Jeffrey Shy's A-theistic Episcopalian Blog

Now the Miter has hit the fan...or the C of E, as it were.

2010-06-18T08:07:00.001-07:00

Gloves...er...hats are off! Let the fight begin!?!? Or not...

These past few weeks, since the feast of Pentecost, the ongoing struggles over inclusion of LGBT persons in the full sacramental and ordained life of Episcopal Church has begun to take a new and more ugly turn. Following the election and consecration of now-bishop Glasspool in the diocese of LA, the Archbishop of Canterbury, ++Rowan Williams, has begun to make good on the prior threats made to us should we do such a thing in spite of his warnings. Letters have been issued to persons in our church asking them to step down from their positions on ecumenical dialogues. Kenneth Kearon, Secretary General of the Anglican Consultative Council (one of the governing bodies of the Anglican Communion) is meeting with the Executive Council of the Episcopal Church (a primary governing body of our Episcopal Church between General Conventions). It is rumored and reported, but not officially confirmed, that our Presiding Bishop, ++Katherine, has been asked to voluntarily resign from the Anglican Consultative Council. In an incident rather more pitiful and petty, the same ++Katherine, on a visit to the UK at the invitation of the dean of Southwark Cathedral, was told by representatives of Lambeth Palace that she could not wear her miter (the pointy hat that many/most Episcopal and Anglican bishops wear as a sign of their office). Some have spun that as "usual protocol" or "necessary" according to Church of England law, (arguing that the C of E has no women bishops, therefore she could not "preside" meaning celebrate the Eucharist as a bishop but only as a "priest" and thus could not wear a miter, but neither was she told that she could not wear violet clerical, pectoral cross, episcopal ring, rochet and chimere or other episcopal regalia, making that argument sound a bit contrived. Those taking refuge in that argument have branded ++Katherine as "colonial," "petty," "bratty" and worse.) but it attracted the glee of conservatives just the same. Even Jeffrey Shy (foolish me), wading unwisely into a discussion on a conservative website about the above (christened "mitergate" on the web), had his posts changed/edited and received a number of personal attacks and insults for his trouble. : )

In short, the "nastiness" on these matters is far from over for us. From the standpoint of some conservatives in this ongoing struggle, we are simply getting the punishments that we so richly deserve, and the main regret seems to be that we are not excommunicated en mass as the heretics that we most certainly are. Although it might be hoped that calmer voices could prevail, it does appear that strife is to be our lot in the International Anglican Communion for some time to come. One conservative commentator whom I encountered (unknown to me as nearly all on the conservative website do not give a real or full name), professed herself quite happy about it all. From her point of view, there are "two Gospels" fighting for place in the Episcopal Church, the true one and the false one, and it is a fight to the death or exclusion of one over the other. She, at least, seemed ready to fight, down and dirty if need be.

Is it time, then, to bring out the big guns and set to for an even larger battle of Apocalyptic proportions, or is there another way? In honesty, I do not have any really novel or revolutionary suggestions, and perhaps none are needed. We have, fortunately, a good example in the person of Jesus of Nazareth whose advice on how to deal with persecution is as good today as it was 20 centuries ago. How about, "Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven?" Reading further on, "Blessed are you, when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you." Perhaps most importantly, "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven..."

In the church year, the green season after Pentecost is sometimes seen as a more calm and relaxed time in which the Church can reflect and grow, bearing fruit from the seeds planted in Advent, Lent and Easter lessons. It may be our lot this year, and for some years to come, that calm is going to be a harder commodity to come by. I hope, however, that like the shrub after a harsh pruning bursts forth with new growth and flower, we can rejoice in the opportunity to share more fully with our Lord in his suffering and bear fuller and more abundant fruit because of it. Let us pray for ourselves, our enemies and the church in sincerity and humility and not lose hope that the Kingdom will one day be made more fully present for us.

In closing, I offer a prayer for your consideration penned a century ago by Baptist Minister and leader of the U.S. Social gospel movement, Walter Rauschenbuch (1861-1918, commemorated in the Episcopal Church calendar on 2 July).

"O God, I pray for Thy church, which is set today amid the perplexities of a changing order and face to face with a great new task. I remember with love the nurture she gave to my spiritual life in its infancy, the tasks she set for my growing strength, the influence of the devoted hearts she gathers, the steadfast power for good she has exerted. When I compare her with all human institutions, there is none like her. But when judged by the mind of her Master, I bow in contrition. O God, baptize her afresh in the life-giving spirit of Jesus! Put upon her lips the ancient gospel of her Lord. Fill her with the prophet's scorn of tyranny, and with a Christ-like tenderness for the heavy-laden and downtrodden. Bid her cease from seeking her own life, lest she lose it. Make her valiant to give up her life to humanity, that like her crucified Lord she may mount by the path of the cross to a higher glory. Amen."

Amen, indeed.

Human Paleoanthropology as the Essential Friend of Religion

2010-04-01T10:16:00.001-07:00

The "gift" this week of an unpleasant case of bronchitis allowed me a recent night of little sleep. Rather more as a distraction from the coughing and chest pain than anything else, I decided to check out the video offerings from the PBS program Nova, a favorite of mine for many years (and, I suspect, a favorite of many others given this program's longevity). As I had watched all of the most recent episodes, I went back a bit to last year and decided that the three-part series from 2009 on human evolution ( Becoming Human ) would be enough to get me through the night. As it turned out, I initially dozed off about 3/4 of the way through program one, but I managed to re-watch that along with parts two and three over the past couple of days. Although it may seem strange programming for Holy Week, it got me thinking again about the difficult intersection of Christianity and science and how we might be enriched in our religious lives by not just a "polite nod" to the "truths of science" but a genuine attempt to incorporate these paleoanthropological insights into our religious world view. Specifically, I was thinking critically against a "lukewarm" modern "liberal" religious viewpoint in which we accept the conclusions of evolutionary anthropology as the "way" the theistic personal God created humans, and then simply go on about the rest of our religious business as if nothing had changed. We continue to espouse such inconsistent ideas as creation in the divine image, the fall, original sin, the incarnation and such with no attempt to reconcile/revise/abandon these "marooned" doctrines (all looking back to the second creation account in Genesis understood as somehow historically or historically-metaphorically true) which are now without historical reference with the real history revealed by the paleoanthropologists.
We are all familiar, of course, with how modern physicists are "dabbling" in ultimate ideas and producing works of a religious character. We are also equally well aware of the vehemently anti-religious works of evolutionary biologists such as Richard Dawkins. It seems particularly odd, however, that the very branch of science that should be so close to religion, since it includes the particular studies of humanity, is now at greatest odds with religion. Is a true blending of Christianity and modern evolutionary anthropology possible, or are we doomed to simply shout at each other across the chasm of differences that divides religious and scientific language?
The Nova programs don't bother to argue about the truth of the "theory" of evolution of the human species and give "equal time" to the pseudo-science of "scientific creationism." They simply pick up the evolutionary story with the Australopithecines, focusing first on Australopithecus afarensis, the most famous example of which is "Lucy," the remarkably complete skeleton from Ethiopia discovered by Johanson in the Great Rift Valley in Eastern Africa, the "cradle" of hominid development. More than any other program that I have watched before, this three-part series took time to do scientific reconstructions of the faces of our ancestors and also to integrate other findings in the archaeological and geological records that give us some clues as to not just their bodily morphology but also their lives, environment and cultures. This added an aspect of realism to what is often just pictures of fossil skeletons and morphing photos showing images of hominid species melting into the next in an orderly succession.
One of the most fascinating aspects of the current version of our human origins story is that we do not trace one smooth succession from species to species culminating in a single "end" product of Homo sapiens. We discover rather that, probably from the common ancestor of Homo habilis, the first in our genus and probably the first "tool maker," at least three (perhaps four) species of humanity evolved and eventually coinhabited the ancient world and probably had contact and perhaps even competition. We know these as Homo erectus (and possibly related "hobbit" Homo floresiensis), our close cousin Homo neanderthalensis along with ourselves, Homo sapiens. That H. sapiens and H. neanderthalensis overlapped and coinhabited ancient Europe cannot be doubted. It is less clear whether H. sapiens and H. erectus "encountered" one another, although their periods did overlap. One wonders how our religious view of humanity (conceived of as just our species) would have been different (e.g. vis-a-vis myths such as the Genesis accounts) if there were not one, but three intelligent hominid species to account for? What "creation myth" might we tell? How would that influence such "core doctrines" as that of the creation of humanity in the "divine image?"
Among the images/scenes scenes that I found particularly moving in the series was one of a reenactment of a burial ritual for H. erectus in southern Spain. In that location, a burial pit has been discovered holding the skeletons of many individuals. It would seem unlikely that this would have been a "natural" occurrence, so one must conclude that the individuals were placed there intentionally. Even more moving was the discovery of a pink granite hand axe amongst the remains. The stone of the axe was not from anywhere nearby but had to have come from a place far distant, suggesting possibly migration or even trade across distances. More importantly, such an item would have been a valuable possession for an individual and not one that would have been abandoned lightly. Its inclusion strongly suggests a ritual event that included a grave offering for the deceased. Here then, clearly preserved, are the remains of "religious" pre-Homo sapiens humans. If one postulates a divine, personal creator god for whom evolution was the "process" by which he created H. sapiens in "his image," then what of his first human children? Were they merely "means to an end," or did God simply love them less?
Equally moving were the dramatizations of the "encounters" between H. neanderthalensis and H. Sapiens. We now know that neanderthalensis were the first to arrive in Europe of the two species. It also appears that the arrival of H. sapiens was associated with the disappearance in short order of the neanderthalensis individuals who were pushed progressively into more and more marginal areas, finally perhaps having a "last stand" on the Gibraltar rock where the latest evidence of their inhabitation can be found. The reason for the decline of the neanderthalensis species is far from clear, but it appears that these larger/heavier and probably larger-brained individuals (i.e. than H. sapiens) had an enormous caloric "appetite" requiring perhaps as much as 5000kCal per day to hold body and soul together. They also appear to have practiced hunting at close range with hand-held weapons such that many of the mostly adult males have evidence in their skeletal remains of multiple broken bones. The lighter, less-calorically-needy H. sapiens who had developed somewhat more complex tools (such as throwing spears) and who were faster and required fewer calories were, perhaps, ultimately more successful in competing for limited resources and simply displaced the less-adaptable H. neanderthalensis individuals.
Where again, do we find in this very human story the unique creation of humans in the "divine image" or evidence of "the fall" or original sin? If these central "doctrines" in Christianity really hold very little water when subjected to a comparison with real history, then why do we persist so strongly in trying to hold onto them? Although I found Robin Meyers book, Saving Jesus from the Church, to be a bit tiresome in its stridency, I did copy a quote that I continue to go back to – "If we continue to believe that we did not come up out of the earth, but were dropped from the sky, then Jesus will continue to be understood likewise as an invader, a harpoon shot from God's bow to reel in the perishing. He will not be a teacher but an elevator operator. He will bring us not wisdom but self-aggrandizement. He will not give us an assignment but a certificate." And to quote Bishop Spong, "To believe dated concepts with the human brain is not a sign of orthodoxy; it is a sign of being spiritually dead."
While I respect, in many ways, phenomena such as the "Emergent Church" movement, I feel sometimes that it is really too tied to the old views of Sola Scriptura, possibly because so many are entering the movement from the starting point of Evangelicalism. It is saddening also that, even in the relatively broad-minded circles of The Episcopal Church, persons are often quickly attacked for so-called "unorthodox" views. Having experienced such attacks myself, I have, I suppose, been reluctant to try to "brainstorm" new ideas for revision of traditional theistic Christianity with its obsession with "the fall," original sin, the incarnation and such. We may have moved forward with regard to some social issues such as sexuality (much to the dismay of reactionaries in other parts of the Anglican communion), but theological experimentation is still viewed with a great deal of suspicion and one often encounters a fire blast of anger directed at anyone who would question "core doctrine" or try to reinterpret it. As Bishop Spong puts it, "When their religious authority claims are challenged, their typical response is not to enter a rational discussion, but to engage in revealing anger. Anger never rises out of genuine commitment; it is always a product of threatened security."
Many more progressive Christians today are finding themselves drawn into mystical practices, and I can say that I too feel this pull. Mainline protestants in particular have been particularly deprived of many traditions of prayer, meditation and contemplation that are our common Christian heritage, and the re-discovery of practices such as centering prayer and the like are welcome developments. What we need, however, is also a cognitive and rational aspect to serve as a worthy partner and corrective for the less-definable mystical experience. These insights need to be experienced both intellectually/academically as well as liturgically if they are to contribute equally to our religious lives as an integrated whole. Unfortunately, the experience mystically continues to be in search of a historically and scientifically aware cognitive religious partner.
Before someone writes to me about the works of Teilhard de Chardin, let me say that, while I respect and honor his legacy, I find that his "grand scheme" approach has rather too much of an element of artificiality. I share, I think, with many post-moderns a suspicion of grand schemes and narratives. His view of evolution as trending towards an "end" in the "Omega Point" of "God" seems too much of a superimposition of older religious ideas onto scientific fact, rather like trying to bang the puzzle pieces into place by force. We need to recognize the unknowable and uncertain aspects of our "future development" and embrace, I think, the unfolding nature of our biological, cultural and spiritual evolution. God experienced as "being" or "ground of being" cannot at the same time be the divine architect who "has it all worked out in advance." God, the ground of being, goes with us on the journey and is both us and the journey. As such, there is no predetermined destination at which we may someday arrive. This sort of "open-ended" spirituality is more in keeping with the realities of how creation/evolution have unfolded thus far, I think. It can look back to the past without a need to "reinvent" or fictionalize where we have been in order to freeze it into an orthodox framework, and it can be open to new change and development about where we are going in the future. To see all religious knowledge as present, experiential and provisional would rescue us from the "orthodoxy" wars that are consuming Christianity from the inside out as well as the outside in. We can find God less in our assent to "orthodox beliefs" than in our openness to the changing winds of "the spirit" in the process of our unfolding cultural and religious awareness.
To some, this may seem just too much, too frightening, too prone to "error" or "whim." I would counter, however, that, if we persist in trying to "hold progress back" we will likely destroy that very thing that we are trying most to preserve. Bishop Spong has written that "religious concepts become fragile indeed when education renders them no longer believable." A release of our religious spirit to allow it to move forward again will inevitably result in change, but it will not necessarily result in the complete abandonment of our past. Again from Bishop Spong, "To walk the Christ-path will take us beyond theism, but not beyond God; beyond incarnation, but not beyond discovering the divine at the heart of the human, beyond the death of every particular living thing, but not beyond meaning and purpose." Do we have the courage to go forward, or we will fragment into those who survive as curators of the religious museum and seculars who find religious experience and belief simply too challenging?

Contra Robertson, Augustine, Calvin and Luther OR "God was not in the earthquake"

2010-01-14T14:59:00.001-07:00

As many of us are watching in dismay at the emerging evidence of tremendous and sudden loss of life in Haiti’s recent earthquake, it is inevitable that persons will ask the perennial question, “Why?” Also very predictably, we find a religious fundamentalist like Pat Robertson who offers a theory about this. His theory: while under French rule, the Haitian people made a pact with the Devil (capital D intended) for deliverance. Since that time, they have been “cursed” (presumably by God) with many disasters and misfortunes. Also predictably, “softer” interpreters of our religious traditions have cried “foul” and once again, we find ourselves impaled on our own sword by the intrinsic illogic of the affirmation of a supernatural all-knowing, all-powerful, all-good creator deity and the seemingly paradoxical existence of evil, both natural and human.

To give Pat credit, he would have made a good Jew in the Babylonian exile. As we read the redacted Torah and Judaic national history as it was assembled at that time, we find a particularly clear message that the conquest of Jerusalem and the exile were the result of the behavior of the Judeans and God’s punishment for the same. Simplified, they disobeyed God’s commands, were not “faithful” to him, “went after” foreign gods and thus deserved the wrath of God and his punishment-hence, the exile. Lesson: disobedience to God brings on disaster, and this is not just particular punishment for individual sins, but also corporate punishment for societal and national sin. If we take this “word” as “authoritative,” then there is no doubt that big national disasters come about because of societal sin. “Sodom and Gomorrah” is another lesson on the same lines, particularly gleefully sited by those who see this destruction as a punishment for sexual immorality. Although we get a little relief with the “bargaining” part where Abraham is ultimately unable to find enough “good” people to persuade God to spare the poor Sodomites and Gomorrans, the implicationis that “really” they’re all "guilty" and God’s punishment is, therefore, “just.”

This idea of inherited and corporate guilt has been heavily incorporated into Western Christianity particularly since the time of St. Augustine. Just like the Jews in the exile, who lived in bad times, the African Bishop Augustine lived at the end of the Roman Empire and experienced the invasion of Africa by the Vandals, a particularly "bad" time in the west. Furthermore, Augustine had a personal history as a Manichean, a non-Christian gnostic religion that accepted one of the common teachings of gnosticism about the “evil” nature of the world and creation as a whole. It has been this dual history that some have suggested accounts for the rather pessimistic view of humanity that Augustine seems to have held. At the time of the reformation, Luther and Calvin, combining and expanding these ideas to embrace a “total depravity” idea of humanity along with their “Pauline” justification “by faith,” made this the centerpiece of Christology and indeed, the entire point of the Christian faith, at least in most of mainline, post-reformation protestantism. As modern biblical scholarship has advanced, however, most of us have come to see the Adamic creation story as not literal but “mythologized” history. We have, however, retained all of the “conclusions” that were reached about the significance of “THE FALL” and its “effects” on our present situation and world. We seldom note that the slender thread of making this conclusion (that neither Jews nor Muslims make) rests on the theologizing by persons who did literally believe the story of Adam to be true and historical. Furthermore, the Pauline “blessing” of this doctrine derives primarily from his teaching on general resurrection such that death entered the world through the man Adam and by the man (I could not resist italicizing that) Jesus, resurrection to life entered the world in a kind of “fitting parallel” of events. This is far, to my eye, from a certain confirmation of “original sin” and the “total depravity” of human nature, let alone a “justification” for an all-powerful deity to wreak havoc on his disobedient creation. The only other dubious scriptural support for the doctrinal formulation of original sin and the “Fallen” world comes from a couple of quotes from the Psalms. There is, however, absolutely equal argument against this concept of inherited or corporate “guilt” in the prophetic writings (Ezekiel for example) as well as the “criticism” in Job of the idea that misfortune and natural disaster come as a punishment for human sin, either particular or corporate, and its correlate that obedience brings wealth and prosperity and safety.

In a derivative blog posting (quoting from yet another blog), The V. Rev, Nicholas Knisely (dean of Trinity Cathedral Phoenix) quotes the modern theologian , David Bentley Hart as writing:

“...if it is from Christ that we are to learn how God relates himself to sin, suffering, evil, and death, it would seem that he provides us little evidence of anything other than a regal, relentless, and miraculous enmity: sin he forgives, suffering he heals, evil he casts out, and death he conquers. And absolutely nowhere does Christ act as if any of these things are part of the eternal work or purposes of God.”

It is hard to argue with this statement as it is phrased, but in essence, all that it does, in and of itself, is to reaffirm the belief in the “goodness” of the God of traditional theism. It does not, however, offer a solution to the problem of evil.

I believe that it is time, quite frankly, for the church to reconsider the entire schema of sin/original sin, and the divine Jesus as the vicarious sacrifice/penal substitution model of redemption. To quote/paraphrase the Rt. Rev. Spong, the doctrine of the fall and original sin is “pre-Darwinian mythology and post-Darwinian nonsense.”

For the questions of the issue of “natural” evil, a closer and more nuanced answer needs to be sought. For geological processes like earthquakes, Tsunamis and the like, it is clear that these are mechanistic processes that derive from our planetary structure. This structure itself (plate techtonics and the like) is intimately tied up with the emergence and evolution of life on this planet. They are, in fact, part of the natural processes that gave “birth” to humanity and other entities with which we co-inhabit our planetary biosphere. One might fault the “intelligent design” of a planet in which such processes were “necessary,” but attributing to them a “moral” or “sin” meaning is patently ridiculous.

Beyond even this, however, if we tackle the encompassing position of “faulty design,” then we need to decide if we can live with a God who is “a little less than omniscent/omnipotent/all-good” or affirm the necessary limitation imposed by the idea that this is the “best of all possible worlds” meaning that God is limited to the degree of his ability to create perfection, provided that we wish to persist in supernatural theism as the foundation of our religious belief. I, however, think that the problem is not the world itself that is the problem, but the whole concept of supernatural theism itself. If we take, for example, the possibility of God’s “existence” as Tillich's “being” or “ground of being” or possibly something along Marcus Borg’s suggestion of panentheism (I would take it another step, for logical reasons, to panendeism, but that is a whole other and extended discussion), then we can drop the obsessions about natural and particular evil and their "problem" completely.

“How long” will it be for us until we find as Christians a substitute for supernatural theism? God only knows : )

As a postscript, the scope of the humanitarian disaster in Haiti does not diminish as we learn more details. The best way that we can act now is by a money donation. If you have not already donated to some allied cause to help, then I strongly recommend that you do so.

Jeffrey.

Christmas Re-membered

2009-12-19T21:28:00.000-07:00

Often today, many feel "caught" in an uncomfortable tight space generated by the disparities between traditional religious and modern thought. For more than 200 years now, "higher" biblical criticism has progressively made untenable many former biblical "sureties." No figure has suffered more from a historical strip down than has the person of Jesus. In the search for the historical Jesus, as it has evolved for more than a century now, we have progressively discovered that many "facts" about the life and words of Jesus can no longer be understood to be historically "factual" in the sense that they might have been recordable on a video camera had technology of that sort been available at that time. This is particularly apparent to us in an historical examination of the birth narratives of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. Not only do they appear to belong to a relatively late layer of the Jesus gospel tradition, but also the accounts of these writers are profoundly different, not just in small details but in general outline and internal "message." (I invite you to read this year the Matthew and Luke accounts separately, not conflating them together into one unified story as we usually do, but considering each one individually, if you are in doubt about this.) It is plainly the case, even at the simplest level, that if one of these narratives is accepted as the "true" story in a literal sense, then the other must be plainly false, and vice versa. An insistence then, on an historically factual birth narrative of Jesus, inevitably "lets us down" unless we are particularly fond of paradox.

What then are we to do with these narratives?

In their recent book, The First Christmas, historical Jesus scholars Dominic Crossan and Marcus Borg set aside very quickly any obsessive preoccupation with trying to discover "factual" information in the birth narratives, and quickly pass to questions of "meaning," looking at the stories from the perspective of myth or parables that we understand to be "true" in the same manner that we find "truth" in the many parables spoken in the gospels accounts by the person of Jesus. Which of us, when considering the parable of the Good Samaritan, for example, would assert that the validity of that particular story depended on a factuality that events "really happened" exactly as described? We note, on the contrary, that the parable's truth resides at a level that is more than any simple retelling of historical fact, in the message that it conveys in story form. In a similar manner, when we relax our anxieties generated by a futile attempt to view the nativity stories as historical fact, we can open up to the deeper truth of the messages that they contain.

