I worked at a Boy Scout camp (Camp Minsi) for a long, long time and a number of us have stayed in touch. About a week ago, one of us (Mike Roberts, on our Yahoogroup) suggested that everyone get a Facebook page as a number of Post and Camp alums were showing up there.
I hate faddish things. Popular, shallow, trendy, pop-culture, in-group things... like Facebook.
But, based on Rev. Mike's big thumbs-up, I figured, hey, why not?
So I created a Facebook page. Took about 15 minutes.
Suddenly, pictures of friends I'd lost contact with for years, if not decades, before started popping up on my screen like freakin' mushrooms after an overnight rain.
And I began re-establishing contact. (I have a strange ability to do this anyway. I can pick someone I've not talked to in 20 years, call them up out of the blue and say, 'what's up?' like we just got together last week.)
And I've been strangely hooked on this over the past week or so.
And of course, ruining it, I then had to go and over-interpret the experience :-)
The way I figure it, it's like this.
You look in a phone book and you see a name, an address and a phone number.
You look at most web pages and you see things like current status of one's life, movies, books that one is interested in, what jobs they have, etc.
Facebook has all that but it is a true database - it relates the information to other people the person knows.
So you see people's friends and you see their interests and community involvements, etc., etc., and all of it is hyperlinked so you really begin to see a person not just as a discrete unit but as a node in an ever-expanding interpersonal network of interests, relationships, commitments, beliefs and so on.
And you begin to see how a person's life history is bound up in the life histories of the significant people in his life over long periods of time.
Case in point. I vaguely recognized the name of a Boy Scout who had been maybe twelve or thirteen when I last worked on camp staff in the mid-90's. I didn't know him very well, but he was the staff groupie or, maybe, staff posse. He'd always show up on the dining hall porch before a meal and share with the staff what was going on in his troop, offer to play his bugle for some camp event, ask us about what was going on, etc.
Just a nice, clean-cut, idealistic kid who, just a bit, hero-worshiped the staff. (Ah, we were not worthy, but it was nice nonetheless :-) )
Anyway, his name popped up in the "fan of Camp Minsi" category and I vaguely recognized it and, more definitively, his photo and I hit the "add as friend" button.
As we re-connected, I got to see a bit of his current life, his friends, the ultrasound of the soon-to-be newest member of his growing family and I thought to myself, 'maybe, just maybe, when all us staff types were up there messing around and getting drunk on the weekends and running muck hikes and fridged froggies and singing silly songs in the dining hall and doing stupid skits at the campfire and ruining perfectly good food in the Scoutcraft cooking campfires maybe, just maybe, we made some small positive contribution to this kid's character.'
In spite of ourselves, no doubt :-)
Now all of this would have been true without Facebook but Facebook makes this network of personal interests, relationships and commitments over time a bit more tangible.
It will be interesting to see where this leads.
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Case in Point: The Blagojevich Dilemna
I'd go so far as to say that the most visible difference between the gods and God in Christ is that the gods, even the most respectable, benign looking ones, are ultimately bloodthirsty and demand blood sacrifice.
God in Christ requires no person's sacrifice.
[From my earlier blog entry: The Beginning of Christian Ethics]
If one can take the allegations at face value for purposes of discussion (without rendering a judgment on Governor Blagojevich's guilt which has yet to be determined)...
If the allegations are true, then it would appear to me that Governor Blagojevich's effective god in this situation (in distinction to any nominal commitment to God in Christ in this situation or even any actual commitment to God in Christ in the other spheres of his life) is revealed as being quite self-serving and disinterested in Governor Blagojevich's welfare, the welfare of the people of Illinois or the welfare of the American political system.
The key difference between service to God in Christ and the gods of money, power, etc. is not Governor Blagojevich's newly acquired disgrace, as Christians can suffer disgrace as well for following their Christian commitments. (Jesus' death by public crucifixion comes to mind.)
The key difference is freedom.
What Jesus did, what Dietrich Bonhoeffer did, what the Berrigan brothers did, they did in the freedom of the Christian to witness to God in Christ's free gift of a meaningful, purposeful and valuable life in the face of all idolatrous claims of the gods.
