Danish Air Force Compensates Santa

The Danish airforce are compensating Santa Claus for the unintended death of one of his raindeer. No, I'm not joking...read all about it here.

Grace & Peace

think about it...

the least I can do

I use Biblegateway all the time. It is perhaps the most useful site on the web for direct access to Scripture. The only downside is that NCC won't let Biblegateway use the NRSV on their site. But after all the use I've gotten out of Biblegateway, I figure that the least I can do is send a little linkage their way. Feel free to use this, copy the code, or use it yourself. It's pretty handy

Grace & Peace

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J'ai soif

Preacher and author Andrew Murray once wrote, "Wherever there is life, there is a continual interchange of taking in and giving out...The one depends on the other - the giving out ever increases the power of taking in...It is only in the emptiness that comes from the parting with what we have, that the divine fullness can flow in."

Several colleagues have recently expressed concern to me about the common analogy of the Christian as a "conduit" of God's love - directed from God to us and then out into the world. Their concern, it seems, is that this idea reduces the Christian to very little as a person - reducing his/her identity to something like a pipe and no more. "Where," they argue, "is the affirmation of the Christian's identity as a beloved child of God?"

I admit that this is something I had not considered, and am currently wrestling with...this notion of individual identity and our loving interaction with others around us. The "conduit analogy" was common in my spiritual upbringing, and I have found it useful tool in both personal reflection and apologetic discourse at various points in my life. Reflexively, I'm simply not quite ready to give it up.

There seems to be tension in Scripture as to whether we find our identity "in Christ alone" (thus implicitly subsuming our identity or possibly losing it completely), or if it is precisely Christ's message of redemption and restoration is exactly what validates us as 'individuals' (in the theological, and not socio-political sense) and calls us to be 'priests' and 'children of God.' Both analogies are frequently employed and implicitly assumed and many points, and it's not immediately apparent how these ideas are to work together.

A recent sermon on the need to serve others reminded me again of this idea. It was brought home during a moment of prayer when I Corinthians 13:3 jumped out to me as clear as day: "If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing." I want to think more about why we love, where love comes from, and what our reasons and obligations are as it regards this love. C.S. Lewis, in his book The Four Loves, discusses whether or not earthly love is actually love only insofar as it participates in the divine Love (an admittedly Platonic idea, but one that bears considering) or if love is somehow independent in each of us, and therefore succeptible to perversion and decay while still properly remaining love.

Is love ultimately something we possess or something we merely channel? Can we (really) love others as God loves us, or rather because God loves us? Can we love someone with implicit or even explicitly selfish motives (..."but have not love, I gain nothing)?

to be continued...

Grace & Peace

The way we see it...

Embrace this right now life while it's dripping, while the flavors are excellently woesome. Take your bites with bravery and boldness since the learning and the growing are here in these times, these exact right nows. Capture these times. Hold and kiss them because it will soon be very different.

--Jill Scott

Currently Reading "Testimony" By Dana Glover

In other news...

According to a recent survey from the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, the public's impression of the Democratic Party has changed in the last year.

Only 29 percent of respondents said they viewed Democrats as being "friendly toward religion," down from 40 percent in August of 2004. Meanwhile, 55 percent said the Republican Party was friendly toward religion.

The poll of 2,000 adults was conducted July 7-17 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.

Well, I'll be darned...

interesting...creationism is quite popular

In a poll conducted last month by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, nearly two-thirds of Americans say that creationism should be taught alongside evolution in public schools, while 38 percent favored replacing evolution altogether with creationism.

I will admit - this is a surprise...even to me.

Read the NYTimes article here.

das evangelische kirke?

Anyone who has studied American Religious History knows that defining "evangelical" is a particularly tricky business. Fortunately, Wheaton College's Institute for the Study of American Evangelicals provides an especially useful way of delineating references to contemporary American Evangelicalism.

