A BETTER BLEND

R. G. Robins writes in his introduction to his book Pentecostalism in America "I struggle into an uptown high church and watch milquetoast frissons ripple through the congregants as their choir downshifts into some honkified spiritual, and I think back to Brother Elmer shouting like a turbo-charge whirling dervish and Sister Trixie, head snapping like a whip, unleashing a staccato stream of other tongues while Sister Vivien torched the piano and Brother Cooper, on the nights he wasn't backslidden, flayed the drums and while my own preacher-man daddy split nifty rifts off his Gretch Signature guitar, with Sister Shirley all the while belting out the gospel blues like some soulful Holy Ghost Loretta Lynn, ..."

What he makes me remember is just how little emotion there is in the average Protestant worship services that I am familiar with. The Presbyterian have been called the "Frozen Chosen" and Robins' description of his Pentecostal worship service gives me a pretty good idea of how far apart the two traditions really are. I could not get our choir director even to use a high school church member who was a great drummer to come in and add a beat to all our hymns.

The human being is a combination of body, mind, soul, heart, spirit, and passion. All of us enjoy different combinations of those elements. It would seem to me that the tradition I had needs a lot more passion and emotions in it and the Pentecostal tradition could benefit from a little more mind. Robins does write that the Pentecostal history is marked by divisions and conflicts over doctrinal and theological positions which suggests the expressions of the holy in words (the mind) matter to them as well.

But it is sad that we could not let it rip once in a while, feel a little passion and emotion in our response to the amazing mystery of life and the gratitude we have for all that we have that we don't deserve. Damn, life can be so good. Damn, life can be so horrendous. We ought to feel it as well as think it. That would be a better blend.

Another crack in an old cliche

It was not the biggest nor the most explosive story in the news lately, but it seems to have a little staying power. It is the story about Judge Clarence Thomas' wife leaving a voice message on the phone of Anita Hill. As I have read the story Judge Thomas' wife called and suggested that Anita Hill might apologize to her husband for the testimony that she gave in the confirmation hearing for the Judge. Now that was 19 years ago. I don't know about other people but I have forgotten a lot of things that happened to me 19 years ago. I did witness the hearings and remember the event, but I had not thought about it recently. I worry a lot more about Judge Thomas' conservative voting record than the events of that hearing.

What this phone call tells me is that the little poem people told me when I was young and other children were calling me names is a lie. "Sticks and stones can break your bones, but words can never hurt you." Try telling that to Judge Thomas and his wife. Apparently the pain is still pretty raw and pretty real. Of course, we have had a number of recent events which demonstrated the error of that poem: the teenage suicides of young people bullied on social media; financial ruin for lots of people lied to by crooks.

The book of Proverbs is said to be a collection of wisdom in compact form. It was used as a text book for leadership. It has some advice about a "soft word turneth away wrath". But the common lore poem about "sticks and stones" is just not true and we ought not to tell it to our children. It would be better to acknowledge the pain that words cause. I think Jesus says something about letting our Yes be Yes and our No's No. James talks about the weapon of the tongue. The words we say can be very dangerous; inflict great harm, and do lasting damage. Just ask Ginnie Thomas.

No Center

For about eight years we lived in Houston,Texas. It has the honor of being the birth place of both of my sons. It gave me a brief insight into the mind and spirit of Texas people. It is where I learned that the South Houston School System purschased student insurance on the football players because they were the only athletes in the school. So I learned about the reality of football. The coach of the University of Texas was quoted one time as saying, "The University of Texas football team has three quarterbacks this year, which means that we don't have any quarterbacks." The fact that none of them was superior to the rest and therefore had established himself is "the quarterback" meant that the coach believed his team lacked leadership.

That experience flashed back when I got the October 19Th Christian Century magazine. On the cover was the big block letter announcement that inside were "The Best Theology Books of the past 25 years." On the inside one discovered that they had put the question of "the 5 essential theological books in the last 25 years" to 8 different scholars and ended up with 40 different titles. Only three appeared on more than one list. The message I get from that survey is that there were no clearly pivotal theological works in the last 25 years. That there may have been lots of nice, thoughtful, well researched works by able scholars, but there were no seminal or dominating works of theology that marked the last 25 years. Every body is doing what is right in their own eyes. While each author is producing something interesting, there is no center, no consensus on the essential theological works. If three quarterbacks mean no quarterback, forty suggested books for the five essential books means there were no essential books.

Perhaps all these diverse works may be the plowing of the landscape so that the ground is fertile for the next great work of theology that is to come.

Did Not Know.

Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned and I did not even know it. I did not even feel guilty doing it. I did not even know it was mentioned in the Scriptures. My friend had some physical pains and problems that necessitated that he stop playing squash and riding horses so he looked around for something to do while he recovered. He went to a couple of the Yoga sessions at the YMCA and enjoyed them and invited me to come and join him. So, for fellowship with him and for the physical benefits of stretching, I went to yoga sessions for about three months.

Now the President of Southern Baptist Seminary in Louisville, Ky. has come out and announced that Yoga is a religious discipline of the spirit and mind that is contrary to the Word of God. Yoga is not a "fit activity" for Christian people. Yoga has its origin in a spiritual discipline that sees the body as a channel and means by which the Spirit comes into the human person. Albert Mohler says that Christians do not accept the physical body as a vehicle for reaching consciousness with the divine. Turns out that even Pat Robertson has decided that aspects of Yoga are "really spooky" and ought to be avoided by real Christians.

And there I was doing it and did not even know I was sinning against the Holy. I was one of those who was not aware and failed to see the contradictions between my Christian faith and the participation in the exercises of Yoga. Why even devout Muslims in Egypt, Malaysia and Indonesia have banned Yoga from their faithful. Yoga has to be a lot more wicked than I could even imagine.

How can it be possible that "the body" as a vehicle for reaching consciousness with the divine" is not a Christian concept? If it is not the body how in the world does Communion work? If it is not the body that is part of the obtaining consciousness with God what are all those monk and nuns doing with fasting, and praying on their knees? Wasn't this one of those ancient councils debate about whether or not Jesus had a real body?

I don't know about Yoga, I just did it to get a thirty minute session of stretching my muscles, and I did not know I was a heretic, but if my body is not part of me and does not help me in my awareness and response to the Holy, then maybe it does not matter what I do with my body. Maybe drinking, smoking, dancing all those things that were once forbidden by Southern Baptists might now be permitted. Gosh, that would be a holy miracle.