[Dialogue] 6/07/18 Progressing Spirit: Van Ham/Wolsey: Ready, Set…RECEIVE!; Spong revisited

Thu Jun 7 07:32:21 PDT 2018

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Ready, Set…RECEIVE!

Essay by Rev. Lauren Van Ham on June 7, 2018

 The June sun was shining, but the whipping wind had us under hats and hoods, huddled close to hear the Naturalist’s instructions, “These flowers just poked out of snow last week.  Up here, Summer turns to Fall by mid-August.  Tundra takes hundreds of years to grow and one sloppily-placed hiking boot can destroy it all.” Then, he pointed across the Alpine carpet, to a collection of immense boulders and we began – adults, grandparents, and children (I was one of those) – hopping rock to rock.  A few paused, using their telephoto lenses to capture the blooms mere centimeters wide; the athletic made it into a game of how quickly they could “gazelle” from one rock to the next; and others moved with deference to the altitude, reaching for each inhale of thin air.  Other species – marmots, elk, birds – might have been looking on quizzically, but we did all we could to not touch our feet to the strong, fragile life below.
It is the launch of Summer.  Graduations abound, sleep-away camps will soon begin, and in this season, Earth’s generosity offers strawberries, thundershowers, long days of sunlight, and lightning bugs after dark.  Near the Continental Divide, snow may still fall, but underneath, the resilient Moss Campion faithfully await their perennial unveiling in technicolor!  Whether we’re there to “ooh,” & “ahhh,” or not, Earth gives and gives and gives.  It would appear that our role is to receive, which isn’t the same as consuming or taking.
Probably as for many of you, the events and responding events happening in our world today don’t match the teachings I’ve received from National Park guides, indigenous people around the world, and most sacred texts.  In the Christian Gospels there is Luke 6:38,
Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down,
shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap; for the
measure you give will be the measure you get back. (NRSV)
As a child raised in the 70s, I also think about the holy teachings of Sesame Street, Mister Rogers and Mary Poppins all of whom iterated that it was good to enjoy things so long as we ask permission, share, and put them back when we are done.  All of this is a start, but in a time when so much has been taken without permission, sold for profit, and with no plan for return or replenishment, I find myself in despair.  Taking coal and minerals buried deep in the earth, while depositing plastic bags and last year’s furniture in the landfill is clearly not an honorable exchange, nor is it healthy for any of us.
Thankfully (and finally!), we are seeing the errors of our quick-fix dependencies…and we are wondering what this will continue to mean for our children, oceans, forests, and other species.  How can we, in this moment, wake up, make amends, and learn from Earth’s practices of giving and receiving?
If we paraphrase Luke 6:38, the take-away is that giving begets giving.  And when I think back to rock-hopping in the tundra that day, it was the same.  We were giving Life the space and honor it needed so Life could give us her abundant show: lacey rivulets of water, verdant greens photosynthesizing and providing fresh air, brilliant colors and patterns that we, in turn, desperately try to mirror in our daily lives through design, art and technology.
These offerings that capitalism deductively label, “resources,” are what Native people call, “relatives.”  What might feel different for us if, instead of taking, we recognized the abundance of what is being freely given?  And what happens if we return the gift by really celebrating the Giver?  I don’t know whether Hafiz, the 12th century poet, was foreshadowing photovoltaic potential, but every time I read these words, I smile,
……………………....Even after all this time
………………………The sun never says to the earth,
………………………“You owe Me.”
………………………Look what happens with a love like that,
………………………It lights the Whole Sky.
Receiving is an active stance.  What, in this moment, is being Given?  Start small.  The birds singing?  The smell of lilacs coming through the window?  Your cat, sprawled out and dreaming in the sunbeam?  “Thank you, beautiful beings, for all that you are giving!  I receive you, and in return I give you my love.”  Now make it bigger. Wind, sun and waves are Earth’s ever-present rhythms of giving and receiving. Each, with their own force, create renewable cycles of communication, nourishment, and energy!  We haven’t fully received these gifts, not yet.  And to do so will require some active giving on our part.
What if, this Summer, we give ourselves to receiving Earth’s teachings?   Like any spiritual practice that’s worthwhile, it asks for our time and discipline.  That’s alright; our relative, the tundra, models the virtues of both.  And the promise of a spiritual practice done well is sanity, insight and our return to the sacred experience of Belonging.  I hope you’ll join me: ready, set….RECEIVE!