According to the ISAE, there are three senses in which the term "evangelical" is used today:

1. All Christians who affirm a few key doctrines and practical emphases. From British historian David Bebbington, a more concise (and probably accurate) rendering of Alister McGrath's six points: conversionism, the belief that lives need to be changed; activism, the expression of the gospel in effort; biblicism, a particular regard for the Bible; and crucicentrism, a stress on the sacrifice of Christ on the cross.
2. An organic group of movements denoting a "style" as much as a set of beliefs. Groups as disparate as black Baptists and Dutch Reformed Churches, Mennonites and Pentecostals, Catholic charismatics and Southern Baptists all come under the evangelical umbrella.<
3. The self-ascribed label for a coalition that arose during the Second World War. This group came into being as a reaction against the perceived anti-intellectual, separates and belligerent nature of the fundamentalist movement in the 1920s and 1930s. Importantly, its core personalities (like Carl Henry and Billy Graham), institutions (Moody Bible Institute and Wheaton College), and organizations (such as the National Association of Evangelicals and Youth for Christ) have played a pivotal role in giving the wider movement a sense of cohesion that extends beyond "card-carrying" evangelicals.

As the coordinator for the YDS Evangelical Fellowship, I wonder which of these elements I am supposed to represent. Certainly there is some overlap, but our mission statement is heavy on definition one, and this seems to encourage certain people (particularly theological conservatives at odds with their denomiation) to get involved. However, midwestern and western evangelicals at YDS are often more interested in things like praise-and-worship nights, which seems to emphasize definition two. This, of course, makes all the evangelical Anglican's roll their eyes...it's a difficult balancing act.

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Really? (Part II)

In the business of the summer, I never recounted the content of my conversation in which I noted a striking connection between Christianity and sex. Actually, in retrospect, I should note that the connection is more between the Christian Life and sex than with Christianity per se.

The controlling metaphor that links the two is the recognition that while both are beneficial/pleasurable for the individual, the moment that it becomes "all about you," you miss the best of what they have to offer.

The Christian life and sex are ultimately 'other centered' activities...at least, in their best moments. Both can (and often are) pursued for personal or selfish reasons, but doing so misses out on the true and lasting benefits inherent in each. The more other-focued we become, the more we recognize that extravagent love stems not from our own pleasure/benefit, but in the recognition of the other as a worthy participant in the same.

Grace & Peace

What is it all for?

The end of another summer - 2005 - and the start of yet another academic year, and I'm following the trend of 'taking stock of my life.' Not in the grand, existential sense, though I just realized that I have been preparing for school every Fall for the past 21 years of my life save 3 (Falls of '01, '03 and technically '04). I am simply thinking about what this blog is 'for,' and why I should keep it around.

I've been at this for nearly a year (with some admittedly extended gaps), and my life has changed pretty dramatically in that time (see posts here and here). Now, a few of my friends are considering dropping off the blog bandwagon (here), leaving our little corner of the blogosphere, but I don't think I am ready to do that just yet. Part of my determination to stick it out, as it were, is the desire to not be a "bandwagon" person. I don't need to enjoy the 'flavor of the month' because that is what everyone else is doing, and then move on the next month. I have no need for podcast and no interest in starting one...

Frankly, my blog has always been (or should have been) more about me than about readers (not that there ever were many). Blogs have many stiles, purposes and intended audiences. For some, it's all about the 'dialogue,' and success or interest is measured in the amount of comments and heated exchanges that a post generates. I'll admit I never get many comments. But as I stated in my very first post, this space is meant to be something of an 'intellectual diary' for me, a place to vent the thoughts in my head and see how they look on paper. Less personal than a diary, but requiring less editing than a 'paper.' In the end, this blog should serve as something of an intellectual timetable for the ideas that I wrestle with. Going back through it as I have this morning, it does a pretty good job of that.

I know that I have not posted in a long time...but that's the way diaries are sometimes. This summer has been amazing and challenging and has blessed me in many ways. For those that actually read this or care, I hope to share that with you soon. But working at a camp 14 hours a day, 6 1/2 days a week with limited internet access made the time, energy and means for blogging difficult. Introspective and ongoing works are all about second chances. And third chances...and fourth. So, with a renewed sense of purpose...here I go again...

"It's never too late to be what you might. have been." —George Eliot, British novelist (1819-1880)

Really?

I just finished an hour-long conversation about why Christianity is a lot like sex. Now, I will note that this is not a typical conversation for me, although both topics hold a certain allure - as I'm sure they do for most of us. Actually...come to think of it, maybe this is a typical conversation after all.

