07.18.06
Posted in faith, culture at 3:14 pm by Brandon
Ah, it’s a beautiful day here in internet-avoiding-the-finishing-touches-on-my-Master’s-thesis-land. It’s funny, all joking about avoiding work aside, how we internet-happy blog-surfers tend to think of the internet as a real place. Almost as if we could reach out and touch our fellow internet surfers.
I was just reading a piece at Stupid Church People about the idea of a community of internet-Christians being a church. It’s an interesting, even intriguing thought, isn’t it?
I admit, I like the idea of being able to be a part of a community of believers, no matter the medium by which we interact. However, it’s an idea that I just don’t think I can buy into.
Now, at the outset, I must admit that I wholly think it’s possible to be part of THE Church in a particular internet community. But the idea of being A church is what I’m not sure I’m on board with. Being a part of the Church is something you take with you everywhere you go, I think. So yeah, having a community of believers interact is a good thing. Probably something that needs to happen more often.
However, becoming a church is another thing entirely. I think in American society we Christians have fallen in love with the pat answer about a church being about the people, not the building. The thing is, proximity IS a big part of what makes A church “a church”. The church is a body of believers called together at a specific place.
Why does it matter? Well, I think it matters for a few reasons. First, being bound together by proximity creates a community whose first tie is not ideology. I think there’s a real danger in church communities whose ideologies are their binding characteristic. Now, that’s not to say that it’s entirely a bad thing to be involved in all ideologically driven communities, it’s just dangerous for churches. An ideologically driven church will necessarily single out and endivinate (no, I’m not sure that’s a word) specific ideologies–such as conservative, or liberal ones. Everybody else is sort of left out to dry. In fact, if you’re reading this blog and empathising with what I’ve written about here for, say, the past 2 plus years, you’ve probably been hurt by an ideologically driven community.
Another thing that lacking proximity does for religious communities is that it disallows them to do things. I mean, sure, we can have a computer mediated discussion, and we’ll even be more likely to be incredibly satisfied with that discussion…but the bottom line is that we don’t shake hands, celebrate the eucharist together, serve at a soup-kitchen together, or go visit the sick.
Being a community of proximity also allows us to contact people of multiple generations. If you hadn’t noticed, most of us in the blogosphere–at least those of us who I usually interact wit–are basically my age. Sure, there’s the odd 50-something (no offense intended by the “odd”) but for the most part, we’re in our late 20’s through our 40’s. There’s no elder stateswomen from whom we can glean pearls of wisdom, nor are there many (any?) children whose faith the scriptures tell us hold the key to the very moorings of our faith.
The people with whom we discuss (read: argue) often hide behind a hot-headed rhetoric of youthful-righteous-indignation, and to be honest we (read: I) often respond in kind. In a community of proximity, we wouldn’t do that. We wouldn’t berate, belittle, or any of those other awful “be”’s because, frankly, we’ll be seeing them throughout the week.
Now, that’s not to say that we shouldn’t involve ourselves in online communities. Far from it. They can be a place of solace, fresh thinking, and a place where the soul can be rebuilt. We can use these communities as a place to be THE Church.
I’m not sure the article in question was advocating a position that the online community can REPLACE a church; however, I fear that some of us can start to think that way from time to time. When we get frustrated with the current state of the Church of proximity, we like to think that there’s another, better option. I fear, though, that that option isn’t really “better” at all, it’s just different. I think it’s human nature that the grass will probably ALWAYS look greener, no matter where we are.
I don’t write this to be adversarial, but I do write it to point out that it is important to be reminded that despite all the angst we’re caused by the church’s antics, it’s important to remember that antics exist everywhere.
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07.11.06
Posted in faith, culture at 1:18 pm by Brandon
Jen and I were in Amsterdam about a month ago. Now, before your mind gets to racing about all the debauchery in which we were enaged, let me assure you–we didn’t do anything more immoral than usual.
We were in a small group a number of years ago at a relatively local mega-church. At one, rather memorable, meeting a couple who travelled through Amsterdam on their way to a mission trip to India quipped, “Yeah, we got off the plane in Amsterdam–you could just smell the sin.”