As Episcopalians (along with Lutherans, Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox and other Christians retaining strong liturgical traditions) we can enter into a particularly intense experience of these narratives as we participate in the rituals and liturgies of the Advent and Christmas cycle. Just as with the narratives of Lent and Easter where we ritually walk the "way of the cross," the rites of Advent and Christmas invite us to walk "the road to Bethlehem" and symbolically re-enact the truths of the nativity stories not as written and received records of a distant past, but as experiences made present to us today. We can assume, liturgically, mentally and symbolically, the roles of the many characters in these stories– standing in the cold wintery fields with the astonished shepherds, feeling the anguish of Joseph in the presumed infidelity of his engaged spouse and the wonder of a dream that reveals a miraculous and unbelievable alternative, following with the Magi behind the star to Bethlehem, escaping by the warning of a portentous dream the murderous intent of King Herod, and like Mary, pondering the "meaning of these things" "in our hearts.

In the early development of our English Prayerbook tradition, some of those with more Puritan attitudes objected to the inclusion of canticles such as that recorded in today's Gospel reading, which we know as the Magnificat or "Song of Mary," on the grounds that such texts were properly understood as being appropriate only to those historical persons who had "originally" uttered them. Their position was the same as that of many so-called evangelicals and fundamentalists today who insist that the only "true" understanding of these narratives is the literal acceptance of these texts as historical facts and "proofs" that thereby legitimate the proclamation of Jesus as Messiah and Lord. Fortunately for us, however, traditional practice prevailed, and the texts came down to us not merely in our Bible, but in our Prayerbook rites as well. When we sing the Magnificat in a ritual setting, we "assume the role" of Mary as she marvels at the "great things" that "the Almighty has done." We do not sing "Mary's soul proclaimed the greatness of the Lord," but "My soul proclaims (noting the use of the present tense) the greatness of the Lord." Taking on the persona of Mary, we affirm our own hope and trust in the rule of God in which the tyrant is made into a subject and the humble ones exalted to power, the hungry in spirit and flesh are fed and the prideful are brought low. The ritual and liturgical "making present" of the narratives of our faith tradition begins then to reveal levels of deeper understanding and leads us into a more profound form of "belief" ( as trust / confidence / commitment, rather than an intellectual assent to a collection of facts to be affirmed as "true") than any literal reading of these stories as events past could ever accomplish. Our use of these foundational stories and texts in liturgical settings becomes part of the larger "incarnational" character of our religious practice where the narrative is not just stuff from the "elsewhere past" but our narrative in the here and now. In theological terms, this is akin to the belief that the presence of God in Jesus the Christ is experienced as the presence of God/Christ in us and in the world today. (In the words of the apostle Paul, "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.") We thus may engage in a special form of symbolical and liturgical "re - membering" in the Advent and Christmas narratives in a way similar to that in which we celebrate the Eucharist, as an "anamnesis" in Greek, or in approximate English equivalent a "re - presentation" of the narrative as a present and active reality, not just a fond recollection of things past.

This Christmas, once again then, I invite us to become like "little children" and "re-live" the stories of these birth narratives, and in this re-living, find ourselves transformed by the truths and messages that they incarnate in a symbolic and parabolic way. To close, I invite you particularly to look as you sing them this year for the many present tense and personal references that we find in even our more modern songs of the Christmas season, starting you off with a few examples here (my emphasis added):

"O Holy Child of Bethlehem, descend to us we pray.

Cast out our sin, and enter in.

Be born in us today...."

"How far is it to Bethlehem? Not very far.

Shall we find the stable room lit by a star?

Can we see the little child, is he within?

If we lift the wooden latch, may we go in?"

"Yea, Lord, We greet thee, born this happy morning..."

Yes, Lord, we greet you, born this and every other happy morning into our lives by faith. Help us to get beyond the superficiality of misguided literalism, and lead us to truth that begins and ends only in life lived within and filled by you. Amen.

9This post originally was published in the Integrity @ Trinity weekly newsletter, The Sunday Roundup for 20 December 2009.

The Odes of Solomon

2009-11-18T15:54:00.001-07:00

I had posted this week a couple of comments to Nick Knisely’s blog where he and some others are “struggling” with the doctrines of “the fall” and “the incarnation” as they might apply to the future discovery of non-terrestrial intelligent life. I have twice advanced the opinion that “the fall” is overemphasized in Western Spirituality thanks to Augustine and Anselm of Canterbury. I have also suggested that the “incarnation” is a doctrine that is not necessarily tied tightly to “the fall” nor ideas of human “sinfulness.”

I was re-reading this week from a book by Philip Jenkins entitled The Lost History of Christianity. This is a commentary-loaded history of the Christian East in the areas of Syria, Iran, Iraq, India, Tibet, China, etc. These so-called “Nestorian” Christians had a vibrant culture and, in their day, far outnumbered the Christians of Europe and the Mediterranean.

One text that we owe to the earliest days of Syrian Christianity is the so-called “Odes of Solomon.” Clearly not Solomonic, but Christian in origin, they should not be confused with the similarly named Psalms of Solomon that are a pharasaic Judaic creation. The Odes have been criticized by some for “gnostic” content (they mention “knowledge” here and there), but classical elements of developed gnostic thought are plainly missing (e.g. the “evil” nature of the physical world/creation for example). In the translantion by James Charlesworth, they are incredibly beautiful poems/hymns and demonstrate a theology rather more akin to the Johanine tradition than anything else in our current corpus. These odes were “discovered” in the late 19th/early 20th century and have since been found in multiple manuscript traditions. Scholars have dated them to about the 2d century (some minority opinions say late 1st century) of the common era making them about contemporary with the Didache. Had these texts been widely circulated in the Christian West, I think that they would have stood an excellent chance of inclusion in the New Testament canon of scripture.

Since our canon is long-since “closed,” that is “water under the bridge,” but they are nevertheless beautiful pieces of Christian poetry. They reveal a gentle and kindly God who, like a divine mother, offers “his breasts” for milk for his children. They describe a view of the incarnation that is both ancient and fresh, singularly lacking in the dark colorations given that doctrine by Augustine and Anselm and their adherents in the west.

There is a free online version of the Charlesworth translation that is available at the link: The Odes of Solomon

I’ll also “paste in” a copy of the segment that I quoted in Dean Knisely’s blog, Entangled States

From Ode 7

"For there is a helper for me, the Lord. He has generously shown himself to me in his simplicity, because his kindness has diminished his dreadfulness.

He became like me, that I might receive Him. In form he was considered like me, that I might put him on.

And I trembled not when I saw him, because he was gracious to me.

Like my nature he became, that I might understand him. And like my form, that I might not turn away from him.

The Father of Knowledge is the Word of knowledge.

He who created wisdom is wiser than his works.

And he who created me when yet I was not knew what I would do when I came into being.

On account of this, he was gracious to me in his abundant grace, and allowed me to ask from him and to benefit from his sacrifice.

For he it is who is incorrupt, the perfection of the worlds and their Father.

He has allowed Him to appear to them that are his own; in order that they may recognize him that made them, and not suppose that they came of themselves.

For towards knowledge he has set his way, he has widened it and lengthened it and brought it to complete perfection.

And has set over it the traces of his light, and it proceeded from the beginning until the end.

For by him, he was served, and he was pleased by the Son.

And because of his salvation, he will possess everything. And the Most High will be known by his holy ones:

To announce the coming of the Lord, that they may go forth to meet him and may sing to him, with joy and with the harp of many tones...

Let the singers sing the grace of the Lord Most High, and let them bring their songs.

And let their heart be like the day, and their gentle voices like the majestic beauty of the Lord.

And let there not be anyone who breathes that is without knowledge or voice.

For he gave a mouth to his creation: to open the voice of the mouth towards him, and to praise him."

I found this, frankly, to be stunningly beautiful. What's more surprising is that all of the Odes are like this. How did we "miss" this text in the West, and why are they not more popular?

Christological Confusion.

2009-11-10T15:29:00.004-07:00

It is becoming increasingly common to think of faith in the Christian West as going through a time of great change. In the simile proposed by Phyllis Tickle, we have torn open the covering of the "cable" to the anchor of faith and are examining the cords/threads within. The source of our modern "predicament" has been variously conceptualized, and I am drawn to the hypothesis proposed by Karen Armstrong that, in the post-reformation period, the Christian West has abandoned too much of the "mythos" in religion, opting for a more purely "logos" approach, creating a new synthesis out of the interaction of traditional faith with the ideas of the enlightenment and the growth of modern science. This approach asserted the "understandability" of religious faith in rational terms in much the same way that the discovery of the "laws" of physics had rendered the physical world intelligible and understandable. As the discoveries of science have rapidly rendered a literal understanding of at least the cosmology of the bible untenable, however, the "cracks" in the old religious synthesis have continued to appear in ever greater number and size.

Somewhat less credited, it would seem, in Armstrong's work, has been the influence of the so-called higher biblical criticism. Shunned by conservative evangelicals who continue to espouse a "literalist" approach, it has become rather standard stuff in a modern seminary education for mainline protestants and also Roman Catholics. Although it is not frequently referred to in explicit ways in most Sunday sermons, it underlies a great deal of the public preaching in the mainline Protestant churches and lurks underneath the surface in more Catholic settings. Currently, the "debate" between radical atheism and religious faith has focused on questions such as the "existence" of God and the attacks by the atheist activists on the literalist/fundamentalist form of Christianity that has arisen as a response to the tide of the degradation of the old-paradigm, post-reformation Christian synthesis. As in any bitter divorce, there is acrimony aplenty flowing in both directions between the now-atheist scientists and the Christian fundamentalists. This has become further complicated by the "culture war" causes of civil rights for persons of color, women and GLBT persons.

One more subtle thread, however, often lost in this drama that plays out on the more public stage, has been what I might term the "Crisis of Christology." Traditional histories of Christianity relegate the great Christological debates to a long-past period of the first centuries of Christian development. The "settled question" of Christology, however, has begun to resurface following assaults on many fronts: questions about the literal/factual nature of the resurrection, "historical" Jesus research and the rediscovery of ancient "alternative" Christologies such as those found in the Nag Hammadi texts to name a few. As an Episcopalian in a church where fundamentalist biblical literalism is a decidedly minority opinion, the Christological controversy is likely to prove much more divisive and destructive, and it is something that we would be well-advised to watch very carefully. It has already surfaced in a practical sense in the recent controversy over the consent to the election of the Rev. Kevin Thew Forrester in the Diocese of Northern Michigan. It was implicit in the furor over the sermon of the Most Rev. Schori with her supposedly "universalist" comments at recent General Convention. For conservative Evangelicals, little of their faith life has been grounded in any conscious/careful understanding of traditional Christology, although it "assumes" some of the basics. For Episcopalians, however, traditionally both reformed and catholic, continuing to affirm the Nicean-Constantinopolitan Creed and possessing an historical liturgical tradition, our whole religious life "reeks" with complex Christological underpinnings. In online debates I have seen this surface in what I might call a "mining" or rediscovery of more "eastern" orthodox traditions. We find quotes trotted out from the earliest fathers of the Church: Athanasius, the Gregories, Basil and others as "defenses" in a way that has not been seen in Christian theological debate for more than a millennium. This reassertion of the complex Christologies to which they contributed has been countered by a contrary school of reaching back to more mystical traditional ideas with elements from Origen, Duns Scotus, Eckhart, pseudo-Dionysius and others revered for their works on religious experience/practice and some of them villified for their "defective" Christologies. In a more profound way than the debates that have arisen over biblical literalism, this has touched the heart of more "catholic" strains of Christianity such as exist in Anglicanism and TEC and has contributed to the present unhappy marriage of biblical-literalist evangelicals and traditionalist Anglo-catholics. We saw this earlier this year in a debate in The Episcopal Cafe in which I participated in which the "meaning" of the incarnation and its "orthodox" understanding was a topic of lively debate. It has resurfaced this past week on Dean Nicholas Knisely's Blog, Entangled States, where he was noted to have quipped, "Ugh. Who says the Christological controversies are fully behind us?"

Rather than being "fully behind us," I believe that the question of the place of Jesus in post-modern Christianity is very much an open one at present. As someone who has moved in a non-theistic and more "mystical" direction in the "understanding" of religious faith and practice but who has also absorbed a great deal of the "higher criticism," I have been trying, so far, to "let the question ride." Inasmuch as a "mystical" or "experiential" approach to the numinous requires a liturgical and ritual context, I had decided that it would be best to loosen my crossed fingers and just "do" the liturgy rather than placing each prayer, response and action under the analytical microscope. I have also been drawn, as a response to the dreaded "Anglican Covenant," to the idea advanced by the V. Rev. Knisely of the idea of the BCP as a de facto covenant and one that precludes the need for the one under present consideration. I have, therefore, been a bit "agnostic" of late in my own Christology.

It is clear, however, that the liturgical life of our branch of the church, so essential to our corporate identity, is strongly rooted in a "high" traditional Christology. The centrality of the eucharistic observation is tied up with dogmatic formulations such as the so-called doctrine of penal substitution. The doctrine of the Holy Trinity and the problematic "God the Son" is so pervasive that one can scarcely find a single paragraph of the prayerbook that does not touch on it- explicitly, implicitly or formulaically. In general, I think that the church will be better served by anticipating these controversies at this comparatively early stage and starting to deal with them in a conscious and considered manner rather than engaging in our usual practice of waiting for it to become an overwhelming and destructive tidal wave. We need to begin to consider that we may have to re-answer the old question from the Gospels of "Who do you say that I am?" regarding the Christ of Faith, if we are to be able to "save" Jesus for the next synthesis.

I would suggest that this has the potential to be far more divisive than the present hot-button issue of sexuality about which there is currently so much angst. Admittedly, the "Christological Crisis" has not come fully to the attention of the everyman in the pew, but it is being heard increasingly in more liberal-minded circles in the church. I find, in addition, that this type of "issue" begins to divide even the so-called "liberals" at a deep level. There are clearly those who are ready to move forward on issues of morality/sexuality but are deeply suspicious of opening the Pandora's box of re-examining our Christology. Many otherwise "liberal" and intellectual persons in the church have begun to engage in what I have tended to call "heresy cataloguing" in which the response to a "suspect" Christological statement is to "name the heresy" and slam the door shut on debate. That a middle-of-the-road clergy person such as Dean Knisely could suggest that Christological controversy is not "fully behind us" suggests that the questions are widespread and deep, even if we do not talk about them. I would hope that we could continue to exercise our Anglican/Episcopal open-mindedness in debate and discussion and allow some of this to "come out" into the open, particularly after the "sexuality storm" has settled down a bit. So far, much of the "Emergent Church" movement has come from a post-evangelical perspective, and seems little interested in resolving these issues or even discussing them, presumably as high Christology was never a strong "evangelical" concern to start with. I would hate to see, however, the development/evolution in these new churches continue without the input of those of us from more traditional "mainline" backgrounds who are better equipped to deal with the Christological questions, having historically had a "high" Christology to start with, but we shall see....

Anyone ready to debate the "two natures?" Don't be chicken!

The Church as a Sponge

2009-08-29T06:43:00.003-07:00

I recently posted a reply to a posting on The Episcopal Cafe's Section, "The Daily Episcopalian," in which Adrian Worsfold wrote an essay entitled Anglican No Longer . He describes complicated reasons as to why he no longer feels comfortable calling himself Anglican or Christian for that matter. I oddly felt that I had "been there done that" and that, as one of the few non-theistic Episcopalians that I know, I needed to post some of my own ideas. I suspect that, as I took several days to put my thoughts together for that post, it will not get much notice. I did, however, want to incorporate it into my own blog, as it contains some ideas about what I have recently been thinking about church and the world. I am attracted, I think, to some of the "emergent" Christianity movement's ideas, but I often get the feeling that the persons writing in that area are coming from an Evangelical background and that their foundational assumptions and language "do not go far enough" to move away from that source. Another voice from both a more "catholic" as well as "pluralist" perspective is needed. As I read it over, I think that I "jump" a bit from the metaphor of the sponge to the metaphor of pilgrimage, and I could probably "clean it up," but I think that I will post it as I originally wrote it for now:

As an a-theistic (non-theistic) Christian/Episcopalian, I somehow feel that I should comment. Ultimately, however, paths like that which Adrian has taken cannot be walked by another, no matter how much sympathy I feel for many of his views. I can only wish him well on his journey, and I hope that his pilgrimage will be one of fulfillment and meaning.
I have thought a great deal recently about "what does it mean" to be Episcopalian/Anglican in this time of re-examination of our foundational "truths" and the inevitable anti-explorational reactions that this invokes. Somehow, I feel that, while I applaud our moves for "fuller inclusion" of LGBT persons and women, we are missing the mark. What Christianity and TEC/Anglicanism does not need so much is "inclusivity" (and certainly not more "exclusivity") but more "porosity." We need for the church to be more "porous" in terms of its experience of/with the world and creation, the "numinous" and the stories and perspectives of other religious traditions and how we understand and allow that to meaningfully interact with our own traditions and history. I was thinking recently that, in spite of our attempts to formulate positions/doctrines, Jesus in the Gospels often seemed to resist firm definitions. "What is the Kingdom of heaven like?" was answered mostly in parable and metaphor, not in creed/covenant/doctrine. "Covenant" Anglicans need to appreciate the irony of what they are trying to accomplish.
How about a new parable? "The Kingdom of Heaven is like a sponge. When it is taken out of water, it dries out, hardens, breaks and disintegrates. But when it is put into water, it takes up the water and grows and absorbs it. And when you take it out again, it drenches everything around it. "
The Church, I think, needs to be more sponge-like. It needs to absorb the concerns and needs of those that it encounters. It needs to avoid having firm boundaries and borders. It needs to be drenched in the experience of the world as it is, not as we wish it to be and also the possibility of the numinous that we may find/encounter in ways unlike any that we have known before. Scripture needs to be a springboard for experience/thought, not a wall around our minds and lives to fence them in. We need to break the canon open, not fence it in. The church needs to be immersed in the water of the numinous and the world, not out of the water and drying out on a storage shelf. It needs to "leak" the numinous and its reflections and experience back into the surrounding water and world.
At this point, I am more "optimistic" than Adrian that the churches, Anglican and Episcopal and others, can still possibly do this. It will not be easy, but what real thing is ever easy? In the year 2000, the liturgy for the opening of the Holy Door at St. Peter's in Rome was accompanied by a prayer containing a line that still resonates with me: "The Church is on a pilgrimage through time to eternity." Each of us is journeying in this Pilgrimage for such an infinitesimal time with no end in sight. We walk, yes, but wither none of us really can say nor can we say that there is some "end" at which we will arrive. I hope, though, that while we live and walk together or apart, we may find meaning in the journey itself.

True Anglican Unity-arguments against an Anglican covenant and magisterium

2009-08-06T12:34:00.003-07:00

Although I have been spending the last few weeks (indeed last couple of months) running from one task to another, it has also been a time for growth and reflection, particularly as regards the recent events at TEC's general convention the ordination to all levels of ministry of LGBT persons as well as the resolution calling for an interim local pastoral solution on blessings as the Standing Liturgical committee collects liturgical resources for the next GC in 2012.

One of the best personal outcomes of this process, for myself as well as others, has been the chance to reflect and listen and respond to +Rowan Cantuar's own "reflection" on the issue of Anglican unity. (Here)

It has been heartening to hear the spectrum of dissenting response, not all necessarily from liberals/progressives, against his view of the structure that he is proposing for the Anglican Communion as a whole. In particular, it has invited a great deal of reflection on really what Anglicanism is, and what is our true "instrument" of unity.

Giles Fraser, in an insightful essay (here) in the Church Times writes:

"[T]he genius of the Church of England has been to allow different theological temperaments to worship alongside one other, united by common prayer and community spirit. This was how we recognised each other as members of the same Church. This was our particular charism, and we were widely valued for it." (emphasis added)

A Lutheran in-law of mine once stated a perspective of some other Lutherans about TEC that, "You can believe in a rock, as long as you use the prayerbook."

For those persons who see our faith lives as bounded by creeds and covenants and definitions, this conceptualization of the church is an offensive and heretical one. Anyone who knows the history of the post-reformation Church of England and the post-revolution Episcopal Church knows, however, that this way of "defining" who we are, who's "in" and who's "out," has not been the prevailing Anglican way. We have tried to do this in the past, but always with disastrous results.

I was reading a post by Trinity Cathedral Dean, Nicholas Knisely, last week about his own feelings about GC and the subsequent furor. In a post in his blog "Entangled States" entitled "We pray together. And that's enough." (here), he writes:

"The Elizabethan Settlement, which for me is modeled at every Eucharist when I present the host to a communicant with the paradoxical words (to a person of Tudor England) “the body of Christ, the bread of Heaven”, is fundamental to our identity as Anglicans. We are willing to be in relationship with people who will gather with us around Jesus; whether they by [sic] free or slave, man or women, Jew or Greek. We are the anti-puritans caring less about clarity of theological categories than we do about loving relationship. “If you will pray to Jesus with me, I will pray to Jesus with you.”

At least we try to when we’re at our best. Which isn’t always that often admittedly.

In my mind, as an Episcopalian of catholic leanings and ecumenical enthusiasm, if there’s one thing that argues for the continued existence of an Anglican witness in the Universal Church - it’s our charism of holding firm to praying with those with whom we disagree no matter how hard that is to do." (emphasis added)

I would agree, therefore, that one of the essences, perhaps the essence, of Anglicanism is our willingness to worship and pray together in spite of our differences. It is this sort of liturgical unity, an acting out of our spiritual unity as members of the Body of Christ, that is nearer to the heart of Anglicanism than is the misguided attempt to make us the English Branch of Roman Catholicism that some, such as the ABC +Rowan, seem to be trying to force upon us.

