I Never Picked to be a Fundamentalist

I never chose to be a fundamentalist Christian.  There are people in my family that would object to this statement, and perhaps they should.  When I was 8.5 years of age I walked to the front of the church as the congregation sang “Just As I am,” and I made a confession of my sins.  But really, I was not overcome with the sense that my sins were so great that I needed to make things right, or risk eternal damnation as the consequences of my delay.  My baptism was no surprise at all.  My mother had come to church carrying a change of “tighty whities” and a bath towel.  My father had called the preacher the night before and requested that he be allowed to baptize me. 

And I was just shy of 9 years of age.  What sins had I committed?

I had one, of course.  I had discovered, a few months before, that my pee-pee would sometimes get stiff and sensitive.  I explored this an noticed I could make “it” stay stiff and erupt with a sort of joy and leaving behind a sticky mess.  No one had ever told me this happens to boys sometimes.  Nevertheless, I was sure, without being told, that this was “sinful.”  The pee-pee was obviously dirty.  You were not suppose to show yours around.  You had to wash your hands after you peed.  Obviously the penis was a wicked shameful part of my body.  Add to that this general sense in my family and in my church that pleasure was bad, it was clear that my stiffies were sinful.  I also knew that there was some sort of connection to this thrilling secret part of me, and girls.    I was aware of ‘boobies” and while I had no idea what was between a little girl’s legs, I was sure it was going to be wonderful.  Just thinking about boobies, panties, and bras could make my pee-pee move about, and stiffen.  I was pretty sure all this was sinful stuff and I needed to be baptized. 

I had the idea that baptism might be a little like the polio vaccine.  If I could just get baptized, I’d never get stiff again, I’d never play with my secret, and I would stop fantasizing about girls.

Now, at 64 years of age, I think I was following the script as intended. It seems to me that there was a push on young children to get baptized around the same time as they start to get erection breasts and menses.   Baptism was, according to the church of Christ, reserved for adult conversion, there were no baptized babies in the churches of Christ, and the earliest you could be baptized was after you reached the age of accountability.  As far as I can tell the age of accountability occurred around the same time as one’s puberty.

While I certainly said that I was a sinner, and that I wanted to be baptized for the forgiveness of my sins, I do not see that  as a real choice to be a fundamentalist.  I mean, it is not like I considered the Roman Catholic Church, or the Episcopal Church, or the Unitarian church and compared those groups to the churches of Christ and that I then came to my own free and independent decision to reject those other churches because the churches of Christ seemed closer to the truth God would have me follow.  I didn’t even compare the churches of Christ to other fundamentalist groups.  I didn’t go down a Baptist/churches of Christ check list and opt for one over the other.  I was baptized and counted as a member of the church of Christ because my parents were members of the church of Christ.  And my parents did not join the church of Christ after carefully considering the other options and coming to their free and independent decision to reject all other possible denominations.  They too were born to parents who were members of the churches of Christ.

My father’s father was also born to someone who was a member and preacher for the churches of Christ.  I suppose, had I the information, I would find that someone, way back did consider at least some other options and opted for the churches of Christ.  There are probably people today that leave one church for another and sometimes they pick the church of Christ.  I’m just saying it did not happen to me, or my parents, or my parents’ parents.

I am actually, just now, making those comparisons.  For a time I rejected God, because I found fundamentalist Christianity dependent on ignorance and wishful thinking.  You see, I was raised in the one, and only true church.  I was taught that the church of Christ was the ONLY church on earth that was compliant with the word of God and while no one in the church of Christ claims to be perfect, they do not question the truth of the scriptures as interpreted by the churches of Christ.  We had the right answers to every question, and while we were imperfect people, the Bible was perfect and the church of Christ had searched the scriptures and discovered the proper understanding of those scriptures, and any church that had a different interpretation was wrong and their membership would be spending eternity in a lack of fire where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth and the worm is not consumed. 

If I lost my faith in the churches of Christ, well, there were no other choices.  There was nothing else to believe since I had lost my confidence in the answers supplied by the only one true church of Almighty God.  If the one true church was wrong, then I was done.  It has taken me a long time to see that there are no absolute answers, that the search for faith is always couched in approximations.  I have started to believe that religious faith has evolved just like biological organisms have evolved.    This blog is just a reflection of my search for faith.  I can no longer say I reject everything.  I also would not say I am open to anything.  What I hope is that I might be willing to let go of things I thought I knew in order to be open to truths I never dreamed were there.