I was justly confused, then, when just a month ago my schnoz was incredibly active desperately in search of the “smell of sin” and I just couldn’t detect it. Admittedly, I was probably absent the day they taught the “good Christians” what, exactly, sin smelled like. I imagine it smells a little like a Kerusso T-shirt–fresh from the sweatshop, but I can’t be sure.
What we found, instead, was a city of wonderful people. Probably some of the kindest people in Europe that we ran into. To be fair, the wholesale lack of a language barrier probably helped. Still, I was on the hunt for sin in Amsterdam–surely I’d missed some orgies and the like.
Everytime we encountered a new person, I expected to see some sign of Satan–you know, maybe in a moment of indiscretion they’d slip out their forked tongues, or reveal that they actually had two sets of eyelids or gills or something. Imagine my shock when on a worshipful Sunday morning canal boat tour we cuised past a church that was–gasp–just getting out of service. Imagine that, a church, filled not only with grandmotherly types, but young families. Quietly sipping their coffee (an after church ritual) and chatting–pausing only momentarily to kindly wave to friends passing by on their Sunday morning boatride through the canals.
Sure, a prostitute in the red light district asked Jen and I if we’d like to “do it”, but when we politely replied, “maybe next time” she just sort of let us go on our way.
In west Michigan (and in Christianity, too, I think,) we like to think of Amsterdammers and their ilk as the embodiment of Beelzebub. We speculate that any Christian who supports liberal Marijuana laws can’t really have Jesus living in their heart. No people who make a space for, and–again, gasp–protect and care for their prostitutes could have Jesus living side by side with them.
This is not all to say that all Amsterdammers go to heaven and all Americans go to hell. Far from it. There, like here, there is a pressing need for the love of God to touch people. We all have a need to be transformed.
Transformation.
That’s the tricky bit. Here in America we tend to surmise that transformation moves us in the direction of wealth–what with streets paved with gold and all. Yet, I’m not so sure wealth is the direction of God’s transformation. The Dutch seem, knowingly or not, to be on to something with regard to being transformed by God’s grace. They get that working 60 hours a week in search of something approaching upward mobility, may just be moving us backward. They get that just sitting on the front porch eating dinner with friends and sharing a bottle of wine isn’t such a bad thing.
In short, the Dutch understood the meaning of rest. That rest isn’t so much something to be done passively–so that we can store up our energy to head back into the grind. They understood that rest is something to be done actively…riding your rowboat down the canals, sharing a dinner with friends, and generally stopping to smell the roses.
So, I guess I went to Amsterdam in search of the smell of sin. What I found, however, wasn’t sin–at least not in any more abundance than I find here. I found the smell of delight, the smell of patience, indeed, I found out what the roses smell like. And that, my friends, is not a smell I’m likely to forget.
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06.04.06
Posted in faith at 10:36 pm by Brandon
As promised, I read Brian McLaren’s latest book, The Secret Message of Jesus. My review will be neither as academic, nor as in depth as Greg’s great treatment of the book. However, I’d like to offer what thoughts I can, regardless of how elementary they might be.
So, let me say at the outset, I liked The Secret Message of Jesus (SMoJ). And yes, I’d even suggest you either buy yourselves a copy or run down to your local library and get it so you, too, can give it a read. I’d like to structure this little review by first talking about some critiques of the book. Then, moving on to what I believe are strengths.
I’ll be honest, I’m not wild about the rhetoric of SMoJ. What I mean is this, when you call something a secret, people start to think that it actually is intended as a secret, that Jesus really only wanted his message to be clear to a few, wise folks. Now, McLaren clearly demonstrates that he knows that this was not the case, yet the rhetoric of the terms “Secret Message” used throughout the book can be a bit confusing.
Another thing that sort of drove me nuts was the idea that this secret message is a totally new idea in Christianity today. I feel like the rhetorical move of calling the Jesus’ ministry a “secret message” tends to downplay those movements in Christianity that’ve really hit the Kingdom of God nail on its proverbial head. For example, the ministry of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. And, while McLaren offers nods to Dr. King, and various other executors of the social gospel, the message isn’t really a secret.