I have posted a quote from Edward Pucey elsewhere (in response to Nicholas blog post) from his "Eirenicon," itself an "answer" to questions of unity/relationship between the C of E and Roman Catholicism, but I believe that it bears repeating as it summarizes things so well:

"At Holy Communion we pray to God to 'inspire continually the Universal Church with the spirit of truth, unity and concord,' and for 'all Bishops,' not our own only. Certainly, since prayer is the voice of the soul to God, we express not our inmost belief only, but a loving belief, that the Church is one.
How it is one, the Church nowhere defines; but the faith is kept alive by prayer more than by definitions. Yet, whatever duties may follow up in the Unity of the Church, it is plain that no harmony of men's will can constitute a supernatural and Divine unity.
Unity, in part, is the direct gift of God; in part, it is the fruit of that gift in the mutual love of the members of the Church. In part, it is a spiritual oneness wrought by God the Holy Ghost; in part, it is a grace to be exercised by man, a consequence and fruit of that gift. In one way, it is organic unity derived from Christ and binding all to Christ, descending from the Head to the Body, and uniting the Body to the Head; in another, it consists in acts of love from the members one to another. Christ our Lord, God and Man, binds us to Him by the indwelling of His Spirit, by the gift of His Sacraments, administered by those to whom He gave the commission so to do, by the right faith in Himself. , We are bound to one another, in that we are members of Him, and by the love which He sheds abroad in our hearts through the Spirit which he giveth us, and by common acts of worship and intercommunion.
Of these, the highest and chief is that which binds us to Christ Himself. Our highest union with one another is an organic union with one another through union with Him." (emphasis added)

I would add, therefore, my argument that we neither need nor want a more defined "Anglican Covenant" nor an established international Anglican Magisterium set up in imitation of the Roman Church's model that we chose to abandon nearly 500 years ago. Those of us who oppose this model that is, for us, both reactionary and novel, need to speak up and be insistent. I agree that, although TEC has plainly articulated "where we are" as a province, it would be a sorry state if we did not support others throughout the Anglican Communion in their struggle to resist this kind of counter-productive and backward-looking "reform" that is being offered in the guise of a truly "catholic" Christianity.

"Summoned by the God who made us

Rich in our diversity,

Gathered in the name of Jesus,

Richer still in unity:

Let us bring the gifts that differ

And, in splendid, varied ways,

Sing a new church into being,

One of faith and love and praise"

Fearing the "where we are" option

2009-07-11T06:27:00.002-07:00

I just "responded" to an article on Episcopal Cafe written by Richard Helmer under the title "Eyes on the floor: B033 – A Festering Wound" I think that I should also place my worries in my blog as well, and I would invite any comments that any would like to make, hopefully to assuage my growing fears.

I have had a growing sense of uneasiness that the "where we are now" option response to B033 has a potential for being the convention's response to the pain and problems that followed B033. It is such a "liberal" and so "Episcopalian" response. It is sincere in saying what we "all" believe. My fear, however, is that this "where we are" will move full inclusion really little to no distance forward, but will be "just enough" to invite another aggressive response from the "other side." Although we on the side of full inclusion seem to be trying to avoid an all out war, it seems that the "other side" has been preparing a preemptive and devastating strike.

B033 accomplished little to nothing. We had no more LGBT candidates move forwards in the process of elevation to the Episcopacy. We were, however, left with all the scars. ACNA happened. Extra-provincial Episcopal interventions happened. The attempts to extort commitments from TEC and to put it under disciplinary actions continued.

The recent meetings in the C of E show that the anti-inclusion persons are continuing to use the issue to push their own agenda forwards in an aggressive manner. Do we really believe that, should we make a "modest" response, they will respond "modestly" as well? "The last time" the schismatics had the bonfires all set and ready to go. B033 was passed; they lit the bonfire anyways. Who knows what "bonfire" or "bomb" is set and ready to be ignited when GC closes the door for another three years?

My fear this time is that we now have the momentum to really do something positive, but that we will, out of charity and a sense of trying to still "include" persons and groups who have no desire at all to be "included" in anything with us, take a "half measure." There "where we are now" option will move us no forward from the status quo. The "backlash" that is already likely set up to be let loose no matter what GC does, will not be moderated by our measure being a "half measure." We will, once again, get all the "badness" with none of the goodness. Already, some of us are getting the "jitters" because we fear that affirming the value of our (minority) LGBT brothers and sisters will harm more people than it helps if it impairs our ability to minister to the "poorest and the least." (We will save a few LGBT people, but will consign many more to poverty and death.-- a net "loss" on the "debit and credit" model of salvation and ministry). When the backlash comes (and it will), I fear that many of them will simply lose heart, choose to "cut their losses" and drop LGBT inclusion as a "lost cause" for now. The ongoing "process" that the "where we are" option will come to a halt.

So, what would I suggest? I believe that it is not the time for a half measure. I believe that we are going to get the same "backlash" no matter what we do. Let's make what we get out of it "worth it" by making a a clear and unequivocal statement for full inclusion. Agree?

I need Thee, O I need Thee...

2009-06-21T07:40:00.002-07:00

This past week, I had to go home to Ohio. I went, primarily, with the purpose of continuing the process of settlement of my parents' estate. This has meant continuing to deal with issues of property, paying bills and making legal arrangements, but that has been the easy part. The harder part has been dealing with their home, a house full of possessions, not only theirs, but their parents and grandparents. These were not just possessions bought at malls but things that they made and created, objects that they saved as memories of their parents and their own lives. It has been and continues to be a painful process that continues what happened in their deaths– the dissolution of the evidence of their lives. Each envelope opened, every clamp in my father's workshop loosened, every tablecloth unfolded releases and dissipates more of the energy and evidence of their lives. Their physical deaths made this necessary, but that was not primarily by my hand. This was by my hand, my complicity and active surrender to the finitude of theirs, and ultimately, my existence. Here, I am not just the victim of entropy but the agent of it as well.

On top of the "planned" tasks and events, I was greeted only hours after my arrival by news of the death of my Aunt Sally, my father's sister. Although my father has still one half sister living, we were never very close, and this felt to me like "the end," the passing of the last person of my father's and mother's generation. It was not just the end of the life of one person, a precious one to be sure, but the end of an "era." It brought home again to me the "truths" of what the Buddhists call the "Five remembrances:" We will grow old; We will grow ill; We will die; We will lose what is precious to us; We will leave behind only the consequences of our actions.

Sally's funeral was presided over by both a Baptist and a Mennonite minister. It was full of scripture verses. It was full of assurances that the "parting is only for a time" and "we will be together again" that characterizes the "hope" of supernatural theism and heaven--we will die, but that is only a physical body. We will be together in the next world in paradise. At the end of the funeral, we engaged in the "country" funeral practice where each of the persons attending filed by the open casket for "one last look," one last glimpse of the features of the dead one before the casket is closed and we see them no more forever in this life. My uncle Delmer, Aunt Sally's 90-year-old and physically unwell husband, collapsed as he was standing at his wife's casket. A wheelchair was needed to allow him to leave and get to the car to go to the cemetery for the graveside service. Their children did little better and were clearly overcome with tears and grief, and why should they not be? As the ministers were helping my Uncle into the wheelchair, one of them, the younger one, kept repeating that it was "only for a little while," "only a little while." I do not know if it comforted my uncle. Perhaps it did. I am pretty sure that it did not comfort me.

Before and after the funeral, a pianist played many of the "old hymns," primarily evangelical, American hymns, the kind of ones that are heard in Methodist, Baptist and other conservative Christian churches still (but fading in the face of growing "praise music"). One of them has continued to run through my mind this last week: "I need thee every hour."

I need Thee every hour, most gracious Lord;

No tender voice like Thine can peace afford.

I need Thee, O I need Thee;

Every hour I need Thee;

O bless me now, my Savior,

I come to Thee.

I need Thee every hour, in joy or in pain;

Come quickly and abide, or life is in vain.

I need Thee every hour; teach me Thy will;

And Thy rich promises in me fulfill

I need Thee every hour, most Holy One;

O make me thine indeed, Thou blessed son.

I need Thee, O I need Thee;

Every hour I need Thee;

O bless me now, my Savoir,

I come to Thee.

Thanks to the internet and the "cyberhymnal" (www.cyberhymnal.org), I was able to retrieve the whole text as well as a bit of the story behind it. Apparently, it was written in 1872 by a woman, Annie S. Hawks, who had, at the age of 37 years, a "numinous" experience. She wrote," Suddenly, I became so filled with the sense of nearness to the Master that, wondering how one could live without Him, either in joy or pain, these words, 'I Need Thee Every Hour,' were ushered into my mind, the thought at once taking full possession of me.' Many years later, after the death of her husband, she wrote again, "I did not understand at first why this hymn had touched the great throbbing heart of humanity. It was not until long after, when the shadow fell over my way, the shadow of a great loss, that I understood something of the comforting power in the words which I had been permitted to give out to others in my hour of sweet serenity and peace."

It brought home to me, perhaps, more clearly than before, that what I need, we need, we all need, is presence. It is not so important what we say to the person in pain, but that we be present to them. It is what we want of our community and especially our church or sangha. We want them to be present to us. It is this desire for "presence" I think, that makes us want God to be a "person" – the most focused kind of "presence" that we know. This is the "great throbbing heart of humanity." If our religious practice and experience cannot "answer" this in some way (not necessarily confirming it in the way we are immediately inclined to want it), then it can do little for our real needs. The lack of "presence" is what turned me away from supernatural theism. I simply could not find such a "presence" anymore in that context and way of thought.

In many ways, my "rebirth" in a religious sense has been a "turning the page." What I found, however, on turning the page, was not a new "answer" but page after page of blank paper. I have taken only some tiny steps to write a few shaky lines on these new pages, like the first-grader starting to practice the basic shapes of the letters of the alphabet. I can feel the "need" however, in myself for "presence" but how, or if, or in what form it may come, I really do not know. Will it come in gently recognizing the "need" but understanding that the "need" has no answer: We will grow old; We will grow ill; We will die; We will lose what is precious to us....there is no escape? Will it come in a flash of light and a heavenly voice.? Will it come at all? I really and honestly do not know. I know, at least, a bit more clearly what is the reality of this "great throbbing heart of humanity." It is a tender place, and one that at least "softens" my own "hardness" as I encounter this need in everyone else that I meet: "I need Thee, O I need Thee; Every hour I need Thee...."

Trinitarian Reflections

2009-06-08T07:08:00.001-07:00

Although much of my attention outside of work this last week has been focused on the preparation for the music for Trinity Sunday, there has been an undercurrent of "theological angst" that has been running just beneath the surface. Quite honestly, although I enjoy making music, Trinity Sunday is not a feast day that I look forward to with great anticipation. As we are all fond of saying, it is the only Sunday of the church year that is devoted to a dogma, and this one is, of its nature, a difficult one, particularly for someone who has moved away from supernatural theism.

Although the Bishop was careful to not delve too deeply into the "mystery" of the Trinity, he did bring up an idea that has been around in Western Christianity at least since Augustine, probably before, namely, that the Trinity of God is reflected in a Trinity in humanity. The attribution is that, a humanity created in the image of God, would have a Trinitarian identity as a reflection of that divine "imaging" process.

I must say that I found the Trinitarian reflections less personally simulating than the restatement of the idea of the "divine" image in humanity. For the traditional supernatural theists, the incarnation of God in Jesus cum Christ is a, if not the unique event in the history of the universe. For some eastern incarnational theologians, the incarnation is the purpose of all creation. For a non-theistic Christian, this is much harder, but I might get to "the same place" as my supernatural theistic friends by another route. If I see the universe as not a "creation" of God but as a "birth" from the "substance" of God (i.e. a pantheist or panentheistic or pandeistic view), then the "incarnation" was not something "added on" to creation in Christ, but a pre-existent "fact" that is at the very nature of the world itself. The "incarnation" is, therefore "before all worlds." We find, therefore, the incarnation in all of "creation," ourselves included. Not just Jesus, but every human is a unique "son" of God. To take it a step forward (which is where I would lose my theistic and orthodox friends), all humanity (not just Jesus Christ), is fully God and fully human, as this is what, in essence, humanity is. In the same, but different way, my cat Charlie is fully God and fully feline. My sock is fully God and fully sock. Each element of creation is a reflection of the image of God, because it is, in its deepest essence God/part of God because all of the universe is "God."

In my mind, then, I hear directed at me the question that was posed to Father Telemond in the film, Shoes of the Fisherman, when he (playing the role of Father Teilhard de Chardin) is asked "What think you of Christ?" As I have been trying to reconstruct, as it were, a new way of faith out of the shards of the one that I lost, I must truly ask, what is the place of "Christ" in this "non-theistic Christianity" that I and others are exploring? I am not sure, frankly, what I want to say in answer to this question, at least as regards a fully developed "Christology" to accompany the developing "Theology." A partial answer may be that, it was in the human Jesus (fully God and fully human) that we were given a first or "unique" view of this pre-existent reality. We, meaning the community of Christian believers, were given a unique glimpse or demonstration or revelation of the incarnation. Jesus, in his own person, "showed us the Father." Because we have "seen" Jesus, we have also "seen" the "Father." By walking in the way of Jesus or following him as his disciples, we too can be brought to a more complete or "higher" awareness of the unity of humanity and God and experience it i ourselves. This "Theosis" is not something to "achieve" as it were, but is an "epiphany," a revealing of something that we had all along, but of which we were, largely, unaware. We might find, then, a correspondence or a point of communication with our Buddhist brothers and sisters who look for "Buddha nature" in themselves and the universe. In Taoism, we might look to the concept of "pu" the "uncarved block" or "original essence." In a "missional" or "evangelistic" sense, the Christian believer has something worthwhile to offer the non-Christian world if it helps potential believers to "self-realize" their "divine" nature.

I know that, for "orthodox" Christians, this is the "one step too far." It is also the step that so many mystics have taken who have been condemned as heretical. It was, I think, the "error" of Eckhart and Origen. But is it an "error?" It is a truism that, often, today's orthodoxy is born from yesterday's heresy. We shall see....

Idolatrous Meat and Having a Coffee

2009-05-15T07:21:00.002-07:00

Last night, Integrity @ Trinity had a very productive and, dare I say, satisfying exchange and sharing with the Bishop of the Diocese of Arizona and the Dean of Trinity Cathedral Phoenix. Naturally, a great deal of discussion was centered around concerns for moving forward on the issue of full inclusion of LGBT persons in the life of The Episcopal Church (TEC) but also the conflicts and difficulties that have been brewing in the larger Anglican Communion.

One very valuable piece of information confirmed my suspicions that certain conservative persons have very consciously been using this issue to precipitate schism and division in TEC. While TEC has, for the most part, held to its commitment to abide by the provisions of B033, it is quite clear that some leaders of the conservative movement have simply ignored all pleas for "restraint" such as those urged by the Windsor Commission. To discover that one of "their" (formerly "our") bishops spoke quite openly before the consecration of V. Gene Robinson about his intent to use this issue to provoke a division of TEC, is exceedingly disheartening. If "listening" and "dialogue" seemed to meet no response from this individual and others closely associated with him, I should not be particularly surprised about that, inasmuch as the actions were not a "reaction" to events, but a carefully plotted and "premeditated" strategy to do just what has been done. It is, frankly, a shame that this is not more widely known.

At the same time, it encourages me to think that persons with such ill-begotten motives cannot represent all of conservatism in TEC. Clearly, some persons on the "right" are behaving in stunningly un-Christian ways as they defend views that really have little to do with Christianity. At the same time, I have known committed Anglo-Catholics who have deep religious convictions and lives of prayer who simply see the world in another way. I would hope that we may find room in TEC for both liberal and conservative individuals who are not simply motivated to do as Bishop Kirk put it, "blow the church apart."

I must also put in a voice of gratitude to Bishop Kirk for bringing up the one biblical passage that has troubled me most as we move forward to the formal recognition of full inclusion for LGBT individuals, specifically the discussion from St. Paul in his letter to the Corinthians centering around eating meat offered in pagan temples. Paul quite specifically seems to agree with the position that, as the "idols" do not really "exist," there could be no harm in eating the food. Meat was simply meat and could nourish just as well whether it had been offered in a pagan ritual or not. The difficulty seemed to come when those without scruples were critical of those who were not so clear on the issue and perhaps did not as clearly understand the distinction between the "false" gods of the pagan temples and the "true" God whom they now served and acknowledged. He urged that the "eaters" should have compassion for their "weaker" brethren. There is no doubt that this passage is on the minds of many of us who, at the same time as we wish to move forward "once and for all" on LGBT inclusion, do not wish to harm our "weaker brethren" who have, perhaps, simply not had enough time to understand and to reflect. We do not want, as it were, for our practice to become a "stumbling block" for them.

Quite frankly, this is a moral dilemma which has no pat solution that I can see. There is no doubt in my mind that the church needs to move forward with the "courage of its convictions" about the worth of LGBT persons and allow full access to all of the sacraments of the church. At the same time, we need to exercise compassion towards those who are shocked or surprised by this move. In a practical sense, I tend to suspect that many within the groups that have fragmented away from TEC were "looking for an excuse" to move out, and they probably would have done so over some other issue, if not this one. Once that dust has settled, I hope that we can continue to dialogue with those who have chosen to remain within TEC and try live in unity if not in unanimity. To that end, if we can do what the presiding bishop has suggested, that is to make a positive statement of inclusion, then we must also include those for whom this, hopefully inevitable forward movement, causes pain and continue to offer them the full support and resources of the church.

Ending with an anecdote. There is a person at Trinity Cathedral, an eastern European immigrant, who has been a member of the cathedral congregation for many years. Philip and I met her and have had a cordial relationship with her for over 10 years now. She has, it would seem, a very deep spiritual life and believes most strongly that her relationship with God has made her "clean all over." It is also clear that she reads the bible frequently and intensely and quite frankly believes that homosexuality is a sin. When she encounters groups of LGBT persons after the Sunday Eucharist, she will often give a "blessing" with a prayer that these sinful persons will be cleansed of their sin. (Sort of an involuntary exorcism) For some in the LGBT local group, this is quite frankly offensive. I suspect that, had we not already had a cordial relationship with this person, I might have found that also to be the case. It was, however, our relationship to one another, that neither of us is willing to abandon, which keeps our disagreement from being disagreeable. I simply thank her for her blessing in the spirit of compassion in which it is (from my viewpoint misguidedly) offered, and offer my own intentions to pray for her and her family as well. Once that is past, then our relationship continues to carry us on together, we share a coffee and talk about our families and other things that we hold in common. I hope that TEC can work to do something like this on the larger level as well.

Many Visions

2009-05-07T06:04:00.002-07:00

I am not sure where this "thought" will take me, but as I was having my walk this morning, I did some more reflection about the current conflict in TEC and the Anglican Communion. It seems fairly clear that the "sides" in this current debate have different visions of themselves, God and the church. Inasmuch as these visions guide us as we walk, it is inevitable that we will walk in different ways and different directions. The only practical solution that I can see, is to allow those with different visions to be guided by those visions and to walk in the directions and ways that those visions lead them. For those whose vision is of a "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and forever" whose vision guides them to preserve the "deposit of faith" as they have received it, they must do as that vision compels them to do. For those of us who hear the voice of the Spirit calling us to full inclusion, openness and exploration of the many faces of the life of the Spirit, we must walk in the way that this vision compels us as well. The best we might hope for is that, even if we do not walk in lock step and in each other's footsteps, we may still share the road together as civil companions, if not as "husband and wife." We may still converse and point out to each other the sights that we see. If our roads divide, then perhaps we may still say farewell with civility and hope that our paths may converge again after a time, as we surely do not know where all paths and roads lead. Too metaphorical? Probably, but metaphor may be the only way to cope with a reality that is too painful too experience emotionally and to "contrary" to experience logically.

Be Thou my Vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art.
Thou my best Thought, by day or by night,
Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.

Jeffrey Shy

"Visions in Arizona?"

The pain of dialogue and the ACC

2009-05-06T07:20:00.002-07:00

I have been a bit reluctant to delve into church polity and events, but as a new subscriber to Twitter and as one following the Episcopal Cafe, I have been following as well the events of the current ACC meeting in Jamaica. It has taken so much time in my internal conversation, that some sort of reflection might be helpful, to me if to no one else. Some of the news has been as "bad" as it might be. The continuing Windsor report basically asks for a continuation of the "freeze" on the consecration of LGBT bishops and the blessing of same-sex unions as well as a cessation of extra-provincial incursions. It does, of course, encourage more dialogue and listening, which is a good thing. It also leans towards putting some "teeth" it would seem into the "instruments of unity" in the form of the so-called Anglican Covenant.

It is hard for me to sort out how I "feel" about all this. On the first blush, it makes me feel hurt and angry. It seems to continue to delay the full inclusion in the life of the church of LGBT individuals. I imagine this is somewhat like the feeling of a person caught in an abusive family relationship. We wish to remain part of the family, and our desire to remain a part has trapped us in a relationship with certain persons who are not so much conservative in attitude (yes they are that) but also authoritarian. There is so much here that seems to be "really" about authority and power, that one begins to feel like a convenient pawn in a power struggle about just who can claim to be "in charge." Those who espouse a conservative and authoritarian view seem to be struggling to hold onto their authority. The deposed bishop of Pittsburgh had barely received notice of his removal when he was immediately elevated again to a new position of authority. The recent legal challenge to the metropolitical status of the presiding bishop and the general convention seems yet another attempt to assert authority. Perhaps I am self-blinded by my closeness to these issues, but the consecration of V. Gene Robinson and the church's movements towards the blessing of same-sex committed relationships seems more of a "bottom up" growth than a "top down" authoritarian development.

I am, of course, in favor of dialogue, but does that mean that we must resign ourselves to an open-ended and seemingly endless paralysis of action? Must we wait for the entirety of global Christianity to give its assent before moving? I would tend to suspect that, if we had chosen this pathway with regard to inclusion and ordination of women, we would still be waiting and dialoguing, not celebrating the enrichment of our lives that has come from our women deacons, priests and bishops. There is an even more important question to ask, of course, whether it is even possible to have a meaningful dialogue with someone who comes to the conversation with strongly-held authoritarian convictions? When we marry surety of belief with authoritarian power structures, can there ever be any progress in discussion. I would like to believe that "all things are possible" but I must be realistic that not "all things are probable." B033 was passed in a guilt-saturated attempt to "hold us together" and was followed by nearly immediate schismatic retaliation from the very people to whom it was offered.

It is not clear that I even have the concern all for myself. If the Episcopal and Anglican church should choose to marginalize and condemn, this would be no more than I have come to expect through my last 40 years and more. I and others like me would, likely, simply turn inwards, regroup and continue to work. I worry more, however, for those who are not so "hardened" to this. What of the young LGBT people, the teens and 20-somethings who desperately need the welcome and nurture of a church that accepts them fully and wholly? What irreparable harm will we do to them as we convey to them that they are "not quite" as good as the rest of the world? What of those who are older, who have "fought the good fight" and look to leave this life still without a reward for all their long labors? I worry as well about the harm that will come to the Episcopal Church should we walk down this path of never-ending waiting. TEC in North America is simply not the church of Uganda or the West Indies. The "mainline protestant" churches in North America continue to fade, and it would be foolish for TEC to pretend that it is "something other." We might be something other, but not if we walk backwards into ever more authoritarian structures. So much of the growth in our church has been from those from outside the circles of "cradle Episcopalians." What do they come for? The answer, I think, is a corporate experience of worship that is both traditional and new coupled with an openness to explore and develop our own spiritual lives and natures with the blessing, welcome and guidance of a church that "welcomes you." Any backwards retreat will surely dilute the sincerity of that "welcome" and could, I fear, push us closer to the day of our demise. Finally, there is the issue of global justice and humanity. It seems no coincidence that the Most Rev. Akinola presides over the church in a country that appears to be racking up one of the worst civil right records for LGBT persons in the Christian world. What message do we send to them, if we do not challenge the positions of their religious and political leaders? More appropriately, if we do not shine the spotlight on the horrors that appear to be happening there, we become silent conspirators to these human atrocities.