A Review of: Faith & Doubt by John Ortberg

A lot of my recent reading has been on the subject of doubt.  After finishing The Atheist who Believes In God by Frank Schaeffer I moved on to a more organized approach by a well known Christian writer, John Ortberg.  

Mr. Ortberg’s work is far more focused and clearly he is a minister with a hope to help Christians who struggle with doubt.  The Book, Faith and Doubt makes it clear that if you have faith, you have doubt.  He goes so far as to say you cannot have faith and certainty.  Near the end of the work he talks about holding up his fist and asking people if they believe he has a twenty dollar bill in his hand.  At that point the people around him have no way of being certain what is in his hand.  Some of those on lookers will have faith that the minister has $20 in that fist, because he said he did and they have faith that a minister would not lie.  Some around the minister might be equally sure that the minister is lying.  Maybe they have known some ministers well, in their past and know not to trust them.  Then the Reverend Ortberg says to those who have faith in him, “I am now going to destroy your faith in me,” and he opens his hand and shows them what the fist contains.  You see, once you know something, once you have seen with your eyes, once you are absolutely certain, you no longer have any need for faith.

When it comes to the claims of the Bible, we cannot know for certain that the claims are true, just as we cannot know for certain that the claims are untrue.  We can have an opinion.  We can have a conviction.  We can believe so strongly that it feels like a fact, but in the end, honest thinking people know that we cannot know if the those Biblical stories are true, or untrue.

Another powerful point in the book Faith and Doubt is that there is a difference in faith and faithfulness.  The author gives an example of his marriage.  I have been married 42 years so I could identify with this example.  The author writes that on his wedding day he was 95% sure that he was marrying the right person.  He was almost totally sure that he was marrying for the right reasons, marrying the right person, and that his bride was almost totally sure as she approached their wedding day.  But almost sure, pretty darn sure, is not the same thing as being certain. beyond all doubt.  When you consider that about half of all marriages end in divorce and most people getting married also were pretty sure they were marrying the right person, well, you get the point.

But not being absolutely, beyond all doubt, 100% certain did not prevent the couple from taking their marriage vows.  They could pledge to love, honor, and care for one another in sickness and in health, for richer and poorer, and they could promise to forsake all others without being 100% sure they were perfect for one another? 

HOW?

They could make promises to love one another forever, even when they were not 100% sure, because they were making a personal commitment to be faithful to one another.   

Being faithful to your spouse does not require you to be sure, it only requires you to intend to be faithful.  Intention fills the gap between being pretty sure and being unsure.  In a similar way, when we recite the Nicene Creed and we say that we believe in Christ who “came down from heaven,” or if we say we “believe in the resurrection of the body” when we actually have some doubts about that stuff, well, we can still say we believe it, if we are willing to fill in the space between pretty sure, and unsure with our faithful commitment to Christ.   

The author points out that not being absolutely certain, is not the same thing as having no reasons to believe.  Like getting married, our faith in the truth of some part of the Biblical story might be 95% sure with just a few elements of doubt. If you are honest you will have to admit that there are things that are unknowable on this side of death’s door.  After we pass through death’s door, if there is an afterlife, we may know that for sure, but we will have no way to communicate that certain knowledge to those still living.  If there is nothing on the other side of death’s door, the atheists will be right, but they will never know for certain that they are right, because they will be nothing but broken meat computers.

One rule of thumb that the author shared needs to be shared again, and as often as possible:  When something is UNKNOWABLE, then it is pointless to argue about it.  If there is a question that cannot be answered on this side of death’s door, then what we should do is not decided.  Don’t decided that God exists and all the promises of the Bible are true, and don’t decided that God does not exist, and that all the promises of the Bible are untrue.  Instead, choose to do what you can to enhance this life.  Nurture relationships.  Advocate for love.  Move forward with both the faith and the doubts you carry inside of yourself.