Yet, at the same time, McLaren knows his audience. Because for many people, the story of Jesus’ message as retold by McLaren, may just as well have been a secret. McLaren’s discussion of the life and meaning of Jesus (who he was, what he did, and what his message was) along with his treatment of other NT authors, was good. It reminded me quite a bit of NT Wright, Marcus Borg, or some other Jesus scholar who emphasized casting the message of Christ in the culture of a 1st century middle eastern village.
To whom is this message a secret? Well, probably to many church-goers in America. The kind that think Christianity is first and foremost about substitutionary atonement–that’s who’ll be surprised by the SMoJ. I admit, I didn’t find the SMoJ incredibly surprising. And, I think that’s okay. Instead, for me it was a reaffirmation of many things that I’ve been thinking about in my own coming to terms with church, God, and life.
If you’re a fundagelical-ish, aberchurch-goer, however, you may be in for a shock or two regarding what Christianity actually is. And, for me, this book has been good for that, helping people to understand what I think about Christianity. Because, frankly, I’ll hand it to Brian on this one, he nailed it. He said in this book, almost exactly what is in my heart. Books like that are few and far between.
Tags: The Secret Message of Jesus, Brian McLaren
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05.16.06
Posted in faith, culture at 2:47 pm by Brandon
Amidst the DaVinci Code hype, Christians are, once again, whining…loudly. In that spirit, I’m offering this letter to Christians:
Dear Christians,
Brothers and Sisters, it seems that many of us have become taken up in righteous indignation with the recent popularity of Dan Brown’s popular work of fiction The DaVinci Code. In adult Sunday school classrooms across the country, we’ve riled yourselves into a righteous tizzy over the “heretical nature” of this text. It seems that now that the subversive Sponge Bob Squarepants has been uncovered for the gay that he is, our collective attention needs, now, to turn to other subversive influences.
Indeed, we Christians need to pay close attention to this grave threat to our very existence. The future of the religion, no, the future of the world does indeed depend upon our ridicule of this text.
Some in the so-called “progressive Christian movement” have tried to claim that the DaVinci Code isn’t very harmful to Christianity. We must be strong in our insistence that this heretical perspective be stamped out in all of its forms. It’s all well and good, to them it seems, to be offended by our President George W. Bush (praise be upon him), but when we, the upright, holy, God-centered, religious right are offended by attacks upon Christ himself–then the progressive eyes start to roll.
Their idol of progress has blinded them to the call for Christians everywhere to be offended by the attacks on the very celibacy of Christ present in the DaVinci Code. Further, their claims that Christ wasn’t a white middle class Republican is nothing less than repugnant. As if you needed more evidence of this heresy, sheesh.
Some of those godless bastards even have the gall to claim that the DaVinci Code doesn’t represent a direct attack on the central message of Jesus Christ. They claim that Christ’s central message was something about the Kingdom of God bringing about a New World Order of social, economic, and religious justice. More reviling still is the claim that we should be more offended by the so-called lack of air time we righteous members of the religious right (including our President George W. Bush–pbuh) pay to issues of social injustice.
As you all know, the central message of Jesus regards personal salvation, the God-given right of men to have dominion over women, and the hellish realities of socialist regimes at the expense of holy capitalism–nothing more and nothing less. Some of these progressive Christians–if they’re really Christians at all–have been secretly trying to subvert our collective attention from the awful realities of the DaVinci Code and insist that we pay attention to this “New World Order”. Such new-age schemes must be opposed at every juncture.
I write you this message, Brothers and Sisters, that you may stay strong in the light of the evil and repressive force of progress. These self-labelled progressive Christians are nothing more than a hip and dynamic attempt of the evil one to bring down the true Kingdom of God being brought about by God’s one true leader, George W. Bush (pbuh). Such evil attempts at anarchy must be squelched.
In time, it’s certain that the DaVinci Code will become just another blip in our collective memory, it will be unveiled for the fiction that it is. In this dark hour, however, it is vital that we remain strong, stay the course, and pray unceasingly that our attention not be diverted from the true goal of forwarding the principle message of Christ. The Kingdom of God (that is, the United States) will win. It’s only a matter of time: 23 years 14 days to be exact (see the LaHaye & Jenkins study Bible’s end times timeline.)
