I invite you to meditate for 10 minutes:
Singing Bowls
Wednesday, October 23, 2019
Thursday, October 17, 2019
Curriculum and Church Space
My ministry must consider how the educational programming I will create in my context can bring forth Kingdom. I believe that Kingdom must encompass justice and equality for all peoples, which necessitates critical analysis of social location and ways of learning that can unpack our embedded theologies and presumptions about society and the world. Understanding how we operate in the complex, often discriminatory structures of our world, can help us to see how structures of oppression (that may not be superficially apparent as such) inhibit Kingdom. Understanding my context as well as my community’s wider context helps me to discover the particular starting places for my critical treatment of the ways we exist in the world and the work necessary to build Kingdom.
It is common for Christian understandings of Kingdom to take on an “otherworldly” manner and for Christians to see their relationship to Kingdom as individualistic and salvation-oriented (1). This popular understanding of Kingdom leads to practice that is self-centered and neglects Jesus’ ministry in favor of a high Christology that promotes individual salvation by “belief.” As might be expected, faith that focuses on “believing” may lack real applicability to the world and result in practice that favors inner work over addressing the very real concerns of the world– concerns that we can see were important to Jesus by virtue of how he performed his ministry: by ministering to the poor, the sick, and the outcast and inviting them to full participation in the life of God (2). In creating clear ways of understanding Kingdom, we can bring its meaning back into alignment with Jesus’ ministry.
Thematically, Kingdom was important to Jesus and our gospel writers. Its prevalence requires us to meditate on what it means for our communities. Fleshing out the meaning and importance of Kingdom can set a foundation from which to build justice work. If our churches can begin to develop meaningful visions of Kingdom, those understandings will rise to the forefront in our treatment of scripture and become part of our explicit curriculum (3). It became important to me to understand more specifically what Kingdom meant to me and how I want to present Kingdom in my ministry contexts. I would articulate Kingdom as the “radically and thoroughly historical” arrival of peace and justice the world, heralded by Jesus, co-created by God and humanity (4). Kingdom is in process and will fully arrive when humanity truly realizes its inherent interrelatedness with all of life and lives that truth. If I can bring this lens to scripture, I hope that my ministry will elevate the importance of engaging our faith in the world to bring about the reign of peace.
This work will look different as members decide how their hands and feet can best serve this purpose. It is important, however, that the work be rooted in love. Jesus’ ministry conveys love and radical acceptance that we are called to emulate. Furthermore, a word often translated as “knowledge” or “knowing” in the Bible is, in the Hebrew, yada, which is also often referring to an intimate love. If we bring this idea forward, we we study our scriptures, we can see that we are called to act in love. Furthermore, as a community, we must discover what that knowing/love must look like in our lives. It will be important for me and my faith community (which currently consists of primarily white, middle class individuals) to analyze our ways of being in the world and ask what our love needs to look like (5).
If Kingdom is rooted in peace and justice, it is important to work toward a world in which people are given equal opportunities and avenues for support and care. In asking how to do this, addressing our own social location will be very important. I imagine discussions in which my community explores who we are in the world and how we can best serve. These discussions will need to be in an environment that respects differences and is open to and welcoming of a variety of voices. This will require careful thinking on ways that “narrow boundaries have shaped the way knowledge is shared,” especially since we come from generally privileged positions (6). I must remain mindful of what my presence will bring to these discussions as a white, middle class, cisgendered woman (7). It will be important to be critical of and open about the systems that position me (and us) in situations of opportunity and oppression in order to understand how such systems inhibit or produce Kingdom, as well as how we can act within them or resist them in the work of Kingdom.
Also important in working toward are more equal and inclusive world is confronting the ways that our perceived multiculturalism is often ill-conceived, however well-intentioned. This is especially important in my community of mostly white and middle class people who generally operate from the dominant perspective. Four common misunderstandings will require frequent consideration: inclusion, encounter, hierarchy, and naivety (8). Confronting my privilege will be important in considering how I can be a voice in bringing forth equality without presupposing opportunities based on said privilege or dominating conversations in which “my” voice has historically been heard. Working toward equality and peace cannot be naively perceived as a Candyland-like future absent of struggle. As history should tell us, progress is difficult and a multicultural reality is not achieved by the inclusion of a multiplicity of people. While representation and diversity are important, this cannot be done as a way that minorities integrate into the normative center. This fails to be truly multicultural and instead asks for conformity while continuing to privilege dominant paradigms and voices. This will be important to draw to the surface so that folks do not misinterpret our levels of progress. Including marginalized voices does not alone bring about equal participation and consideration, nor does it dismantle hierarchic systems of valuing. Such hierarchies are often implicit and unacknowledged, even in situations in which we intend to acknowledge and celebrate diversity. Furthermore, in exploring the diversities that exist among us, our interactions cannot be “cultural tourism.” Well-intentioned folks often engage in education and experience in ways that fail to fully acknowledge the humanity and integrity of the peoples they encounter. For instance: it would be important for us to avoid attending a worship service in a black church in such a way that our interaction treats a community like subjects in a museum. This kind of interaction would expand the education and opportunity (although superficially) of my community (more generally privileged) while offering nothing to the “subject” of the interaction, who is often objectified in this process. Programming and conversations must bring these misconceptions to the forefront, so that we do not make these mistakes or operate in ways that further reinforce privilege and oppress authentic multicultural expression. While I intend to set these issues up as important to consideration of how a community can best discover ways of pursuing Kingdom, I believe the conversation must be organic and incorporate lessons from bell hooks and Jane Vella in how to construct opportunities for learning and dialogue that are open, welcoming, and safe for all.
I hope that discussions like these will serve to help the communities I will minister in the future to discover how to best continue these educational discussions alongside projects that integrate lessons learned into concrete action for Kingdom-building. As Maria Harris suggests, Christian faith can no longer be about memorization and religious laws (9). Faith seems to devolve into moral elitism when it becomes about “believing right.” It is important that reflections of our theologies manifest in multiple ways (10).