~ Rev. Lauren Van Ham

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About the Author
Born and raised beneath the big sky of the Midwest, Lauren holds degrees from Carnegie Mellon University, Naropa University and The Chaplaincy Institute.  Following her ordination in 1999, Lauren served as an interfaith chaplain in both healthcare (adolescent psychiatry and palliative care), and corporate settings (organizational development and employee wellness). Her passion and training in the fine arts, spirituality and Earth’s teachings has supported her specialization in eco-ministry, grief & loss, and sacred activism.  Lauren’s work with Green Sangha (a Bay Area-based non-profit) is featured in Renewal, a documentary celebrating the efforts of environmental activism taking place in religious America.  Her essay, “Way of the Eco-Chaplain,” appears in the collection, Ways of the Spirit: Voices of Women.  Lauren tends a private spiritual direction practice and serves as Dean for The Chaplaincy Institute in Berkeley, CA.

Question & Answer

Q: By Kenneth

No argument: the Christian church was complacent about standing up to Hitler and the holocaust.  But ... in the United States, it also failed to stand up to Vietnam.  It has tolerated racism, slavery, lynching, torture, and the death penalty.  It is substantially failing to stand up to climate change.  And now, it is failing to stand up to Trump's immorality, enrichment of the wealthy, military buildup, and trashing of the environment.  What should our expectations be?  I'm not convinced that saying "thank you" to God is adequate.

A: By Rev. Roger Wolsey

Dear Kenneth,
You certainly raise some valid concerns and offer a critique of much of the Church over the years – and today. There were, of course, all sorts of Church leaders who defied and denounced Hitler, and the same is true for racism, segregation, and the Vietnam conflict. That said, it is the case that there has been a tendency for churches to go along with the status quo and not rock boats that need rocking. While there are prophetic exceptions who have bravely spoken truth to power – they do seem to be in the minority – or at least, the media doesn’t put them in the limelight very frequently.
You may respond to what I’m saying thus far with, “Yes, of course and you are minimizing things greatly.” To which I would respond with a reminder that it only seems like the Church in the US is full of moral quietude. The fact is that most denominations do take stands on various matters of the day. The largest denomination in the US is the Roman Catholic Church – roughly ½ of all Christians in the U.S. – and that denomination has a long track-record for social engagement and speaking truth to power. Similarly, most all of the major mainline denominations (United Methodist, ELCA, PCUSA, UCC, Episcopal, etc.) have strong history – and present – of work toward social change and transformation, and advocacy for social justice and the environment. If one’s primary exposure to American Christianity is televangelists, mega-churches, and evangelical and fundamentalist Christianity one might conclude otherwise. For whatever reason, intellectual laziness and simplistic thinking most likely, the media tends to conflate all forms of Christianity with the conservative variety and give those types of church leaders the most voice and visibility. But rest assured, the loyal opposition is alive and well!
Let us consider the fine work of Jim Wallis and the Sojourner’s community over the past several decades.
Let us consider the bold Moral Mondays movement led by Rev. William Barber III. This movement is now in its 5th year.
Let us consider the recent “Reclaiming Jesus” event in Washington, D.C. that was held by many church leaders who are opposed to the policies of the Trump administration and how certain sectors of the Church are blessing those deplorable actions.
And let us consider the over 340,000 participants on The Christian Left Facebook page as well as the over 233,000 followers of the Kissing Fish Facebook page – realizing that these are but a small number of the many forums for progressive Christians who are seeking to put their faith into action and allow Jesus (as opposed to Caesar) to be lord/savior/Christ of their political lives as part of their discipleship.
Again, your critique is a good and needed one. The growing number of people who are leaving Christianity - or who were never part of it – yearn to see authentic Christianity showing up in a world that so badly needs Christians to truly be Christian and the Church to be The Church.
I will close with these words pulled and collaged from the Talmud, “Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world’s grief. Do justly now. Love mercy now. Walk humbly now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it.”
Yours in Pax Christi - not Pax Romana/Americana,
~ Rev. Roger Wolsey

