Honored in the Absence -Christian use of Scripture

The whole religious climate in this country is getting very depressing and dangerous.  We have a very strong Christian religious fanatical element. We have a strong Roman Catholic tradition that has lots of rigid and dogmatic positions. The Pope seems to be trying to bring the "ship" around a bit, but that is slow. We have a growing faithful Muslim community and some rabid fundamentalist Muslims as well.  The Muslim fundamentalists have a lot of mixed motives and reasons for their attacks upon the West.

Today while sitting in a worship service, the name of William Stringfellow came back to me.  William Stringfellow was an American lay theologian. He was a Harvard educated lawyer. He was  a civil rights activist.  Stringfellow was convinced at Baptism one entered one into a lifelong struggle against the "powers and principalities" of systematic evils. This is what the New Testament calls the powers of death.   This is larger and more devious than individual sins. This is the power and authority that institutions, government. international corporations, and even church denominations. From his convictions Stringfellow insisted on the primacy of the Bible for Christians.

I remember reading of one of his experiences. It seems he was working in Harlem with Dorothy Day. He was working out of a church that had a swimming pool. It was one of the few swimming pools in the neighborhood.  In order to be able to use the swimming pool, youth had to come to Sunday School. Stringfellow was asked to teach the class of high school youths. He tried to follow the church literature for a while, but it was so deadly. He decided that he would resort to Scripture. Every Sunday morning he would simply read them the book of Romans.  The students just sat there and looked bored.  But every Sunday morning he would re-read the book of Romans. Finally after six or seven weeks some of the students began to ask him questions about the book and about the message. He had some significant life changing experiences with those young people.

Almost every Christian Church I know talks about the primacy of Scripture, but you really have to wonder what that means.  So many of the places I visit have an hour or more of worship service, but there is no more than two or three minutes of attention give to the "hearing of the Word."  There are worship services where they read two or three passages of Scripture, but the person who is reading the scriptures does it so poorly that no one can hear the words.  Of course, there are services of worship where the scriptures are so mistreated. They are not even given serious intellectual examination. Poetry is taken as history.  History stories are taken as prophecy.  Events in the Old Testament are supposed to be predictive of events in the 21st century. Symbolism is taken literally.
Cultural traditions are made into divine commandments.  As so often is said one can make the scriptures support anything you want.

The Bible is a collection of reports, conversations, witnesses, personal testimonies, poetry, songs, and memories about God and what he has done in the lives of those people.  We are invited to join in that conversation. It obviously suggests that God may be active in our history in our lives in unique and unexpected ways, but the ways and the circumstances of the past are not the divine requirements.  If God enables Samson to kill lions with a jaw bone of an ass, does not mean that his disciples now ought to all carry jaw bones for protection. It may suggest that God will equip his servant with the items she needs when confronting danger, but it is not always a jaw bone.

For the Christian religion, and Presbyterians are Reformed and one of our mottoes is "Sola Scriptura" to be so dogmatic about the Bible and then to spend so little time on honest serious study and discussion of it,  denies its own affirmations about the role of scripture in their thinking.

So Lucky - So Blessed -So Thankful

I do not claim to be a very gifted or unique person. In fact, there have been personnel committees that thought I should be Richard Bland.  I have never been the "hare" and jumped and rushed off to do stuff. In my positions in work and hobby I have generally preferred to be part of the arrangement and management team rather than on the speaker's platform.  I recognize that is strange for one who was a preacher for 40 years.  The sermons were probably more serious reflections than emotional stem winders. But I was also never willing to refrain from taking a stand on important issues. An Open Letter to Anita Bryant, Letter of support in the paper for McGovern, opposition to the Vietnam War and campaigning against the war in Iraq.  Of course the reaction of my congregations were mixed depending on their view.  I do know that members of churches do not mind if you mix religion and politics together as long as you are on their side.  My persistence in following a decision has generally meant my term of service on community agencies has been one term. When the agency went through the process of developing a five year plan, I would ask each meeting how that plan was being worked. Of course, nobody really wanted to work the plan, it was only to fulfill the by laws to have one.