The allegations (based on phone transcripts) of the federal indictment against Governor Blagojevich reveals a person who is in no essential respect free. He, if the allegations prove true, was acting while in the iron grip of the gods. He is the puppet and the gods are the puppet masters.
God in Christ requires no such thing.
Galatians 5.1:
For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. [NRSV translation]
Monday, December 08, 2008
The Beginning of Christian Ethics
If the beginning of revelation is that our speech, our actions, our loves and our causes have a fundamental meaning, purpose and value associated with them that the unyielding reality of death can not ultimately defeat, then what constitutes the program by which we live in the world? What is the beginning of Christian ethics?
Following William Stringfellow I do not believe that anyone can know how God will judge any particular action.
As the Rev. Hugh Flesher once told me, there is a difference between praying to do God's will and to know God's will.
But there is, I believe, a principle that stands behind Christian ethics and, oddly enough, it's a negative one - and one that even might sound a bit goofy to modern ears.
Simply put, don't worship false gods.
That certainly sounds easy enough, doesn't it? :-)
My atheist friends go one further - not only, do they say, will they will resist such temptations as worshiping Baal or Krishna, they'll do me one better and not worship God in Christ :-)
But the simple fact is that, at least in the Bible, there simply is no such thing as atheism. It is taken for granted that everyone worships the gods and a certain incredulity at the Hebrew claim to only worship one of them!
The normal atheist claim to worship no gods would have been considered quite an astonishing assertion.
But when one considers that those the ancients call gods have in a more secular age, been recast as values, ideologies, movements, fads, etc (and the physical and institutional manifestations thereof, such as money in the bank, governments, reputation, etc.), it can be seen that the gods are alive and well.
The source of ethical difficulty is that while many of the gods may be disreputable on their face (sex, drugs and rock and roll, that kind of thing), the most effective gods are quite appealing.
Who doesn't want to be a patriot for one's country?
Who doesn't want an outstanding reputation in the community?
Who doesn't think it important, even in a moral sense, to have money in the bank and to be dependent on no person or state for one's care?
Who wouldn't want to help lead a family and produce children?
These are inarguably all good things.
The problem, from a biblical point of view, is when one wraps one's life around any or all of these to the point that they become (false) means of justifying - to use the Pauline word - one's life or, in other words, to establish the ultimate meaning, value and purpose of one's life in the face of death.
To do for us at great cost and sacrifice (of our own lives and of anyone who stands in our way) what God in Christ claims to do for us as a free gift.
I'd go so far as to say that the most visible difference between the gods and God in Christ is that the gods, even the most respectable, benign looking ones, are ultimately bloodthirsty and demand blood sacrifice.
God in Christ requires no person's sacrifice.
And this is why I believe that while one may hope and pray to be doing God's will in some particular action or program or cause, one must ultimately leave final judgment on such action to God.
Because, to use a historical example, who other than God in Christ can say whether someone's decision to drop an atomic bomb on a Japanese civilian city in hopes of preventing a seaborne invasion that would have been costly in American and Japanese lives was motivated by one's honest obligation to make the best possible decision in the face of one's responsibilities or by an idolatry of one's nation over other nations?
For what it's worth, these are some of the tools that I'll bring to the table in coming discussions of abortion and the utilization of America's nuclear capacity.
Following William Stringfellow I do not believe that anyone can know how God will judge any particular action.
As the Rev. Hugh Flesher once told me, there is a difference between praying to do God's will and to know God's will.
But there is, I believe, a principle that stands behind Christian ethics and, oddly enough, it's a negative one - and one that even might sound a bit goofy to modern ears.
Simply put, don't worship false gods.
That certainly sounds easy enough, doesn't it? :-)
My atheist friends go one further - not only, do they say, will they will resist such temptations as worshiping Baal or Krishna, they'll do me one better and not worship God in Christ :-)
But the simple fact is that, at least in the Bible, there simply is no such thing as atheism. It is taken for granted that everyone worships the gods and a certain incredulity at the Hebrew claim to only worship one of them!
The normal atheist claim to worship no gods would have been considered quite an astonishing assertion.
But when one considers that those the ancients call gods have in a more secular age, been recast as values, ideologies, movements, fads, etc (and the physical and institutional manifestations thereof, such as money in the bank, governments, reputation, etc.), it can be seen that the gods are alive and well.