So finally, where did this post get me? A solution? Hardly. A bit more clarity of my own conflict? Perhaps.

The "Drawing" Power of Creation

2009-05-04T06:38:00.003-07:00

Some of the writers in the mystical traditions urge us to turn away from creation to experience God in the formless interior silence. The writer of the Cloud of Unknowing advises this. While he lauds the worthiness of "lesser" thoughts, it is his argument that one must aim "higher" to the cloud of unknowing, that which is beyond thought and "pound at it" to move ever closer and into the cloud.

Other authors, however, write about how God may be experienced through the contemplation of creation, the physical universe of which we also are a part. Today's reading on "The Episcopal Cafe" for Monica, Mother of Augustine, suggests one such experience. In the quoted excerpt from The Confessions, Augustine, describes an experience which he shared with his mother, just before her death in which they were discussing and trying to imagine what the life of the world to come would be like. I will indulge in an extended quote:

"...we laid the lips of our hearts to the heavenly stream that flows from your fountain, the source of all life which is in you, so that as far as it was in our power to do so we might be sprinkled with its waters and in some sense reach an understanding of this great mystery. As the flame of love burned stronger in us and raised us higher towards the eternal God, our thoughts ranged over the whole compass of material things in their various degrees, up to the heavens themselves, from which the sun and the moon and the stars shine down upon the earth. Higher still we climbed, thinking and speaking all the while in wonder at all that you have made. And while we spoke of the eternal Wisdom, longing for it and straining for it with all the strength of our hearts, for one fleeting instant we reached out and touched it."

Pseudionysius similarly writes:

"Hence, with regard to the supra-essential being of God–transcendent Goodness transcendently there–no lover of the truth which is above all truth will seek to praise it as word or power or mind or life or being. No. It is at a total remove from every condition, movement, life, imagination, conjecture, name, discourse, thought, conception, being, rest, dwelling, unity, limit, infinity the totality of existence. And yet, since it is the underpinning of goodness, and by merely being there is the cause of everything, to praise this divinely beneficent Providence, you must turn to all of creation. It is there at the center of everything and everything has it for a destiny. It is there "before all things and in it all things hold together." Because it is there the world has come to be and exists. All things long for it. The intelligent and rational long for it by way of knowledge, the lower strata by way of perception, the remainder by way of the stirrings of being alive and in whatever fashion befits their condition."

I do not want to stray into murky territories of "scientific creationism" or arguments for God's existence, e.g. "design requires a designer," yet there is a "drawing" power, it seems, in the contemplation of the physical universe. The way of interior silence and formlessness may indeed be a way to the mystery of God, but as a sometime scientist and "amateur" naturalist, I find myself "drawn" to the beauty and mystery of the physical universe. Our cathedral dean, in his sermon this Sunday, commented that "like so much of our faith," we find so much that is paradoxical. We may experience God in the interior formless silence, but we may also find the numinous in the "longing" of creation as well.

Spirituality and Brain Evolution

2009-04-30T06:45:00.002-07:00

Today, I am a bit short on time. Somehow, I just needed more sleep! I have continued, however, to read How God Changes Your Brain and found this quote this morning:

"The cultural evolution of God follows the neurological evolution of the brain. The circuits that generate images of a wrathful God are closely tied to the oldest structures in the brain, and the circuits that allow us to envision a compassionate and mystical God are in the newest part of our brain. we can't get rid of our old limbic God, which means that anger and fear will always be part of our neural and spiritual personality. however, we can train the newer structures in our brain to suppress our biological tendency to react with anger and fear."

Divine Enlightenment from Pseudodionysius

2009-04-28T06:50:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, I think that it is better to hear the voice of another than to talk so much myself. Today, I'll be silent and let Dionusius speak from The Divine Names:

"This is the kind of enlightenment into which we have been initiated by the hidden tradition of our inspired teachers, a tradition at one with scripture. We now grasp these things in the best way we can, and as they come to us, wrapped in the sacred veils of that love toward humanity with which scripture and hierarchical traditions cover the truths of the mind with things derived from the realms of the senses. And so it is that the Transcendent is clothed in the terms of being, with shape and form on things which have neither, of what is an imageless and supra-natural simplicity. But in time to come, when we are incorruptible and immortal, when we have come at last to the blessed inheritance of being like Christ, then, as scripture says, ' we shall always be with the Lord.' In most holy contemplation we shall be ever filled with the sight of God shining gloriously around us as once it shone for the disciples at the divine transfiguration. And there we shall be, our minds away from passion and from earth, and we shall have a conceptual gift of light from him and, somehow, in a way we cannot know, we shall be united with him and, our understanding carried away, blessedly happy, we shall be struck by his blazing light. Marvelously, our minds will be like those in the heavens above. We 'shall be equal to angels and sons of God, being sons of the resurrection.' "

The Meditating Brain

2009-04-27T05:58:00.003-07:00

I was tipped off a couple of days ago by a tweet from "The Episcopal Cafe" to a new book by Andrew Newberg, M.D. and Mark Robert Waldman, How God Changes Your Brain, Breakthrough Findings from a Leading Neuroscientist. Although I have just started reading, the book is well-referenced with articles from respected peer-reviewed journals. It has been his finding that meditative techniques such as contemplative prayer and the like, produce measurable and distinct changes in the brain. Of the effects that he describes, one is that the meditative techniques appear to enhance activity in a circuit involving the anterior cingulate, prefrontal cortex, basal ganglia and thalamus. The anterior cingulate "appears to be involved with emotional regulation, learning and memory." Increased activity in the anterior cingulate appears to have a role in "lowering anxiety and irritability, and also enhances social awareness." The prefrontal cortex is also activated by meditative techniques and, of course, appears to play a role in sustained attention. One thing that Newman is very careful to point out is that this provides no "proof" of the existence of "God" and that even atheist individuals using some of the meditative techniques can achieve similar changes in the brain. Nevertheless, it does suggest that there is something that meditation/contemplation does to our brains and that it has the very real potential to change not only our internal millieu but perhaps through the thalamic regions, our perceptions of the world around us.

Running and Returning

2009-04-22T07:11:00.001-07:00

Can we even talk?

I have to admit that, as a "reader" and someone who has come to love discovery, learning, knowledge, it is a bit "unnatural" to try to move away from intellectual concepts to "pure" experience. I know, of course, that experiences can never be "pure" as the "I" that experiences them has been conditioned/shaped/created by all the experiences, internal and external that went before. Nevertheless, there is a great emphasis in so much writing on contemplation that warns against trying to "get to it" in an overly intellectual manner.

From the Cloud of Unknowing:

"For God limits his divinity to come down to our level and our souls find an affinity with him because we have the great distinction of having been created in his image and likeness. And he alone and only he is able to fulfill the longing and intentions of our soul; by virtue of his grace, which re-creates us, our soul is capable of comprehending him completely by love, though God can never be comprehended by any created intelligence–either by a human being or by an angel. But by that I mean that they do not comprehend him in the understanding, not by means of their love. He is only incomprehensible to their intelligence, not to their love. "

Years ago, I read a book whose name I no longer recall that recounted the story of a Jewish woman who was trying to recover / participate in the mystical traditions of Judaism. One of her questions was how to "remain" in the state of contemplation and not leave it. The answer seemed to be that she could only "run and return." She could "run" up the mountain to the more clear presence of God, but inevitably she had to "return" down the mountain again.

Again from the Cloud of Unknowing:

"..pay attention to his wonderful divine activity in your soul. Properly understood, it is always an impromptu and unpremeditated impulse, which leaps up to God as a spark springs from the coal...Yet because we are fallen creatures, he can quickly fall prey after each impulse to some thought or memory of some deed that he has either done or left undone. But so what? The soul can immediately spring up again as unexpectedly as it did before."

Perhaps an answer is that, at the top of the mountain, I can only "be still" in the presence of God. When I return to the bottom, then there may be a place for talk. One story I read at some point said that Moses on the mountain did not receive any commandments, but he heard only silence, but at the bottom of the mountain, he delivered the tablets of God's word. No one, however, suggested that the tablets, however, were the "real thing" but in a modern idiom, only a "reflection" of the "real thing."

A blog cannot be a place to have the real thing, but some reflection may be OK, as long as it does not become the "only thing."

Jeffrey Shy

Mesa, Arizona

"Running and Returning"

Eating is better than looking

2009-04-21T06:56:00.001-07:00

Since no one reads this blog, as far as I know, it is not absolutely clear to me why I should keep writing it. Perhaps, however, like many things that we do not know the end of, it is best to proceed on "Faith" and just do it.

In the last year, I think that I finally reached what I hope is the "bottom" of the "search for the nontheistic God." Quite simply, all my explorations as to the nature of God led me to, simply, nothing. I wish that I could say that experiencing this was a profound revelation. This was not a "somethingful nothing" of great significance, but simply an "absence." No matter how far I looked in the philosophy of religion and in theology and and science, I did not find anything that made any difference to me. By the time I eliminated all of the logical paradoxes and morally repugnant elements, I was left with simply, nothing, or at least nothing worth having.

I have been reading, this past couple of weeks, the book The God We Never Knew by Marcus Borg. Although I fear to distort him in paraphrase, at the center of this work is his realization that the traditional supernatural theistic view of God, was not the only, nor indeed the most (or at all) desirable way of looking at/for God. I would like to engage in an extended quote:

"The consequences of supernatural theism for my religious life as a Christian were severe. Four were particularly important. It made believing in God difficult, as it has for many people. God became remote at best, unreal at worst. The question of whether I was a believer or an atheist became the question of whether I believed in the God of supernatural theism. It also made the problem of evil acute. If one thinks of God as an all-powerful being who can intervene in the world at will (as this way of thinking about God most commonly does), then it follows that God could have intervened to stop the Holocaust and a whole host of other collective and personal disasters but chose not to. It is difficult to believe in such a God. It also affected my sense of what the Christian life was about. Because I thought of God as remote, 'up in heaven,' and not here, I thought Christian faith was about believing in a distant God; indeed, this became the central meaning of faith. Finally, it made prayer problematic. I could see no framework within which prayer made sense. It seemed like addressing a distant God who might not be there–like speaking into a universe that might be empty." (sorry no page citation as I read this in a Kindle e-book version).

While my experience was not precisely the same, it was close enough to this that I feel as if I am reading about myself. Borg goes on to describe his own "concept" of God as "Panentheistic." Since I am not writing a discourse, I don't feel the need to define that, but a quick search of Wikipedia will give anyone who wants both definition and discussion. I cannot say that I can truly espouse a panenetheistic view. What does it mean to say that God is "more than" or "beyond" the universe as well as being in the universe? I am not sure that it really can "mean" anything at all. I would probably prefer, at this point, to lean more firmly on ideas of relationship and experience. We can "experience" God only insofar as we can find that we are in "relationship" with him. As a creature wholly of the universe, the only "place" that I can experience God or have a relationship with him is here and now, so an extra-universal deity cannot mean very much to me. If there are "extra-universal" aspects of God, then they are, as it were "veiled" to me. I cannot really conceive of anything "outside" the universe, other than just making words about it, so the "God is more than the universe" or "transcendent" is not really meaningful to me."

On the problem of evil or theodicy, Borg touches very lightly and cautiously. From my current point of view, I think that we can simply say that the conceptualization of God as omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, etc., is incompatible with the world as we experience it. Why not then simply say that God is not all of these things? Who said that God was all-powerful? On what evidence or based on what experience? Quite simply, we do not experience a loving and good God as all-powerful, so to insist that he is so is to place an insurmountable stumbling block in the way of having any experience of "God." If I must abandon these ideas to have the experience of God, then so be it. I abandon them. The "Pandeist" concept of God is perhaps a little easier to live with, but maybe the problem is having any verbal concept of God period. I suspect that some might say, "Well, duh...," but I am not always a quick study.

It would seem that some people have an experience of the "numenous" and if that is the case, perhaps I can have or recapture that as well. I would suspect that, in the longrun, having one good experience is better than a thousand verbal descriptions. Eating one really great Neapolitan pizza is better than all the photos and descriptions that one could ever have. Perhaps it is time to stop looking at the menu, and get on with the dinner.

"Eating is better than looking"

Jeffrey Shy

Mesa, Arizona

Back from a Buddhist meditational pause.

2008-03-24T08:28:00.002-07:00

It has been quite a long time since I wrote on this blog, but the task goes on. After a fairly intense ramble through the philosophy of religion, I felt that I had, at least for now, drawn enough water from that particular well, and I was looking for something else. I accidentally happened to discover the PBS website of Bill Moyer's Faith and Reason series. Although I did not view the original, I found the video clip of Pema Chodron quite fascinating. Shortly after watching that little interview several times, I bought one and then ultimately 3 of her books and took up a very simple practice of some silent meditation. While I cannot say that this has "solved" any of my difficulties, it has, perhaps, made it a little easier to simply "live" with them.

In Buddhist terms, it might be said that my struggle in this blog could be seen as "suffering." I like Pema Chodron's answer to Bill Moyer's on "What is suffering?" Pain, she said, is the "unavoidable." Suffering is our all-too-common reaction to pain. To use another Buddhist illustration, our reaction is like that of trying to put out a fire by pouring kerosene on it. I think it might be important, however, before walking too far down this oh-so-tempting Buddhist pathway, to consider if I can/should try to drag Christianity along with me. It seems fairly clear that Buddhism can deliver on what it promises - a "release" from suffering. Is there any point, then to trying to keep Christianity if ending the suffering is my primary goal? I do not know the answer to this question. Probably even the question is a "wrong-minded" one, I would suppose.

This weekend, I went with may partner and family to the traditional Holy Week and Easter liturgies. I cannot, however, help but feel that, how ever hard I tried, I could not bring back the old excitement of the "spiritual" experience that I had previously found it to be. I do not mean say that it was a bad experience, just that it was a less intense one. Was it "good" for me to have attended? I am not sure. Certainly, it sent me back to this blog today. It heightened, I suspect, my sense of feeling "disjointed." I feel, somehow, like I have been given a jigsaw puzzle to assemble, but I don't know what the picture is supposed to look like, making it rather hard to even consider how to put it together. There is the further lingering doubt that it can even be put together. I also might not be too pleased with the picture once the assembly is complete.

What to do?

More confused than ever

Mesa, Arizona

"For this life only..."

2007-04-20T14:16:00.000-07:00

“If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are all people most to be pitied.” I Corinthians 15:19

As I have written this BLOG over the past months, I have struggled to come to terms with the loss of the presence of God. I have also struggled to come to terms with the finality of the end of human life and what I now see as a hopeless fantasy for an eternal and better life in some other existence after our deaths here.

I have explored again the "arguments for God" in the philosophy of religion and have tried to see if we might take religious God language and “interpret” it in some other, non-theistic way to make it more palatable. I am now reading John Shelby Spong’s most recent book, Jesus for the Non-Religious. While I greatly admire his courage to speak out against the failed paradigm of literalist, fantastical Christianity, I cannot say that I share his “inexpressable-in-language” belief in the reality of God (even a nontheistic God) and the resurrection of Jesus. Clearly, he makes an “argument” about the resurrection as “experience” and finds fault not so much with the experience itself as with the way that it was later concretized in writing and doctrine. For me, however, this "possibility," while intelectually interesting perhaps, does not captivate. What “experience” can I point to that suggests transcendence or a reality beyond that which is visible to the eyes and palpable to the senses? I wish that I were as optimistic as he seems to be that we can make a revised Christianity “work." I will reserve judgment until I have finished the book of course, but any “optimistic” way seems to me to be too much like the wishful thinking that gave birth to theism in the first place. I just cannot, no matter how hard I chew the term, find much meaning in the definition of God as the “ground of being” or “being itself.” I know what "beings" are, but what is “being itself?” We can all dream up paradoxes, but that does not endow them with some sort of numinous or supernatural existence.

I wonder, when I read the line above from Paul’s first letter to the Corinthian church if there might be some “solace” in a religion that is “for this life only.” Perhaps the answer to the existential dilemma is to admit that, tragically, it has no answer. We are, each of us, on a walk from birth to death, and the entirety of all that we know/do/are will have to be bracketed by these events. It is not, then, just faith in Jesus or any single pursuit, but everything that is “for this life only.” We are, perhaps, “most to be pitied," if we understand and admit this finitude. No window dressing. No caveats or maybes or sighs about the numinous or some other vague conception of eternity/transcendence. Just the simple reality and admission that it is all “for this life only.”

What might it mean, then, to live in full knowledge and acceptance of that fact that all is “for this life only," to really believe that each and every living creature, known and unknown to us also lives “for this life only?” First and emotionally for me, there is a sort of quiet despair and sense of ultimate hopelessness in this acknowledgement. A sense of doom and tragedy clearly seems to pervade how I feel when I look at myself and the world from this point of view. I feel somehow, as well, as if I should speak and move quietly and softly, rather like the visitors at a funeral. Laughing and joking and, indeed, any strong emotions seem rather out of place. It is an occasion for downcast eyes and knowing “shakes of the head” and those soft shoulder pats that we give one another in sympathy and grief.

If there is, perhaps, some “ethic” in this sort of realization, it might be that we do what we can to retard decline/decay and the end of “this life only” for ourselves and for others. We also should do what we can to reduce, if possible, the suffering of others as well as ourselves and try to “do as little harm as possible.” Entropy must, of course, increase, but there is no need for us to encourage it. We may still be seen to be the “most pitiable” but that may be the best that we can do.... “for this life only.”

Jeffrey Shy
Mesa, Arizona
"for this life" at least

How about some "un" reform?

2006-12-21T11:34:00.000-07:00

It has, of course, been a bit of time since I last made a post. Home, work and other occupations have made life VERY busy for a while, but although I have not made a post, I have been far from negligent in my “religious studies.” Since the last post, I have found myself oddly attracted to, of all things, the Bible and also the pseudepigraphic and apocryphal texts that are its “peripheral” contemporaries. It has been, actually, rather refreshing to read/look again with the “new eyes” of perhaps a bit greater objectivity than I employed when I was a “practicing theist.”
One of the more fascinating stories that I have been exploring is that of the late pre-exilic kingdom of Judah and the “reforms” of Hezekiah and Josiah. Although the writers of the Deuteronomistic history paint them as “good” kings, neither was successful politically (compare them to the “bad” Omrides for example), and both, today, would probably be classed as religious extremists or conservative fundamentalists. One thing that seems likely from rereading this history is that pre-exilic Israelite and Judahite religion was quite diverse. It would probably give Hinduism or the Greek pantheon a “run for the money” in the various divine figures that were honored or worshipped in very diverse ways. Yes, there was Yahweh/El, but there was also “his Asherah” the “Ba'als,” Molech, Chemosh Tammuz, the Sun/Moon/Stars, the “heavenly host” and probably others, and surprisingly, perhaps, most/all of them worshipped in the center of “Judaism” of Jerusalem and possibly even the temple itself. There were male temple prostitutes, women “weeping for Tammuz” in ritual grief and all manner of diverse religious activities associated with the Jerusalem temple and its near environs including the royal palace.

Witness this quote from II Kings about Josiah’s “purification” after the “finding” of the book of the law:

“And the king commanded Hilkiah the high priest, and the priests of the second order, and the keepers of the door, to bring forth out of the temple of the LORD all the vessels that were made for Baal, and for the Asherah, and for all the host of heaven; and he burned them without Jerusalem in the fields of Kidron, and carried the ashes of them unto Beth-el. 5 And he put down the idolatrous priests, whom the kings of Judah had ordained to offer in the high places in the cities of Judah, and in the places round about Jerusalem; them also that offered unto Baal, to the sun, and to the moon, and to the constellations, and to all the host of heaven. 6 And he brought out the Asherah from the house of the LORD, without Jerusalem, unto the brook Kidron, and burned it at the brook Kidron, and stamped it small to powder, and cast the powder thereof upon the graves of the common people. 7 And he broke down the houses of the sodomites, that were in the house of the LORD, where the women wove coverings for the Asherah. 8 And he brought all the priests out of the cities of Judah, and defiled the high places where the priests had made offerings, from Geba to Beer-sheba; and he broke down the high places of the gates that were at the entrance of the gate of Joshua the governor of the city, which were on a man's left hand as he entered the gate of the city.” (II Kings 23:4-20, JPS)

and for good measure, from Ezekiel:

“...the door of the gate of the LORD'S house which was toward the north; and, behold, there sat the women weeping for Tammuz.” (Ezekiel 8:14, JPS)

Clearly, as well, the “world of the New Testament” was one that was quite religiously pluralistic / syncretistic as well. We have recently begun to appreciate more and more that early Christianity was far from an “orthodoxy of the Apostles” that was corrupted by “heresy." It was, certainly, an extremely diverse religious movement from its very earliest days after the death of Jesus.

As I consider again how difficult monotheism has become for many thoughtful individuals as well as the worldwide problems of religious fundamentalism and chauvenism, I wonder if some of the “old diversity” would not do us good. Perhaps we need to have a reverse of the Hezekiah and Josiah “reforms” and let the Ba’als and Asheras back in, sing a good mourning song for Tammuz and remember sacred sex. If nothing else, the diversity might prove refreshing and could sweep out some of the cobwebs of antiquated “orthodoxies.”

Jeffrey Shy
Mesa, Arizona
( thinking Yahweh might have been a bit less difficult if his wife Asherah had kept him in better control)

But God was not in the wind....

2006-09-28T06:32:00.000-07:00

In my last post, I related that I had been reading and considering Western, primarily Christian, religion from the point of "the philosophers." I reviewed the classical "proofs" for the existence of God, the problem with thinking of a God who "exists" the question of "grace and freedom" and, most importantly in the case against theism, the "problem of evil." I also re-read the biblical book of Ecclesiastes and portions of the biblical book of Job. Although I cannot say that I "found the answer," in these readings, I was perhaps able to shape the questions in my mind a bit better, and I suppose that I can say that I am "better off" in an intellectual sense by this re-introduction to the philosophy of religion.