I started to consider the ways that my home community is very good at articulating an explicit curriculum, but wonder what we suggested implicitly or what was null. The space likely speaks as “traditional” by virtue of its pews, organ, stained glass, and hymnals. However, our stained glass is trees (as opposed to biblical figures), we do not have a lecturn (it was removed because of the hierarchy it implied), and aside from the Bibles in the pews, there is no symbolic elevation of Christian scripture in our sanctuary (although there is a large wooden cross on one side of the chancel). This communicates, to me, a tension between tradition and newer ways of experiencing worship that are probably true to our worship stylings. While I’m happy to say that our sanctuary was redesigned in recent years so that wheelchair access is available to the chancel and wheelchairs can enter the sanctuary through the main doors (as opposed to a side door, which was previously necessary), in our current sanctuary set up, there is little else suggestive of our “Open and Affirming” status beyond what is explicitly printed in bulletins (although sometimes banners are hung with, for instance, hands of many colors or a quote from a POC). It would be nice to see something more consistently suggestive of our efforts, like a Pride flag. Our church is currently commissioning a mural of the Virgen de Guadalupe, which I believe is progress toward these ends. I am grateful for the ways that Harris pointed out what we say with our space. This will be important to me going forward as I advocate for things like our mural and other ways to speak with our space.
Critical analysis of our contexts are important to building Kingdom, as we co-discover the ways that our systems advantage and disadvantage people and address ways to dismantle or reform systems that serve to divide and oppress. I must consider not only the ways that my community and I are explicit in our work toward Kingdom, but what we communicate implicitly or fail to communicate at all. I am asked to continually examine my context and the ways that I communicate it and my goals.
(1) Thomas H. Groome, Christian Religious Education: Sharing Our Story and Vision (New York: Harper and Row, 1981), 35.
(2) Groome suggests that this conflation of “faith” and “belief” stems from Post-Enlightenment ways of thinking, which is primarily concerned with “facts.” Ibid, 57-60.
(3) Maria Harris, Fashion Me a People: Curriculum in the Church (Louisville, KY: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1989), 68.
(4) Groome, Christian Religious Education, 44-45.
(5) Ibid, 141.
(6) bell hooks, Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom (New York: Routledge, 1994), 44.
(7) Ibid, 135.
(8) Class session March 17, 2015: Critical Religious Pedagogy: A Christian Perspective taught by Rev. Dr. Boyung Lee
(9) Ibid, 45-46.
(10) Harris discusses this in terms of “explicit curriculum,” “implicit curriculum,” and “null curriculum.”
Bibliography
1. Groome, Thomas H. Christian Religious Education: Sharing Our Story and Vision. New York: Harper and Row, 1981.
2. Harris, Maria. Fashion Me a People: Curriculum in the Church. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1989.
3. bell hooks. Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom. New York: Routledge, 1994.
It is common for Christian understandings of Kingdom to take on an “otherworldly” manner and for Christians to see their relationship to Kingdom as individualistic and salvation-oriented (1). This popular understanding of Kingdom leads to practice that is self-centered and neglects Jesus’ ministry in favor of a high Christology that promotes individual salvation by “belief.” As might be expected, faith that focuses on “believing” may lack real applicability to the world and result in practice that favors inner work over addressing the very real concerns of the world– concerns that we can see were important to Jesus by virtue of how he performed his ministry: by ministering to the poor, the sick, and the outcast and inviting them to full participation in the life of God (2). In creating clear ways of understanding Kingdom, we can bring its meaning back into alignment with Jesus’ ministry.
Thematically, Kingdom was important to Jesus and our gospel writers. Its prevalence requires us to meditate on what it means for our communities. Fleshing out the meaning and importance of Kingdom can set a foundation from which to build justice work. If our churches can begin to develop meaningful visions of Kingdom, those understandings will rise to the forefront in our treatment of scripture and become part of our explicit curriculum (3). It became important to me to understand more specifically what Kingdom meant to me and how I want to present Kingdom in my ministry contexts. I would articulate Kingdom as the “radically and thoroughly historical” arrival of peace and justice the world, heralded by Jesus, co-created by God and humanity (4). Kingdom is in process and will fully arrive when humanity truly realizes its inherent interrelatedness with all of life and lives that truth. If I can bring this lens to scripture, I hope that my ministry will elevate the importance of engaging our faith in the world to bring about the reign of peace.
This work will look different as members decide how their hands and feet can best serve this purpose. It is important, however, that the work be rooted in love. Jesus’ ministry conveys love and radical acceptance that we are called to emulate. Furthermore, a word often translated as “knowledge” or “knowing” in the Bible is, in the Hebrew, yada, which is also often referring to an intimate love. If we bring this idea forward, we we study our scriptures, we can see that we are called to act in love. Furthermore, as a community, we must discover what that knowing/love must look like in our lives. It will be important for me and my faith community (which currently consists of primarily white, middle class individuals) to analyze our ways of being in the world and ask what our love needs to look like (5).
If Kingdom is rooted in peace and justice, it is important to work toward a world in which people are given equal opportunities and avenues for support and care. In asking how to do this, addressing our own social location will be very important. I imagine discussions in which my community explores who we are in the world and how we can best serve. These discussions will need to be in an environment that respects differences and is open to and welcoming of a variety of voices. This will require careful thinking on ways that “narrow boundaries have shaped the way knowledge is shared,” especially since we come from generally privileged positions (6). I must remain mindful of what my presence will bring to these discussions as a white, middle class, cisgendered woman (7). It will be important to be critical of and open about the systems that position me (and us) in situations of opportunity and oppression in order to understand how such systems inhibit or produce Kingdom, as well as how we can act within them or resist them in the work of Kingdom.