The source of ethical difficulty is that while many of the gods may be disreputable on their face (sex, drugs and rock and roll, that kind of thing), the most effective gods are quite appealing.
Who doesn't want to be a patriot for one's country?
Who doesn't want an outstanding reputation in the community?
Who doesn't think it important, even in a moral sense, to have money in the bank and to be dependent on no person or state for one's care?
Who wouldn't want to help lead a family and produce children?
These are inarguably all good things.
The problem, from a biblical point of view, is when one wraps one's life around any or all of these to the point that they become (false) means of justifying - to use the Pauline word - one's life or, in other words, to establish the ultimate meaning, value and purpose of one's life in the face of death.
To do for us at great cost and sacrifice (of our own lives and of anyone who stands in our way) what God in Christ claims to do for us as a free gift.
I'd go so far as to say that the most visible difference between the gods and God in Christ is that the gods, even the most respectable, benign looking ones, are ultimately bloodthirsty and demand blood sacrifice.
God in Christ requires no person's sacrifice.
And this is why I believe that while one may hope and pray to be doing God's will in some particular action or program or cause, one must ultimately leave final judgment on such action to God.
Because, to use a historical example, who other than God in Christ can say whether someone's decision to drop an atomic bomb on a Japanese civilian city in hopes of preventing a seaborne invasion that would have been costly in American and Japanese lives was motivated by one's honest obligation to make the best possible decision in the face of one's responsibilities or by an idolatry of one's nation over other nations?
For what it's worth, these are some of the tools that I'll bring to the table in coming discussions of abortion and the utilization of America's nuclear capacity.
Saturday, December 06, 2008
The Beginning of Revelation
One of the nice things about a blog (as compared to a web page or even a discussion board) is that you can pretty much shoot from the hip and worry about the niceties later.
So, having thought about this long and hard and even, arguably, professionally, I'm going to venture a quick, sketchy proposal or hypothesis or whatever on revelation.
We all know that we're alive and that life, despite suffering, is good. We also all know that someday we're going to die, along with everyone we've ever loved, every cause to which we've committed ourselves, every project or production or accomplishment we've helped bring about.
The vast majority of the human race, and their loves, projects and causes, will be forgotten one to two hundred years after their death.
On the face of it, that would - it appears to me - paint a very pessimistic view as to the nature of human life.
But humans (whether Christians, atheists, Buddhist or none-of-the-aboves) don't see it that way.
Despite all empirical evidence to the contrary, we speak and act as if our speech and actions had ultimate meaning, value and purpose.
And, again, we do that in the face of the empirical, overwhelming and inescapable evidence of the reality and finality of death.
I would affirm that this wispy, apparently ungrounded hope in the face of the iron reality of death is the greatest evidence for the providential presence of God in Christ in human life, whether individual humans or communities describe it in Christian terms, the terms of other religions or completely secular or atheistic terms.
So, having thought about this long and hard and even, arguably, professionally, I'm going to venture a quick, sketchy proposal or hypothesis or whatever on revelation.
We all know that we're alive and that life, despite suffering, is good. We also all know that someday we're going to die, along with everyone we've ever loved, every cause to which we've committed ourselves, every project or production or accomplishment we've helped bring about.
The vast majority of the human race, and their loves, projects and causes, will be forgotten one to two hundred years after their death.
On the face of it, that would - it appears to me - paint a very pessimistic view as to the nature of human life.
But humans (whether Christians, atheists, Buddhist or none-of-the-aboves) don't see it that way.
Despite all empirical evidence to the contrary, we speak and act as if our speech and actions had ultimate meaning, value and purpose.
And, again, we do that in the face of the empirical, overwhelming and inescapable evidence of the reality and finality of death.
I would affirm that this wispy, apparently ungrounded hope in the face of the iron reality of death is the greatest evidence for the providential presence of God in Christ in human life, whether individual humans or communities describe it in Christian terms, the terms of other religions or completely secular or atheistic terms.
Now, that's a name I haven't heard in a very long time...
Had one of those happy coincidences of running into an old friend who suffered under my leadership in the kitchen at Boy Scout Camp Minsi some fourteen or so years ago.