In Christ,
Brandon
Tags: The DaVinci Code, Satire, Christianity
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05.11.06
Posted in faith, pet peeves at 8:34 am by Brandon
Since I wrote my Christian t-shirt post, a number of you have voiced the concern that if you’re causing people to have conversations with you about God, it’s okay to wear “Witness wear.” My response follows.
Everybody seems pretty fucking wound up about the notion that they should get to wear what they want, don’t they? I’m starting to think that this is more about freedom of speech than anything else. Perhaps it is. Rest assured violent, militant, and defensive Christian T-Shirt wearers that I have no desire to infringe on your RIGHT to wear a stupid t-shirt. It’s written into the constitution, you can–as long as it’s decent–wear whatever the hell you’d like.
Everybody also seems pretty fucking wound up with the idea that if their shirt causes a conversation about God to happen, then their brave attempts at evangelizing the godless bastards–you know, non-evangelicals–should be sung from the mountain tops. (Screw those yodelers, anyway.)
Let me say this directly. Perhaps (and that’s a big fucking perhaps) the conversations that are spurred from the wearing of these “Christian-hip” duds, are helpful. Maybe, but I’m not so concerned with the one conversation that DOES happen.
For me, what’s more concerning are the FIFTEEN or so conversations that DON’T happen because you’ve got to exercize your motherfucking right to have the words “Prayer Warrior” emblazoned across your chest.
Rest assured tacky-shirt-wearers, the vast majority of the world is no longer intrigued by your sometimes-insightful-most-times-idiotic textiles. No the rest of the world sees them and you as a stupid, ignorant fool. The God Hates Fags people use the same tactic, you know. Sure, they craft messages that are intended to catch your eye in order to spur on a conversation. (Side note: Josh and Steve interviewed Shirley Phelps Roper over at Stupid Church People, it’s actually pretty fascinating–give it a listen.)
My suggestion to all of you who desperately feel the need to be identified publicly as a Christian is this: Instead of wearing a shirt that essentially says, “I’m saved”, live a life that practices your ressurection. You shouldn’t need to don a piece of cloth for people to know your faith. And, frankly, I’d bet good money that if you practiced your ressurection on your sleeve rather than a tacky-ass message, a whole lot less people would write you off as a blow hard hypocrite.
Tags: Christian T-Shirts
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04.26.06
Posted in faith, culture at 2:05 pm by Brandon
These bits of news were what RelevantMagazine.com decided were particularly newsworthy today:
Apple has decided to block MySpace.com from being accessed on the demo computers at its retail stores. Employees have reported customers using the in-store computers, taking up bandwidth and blogging on MySpace for hours at a time …4/26/06 | 2:43 PM
The ’90s rock favorites the Lemonheads are reuniting. The band has signed to Vagrant Records and will be releasing a new album later this year …4/26/06 | 2:42 PM
In an interview with MTV, UK pop-darlings Keane said that prior to recording their new album, Under the Iron Sea (which hits stores June 20), the band nearly called it quits. Two years of being on the road together brought the band to the edge; the result of the drama, they say, is a much darker, more complex album … 4/26/06 | 9:34 AM
Well, there’s trouble in paradise for the American Idol crew. Host Ryan Seacrest has said that he is not talking to Paula Abdul after the two have publicly bashed each other on talk shows. Simon has wisely decided not to take sides in this catfight …4/26/06 | 9:33 AM
A Roman Catholic Bishop in Croatia is attempting to ban bikinis on one of the country’s islands. The bishop wants there to be a “decency zone” at the town center on Krk Island where tourists frequently wear swimsuits …4/26/06 | 9:33 AM
This Saturday, thousands of people across the world will be taking part in the Global Night Commute, a peaceful demonstration for the Invisible Children of northern Uganda—children who have been unjustly caught in the middle of a 20-year-war. Click here or watch Oprah to get more info about the movement …4/25/06 | 7:44 PM
So, Mr. Strang, you run a for-profit (yes that means he’s paying people) magazine, and this is the best news about God, Life, and Progressive Culture you can offer me? A spat between Ryan Seacrest and Paula Abdul, you remind me to watch Oprah for my social justice needs, and you inform me that Catholics in Croatia are banning bikinis. Sweet crap, man!
Could we find a bigger Merchant of “cool”?