What seems most likely to me, however, is that a quest to find a "God of the Philosophers" looks to be one that will not conclusively satisfy. In greater and lesser forms, the philosophical discussion of religion has been going on now for some thousands of years, and yet, the "grand unified theory" has eluded us. In the general text that I read as the centerpiece of my recent study, the possibility of a "soft rationalist" approach that looked at the "whole case of evidence" was offered as a "reasonable" approach to the problem of religious philosophy. This "case" would be formed of many strands or types of evidence. It could include logical argument, consideration of history and historical precedent, scientific research, divine revelation and, perhaps most importantly for my thoughts today, the contribution of "religious experience."

To my present state, it seems that the "non-experiential" portions of the case for religion create only the possibility for "god" and "religion." They do not, however, in themselves constitute a conclusive case, but allow, perhaps, a cautious curiosity. The problem, to my mind, however, is that without some sort of "experience" that "illuminates" religious practice and adherence, it remains rather abstract in the sense that I would have to make a quasi-catechetical response such as "but what does this mean for me?" Furthermore, it would seem that the "arguments" that might be advanced from religious experience would be either a "cumulative" case based on the experiences of others that we know both historically and in the present or a "conclusive" experience that I myself have that is convincing/transformational, or perhaps some lesser amalgam of both.

While staring at my bookshelves, I noted that I still had a largely-unfinished copy of Thomas Merton's biography, The Seven Story Mountain. (I know, I should have finished it years ago.) As I succumbed to the "tolle lege" that this seemed to suggest to me and began to read, however, I immediately encountered some of the less-attractive aspects of Merton, such as his "anti-protestant" bias and his immediate recourse to such conceptions as the mystery of the "non-bloody sacrifice of the mass" as the pre-eminent exemplum of divine love. Clearly, having read some of the rest of Merton, I understand that his religious experience was intense and transformational. But does an experience that leads to so many "traditional" conclusions (that I cannot accept) really inform the search for me? How am I to judge a religious experience that occurs in a context of a "traditional" concept of Christianity, when it would seem that, if the traditional concept is untenable, how is it that the "experience" is so "consistent" with it? Somehow, it would seem that my "search" for evidence in the historical experience of others is going to continue to be problematic.

As I consider, however, the other possibility, the experience that I, myself, have, I wonder what sort of experience I would find "convincing" at this stage? If I have discounted the possibility of a theistic god who could perform miracles that would "invade" the world of "natural law" and create a "special exception" for some purpose, then even "if I saw someone rise from the dead," I would have to consider questioning it. Should such a thing truly happen, then would that force me to concede and return to the theistic camp? What would be my experience of religion, then? It would be perhaps, I would suppose, one of pragmatism. Something like, "Well, heck, all that Christian dogma and doctrine really is true. Doesn't it suck that God (I would have to re-capitalize) allows such human suffering? But he holds all the cards and makes the rules, so I had better just shut up and walk the walk like a good boy." If then, miracles are "out" for the time being, then what "experience" would really "convince" me? I have dealt enough with deluded and sick minds to understand the power of want that can create internal experiences and convictions that, from my external point of view, seem clearly erroneous or delusional, that I would mistrust the argument from "feeling" the presence of "god" in "my heart" or some such conception. Again, how could I know that it was not the product of just some wishful thinking on my part?

It would seem, at this point, that the "experience" would have to be something rather un-expected. Since I know the biblical story of the "but God was not in the wind/storm/etc" and the "still small voice," it does rather suggest that at least some people got their "experience" in a form that neither they nor others might have expected. It is hard, however, to "live today" in the "hope" that some such transformational or "convincing" experience may come my way. Should I be like the "wise virgins" who "keep their lamps trimmed" waiting for the bridegroom's appearance? What would be the consequences of a life oriented to "waiting" for this sort of experience? How does one behave in the meantime? Does one simply keep "dipping one's finger in the holy water" and hope that one will "end up believing?" Does is make more sense to adopt a thoroughly secular orientation and leave religion as a "possibly provable" theory that we simply at this point do not have enough evidence at this point to affirm or refute?

Such problems!

Jeffrey Shy
("winded" in Arizona)
Mesa, Arizona

Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost-Reflection on the Pericopes

2006-09-25T06:46:00.000-07:00

After a lovely week of vacation and then a very not-so-lovely week of family illness and then one more somewhat unpleasant week of "catching up" from both, I find that it has been more than a month since I last made a post. It has not, however, been a month without reflection. For the last several weeks, I have taken up an interest again in the philosophy of religion. I was fortunate enough to have kept the textbook from my college course and used that as a starting point. I wish that I could say that I was ready to make a profound post that was a great breakthrough, but I have found that philosophical reflection has its own rewards, and some posts will likely follow shortly.

For today, I am sitting here on Monday morning with some thoughts in my head after attending church yesterday morning. The first biblical reading was from the first and second chapters of the book of Wisdom. It was striking to me first that the portion selected has a significant lacune in the middle that "robsbed" the "godless" of their full argument. The argument, of course, stated in rather striking poetry was of the evanscence of life. "In time, our name will be forgotten, nobody will remember what we have done; our life will pass away like wisps of cloud, dissolving like the mist that the sun's rays drive away and that its heat dispels. For our days are the passing of a shadow, our end is without return, the seal is affixed and nobody comes back." Then comes the conclusion of, therefore, "... let us enjoy the good things of today." This is contrasted against the god-fearing righteous man who makes his purpose the keeping of god's commandments. The difference, "of course," is that he "knows the secret" in that he contends that there is a life after death and his reward comes then. It is also one of the few times in the bible that we read, prior to the new testament, about a concern for an "afterlife." It also moves the blame for death out of the hands of god and blames the devil as the author of evil: "For God created human beings to be immortal, he made them as an image of his own nature; Death came into the world only through the Devil's envy, as those who belong to him find to their cost."

The further fallacy in the argument is that enjoying the "good things of today" comes at the cost of contempt and intentional disregard for the needs of others. This may be a practical consequence of the employment of the "live for today" mentality of some, but it is not an inevitable or necessary one.

In a further interesting "jolt," the Wisdom text is paired with the "receive a little child" story from the gospels. As the text was interpreted in our sermon, the idea was not that children were wonderful and innocent, but that they were regarded at the time as somewhat less than other human beings. The message was that we needed to concentrate each day on taking care of the "least of these," and that the "least of these" were the poor, homeless, etc. Certainly, I cannot argue with that, but the final argument advanced bothered me a great deal more. There was a reference made to the "current disagreement" in the Anglican communion. For a person "not in the know" this is quite simply dealing finally and clearly with the issue of justice for gay and lesbian persons in the church. It has been finally "forced" on the conservatives through the American church's ordination of an openly gay bishop (as opposed to closeted ones of which there have been many). It also involves a rather extraordinary turn of events that it has provoked a "crisis of Anglican unity." Simply put, those who disagree in the American church are forming splinter churches and dioceses, and those who disagree in the larger Anglican community are trying to force the American church to repent or depart. (This problem has been building, not just with regard to gay/lesbian issues, for more than 20 years) This has, very unfairly, foisted the onus of the "disruption of Anglican union" onto the backs of gay and lesbian persons in the church. "You really don't want to destroy the Anglican communion do you? Of course we (liberals) agree with you, but is 'having it all our way' worth disrupting the Anglican communion over?" We might have just as well have asked the sourthern slaves of 19th century America the same question: "You don't really want to have the United States erupt into war over this do you? Wouldn't it be better to....."

Where I was getting with this, however, was the rather additional extraordinary argument that if we got down to the "real business" of taking care of "the least of these," these other troublesome issues would take care of themselves. This was brought up at the General Convention under the protest that all the "gay and lesbian stuff" was "distracting" everyone from the "real" work of the church--in that setting this meant attention primaril to the UN millennium Development Goals to eliminate extreme poverty. While these are clearly worthy goals, I fail to see how the denial of fundamental human rights of justice and equality to 10% of the world's population is not a "real" issue for the church. There are plenty of conservative evangelicals and fundamentalists who would easily vote to criminalize and imprison gay and lesbian sinners who are perfectly happy feeding and clothing the poor and the hungry. I cannot see, therefore, that attention to the "least of these" inevitably will solve the issue of justice for gay and lesbian persons. Justice will at times be painful, especially as we consider that in cases at law, there are sometimes winners and losers. I will note, as well, that the "liberal" dioceses are not the ones threatening to leave after the weak response of the general convention and the 11th hour compromise, nor have they threatened to "leave" over the noncompliance of conservative dioceses for years over questions regarding the ordination of women. It was the conservative ones that immediately began to act out their blackmailing threats.

Am I angry still? I guess that I am. Yes, I want to feed/clothe the poor. No, I do not want to "wait" for justice at some future nebulous time.

Jeffrey Shy
Mesa, Arizona
(I suppose I would be "mad as hell" perhaps if I believed in the existence of such a place.)

We're still not there yet

2006-08-21T06:28:00.000-07:00

As I sit down this Monday morning after the morning "chores," I feel that I should put some more words to paper. I know that literally no one (or only perhaps) one person has ever visited this blog, but that really is not the point of the blog. I did not set this up to be a campaign site to convince persons of the virtue of abandoning theism. I set up the blog to help me make sense of life and the world in the absence of the theistic god. Although I chose the term "atheistepiscopal" as the address of the blog, I have to admit that I regret it a bit. I wanted to be confrontational, perhaps, in the name and not shirk from what I had "done" in saying that I had rejected theism, but having read some more sites that are specifically "atheist," I cannot say that I find them universally thoughtful. There seems to be too much emphasis on "cutting down" and "ridiculing" people who follow theism or any religion at all. Furthermore, there seems to be little effort that goes into coming up with some alternative schema that will replace religious theism. It seems rather like tearing down a house and leaving the lot empty. Perhaps there is nothing that can replace a lost theism that will serve the same functions as theistic religion, but it seems too fatalist at the moment not to even try. There is a feeling, as well, of a certain "wickedness" in what seems to be taking pleasure in attacking and ridiculing religion and a cynical superficiality as well. I certainly "get the point" when these persons take the bible and "literally" read it and point up all manner of morally offensive and self-contradictory content, but they "miss the point" just as much as those who espouse so-called biblical literalism in the sense of literal innerancy. I may be an atheist in the sense of saying that I do not believe that I can any longer accept theism, but I am not an atheist in the sense that so many other people seem to be.

In the last week, I have continued reading some of Karen Armstrong's Book, The Battle for God, about the historical development of fundamentalism, but I must admit that I can only "stand" to read it in short bursts. There is a certain fatal despair that I feel whenever I pick it up. It is rather like watching one of those movies that begins with the ending, in this case a tragic one, and then doing the whole rest of the film as a "flashback" to see how the end comes about. We are living the reality of fundamentalism today, and it is not pretty. When we look back at the history, I can certainly see how it came about, and of course, can think of how, possibly, it could have been avoided, but that is "water under the bridge." Somehow, I feel that it is important that I really understand fundamentalism and the slightly-less-extreme versions such as the Christian "evangelical" movement. Certainly we all need to understand Islamic fundamentalism as well. It is just, unfortunately, that at times it is too distressing to look at for too long. It is escapist, I suppose, but I feel that I need some resting spots along the trip, or I will never finish it without suffering emotional exhaustion.

In between the fundamentalism book readings, I have also been reading Mortimer Adler's book, Six Great Ideas. The six "great ideas" are truth, goodness, beauty, liberty, equality and justice. I watched some pieces, years ago, of the public television show by the same name, and bought the book many years ago, but never got through much of it. (I am not even sure how long I have had it as it was published in 1981). I have been thinking about the definition of "good" that he derives. In short (and less convincing, I suppose, without the proof), those things are good that satisfy or answer human needs. Needs are defined as those things that humans must have to live a good life. They include biological needs such as food and shelter but also include other needs such as health, wealth, companionship, pleasure and beauty. Real goods are the things or means by which we satisfy these needs inherent to human nature. Apparent goods are those that satisfy wants in an innocuous way (meaning that they do not prevent/impair us from having what we ought nor in a secondary sense, produce deprivation in others). So far so good, I am still "on board" in a sense that what he "proves" seems reasonably true. The "trick" however, in determining what is "good" lies, however, in our interpretation of "human nature." What do humans really need. It occurred to me to ask if humans need religion, and then to ask the corollary question of "just what is religion" anyways? My computer version of the Oxford American Dictionary gives four definitions: (1) the belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power; (2) details of belief as taught or discussed; (3) a particular system of faith and worship; (4) a pursuit or interest to which someone ascribes supreme importance. Clearly, the first "definition" is simply theism. The second and third are nearly tautologies, religion is a word that describes what people do when they engage in religious practice or discourse. The fourth, however, is more interesting. Religion is "a pursuit or interest to which someone ascribes supreme importance." This comes very close to Tillich's view of god as "that about which we are ultimately concerned."

If I accept this definition as a "working" proposition, then the question is this - what is that to which I can ascribe "supreme importance?" Furthermore, if religion is conceived of as a "need" of humans (realizing that I have not proved that human nature requires religion, of course), and religion is that with which we are ultimately or supremely concerned, then the "good" that is religion is a "supreme" good. Perhaps religion is the summum bonum of philosophy, the single highest good. The question goes back, then to the supposition that religion is a human need. Do humans need religion or do some of us simply want religion? I find it hard to come up with a firm argument that we really need religion, but perhaps we might speculate a bit. First, it does seem that humans spend a good amount of time and activity "doing" religion. If religion did not at all satisfy some sort of human need, then why do we spend so much time on it? ( I know this is dangerous. We spend a lot of time on war as well, but do we need war? ) One might speculate that we spend nearly as much time/effort at religion as we do to satisfy even our most basic "biological" needs such as food, drink, shelter, etc. Sometimes, we will even forgo access to these "basic" needs to "do" religion. Witness the gospel story of the "widow's mite." Where the poor widow placed her entire living into the temple treasury. She gave all that she had to live on for a religious reason. Secondly, if I expand "religion" to be the pursuit of the answer of the "great questions" such as illuminate a search for "meaning" of life/existence, then it would seem that a life of meaning would be preferable to a life "without meaning." We desire/want that our lives/existence should have meaning, do we not? Simply being a "being" that is self-aware, suggests that we must necessarily examine or come to terms with our most essential quality, that we "are" and that we know that we "are."

To the extent, then, that persons interpret "a-theism" to be "a-religion," then we can suggest that they are unlikely to succeed in living a "good life" inasmuch as they deny a fundamental "need" of humans. We must, however, be careful to avoid equating religion with theism, as the first dictionary definition did when it defined religion as the "belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power." Religion in the sense of a "human need" is the pursuit or acquisition of that with which we are "ultimately or supremely concerned", or the "meaning" that we find in life/existence. I think, then, I can accept, for the moment, the proposition that religion as a need and therefore a "good" as reasonably true if not self-evidently or "beyond a shadow of a doubt" true. This "broad sense" definition has somewhat of the character of an "open ended" conclusion, and perhaps an unattainable one. In theism, the "chief end of man" is to "glorify God and enjoy him forever." It has a certain point/finality to it as if the "work" is really all done. The search for meaning in existence, however, without the "end point" of a theistic God, has more about it the nature of a process. Is there a "conclusion" to this search? I do not know.

Jeffrey Shy
(Searching)
Mesa, Arizona

Building Houses on the Sand

2006-08-11T21:47:00.000-07:00

In the last week, I have been reading in Karen Armstrong's book, The Battle for God, in which she traces the emergence of fundamentalist religion as an outgrowth of a reaction against modernity. For Armstrong's fundamentalists, there is a sense of fear and doom from the experience of modern world and rational thought (logos) when separated from the mythos of a religious experience. in this schema, fundamentalism is a, perhaps regrettable, but certainly understandable reaction to this alienation that comes of the experience of the modern world without as sense of meaning. While I am not sure that I agree that the traditional "mythos" of western Christianity can sustain us as it did in the past, I agree that we seem to need a sense of "meaning" if we are to live fully and happily in the world.

As I have been trying to explore my own sense of "meaning" in a world in which God has ceased to exist, I feel as if I stand on a knife edge between chaos on the one side and order on the other. Like apparently so many others before me, I have been exploring the idea of an "evolutionary" view of cosmic history. This has been, of course, a modernist view that looked at the history of the cosmos and also biological evolution on earth and found in it something akin to "progress" as we know it in our knowledge-based and increasing technological society. In this view, we imagine a sort of "stream of consciousness" that moved from the first awareness of self to a sense of "family" to a sense of tribe, nation, globalism and finally, I would suppose, to a sense of a "cosmic" identity and awareness. Along with this, the progress of thought and knowledge has, with some fits and starts, been one generally of growth. This is a growth from ignorance to knowledge, from superstition and myth to theory and fact, from the "red in tooth" perservation of self to an increasing sense of the need for and rightness of "charity," from simplicity to complexity (although this latter has been argued), from no thought to thought, from inanimate, to aware to self aware to globally aware.

I thought of a parable or allegory in which we are, in this view, rather like a great company of people building houses or castles in the sand. Each of us builds for a time, either a little or a lot, but inevitably death/entropy washes away these castles that are our lives. But we do not build in isolation. We build in company with those who build as our companions on the beach. We learn from them, and we copy them and they us. We also learn, in an unbroken stream into the past, from those who built before us, so that our unique contributions create castles that are of increasing complexity and "perfection." Some of us, perhaps, build well and advance the progress of self and others. Some of us build poorly, perhaps, or even give up building and dedicate ourselves to destruction. Nevertheless, the general direction, with sometimes great leaps forward, periods of stagnation and even tremendous steps backward, has so far been that of "progress." Looking at this "big picture," it seems that there is a general trend, a "direction," if you will, in what we see and are.

It is this apparent "direction," perhaps, that might give us a sense of "hope" and "purpose." Even if our presence as self-aware biomatter is one that came about by merest chance, our self-awareness gives us a unique opportunity. We each have, as it were, our "day in the sun" in which we are the builders. We can build well or poorly, according to our ability and knowledge, but whether we will or not, we will build something that influences the future and touches back to the past. We are, in our small selves, part of a larger "self" of humanity and perhaps the cosmos that reaches forwards and upwards and outwards, seeking to expand who and what we are and looking to what we may become. And who knows what it is that we might become? It is this "great becoming" that, perhaps, gives us some sense of inspiration. We are part of a great cosmic evolution that began at the time of the big bang and moves into the future to--what? We do not, of course, know the "ultimate" answer. We can, at most, use the short ruler of our experience so far to draw a theoretical "future line," but the "ultimate answer" is unknown. We dream of "perfection" but what form that or whatever future is to come is unknown with any certainty. Our meaning, however, is not that we know or can surely predict what we will become, but that we are part of this becoming and that we are know that we are a part of the life and existence of the universe. Through a great and un-numbered sequence of occurrences, we have been given a chance to be a little bit of the process by which the cosmos is able to know itself. Even the tiniest glimpse of this "great becoming" is the greatest of gifts. It is one that we receive as a most precious gift from our ancestors in humanity and farther back up our "family tree" to the beginnings of the universe of which we are direct lineal descendants. It is our awareness of being on this journey or part of this process of becoming that is our "spirituality." It is this "gift" of knowing that we will pass to the future, should we not care for it so poorly that there is no future.

It may be, perhaps, that our desire that this journey should continue would be a moral imperative that would shape our behavior. Since we know that we journey together (i.e with the help of our contemporaries as well as the "boost up" of our ancestors) , our moral behavior should be that which fosters our "togetherness." It should, therefore, be one that values the other as well as the self, leading us to restate in a new way the "golden rule" of antiquity. We do not love simply because we can, but we love because we must, for our survival and continuance depends on it. We do not learn to adapt because we can but because we must. We do not learn to be careful of our environment and the earth as a whole because we can but because we must.

But our "view" or "vision" is conditional. This "vision" may sustain and guide us today, but it may not be an adequate vision for the people or creatures of tomorrow who must evolve their own vision and find their own sense of meaning. This is, I suppose, akin to "theory" in science, which we accept not because it is necessarily "true" but because it "works" and "explains" and "interprets" reality and "predicts" it in some way. We do not necessarily discard an older view because it was "wrong" but because it no longer "works" for us in our world today. I might even be able to come to terms with Tillich's "ground of being" - that "larger being" of which I am a part and which is, in its totality, all of the cosmos or simply "the all" or "everything."

Finally, I might even imagine a sort of "dialog" with theists who "see" from a different perspective. If we can, for just a moment, admit that "religious" or philosophical language is not always "literal," I can see a point of company with the proponents of "intelligent design." Where I see a "becoming" that has, at least in a short sense, a "direction," they see the finger of God. For the theist, "God" is the creator and "prime mover" of all that is. The "progress" of the world is the creating hand of God. He is the "alpha" point of all that is. For me, while I cannot necessarily see the "alpha" point "God," I can perhaps admit that the "direction" of the universe points to something more than I/ we am/are at this point in time. This "direction" that we perceive could tend towards an "omega point" in which a sort of "perfection" might be achieved that would be, perhaps, akin to what the theist calls "God." We might be, perhaps, rather like the old story of the blind men describing the elephant. We are simply at opposite ends of the creature, and it is only in seeming that our views are so different or opposed.

Once again, this is only a "proposition," something for future contemplation and discussion and not a "final word." It would remain to see how we would function in such a view or how much "meaning" I/we could derive from it. Could it be the basis of a "meaningful" life? Could it provide some measure of "positive" and inform and inspire and shape my/our existence? Perhaps....

Jeffrey Shy
(And the foolish man built his house upon the sand....)
Mesa, Arizona

The "Love Connection"

2006-07-31T09:04:00.000-07:00

It has been about 11 days since I had my last posting. Although I have not recently posted, partly due to a number of visits from relatives, I have continued to "think and reflect." It has been growing in my mind that there is a definite "attitude adjustment" that would come with the "universal love" religious world view. As I have been reviewing the "sayings" of Jesus and some readings in the Mohist cannon, it appears clear that there is a certain dual effect of this practice. First, we have the "internal" effects of the attitude adjustment. I truly think that it may be reasonably correct that practicing this attitude does improve feelings of well-being and, well, happiness. The external effects would seem to be significant as well. Generally, for the most part, persons who are treated well and with love have a greater tendency to respond in kind. I speculate, though, that there may be a more "spiritual" effect perhaps. It seems that there is a certain resonance that the more positive internal orientation creates in other persons. To the extent that my internal state of being is "positive," it seems to create a higher likelihood of others experiencing the same thing. Whether this is through subliminal clues, body language, pheromones or what, I do not know. It is rather like setting a tuning fork vibrating and then noting that it induces a vibration at a similar frequency in an adjacent string or tuning fork. Perhaps this is what is meant when someone is described as having an emotion that is "infectious." Although perhaps excessively "utopian," one could see that, if there were enough people "vibrating" on this frequency, the whole world could eventually fall in tune with it. Conceivably, the opposite effect could occur as well. To the extent that we are internally self-focused, angry, hateful, prejudiced, etc, we will induce negative "resonances" in others that can be "infectious" as well.

