non-metaphysical stephen

Back in August I wrote some observations and concerns about Ezra’s decree that the people of Israel put away their foreign wives.

Today, while working on a book review, I read an article about that same passage and how it relates to modern African-American readers. The article, “Reflections in an Interethnic/racial Era on Interethnic/racial Marriage in Ezra” by Cheryl B. Anderson, outlines the ways in which the text claims to be about religious purity but in fact promotes cultural divisions along racial, class and gender lines.

Anderson states that Ezra’s emphasis on genealogical purity is actually more severe than earlier Hebrew restrictions on group membership, since earlier texts focused on ritual and/or moral purity, both of which are more amenable than Ezra’s position towards the inclusion of non-Hebrews. Anderson also argues that the decree exacerbated class differences, many of which come to a crisis during the time of Nehemiah. Similarly, she notes the asymmetry of the divorce ban–it affects wives more than husbands; Anderson connects this problem with a more widespread use of “women as Other” throughout the scriptures.

It’s nice to see that I wasn’t off track in my concerns about the implications of the text.

At the same time, Anderson demonstrates the parallels between Ezra’s decree and the anti-miscegenation laws in the United States, many of which were defended by theological arguments that deflected attention from the racial, class and gender problems that accompanied them. Thus, she claims, black readers have good reason to identify more with the divorced wives than with Ezra and his followers. If this is so, then modern readings of the texts need to pay attention to these issues lest they reinscribe the problems we have tried so hard to overcome.

My dad recently noticed that one of the Christmas albums we listen to every year has a bit of a “mixed-message” (his term–and what an understatement!). One of the lyrics goes:

Let us thank the Lord above that Santa Claus is coming tonight!

?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

As one of my online colleagues put it, non-believers have taken the holiday and made it fit their own purposes. I guess the real war on Christmas comes not from the Jews and Muslims and Pagans who have different festivals altogether, but from the semi-faithful who prefer their American commercialist traditions over the penitential season developed by the Church over centuries.

I’ve said it for years now: Save Christ from Christmas!

…I found Christ and left the GOP: because they lack charity.

And if we have not charity….

Promises, Promises | Christianity Today

I’ve known about The Political Illusion but didn’t know much about what he says in it until it showed up in my Google Search results a few days back. Tonight I found this discussion of the book from Christianity Today, a magazine I generally have very little in common with other than being a Christian and living “today.” (The article is by Chuck Colson, with whom I also have very little in common. The fact that he wrote this piece almost makes me suspicious of how he’s using Ellul, who had some harsh things to say about conservative Christians.)

From the article, it seems that Ellul focuses on the problem of relying on government for everything. Although I’m critical of all the accusations of socialism (mostly because I feel that the free market is screwing people over and that something needs to change), I recognize that we can’t simply turn everything over to the government. This idea is one I’ve believed for a while, but I must admit that I’ve been reluctant to give any credence to the paranoiacs on the right.

I’m trying to keep my critical distance with all the policy debates going on, and hearing this idea from someone I trust intellectually (Ellul) helps. The church needs to take a stand for human rights, needs to stand up for the people who are getting squeezed by the capitalist system. But how to do this without simply leaving everything up to the government.

I’m convinced that an unregulated free market will continue to be a bad thing. But I don’t want the theocrats getting into office either. So what’s the option for the church to follow that can set an example of how to fix the system without relying more and more on the government?

Here’s the message I wish I could get across to all the conservative folks who try to use Christianity to explain their political policies:

1. Do you follow the Constitution or the Bible?
2. Do you trust in the Founding Fathers or in Jesus?
3. Do you serve the USA or the Realm of God?
4. Are you a citizen or a priest?

You can’t serve two masters. It’s time to pick one.

That’d be my billboard. What’d be on yours?

And I say, Right on, Brother Frank!

Far-Right Evangelicals And The Campaign Against Obama

Above all, ordinary Americans—and especially religious people who seek faith rather than power—need to understand that the evangelical right is basically unpatriotic and anti-American.

As I have said before, the Religious Right has turned the nation into an idol and now worships the scriptures of The Constitution and The Wealth of Nations. So I’d say they’re also un-Christian….

May God deliver us from all who advocate nationalism in place of the humility and charity of Christ. Amen!

Are you effing kidding me????

The American Patriot’s Bible

Here’s the publisher’s description:

THE ONE BIBLE THAT SHOWS HOW ‘A LIGHT FROM ABOVE’ SHAPED OUR NATION. Never has a version of the Bible targeted the spiritual needs of those who love our country more than The American Patriot’s Bible. This extremely unique Bible shows how the history of the United States connects the people and events of the Bible to our lives in a modern world. The story of the United States is wonderfully woven into the teachings of the Bible and includes a beautiful full-color family record section, memorable images from our nation’s history and hundreds of enlightening articles which complement the New King James Version Bible text.

Quelle horreur!!!!!

I’m glad I didn’t know about this before July 4th. I had to give the opening prayer at church the following day and this information would have really set me off!

Thankfully, a lot of people are seeing this in the same way I do–as idolatry. (more…)

Nice to see this kind of editorial in a Baptist paper — but look how predictable the comments are….

Associated Baptist Press - Opinion: Truly supporting our troops.