The author points out that when faith also contains doubt that those doubts motivate the doubter to keep looking for answers.  Doubts keep us from the hubris of certainty.  We won’t presume to do God’s work for God, we won’t judge, we won’t cut heads off those who believe God hates, we won’t shun those who think differently from us, we will allow God to be God, and we will be more willing to be disciples of Christ doing what Jesus did, loving others.

I am sure I have not done this book justice.  The author is a better writer than I am and he presents his views far better than I can, but I just want you to consider reading this book.  If you want to be a atheist then this is not the book for you.  If you happen to be a human, struggling with a desire for faith but having honest doubts and misgivings, then this well might be a perfect book for you to read.

Empathy for Black Males, et cetera

One evening in October of 1974 Officers Elton Hymon and Leslie Wright were responding to a burglary call.  When they got to the scene Hymon spotted a 15 year old kid named Edward Garner, an unarmed and standing by a fence.  The officers ordered the 15-year-old, to halt.  Instead of halting, Edward Garner tried to climb a fence to get away from the officer, so they shot him in the head and killed him.  A federal district court ruled that the shooting was justified under a Tennessee statute—the law said that once a police officer voices intent to arrest a suspect, "the officer may use all the necessary means to affect the arrest."

How would you feel if Edward Garner was your child?  Yes, he should have halted when the officers said halt.  But you don’t know what experiences that young man has had with the police, or what stories he has heard from family members and friends.  Perhaps he has heard all his life, if the police want to hang a crime on a black man, they do.  Perhaps he was afraid he would be assumed guilty if he was caught so he made a 15 year old kid decision to try to run away and the police and the laws of his state all agreed that it was OK for him to be killed under those circumstances.

Edward’s father appealed the decisions of the Federal Courts and the appeal went all the way to the Supreme Court.

When the Supreme Court, heard this case they ruled that the Tennessee statute was unconstitutional and the killing of Edward Garner was unjustified. Edward’s daddy went to court and got the decision changed.  The police had no right to shot this child in the head because he was trying to run away.

Justice Byron White wrote for the majority: "It is not better that all felony suspects die than that they escape. Where the suspect poses no immediate threat to the officer and no threat to others, the harm resulting from failing to apprehend him does not justify the use of deadly force to do so. It is no doubt unfortunate when a suspect who is in sight escapes, but the fact that the police arrive a little late or are a little slower afoot does not always justify killing the suspect. A police officer may not seize an unarmed, non-dangerous suspect by shooting him dead."

So the dad, seeking justice for his son, won justice.  Right? 

Wrong.

Despite the reversal, the officer who shot a 15 year old boy was never charged.  That father still had a dead son.  The killer was still working on the police force.  Do you think the community, any community, regardless of color, would think justice and fairness prevailed in this case? 

Now just imagine the high profile cases that happened in just the past few months.

* * *

On July 17^th the police noticed 43 year old Eric Garner, who had just stopped a fight between two other guys.  The police approached Eric had no intention of thanking this big guy for stopping a fight, they wanted to arrest the peace maker for one of the worse crimes that To earn a little money people will buy a pack of cigarettes or $7 and then sell the individual cigarettes to people on the street earning $20 for the cigarettes that only cost them $7 to buy, and of course these vicious criminals do not pay any sales tax on this nefarious business.  So naturally the police decided to arrest the big guy who stopped a fight. 

As it turns out, the police have been coming by regularly and disrupting his lose cigarette business.  Mr. Garner this criminal entrepreneur said, “Every time you see me you want to mess with me,” then he said, “I’m tired of it. It stops today!”

Now it is all true that Mr. Garner was committing a crime selling loose cigarettes.  And when the police wanted to arrest Mr. Garner, he should have complied with their order.  You can watch a video of what happens next and I’m sure my description does not capture every frame.  Mr. Garner pushed a policeman’s hands away from him, and told the policeman to leave him alone.  Another policeman came up behind Mr. Garner and put him in a choke hold.  Mr. Garner was taken to the ground and the other policemen piled on top of him.  What followed was a muffled sentence that Mr. Garner repeated 14 times:  “I can’t breathe.”  When it was clear to the police that Mr. Garner was limp and had stopped breathing he was taken to the hospital where he was pronounced dead.