Tags: Relevant Magazine, News, Slices
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03.31.06
Posted in faith, culture at 9:07 am by Brandon
I’m not sure which concerns me more:
The idea of calling God “she” publicly because it might confer less holiness on God.
OR
That I refer to God as a “he” because I’m afraid of the negative reactions I’ll get from people if I do otherwise.
OR
The fact that, even after lots of study about the topic of gender and derogation, I still remain enough of an idiot to believe that holiness, purity, omnipotence, etc. is somehow associated with masculinity. And when it comes down to it, I don’t have the uterus to buck the system.
Perhaps having the uterus to buck the system in real life is what we bloggers tend to share in common. We’d love to do those things we write about, but all too often, we write because we don’t have the courage to “do.” And, maybe deep down, we write because we hope that in writing we can give others the courage to do what we can’t–or won’t–do.
Of course, none of these good intentions really excuse us from the fact that we’re dodging an inevitable bullet. Someday, I’ll be forced to do either the right thing–like standing up for the position of women in the naming of God, for example–or the wrong thing, and until then, I’ll be praying like mad that I’ve got the uterus to do what’s right.
Tags: Confession, Gender and God, Blogging
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03.15.06
Posted in faith at 4:35 pm by Brandon
This post is long, rambles quite a bit, and it’s exactly what’s been on my heart. You’ve been warned.
I was reading my friend Kate’s blog today. You know how we all sometimes read blogs, right? Even those blogs we really like to read, like for me reading Kate’s blog (it’s one of my favorites), we sometimes are oblivious to the context and purpose of each other’s writing.
But, today I really READ Kate’s blog. Particularly the part where she talks about her purpose for writing Evangelical Expatriate. I like the way she puts it:
Author Barbara Kingsolver writes that rather than buying into the “love it or leave it” approach to the groups with which we affiliate, a more honorable slogan is “love it and get it right, love it and never shut up.” This, I believe, is the function of evangelical expatriates. These expats have renounced their citizenship in evangelical subculture, but not their faith. They have ventured out into the wider world, but they remain interested, and often emotionally invested, in their culture of origin. They have become skeptical of how the church manifests its witness, but also dedicated to calling it back to its truest expressions. This blog is a repository for the commentaries and critiques of various evangelical expats.
Kate goes on to list some evangelical expatriates. I’m quite honored to be included.
Sometimes I find myself longing for the days where I wrote out of angst regarding a particularly irksome church I used to attend, or the time I would spend defending my the glorious freedom I have in Christ to say the “fuck-word”.
As I remember, a lot of my angst and vitriol in the early days of this blog was in response to some bad situations I encountered because of my involvement with particular expressions of the church. Somedays I feel tamer, quieter, more content now. Part of that change is probably brought on by the fact that we carefully chose, after a few months of absenteeism from church attendance, a church family whose vision more closely mirrors my our own priorities about kingdom service.
In a way, though, I sometimes see myself as an evangelical subculture member. And, I don’t much like it. It’s hard to feel like you’re living outside of the greater evangelical subculture of powerpoint driven church services, tacky devotional driven small groups, and ego driven pastors (I’m speaking in general here) when you’re a practising member of a Church that–to one degree or area or another–ascribes to some of those things.
Here’s the place I find myself: I desperately want to be a part of the COMMUNITY of Christ, yet I desperately DON’T want to be a part of what I believe to be a sinful subculture that propogates greed, selfishness, and tolerance of injustice. It feels like the more I become a part of the COMMUNITY of Christ, the more I am entrenched in the subculture. I find this to be an unfortunate position. On the one hand, I think that being an active member of a church is important, on the other, I think it increases the degree to which I’m engulfed by evangelical subculture.
Another thing that I find difficult knowing what my place is within a church. I mean, I love God and I love the Church, but seriously, is there any role for someone who really opposes the very subculture that the Church has, for the past 2000 or so years, been cultivating? I don’t need everybody to be like me, or think what I think, or do what I do, or even believe what I believe; I just want to know what kinds of roles an evangelical expat like me should plan on filling. I mean, would I do the least damage as a greeter, or maybe you could put me in charge of leaf raking, or something, you know, “non-essential.”