Despite the fact that the Lehigh Valley has somewhere in the vicinity of half a million people (99.999 % of whom I do not know), this type of experience seems to happen to me quite often.
He passed my house mate and myself by and I had a flicker of recognition. I yelled at his back, "Excuse me, Sir, but you look very familiar" (apparently scaring the hell out of him :-) )
By this time my house mate had gone almost face-to-face with him and yelled his ancient nickname, "Weed!". (The name referred to his diminutive height and not to any pharmaceutical investigations on his part.)
He said that when he heard that it kind of amazed him as no one had called him that in at least ten years.
So we went into a bar, caught up and had a great time.
Once inside he said that he believes God puts different people in our lives at different times for specific reasons. (He's a lot more philosophical / theological than he was at the age of 15 which, considering he has a philosophy degree from a Catholic college, he has every right to be!)
It will be interesting to ponder the deeper significance of this chance meeting.
Despite the fact that the Lehigh Valley has somewhere in the vicinity of half a million people (99.999 % of whom I do not know), this type of experience seems to happen to me quite often.
He passed my house mate and myself by and I had a flicker of recognition. I yelled at his back, "Excuse me, Sir, but you look very familiar" (apparently scaring the hell out of him :-) )
By this time my house mate had gone almost face-to-face with him and yelled his ancient nickname, "Weed!". (The name referred to his diminutive height and not to any pharmaceutical investigations on his part.)
He said that when he heard that it kind of amazed him as no one had called him that in at least ten years.
So we went into a bar, caught up and had a great time.
Once inside he said that he believes God puts different people in our lives at different times for specific reasons. (He's a lot more philosophical / theological than he was at the age of 15 which, considering he has a philosophy degree from a Catholic college, he has every right to be!)
It will be interesting to ponder the deeper significance of this chance meeting.
Thursday, December 04, 2008
Update
I've set up discussion forums dealing specifically with media issues on The Inclusive Christian discussion boards.
Wednesday, December 03, 2008
Moral Flexibility
Nick Naylor: My job requires a certain... moral flexibility. (from Thank You For Smoking)
As noted a few posts before, on Inauguration Day the 'football' with the codes for launching a nuclear attack will pass from one President (George W. Bush, a Christian) to another President (Barack Obama, another Christian).
Beyond the Armageddon scenario, both presidents have had to deal with (or will have to deal with) issues involving conventional warfare, detainment of foreign enemies without trial, torture, whether or not to pardon persons facing the death penalty).
And, it goes without saying that any politician must consider the question (if it's even to still be considered a live question) as to their responsibility to always tell the truth to the American people.
While I'm at a happy point in my life where I, myself, need do nothing that troubles my conscience to earn a living, it is not like I'm not implicated in the Christian moral dilemma.
As a consumer, I make choices that - when their effects are multiplied by large numbers of American consumers making the same choices - cause poverty and suffering in other parts of the world.
The wars that America is fighting, along with their inevitable innocent casualties, are subsidized by my tax dollars and condoned by my silence (motivated by my desire to 'get along') and my political quietism (resulting from my expending all my energy on my employment, maintaining my standard of living and happily losing myself in the many entertainment distractions (such as blogging :-) offered in a consumer-oriented society.
Beyond that, despite what I consider my relatively conservative views on abortion, I find myself escorting patients (past screaming protesters) at a clinic that provides abortions.
As that is the issue I'm most immediately involved with that calls for a bit of Nick Naylor's "moral flexibility," that shall be the issue to which I'll return in the next post.
As noted a few posts before, on Inauguration Day the 'football' with the codes for launching a nuclear attack will pass from one President (George W. Bush, a Christian) to another President (Barack Obama, another Christian).
Beyond the Armageddon scenario, both presidents have had to deal with (or will have to deal with) issues involving conventional warfare, detainment of foreign enemies without trial, torture, whether or not to pardon persons facing the death penalty).
And, it goes without saying that any politician must consider the question (if it's even to still be considered a live question) as to their responsibility to always tell the truth to the American people.
While I'm at a happy point in my life where I, myself, need do nothing that troubles my conscience to earn a living, it is not like I'm not implicated in the Christian moral dilemma.