We find out that the choke hold was a violation of police policy.  The medical examiner rules that Mr. Garner’s death was a homicide.  A grand jury meets and they rule that the police did nothing wrong.  The officer denies using a choke hold and instead calls this a seatbelt take-down  maneuver where one arm goes over the front near the throat and the other near the waist [the places where the seatbelt touches you]. 

No one will be arrested.  No one will face charges.  The police kill a guy for selling loose cigarettes and pushing a policeman’s hand away.  Does the actions of this overweight guy sound like it warranted deadly force?

* * *

In October a few years back, the police in a California suburb were called to a party on a noise complaint.  It was a Halloween costume party.  The police enter the home and go from room to room.  At one point they enter a room where there is a black male named Dwain Lee, an actor who had appeared in a small part on the movie Lier, Lier, and in a part on the TV show ER.  Lee was dressed in a devil costume and he was holding a toy gun as part of that costume.  When a n Officer Hopper saw the toy gun, he opened fire several times fatally wounding the young actor.  Lee’s death was ruled justified because the officer thought the toy gun was real and feared for his life.

* * *

In a more recent incident that happened in Pennsylvania, a rookie police officer shoots and kills a 12 year old black boy who was playing in a public park with a toy gun that had that orange cap removed from the tip.  The video shows the police officer pulled up, got out of the car and two seconds after getting out of the car  [they timed it] the officer shoots this 12 year old child killing him.  The orange cap that was supposed to be on the tip of all toy guns is there so the police can see from a distance that a real looking gun is actually a toy.

The police officer was given bad information and some information was not passed on to the officer.  For example, the officer was told this 12 year old child was 20 years old.  The officer was not told that the 911 caller said he thought it was a toy gun. 

In many, many of these cases there may have been reasons that the police acted with deadly force.  We could argue about the degree of justification that existed in each and every case, but often there were reasons.  It is also true that often the black male did resist arrest or refused to follow orders from the police.

In the past year I have seen video of police shooting at a car filled with black children because the black mother refused to get out of the car and drove off claiming she was afraid of the officers on the scene.  It sounds like she should have been afraid.

I saw a film of a black man pulled over for not wearing his seat belt.  The police officer has his gun drawn on this seat belt violator.  I have had two tickets for no seat belt this year and the police did not pull their gun out and aim it at me.  When the officer asked for license and registration the man reaches into his car for his wallet and the officer shoots the man several times. 

If these incidents were statistically rare it would be a tragic thing and something we should work to eliminate ever happening again.  But what if these incidents are statistically common?   And what if being black carried with it an almost statistical certainty that you have been or soon will be singled out an scrutinized by law enforcement?  What if you knew that when law enforcement detains you that there is a chance that you will be killed during that encounter?  How do you think you would react when you hear about one incident after another, week after week and year after year?    

It is not over sensitivity that is fanning the flames of protest over the killing of black males by the police.  Did you know that while more white people smoke marijuana than black people that the arrest of blacks and whites for marijuana related crimes is at an 8 to 1 ratio?  For every 8 blacks arrested for possession of marijuana only 1 white person is arrested.  This is true even when the majority of the people living in the area are overwhelmingly white. 

Among black communities they talk about a crime they call DWB:  Driving While Black.  You can be law abiding, you can be rich, but if you are black you are at some degree of risk all the time.

I have a close friend who once worked as principal  for a private school in Hollywood.  Among the students there he had Demi Moore’s children, and the child of Matt Groening, the creator of the Simpsons, and Eddie Murphy’s children.    I remember him telling me once about a talk he had with Eddie Murphy’s children.  These kids were rich, and if they were among people who knew who their daddy was, they were treated like royalty, but out in the world, when Eddie Murphy’s children went into a store, they were followed around by the employees and watched closely to see if they were going to shop lift or cause some act of violence. 

Think about Henry Lewis Gates, a black man who hosts a very popular show on PBS about tracing your family tree.  It is called,  Finding Your Roots  with Henry Louis Gates, Jr.  This is the same Professor Gates who was arrested inside his own home because a new neighbor saw a black man inside the house and assumed no black man would live in such a rich neighborhood.  When Sgt. James Crowley arrived on the scene he made the same assumption, and demanded proof that Professor Gates was actually the person who lived in his house.  Professor Gates got mad and cussed the police officer out and ended up going to jail, getting a mug shot taken of him, all for daring to go home after work.  Would you have gotten mad if you were accused of being a criminal and the only grounds were that you were inside your own home?  Might you have cussed or been rude to the policeman who obviously thought a black man could not be the actual resident of such a nice home?