I will not divulge all the interesting analogies that I found illuminating in the discussion, but suffice it to say that I will ponder their similarities and post later. I think I just need time now to let it all...percolate. Hmmmmm

Graced & Peace

Currently Reading "The Untamed God" By Jay Wesley Richards

Three Degrees to Kirk Cameron

The small size of the Christian community in the United States - particularly the evangelical community - never ceases to amaze me.

If you're a 20-something evangelical, chances are I know someone you know. I'd bet on it. I've had this conversation with several friends, and whether we are from Chicago, California, or Connecticut, it invariably takes less than three degrees to find someone we know in common. This is especially true when the smaller "Christian college network" is invoked. All you need is a friend who went to Wheaton, Gordon, Seattle Pacific, Messiah, or Westmont and you've got an interlaced evangelical network that stretches from sea to shining sea.

This wasn't as true as an undergrad, when most of us came straight from our family's homes to college. But as we have moved, started working or gone on to graduate school, it is becoming more frequent. This is increasingly true for the evangelical colleges as their academic rigor has increased, and they are now have graduates attending top schools all across the country.

A few pertinent (though continually surprising) examples:

• my good friend from Yale (who grew up in Chicago) has recently become quite close with a "friend of a friend" from my public high school in California. The connection? Princeton Seminary and Seattle Pacific.
  
• Another friend working in Washington, DC randomly met a girl I attended summer camp with in high school while both girls attended Westmont.
  
• In the past 3 months, I have become friends with a girl from Gordon, and another from Westmont, all through a connection at Yale Divinity School. Turns out that this Westmont girl TA'd my brother while he was there!
• I got an e-mail yesterday from a Wheaton girl getting ready to attend YDS. She is looking to take part in a group that I lead there, was directed to me by a close mutual friend.
  

Though these connections are becoming frequent, they never cease to amaze me! They are even more common as my social circle begins to narrow to the Seminary and Religious Studies types, who often come from this small network of schools, or from this close community.

I wish I had more insight into this strange phenomenon - something pithy to say or some great social observation to make. Instead I'm merely reporting what I see, and asking you for your comments. Do you have any stories like this? Why do you think this is happening? Am I merely on crack? (don't rule it out) As always, I await your response...

Grace & Peace

An Improper Relationship With God

Turmoil rocked Heaven this morning as allegations arose that God had an "improper relationship" with a former worshipper. The scandal broke when a 21 year old woman, known only as Mary, claimed that she had given birth to God's "only son" last week in a barn in the hamlet of Bethlehem. Sources close to Mary claim that she "had loved God for a long time", that she was constantly talking about her relationship with God and that she was "thrilled to have had his child".

In a press conference this morning, God issued a vehement denial, saying that "No sexual relationship existed", and that "the facts of this story will come out in time, verily". Independent counsel Beelzebub immediately filed a brief with the Justice Department to expand his investigation to cover questions of whether any commandments may have been broken and whether God had illegally funnelled laundered money to his illegitimate child through three foreign operatives know only as the "Wise Men". Beelzebub has issued subpoenas to several angels who are rumoured to have acted as go-betweens in the affair.

Critics have pointed out that these allegations have little to do with the charges that Beelzebub was originally appointed to investigate that God had created large-scale flooding in order to cover up evidence of a failed land deal. In recent months, Beelzebub's investigation has already been expanded to cover questions surrounding the large number of locusts that plagued God's political opponents in the last election, as well as to claims that the destruction of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah was to divert attention away from a scandal involving whether the giveaway of a parcel of public land in Promised County to a Jewish special interest group was quid pro quo for political contributions.

If these allegations prove to be true, this will be a big blow to God's career, much of which has been spent crusading for stricter moral standards and harsher punishments for wrongdoers. Indeed, God recently outlined a "tough-on-crime" plan consisting of a series of 10 "Commandments", which has been introduced in Congress in a bill by Representative Moses. Critics of the bill have pointed out that it lacks any provisions for the rehabilitation of criminals, and lawyers for the ACLU are planning to fight the "Name in Vain" Commandment as being an unconstitutional restriction on free speech.

pondering Sabbatical

While numerous thoughts plague my mind and urge me write, the weight of words bids me take time...to feel their weight and confirm their worth. And as logistics press forcefully on this inopportune time of year, and blossoms beckon after many dark days of fitful slumber, I contemplate a brief sabbatical from my dear weblog. To allow my ideas to percolate and distill, and to indulge my procrastination not in front of my computer but in front of creation. If I am temporarily silent, do not mistake my absence for lack of love. I shall return.