I see other women and men my age, they’re becoming deacons, fathers, mothers, cadet leaders, or other church leaders. But, not me. I’m a grad student. I live this fairy tale life between two cities, going to the bars with my “heathen” friends, cultivating communities in non-traditional environments, and just trying my darndest to love my wife and God and my kitties with all my heart. Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not knocking down any doors to earn the right to pass the plate on Sunday morning…I’m just saying I’m a little odd for the norm.
So, I’m wierd. Does it make me less spiritually mature? Maybe, I am. And, maybe I’m just a non-traditional Christian–not yet mature, but growing.
Fundamentally, it’s the worry that this feeling of “different” comes because I’m just not Godly enough. I don’t like to clap when we sing praise songs, I think sermons are boring and often have little point, I’m not an incredibly faithful ‘devotion-doer’. These things make me feel like I’m a bad Christian, like I need to just bend over and assimilate to the subculture.
When I look around and see everybody else loving church, sometimes I wonder what the hell is wrong with me that I just don’t.
Maybe this is something every “non-traditional” Christian goes through. Maybe I’ll find a way to both be me and be a part of the Christian community. Maybe I’ll feel like my questions and thoughts aren’t such a bother to people. Maybe I’ll stop censoring those questions I have that might prove troubling to others. Maybe.
Am I spiritually immature? Am I unwilling to assimilate to my subculture of faith? Would it look any different if I was one or the other? How should someone who doesn’t affirm the subculture of evangelicalism approach the task of being an active member in the evangelical (or reformed–pick your poison) body of Christ?
And, maybe, this is all part of the struggle of what it means to be authentically honest about your Christian walk, I don’t know.
Anybody with any answers to any of these questions (or any other advice) is welcome to chime in. And, if you know any really wise men or women, you know, who live up on the proverbial mountain, I’d certainly appreciate it if you could send them my way. I could sure use some guidance to help me down the road of figuring out if and where I fit in.
Tags: Evangelical Subculture, Bad Christian, Christianity
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03.14.06
Posted in faith at 10:00 am by Brandon
One of our favorites, Brannon Howse–web-writer extrordinare and all around fun guy,–has another winner up over at the Christian Worldview Network. Howse gave an interesting treatment of why those that preach tolerance are truly intolerant of the intolerant, thus they’re hypocrites. Technically, he’s right, I think. Here’s an excerpt, even if a little confusing:
If you’ve read some of my articles before, you know how much I enjoy pointing out the intolerance of people who scream the loudest about how important it is to be tolerant. And it’s almost amusing that those who yammer about not judging others are the most judgmental of your judgments.
In this piece Howse lays out a defense of intolerance. I’m willing to say that his logic is good…at least for this part of his argument.
Where I get a little fuzzy, though, is where Howse berates a group of “tolerance mongers” for in fact being intolerant. I’m confused, I suppose, because Howse first lays out an air tight defense of intolerance and then goes on to berate one particular group for their intolerance! Here’s another excerpt:
Citations from the PCM18 Police rolled in like a tsunami. But did they e-mail to privately chastise me for my “unbiblical” conduct of writing and speaking out against the false teachings of Joel Osteen, the Emerging Church, or the liberal activism and unchristian funding of the group of 85? No, of course not—even though that is exactly what they were writing to tell me I should have done. (You’ll recognize that the hallmark of any tolerance monger is that they want you to do what they would never do themselves.)
Howse wants to eat his cake and have it too, it seems. The only intolerance that is acceptable is HIS intolerance, as if he somehow sets the supreme standard of what is good and right. It’s cool to be intolerant of people who oppose global warming–because they’re liberal, after all. And, it’s cool to be intolerant of Joel Osteen’s happy talk, or the Emerging Church. But, good Lordy look out if you get intolerant of Brannon Howse.
Let’s be honest with ourselves, we’re all intolerant of things. The question though, I think, isn’t what you are or are not intolerant of, but rather what the standard is that you make your judgements about tolerance. Me, although I’m far from perfect and have my biases as well, I like to think that the holy scriptures are the best tool for MEASURED intolerance.
Brannon Howse seems to think that the defining characteristic of what we should be intolerant of is any position on any issue that’s not on the far right of the political spectrum.
