Funny Baptism

enjoy:

Confessing Hitchens & Camus

Hitchens

Brian Lamb, from C-Span, interviewed Christopher Hitchens last night on the television program, Q&A. I generally watch this discussion every Sunday evening; I enjoy Mr. Lamb's demeanor, the personality of his interviews, and the fact that he does not practice, "gotcha journalism." 

Mr. Hitchens, of course, is the iconoclast journalist who usually succeeds in making everyone angry before the interview or article concludes. His latest book, God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, places him at the forefront -- along with Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris -- of the new atheism. 

Interestingly enough, Mr. Lamb did not get much into the book until Mr. Hitchens seemed to force the issue. Instead, the discussion was more about the author's life and his various biographical signposts, for example the reason he decided to become an American citizen, or his willingness to be "water-boarded" to see what it was like.

I have a confession to make. I love to read Christopher Hitchens' prose. His book, Love, Poverty And War, offer several examples of pure polemic writing that both infuriates and evokes steep admiration (jealousy?) in his ability to turn a phrase. The New York Times review said he "is happiest when he has an enemy, and least happiest when he is most content." I think this is true.

My favorite of his writings, the little book, Letters To A Young Contrarian, offer his advice to those who would swim against the stream and find their own way. This book shows us his way of seeing the world, a unique view, I think, and one worthy of our attention. Which means, even if you find yourself in total disagreement with Mr. Hitchen's ideas, he is a worthy adivsary and a joy to read.

Camus

Mr. Hitchens confesses as an influence  Albert Camus, one who also challenges and provokes our thoughts with prose that is both dense and heavy. Like many, my introduction to Camus came through his fiction, namely, The Stranger, and was followed later by his non-fiction work, especially, The Myth of Sisyphus.  What Hitchens and Camus' writings offer the Christian believer, besides a guide to excellent prose, is the distain for hypocrisy. If there is any distance between what we say and what we do, these authors can smell it, and they love nothing more than to expose it and exploit our failings. Said another way, we always learn more from our enemies than we do from our friends.

Holding Hands in Church

As in most urban settings, people with addiction and mental issues tend to gravitate toward the church. This is true for us because of our location, and it is true because so many with these challenges also live on poverty's edge. That is why I wasn't surprised when M. walked into our worship service yesterday. He's been here before. 

Actually, I have been working with him for five years or so, attempting to live-out the Gospel before him, while not seeking to overtly speak about church or Jesus, unless he brings it to the conversation. Instead, I have mostly offered to really listen to him the three or four times he visits each week, which means most of our conversations revolve around me encouraging him to stay on his meds, attend his meetings or respond to his requests for cash (which he always pays back). 

So, while I wasn't surprised when he came to church yesterday, I wasn't too excited either. You see, the thing about M. and worship is that he rarely stays for an entire service.  Most times, usually during the song-set, he will mosey out of the sanctuary, down the steps and out the door. Which is fine with me, my thinking being -- around here, you are allowed to rise to the level of your own involvement.

Well, yesterday, he walked up to me before the service and said, "Is it OK if I come to your church today?"

To which I replied, "What do you think?"

He grinned and said, "Yeah."

Since he had a twenty minute wait, I offered a seat, not really thinking he would even make the wait-time before the start. But, about five minutes before worship I saw he was still sitting there, so I tossed a prayer over the wall: "LORD, have someone sit by M.," and to my surprise, someone did. When I stood to share my Conversation with the TEXT I noticed that B., a very frail senior adult lady, had moved across the aisle from her seat with her family in order to sit with him. 

M. ended up staying for the service, and as B. left she said, "You know M. is a nice man, but he was so nervous I ended up holding his hand."

Work Of The People @ Yale

Steve Frost, from Work Of The People, made a presentation at Yale on the arts, the media, the liturgy and grace. This is must see. I use their work for many of our visuals and thirdspeople. 

TWOTP at Yale Divinity from The Work Of The People on Vimeo.

The Liturgy as Discipleship

What is increasingly a challenge in pastoral ministry is the crunch of time experienced by our parishioners, or what Alexander Schmemann calls the, "nightmarish alteration between rush and relaxation," and what Susan J. White, in her book The Spirit of Worship, describes as "a particular problem for those who are seeking to build integrated spiritual lives in the contemporary situation."

Think of the problem this way. At best, at least in our tradition, we have four hours each week to meet and to remind ourselves of the Christ event, and together, to shape ourselves into his followers.  Is this enough time? Well, of course, that depends on just what is happening in those four hours, and it also depends upon what is being practiced during the other 164 hours of the week as well.

THE LITURGICAL HOUR

MS. White's book is important in this regard, offering an overview of the Liturgical Tradition of Spirituality, by which is meant, "the primary source for the nourishment of the Christian spiritual life is to be found in the Church's public worship." 

