Moving the Furniture

What does our furniture say about us?

I’ve got a garage full of furniture that my brother and I inherited after my parents deceased. In the rectory is furniture that has been donated or loaned to me over the last ten years. It doesn’t all match, but after a while it becomes more familiar. Perhaps my furniture says I have different sorts of s(h)elves.

Or that I’m just too lazy to throw any of it away.

The furniture we love the most is that which lasts. We associate memories with furniture thats been around a long time. Such timeless furniture is also the most expensive, and sometimes requires the care of talented artisans. It is even more ecologically responsible.

Most of us have probably bought furniture that is beautiful but doesn’t last very long, like at Ikea – good enough, of course. And I remember in college taking some cinderblocks and boards and thinking I had some very elegant bookshelves.

Of course, there are times when when we have to move furniture around. Although moving furniture is exhausting, it can completely alter the sense of a room. Moving a desk, a trash can, a bed can change the way we work. I have a garbage basket next to the mail box so I can throw away bills I don’t want to receive. I have my desk next to my library. I have a little island in the middle of the kitchen. Furniture in the right place changes the way we move and think. Puting a TV in the bedroom makes it our bedroom companion. Putting one in the dining room does the same. Personally, I think it’s best to have only one, and put it in the den. Not that I’m judging others who do things differently.

A little more than a year ago we moved the furniture in the church. We did this in part because the nature of the spirit is one that should bring people closer together and see the image of God in people who are different: old, young, black, white, male, female, bearded, and limping. To name a few. Having to see each other makes us aware of the many dimensions God is reflected.

There is a style of having furniture called “feng shui.” I’m not a proponent of this style of arranging furniture, but it does point to the fact that arranging furniture is important, and it reflects a sense of our own humanity and sense of the sacred.

There is a small irruption to thinking about furniture too much, and that is because our Israelite forebears were very much pilgrims. Perhaps this means we are not to be so concerned with furniture: we’re reminded that God is not an idol – a piece of furniture – but actually works in our lives when we have arranged spaces for Him to express His life.

Have you ever been in a place that is too crowded? A closet, a room with just too much furniture? A space that doesn’t allow for movement? The word “salvation” comes from a concept of opening up space: and perhaps this is what we are trying to do now: move the furniture so that we have space. Space to love, space to play, space to touch the God that seeks to move in our lives.

So when you see the furniture moved in our sacred space, ponder what it feels like. And perhaps it is useful to consider what your space says about who you are, what you value, and how you work. If you’re stuck in your mind, in your work, or in your life, perhaps the simple answer is to move some furniture around and see what happens.

Which is exactly what we’re trying to do here. Just see what happens. Because that is what the church is for: making things happen.

Atheists and Public Office

Rob Boston reports the story of a North Carolina councilman, Cecil Bothwell, who some local politicians would like to remove.  He’s an atheist.  There is also a legal reason to do so.  Being an atheist, and a public servant, is against the law.

This law should also be offensive to believers.

I understand the argument:  there is a generally held belief about believers that atheism cannot provide a general account of the common good.  I don’t think it is a bad argument, but it is empirically wrong, if deductively plausible.  Religious people should be wary of such requirements for the simple reason is that it makes politicians hypocrites and liars.

Most politicians are opportunistic in their belief.  There are plenty of ultra right wing conservative Christian politicians who have no faith, but find it useful to proclaim it.  Announcing one’s faith says “I’m on your team.”    S/he may say they don’t believe in evolution but insist on requiring their own kids take science classes.  They still want their children to go to a secular, private, ivy schools.

Religious requirements make politicians liars.

Religious affiliation is, after all, a low cost marker.  It doesn’t require commitment; it doesn’t require sacrifice.  Just parrot the right things, and the credulous will believe you.

So when an atheist runs for office we should commend them for their honesty, and evaluate them on their politics.

And that’s actually the real issue.

The issue is not, in my view, about his beliefs.  If he had been an atheist who believed in conservative politics, would there have been such an outrage?  Chances are he would have been a bit quieter, perhaps, but I doubt politicians would be aggressively challenging him.  What has happened, alas, is that non-belief becomes an identifier for progressive politics.  It need not be that way, of course.  There are lots of libertarians and conservatives who have no truck with religious institutions, traditions or thought.

The mistake that we make is to assume that this issue is primarily about belief.  It is more about how progressive politics will get framed, challenging the standard narratives of political discourse.  If this creates more honesty, then we should welcome it.  But it’s not first about religion; its about politics.  We need more truthfulness in institutions, and should commend those who can speak about their religious allegiances, or non-allegiances, without fear of judgment.