Also important in working toward are more equal and inclusive world is confronting the ways that our perceived multiculturalism is often ill-conceived, however well-intentioned. This is especially important in my community of mostly white and middle class people who generally operate from the dominant perspective. Four common misunderstandings will require frequent consideration: inclusion, encounter, hierarchy, and naivety (8). Confronting my privilege will be important in considering how I can be a voice in bringing forth equality without presupposing opportunities based on said privilege or dominating conversations in which “my” voice has historically been heard. Working toward equality and peace cannot be naively perceived as a Candyland-like future absent of struggle. As history should tell us, progress is difficult and a multicultural reality is not achieved by the inclusion of a multiplicity of people. While representation and diversity are important, this cannot be done as a way that minorities integrate into the normative center. This fails to be truly multicultural and instead asks for conformity while continuing to privilege dominant paradigms and voices. This will be important to draw to the surface so that folks do not misinterpret our levels of progress. Including marginalized voices does not alone bring about equal participation and consideration, nor does it dismantle hierarchic systems of valuing. Such hierarchies are often implicit and unacknowledged, even in situations in which we intend to acknowledge and celebrate diversity. Furthermore, in exploring the diversities that exist among us, our interactions cannot be “cultural tourism.” Well-intentioned folks often engage in education and experience in ways that fail to fully acknowledge the humanity and integrity of the peoples they encounter. For instance: it would be important for us to avoid attending a worship service in a black church in such a way that our interaction treats a community like subjects in a museum. This kind of interaction would expand the education and opportunity (although superficially) of my community (more generally privileged) while offering nothing to the “subject” of the interaction, who is often objectified in this process. Programming and conversations must bring these misconceptions to the forefront, so that we do not make these mistakes or operate in ways that further reinforce privilege and oppress authentic multicultural expression. While I intend to set these issues up as important to consideration of how a community can best discover ways of pursuing Kingdom, I believe the conversation must be organic and incorporate lessons from bell hooks and Jane Vella in how to construct opportunities for learning and dialogue that are open, welcoming, and safe for all.
I hope that discussions like these will serve to help the communities I will minister in the future to discover how to best continue these educational discussions alongside projects that integrate lessons learned into concrete action for Kingdom-building. As Maria Harris suggests, Christian faith can no longer be about memorization and religious laws (9). Faith seems to devolve into moral elitism when it becomes about “believing right.” It is important that reflections of our theologies manifest in multiple ways (10).
I started to consider the ways that my home community is very good at articulating an explicit curriculum, but wonder what we suggested implicitly or what was null. The space likely speaks as “traditional” by virtue of its pews, organ, stained glass, and hymnals. However, our stained glass is trees (as opposed to biblical figures), we do not have a lecturn (it was removed because of the hierarchy it implied), and aside from the Bibles in the pews, there is no symbolic elevation of Christian scripture in our sanctuary (although there is a large wooden cross on one side of the chancel). This communicates, to me, a tension between tradition and newer ways of experiencing worship that are probably true to our worship stylings. While I’m happy to say that our sanctuary was redesigned in recent years so that wheelchair access is available to the chancel and wheelchairs can enter the sanctuary through the main doors (as opposed to a side door, which was previously necessary), in our current sanctuary set up, there is little else suggestive of our “Open and Affirming” status beyond what is explicitly printed in bulletins (although sometimes banners are hung with, for instance, hands of many colors or a quote from a POC). It would be nice to see something more consistently suggestive of our efforts, like a Pride flag. Our church is currently commissioning a mural of the Virgen de Guadalupe, which I believe is progress toward these ends. I am grateful for the ways that Harris pointed out what we say with our space. This will be important to me going forward as I advocate for things like our mural and other ways to speak with our space.
Critical analysis of our contexts are important to building Kingdom, as we co-discover the ways that our systems advantage and disadvantage people and address ways to dismantle or reform systems that serve to divide and oppress. I must consider not only the ways that my community and I are explicit in our work toward Kingdom, but what we communicate implicitly or fail to communicate at all. I am asked to continually examine my context and the ways that I communicate it and my goals.
(1) Thomas H. Groome, Christian Religious Education: Sharing Our Story and Vision (New York: Harper and Row, 1981), 35.
(2) Groome suggests that this conflation of “faith” and “belief” stems from Post-Enlightenment ways of thinking, which is primarily concerned with “facts.” Ibid, 57-60.
(3) Maria Harris, Fashion Me a People: Curriculum in the Church (Louisville, KY: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1989), 68.
(4) Groome, Christian Religious Education, 44-45.
(5) Ibid, 141.
(6) bell hooks, Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom (New York: Routledge, 1994), 44.
(7) Ibid, 135.
(8) Class session March 17, 2015: Critical Religious Pedagogy: A Christian Perspective taught by Rev. Dr. Boyung Lee
(9) Ibid, 45-46.
(10) Harris discusses this in terms of “explicit curriculum,” “implicit curriculum,” and “null curriculum.”
Bibliography
1. Groome, Thomas H. Christian Religious Education: Sharing Our Story and Vision. New York: Harper and Row, 1981.
2. Harris, Maria. Fashion Me a People: Curriculum in the Church. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1989.
3. bell hooks. Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom. New York: Routledge, 1994.
Tuesday, October 15, 2019
Christianity Needs Saving
This is going somewhere. Stick with it.
Hebrew is normally written without vowels. They’re not necessary, for the most part. Someone who reads Hebrew knows where the vowels belong. Vowels are included for those learning Hebrew.
In the Jewish scripture, vowels are included for “YHWH.” This is all fine and dandy for the English reader, but if you’re a Jew, you understand that the vowels are placed in positions that don’t make sense… positions that show the word is unspeakable. Naming something gives one power over it. Read Genesis.
We cannot have power over God. This doesn’t mean that we can’t contradict God’s will, but it means we cannot ultimately overcome it.