Still as I enjoy my retirement, I have to confess that I have been very blessed. My father died of a heart attack watching Ed Sullivan one of his favorite TV program. My mother's death was a bit more difficult as she had liver cancer and had to have hospice care. But my children are both grown and responsible adults. One has married and has two children, a boy and a girl.  We have had our share of medical issues, but they have not impacted our lives the way so many others have suffered. Some car wrecks but no one was injured in any of them. I have not been unemployed as long as I wanted to work.  I look around and listen and hear so many tragic stories, so many people with flooded homes, so many people with lost limbs, so many college students without jobs and high debt.  The dark side of life has invaded so many people, drug addictions, long term cancer, drive by shootings. I have not been forced to experience any of that.

I remember a woman once was quoted that sometimes you look around and you suddenly feel so thankful and grateful for all that has been in your life and in your experiences and you feel you ought to say thank you, thank you, thank you to someone or to something.  That is why we have Thanksgiving.  To say thank you to the One who created the world, who created life, and who has given you life and allowed you to have such a long and gracious life. Thanks be Unto God who gives us the gifts.

I Did It My Way

I DID IT MY WAY!

Frank Sinatra may have made a fortune singing that song among others, but it seems to me that that idea has become the greatest obstacle to our common life together. 

It appears to me that more and more of us are rejecting the mega narratives and living in our own narrow personal narratives.  What I have in mind is  best suggested by the story of the mother who complained to the school board that the Social Study teacher was infringing on her daughter’s religious faith by just teaching the history and tenets of the Muslim faith.  The “in coming” freshmen at a college refusing to read the assigned book because they did not agree with the author’s purpose. The Clerk of Court refusing to issue marriage licenses to all people because she felt that giving licenses for homosexual marriages was contrary to her religious faith.  The refusal of people to accept as fact the information from authoritative figures. For example, the refusal of leaders to accept the reality of climate change.

People have become more and more separated from the common narrative. The dramatic rise in the number of home schooling children and the ever growing number of religious and charter schools means that parents now can pick the education they desire.  The parent who does not want her child to know about the history of this country with Native Americans can pick a school that “white washes” American history.  The family who does not want their daughter to read Slaughter House Five will go to the school board and get her child exempted from that assignment. 

The multiplication of news sites adds to this problem as we can now pick the news media that gives us the facts that fit our assumptions rather than the media that gives us facts that challenge what we know.  There seems to be very few media outlets now that we tell you both sides of the facts.  One source will repeatedly tell you that the economy is horrible, as it is in certain locations and for certain kinds of skills that have become obsolete because of robots and technology, and another will tell you that the stock market is at an all time high and unemployment is at record lows. 

We pick the information and the source we like and refuse even to hear or listen to other information.  There does not appear to be mutually accepted authorities on the major questions of society.  The collapse of “universals” that all of society accepts as a starting point seems to have become total.  The poet wrote, “things fall apart, the center cannot hold, mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.”  The recent election present a very clear example of each side picking the facts and reality that want to hear and not hearing anything the other side was saying.

not the most important?

MAYBE NOT THE MOST IMPORTANT ?
I am not a history scholar enough to know whether or not the coming election in 
the United States of America is the most important election in history, but I think the United States stands at an incredible turning point.

For a very long time the United States has had this vision of itself. It has passed along the self-image of a country that was a Christian nation, a nation that was blessed because it was elected by God as a Christian people. It has added to that image the supporting myth that it was a country blessed because it was lead by wise white male leaders. The founding fathers were all wise white men. The country was built by the wisdom and business acumen of white people. The country perpetuated the notion of its virtue and innocence by keeping out of its textbooks the crimes against Native Americans, the crimes of exploitation of South America, and the middle east oil. This was a magnificent country with a self image of white power and privilege that had accomplished its economic prosperity with the blessing of God.