There seem to be intimations of this in some of the "sayings" of Jesus when he tells stories about the "Kingdom of Heaven." Yeast makes the whole loaf rise. The light on the lampstand lights up the whole world. You are the salt of the earth. The smallest of seeds grows up into the largest of trees. It might also give some meaning to some of the "backwards" or darker versions such as the "Beware of the leaven of the scribes and Pharisees," where the "negative" leaven can also get into the loaf and have significant ill effects.

The place where Christianity is a bit lacking, perhaps, is in concrete suggestions or a specific program to create this internal change. It is hinted at in imagery such as being "born again," but this is too tied up with the theistic god, redemption, original sin schema to hold much appeal for me. I have had, for weeks now, a phrase going repeatedly through my head, rather like a mantra. "Cultivate an attitude of calmness and compassion." This would seem to encapsulate both the "Take no thought for the morrow," with regard to personally centered anxieties as well as the "Golden rule" principle. Although it may not be enough for the longterm, I have found it helpful to "pray" this phrase repeatedly. When I find myself, for example, getting irritable, angry or upset---in short when the calmness and compassion start to fade--- then this is a time for reflection. Why did I change, do this, think this, feel this? How can I respond differently? Am I being truly compassionate? Am I practicing the "Golden Rule?" Finally, make a conscious effort to "Cultivate an attitude of calmness and compassion." Strangely, far from being an attitude that leads to apathy, it allows me to accomplish a great deal more. I begin to doubt the "power of negative emotion" such as the so-called "righteous anger." I wonder if, no matter what the outcome, the anger behind the intent somehow adversely taints the results. Yes, the concrete desired "result" may occur, but at what personal cost? I may "get the job done," but I wonder if I have not somehow damaged myself (and others) in the process? I seem to recall from reading some years ago in writings of Mahatma Gandhi where he implied that negative means inevitably produce negative ends. It is, perhaps, a failure to really believe this that makes us imagine that war can produce peace. We might, possibly, force a regime change. We might, for a time, reduce the number of "opponents" or their capacity to do violence, but ultimately, the anger/hatred/ill-feeling that war produces will have its effect, and that will of necessity be a negative one.

In a more personal sense, a "calm and compassionate attitude" truly appears to help one accomplish the daily "grind." I was reminded, on a Disneyland trip over the weekend, of the Mary Poppins "Spoonful of Sugar" song. "In every job that must be done, there is an element of fun. Find, the fun, and the job's a game." If we cultivate the "attitude of calmness and compassion" the "happiness" aura that surrounds it certainly lessens the "medicine" of accomplishing many "jobs that must be done." Here I've been looking for help in centuries-old religious texts, and all I had to do was listen to Julie Andrews!

Jeffrey Shy
(Having a "spoonful of sugar")
Mesa, Arizona

Building a raft

2006-07-20T06:14:00.000-07:00

In the last couple of days, I was able to get in a bit more reading in Karen Armstrong's, The Great Transformation. I have to admit that I had been "looking forward" to her discussion of Buddhism, and I was not disappointed. Of the "great religions" as they exist today, Buddhism, of all the non-Christian religions, honestly has the greatest attraction to me. Although I cannot be strongly interested in a "cosmology" of "rebirth," the "here and now" orientation and the strong emphasis on compassion just makes so much sense. It just seems so right. Although I have been writing to help myself work out a "new" Christianity, it would seem foolish to try to "do it all myself" and limit myself to "only Christian" resources.

Where we stand today is clearly "on the shoulders" of our human past. This is not to say that we are dwarfs on the shoulders of titans, but simply that, as I have opined before, each human has a cultural and societal heritage and does not need to start purely from scratch. Frankly, I would doubt that anyone would do much at all if we each had to rediscover language, writing, religious thought, philosophy, mathematics, et cetera. If our search for meaning is to have the highest chance of fulfillment, then it would be profoundly foolish to ignore any source, no matter from which religious tradition, that gets us further along the way.

I do think that it is possible that Chritianity has some meaningful things to say, and I have begun, for example, to look again at the "sayings" of Jesus outside of the gospel narratives along with the "best" of the Pauline corpus as a reasonable place to start. What makes Christianity more problematic, however, is our long devotion to theism. It is hard to find any source that is not "contaminated" by this, and I find that as I sift these sources for meaning, I end up leaving a lot of "theistic ellipses." At times this is so bad I wonder if just taking a "paper punch" to the text would be less drastic. Sensibly, we may very reasonably draw on other nontheistic sources that speak to our needs. Getting too caught up on the "authority" or "validity" of any source is simply misguided.

In this sense, a new Christianity is going to have to be more than we usually mean when we talk about being ecumenical. In the biggest and most generous conception admitted by most so far, "ecumenism" seems to boil down to "We've got a really great tradition that works for us. You've got one too. Isn't that nice?" What I believe that the "new" Christianity has to admit is that the tradition is not working for us, and that we need help. If I can find that help in "Christian" sources, then great, but that should not be the limits of our search. One does not have to go very far, for example to find in Mo-ist thought a very reasonable statement of the "love" as the center of behavior view and a conception of how that works out at a personal, local and even international/global level. If, for example, one state, filled with people who always are compassionate towards one another conceives as another state as similarly filled with people equally deserving of our highest level of compassion, then could we ever conceive of starting a war? If we all could form this compassionate attitude, then war and conflict would evaporate. Isn't the best solution for us to work hard at cultivating a spirit of compassion and encouraging others to do the same? This is, of course, just a simplistic example, but it is a clearer statement in terms of "politics" at least than the Christian version the Golden rule.

I think we need a page from Buddhism about not getting too tied up on "how we get there" but concentrating on the journey and its goals. Karen Armstrong re-tells a Buddhist parable that talks about the man who wishes to cross a river, but there is no bridge or boat or other means already available. He cobbles together a raft from whatever he can find and floats across the river to the other side. Once he gets there, what does he do? Does he pick up the raft that helped him across and carry it forever on his back because it helped him across the river, or does he leave it moored on the bank and carry on the journey ahead? I think that the lesson is clear, we need to cobble together our raft from whatever resources we can assemble, and we should not be as obsessed with turning it into some object of devotion or setting it up as an idol to worship.

To conclude, then, a new Christianity, to me, will acknowledge a heritage of religious thought from the ancient middle east and its descendants through the "Christian West (including eastern Christianity of course)," but it needs to do more than an "I'm OK and You're OK" with the sea of non-Christian religious thought. If it is to be "true" in the broadest sense, it must be inclusive in the broadest terms possible. Does it sound like I'm turning into a "Universalist?" I suppose that was inevitable.

Jeffrey Shy
(How do you use a raft in the desert?)
Mesa, Arizona

But what about REALLY bad sh_t?

2006-07-18T06:40:00.000-07:00

Since I'm not sure that there are not rules here about "foul" language, I decided to "bleep" the title, but it's pretty clear what I mean here. Although a "positive" sort of tone seems to be emerging as I am trying to work out my ideas and feelings and as I am trying to find a new center and purpose for my life, it's pretty clear that I am "doing well" at this point in a number of ways. I wonder, however, how sustaining these ideas will be for me when really bad stuff happens?

It was just a little thing this morning that started this line of thought. My new morning "ritual" begins with getting up at about 5:30 AM. After that, I feed the "inside" (five at present) and the "outside" (two feral males at present) cats. Once the cats are fed, I do a bit of watering in the yard. We have "drip" irrigation that we are using twice daily, but even this is not enough for new plants and for some that are more delicate. With our mid-summer day temperatures in the 110 to 115 degree range, this is a pretty brutal time for all outside plants and animals. One plant I had rescued had been something that we had for a time largely abandoned. We had a small orchid plant that we brought back from one of our Hawai'i trips. It had languished in the bathroom in the shower stall for a while as the inside cats cannot resist chewing on a green plant. When we gave up the master suite recently for a visitor, my partner moved the orchid outside. For a time, we simply forgot it and it came close to death. I moved it under a tree outside and made it part of my daily watering campaign. Under the shade but with tropical heat and the local humidity of the soil that was watered and the daily dousings, it began to recover. First one, then two, then three, then four and a hint of five leaves. I was very pleased that I had "rescued" the little plant from dying. This morning, however, I went out to do my daily rounds and found somewhat of a mess. The paper bowls that I use for the outside cats were scattered and had clearly been chewed up by a larger animal. I noted that the orchid pot was tipped over, but it was a couple of minutes before I realized that the orchid inside was gone. I searched around and finally found what was left of it-some roots, my "five leaves" pretty much chewed away but a few stubs left.

I suppose that many would laugh that I could be upset at such a "little" thing. After all, I eat plants all the time. For that matter, I eat animals too (which of course I do not kill myself and buy at the grocers so that they look very little like any living creature that I might imagine). I understand, as well, that I was probably visited by coyotes or raccoons that are living at the edge of starvation. What was most difficult was that it was unexpected, violent and random. Human violence may anger me, but the impersonal violence leaves one without anyone or anything to blame. This one instance, I suppose, can be "explained" by a hungry creature or creatures that came into my yard drawn by the possibility of food and water. Although it upset my plans, it is, I suppose, understandable. It gets harder, however, when there is no one or nothing that seems to gain from the destruction. Who "gained" from the great Asian tsunammi? I can look "from a distance" like the deist God and see it as merely a ripple in the great fabric, but up close, it looked bad. Really up close is hard to imagine.

Is there an "answer" to this kind of thing? Is it really just all "vanity, vanity" after all? Perhaps what is getting in the way of "understanding," I wonder, is some element of "Pride?" When I imagine that humanity is unique in this world because we have "awakened to self-consciousness" and that we can "build the Kingdom of Heaven," is this really just prideful boasting that disguises a sort of "whistling in the dark" to keep the real world from intruding into the picture too much?

Today, I am not so full of answers, and I am not sure that there is a "logical" answer. I know that natural processes that are unthinking and impersonal are behind these "natural" disasters that we sometimes mockingly call "acts of God." Can we really, however, treat them as "impersonal" or "neutral" when they make such a difference to us "persons?" I really don't know.

Jeffrey Shy
(A little bit more dead today)
Mesa, Arizona

Growing up not falling down

2006-07-17T06:31:00.000-07:00

During the last week, I have continued to do some reading in Karen Armstrong's book, The Great Transformation but I have also continued some readings from Dr. Spong's books as well. As he follows the ramifications of the abandonment of theism, it is, of course, inevitable that Jesus "takes a tumble" as well as I have noted in previous posts. If we reject the formulation of the incarnation of God as a human without original sin who is sacrificed to "take away the sins of the world" and we also reject the creation of the world ex nihilo by the sky god, then we have to also jettison our whole concept of "sin" and "original sin." This means, of course, that humanity "never fell," and this, of course, makes a great more sense than some utopian past to which we hope to return. This is the illusion that draws so much of conservatism. We need to get back to the "good old days." Of course, the "good old days" when studied carefully, are of course no such thing. This does not mean that everything in the past was "always and everywhere" bad, but neither was it the fantastical utopia to which we would want to return.

As an alternative, Dr. Spong embraces a new approach of a humanity that is evolving and "growing up." This is, of course, in tune with evolutionary theory, the evidence from the natural sciences and the survey of the broad look at human history. Without rehearsing too many specifics, I believe that all manner of evidence confirms that we have progressed/improved in the last 20 to 30 thousand years of human history. What is more unique about our development so far, is that we are now conscious of our existence, aware of the possibilities for improvement and able to consciously act to do something about it. Rather than the long wait for a random mutation that proves to be advantageous or the selection of a pre-existing one by circumstance or climatic change, we can now do something about it. Dr. Spong goes on to consider, then, the question of evil. He is able, for the most part, to attribute evil to the evolutionary dross of the competitive nature of the evolutionary process. We succeed because we do "better" than others in our society. This works pretty well, of course, if the whole point is to merely disseminate our genetic patterns, but it works less well when we are doing something more. We must, of course, stand on the shoulders of those who went before us, and we are greatly dependent on our contemporaries as well. Each new human does not have to invent language, writing, baby wipes, food canning, etc. We can depend on a shared cultural, historical and scientific heritage that is communicated through our societal structures. Our cooperative needs, then, begin to outweigh our competitive ones. "Evil" then may be traced in large part to this evolutionarily embedded "selfishness" in which one acts on one's own behalf without regard for others. He has problems making this work when he considers some aspects for example of mental illness such as alcoholism, but I cannot really see putting them in the "evil" category. These are illnesses that, although they affect the way that we think and behave, are not necessarily completely of our own making or choosing. They live more in the "shit happens" category than in the "evil" category.

Although I have a slight wave of revulsion at summarizing this way of looking at who we are and may be come as "Be all that you can be," if I make the "you" a plural, it loses some of the military association. We are, then, in this sense, part of a "great becoming." We are moving in a general direction that, if most of us would acknowledge it, we have wanted to move in for as long as consciouness has existed. We look forward to a world without poverty, disease or suffering where all are at peace. We do not look backwards to a "Paradise Lost" but forward to a possible "Paradise to Gain." This could be the "Kingdom of Heaven" of the language of Jesus. In this sense, "God" who is in us and is us "becomes" right along with us. Our "divinity" grows as we individually and even more collectively move to a more "humane" and less selfish/self-centered world. As we as present individuals try to live today this "life in the Kingdom," we can participate in a "dim" way, perhaps, in what it would be like if it were universal. At the same time, our adoption of the "Kingdom-oriented" way of living helps to bring its universality ever closer. Our new mythology will not be the star of Satan falling from heaven, but the image of "Jacob's Ladder" on which we are climbing "higher, higher." Here, perhaps, we can escape a bit of the angst that comes when we contemplate the "futility" of human existence. We would not be where we are today if it were not for the efforts of those past humans who lived for more than just self. Those who live tomorrow will not be any better than today if we do not assume the burden for our times. Our immortality, perhaps, then is a collective one. We are, possibly, becoming a corporate being as we learn to try to move beyond just "self" to a consciouness of "more than self." Our first "great leap" was to awaken to self-consciouness. Our next "great leap" is to awaken to a sort of group "human consciouness" and perhaps, eventually to a "universal consciousness." My only "regret" then is that I will not live to see it fully consumated, but that is a "self thought" isn't it? : )

Jeffrey Shy
(What will I be when I grow up?)
Mesa, Arizona

Dump the Apocalypse Stuff

2006-07-10T06:27:00.000-07:00

In the last few days, I have been devoting my "blog time" to more reading of Karen Armstrong's new book, The Great Transformation as she traces the history of the pre-axial and axial age developments in religion and philosophy in China, India, the Middle East and Greece. As such, I can see that it has been now 5 days since my last post, so I feel that I need to keep up with another post today to "keep the discipline going" as it were.

As a sidelight to the Armstrong reading, I decided to read again yesterday the Gospel of Mark. This is relevant on two levels. First, it is agreed that it is probably the earliest of our "Canonical" gospels, and secondly, it is the "Gospel of the Year" in our current lectionary cycle. I tried, as much as possible, to read it without trying to superimpose back a pre-conceived theology about Jesus and also a pre-conceived idea as to the teachings of Jesus. I also read it in the somewhat less familiar translation of the Scholars Version which was the work of the Fellows of the Jesus Seminar. They did a number of interesting things in their translation, the most fascinating of which was their desire to not "improve" the grammar of Mark nor to make all of his tenses agree with our modern English sensibilities. What struck me most was the use of the present tense as well as their creative way of conveying the "immediately" or "right then" or "right away" usages that are throughout the Gospel of Mark. More than before, this seemed to match up with the view of the "Apocalyptic" character of the first Christian message. God's Imperial Rule (to use the Jesus seminar term) was perceived as not a growing and gentle awareness of the "Kingdom within you" but rather the immanent sense that something is going to happen "really soon."

It rather makes me wonder if the early growth of the Church in the post-Jesus years was not due to an apocalyptic fervor? There have, of course, since that time been any number of apocalyptic movements, particularly among "evangelicals" in the US. One has only to think of the Oneida community dressed up and sitting in the trees for the parousia to get an idea of the extremes to which apocalypticism can drive people to to get an idea that a similar thing may have happened in the early church as well. They had, at least in the Jewish Middle East, some pretty good "signs" of it noting the destruction of the Temple in the ca CE 70 defeat of the Jewish revolt. We can see these events projected backwards onto the Jesus narratives of the Gospel where Jesus speaks "prophetically" of the destruction of the temple, and when he tells the women to "weep for themselves and for their children." It is significant, I think, that so much of the oldest NT book, the first letter of Paul to the Thessalonians, is dedicated to explaning what will happen at "the Lord's coming" regarding "we who are alive" as well as those who had died with a sense that "we who are alive" are going to see this miraculous event occur.

But, the Lord did not come quickly back. One wonders what were the thoughts of these "transitional" Christians as they realized that this return of the Lord in glory was not happening as they had expected. I suppose that there was more emphasis placed by some on the "keep ready" for "no one knows the day nor the hour" "not even the Son (of God)." Although a specific date was never predicted (as had been the case for so many of the more recent "events" that we knew of), it would still have required a "recalcluation" of the original mental chronology. I would suspect that this has already been done, but I would guess that, if we follow the writings of the NT and the post-NT period chronologically, we could find a progressive de-emphasis of the apocalyptic character of the message of the early Christians.

What then do we do with the early Christian message? What can we look back to and at least touch as a source of our own inspiration that allows us to give meaning to our existence today? It came to me yesterday that we might look even more closely back at the "greatest commandment" quotation as a central meaning for us. This story exists in the Gospel of Mark and is an "early" one, therefore and perhaps "authentic" as "close to" the message of Jesus. In it, of course, Jesus is asked a question by "one of the scholars" as the SV describes him as to which is the most important commandment. Jesus replies that the most important commandment is the "Hear, Israel, the Lord your God is one Lord, and you are to Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind and with all your energy." He goes on to give the second part of it which is, "You are to love your neigbor as yourself." The questioner complements Jesus on his answer and appears to be sincere to Jesus who replies "You are not far from God's domain." The passage ends with a certain sense of finality when Mark writes that "From then on, no one dared to question him."

It occured to me that the "great commandment" could be perceived as a somewhat koan-like statement. First, one must "love the Lord" with the totality of one's being with all one's intellectual, emotional and spiritual resources. How then, do we "love our neighbor" or "love our selves" if all is given over to the love of God? Perhaps this would suggest that we find God in our neighbor and ourselves and our "God" is this total experience of love. This would mesh, perhaps, with a philosophical view that we are "all one," suggesting that, in the deepest and most meaningful way, there is no essential distinction or separation between ourselves and others. That loving others is like loving ourselves because others, in essence, are the same as ourselves. This essential commonality has a transcendent quality that might earn it the name of "God" perhaps when it is fully and completely realized. The "task" then for us is a dual one. First, it is an internal search for the "ground of being" or "spirit" or "essence" or "self" that is in each of us the same "self" that is in all of this. The "experience" of this self would then be the "point" of contemplation, meditation and prayer. Secondly, a growing awareness of this reality would be a source for acting charitably to others as we would be acting charitably to ourselves by doing so and thereby experiencing in a practical way the transendence that we achieve by our growing awareness of this unity of all people and individuals. We could find a commonality with other faith traditions as well such as the perception of the self or Atman as identical with Brahman or the enlightenment experience of Buddhist tradition where the "illusions" of separation and the small self drop away, and the birth of compassion for all living beings emerges.

The "God is Love" conception is not one that could necessarily be condemned even by traditional Christians as heretical. Furthermore, some of Paul's most excellent writings relate well to this. Witness his famous discourse in the Corinthian letter of the "I may speak with the tongues of men and angels, but if I have not Love..." speech. We also may find an answer to "moral" dilemmas as well by using the "Love is the fulfilling of the Law" principle with the corollary that "Love does no harm to a neighbor." This "Love" principle would, if carried to the fullest, be a way to lose all of the "dross" of prejudice and superstition that fills up the "moral codes" that appear throughout the Jewish and Christian scriptures. It would allow us to, from a first principle, apply a test to any question: "Does this do harm to a neighbor?....no....then it is either a loving or a morally neutral act."

Finally, this brings God both down to a human level as the "spirit of Love" within each of us as well as making the experience of that same "spirit of Love" a transcendent one. It is much more satisfying morally and intellectually than the "big guy in the sky" way of thinking. It also could form a nidus for even bringing back the "Kingdom of Heaven" concept. This time, it is not a cataclysmic event of a supernatural being who invades our reality but something that grows out of our own ability to be aware of the "oneness" of all people and our experience/practice of the "love your neighbor" ideal. Clearly, we can at least imagine a utopian sort of finality to this if it could be applied universally.

Well, I suppose that, like any other "way of thinking" this might be pulled apart in many ways, and it makes some assumptions that are hard to justify empirically such as the "essential oneness" of all persons, but even this might rationally and reasonably be done, and it is certainly not out of keeping with the kind of things that are said by those who have, over the ages, devoted themselves to prayer, meditation, etc.

This might be at least, a concept that would form a pretty firm foundation for a post-theistic Christianity.

Until next time....

Jeffrey Shy
(Nope, all I see up there is a cloud)
Mesa, Arizona

I forgot to take my weapon

2006-07-05T06:44:00.000-07:00

In spite of my last post, I have to admit that I have been trying to" find Jesus on the road" again. This was started, at least in part, by an observation of Sunday's preacher who was discussing the story of Jesus raising of Jairus daughter. Although we "skirted" fairly delicately the issue as to whether she had really died, it was a side-light on the story that caught my attention. Simply, if Jesus was a 20-something wandering Rabbi, his disciples would probably have been rather young, very possibly even just teenagers. Furthermore, it was mentioned that, rather than having his chief disciples come to him, Jesus is portrayed in some Gospel accounts as seeking them out. This led me to consider just whom Jesus picked, and a rather unlikely bunch of students they were. It occured to me that Jesus was probably able to read (witness his picking up the Isaiah scroll in the synagogue, reading it, and then sitting down to teach---not the likely actions of the "humble carpenter's son" and one suggesting some level of education, perhaps) and possibly to write (if one accepts that there may be some hint of the historical Jesus in the story of the Woman caught in adultery, for example, where Jesus "writes something" in the dirt). If then, Jesus was literate and educated, then his likely illiterate and uneducated pupils were rather a novelty. Following this line of thought, one might speculate that Jesus was not so shocking for what he taught (much of it not very original) but whom he taught. I intend the emphasis on both the "whom" and the "taught" because it is likely that such persons would have been felt to be uneducable. I do not believe that our egalitarian ideas today would have made sense to many at that time. Women, laborers, other country Yokels would not perhaps have been seen by most as economically disadvantaged and therefore uneducated, but as possibly "unteachable" or at least (in the case of social outcasts---sex workers and tax collectors) unworthy of being taught. This could create, as it were, a picture of Jesus as the "great educator" who tried to bring the teachings of the time that were important to him to the masses, perhaps like the first writer of "Judaism for Dummies."