We each have our own contexts. We each have our own needs. God transcends all of them.
God is mystical. God is subject to certain laws, but God is eternal. God might not be able to grab a microphone and speak to us, but God operates through those who can understand God’s will.
If God is beyond our naming, how can we define ourselves as followers? We call ourselves Christians. It was a name imposed on early Christ followers by Romans. It was name-calling that stuck and was reclaimed by those who wore it.
I feel like “Christian” is name-calling again for me. I don’t want to be what people think of when they think of “Christian,” but I want to be what I am. I want to reclaim the title. I think that requires giving the title back its context. It requires educating people who claim the title so they know what it means.
We throw around our Christian vocabulary and think we’re communicating. We have changed the meanings of our own words. We sometimes understand them differently and mis-communicate because of it.
As much as I hate to identify with the Evangelical movement, I cannot help it in this moment. The idea: “Hate the sin, not the sinner.” I’m going to show you what I mean about words.
Sin is an alien word for me, not because of its meaning, but because of the meaning we gave it.
Literally, “sin” means to miss the mark. There’s nothing wrong with that idea. Of course all of us try to be our best, but we fail. Because we are in the image of God and because we have eaten from the Tree of Knowledge, we understand that failure. We know it when we make mistakes and when we act against our better nature.
The connotations of the word sin have made it alienating. If we understood sin as wandering off the path, whether by daydream or curiosity or a simple childish rebellion, it would not hold its power of guilt. If sin could be understood as it was meant, as an honest mistake or a failure to live up to our potential, it couldn’t haunt us the way it sometimes does.
If sin could truly be understood as missing the mark, we would all understand that all of us fail. We all miss the mark because perfection is an absurd idea brought on by thinking Law is there as more than an example to strive for, but as a set of exclusivist rules by which we can create an esoteric cult. If Law was all that mattered, God would have given us Leviticus and been done with it. We have the good news and it is not that God is an exclusivist. It is not that God wants you to believe x, y, and z.
Jesus didn’t just sit and believe things. Beliefs can’t do anything on their own. Really, when we look at the history of religious belief, what can we say for ourselves? Beliefs don’t seem to help advance science or save countries from war. More often than not, religious beliefs have bred hostility.
And yet…
God’s very nature says, “You cannot define it.” We cannot name God. Any power derived from naming is ultimately arbitrary.
The title Christian, in the grand scheme of things, is arbitrary. It’s the reason I can claim it. I can claim it because I know that calling myself Christian doesn’t make me more like other Christians or less like Muslims. A name is not a source of identity any more than it’s a source of power.
What is a source of power?
I was born into an American family with parents raised Roman Catholic and Mormon, yet who decided that their children had the strength to find God on their own.
I have found God. I have found God in my place of worship.
I imagine that I can also find God in a mosque and a field. God seems to find people wherever they are.
Before I could claim an academic understanding of religion, my understanding of God was very different. It is because of my education that I understand God to be inclusive, to be pervasive, to be limited, despite whatever desire we may have for God to preside over the trivialities of our lives. I also know, however, that God is unlimited in the way that God is active in every Human mind.
If we can nourish God’s mustard seed in our minds with education and context, I know that our contexts can meet and bow to each other and worship together knowing that the ritual, the naming, the scripture (the search) cannot alter God and cannot matter more than the now, because now is all that God is ever working with.
As much as I despise the Evangelical phrase “hate the sinner, not the sin,” I have to embrace it and extend it into my context. “Hate Evangelism, not the Evangelical.”
I have to know that education trumps ignorance. Religious Studies has made me love God and love reality in ways I couldn’t have without it. Religious Studies creates unity and heals ignorance.
And it needs to be in our churches.
Hebrew is normally written without vowels. They’re not necessary, for the most part. Someone who reads Hebrew knows where the vowels belong. Vowels are included for those learning Hebrew.
In the Jewish scripture, vowels are included for “YHWH.” This is all fine and dandy for the English reader, but if you’re a Jew, you understand that the vowels are placed in positions that don’t make sense… positions that show the word is unspeakable. Naming something gives one power over it. Read Genesis.
We cannot have power over God. This doesn’t mean that we can’t contradict God’s will, but it means we cannot ultimately overcome it.
We each have our own contexts. We each have our own needs. God transcends all of them.
God is mystical. God is subject to certain laws, but God is eternal. God might not be able to grab a microphone and speak to us, but God operates through those who can understand God’s will.
If God is beyond our naming, how can we define ourselves as followers? We call ourselves Christians. It was a name imposed on early Christ followers by Romans. It was name-calling that stuck and was reclaimed by those who wore it.
I feel like “Christian” is name-calling again for me. I don’t want to be what people think of when they think of “Christian,” but I want to be what I am. I want to reclaim the title. I think that requires giving the title back its context. It requires educating people who claim the title so they know what it means.
We throw around our Christian vocabulary and think we’re communicating. We have changed the meanings of our own words. We sometimes understand them differently and mis-communicate because of it.
As much as I hate to identify with the Evangelical movement, I cannot help it in this moment. The idea: “Hate the sin, not the sinner.” I’m going to show you what I mean about words.
Sin is an alien word for me, not because of its meaning, but because of the meaning we gave it.
Literally, “sin” means to miss the mark. There’s nothing wrong with that idea. Of course all of us try to be our best, but we fail. Because we are in the image of God and because we have eaten from the Tree of Knowledge, we understand that failure. We know it when we make mistakes and when we act against our better nature.
The connotations of the word sin have made it alienating. If we understood sin as wandering off the path, whether by daydream or curiosity or a simple childish rebellion, it would not hold its power of guilt. If sin could be understood as it was meant, as an honest mistake or a failure to live up to our potential, it couldn’t haunt us the way it sometimes does.