The current election may be the last great battle to hold on to that crumbling image. The image is crumbling. The cracks in the image are beginning to open to wide to hold together. The old myth of our white power and privilege is under attack by a rising number of forces. The growing number of legal people of Hispanic ancestry. The report is that more than half of the children born in California are of Hispanic heritage. The number of Latin American legal and illegal immigrants may be tapering off but their presence must be acknowledge. The visibility and demand for equal treatment as a religion by the Muslims means that we can no longer pretend that all of our citizens are Christians. The separation of church and state means that government and society have to acknowledge the Muslims have as many rights as the Christians. 

The Christian unity is being slowly weakened by the rise in the number of “nones” and the decline in the power of the main line Christian Church. The rise of the harsh religious conservatives is a response to the fear of losing Christians dominance in the culture and they are struggling to maintain the myth. The white power institution may be trying to maintain its grip on the power by the police’s attempt to keep blacks in their place by shooting many. Black lives matter is the refusal to continue to allow white privilege to go unchallenged. Women are beginning to speak up and demand equal pay for equal work. The impact of ever changing technology that puts many out of work is changing the way we work. The demand for a higher minimum wage is a response to the widening gap in wealth that pays “old white men” way more than they are worth. If those CEO are so wonderful why do we keep having to bale out the saving and loan industry, the real estate industry, the auto industry, the banking industry?

The Old White Male dominated Christian image of ourselves is being attacked and Donald Trump is running as the great defender of that old image. His appeal is to those who fear the coming of a new USA. Those who have lost their jobs in the new economy want to go back to the old way. The Christian right is supporting the immoral Donald because he offers them their continue place at the top of the power structure. Donald Trump is the last great white hope. Unfortunately Hillary Clinton has been a part of the working of the old power structure for so long that she has a hard time being the champion of the new world that is coming. She speaks on behalf of that new vision, but her long career as part of the old power elite makes many new voters a little less enthusiastic about her. If Donald Trump wins, the revolution will continue in the street. 

Shafted again by their own government

THE GREAT DIVIDE

There is nothing that illustrates the great divide between the wishes, the hopes, the
passions, the compassion of the American public and the members of Congress more than the current sad treatment of the military veterans.

The citizens, the average person, the people in the street care deeply about the veterans. They have and continue to respond to the great number of programs and charities that have sprung up to support our veterans. So many companies have created programs where the purchase of their product means that the company will make some donation to a veterans’ cause. The Wound Warrior charity gathered in large donations which unfortunately did not get to the veterans, but still demonstrated the public’s great desire to help.

The public has great sympathy and compassion for these veterans because they understand that our government has sent them over and over into some terrible situations that should have never been begun. These veterans were asked to begin a war. Something no other veterans in our history have done. These veterans were sent into a war that should never have been started by us. But they have gone and done their duty to their commanders. They have sacrificed lives, body parts, and emotions. The public recognizes the great debt we owe to these men and women.

Yet over the last eight years the House and the Senate have repeatedly refused to pass legislature that gave better benefits to these veterans. When veteran hospitals and medical services are so backed up that three months waiting lists are normal, when more veterans are coming home with physical disabilities and emotional needs, when the job market is complicated at home, the House and the Senate have five times failed to help veterans.
In 2015 when the Veterans Affairs Funding was presented in the Obama budget, the House Appropriation Subcommittee removed more than $1.4 billion dollars in veteran services. Included in those cuts were $690 million earmarked for direct VA medical care and another $582 million in VA construction projects. The results of those cuts were that that approximately 70,00 fewer veterans were able to receive needed care.

In 2014 there came forward a very personal and emotional bill called the Women Veteran and Families Health Services Act that was a bipartisan bill to provide fertility treatment and counseling for severely wounded veterans and the spouses. This bill never made it out of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee because Republicans wanted amendments that prevented the involvement of Planned Parenthood.

In the same year, 2014 Senator Bernie Sanders introduced Veterans Health and Benefits and Military Retirement Pay Restoration Act. This was sweeping overhaul of health care and education benefits. The Senate gave it a 99-0 procedural vote approval, but Senator Mitch McConnell attached all kinds of sanctions against Iran and the debate over the amendments resulted in an expanded debate over cost of the benefits and 41 of the 45 Republican Senators voted against the bill.