Grace & Peace

word

"The ascetic character of the person, derived as it is from the eucharistic form of the ecclesial hypostasis, expresses the authentic person precisely when it does not deny eros and the body but hypostasizes them in an ecclesial manner."

-John Zizioulas, 'Being as Communion' (pg. 63)

The Anti-blog

The Anti-blog has a new post, which happens rarely enough that it's worth mentioning. Not as profound (perhaps) as his last, but here's to him deciding to continue...

Grace & Peace

Non impediti ratione cogitationis?

(Or, It takes an Man to make a Woman feel like a Woman.)

On a recent transatlantic flight, a plane passes through a severe storm. The turbulence is awful, and things go from bad to worse when one wing is struck by lightning. One woman in particular loses it. Screaming, she stands up in the front of the plane. "I'm too young to die," she wails.

Then she yells, "Well, if I'm going to die, I want my last minutes on earth to be memorable! Is there ANYONE on this plane who can make me feel like a WOMAN?"

For a moment there is silence. Everyone has forgotten their own peril. They all stared, riveted, at the desperate woman in the front of the plane. Then an Italian man stands up in the rear of the plane. He is gorgeous--tall, well built, with dark brown hair and hazel eyes. He starts to walk slowly up the aisle, unbuttoning
his shirt.....one button at a time.

........No one moves.

He removes his shirt.

.......Muscles ripple across his chest.

.......She gasps...

.......He whispers:

"Iron this, and get me something to eat..."

Joyeuse Paques

Happy Easter everyone. For many reason, this is my favorite holiday of the year. May your time with friends and family be blessed by the knowledge that Christ is alive, and that the power of the cross is that it is empty.

He is risen. He is risen indeed.

Grace & Peace

Ready, Fire, Aim...

Taking inspiration from a friend (whom I recently discovered is a fantastic narrative writer), I have become enamored with the idea of serial posts - periodic thoughts in a related vein addressed under a common title. These are not to be confused with posts that take a few iterations to complete (like our community's thoughts on worship), or mutiple posts in a similar theme that lack the conscious coherence of a serial post (e.g. many politically oriented posts close to last year's election).

I currently have two serial posts: "who's your grandma?!" a serial including random thoughts and fun news items, and "Non impediti ratione cogitationis?" a new serial of my thoughts on the fairer sex.

At the risk of overkill, I'd like to kick-start another serial entitled "who we are" (no linkage yet for obvious reasons), that examines and reveals things about myself that I often find surprising. I consider this post to be a proto-iteration of this serial.

As with all serials, I will link the current post to its previous iteration, and welcome your thoughts and comments, especially stream-of-consciousness thoughts that will inevitably spark me to look deeper at my reflections.

Grace & Peace

Currently Spinning "Kind of Blue" By Miles Davis

Non impediti ratione cogitationis?

(or, my thoughts on women)

A post of this magnitude certainly entails more layers than I can ever imagine uncovering. Plus, I have precious few thoughts I dare categorize as "conclusions." But in a spirit of profound humility (dare I say reverance?), I would like to make this a periodic post of my thoughts on the fairer sex.

The following poem you may find distressing, humorous, profoundly beautiful, or perhaps deserved, depending on your perspective. I hold these in tension:

I, being born a woman and distressed
By all the needs and notions of my kind,
Am urged by your propinquity to find
Your person fair, and feel a certain zest
To bear your body's weight upon my breast:
So subtly is the fume of life designed,
To clarify the pulse and cloud the mind,
And leave me once again undone, possessed.
Think not for this, however, the poor treason
Of my stout blood against my staggering brain,
I shall remember you with love, or season
My scorn with pity, --let me make it plain:
I find this frenzy insufficient reason
For conversation when we meet again.
Edna St. Vincent Millay

In a complimentary, or perhaps contradictory spirit, to what degree do we think that men and women need each other? This may be taken in many ways, and I consciously imply all of them, but anticipate a response predicated on the likely impression of one element over the others.

Don't second guess yourself too much. We're all smart enough to play devil's advocate with ourselves. But stream of consciousness is far more enlightening...my answer to follow.
Grace & Peace