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About the Author
Rev. Roger Wolsey is an ordained United Methodist pastor who directs the Wesley Foundation at the University of Colorado at Boulder, and is author of Kissing Fish: christianity for people who don’t like christianity; The Kissing Fish Facebook page; Roger’s Blog on Patheos “The Holy Kiss”

Bishop John Shelby Spong Revisited

The Dark Side of Evangelical Religion

Essay by Bishop John Shelby Spong on August 31, 2005

 I often wonder what Bible it is that people read in America’s Bible Belt. I wonder what the religion is that is practiced by the Religious Right. It certainly does not connect with my understanding of Christianity. Perhaps I am the one who is blind to the things they perceive, but seeing their
enthusiasm for war, their lack of concern for the welfare of minorities, their overt homophobia, and their violence (as expressed in the number of legal executions in that region), I cannot help but ask those who live in the Bible Belt and those who hold membership in the Religious Right to help me comprehend the religious understanding that they espouse.
This issue was raised sharply for me recently by a remark from Pat Robertson, president and owner of the Christian Broadcasting Television Network. On his 700 Club program, Robertson — one of America’s leading evangelical voices — called for the assassination of Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez. Murder, apparently, is a legitimate Christian solution when you have a disagreement with someone. Robertson, who was a candidate for the Republican nomination for president in 1988, is a major force in the religious base dedicated to the presidency of George W. Bush. (Bush’s “red state” region is the home of the most overtly religious voters in this country.) The president has represented their point of view well with his opposition to abortion, stem-cell research, homosexuality, and the right to make end-of-life decisions. Utterances emanating from Pat Robertson’s lips, however, do not sound to me like the words of a religious leader, at least not a Christian religious leader.
This murder recommendation, by the way, was not his only bizarre moral lapse. Writing about the feminist movement in a fund-raising letter, Robertson said: “The feminist agenda is not about equal rights for women. It is about a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians.” That does not sound like the feminists I know and is especially offensive to those feminists who are my wife and daughters. About homosexuality Robertson has not only been hostile but also
uninformed and judgmental. Additionally he has combined his prejudices by adding the faint odor of anti-Semitism to his homophobia. In a Christmas Eve program, he once said: “The acceptance of homosexuality is the last step in the decline of gentile Christianity.” Now he has decided that the murder of Hugo Chavez is within his understanding of Christianity. This is the same man, I remind you, who championed the right of Chief Justice Roy Moore of Alabama to hang the Ten Commandments in his courtroom. Perhaps Robertson has not read those commandments recently, but the last time I looked they still contained the injunction: “Thou shalt not kill.”
It was amusing yet frightening to watch some of this nation’s other evangelical leaders dance around these comments by their colleague. One of them tried to justify Robertson’s words by suggesting that they came during “the political side” of Robertson’s television program rather than “the religious side.” This strange logic suggests that murder is okay in the political arena, but not in the religious arena. Somehow murder seems to me to be both terminal and evil in either place. Jesse Jackson’s request that the Federal Communications Commission discipline Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network for his comments, just as they disciplined CBS and MTV over the exposure of Janet Jackson’s breast during the half-time show of the Super Bowl in 2004, was dismissed by the same evangelical leader as not being “in the same category of moral concern,” the implication being that the comments were a lesser offense. That argument’s value escapes me. A performer’s exposed breast is certainly in bad taste but no one died as a result of that insensitive act. To call for the murder of a head of state because you dislike his politics strikes me as of a totally different and far more severe moral dimension. Members of the Religious Right do seem to be more obsessed with issues of sexuality than they are about issues like war and peace or discrimination. Sometimes they remind me of the old joke that “fundamentalists are opposed to sex because it might lead to dancing!”
I grew up a Southern evangelical fundamentalist in the Bible Belt. I certainly needed the security it offered me during the early years of my life, as I dealt with both death and poverty. I left that movement, however, because I found it intellectually bankrupt and morally indefensible. It was their indefensible morality far more than their intellectual bankruptcy that bothered me the most even then. Intellectual issues can be debated, facts cited, and minds changed. I know that from my own spiritual journey. When immoral activity done in the name of religion occurs, however, the scars created by both the pain of disillusionment and the loss of integrity are very long lasting. So out of the