We Christians should be against all forms of deception, and yet, in an attempt to impose mandatory heterosexuality, we force many of our men and women in uniform to deceive their fellow soldiers. Besides the immorality of forcing our troops to lie, the present policy is placing them and our nation in greater peril. Since the policy was enacted in 1993, almost 800 specialists with critical skills needed for the defense of the homeland have been fired, of whom 323 are linguists — 55 of them Arabic experts. Think of the backlog of thousands of documents that cannot be translated — documents that, conceivably, could save American lives — because we are more concerned with whom a soldier loves than we are with his or her ability to do their job.

(Though I have to admit that I think the first commenter has a point about Christians and militarism. I don’t know if defensive campaigns are compatible with Christianity, but I do know that the early church kicked out people who joined the military. And even if defensive campaigns are okay (I think of the Israelites re-building the city wall with a sword in their free hands), I do not believe for one second that our actions in Iraq were justified in God’s eyes.)

This morning at church I was asked to give the opening prayer–and of course it’s July 4th weekend, one of my least favorite holidays of the year. Thankfully, the service had almost none of the usual Holiday trappings–no patriotic songs, no American flags on display, no sermon reminding us how great this nation is. In fact, I may have given the service the only mention of the holiday–now THAT is ironic! Still, this is my first July 4th at this church, so I didn’t want to launch into a Jeremiah Wright style attack on our nationalist pride and arrogance–not sure how that would go over!

So, here’s the holiday portion of my prayer, as best as I can remember it:

Gracious God, on this 4th of July weekend, we lift up a special prayer for our country. We thank you so much for the freedom you have blessed us with, for the power you have given us to do great good in the world, and for the unbelievable wealth we have in this nation.

God, have mercy on us. Help us to use our wealth and power wisely to do good in the world. Instill in us a spirit of humility, a spirit of charity and a spirit of compassion, so that we might be agents of love, freedom and justice in this world.

In the name of Christ our Savior,

Amen.

I ran across this article from The Daily Kos, which reflects many of my own complaints against my former political party: a seemingly complete lack of compassion for other peoples, especially for peoples who have been prevented from having equal access to opportunity and/or denied their status as full human beings, and who are in many ways still aren’t given a level playing field.

To go one step further than Kos, I believe that empathy is a Christian value, and it’s one of the reasons I get so annoyed by hearing people on the Right spout off about Christianity this and God that. I left the Republican Party because I realized that the Bible seems more supportive of the values found today amongst the left: charity, compassion, humility, respect for differences, etc. In leaving behind the GOP, I broke out of the restraints that kept me from truly loving others.

The post also contains another thing that REALLY grates on my Christian nerves: American exceptionalism, as seen in the passage quoted from Liz Cheney. I first noticed the ugliness of this belief years ago in a copy of The Limbaugh Letter, and I still can’t see how you can justify it as Christian. My Bible is quite clear that nationalism is a rebellion against God, a sure way to bring judgment upon the nation. (Just in time for July 4th–huzzah!)

May God have mercy on us and not deal with us as we deserve. Instead, may God instill within our hearts that compassion, humility and generosity of Christ Jesus. Amen.

And then today I had this verse in my devotional reading:

Proverbs 17.5a:

Whoever mocks the poor insults his Maker

May God grant that we be a people of compassion, of true charity, of Christlike humility, that we may live out God’s reign here in the midst of the nations.

In Christ,
Amen.

This weekend we watched all four episodes of the documentary The Century of the Self, which discusses the way Freudian ideas were imported into British and American culture through Freud’s daughter and nephew. The final volume looks at the impact on politics, especially on the Reagan/Thatcher revolutions and the later Clinton/Blair victories.

One thing in particular chilled me: In discussing Reagan’s rise to power, he says that Reagan found favor with the American middle-class by giving them permission to reject calls to charity (e.g., the welfare system) and instead to blame lower-classes for their own situations.

Is this really what a “Christian nation” is supposed to do? How can we continue to associate Reagan conservatism with Christianity?

Why is it so difficult to focus on Christ during the Christmas season? Advent is a penitential season, a season of examination and expectation, a season of quiet, hopeful waiting. Yet it seems impossible to live this season outside of a monastery. Traffic, noise, busyness, adornamentation, wish-lists (argh! to do away with the evil of the wish-list for Christmas! Christ has given himself completely to us; how dare we think we need or even desire anything more?), spend and buy and eat and drink and be merry and be busy and don’t slow down or you’ll be behind.

I continue to say, Save Christ from Christmas! Bad music, bad clothing, bad decorations. Teaching children all the wrong lessons, instilling them with the worst expectations. Was it for this that Jesus became the bread of the world?

How have we gotten so far away? Kierkegaard and Ellul were right: Christendom is the exact opposite of gospel Christianity. American Christendom even more so (more the opposite? is such a thing possible?). The true god of the season is greed/luxury. Celebrate the economy. Celebrate the capitalist virtues. Celebrate Jesus for one day when we ignore him all year.

The Christmas season does not start the day after Thanksgiving. It starts on Christmas Day and runs for 12 days. We have it completely backward. But do we care?

Christ be honored and glorified in spite of it all. May our hearts and minds return again to the bread of the world, born in the House of Bread (Beth-Lehem) and lying in the feeding trough. Eat of him and live eternally. Glory to God, Peace to mankind. O come, o come….