She intends for us to understand that no matter what passes for liturgy (whether high or low), the proponents within the liturgical tradition assert that, "one receives the primary spiritual insight, strength, experience of the holy and nourishment for godly living," through the liturgy. This means that what really matters is "not how the liturgical tradition works, or what it means, but rather how it...sustains, influences, enriches, and enlivens the relationship between the Christian believer and God."

To this end she outlines how the liturgy offers spiritual resources in at least six ways:

• a language for prayer and meditation -- the liturgy teaches prayer
• a pattern for the spiritual disciplines --  various forms of devotional exercises are expressed in the liturgy
• an arena for an encounter with God -- the liturgy offers a context in which to encounter the Holy
• signs, symbols and rituals by which to express the relationship with God -- the liturgy offers the primary speech about our complex  relationship with God
• a model for the Christian life and community -- the liturgy shapes how we are to relate to each other and the wider community
• strength in the time of spiritual crisis -- the liturgy is a source of spiritual sustenance in times of temptation, trial and torment

The point here is that we must deepen our investment in the liturgical moment. We must offer the liturgy with a clear understanding of just what is at stake when we gather in ritual performance.  And, we must see that the metaphor of the liturgy speaks volumes to those expressing and experiencing the movements and cadence of those sacred, shared meanings.

Saturday's Gift

All The Things You Are - Art Tatum

Food for Thought

Those of us involved in direct church ministry (feet on the ground as opposed to thoughts from the tower) realize the almost constant movement of those in need to our doors. And now, what with the serious economic crash, the resources of most churches are being severely stretched by the very real needs of those coming to us who want for the most basic survival necessities.  

PBS's Religion & Ethics host, Bob Abernethy, featured this important issue on March 27 of this year (go here).  Recently, Jane Raphael, our Church & Community Director made this appeal to thirdspeople:

I would be interested in any thoughts, experiences, insights of others who are seeing this same troubling trend.

Pagan Christianity

Frank Viola and George Barna collaborated on a book in 2008 entitled Pagan Christianity, and it may mark the final nail in the coffin of a deconstructed Christendom.

Essentially, the book recites in detail how the church developed historically, and how its structures and actions and hierarchy were surreptitiously co-opted from a New Testament presentation by an add mixture of pagan thought and ritual, and therefore all we now do as church is by their account, not at all "by the book." 

It is clear Mr. Viola welcomes the demise of Christendom, hoping, it seems, that in its death rattle we will somehow hear the sound of an unspoiled church rolling toward us, something as pristine as the New Testament model. One wonders if he sees the irony in making money by selling books to the churches and people he hopes will soon go into the tank, but that is not said to diminish his argument, this is still America, after all. 

In fact, I have often argued in this blog that the death of Christendom is imminent (go here and here).  And, as I say in the description of this blog: "we who are saying grace at the graveside of Christendom must give an account to the future. we must tell the story of these days of loss and transition, and we must get out of the way of those who will take us to the next church." 

The difference between us is quite clear, however. Besides being much smarter than I, Mr. Viola has no vested interest in the survival of Christendom (other than selling books) -- having left it long ago, while I am still paid by Christendom. So, like all good revolutionaries, he can strike the match that begins the fire, but I am here holding a squirt gun in a match factory. We all have our roles in this drama.

To be sure, the church of tomorrow will hardly resemble the church we see today. (For an excellent description of this transition see The Great Emergence by Phyllis Tickle.) But, what also is without doubt is the truth that the church now emerging to replace Pagan Christendom will merely be a station on the way to church next. And what will also be true -- though I'm neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet -- is that church next will not be some fundamentalist wet dream of an unspoiled Christian community. The wheel is still spinning very quickly indeed. 

Said another way, to ask, "What would Jesus think?" as if the problem in the church is merely wrong thinking, truly misses the basic understanding of the desperation of the hour. Simplicity and statistical analysis will not cut it. Neither will house churches or foundational theology, not when we are so marginalized sociologically and not when our ideas and doctrines are hollowed out with age and senility.

Saturday's Gift

a little traveling music for saturday...

Leap Frog - Dizzy Gillespie

Pastors Meeting

Once a month I am fortunate enough to meet with three other like-minded pastors. I drive about 40 minutes to meet with them; it is well worth the trip.

As you might expect, I find these two hours a month to be of profound importance in my life. It's a time a letting loose, really, of not being "on." Sometimes we meet and commiserate about the state of the church, and about the challenge of pastoral ministry today. Sometimes we share difficult problems we face in pastoral care. And very often our conversation turns to laughter (sometimes irreverent) and ribbing. But almost always we eventually make it around to asking, "What books are you reading?" and, "What authors do you recommend?" and, "What speakers have you heard." 

I share this as a word of testimony and a word of gratitude. I am thankful for these men. I am a better pastor for knowing them.