The refusal to vote for and give the veterans the increased benefits they deserve has a long history. Republicans in the Senate refused to approve a Veterans Job Corps Act in 2012 and Senator McConnell killed a Homeless Women Veterans and Homeless Veterans with Children Act in 2010 because they did not like the cost. But they could turn around and voted for increase military spending in the same session. This is a nation that cares and wants to take care of our veterans. Apparently this Senate does not. We need a new Senate.

ANNUAL REVIEW
Most of the “terms of call” for Presbyterian ministers, I do not know how it goes in
other denominations, contains wording that suggest that there should be an annual review of the performance of the minister.

It is an idea that has great potential. It is an aspect of employment that many others in lots of other fields of work experience. Teachers are “observed” by other teachers and principals. Sales people have annual reviews. Other corporations have procedures that bring people in for an annual review of how their work has been. There are precise standards for these evaluations in some places. In other places it is much more subjective and difficult to evaluate the quality of the work being done.

I think that the profession of ministry is a very difficult profession to evaluate. By what standard do you judge the work of the minister? Is your model of how the minister ought to perform taken from the television preachers you have seen? Is the model by which one judges the minister one of the tall steeple preachers in the area? Maybe the committee is made up of people who want the minister to focus of the works like Mother Teresa or the Rev. Jesse Jackson, be a social activist? Maybe there are some who ask, “What would Jesus do?”

What are the bullet points that the committee needs to consider? George Buttrick, an outstanding minister in New York City in the 40’s and 50”s said that there are two things a minister ought to focus on: Calling on members and visitors, and Preaching. But even those must be dissected. Calling - how often? One a month on all members? One a quarter? Maybe all members once a year and when crisis comes? And there are deeper questions. What should happen in those calls? Should there be an agenda? I once heard of a minister who went with questions: Do you all prayer together every night? How is your habit of scripture reading? Do you find your place of work being a place where you feel comfortable sharing grace with others? How can the church help your spiritual life to grow? Other ministers just make it a social call unless the member has a question. Hospital and nursing home visits? How often? Every day?

Preaching - now there is a real sticky wicket. How do you evaluate the quality of the preaching? Is the work of preaching to comfort or challenge? Is the job to give answers or raise questions. Dogmatic or “Faith in search of understanding?” Does the preacher speak the politics of the kingdom of God or the politics of the USA? Is the preacher enable the members to leave satisfied or to leave a bit agitated? Is preaching a Bible study experience where most of the time is spent in telling the Bible story or is it to relate the Bible to contemporary society? How long should that sermon be? Does the preacher keep to the time limits? Does he read from a text or “preach from the heart?”

From my forty years of ministry, I have had a number of “annual reviews”. Some with just one member of the session. Some with a committee. Some with a job description given in January and used in December to see how it was accomplished. From those forty years, I do not think I had very many reviews that I thought were very helpful. Most of the time I thought they were too kind or indifferent. There was a “proforma” feeling about them. Let’s get this over.
How do you think a minister ought to be evaluated?

FATHER'S DAY OBSERVATION

     For forty years I had the pleasure of being a pastor in a congregation. Every May we had a recognition of Mother's Day.  Over the course of those forty years there grew up a real divide.  There was the focus at the beginning on giving thanks for the mother you had.  Everybody had a mother and everybody could participate. (This ignored the whole question of those whose mothers were cruel, abandoned or somehow unworthy of gratitude)  But everybody had a mother, and so Mother's Day was a day in which all people could participate.

     Slowly there came the equal focus in many services to recognize all those who were mothers. If you had had children you were singled out, lifted up and recognized.  This became a moment of pain and sorrow for all the women who had not had a child. For many of the single women who had not had a child were excluded.  All the barren wives were excluded. All the men were excluded. It'd was a moment when all those who were mothers were recognized and a moment that gave pain and sorrow to many of the women who had never had a child.

     In my own comments, I attempted to focus only on the fact that we all had mothers and were were, on this day, recognizing and giving thanks for the mothers we had. But that did not stop the officers, deacons and the ushers from giving flowers only to those who were mothers. Another slight to those who had not had children.

