sins; I justify mine on text analysis and metaphor. The true translation is "forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors" and this is especially true now. What if we did forgive debts? I read somewhere that before the latest crash, up to 30% of the profits of Corporate America was on interest and debt service, so this reading is going to make many Corporate Christians uncomfortable. Sins can be kept off the books.
So every night when we get to that part, he pipes up a little louder "... forgive us our SINS..." and I say "... forgive us our DEBTS..." and we then continue on in ecumenical harmony.
What is the dif?
I think it is important to know that taxes, loaning and debt service was how the Roman Empire financed its wars, and was a huge piece of motivation for conquering people. They hired Tax Farmers to go out and collect money from people, and if they couldn't pay they would have to borrow money. Now remember, taxes in the Roman Empire were not about building schools and creating parks. They were about national defense and building hghways, but that part was about posting armies in your town to keep an eye on you. And although they built highways, and had a postal system that actually worked better than what Europe has now, the main point of taxes was to enrich the Governor and the Roman Senate. So the goal was not necessarily to rub out your business, because then you couldn't pay taxes . The goal was to squeeze you, though, and it you got too far behind, they could take your land. Oops.
So when Jesus was saying "forgive us our debts" he was making an economic statement. A lot of what he taught came out of economics. Give money to anyone who asks. Loan money to those who cannot pay you back. Give something to God, even if it is your last two copper coins. Invite to dinner people who cannot return the favor. Render to Caesar that which is Caesars, and render to God what is God's. And don't get the two mixed up. Forgive us our debts was both fiscal and metaphorical.
The metaphorical content is clear as well. If you are in debt to someone for a favor, you want to pay them back. If you forgive me my debt to you, fiscal or non-fiscal, I am freed to move on in my life. But if I am trapped by a sense of indebtedness, it becomes a drag, an anchor on me.
This is actually the core of the Good News, the Gospel, that God loves us enough to forgive us our indebtedness to God. To me, the idea of forgiving our "sins" leaves a lingering sense that we are sinful, which we are, but I don't think we have to obsess over it. My Norwegian Lutheran upbringing was focused on making us feel bad about ourselves all the time."Don't make such a big deal of yourself." "Oh, so now you're all hoity-toity." "Who do you think you are?" My new understanding is that God created us in God's image, male and female he created us, and he saw his Creation and said it was Good. And when we fail God, and are indebted to God, God forgives us this debt. It is a cleansing forgiveness. At that point we should feel good about who we are, and go on in a life of joy. Jesus asks us to live life abundantly. That doesn't mean making ourselves as small and miserable and as invisible as possible.
God forgives both sins and debts, and we need to do likewise. Otherwise we are like the manager who was forgiven a debt and then threw people who owed him money into a debtor's prison. I don't know if you have ever asked a Christian to forgive you a debt, but it is not a pretty sight. The look reminds me of someone saying, "Don't you quote scripture to me!" We need to forgive, because we have been forgiven. We need to not hold differences against each other, even if we know the other person has it all wrong, because we may find out later we were the wrong one, on another occasion or even the one that is in dispute. And because God has forgiven us, we have the wherewithal to forgive others.
So the next time you find yourself disagreeing with another person of faith, find a way to silently forgive them for disagreeing with you. It's a way to acknowledge the debts you have been forgiven.
Don't Call Me White
Don't Call Me White, by Dean J. Seal
So I'm filling out a form somewhere, and it seems it's the same thing every time. When they get to asking for demographic material, they ask are you African American, native American, Hispanic American, or.......White?
Here's what bugs me about that. It implies, very strongly that White is Normative. Normative is a technical term that means this is what is normal. It is normal to be white, and we are just tracking the rest of you non-whites to try to be fair, because you are not Normal.
What is that about? Why can't they say European American? BEcause us Whiteys don't want to think about the fact that we Came Over and stole this land from the Native Americans. We hate to be reminded of it, because we are taught that the natural progression of history was that European culture improves and progresses and is a gift tot he world, and we came over from Europe so that wee can make peace with each other and create freedom of speech and press and religion.
Well, we denied freedom of speech and freedom of religion to native Americans. We actually made it illegal for them to practice their faith from about the 1880's to the 1970's. That's pretty un-American, if you ask me.
The assumption was that these "poor" people would be happier if they were like the White Man. That' why we stole their kids and put them in boarding schools, to take their language and culture away from them because it was "pagan" and "uncivilized" and "backward" and "ignorant."
Why do I bring this up on a church website? Well, ladies and gentlemen, for most of Christian History, Christian institutions have acted the same way. We are Christian, Christian is normative, anyone who isn't needs to be converted. There is nothing of value in "pagan" "heretical" non-Christian wisdom, they have nothing to teach us.
This means if Indians ( it's okay to use that word, if it is said with respect. As a technical term, it originated in the description of anyone west of Spain) say a place is sacred, the courts of the US do not recognize it because there is no Anglo documentation for it. Well, what if the indians don't write stuff down? Are they automatically assumed to be lying about it? Read "God Is Red" if you want a long list of harrowing stories about how the White Christians have kicked native Theology into the mud for several centuries. Even now, if an Indian is killed, it is not in the news. They are invisible. But if a white woman age 17 is killed, it is headline news for weeks.