As a consumer, I make choices that - when their effects are multiplied by large numbers of American consumers making the same choices - cause poverty and suffering in other parts of the world.
The wars that America is fighting, along with their inevitable innocent casualties, are subsidized by my tax dollars and condoned by my silence (motivated by my desire to 'get along') and my political quietism (resulting from my expending all my energy on my employment, maintaining my standard of living and happily losing myself in the many entertainment distractions (such as blogging :-) offered in a consumer-oriented society.
Beyond that, despite what I consider my relatively conservative views on abortion, I find myself escorting patients (past screaming protesters) at a clinic that provides abortions.
As that is the issue I'm most immediately involved with that calls for a bit of Nick Naylor's "moral flexibility," that shall be the issue to which I'll return in the next post.
Tuesday, December 02, 2008
Update
As of today, the Inclusive Christian discussion forums at http://p066.ezboard.com/btheinclusivechristian are being supported.
Bill
Bill
Monday, December 01, 2008
Codes for Armageddon: A new president to hold nuclear launch 'football'
A friend sends me a link to a thought-provoking article which uses as its hook the passing of the nuclear football from Bush to Obama.
In the close calls of the Cold War (which I am old enough to remember) both the Soviet Union and the USA had too much materially to lose to casually initiate a nuclear exchange: the so-called Balance of Terror.
Now, we could face nuclear-armed enemies who have nothing to lose and a glorious martyr's death and Paradise to gain. (Americans may have believed in Heaven during the Cold War, but were in no immediate hurry to get there :) ).
It will be my endeavor to continue to examine this issue over the coming weeks and determine what, if anything, the Christian tradition can contribute to a discussion on where America should go from here.
The 'flow' will go from initial reaction on the blog, to discussion on the discussion board and - if anything worthwhile comes of it - posting more substantial articles on the web site.
Add to that the possibility of terrorist acquisition of nuclear bombs or material from such states (with or without those states' cooperation) and there is certainly a recipe for disaster.A new long-range forecast from America's top spy agencies said the possibility of a new nuclear arms race in the Middle East, ignited by Iran's race to build a nuclear weapons arsenal, promises new instabilities "potentially more dangerous than the Cold War" between the United States and the Soviet Union.
Weak Middle East regimes might be more tempted to actually use the weapons during a crisis in a region already prone to convulsive violence, said the report, Global Trends 2025, released by National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell.
The six Persian Gulf states, within easy missile range of Iran, have said they are pursuing "peaceful" nuclear energy programs. They are among 50 nations interested in building new nuclear facilities.
In the close calls of the Cold War (which I am old enough to remember) both the Soviet Union and the USA had too much materially to lose to casually initiate a nuclear exchange: the so-called Balance of Terror.
Now, we could face nuclear-armed enemies who have nothing to lose and a glorious martyr's death and Paradise to gain. (Americans may have believed in Heaven during the Cold War, but were in no immediate hurry to get there :) ).
It will be my endeavor to continue to examine this issue over the coming weeks and determine what, if anything, the Christian tradition can contribute to a discussion on where America should go from here.
The 'flow' will go from initial reaction on the blog, to discussion on the discussion board and - if anything worthwhile comes of it - posting more substantial articles on the web site.
Re-Inventing the Blog
For reasons that escape me, I've decided to resume activities on this blog, The Inclusive Christian Web Page and The Inclusive Christian Discussion Board.
I'll start with the blog, even though I've always been suspicious of them. Who really cares what my favorite TV show is or the latest adventures of my beagle?
Nonetheless, it is the most accessible to me, so we'll start with that.
The web page should be re-built in about a week and the discussion board will start up after I a) post some content worth discussing to it and b) find someone who wants to discuss it.
Bill Bekkenhuis
bekkenhuis (at) fast.net
Bethlehem, PA
I'll start with the blog, even though I've always been suspicious of them. Who really cares what my favorite TV show is or the latest adventures of my beagle?
Nonetheless, it is the most accessible to me, so we'll start with that.
The web page should be re-built in about a week and the discussion board will start up after I a) post some content worth discussing to it and b) find someone who wants to discuss it.
Bill Bekkenhuis
bekkenhuis (at) fast.net
Bethlehem, PA
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