     When it came to June and we had Fathers's Day, the focus was on recognizing and honoring the feathers that we had. We were, again, all able to participate because we all have a father (again ignoring the fact that many fathers had refused to be named on the birth certificate, had walked out on the family, had refused child support, or been surrogate sperm donor) The liturgy and the talk was about honoring your father.

     In my forty years of ministry, the day never developed the movement to recognize all those who were dads and to have the men who were fathers stand and be recognized.  I have not heard of any young man complaining about being left out or ignored on Father's day because they have not become a father.

     I have been retired now for over eight years so there may have been changing in the way Father's day is now celebrated and recognized, but I always thought it was interesting how the two celebrations were described.

Old Time Religion

It makes me very sad to see what has happened to so much of what is being called The Christian Faith.  No wonder there are so many who are deciding that they would rather have "none" than be associated with Christianity.  The theology of Glory, the triumphal theology, the theology of domination, the theology of the promise of victory and blessing, has seemed to capture the moment in many congregations.

But for me, just give me the "Old Time Religion" of the New Testament Early Christian church, the church that was underground, meeting in people's homes,  putting all their resources into a pot and sharing what they had with each other. The early Christian church that did not have any power with political figures, the early church that was able to live and to wrestle with the questions about what to do with the other religions in the neighborhood.  Can we eat the meat that was sacrificed to Zeus? The "old time religion" that attracted people by the way they loved each other.  They were not in a position to try to force the way they lived on other people. That did not happen until the 4th century AD. The old time religion that did not have vast physical empires with gyms, day cares, classes on yoga, financial seminars, that did not have to try to raise millions to pay off buildings that are named for wealth donors.

The old time religion that was speaking about a new kingdom of God that had come into the world and was an alternative to the life and culture that surrounded them. Now the preaching seems to be how can we help our members live more successful and fulfill the American dream of prosperity and leisure.  I understand we will not be able to go back to that old time religion of the New Testament early church but as a goal, as a vision, as a marker towards which we might look, it is better than what so many are preaching.

It is the little things

Jesus said that those who were invited into the Kingdom had done the little things: glass of water, a visit to the nursing home, a shirt for a naked person, a cane for the cripple, the small acts of dignity that recognize the common humanity of each person.

I think I am tempted to forget that, but I have to confess that there are posts on social media that remind me of the power of the little things. The story of a woman who paid for the groceries of another woman who had Food Stamps and was abused by another woman in line. The story of the stewardess who was grabbed and demanded by a white woman that she would not sit next to an African American. The stewardess went found another seat and came back and invited the African American to come with her, that he did not have to stay seated next to that bigot. The post of the three year old boy walking the dog who walked past a nice large puddle. The boy got about three steps beyond the puddle and then reconsidered. He carefully put down the lease, turned walked back to the puddle, jumped into the puddle two or three times and then came back slowly, picked up the lease and walked on with the dog calmly waiting while the boy did the jumping.  A little moment of joy grabbed by the little boy. The story of some teenage boys all getting their head shaved so that their friend with cancer getting chemo would not look strange.  The young girl wearing the traditional head dress of the Muslims in order to show support for the young Muslim girl in her class.

You can add your own stories, but grace does not come very often in large measures. It slips in on the little things that we do to recognize and rejoice in our common humanity and our common dignity.  It is the little things that are not required, that we do because we care not because we have to, but because it feels good to do and it gives respect to others. But be very careful, it is not always easy even to do the little things. There can be some very negative responses and attack from others for even the little things. Ah, but nothing can take away the great joy and fellowship that is birthed in doing those little things.

Still blind to the others

I have just come home from the Festival of Homiletics in Atlanta. I always find them very enjoyable. It is a chance to hear nationally known preachers and to be inspired by the magnificent power of five or six hundred males and a couple of hundred females who are all eager to sign the hymns. What a moving power.


But one of the nagging questions that remains is what do we say to the world about all those who claim the same Bible, but who use it differently?  One of the presenters made a marvelous case for the current crisis in our mainline churches and culture is the competition of different narrative stories that explain life and the Biblical ignorance of the church so that it cannot present its story in a powerful and effective way.