Annual Meeting

We had the annual meeting yesterday.  No priests were harmed in the process.  Or treasurers.  We didn’t discuss sexuality or the Anglican Communion.  We celebrated the best pledge drive we’d had in several years.

We did a few tasks differently this meeting.  The budget was far more detailed than before, and we sent it out for review to everybody in the congregation.  It was a risk.  We didn’t know of someone would complain about the price of stamps or my subscription to the New Yorker.

My reflections were, in sum, like so:

Thanks everybody, you rock.  Now here is what we need to do.

Now let’s do some work.   It’s simple.  Painfully so.  First, we love each other.  Then we do the work of loving as best as we can.  Then communicate this to the world.   Simple.

I just said this in longer paragraphs, with greater detail, which is where, it is said, the devil lies.

Atheists in Foxholes

Because I susbscribe to Alternet, I occasionally read the blogger Greta Christina.   She’s an atheist, one who believes that it is important to be aggressive in overcoming “religion.”   I have many philosophical disagreements with her, such as a belief in God, but more fundamentally, she is a useful example of an atheist who is tone deaf to the experiences of those who find religious traditions worthy and useful.  She is also one an atheist who doesn’t believe she needs to learn much more.

In her most recent Alternet column she takes on the phrase “there are no atheists in foxholes.”  It’s a charming, quaint assertion, one that, she rightly points out, is most likely empirically untrue.  Atheists do face death and they don’t suddenly become metaphysicians in those times.  My father, when he was diagnosed with cancer, didn’t start praying,  although he did continue going to a Unitarian Universalist church (he was one of those atheists who wasn’t offended by religion) and did not drive out the Episcopal chaplain who offered consolation when he was in hospice.

She also argues that it is a bigoted assertion.  That somehow it insinuates that atheists, in their moment of questioning, will then abandon their beliefs and join, for example, the Catholic Church.

At heart of the conundrum is the example of the “praying atheist.”   What she doesn’t seem to understand is that the issue is not about the afterlife, or about death, nor is it really about belief.

For her, in a foxhole, the true atheist may fret, complain, twiddle their thumbs, anything except pray to something that doesn’t exist.   But does an atheist in a foxhole who does pray suddenly a theist?   No:   all they have done is express a desire to be rescued.

And there would be nothing wrong with that.

The phrase, as Ms. Christina reads it, is a good example of one that misdirects.  To add to the confusion, she mistranslates it, interpreting it mainly as a comment on the faith of atheism, rather than on their desires.  Religious language, however, directs the hearer to look and hear in a particular way.  Greta Christina hears religious language in a foxhole as a communication to a non-existent object.

But is that all it is?  Not really.

Being in a foxhole presumes a couple things. One is that we would be completely powerless.  We would have no control.  And that our lives are at stake.  In these situations, our mental energy might be consumed, believer or non believer, by one possibility.

We’d want to be rescued. And that presumes that rescue is possible, even when the facts, the reality, is that we won’t be.  Reality matters, of course, and in a foxhole, the reality is that we would probably die.  To a religious believer, in these situations, prayer is justified.  And I would assert that it would be perfectly reasonable to do so, even if it were inefficacious.

But it seems to me that any sort of prayer, for Ms. Christian, is that prayer is an incomprehensible language, the expression of which is not merely nonsense, but also – even in its utterance – morally circumspect.

When someone says “there are no atheists in foxholes,” however, the assertion is not merely that they will become metaphysicians.  It is not necessarily about the supernatural.  It is an expression that asserts that even when we are powerless, we may desire a power that will rescue us.   It may be a natural, materialistic power.  But the desire still exists.    Even when the object, the rescue, the rescuer, may not exist.

If anything, the praying atheist is merely taking a bet, covering all bases.  When one is powerless, it is fully rational and pragmatic to put ideology aside and take a risk, even if is a poor one, if only because the only temporary cost to prayer is one’s identity as a non-believer.  If praying is merely an archaic tool that probably has no use, there is no shame in using it in a time of need.  But if it is a tool that is morally and conceptually offensive to one’s own identity, then it becomes a problem.  Greta seems to be in the latter category.  Praying is not merely incomprehensible, no true atheist would use it.

Granted, not all atheists require a belief in human power.  But for many people – including non-believers – power is desirable, especially when faced with death.   Such a statement about atheists in foxholes is to place them in the company of human beings who have such desires.  And these desires are reasonable, even if the outcomes are not guaranteed.

Greta is clear:  “the fact that atheists love life, that we’re deeply attached to the people we love, and that we experience fear and grief in the face of death. It’s a lie that tries to depict us, as not just callow and naive, but as something less than human.”   Well, I do hope that Christians could understand that.  In fact, it might be exactly why they say “there are no atheists in foxholes.”  Even an atheist loves life and experiences fear and grief in the face of death, and a desire not to die.