Imagine how you would feel if you were followed around almost every store you entered, and you were constantly consistently treated like you were a violent, untrustworthy creep.  Now imagine that this was going to keep happening to you for the rest of your life. 

This past week I heard an 87 year old white woman decrying this violence over the Ferguson, Missouri mess.  This woman said, “the grand jury met and made a decision, and the law applies to everyone, black or white.”  This sweet woman could not understand the protest, because she is ignorant of what black people, especially black males live with on a daily basis, and lacking that information she also lacks empathy.  I understand why she didn’t get it.  This woman was not raised in a family where every male relative in her entire family has been unfairly hassled by the police at one time or another.  If her favorite uncle, a gentle, sweet, law abiding man had been mistaken for a criminal and arrested, or beaten, she would have a very different view of things. 

I don’t support the violence anywhere.  I don’t claim that the grand jury got it wrong.  All I urge on all Americans is that we place ourselves in the shoes of black men and imagine how it feels for these things to happen over and over and over again, and time after time, the police are exonerated, nothing is done, and your loved ones are dead and nothing is going to be done about it.  Empathy begs us to do something about the larger problem.  There should not be such statistical disparity between the way white men and black men are treated.  Something must be done, or we can expect the reaction of black American’s to be fear, resentment, and rage.

As followers of Jesus we must advocate for fairness, and fight racism.  What Would Jesus Do?

Book Review

A Review of:  Why I am an Atheist Who Believes in God: How to give love, create beauty and find peace by Frank Schaeffer 

I suppose I ordered this book for my Kindle, because the title caught my eye.  It seemed a contradiction.  Either you are a believer or you are not.  I thought, there can be no in-between . . . can there?

As I read the book I found that he was raised by fundamentalist parents, just as I was, and he started his life trying to be as good a Christian as his family wanted him to be.  That sounded like me.

And later, over time, Frank Schaeffer rebelled against that fundamental past.  I did that too.  Frank turned his back on fundamentalism, and that lead to a less certain life.

Frank calls himself an atheist, but he is an atheist that prays, goes to church, reads the Bible to his grandchildren, and he has been attending the Greek Orthodox Church for over 25 years.

Frank is a very interesting atheist.

I actually do not think he is an atheist.  This is just me contradicting what the author said about himself, but I think Frank Schaeffer is a believer who believes so differently about God now, that he knows his fundamentalist parents and their followers would call him an atheist now.  Frank believes in evolution.  Frank believes the Bible is a book written by inspired men who were not perfect and the document itself is not perfect.  Frank picks and chooses which parts of the Bible he will accept.  I believe Frank would even admit that sometimes he accepts parts of the Bible that he earlier did not accept.

There is a part where Frank talks about reading a children’s book of Greek myths.  His granddaughter would hear the wild stories and at the end of one myth his granddaughter would say, “That one really happened.”  At the end of another she would say, “That didn't happen.”  When Frank moved on to reading Bible stories to the child she did the same thing.  Some stores just sounded true, while others didn’t.  Frank talked about when he worked in the movie industry that he could tell when a script had too many writers.  One part would have a sound and direction to it and then the script would lose something.  Frank compared this to sound.  We all can tell the difference between a vibration of a violin string, and a shoe scraping in gravel.  Both or sounds but if you can hear, you can hear the difference between music and a noise. 

It was clear in this book that Frank was still smarting from the hurt of his fundamentalist past.  There is a passage where he asks what he would do if he were god and his grandchildren were various characters in the Bible.  Would any loving grandfather yell at a grandchild because they brought fruits and vegetables as an offering instead of meat?  Even if a grandchild was angry and said, ‘I hate you, I wish you were dead’ would any grandfather reject the grandchild and send them to be tortured for all eternity?  And if Frank the grandfather would not do such a thing to a child and Frank has imperfect love while God is pure distilled love, why would any of us think God would just his children so harshly?