My friends, I’m not perfect–far from it,–but please let’s see this as what it should be seen as: Heresy, purely and simply. Christians who judge issues, such as global warming or climate change (as Howse has done), based on their position left of center rather than as a kingdom imperative, twist scripture and are dead wrong. Calling such a position “Christian” is nothing short of heretical.
Tags: Brannon Howse, Tolerance, Heresy
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03.04.06
Posted in social science, sunday school journal at 1:35 pm by Brandon
A few weeks ago, I took a spiritual gift inventory for the new member class at our church. (Yes, now that Jen and I know for sure that we’ll be in Grand Rapids for at least the next 3 years, we’re doing what Zalm would term “membering up”.) As a social scientist in training, I find myself hyper-sensitive to tests of my personality. Thus, you should probably read this post with a grain of salt.
It should also be noted that I’m not trying to critique the PERSON who lead the class that followed the spiritual gift inventory, or the administration (though, I’d suggest greater selectivity in choosing the next class’ spiritual gift inventory.) Further, I’m not really trying to deal with the issue of spiritual gifts themselves. Rather, I’m just a little miffed as to the way that the test evaluated my spiritual gifts.
Some of my results were quite predictable. For example, I scored a big goose-egg when it came to speaking in, or interpreting tongues. I think much of that has to do with the tradition in which people are raised. I’ve never really been exposed to these gifts, and though I’m reticent to say that they can never be practiced effectively today, I find it a little odd that people who interpret tongues only interpret spiritual messages, like “shak a laka bulu zangiti” being translated as “Glory be to God most high!” It just seems a tad wierd that a tongue speaker would never, you know, ask “Which way to the restroom?”, “Do my socks match my skirt?”, “You can’t see my boxers through my khakis, can you?”, or “I hope no-one can tell that I just farted.” Anyway, that’s just an aside.
What really struck me were the items measuring evangelism. One particular item really got me. It went something like this: “I desire to be all things to all people in order to win them over.” I strongly disagreed. My reasoning was that I really just wanted to be myself. Another evangelism item reflected a desire to spread the gospel. I strongly agreed with that one. Another item was a double barreled question that combined both the desire to spread the gospel, and the individual’s intent to share the gospel verbally to unbelievers by telling them about the love of God or something. Here, I do have a desire to share the gospel, but I have questions about the methods and modes of that communication…thus, I split the difference.
One tool that quantitative social scientists use to understand if a scale is really getting at what they think it’s getting at, is a reliability analysis. Essentially, reliablility is the idea that if scale items are each measuring the same thing and doing it well, they should be highly correlated with one another. Logically, this makes sense. If I asked you three questions about an identical topic, you should give me similar answers each time. If however, I asked you three questions about a topic I believed to be identical and you gave me three very different answers, I would know that I probably didn’t ask questions that were really getting at the topic at hand.
My answers to the evangelism questions are as divergent as possible. I would suspect that others displayed the same unreliablity.
Beyond unreliability, I think there’s a greater issue with this particular scale (and, I’m picking on evangelism here, but I feel that there were a plethora of reliability issues with the scale.) I’m not sure that it’s really on target. I mean, I think that it could reliably measure the spiritual personality of a modern with regard to evangelism, but for a pomo, it falls flat. For me, the notion of ‘being all things to all people in order to win some’ is a rather dubious way to measure evangelism.
Further, the scale was laced with double barrelled and leading questions. So much so that I have hardly any confidence in its results. I can’t help but wonder why it is that Christians sometimes settle for such a lax view of science. And, yeah, a lot of that pops up with regard to the issue of natural science and the origins debate, but it creeps its way into all areas of academia, too. Such scales are an indicator of the greater movement in Christianity–toward academic laziness. And, amazingly lots of young ’scholars’ go to Christian colleges where, many times, this academic laziness is championed. And, the cycle begins again.
It’s my prayer that the next generation of Christian college professors are a little more critical than the last one, and they are able to bridge the nebulous gap between academia and the Kingdom of God. I suppose I’ll have to place my hope in Steve.
**Note: No, it’s not all Christian College profs that promote this ideal of academic laziness. There’s some really good ones out there, I’m speaking more broadly about a disturbing general trend.
Tags: Spiritual Gifts, Social Science
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