I have no problem with that analysis of the situation. What I find disappointing is that he did not recognize and talk about that one of the competing stories is another version of the Christian faith that claims to be the answer.   The Christian narrative that he was promoting, and which I find myself in agreement with, is that God's love in Jesus calls us to seek to redeem and to minister to those who are ignored, abused and exploited by the world.  This narrative invites in all people, includes all people, and desires to free people from all of the things that keep them in bondage. That includes the wealthy and those who desperately want to be wealthy called to be free from the power of that wealth.


That there is another narrative that claims to be Christian that is much more elitist. In that it desires to separate the good and the just, themselves, from those they believe to be sinners: those on welfare (lazy), those who take certain drugs (but not the drugs they take), those who love different people than they love (gays and lesbians), those who make decisions that are contrary to their decisions (like abortion) those who believe that power and might are evil (gun control, less military spending).  There is a narrative of the Christian story that claims that God's will for all people is that they become wealthy and blessed with great material blessings forgetting that there are many more definitions of blessings that the American way of life.


What troubled me was that no one at the conference ever acknowledge that what was being preached here had to contend with the other stories that also claim the name of Christian. Nor did they talk about how to respond to that challenge or to separate the narrative of the Christian faith from the other narratives.

Dr. King's Memory

January 18th will be another Martin Luther King Day celebration.  The work and dreams of Dr. King are an important part of our American struggle towards justice and equality for all citizens. Dr. King lead an incredible battle for the right to vote. Dr. King under girded that battle with the strategy of non-violence. He opposed the war in Vietnam because he could not justify telling young black men to go fight, shoot, bomb, kill in Asia and then tell them to be non-violent in New York, Chicago or Atlanta. The struggle for justice, equality and dignity took Dr. King into a number of different areas at the time. The major fight was for the voter right bill, but He soon was involved in anti-war movement and in labor negotiations. The Memphis sanitation strikes were about wages and working conditions.

Dr. King was a passionate leader and battled until his death. If we are going to gather and remember and pay tribute to his memory, that memory must energize us as it has not in several years to resume the battles that he fought.  There has been a major assault on the voting rights of minorities, students, seniors and the poor. The redistricting of states has resulted in districts that are heavily in favor of one  party over the other. Voter ID requirements, shorting the early voting time, eliminating Sunday voting, and a host of other restrictions have been adopted to prevent voting by people who do not vote Republican.

Dr. King lead marching for wages in Memphis and the struggle for better wages has got to be resumed as the minimum wage has not been increased at the Federal level in decades. Equal pay for equal work has got to be an agenda item if we are to be for equality of all people.  The tax reforms implemented by the Republicans do not stand the test of being fair or just to all segments of the economy.

It is of little benefit if all we do is go and remember what a courageous, bold, and dynamic man Dr. King was.  This year the celebrations of his life need to be the inspiration for us all to renew his battles and to get out into the politic arena and fight for the same things he fought for.

December note from Brother Biddle

It is always a pleasure to hear from Brother Biddle. Since we are both retired now, it is more like Christmas letters in Christmas cards and Easter greetings, but it is still good to hear from him.  He said he had had a knee replacement and cataract surgery was scheduled for February, but other than that and a few extra pounds he is in fine shape.

His first complaint was that East Burlap did not have a Starbuck shop. He said it must be the only town in America without one, but he had wanted to get one of those red cups they were selling. He wanted to show his support for red cups; said he liked red cups; said he did not know what was wrong with the color red.  In his view all that noise about red cups being "anti-Christmas" was silly. If you want to see a real war on Christmas you just need to go to any mall and look at all the materialism and commercialization of Christmas. That is the really war. Santa is the real enemy.

Retirement has its good side because it meant that he did not have to get involved in the great theological conflict at the East Burlap Protestant Parish.  It seems that the Bruce Jenner sex change had raised some interesting questions at the Parish.  Somebody wanted to know if Mary was bi-sexual as she had had relations with the Holy Spirit and with Joseph. Naturally that was refuted immediately and decisively. But that lead to the question of what kind of sex Jesus was?  Did he just have one Chromosome since he just had one human parent?  If you did a DNA test on Jesus would you find an X and Y chromosome?  The next step was to have some one wonder if Jesus was a gay man, but someone else said he was heterosexual as he spent a lot of time with prostitutes. That was an agreement that may have answered one problem, but created another.  Of course, the debates created a lot of heat at East Burlap, but little light, and Brother Biddle was glad he was not the one who had to shepherd the people through that.