If sin could truly be understood as missing the mark, we would all understand that all of us fail. We all miss the mark because perfection is an absurd idea brought on by thinking Law is there as more than an example to strive for, but as a set of exclusivist rules by which we can create an esoteric cult. If Law was all that mattered, God would have given us Leviticus and been done with it. We have the good news and it is not that God is an exclusivist. It is not that God wants you to believe x, y, and z.
Jesus didn’t just sit and believe things. Beliefs can’t do anything on their own. Really, when we look at the history of religious belief, what can we say for ourselves? Beliefs don’t seem to help advance science or save countries from war. More often than not, religious beliefs have bred hostility.
And yet…
God’s very nature says, “You cannot define it.” We cannot name God. Any power derived from naming is ultimately arbitrary.
The title Christian, in the grand scheme of things, is arbitrary. It’s the reason I can claim it. I can claim it because I know that calling myself Christian doesn’t make me more like other Christians or less like Muslims. A name is not a source of identity any more than it’s a source of power.
What is a source of power?
I was born into an American family with parents raised Roman Catholic and Mormon, yet who decided that their children had the strength to find God on their own.
I have found God. I have found God in my place of worship.
I imagine that I can also find God in a mosque and a field. God seems to find people wherever they are.
Before I could claim an academic understanding of religion, my understanding of God was very different. It is because of my education that I understand God to be inclusive, to be pervasive, to be limited, despite whatever desire we may have for God to preside over the trivialities of our lives. I also know, however, that God is unlimited in the way that God is active in every Human mind.
If we can nourish God’s mustard seed in our minds with education and context, I know that our contexts can meet and bow to each other and worship together knowing that the ritual, the naming, the scripture (the search) cannot alter God and cannot matter more than the now, because now is all that God is ever working with.
As much as I despise the Evangelical phrase “hate the sinner, not the sin,” I have to embrace it and extend it into my context. “Hate Evangelism, not the Evangelical.”
I have to know that education trumps ignorance. Religious Studies has made me love God and love reality in ways I couldn’t have without it. Religious Studies creates unity and heals ignorance.
And it needs to be in our churches.
Monday, October 14, 2019
Literalism and Exclusionary Theology
Beyond Authority: Scripture in Our Churches (edited down)
In A New Teaching of Authority: a Re-evaluation of the Authority of the Bible, Mary Ann Tolbert aptly discusses the ways in which ecclesiastical institutions use a “special hermeneutic” in studying the Bible that allows for selective, biased, and harmful uses of scripture. She discusses how prevailing lenses of the academy are decidedly different in their approach to biblical study; how prevailing uses of scripture as authoritative have damaging consequences and involve removing scriptural passages from their textual, historical, and cultural contexts; and how church hierarchies are reinforced and laity stagnated by defining how scripture is to be interpreted by adherents. She argues that the authoritative use of scripture is damaging in ways that are seemingly at odds with the “spirit” of the text.
Scholarship within the field of religion has set aside the “specialness” of the Bible in order to give it the fair treatment applied to other historical and ancient texts. Different fields’ expertise offer a multiplicity of ways to view scripture, including through the lenses of history, archaeology, sociology, psychology, and linguistics, which allow academics different ways to view biblical material and study it in ways that allow for multivalence. The academy treats the Bible as no different than scripture from other faith traditions or other great works of antiquity. Such lenses have not only allowed for a more generous interpretation of the biblical texts, but also have brought us closer to what the lives and communities of our spiritual ancestors may have been like and what their intentions and viewpoints may have been. It is through the contributions of scholarship that we can see how scripture has been used to “exclude certain groups or people… and to justify morally or historically debatable positions” (Tolbert, 171). Churches, in selective uses of scripture that are promoted by those with authority, have promoted uses of the Bible that allow for morally repugnant practices and worldviews to be spread and justified. History shows us that scripture has been used to promote slavery, the Holocaust, suppression of women and minorities, and homophobia by elevating “tenuous and marginal” passages which are in contrast to the spirit of the Bible and have debatable meanings in their original languages and contexts (Tolbert, 171).
Tolbert further explicates her position by discussing how the “special hermeneutics” found often within religious bodies are “radically ahistorical” (Tolbert, 176). In treating the Bible as transcendent in its capacity to be applied to the specific lives and needs of all individuals and communities, it must necessarily be removed from the lenses and biases of the biblical authors and their contexts (Tolbert, 176). Such a perspective consequently leads one to disregard the worldviews of antiquity that are undoubtedly pervasive in the texts and apply them to the modern world, centuries removed from the Bible’s authorship, in ways that the authors could not have foreseen and make little sense given the scientific, technological, and societal advancements that have been made (Tolbert, 177). Furthermore, such application of the texts often requires picking very small passages from a large collection of books in order to meet specific needs of today. Such passages must be removed from their contextual reading in order to be applied to a very different modern world (Tolbert, 178). Finally, Tolbert shows us that “multiple meanings” are ruled out in favor of a “single meaning” which is decided by those in institutional power (Tolbert, 180). Such treatment of clergy as authoritative “advances the pervasive and demoralizing attitude of regarding laity as passive, perpetual children” and disallows clergy from being honest with themselves or their congregants (Tolbert, 173). While such treatments of the text are well-intentioned and are undoubtedly indicative of efforts to faithfully apply the Bible to our own contexts, Tolbert reminds us that “there are no neutral interpretations” and that any treatment of the Bible’s text must be influenced by our own paradigms (Tolbert, 182). Taking these arguments into consideration, it seems obvious to me that the “special hermeneutic” is applied inconsistently and in ways that reinforce extant paradigms within a given church body, inevitably leading to damaging uses that fortify the positions of those in power, often while encouraging for oppression and discrimination.