Well, just like all "portraits" of Jesus, it is subject to criticism. What about all the "healing stories" and all the "miracle stories?" What about all this "Kingdom of Heaven" stuff? The latter is particularly bothersome, since it seems fairly likely that, at least the Pauline Christians were waiting for the eschaton---the return of "the Lord" in power on the clouds of heaven to usher in the messianic rule. Whether Jesus thought himself the messiah or not will never be known, but there is certainly, whether original or projected back, a content of the "last days" sort of thinking in the Gospel accounts of Jesus. Even if the Qumran scrolls represented even a minority opinion of the day, then this way of thinking existed outside the Jesus community, and would not have been so terribly unusual perhaps at the time (witness John the Baptizer and others mentioned in other historical accounts such as, I believe, Josephus).

If, indeed, Jesus was preaching an apocalyptic message, then clearly this is not a message that holds much resonance for me today. I do not expect to see "one come with the clouds of heaven" to usher in the new age. The "teacher of the poor" is better, I suppose, and at least could allow for some "imitation" as it were, but in the end it too is speculative.

I cannot help but be fascinated and admire the scholarship of those who study the Christian New Testament seriously and have looked for the "real" or "original" or "authentic" Jesus, but I have to admit that such studies, to me, seem likely to become only "sidelights" as it were, in the future development of the religion that came be called Christianity. We can "look for" the historical Jesus, but every time we "find him," I think that we end up a bit disappointed.

Jeffrey Shy
(Honey, get the gun!)
Mesa, Arizona

My Photo

2006-07-01T11:30:00.000-07:00

The "J----" word

2006-07-01T09:02:00.000-07:00

A search of this Blog (admittedly not a thick tome) since I started it finds that I have used the word "Jesus" only 5 times in its postings so far. A search of "Google" for Jesus came up with "about" 230,000,000 occurences. Clearly, any new Christianity has to include Jesus, but the question is how/where/in what way? Dr. Spong writes of the "domino effect" that occurs when we knock down any central religious idea. Clearly the rain of falling dominoes does not have to go very far before the traditional Jesus and millions of derivatives join in.

It is pretty clear that, from the first, the people who came to call themselves Christians struggled with the just who and what Jesus was/is. Episcopalians are pretty familiar with the creeds. Every Sunday's liturgy of the Eucharist includes a recitation of the Nicene Creed as a mandatory inclusion. (It is not a "may" sort of rubric). The so-called Apostle's creed makes its appearance in the daily office and Baptismal liturgies. The "Historical Documents" section of the American prayerbook includes the Chalcedonian formulation as well as the Athanasian Creed. In essence, the composers of the credal statements had a central purpose. Yes, they wanted to make a statement about who is/was Jesus, but more importantly, they wanted to make it clear who/what Jesus is not. Prior to these creeds, there were may different answers to these questions, but the church authorities felt it essential to get this worked out. It was generally accepted that the Chalcedonian formulation was a sort of ecclesiastical "last word" on the subject. All the orthodox could breathe a collective sigh of relief on having settled this sticky issue and get on to being good little Christians from that point on. The "Credo" was no longer a statement about committment, but an intellectual assent to some core "facts" about Christianity. Assent to the facts was required to be an authentic or true Christian. Denial of any of these branded one as a heretic.

Unfortunately, in the minds of the rigidly orthodox, we moderns have been chipping away at the credal definitions for some time now. Once we could stop accepting the words of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian New Testament as literally true and inerrant, we began to see there was far from unanimity with regard to how the early church thought of Jesus. Mark, the earliest of the gospels, mentions nothing about the miraculous birth narrative of Jesus. Paul is hard to piece together, but he seems to have a sort of "adoptionist" view of Jesus, perhaps. Clearly, if those who were temporally closest to Jesus could not "get it together," it is rather foolish to think of the Nicene and Chalcedonian formulations as the "last word" on the subject.

The "Quest for the historical Jesus" in modern biblical scholarship has given us some fascinating insights, perhaps, into the "original" Jesus, but ultimately comes down at the end to a lot of speculation. We have very few "hard facts" about Jesus other than a general assent to the existence of an historical individual by that name who lived in the early years of what we now call the "common era" and who seemed to be a sort of religious teacher, perhaps, had disciples, fell out somehow with the political and/or religious authorities and was executed while still a relatively young man. He left no authentic writings. None of the writings about him are strictly contemporary. The first "Gospels" that tell the story of his life and teachings were written a number of years after he was dead. There is great debate about which, if any, of the words attributed to him in these Gospels he may have actually spoken. It does not take too long living in the "Historical Jesus Club" to get a certain sense of futility about the whole thing – simply that it will likely never be possible to really "know" the historical Jesus.

What then am I to do with Jesus?

First, we must admit that the adoption of a non-theistic view knocks "Jesus" down a number of rungs on the ladder of religious exaltation. I cannot afirm the conception of the God who homo factus est. The bodily resurrection "on the third day" or "after three days" seems a piece of religious fantasy as does the cosmological ascension into the divine sphere over the dome of the sky, the ability to suspend the laws of physics in making nature miracles, the predicted return on the "clouds of heaven," and I could go on for a long time. I think that I can safely agree that Jesus was a human person. Whatever he may really have said, the "experience" of Jesus continued after his physical death as a "spiritual reality" for people who have done extraordinary things. It has been a reality that has led many to accept self-destruction rather than deny their allegiance to a dead individual. The religion about him has been the dominant religion of the post-classical western world and is a central mover of our entire post-classical history. He is a figure at the center of great art and music. Countless volumes have been written about him. Even today, people remain fascinated with him in both intellectual and experiental ways.

Clearly, this is "one important dude" that we need to get to terms with, even if we are not trying to claim, in some sense, to be "Christian" in a religious outlook. I can no more dismiss Jesus from a religious perspective than I can ignore Mohammed, Siddhartha Gautama the Buddha, Lao Zi, and others. I must admit, though, that I have a hard time deciding where Jesus goes in the Christian non-theist camp. If I want to accept him as a great teacher, then naturally I would want to study his teachings. Uh-oh, just what were his teachings? If I am to revere him as "Master" then for what reason am I to adopt this posture of submission?

In a non-theistic Christianity, I would suspect that we could have some common ground with Buddhism. Buddhists too have spent quite a bit of time on a similar who/what and was/is the Buddha question. The basic story/facts of his existence seem to be reasonably well-known, but is is pretty clear that nothing close to the amount of words attributed to him could he have actually spoken. Just as in the many branches of Christianity, there are different formulations of his central "message" and how to practice that message in our own lives. I cannot, of course, forget Lin Chi's famous instructions, however, to his monk who reported seeing the Buddha in a vision while walking on the road. "If you see the Buddha on the road, kill him!" The second, less-quoted part is, "And burn all the sutras." This would suggest that perhaps the "finding the real Buddha" is a misdirected endeavor. Maybe we can find a kinship in our "search for the real Jesus." For the moment, it might be best that we should engage a little suspension in the search for a definition. We need a little of the "Credo" in the older sense of commitment rather than assent to a formulation. It may be that we should adapt Lin Chi and say, "If you meet Jesus on the road, kill him!"

Jeffrey Shy
(Is Jesus a four-letter word?)
Mesa, Arizona

Are we there yet?

2006-06-30T05:54:00.000-07:00

I had intended this morning to re-read as much as possible of the chapter in Karen Armstrong's book, A History of God, on the "God of the Philosophers," but rather absentmindedly, I left it on my desk in my work office, so that it was unaccesible to me. I picked up, instead, Paul Tillich's book, The Eternal Now. It is, perhaps, a testament to laziness that the price on the cover of my trade paperback version is $2.95, and I have never completely read the whole book. I suspect that, at the time I bought it, I got it because some older (and probably wiser) individual had spoken of his/her admiration for Tillich, and I was just imitating. I also suspect that, at the time, I was rather still immersed, as it were, in the theistic God, and Tillich's gentle despair and quiet hope did not quite so much appeal to me at the time.

As I struggle with the philosophical discussion of "God" and religion and Christianity, I am always holding in the opposite hand the "practical" side of things. By this, I do not necessarily mean a "faith and works" dichotomy such that this opposite hand is that of "ethical action" like some sort of divinely inspired social work. That certainly is included, but it is more than that. Once again, it is the direct "experience" of "God." "the spirit," "the numinous," "the holy,"---call it what you will. Furthermore, it is the fundamental question of "Is there a religious experience, or it is all just delusional?" There is, of course, a deep paradox at the very center of this. How can I experience something that "is not?" If "God" or "the numinous" does not exist, then how can I experience it?

But before I fall into the silence that seems to descend every time we encounter one of these "Christian Koans," maybe I should go back to Tillich for a second. It was in thinking about "experiential" religion, that I was drawn to read his sermon "Spiritual Presence." First, his definition:

For Spirit is first of all power, the power that drives the human spirit above itself towards what it cannot attain by itself, the love that is greater than all other gifts, the truth in which the depth of being opens itself to us, the holy that is the manifestation of the presence of the ultimate.

Tillich then introduces a discussant who objects to his "definition" of Spirit:

...What I hear from you sounds like ecstasy; and I want to stay sober. It sounds like mystery, and I try to illuminate what is dark. It sounds like self-sacrifice and I want to fulfill my human possibilities.

Tillich goes on to admit that "Spiritual power" does all of these things (i.e. provoke ecstasy, invoke mystery, inspire self-sacrifice), but it does a great deal more as well. In a long series of examples, he goes on to credit this "spiritual" power as the motivator/mover/ground of all sorts of ways in which humans exceed their lowest or most base or self-serving motives. (Dare I suggest the term "transcendence" for this?) I'll give a few examples (with lots of omissions):

The Spirit can work in you with a soft but insistent voice, telling you that your life is empty and meaningless, but that there are chances of a new life waiting before the door of your inner self....The Spirit can work in you, awakening the desire to strive towards the sublime against the profanity of the average day. The Spirit can reveal to you that you have hurt somebody deeply, but it also can give you the right word that reunites him with you...The Spirit can make you love...someone you profoundly dislike or in whom you have no interest..

For Tillich, this Spiritual power or presence is always there, in, around, under, through all that is. "Mostly it is moving air, always present, not always noticed." It is a good experiential "argument" of rather the "movement" requires a "mover" and inasmuch as these "movements" are not always particularly the "low road" then a "higher mover" than ourselves may be reasponsible for them. It is that "something" that makes us try to be "more" than selfish, and it is that "something" that makes us feel badly when we ignore it and act in a self-serving way to the harm of others.

After this, however, his sermon takes a fascinating turn. It is the "Spiritual Presence" that is the reason for our experience of the "absent God." Tillich again:

It is the work of the Spirit that removes God from our sight, not only for some men, but sometimes for many in a particular period. We live in an era in which the God we know is the absent God. But in knowing God as the absent God, we know of Him; we feel His absence as the empty space that is left by something or someone that once belonged to us and has now vanished from our view....when our awareness of Him has become shallow, habitual--not warm and not cold--when He has become too familiar to be exciting....then He becomes the absent God. The Spirit has not ceased to be present. The Spiritual Presence can never end. But the Spirit of God hides God from our sight. ..the Spirit shows us nothing except the absent God, and the empty space...

I must give him credit for what is a pretty good argument against religious authority that seeks to defend "the deposit of faith" like it was some sort of celestial financial grant that has to be invested very cautiously always making sure that the "principal" is not put at risk. Here Tillich makes the "Spirit of God" that which is responsible for the "absence of God." Put again, it is God himself who snuffs out God. If God is the "ultimate authority" (for those who think like that), then it is hard to argue with him when his Spirit says that he does not exist. (Oh no, another "Christian Koan.")

Tillich concludes his sermon with a cautionary note, as it were, about the "works of the spirit." In trying to answer what this spirtual life is like, he first proposes and then rejects many "traditional" answers. We could say, traditionally for example, that the works of the Spirit are "Faith" or "Hope" or "Love."

But if I used such words, the shadow of the absent God would appear and make you and me aware that we cannot speak like this today. If we did, freedom would be distorted into willfulness, faith into belief in the absurd, hope into unreal expectations, and love--the word I would most like to use for the creation of the Spirit--into sentimental feeling. The Spirit must give us new words, or revitalize old words to express true life. We must wait for them; we must pray for them; we cannot force them.

Impatience makes me want these words now. It is rather like the old car trip joke where the kids keep asking, "Are we there yet?" And, make no mistake (did I just use President Bush's favorite phrase?---gads), I want, perhaps desire to get there. In the meantime, however, I must be careful not to forget to enjoy the view on the way.

Jeffrey Shy
"I'm not there yet"
Mesa, Arizona

Shall we turn out the light?

2006-06-29T06:58:00.000-07:00

I pulled out a book this morning that I had read (and have re-read) many times, A History of God, by Karen Armstrong. In the short time every day I have for my blogging, I clearly cannot make it through the whole of her 400 plus page volume (minus notes, suggested reading, index, etc.) I decided to page back to the final chapter, "Does God have a future?" which honestly might be a good title for this blog. In that final chapter, she takes the reader on a whirlwind tour of many contemporary theologies of the last century. Read quickly, it sets one's head spinning very fast.
I decided to go instead to the index and do a little browsing after looking up references to the via negativa school of theology and philosophy. Without making any presuppositions about the nature of "God," the via negativa tries to put into words something of a more-than and at the same time, less-than, approach to the numinous than traditional theism. It does not, of course, take very long to see that non-theism is not really a novelty, even in the Christian West, which has tended to emphasize a more concrete/rational approach to religion than many others. I found it captivating to read her summary of the theological method of Erigena. Her discussion is so good, that I hope that I am not doing wrong by inserting an extended quote:

Erigena used the dialectical method...in his own discussion of God, who could only be explained by a paradox that reminded us of the limitations of our human understanding. Both the positive and the negative approaches to God were valid. God is incomprehensible: even the angels do not know or understand his essential nature, but is is acceptable to make a positive statement, such as "God is wise," because when we refer it to God, we know that we are not using the word "wise" in the usual way. We remind ourselves of this by going on to make a negative statement, saying "God is not wise." The paradox forces us to move on to Denys's (Denys the Areopagite sometimes referred to as pseudo-Denys) third way of talking about God, when we conclude: "God is more than wise." This was what the Greeks called an apophatic statement, because we do not understand what "more than wise" can possibly mean. Again, this was not simply a verbal trick but a discipline (emphasis added) that by juxtaposing two mutally exclusive statements helps us to cultivate a sense of the mystery that our word "God" represents, since it can never be confined to a merely human concept.

She goes on to illustrate how Erigena used this same "discipline" in the examination of the statement "God exists." You can work it out yourself, of course. This leads to "God does not exist" and then "God is more than existence." Finally, this is, of course, incomprehensible since we cannot really understand something that is "more than existence." This means that God is not a being. In fact, God is "nothing."

The employment of the "via negativa" or the paradox is not unique to Christianity. Any of us who have encountered the "Koan" for example of Zen can understand that the use of paradox is, if you will, a "discipline" that allows us to perhaps escape in a limited sense our use of language in talking about the numinous. This is, of course, a paradox again in that if we admit that we cannot use language to talk about God, we have just done that. It is the logical partner of "This statement is false."

I think that, as we introduce ideas for "consideration" to help us live an answer to the "Does God have a future?" question, we should always have in our minds this essential paradox. To the extent that we do not negate each/every positive statement about "what God is" we are simply bringing back a "God-being" in a new disguise. For every "light" that we turn on, we must acknowledge the shadows that we are to create.

Perhaps again, a little silence to be the "negative answer" to speech?

Don't worry, I'll turn out the light.

Jeffrey Shy
(sittin' in the dark)
Mesa, Arizona

Now let's not get emotional!

2006-06-28T06:49:00.000-07:00

As I wander through the logical mazes of a non-theistic theology, I keep running into those pesky "emotions." As in previous postings, I know that emotions are powerful things. They are a lot of the unreasoned "reason" behind what we do, think and say. It is, perhaps, an emotional state that got us into the "theistic mess" in the first place--our anxiety over the "big" questions of life/death/existence was a powerful motivator for creating the theistic God who could help relieve some of that anxiety. It makes me, therefore, a bit nervous to allow emotions back into the picture.

What I am skirting, and I suppose I should just "out with it," is the problem of the "religious experience." The question is this, simply put: Can there be an "experience" of/with a non-theistic God? Can I experience a "God" who is not? In my "religous practice," meaning things such as "prayer" "meditation" "worship" "service," there always seemed to be a "something" that I "got out" of these experiences. During a very difficult time in my life when I was alone in Washington, DC and coming to terms with my hasty decision to join the Army to pay for my medical eduction and realizing that I was going to have to "pay the price" of my indentured servitude, it was literally my daily prayer/meditation with my Book of Common Prayer that kept me emotionally together. Even in a less distressing setting, I would often drag myself to church on Sunday mornings drained and tired and wanting to rest/relax/escape and then find myself re-inspired and refreshed after participating in the Sunday liturgy. So I ask the question, was this just patching up my anxieties with the "everlasting arms" delusion? Was it just an "endorphin rush" that left me with a sort of "post coital" calm and high? Or was there some other quality to this experience that I simply cannot put into words. Is it possible that, even though I was mistaken in conceptualizing it as a theistic God entity, there was some "reality," a "more" or a "numinous" or an "other" that I could "touch" so to speak?

As I have read more of John Shelby Spong's books, I note that he seems to return repeatedly to the fact that so many persons have shared with him their "faith stories" or "journeys" and that this has been an important part of his growth and his development away from the theistic God. Perhaps what we really need is for more of those of us who are or are becoming "non-theists" to come out of the closet and share not only our ideas, but our experiences and stories - perhaps a kind of "Kinsey Report" for religion, I suppose. We are really lacking in any strong tradition that we can consult of others who have "experienced" a non-theistic Christianity, although there are, I think, some writings of Christian mystics that might be useful. I speculate that this will really be one of the most difficult parts about being on the edge of a new way of thinking or believing. We have no idea how this will all "come out" in the end (or on the way for that matter) for us.

As Dennis concluded in his comments on my last post---What to do, what to do, what to do? (Add some emphasis on the "do" part, I think.)

Jeffrey Shy
(Do be Do be Do be Do)
Mesa, Arizona

What's in a Name?

2006-06-27T06:25:00.000-07:00

Dennis (in a recent comment on this blog) said...
"I'm not sure that there is an answer out there that we may now name God..."

Like many profound thoughts, it often takes a little bit of reflection to see just how profound they are, and I thank Dennis for his contribution. In debate or discussion or any form of communication, there is only meaningful exchange if we agree on the meaning of the words/terms that we use. At the outset, we must first "define our terms" so to speak, before we can talk about something. To give a somewhat frivolous example, say we want to have a discussion about "cheesecakes." Discussant A understands cheescakes to be a confection that is rather "pie-like" usually created using a form of soft white cheese with other ingredients and baked in an oven. Discussant B, however, understands a cheesecake to be piece or "brick" of a cheddar-like dairy product - a "cake" of "cheese." Clearly, if A and B start to discuss "cheesecake" without first agreeing to a mutual definition, they are going to run into a great deal of trouble. They will be talking about two entirely different things, and ultimately, unless they realize the error they have made to define terms, they are going to wind up in a state of either puzzled confusion or massive disagreement.

The problem, perhaps, with even using the word "God" is that, for English-speaking Western Christians, "God" is not just a religious "term", but has come to be used as a name.This is particularly present in the phenomenon of vocal prayer where, although we may preface God with an honorific "O," we use it as a term of address. "O God, we call to you today...." is rather like "Dear Steven, I am writing to you today...." "God" is, therefore, rather the name that we give to the nameless God. We do not phrase the invocation as "In the Father, Son and Holy Spirit" but as "In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit." In spite of inheriting the story of the God whose "name" was unpronounceable, we could not live without a name.

We are, of course, all about giving names to things and particularly to persons. To not refer to or relate to a person by her/his name is tantamount to an insult in our culture. Witness the response that you get to "Hey, you!" Or how you can color a discussion about someone by referring to him or her as "that man" or "that woman." Our desire to "name" the numinous as "God" probably derives at least in part from our natural tendency to describe reality in terms of our human selves. We are self-conscious individuals with names---would it not be natural to conceive of the numinous in similar terms? We really should turn the first Genesis creation language on its head (pardon the gender-laden language, it's in the original):

In the beginning, man created God. In the image of man (woman), he created him (her). Male and female (at least before the feminine divinity was "deleted") they created God.

This is, of course, the essence of theism. It is so essential that even "theism" is probably a bad word for it. Although the term is already taken, "humanism" might have been a better one. It is a belief that so many people find indispensible that it passes hardly without notice. There are plenty of people who state as a prime principle of their faith that they believe in a personal God. In another context for the "born again" crowd, "I accept Jesus as my personal savior." In the deep human longings for something "other" than the surrounding reality of day-to-day life, there is, perhaps, a longing for a relationship. For humans, relationships are primarily those with "people." Even our relationships with non-human animals are conducted in similar terms where we relate to them as "people" (primarily as children for companion animals). It is natural, therefore, that we should think of "God" as a "person." It is a concept born of emotion, of longing, of loneliness, of a desire to love and be loved, to care for and be taken care of.

For this reason, discussions about "God" in impersonal, abstract, non-concrete terms often are perceived as "cold" "rationalistic" and, yes, "impersonal." These abstractions do not often speak strongly to a needy emotional self. They are, therefore, unappealing for most and do not inspire passionate response.

We must admit, however, that emotions, although they can lead persons to do extraordinarily good things, can also lead to extraordinarily terrible consequences as well. When emotions guide our actions, they can lead to ends that are incredibly constructive or incredibly destructive. For the neurologist, emotions are conceived of as coming from the most primitive parts of our brain in an evolutionary sense. They come from the "reptile" brain, we say. Indeed, there is a certain mystery to the origins of our emotions. They do not often come as a part of logical thought, but they arise unbidden from the depths often without clear reason. Witness the phenomenon of romantic "falling in love" that some have experienced as "love at first sight." It cannot come from any logical or considered conclusion about compatibility, but comes unbidden and unasked for. In a religious context, it is, probably, an error to let emotions rule the discussion, because ultimately, emotions can only be experienced, not discussed or argued in or out of existence. We need to both acknowledge our emotional selves and the value of emotion as well as to avoid letting emotion alone control us.