A pastor's heart always bleeds when there is a great tragedy in a community where he serves. This year in East Burlap the whole community was saddened when a young father shot his three year old daughter on the day after Christmas.  The young father had gotten a gun, a pistol, as a Christmas present from his wife. He had always wanted one, but he had never had a gun before. He thought he would be able to protect his family better. The day after Christmas he was "playing" with it, fast drawing from the hip, and he drew and pulled the trigger and it killed his little girl. Turns out he did not even know how to load it, know how to check to see if it was loaded, and where the safety was. Brother Biddle said this gun culture in this country was one of its great sicknesses.

Having just celebrated the birth of Jesus and heard again the story of the Christ Child come to bring the Kingdom of God Brother Biddle is amazed how dogmatic and violent people who believe they are right can be. Why is there such a human compulsion to try to make everybody believe the same way? The Sunni and the Shiites, the Buddhists against the Moslems, the Moslems against the Christians, the Jews against the Moslems. anti-abortionists against the pro-choice, the zeal of the righteous is deadly, and Brother Biddle fell back on theology. We are not saved by being right but by the gift of grace.  It is always good to hear from Brother Biddle.

Two Different Job Descriptions for the Christian People

It seems to me that there are at least two very different ideas as to what Christians ought to be doing and how Churches ought to be conducting themselves. I think there are Christians and Churches that believe the work of the Church is to help Christian people make it through this world. The other way is for Christians and the Church to talk about a whole different society and to change this one.

The first group believes that the world is here and that Jesus and the faith are to help us live better, to be able to handle the stress and the challenges of this life better, to meet the needs of people as they try to live happily and successfully.  The program life of these churches focuses on those things that will make it easier for the Christian members to handle their problems.  They have child care programs. They have AA programs. They have yoga programs. They have sport programs for the member. They have financial planning program and estate planning programs.  The understanding is that Jesus came so that we might love each other and live better in this society. These church do have a lot of social service programs like can food for the needy, collections of clothing, even rent help.

One of the most obvious type of this church is the Prosperity Gospel which claims that God wants all of us to be successful, rich, happy and blessed. That with faith in God and the claiming of the promise that God has a blessing for you, that blessing will come and it will usually be in the form of a blessing that the world will recognize: a promotion, a bigger pay check, a new car, a lottery win, a new wife, health babies, or some other blessing that is a blessing as defined by the culture in which we live.

The other way of looking at the work of Christians and the Church is to speak the word that this world is not the kingdom of God. That Christ came to show us a new alternative, a different society, a whole other way of living. The Church is suppose, in this view, to be the yeast that is at work changing the world.  That Jesus offers us a new blue print of the world in the Beatitudes.  The work of the Church is to be witnesses to the different way in which life can be lived in faith. Mother Teresa creates a community of care for the untouchables. Nelson Mandela and Bishop Tutu show us what forgiveness can do. Dr. King lead the way of changing the racial restriction in our society. Pope France is calling for a new economic justice, calling for changes in the way we live to protect the environment and to distribute the resources of the world better.  These church do not want to help members succeed in the current culture but invites them to live in the new reality of the Kingdom of God and to be at work in struggle to change the culture.

One group of Christians sees the Church as an agent of helping members cope with the present work and even to help the needy to cope with the world as it is. They give food to the homeless. The other group of Christians sees the Church as an agent for the transformation of the world, calls its members to the adventure of the struggle against the powers of this world.  It asks the questions why are the homeless still homeless and how can be reality be changed.  One group say that the square peg sinners need to be sanded round to fit in the round holes of the society. The other group is convinced that when square peg sinners get sanded there is no limit to the shapes they may take and the round hole world needs to be radically redone.