Mary Ann Tolbert expresses well how biblical authority and the “special hermeneutic” applied to the text by many churches is not only misguided but has been historically damaging. The academy’s lenses are decidedly different and more balanced in their approach to the Bible and more honest with the reality that “Jesus of the canonical gospels expends much of his ministry on breaking down… boundaries which permitted some to claim power and superiority” (Tolbert, 177). Prevailing uses of scripture as authoritative involve selective treatment of tenuous portions of the Bible that serve to reinforce community prejudices and preserve power structures. Removing such passages from their textual, historical, and cultural contexts allows for uses which no biblical authors could have foreseen or understood and which have detrimental effects on society. Tolbert shows us how authoritative use of scripture is often at odds with overall biblical themes. The lessons of Tolbert’s perspective could be applied in ways that bridge the gap between academic and community treatment of the Bible which could augment our own experience of the text as well as create a “defense” against dangerous usage of our scripture.
Works Cited
Tolbert, Mary. “A New Teaching with Authority: A Re-evaluation of the Authority of the Bible.” In Teaching the Bible: The Discourses and Politics of Biblical Pedagogy, edited by Fernando F. Segoviov and Mary Ann Tolbert, 168 - 189. New York: Orbis Books, 1998.
Lesson/Family Home Evening: Sukkot
Opening Check-Ins
We support each other no matter what. Invite everyone to share something that made them happy and/or something that made them sad this past week. We are here to support each other in prayer and presence.Centering in Silence and Song
If you have a household altar, I recommend using it. If not, a sense of ritual and sacred time can be initiated by lighting a candle and ringing a bell (three times is usually a good way to help everyone settle into silence). Share a few minutes of silence together. You may sound the bell again when silence is over. Children often enjoy the responsibility of these tasks (and should be supervised and assisted as appropriate).Prayer of Jesus
If you have a particular version of the prayer that you use, you are encouraged to use it.This is the "children's translation" that I wrote and use with my students:
God all around us with many sacred names
We roll up our sleeves to create a beautiful world with you
Please care for us and our needs and forgive us when we don’t do our best
Please help us to be forgiving of others, too.
Help us to be good, loving, and safe so we can help create a loving and safe world for everyone.
Amen.
Sacred Story
Background:
This Sunday past Sunday was the beginning of Sukkot, a festival that Jewish people celebrate every year. It lasts for one week.Sometimes we call the festival the “Festival of Tabernacles” or the “Festival of Booths,” because people set up a booth for the week. During the week, people will eat outside in their booth instead of inside, like we normally do.
Why do you think people might live outside? Are there stories in the Bible in which people don’t have homes?
Sukkot helps Jewish people and all of us remember the time that the Hebrews wandered in the desert after Moses helped the people escape from enslavement in Egypt. The Jewish people are said to have lived in the desert for 40 years! That’s a long time!
Sukkot is also a harvest festival. Who knows what that is?
At this time of year, it would have traditionally been the last big harvest before winter, when it would be hard to grow food for a long time. So people would have a great big feast to celebrate. So it is a happy holiday, because we are celebrating what we have.
One of the things that people did during Sukkot was gather the “four species.” We’ll learn a little bit about that. They would also read from the book of Ecclesiastes, which is one of the shortest books in the Bible. We’ll talk about that today, too.
Craft: Make a Booth!
Bible Story:
Read together about Sukkot from "High Holidays and More"Read together “A Time for Everything” in Growing in God's Love (p. 160-161).
Read together "The Best Sukkot Pumpkin Ever" by Laya Steinberg
Conversation:
Read together "God is a Secret" in Images of God for Young Children (p. 20-21)Closing Prayer
Pray together the prayer on p. 22 of "First Prayers"Curriculum texts used:
- Images of God for Young Children by Marie-Helene Delval
- First Prayers by Caroline Jayne Church
- Growing In God's Love: A Story Bible by Elizabeth F. Caldwell and Carol A. Wehrheim
Special Texts used:
Saturday, October 12, 2019
Thursday, October 10, 2019
Monday, October 7, 2019
Saturday, October 5, 2019
Early Chinese Immigrant Experience in the U.S.
When Chinese immigrants first immigrated to the U.S., they were often treated kindly. However, soon after their arrival, they were subject to targeted taxation, unfair wage rates, and other forms of discrimination. Like other minority groups in the U.S., they were pitted against other groups to compete for wages and jobs.
Chinese immigrants were major contributors to the Central Pacific Railroad, forming 90 percent of the workforce at one point. They also helped California to develop its agricultural lands and make them fit for the agricultural industries that would ultimately lead to a large portion of California’s economy and the United States’ food supply. Chinese immigrants also often opened laundries, seeking self-employment in a field with little competition with white men (because laundry work was seen as women’s work) in an effort to avoid the kinds of discrimination they faced in other fields and to gain agency in a political and social climate that was oppressive. As time progressed, more and more barriers and forms of racism and oppression would be laid upon Chinese Americans, forbidding their testimony in court for or against white persons and prohibiting interracial marriage. Such laws were rooted in racism and white supremacy that suggested Chinese (as well as African Americans and American Indians) were a lesser people both physically and intellectually. However, without Chinese immigration to the U.S., construction of railroads would likely have gone very differently. Similarly, California may not be the agricultural state that it is; much of California’s land might have remained unavailable for the kinds of farming it is used for today.
During economic downturn at the end of the 19th century, as many working class Americans experienced unemployment, more restrictions were imposed upon Chinese immigrants. There was a 10 year ban on Chinese immigration and Chinese Americans were prohibited from obtaining citizenship. It was not until after the 1906 earthquake that more opportunities were available for citizenship and for families to come the the U.S.