Over all, this book was not really organized to provide a cohesive understanding of faith that contains doubt.  I don’t think this would not be a good book for a study group.  The writing goes off on tangents.  Parts of this read like a guy who just needs to vent.  Nevertheless, it makes an excellent point about faith.  We all live with a mix of faith and doubt.  When a tragic thing happens our faith can be shaken and tested.  Just a bad day, and problems finding a parking space can test our faith.  Fusses with our spouse can cause us to question our love and make us grumpy with God.  But we are not called to be certain.  We are not called to be sure.  We don’t have to make 100% on some test to be worthy of God.  We are called to be faithful and that faithfulness can, and does include our doubts.

What IF I have beliefs and UN-beliefs?

There is a story in the Gospel of Mark about a man who has a grown son who has suffered from childhood with an Evil Spirit.  This Evil Spirit makes the kid fall down, flop around, foam at the mouth.  Sometimes the kid is in danger of rolling into a fire or into water, so this is a life threatening condition.

Jesus wasn’t around  so the disciples agreed to heal the boy with this Evil Spirit problem.  I’m sure they thought, “We have watched Jesus heal people, and heard the prayers he prayed, so it seems logical if we do what Jesus did we will get the same results that Jesus gets, right?  Only it didn’t happen.  A crowd had grown around the dad, the possessed boy, and the disciples, and when it was clear they were failing, well, the disciples were embarrassed, the dad was frustrated, and so the followers of Jesus started to argue and blame shift among themselves.

It is at exactly that point in the story where Jesus shows up and asks what the hubbub is about.  

The dad steps up and tells Jesus about his boy and the possession of this Evil Spirit and then the father says something the Jesus found Off Putting.

The dad asks Jesus, “IF you can do anything, please have mercy on us and do something.”

Jesus picks up on that word IF. 

IF is a doubter’s word.  We use the word IF to indicate that there is an uncertainty regarding the subject of the sentence.  We use the word IF when we are clueless about the answer to our question is going to be.

IF you have change can I borrow a quarter?

If you are the supervisor you can help me.

If is not certainty. 

If is not being sure. 

If is not a believer word.

Jesus reacts to the dad’s use of the word IF.  “What do you mean IF I can help you?  ALL things are possible for him who believes.”

The dad’s reply is immediate.  “I do believe.  Help my unbelief.” Mark 9:24

As for me, that describes me perfectly:  I am a person filled with belief, AND unbelief.  Sometimes my belief is strong, and sometimes it is weak, but there is always some unbelief lurking about. 

Most church people I run into are far less tolerant than Jesus was in this situation.  Some might say a person is unworthy to serve Christ and his church if they lack belief in some of the tenants they feel are deal breaker items of faith.

Jesus could have condemned this dad for using the word IF.  Jesus could have said, IF you have doubts then I doubt IF I will help you.  But instead of rejecting a person who has both belief and unbelief, Jesus heals the son of his Evil Spirit. 

There are other scriptures that might support Christ’s tolerance.

In I Corinthians chapter 12 Paul writes about the “gifts of the Spirit” and the passage says clearly that there are different gifts handed out, but all the gifts come from God.  Some of the gifts are gifts of service, others get the gift of messages of Wisdom, still other’s get the gift of speaking other languages, or prophesy, or interpreting these other languages, some get the gift of healing, and some get the gift of faith.

If faith is a gift from God’s Holy Spirit, then that might explain why there are some people that seem to have a strong, unshakable faith, while other’s struggle with their faith.  Everyone is not blessed with the gift of faith.  We, who were left off the list have faith, but it isn’t the sort of faith we would brag about.  I believe.  I still need help with my unbelief.

We doubters might be tempted to get off topic here.  We could get revved up over the story details.  We could say, “That Evil Spirit, sounds like epilepsy, but if God is all knowing and incarnate in Jesus then Jesus would know if it was epilepsy or not, so why is he clearly mislead into thinking this is an Evil Spirit when it is a health issue?”  We could get all stirred up by the act of healing as we poo-poo the idea that healing by just saying words seems a little like magic and magic isn’t real.

I will write about fundamentalism later, and try to address this matter, but for now, let me just say, I am skeptical of miraculous healings, but for me the point of the story is not magic, the point of the story is that Jesus wants us to help each other, even those among us who struggle with their unbelief.