embarrassment of listening to a person identified as a Christian calling for an act of murder, I seek answers to my searching questions.
What Bible do people read in that region of America we call the Bible Belt? In that part of our nation, church going is more popular than it is in any other part of America, and people living there hold to their religious affiliations very deeply. Yet that is the same part of America that engaged in slavery until they were required to give up that inhumane practice by force of arms. Is the enslavement of human beings compatible with the Christian life? Certainly quotations from Holy Scripture were used to justify slavery and to remove any pangs of guilt that might have accompanied that institution in the hearts of the “fine Christian slaveholders” of the South. Yet how does slavery square with Jesus’ words: “By this will all know that you are my disciples, if you love one another” (John 13:35). Would they have me believe that slavery is simply a form of love that I do not recognize? Is the calling for the murder of a head of state also a form of love that I just do not understand?
When slavery was made illegal in the Bible Belt following the American Civil War, its bastard stepchild, known as segregation, took its place. Black people were separated from white people by law. Their children were forced to go to inferior schools. They were not allowed access to public libraries, public parks, or public toilets. They were refused service in both hotels and restaurants, and they were prohibited from trying on clothes in department stores and dress shops. Black people had no standing and few rights in the white-dominated courts. Enforcing these brutal practices was an organization called the Ku Klux Klan, which used the primary Christian symbol, a cross, turning it into an instrument of intimidation and fear by setting it ablaze. The Klan was also served by a “Khaplain,” who invariably articulated the values of what was called white, gentile Christianity, while at the same time seeking to dominate and coerce people of color with physical violence. The great majority of the white people of the Bible Belt supported segregation until it was declared to be illegal in 1954 by a unanimous ruling of the Supreme Court. Even then the white Christians of the South resisted that law by every possible means, legal and illegal. “Massive resistance to the law of the land” was the motto adopted by the church-going political organization run by Senator Harry Byrd of Virginia. It was fully supported by the junior senator from that same state, A. Willis Robertson, who along with his wife, were quite overtly religious, God-fearing, church-going Christians. They were also the parents of evangelist Pat Robertson. Perhaps neither the Byrds nor the Robertsons ever read Jesus’ words describing his purpose as that of bringing life, abundant life to all (John 10:10). Or perhaps they were able to convince themselves that segregation offered enhancement, not diminishment, of the humanity of black people.
What kind of religion was being practiced in the Bible Belt of the South when lynching, mostly of black males, occurred there with great regularity until the mid-twentieth century with the full support of both the white law-enforcement officials and the white dominated courts? How was it possible that Southern sheriffs, police officials, judges, and juries, who winked at this murder of black people, were also God-fearing, Bible-reading, church-going Christians? If they could square the lynching of “offensive” black males with the Christianity they practiced in the Bible Belt, then calling for the murder of an offending head of state in Venezuela by a well-known Southern Christian evangelist a generation later should be easy to understand.
America’s Religious Right was appalled at the sexual misconduct of President Clinton. So was I. But again their moral compass seems askew when they are not equally appalled at the behavior of a president who has taken us into a war based on blatantly false intelligence data. He has presided over a tremendous abuse of human rights in both Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo for which no persons other than enlisted personnel have yet been convicted. His actions have cost the lives of some 1,900 American service persons, the wounding of thousands more, to say nothing of his responsibility for the deaths of uncounted Iraqis. His religious supporters appear to feel no outrage about this. Yet this president claims that his religion guides his every action.
I am glad Pat Robertson got caught with his moral pants hanging at half-mast, for it is time that the citizens of this country awaken to the dark side of the religious coalition that threatens, if it has not already done so, to seize power in the United States.
So, I return to my questions: What Bible do they read in the Bible Belt? What kind of religion do those who are said to be members of the Religious Right practice? What kind of Christian evangelist is it who thinks it is moral to call for the murder of a head of state? I would love to have an answer. So would an increasingly larger and larger segment of the citizens of the United States.
~  John Shelby Spong

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