Atheists often make a similar assertion about Christians:  that if they really believed in the afterlife, why wouldn’t they just love death and kill themselves?  After all, isn’t the afterlife a better place?  Although there is a legitimate tension, the truth is that there is no place in Christian theology that requires a Christian to love death.   There is a strong tradition of not being afraid of death, but the two virtues are not identical.  One can be both brave and love life.  If anything, the doctrine and tradition of the church is precisely directed thus.  This why suicide is circumscribed and the funeral mass is a resurrection mass.  The challenge to the belief in the afterlife that Christians should love death, illustrates a misunderstanding of the tradition and human experiences within that tradition.

A Christian may admit that merely wishing does not make things happen.  Wishing, after all, is only one dimension of prayer, and not even the most important one.   But if I were in a foxhole with an atheist, and s/he started to pray I would neither condemn her for her hypocrisy or her weakness.  I wouldn’t expect her to ascribe to any metaphysic or join a church afterwards.   I would understand the desire.  I might share in that wish.  For sometimes we are powerless, and we want someone to rescue us, and have to find a way to express that hope.  And prayer is a rhetoric that is not circumscribed only to believers.

When we do get rescued, it may be a human face that does, and for me, that face would seem a lot like God’s.

The Divine Scone

1 Kings 17:13:  But Elijah said to her “Do not be afraid, go and do as you have said; but first make a little scone of it for me and bring it to me, and then make some for your self and for your son.”

Scones forever.  That’s what God promises.

Now to find a verse for Gin martinis.

Slacktivist on Health Care

Fred explains why we’re not getting raises and knocks down a couple sacred cows.

15. Do you see the point here? You are angrily, loudly demanding that Congress make sure that you never, ever get another pay raise as long as you live. Because of you and because of your angry demands, you and your family and your kids are going to have to get by with less this year than last year. And next year you’re going to have to get by with even less. And if you keep angrily demanding that no one must ever fix this problem, then you’re going to have to figure out how to get by on less and less every year for the rest of your life.

The entire rant.

About the Massachusetts Election

1.  Scott Brown has a compelling narrative.  He is presidential material – he’s telegenic, smart, socially moderate, financially conservative.  He’s strong on defense, and unlike many Republicans, he’s actually served.   In some ways, he is like Obama – very himself, confident and clear.  Furthermore, unlike many conservatives,  doesn’t have the personal animosity towards Obama being fostered by plenty in the wingnut branch of the party.  That suits him.

2.  This MAY presage bad news for the Democrats.  Yes, perhaps they were not responsible for the economic fiasco.  But they were not able to provide a narrative about how we got here, in part because they, also, were complicit.  They were still at the bank’s bidding.   When the union party sells out the unions, a union man might just decide to vote Republican.

3.  Obama has generally been reticent about playing the economic populist.  He’s not an economic populist.  He’s a centrist, a libertarian of the behavioralist school.  In spite of the ridiculous assertions that he’s a closet Marxist, he actually believes that banks have a proper function in the economy.   This means the Republicans, being the alternative party, are getting to play that role.

4.  People don’t get Keynes.   The stimulus may have prevented jobs from being lost, but people don’t quite understand that.   They buy the easy (and possibly false) idea, that the deficit means something.   People are aware that they are not getting much for their taxes.   They don’t seem to understand that our taxes are helping our military, the Iraqis, the Afghanis, the Israelis, and the Pakistanis.   Good causes, to be sure, but its expensive to help millions of people in the rest of the world, and our own military and not get a much else in return, especially when we can’t seem to police our own borders as well as we should (unionized, skilled TSA workers might help).

5.  Scott Brown is more liberal than some southern Democrats.  He’s unformed by focus groups, and may actually be an independent.

6.  The national health care plan is basically Massachusetts but for the entire country.

7.  Perhaps Obama will be forced to form a bipartisan committee with Republicans and challenge them when they oppose a minimum plan.

8. Obama should challenge those companies, including pharmaceutical companies, who oppose legitimate free-market principles.  A national health exchange and allowing imports from Canada are popular, and legit to libertarians.

9.  Obama mainly wants people to be kept on task.  the task is to reform the system.  He can still be an effective leader, but you start with the possible to get to the impossible.

A year after the inauguration

From 2009

Like the two million people who went to the inauguration, I’m captivated by the change in administration.

Although my personal politics are *ahem* non-partisan, or “Red Tory,” I think that Obama has demonstrated – even apart from his political slant – sophisticated and agile leadership. The most important evidence is his ability to stay connected to people who think differently. He is motivated by curiosity and a sense that everyone has a view worth sharing.