Chinese immigrants were major contributors to the Central Pacific Railroad, forming 90 percent of the workforce at one point. They also helped California to develop its agricultural lands and make them fit for the agricultural industries that would ultimately lead to a large portion of California’s economy and the United States’ food supply. Chinese immigrants also often opened laundries, seeking self-employment in a field with little competition with white men (because laundry work was seen as women’s work) in an effort to avoid the kinds of discrimination they faced in other fields and to gain agency in a political and social climate that was oppressive. As time progressed, more and more barriers and forms of racism and oppression would be laid upon Chinese Americans, forbidding their testimony in court for or against white persons and prohibiting interracial marriage. Such laws were rooted in racism and white supremacy that suggested Chinese (as well as African Americans and American Indians) were a lesser people both physically and intellectually. However, without Chinese immigration to the U.S., construction of railroads would likely have gone very differently. Similarly, California may not be the agricultural state that it is; much of California’s land might have remained unavailable for the kinds of farming it is used for today.
During economic downturn at the end of the 19th century, as many working class Americans experienced unemployment, more restrictions were imposed upon Chinese immigrants. There was a 10 year ban on Chinese immigration and Chinese Americans were prohibited from obtaining citizenship. It was not until after the 1906 earthquake that more opportunities were available for citizenship and for families to come the the U.S.
Friday, October 4, 2019
How do we read the Bible?
I think the three tools I bring to Scripture most prominently are life stories, current events, and questioning/criticism.
I bring my life stories and my world to meet the text in what is most often a search for comfort. I ask how the dominant stories in my life and formation play with (by parallel or contrast) the text. This can be transformative when the comfort I find resists ways that we are taught to resist love in our lives. When I consider current events, I look for both comfort and discomfort/challenge. I try to ask how the "now" meets the stories in the text and how the text might have something to say about our now.
The third piece is informed by much of my academic career and is the piece that is transformative for me, probably because, as Rowan Williams suggests, transformation happens when our interpretations are least palatable. I try to bring historical criticism to the text and also ask how what we can glean about a historical context might mean about the ways that our characters or stories were subversive and counter-cultural in their time and how those lessons might be extrapolated. I try to ask the ways that God might be speaking to or through the characters. I also try to look for the dangerous places in the text-- the meanings I want to resist and be clear I resist when talking about the text. I want to try to look for how meanings might be read by people at different margins as well as those squarely in the center. This involves looking for who has power and lacks it in the text (and why), how this power is wielded, distributed, reinforced, and resisted. How do gender, color, class, and sexuality play out in the story-- how do roles conform or subvert? Who is given voice? In order to make sure I am being effective, I look for ways that I might be reinforcing systems, stereotypes, or harmful ideologies.
Thursday, October 3, 2019
Lesson/Family Home Evening: World Communion Sunday
Opening Check-Ins
We support each other no matter what. Invite everyone to share something that made them happy and/or something that made them sad this past week. We are here to support each other in prayer and presence.Centering in Silence and Song
If you have a household altar, I recommend using it. If not, a sense of ritual and sacred time can be initiated by lighting a candle and ringing a bell (three times is usually a good way to help everyone settle into silence). Share a few minutes of silence together. You may sound the bell again when silence is over. Children often enjoy the responsibility of these tasks (and should be supervised and assisted as appropriate).You may also listen to this song and discuss what it brings up for each of you:
Prayer of Jesus
If you have a particular version of the prayer that you use, you are encouraged to use it.This is the "children's translation" that I wrote and use with my students:
God all around us with many sacred names
We roll up our sleeves to create a beautiful world with you
Please care for us and our needs and forgive us when we don’t do our best
Please help us to be forgiving of others, too.
Help us to be good, loving, and safe so we can help create a loving and safe world for everyone.
Amen.
Sacred Story
Background:
Sunday, October 6, 2019 is World Communion Sunday. Today we celebrate communion with churches all over the world. While we know that we have many differences, we know that we have more in common, and that God wants us all to be blessed and have access to nourishment of all kinds.Churches around the world celebrate communion differently. They use different kinds of bread and different kinds of drink. Some churches use water; some use wine; some use wine mixed with water, others use grape juice.
In some ancient communities, they also used milk and honey to signify to coming sweetness of Kingdom.
In early Christian communities, communion was part of a Pot Luck. Everyone-- the rich and poor together-- ate together. For some people, this might have been the most substantial meal of the week. If people weren't able to make it to church, communion was often brought to them at home. This was a very important part of Jesus’ ministry because it was very strange at the time for Jesus to eat with so many different kinds of people. People back then usually ate with people like them-- from their tribe, from their social class, etc. Today we have our potluck, too! Just like many early Christians a long, long time ago.
Does anyone know why we celebrate communion?
We celebrate communion to remember Jesus and the way he gathered with his disciples. Before his crucifixion, Jesus asked his followers to continue gathering and breaking bread together. Jesus gathered with his followers as friends and equals, even though that was scandalous in his time. Jesus challenges us to make friends with everyone and make sure everyone has enough to eat. Jesus had friends from all different kinds of jobs, with different kinds of families, differently sized houses… he had a diversity of friends. They would get together, bring food, eat, and talk to each other. They would share ways they think they made mistakes that week, things they were grateful for, and things they needed help with. We celebrate communion, in part, to remember Jesus’ expansive (big!) love that he shared with his friends and all of us.
So today we will bake some bread together and share communion, and we’ll use juice, water, milk, and honey and try to imagine what it might be like to share communion in different communities.
At Peace, we gather around a table, hold hands, and sing. Have you ever seen people serve communion differently or been a part of a different kind of communion ritual?
Craft:
We’ll make some simple rolls and prepare milk, honey, water, and juice for communion. Once things are ready and we are waiting for baking to finish, we can read a story.Since we are thinking about the ways we are similar and different from others today, let’s read a story about different kinds of creation stories.
Bible Story:
“The Creation” (Genesis 1 in “Children of God Storybook Bible” p. 8 -11)Contemporary story: “First Light, First Life: A Worldwide Creation Story”
Conversation:
What are the differences in the stories? What are the similarities? What do the creation stories teach us? (How special our earth is to us and to God. We can help take care of the earth and its creatures. Part of how we can do that is by trying to be mindful of what we eat and where it comes from, so we can make sure everyone has enough to eat and will continue to for a long time!)