So what do we do with the word/name "God" then? Honestly, I am not sure. We could, I suppose, create an entirely new word with no pre-existent antecedents, "marneld" or "xtrilin" or some other "alien" sounding word. It is, however, a linguistic rarity for an entirely new word to be consciously invented and to gain general acceptance. Perhaps we need to use other "non-personal" terms that have been at the periphery of religious life such as "the numinous" or "enlightenment" or "buddha nature" or "the ground of being" or whatever. Whether one of these "alternate" terms comes to be central in non-theistic Christianity remains to be seen, but it helps, I think, to pepper them through consideration and discussion just the same. Perhaps we should use "God" only when talking in negatives (the so-called "Via Negativa") as in "God does not exist." or "God is not." Inasmuch as a "new" religious synthesis is going to have to come to terms with other faith/cultural traditions in a global world, perhaps we should simply use as many terms as possible and insist that our discussions always "begin" with an exploration of our words, their origins and their meanings. For those who have come to distrust language at all in a religious context, perhaps we should just not say anything at all....

At least for now, being out of time, I'll end with a bit of that reflective silence.

Jeffrey Shy
(Yep, that's my name, don't wear it out.)
Mesa, Arizona

And don't ask too many questions!

2006-06-25T15:16:00.000-07:00

I was pretty brave today, and I decided to attend church this morning. It was, in the main, a pretty positive experience. I was able to greet someone who is probably the only reader of this blog other than myself. The music (if not all the paired texts) was pretty good for a summer morning without choir. I was also able to "rekindle" a few friendships that had fallen by the way. These are all pretty good in themselves, and I have been trying to promise myself to not be too critical. If there is anything that might come in a positive way from the Windsor report, then a committment to listening certainly might be the big one. I went determined to listen to any alternative viewpoints that might come my way. Even if I ultimately disagree, a viewpoint that makes me think is not all a bad thing, I suppose.

Today's lessons were for the Third Sunday after Pentecost. The first reading was one of, I believe, the rare appearances of a passage from the book of Job in the church's Sunday readings cycle. It was the "divine answer" of God speaking from the whirlwind to miserable and abused Job. It includes some dramatic imagery on the creation of the ocean and, when you read it literally, some very primitive understandings about the origins of the earth and the oceans. To sum up the substance, it is rather a "Hey, where were you when I set all this stuff up? Did you make the world? No? I didn't think so. When you make your own world, hey, then maybe we'll talk. In the mean time, shut the F--- up." As others have commented many times before, this, "answer" to Job's existential questions is far from satisfying.

On to the Psalm. This was sections of Psalm 107 that, I suspect, were mostly chosen because of some sea/ocean imagery that could tie it to the Job lesson and also the Gospel (see below). The key passage being that it describes some people who "went down to the sea in ships" "He spoke, and a stormy wind arose which tossed high the waves of the sea..." "Then they cried to the Lord..." "He stilled the storm to a whisper."

The reading from the second Epistle to the Corinthians is not precisely on topic, of course. It is the "if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation" passage.

Finally, there was the Gospel reading from Mark in which Jesus performs a nature miracle and calms the windstorm when he and his disciples are caught out on a boat in bad weather. It ends with the disciples saying, "Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?" This is, of course, a pretty good story to tell if you want to make some claims about a superhuman Jesus.

Since the writer of the sermon is not online here to defend himself, and I did not take notes or have his text to refer to, I think it best that the place and person remain nameless. If, somehow, my reflections are a misrepresentation of today's message, then I can at least say that what I believed I heard was something that I have "heard before," and it will not hurt anyone to reflect a bit more on what I perceived as the central points. As I understood it, the essential message was what I think I might call the "superbig" theism argument. While still sticking with a theistic conception of God, the caveat added on is the, "but God is really incomprehensible, so you really can never understand him." This is followed by the immediate corollary of "so you shouldn't even try." Another authority was quoted with a comment from Anselm of Canterbury that I probably paraphrase, "I do not seek to understand that I may believe, but I believe that I may understand."

I think that I can honestly say that I find the "superbig" theism argument rather unconvincing. In spite of claiming that "God" is much more than any theistic concept can make "him," the persons who espouse this conception continue, however, to speak and relate otherwise to a very much smaller and inadequate theistic entity. The God in heaven of the everlasting arms is still right there to step back in after a brief appearance of the incomprehensible immensity of the supertheistic God who bows out quickly before the discussion gets to be too difficult. In the end, it is, I think, just a way to squash any meaningful discussion. It is a fallacial argument.

If, however, we go back to Anselm, I have a little less trouble inasmuch as saying that "belief" or "faith" might be an important tool in a nontheistic approach to "God." (Again, I must use quotes so that we do not assume that by "God" I mean some superbeing in the eternal above and hearafter.) To return to Tillich for a moment from yesterday, and to continue the quote for a bit longer:

God is the answer to the question implied in man's finitude; he is the name for that which concerns man ultimately. This does not mean that first there is a being called God and then the demand that man should be ultimately concerned about him.

He goes on to say:

Faith (insert here, perhaps Anselm's "belief" in place of "faith"), is the state of being ultimately concerned.

Although this view of God is not a "comforting" one like theism can offer, it is a more interesting and more compelling one. In this setting, "faith" and "God" are inseparable as one inevitably calls the other into existence. Here, there is not a God outside me asking me to accept his existence based on some pretty lousy evidence, but "God" becomes that which is created, as it were, by the act of faith or ultimate concern.

Here the BIG question then is "What is this ultimate concern?" or "What is there about which I am ultimately concerned?" For Tillich, we have to go back to the first proposition of "the question implied in man's finitude" or as he himself also calls it the "shock of non-being" or again, Freud's "trauma of self-consciousness." In this paradigm, "God" becomes a conditional that, probably, has to be "lived out" rather than answered and defined empirically. "God" becomes our "answer" to a life that we live in full knowledge and awareness of our own mortality. It is, for us, the "point" of what we do from the time between our births and our deaths. This is not a God that one can ask for help in difficult times. This "God" is the answer that we give by our thoughts and actions to the circumstances with which we are presented and the reality in which we live. If our responses, for example, are loving and selfless, then "God" is the essence of love and selflessness. If our responses are mean/cruel/hurtful, then "God" is the essence of meaness, cruelty and harm. To take this further, "God" in a post-theistic Christian sense, might be that unifying principle by which the faith community lives out its ideals of love, mercy, benevolence, selflessness, etc. Here "God" is not a being that calls people together and creates a community of believers, but a community of "believers" who creates a "God" that is their meaningful and considered response to the world in which they live.

Hmm, a bit circular, perhaps, but not bad. I'll have to let this "sink in" for a bit. As a conditional answer, it is a heck of a lot better, however, than the "just shut the heck up" from the big fellow in the sky.

Jeffrey Shy
"Sorry, I can't check my brain at the door, it's attached."
Mesa, Arizona

Nothing's sure but death and taxes

2006-06-24T08:42:00.000-07:00

I think most people are familiar with the old saying, "Nothing's sure but death and taxes." While it is the "tax" part that makes it humorous, it is the universal assent to the first part that makes it insightful. There is no way to think about spirituality, God, religion, faith, et cetera, without having death a central player in the discussion.

Most of us do not think about death very much, but our biological life is really mostly about doing things to avoid it. Eating, drinking, breathing, moving - those verbs that are essential to the very nature of biological life's continuance have as their converse death. If we do not eat, we die. If we do not drink, we die. If we do not breathe, we die. If we do not move or act to avoid physical threats, then we die. The more disturbing reality is, however, that no matter how much eating, drinking, breathing and moving we do, we still die.

We owe to Dr. Kubler-Ross a debt of gratitude for helping many of us better to understand the process of grief. Although we may grieve many losses, death and dying were the subject of her now universally famous work. It has been debated, however, that the "final stage" of the grieving process "acceptance," really happens very much. There are many who contend, and I worry that they are right, that the final stage of acceptance is simply a deeper retreat into denial. We may internalize the person whom we knew externally, perhaps, and come to be "at peace" therefore with the loss, but the reality of the loss may not be fully and completely accepted as it is just too painful, ultimately, to bear.

One of my "hobbies" that I pursue as my time allows is family genealogy. With patience and persistence, I have slowly been putting together a family tree that now includes literally thousands of individuals and extends back over centuries. Along with the "inevitable facts" of date and place of birth, date and place of death, date and place of burial, I try as much as possible to accumulate other facts and "relics" as it were of these people. In the loft room of my home, I and my partner have framed photos of many persons in our family trees who are dead. At times, I have the feeling that, as I look at their silent faces, usually in the more abstract black and white photos of past times, they are somehow still there, sitting, regarding, existing in "silence." But as I think about this more, I shake myself and remind myself that they are not "really" there with me. It does not take much experience with real death to make any pleasant/calm abstraction seem like the most transparent fiction. As a physician, I have seen people die on any number of occasions. It is almost never the "stage" death of the dying individual speaking those last loving words, closing their eyes and slipping into a peaceful and permanent slumber. It is often slow. The individual is rarely conscious to the end. The dead person does not look as if s/he has fallen asleep. The person looks and is dead. There is no waking up from that biological fact. Not to put a gratuitously gruesome face on it, the decomposition of the body after death, at least of human bodies, is something most of us have not seen. We all have seen skeletons, yes, but it is hard to imagine the skeleton as a once-living person. They all look relatively the same, don't they? It is quite another thing to see the flesh melting, putrifying, being consumed by insects, etc. As a medical student taking a rotation in forensic pathology, I had ample opportunity to see bodies burned alive, drowned and decomposed to various levels. It is far from a peaceful sleep.

Paul Tillich has written (forgive the non-inclusive language-his, not mine), "God is the answer to the question implied in man's finitude; he is the name for that which concerns man ultimately." If this is true, and propositionally let's accept it for the moment, then any discussion of faith, belief, philosophy, religion, God, enlightenment, et cetera, must have death pretty close to the center. If the answer to this question is bounded by a question about our finitude (meaning that we were born, live and will some day, sooner or later, die), then having a clear and realistic picture of death is absolutely essential to understanding any "answer" that we may find. In, certainly, overly-simplistic terms, the theist God is an answer to the question of death: There is a God. He existed before me from all eternity. He created the universe and everything in it, including me. As an infinite being, he is infinitely compassionate. Although I may not understand "Why" we must die, I must accept it as part of the plan of this infinite being. If he is truly infinitely compassionate and death is painful, and he has ordained it, then surely it is not a complete end to my being. He even proved it to us conclusively in the person of Jesus who embodied his essence in a fully human being. Jesus died and rose again "on the third day." We are promised that, we too, at the last day, will be raised with all those who have died at any time/place and will live again in perfect happiness for eternity with the direct vision and experience of this loving God whom we may call "Father."

If one can accept the parts and premises, then the conclusions are reasonable and comforting. When, however, I put the "real" world against the theist, all-powerful and "all-loving" God, it just becomes too much to bear. What gets left out is the massive suffering that humans, animals, all sentient beings experience. There is cruelty, hatred, pain, disease, despair....and we can go on and on. People pray every day for mercy, help, relief of suffering from the all-powerful theistic God and get no relief. The apologetic answers are many. Faith was not strong enough. God answers every prayer, but sometimes the answer is "no." God has a higher plan and purpose and is all-wise. He does not give us the relief we ask for because he knows that that it would not be good for us. His "special plan" for each of us will be revealed in time. Just bear it for now and all will be made well after we die and see him face to face. I can find a parallel to this picture in the human world. There are many persons who cannot, for psychological/emotional/situational reasons, leave the relationship of another cruel/abusive individual. Those who have had the opportunity to deal with the victims of spousal abuse are often astounded at how many times the abused spouse will "go back" to the abusing partner. If God is truly a theistic God and is truly all-powerful, then he has a lot to answer for. It will take a lot of explaining to justify as part of the "loving divine plan" the horrors of genocide, of cold-blooded murder, of torture, of natural disasters that snuff out the lives of thousands in horrible agony....I could go on, literally, forever.

It was this theistic God who, for me, had himself to die. The only answer for me to the problem "death" and the God of theism is an ultimate death - the death of that God. To my mind now, however, it was not the death of a "real" God, but only a "false God" after all, so although it was incredibly painful for me, it was a necessary death. The "aching and gaping hole" where this "God" once existed in my life is one that is clearly not fully healed and, like some severe wounds, may never really be made whole. But if I am to be true to myself and others, I could not refuse to accept this death.....

So, "God" is dead...but can there be a "Long live God" echo that comes out of the end of the old, false God? I think, ultimately, that this is possible. Once again, "God is the answer to the question implied in man's finitude." The question, however, is far from simple, and the "answer" will of necessity be far from simple. In the recent movie version of the novels of "The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy," the inhabitants of a long ago and far away planet built an ultimate computer and asked it to compute the ultimate answer. As the story went, they returned millenia later to get the answer. Unfortunately, the answer that they got was incomprehensible. When they asked for an explanation, it was apparent that they had really not understood the question in the first place. The question of our finitude is really the question that is the entirety of our lives. The answer will also be one that is/encompasses/perfects the entirety of human and cosmological existence. It is the process of exploring that answer that is the substance, I think, of Faith. "God" perhaps then, is not an entity, but a process of understanding, becoming and evolving. God may not, therefore, even be fully perceivable by any one person, species or planet but may be the "understanding of finitude" of the entire cosmos. Unlike the small God of theism, that may be an "answer" worth all the seeking.

Jeffrey Shy,
"I'm not dead yet."
Mesa, Arizona

Bells and Smells

2006-06-23T06:39:00.000-07:00

As I have been trying to work out how a non-theistic Christianity might take form, it has been hard to resist simply going back to how I believed things to have been before I gave up theism. One of the persistent attractions has been to return to the music and ritual. Like most people, I was not born with prayer beads in one hand and a BCP (Book of Common Prayer) in the other, but from my first encounters with complex religious ritual, I was captivated. As a child and through high school, I was a member of a Presbyterian Church in a small midwestern town. This church was far from liberal as a whole and had a very sparse liturgical life. The minister of the church, while a wonderful man, was somewhat painfully placed in this congregation. He had a doctorate in theology from a non-Presbyterian school and introduced the somewhat heinous notion that the bible was not to be understood literally, but needed to be interpreted. He also had some slight fondness for religious ritual and made small strides to try to improve the liturgical life of this church. It was from him that I "learned" that the Presbyterian prayerbook of the time, The Book of Common Worship, was a relative of the English and American BCPs via the prayerbook of the Church of Scotland. Unfortunately, this book was very hard to find and was largely ignored by almost every Presbyterian congregation that I knew, so it had little relevance. It was, however, during this time that I found a copy of the Book of Common Prayer (the latest revision) shortly after it was first released. From the first, the complex novelty was fascinating. There were liturgies for all sorts of times and circumstances, a complex calendar, a version of the Psalms unlike any in the bible versions that I knew, not KJV, NEV, RSV or any other V (the pastor of the Presbyterian church had introduced the use of the RSV-"horrors"- and had even purchased and made available many copies of the "Oxford Annotated" version of the same) and other liturgical novelties.

Like any "play" that is read, however, it became quickly clear that liturgy needs to be acted out, and thus started my fascination with and love for religious ritual. During college at a small midwestern Lutheran school, I finally left the Presbyterians and adopted a "When in Rome" conversion to Lutheranism. (In honesty, my reasons were much more complex than that, but it would be too great a digression) At this school, there were a number of students involved in and around the college Chapel. One of them was decidedly fundamentalist and liturgically of the sit in a circle with a guitar, read the Bible, "lift up" in prayer sort of entity. The other group was more traditional but was split between those of us that were liturgically inclined and those that were more for social action and rather indifferent to liturgy. It was in services there that I first experienced some of the "something" that I came to associate with complex religious ritual. It was this "something" feeling that kept me coming back, even though I was socially far away from traditional religous conservatism. In the light of candles, the smoke of incense, the sounds of polyphonic music and the precision of movement, I could often achieve what I suppose I could call a "religious high." I would seek this "high" out many times again in the future. It would become a frustration for me when I could not achieve it. An ineptly or indifferently conducted liturgical event which "broke the rules" became a source of irritation. An extended, complex and well-executed liturgy could send me into a nearly "ecstatic" experience. Eventually, I would go to rather great lengths to get really good liturgy. I took several "pilgrimages" around the time of religious holidays to (by this time Anglican/Epsiscopalian) churches known for their "high church" liturgical practices to get a bigger "fix" of this liturgical high.

After my great collapse (another later blog), I stopped attending church altogether. Initially, I did not miss any of the liturgics, but little things kept calling me back, and that "siren call" continues to this moment. The comfort of saying a piece of the office, an "inspiring" piece of music, the rhythmicity of repeated prayer with a rosary, all of these things keep beckoning me back to a world of religious practice that I left rather abruptly. What I found, however, was that with the collapse of theism for me, the words were all wrong. I would get along OK for a bit, taking some refuge in the "symbolic" nature of religious language (I could redefine terms fluidly by now), but then I would hit on some "ugly" bit. The Nicene or Apostles creeds were particularly bad. Petitionary prayers asking God for help, good weather, peace, mercy, candy, a new Barbie doll, whatever, were also particularly bad and would demand a sort of liturgical "nose holding" until the moment passed. But I still hear the call....I just cannot get the "fix" any more.

You can guess that, from the terms I used to describe the subjective and emotional nature of these experiences, I have considered that the "religious high" was no more than some sort of "endorphin rush" brought on by just the right combination of sensory stimuli (bear with me, I am a neurologist after all). If that is so, then it will be a great task to stay away from it and to avoid "falling off the wagon." If it is merely an addiction, then it can only cloud my reason and perception and make it harder to see things in new ways. At the same time, however, I have to consider that there are other possibilities. Some of my greatest moments of new insight, "Ah ha!" moments, have occured in liturgical experiences. Could this suggest that, in these liturgical experiences, I had achieved some sort of "higher" mental state? In a more religious sense, could I have had contact with "the numinous" or perhaps have been "moved by the Spirit?"

Obviously, the answer to this question has some relevance. Liturgical practice has been an integral part of Christianity and other religions from the very beginnings. To a degree, it is some of the most obvious and visible manifestation of any religion. If there is to be a Christian non-theism, is this to be a purely intellectual exercise that is "works" alone (consider, for example, the present fervor of the "Millenium Development Goals" and the emphasis on "Mission" in the Episcopal Church today), or will there be a liturgical/experiential side as well?

Clearly, I do not know the answer to this question at this point. As I am "trying out" non-theistic Christianity, it is certain that I do not have a "non-theist" prayerbook to pick up. Any liturgies that express the intellectual assumptions and questions of non-theism have yet to be written. Like many of these questions, it is likely that I will not live to see a "final solution," and I suppose that it is naive to think that there will ever be one. I think, however, that I will be careful for the moment. There may still be some sense in preserving a liturgical/ritual life, and I, for one, do not wish to be guilty of "throwing out the baby with the bath water."

Jeffrey Shy
"Was that an 'Ave' I heard?"
Mesa, Arizona

Making new words and re-using old ones - problems with religious language

2006-06-22T06:33:00.000-07:00

I had a bit of time today to continue reading Bishop Spong's book, "The Sins of Scripture." In the chapter on "Reading Scripture as Epic History," he reminds us that spoken language is a fairly recent development on the cosmological scale- about 50 thousand years for us. Written language is even more recent - no more than five to ten thousand years. In a blog, written language is essentially what it's all about. Our ability to write about religious ideas, however, is both a blessing and a curse. It is a blessing because it allows us to depend a bit less on our fallible day-to-day recall and to "acumulate" and "build" ideas and knowledge. It is a curse, to a degree, because of the problem of religious language. Not only does religious language not "follow the rules" always of logic and discourse, but the very most central terms are ones that are so hard to define. Whether we are talking about God, the Buddha, Enlightenment, Brahman, etc (you can extend the list), we are in essence using words/terms that are not clearly definable by any great concensus.

Last night, I participated in some back-and-forth discussion on the 11th hour decision of the Episcopal General Convention to pass a resolution that in substance would seem to be at least a temporary moratorium on the consecration of more gay/lesbian bishops. It is, however, a document that is outstanding in its vagueness. It specifically avoids talking about sexual orientation and rather foolishly talks about persons who might be viewed as inappropriate (see, I'm paraphrasing) in other parts of the Anglican communion. One wonders if their intent is to hold on consecrating any more female bishops? As there are only three provinces to date that have women bishops and, for many in the world, the issue of female priests and deacons is far from a done deed, a woman primate is clearly going to be offensive to some--reference the petition of the Diocese of Ft. Worth to have alternative primatial oversite. Having just elected Katharine as the new PB, this seems extremely ironic. It was also rather choice that another candidate who was twice divorced and thrice married was consented to just before this "gem" of a resolution was agreed to as the "best we can do for now."

I am, however, digressing a bit. What I meant to come to was that I realized in my postings in the discussion how much I had redefined religious language in ways that I knew were far off the mainstream. As a theoretical non-theist (all belief is conditional and I am "trying out" non-theistic Christianity as it were), I feel that words like "God" and "Faith" and "The Spirit" and others seem to demand to be "in quotes" somehow. I rather feel that, until I have new and unique words to convey what I am coming to believe about these things, I have to use quote enclosures to at least remind me and any other reader to pause and consider that we all may mean very different things when we use these words. As I try to explore what a new non-theistic (and perhaps non-religious as the Rt. Rev. Spong has conditionally proposed) Christianity might be like, I know that I will have to be careful at every step to consider the meaning of the words that I use and, when necessary, to define them as best I can, or if I cannot define them in positive terms, to at least do so in negative ones (e.g. God is not a personal entity watching over us from heaven above.)

As a final note, I have read on other blogs some fairly harsh criticism of PB-elect Katharine, and I would suggest that we moderate our criticism to allow her to grow into this awesome responsibility. I suspect that, just like all of us, she has had and will have more and less inspired moments. Fortunately, being an Episcopalian does not require that I view what she says as infallible. It does, however, require that I am charitable. For someone who has been dumped into the fire, as it were, we need to consider how we might do in such a position. I, for one, wish her well and hope that she will become the inspiration to all of us that I know she has the potential to be.

In the meantime, and a bit contrary, how about a quote from Benjamin Franklin? "Well done is better than well said."

Jeffrey Shy
Struggling in Mesa, Arizona

Jeffrey Shy's Non-theistic Episcopalian Blog

2006-06-21T19:24:00.000-07:00

In the light of recent events at the general convention (both positive and negative) and my growing sense that the "whole darn thing" meaning the entire Christian Theistic Religion is on the verge of a collapse, I have started this blog to at least help me to put my ideas and feelings into words. I will strongly admit that I am influenced by the writings of Bishop Spong regarding the need for Christianity to "change or die." I also believe that, as a non-theistic Christian, the Spirit that will allow us to create a new and livable Christianity for the 21st Century and beyond will be found nowhere but in ourselves. I invite all comments should anyone have the great kindness to read any of my posts as I work towards trying to understand Christian Religion, particularly as a post-modern Episcopalian in new ways.

Jeffrey L. Shy
Mesa, Arizona