I share some interests with our President. I moved to Chicago in 1992 for because Chicago was where community organizing was part of the Divinity School curriculum. The city’s physical landscape was organized around neighborhoods. In 1982 it elected Harold Washington, who some think was one of the truly great politicians of all time – a man who combined realism with idealism in a way that transformed Chicago. At the time, I was fascinated by the city more than New York.

The university itself was also the center of rigorous conservative thought. It avoided an instinctive leftish position but was rigorous and fair, generally unimpressed by identity politics. Obama’s teaching at Chicago was a time when he would have been connected to both social action, politics, and conservative thought that would help ground his ability to look at the world in complicated ways. I think this is a worthy gift – being able to see the world through many different lenses.

He inherits a challenge. Yet, our role is not to assent without understanding, to idealize without reflecting, or to worship. We must still organize ourselves as witnesses to love in the world, speak truth to power, and hold up a mirror to our leaders, holding them accountable for their actions. We can do so by remaining magnanimous and remembering the cardinal rule of organizing: there are no permanent enemies. Which is another way of saying, “love your neighbor.”

Martin Luther King Day Prayer

The Benediction given at the Martin Luther King White Plains Unity Dinner, January 17th.

Holy G-d, source of life, lover of souls,

You led your people out of bondage into freedom.

You have shown us the road to righteousness.

We give thanks for this wonderful morning

Of song and story

To remember the movement

That inspired and challenged this country

to liberate the marginalized among us,

and to also remember Martin, your beloved, who challenged this nation to live the promise of human dignity.

Although we know we must continue on that journey,

We lift up to you the sacrifices we have made

Through your love.

We know that this joury for justice will not be easy.

It will not make us popular; it may not bring us bounty,

But it may bring us to a better land.

Bless us for we know this

Now send us now into the world in peace.

To go and serve as you have commanded.

Strengthen the hands and hearts of those who help others in the midst of adversity;

Grant us all firm resolve to stand with our neighbors who are in need,

And support of them in this their time of trouble;

May we speak the truth, though it may be uncomfortable;

May we challenge the powers, though it come at great expense;

But may we do so with love an humility,

Keeping our eyes on the prize.

And the blessing of God almighty, by whom, in whom and through whom we have our power, but upon us, and remain with us forever more. Amen

A Reflection on the Earthquake

Written in 2004 after the Tsunami by David Bentley Hart.

Go Here to Make a Donation.  Episcopal Relief and Development is a 4-Star Charity.  The money goes where it needs to.

As a Christian, I cannot imagine any answer to the question of evil likely to satisfy an unbeliever; I can note, though, that–for all its urgency–Voltaire’s version of the question is not in any proper sense “theological.” The God of Voltaire’s poem is a particular kind of “deist” God, who has shaped and ordered the world just as it now is, in accord with his exact intentions, and who presides over all its eventualities austerely attentive to a precise equilibrium between felicity and morality. Not that reckless Christians have not occasionally spoken in such terms; but this is not the Christian God.

The Christian understanding of evil has always been more radical and fantastic than that of any theodicist; for it denies from the outset that suffering, death and evil have any ultimate meaning at all. Perhaps no doctrine is more insufferably fabulous to non-Christians than the claim that we exist in the long melancholy aftermath of a primordial catastrophe, that this is a broken and wounded world, that cosmic time is the shadow of true time, and that the universe languishes in bondage to “powers” and “principalities”–spiritual and terrestrial–alien to God. In the Gospel of John, especially, the incarnate God enters a world at once his own and yet hostile to him–”He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not”–and his appearance within “this cosmos” is both an act of judgment and a rescue of the beauties of creation from the torments of fallen nature.

Whatever one makes of this story, it is no bland cosmic optimism. Yes, at the heart of the gospel is an ineradicable triumphalism, a conviction that the victory over evil and death has been won; but it is also a victory yet to come. As Paul says, all creation groans in anguished anticipation of the day when God’s glory will transfigure all things. For now, we live amid a strife of darkness and light.

When confronted by the sheer savage immensity of worldly suffering–when we see the entire littoral rim of the Indian Ocean strewn with tens of thousands of corpses, a third of them children’s–no Christian is licensed to utter odious banalities about God’s inscrutable counsels or blasphemous suggestions that all this mysteriously serves God’s good ends. We are permitted only to hate death and waste and the imbecile forces of chance that shatter living souls, to believe that creation is in agony in its bonds, to see this world as divided between two kingdoms–knowing all the while that it is only charity that can sustain us against “fate,” and that must do so until the end of days.

Craig Uffman also quotes Hart.