Closing Circle
We will pray and share communion together. You may close circle time with a prayer of your choosing (improvised or otherwise), or use this offering:
"At his last supper, Jesus showed us a way to gather in community. He gathered with his followers and loved ones, diverse as they were, and made room for them all at the table. All were fed-- both their bodies and their spirits .
"He broke bread with his followers, knowing we all feel broken sometimes, but also knowing that love brings people together like wheat from many fields that rises up together as something new, like how bread is made.
"Jesus poured the cup to share with his followers, showing them how love flows freely and generously. There is always enough love for everyone.
“Do these things in memory of me,” he said, so we gather in his name to pour out our love and hope in community together. Amen."
Today we have water. Water reminds us of our baptisms and that God loves us. It can also help remind us how important clean water is. Water is life. It’s important to keep waters clean for all of us.
We also have milk and honey. This reminds us how sweet things can be and how sweet God’s love is. We believe that a better world is possible, and this milk and honey helps remind us of the sweetness to come.
Closing Prayer: "God, we thank you for bread, juice, and all the foods that give us life. Thank you for the wheat fields, for the bees that pollinate, for the farmers who grow and pick our food, for the workers in the stores, and for the many people who work so we have enough to eat. We thank you for rituals that can bring us together in community and for the memory of Jesus. Amen."
Curriculum texts used:
- Children of God Storybook Bible by Archbishop Desmond Tutu
- Images of God for Young Children by Marie-Helene Delval
Wednesday, October 2, 2019
A Lament For Those With Eating Disorders
God who sees me,
Where are you in my mirror?
Where are you in the fat on my arms, in my stomach, in my legs?
How can I love when I must embrace with these arms?
How can I proclaim your glory with my mouth that consumes?
How can I love my brothers and sisters who starve when I mock them with my own starvation?
How can I love my brothers and sisters who starve when I am gluttonous?
My God of abundance and suffering, please give me balance and strength.
I want to be at your feast.
I want to find agape.
I want to drink of the cup of blessing.
Nourish me, God.
Fill me, Sustainer of Life.
I need you to dwell in my bodily temple.
I know you die and live in the bread and the cup.
God, be in my stomach and my veins.
Be my balance, my constant.
I need you to dwell in my bodily temple.
God who created the fruit and grain,
God who breathed life into me,
God who wants us to eat freely from the garden,
Let me find you in the fruit of the Tree of Life.
Tuesday, October 1, 2019
The Need for Historical Honesty
My identities as Anglo-American, working class, female, cisgendered, and heterosexual interact in complex ways. The complex interaction of my white privilege and economic background led to confused feelings of disparity in my youth. While I understood that my family had fewer economic resources than many of my peers and that my neighborhood looked different than some others, my white privilege also obscured my economic disadvantages. Comfortable within western educational formats and given privileged treatment because of the normativity of whiteness in American culture, it has not been until this semester that I have made the connection between “having less” and the reality of my upbringing. The weight of my family’s financial struggles does not feel heavy to me, not only because of my parent’s frugality and emotional support and commitment, but because of my white privilege-- I was not treated “poor” the same way that a person of color would be (not that I am suggesting my family was poor-- we were working class/lower middle class). Because my life is relatively privileged in most other ways, I have been able to succeed within the public school system and employment. My achievements are seen and recognized; few members of society view me with suspicion, despite whatever criminal, economic, family, or other background I may or may not have because I present in ways that are normative. Understanding my own intersections and borders has allowed me to see my own sensitivities, blind spots, advantages, and disadvantages in a new way. This journey will hopefully allow me to help others analyze their own intersections in pastoral contexts.
Knowing that many ethnic communities are still effectively segregated and impoverished, I have a better understanding of the historical uses of power that have oppressed communities (and continue to oppress them) as well as a better ability to discern historical patterns of discrimination. I now see more clearly how our politicians and many leaders and individuals in positions of extreme privilege seek to foment racial conflict among laboring and working class individuals (often under the guise of “immigration” or “criminality”), in order to direct economic and employment frustrations horizontally instead of laterally. This pattern of positioning ethnic and racial labor groups against one another has kept Americans from seeking effective change together in labor conflicts throughout the history of our country. Better understanding the history of my country also compels me to share this knowledge. Knowing that our school systems are failing to provide our people with this kind of information, I feel it is the responsibility of our churches to help people understand these histories and the affects they have on communities and individuals today. Seeing these patterns and knowing this alternative telling of our history, I hope I can better understand the communities I may be called to serve and also promote prophetic engagement with the continuing injustices and prejudices that plague our society and keep us complicit in and ignorant of systems of injustice. These stories will elevate and contextualize the justice and community work of our religious institutions and help future generations to better understand the big and small ways that our lives interact.
Knowing that many ethnic communities are still effectively segregated and impoverished, I have a better understanding of the historical uses of power that have oppressed communities (and continue to oppress them) as well as a better ability to discern historical patterns of discrimination. I now see more clearly how our politicians and many leaders and individuals in positions of extreme privilege seek to foment racial conflict among laboring and working class individuals (often under the guise of “immigration” or “criminality”), in order to direct economic and employment frustrations horizontally instead of laterally. This pattern of positioning ethnic and racial labor groups against one another has kept Americans from seeking effective change together in labor conflicts throughout the history of our country. Better understanding the history of my country also compels me to share this knowledge. Knowing that our school systems are failing to provide our people with this kind of information, I feel it is the responsibility of our churches to help people understand these histories and the affects they have on communities and individuals today. Seeing these patterns and knowing this alternative telling of our history, I hope I can better understand the communities I may be called to serve and also promote prophetic engagement with the continuing injustices and prejudices that plague our society and keep us complicit in and ignorant of systems of injustice. These stories will elevate and contextualize the justice and community work of our religious institutions and help future generations to better understand the big and small ways that our lives interact.
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