Let's bring this back home. How do we feel about people who are non-Christian? Do we think jews should go to hell because they don't accept jesus as their lord and Savior? That's not what Paul says. Paul says they have their own deal with God. Read through Romans 9-11, where Paul is discussing the Jews who do not accept jesus. He talks about them as missing out, but they are not condemned. "In 11: 26-29, he says this:" And so all of Israel will be saved....As regards to the gospel they are enemies of God for your sake, but as regards to election they are beloved, for the sake of their ancestors; for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable." It is not for us to decide who has what deal with God. Paul saw it as rebellion, but he also saw it as another opportunity to show God's mercy to the jews.
o. If the Jews are okay not being a part of the Christian faith community, how far can we read that out? Paul does not talk about Hindus are Buddhists, or anyone else. Bu the implication, in my reading, in my interpretation- and you will have to make your own- is that we shouldn't worry our pretty little heads about anyone else. We should focus on being the best followers of Jesus we can be, focus on bringing the word to whoever is interested around us, and live by example, so that we bear witness in our actions. Jesus says, "Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You shall know them by their fruits." (Matthew 7:15-16). We can allow him a mixed metaphor here and there; this is a famous sayiing. Jesus is teaching about good and also false prophets; he is telling us to pay attention to what is said and to what is done. Dr. King looked to Gandhi for wisdom, and Gandhi looked to jesus. So, who are we to say gandhi is going to hell because he was not a Christian by profession?
We have better things to do than assume we are right because we are Christian. We have better things to do than assume that European-Americans are normal. Being a Christian is not normative, any more than being white is. Let those of us who are white, and those of us who are Christian, and especially those of us who are white Christians, move forward with a sense of humility, open to learning from all people, from all faiths. In my humble theology, it makes us better followers of Jesus.
So I'm filling out a form somewhere, and it seems it's the same thing every time. When they get to asking for demographic material, they ask are you African American, native American, Hispanic American, or.......White?
Here's what bugs me about that. It implies, very strongly that White is Normative. Normative is a technical term that means this is what is normal. It is normal to be white, and we are just tracking the rest of you non-whites to try to be fair, because you are not Normal.
What is that about? Why can't they say European American? BEcause us Whiteys don't want to think about the fact that we Came Over and stole this land from the Native Americans. We hate to be reminded of it, because we are taught that the natural progression of history was that European culture improves and progresses and is a gift tot he world, and we came over from Europe so that wee can make peace with each other and create freedom of speech and press and religion.
Well, we denied freedom of speech and freedom of religion to native Americans. We actually made it illegal for them to practice their faith from about the 1880's to the 1970's. That's pretty un-American, if you ask me.
The assumption was that these "poor" people would be happier if they were like the White Man. That' why we stole their kids and put them in boarding schools, to take their language and culture away from them because it was "pagan" and "uncivilized" and "backward" and "ignorant."
Why do I bring this up on a church website? Well, ladies and gentlemen, for most of Christian History, Christian institutions have acted the same way. We are Christian, Christian is normative, anyone who isn't needs to be converted. There is nothing of value in "pagan" "heretical" non-Christian wisdom, they have nothing to teach us.
This means if Indians ( it's okay to use that word, if it is said with respect. As a technical term, it originated in the description of anyone west of Spain) say a place is sacred, the courts of the US do not recognize it because there is no Anglo documentation for it. Well, what if the indians don't write stuff down? Are they automatically assumed to be lying about it? Read "God Is Red" if you want a long list of harrowing stories about how the White Christians have kicked native Theology into the mud for several centuries. Even now, if an Indian is killed, it is not in the news. They are invisible. But if a white woman age 17 is killed, it is headline news for weeks.
Let's bring this back home. How do we feel about people who are non-Christian? Do we think jews should go to hell because they don't accept jesus as their lord and Savior? That's not what Paul says. Paul says they have their own deal with God. Read through Romans 9-11, where Paul is discussing the Jews who do not accept jesus. He talks about them as missing out, but they are not condemned. "In 11: 26-29, he says this:" And so all of Israel will be saved....As regards to the gospel they are enemies of God for your sake, but as regards to election they are beloved, for the sake of their ancestors; for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable." It is not for us to decide who has what deal with God. Paul saw it as rebellion, but he also saw it as another opportunity to show God's mercy to the jews.
o. If the Jews are okay not being a part of the Christian faith community, how far can we read that out? Paul does not talk about Hindus are Buddhists, or anyone else. Bu the implication, in my reading, in my interpretation- and you will have to make your own- is that we shouldn't worry our pretty little heads about anyone else. We should focus on being the best followers of Jesus we can be, focus on bringing the word to whoever is interested around us, and live by example, so that we bear witness in our actions. Jesus says, "Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You shall know them by their fruits." (Matthew 7:15-16). We can allow him a mixed metaphor here and there; this is a famous sayiing. Jesus is teaching about good and also false prophets; he is telling us to pay attention to what is said and to what is done. Dr. King looked to Gandhi for wisdom, and Gandhi looked to jesus. So, who are we to say gandhi is going to hell because he was not a Christian by profession?
We have better things to do than assume we are right because we are Christian. We have better things to do than assume that European-Americans are normal. Being a Christian is not normative, any more than being white is. Let those of us who are white, and those of us who are Christian, and especially those of us who are white Christians, move forward with a sense of humility, open to learning from all people, from all faiths. In my humble theology, it makes us better followers of Jesus.
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