Live Generously

To both of you that regularly read my blog, I apologize for the lack of substantive posts recently. I’ve got a lot on my mind that I’d like to write about, but unfortunately this is a particularly busy school week for me, so blogging has taken a back seat for the time being. That being said, I did want to make a few brief comments about some different things that have caught my eye.

1) One of the books I’m reading for my political theology class this week is called, The Beloved Community: How Faith Shapes Social Justice, from the Civil Rights Movement to Today, by Charles Marsh, a religion professor at the University of Virginia. In it there is an amazing quote from a book called A Theology for the Social Gospel by Walter Rauschenbusch. Rauschenbusch writes:

“A Kingdom theology involves the redemption of social life from the cramping influence of religious bigotry, from the repression of self-assertion in the relation of upper and lower classes, and from forms of slavery which human beings are treated as mere means to serve the ends of others…the redemption of society from political autocracies and economic oligarchies; the substitution of redemptive for vindictive penology; the abolition of constraint through hunger as part of the industrial system; and the abolition of war as the supreme expression of hate and the completest cessation of freedom.”

Amen.

It’s always refreshing to hear voices (that are thankfully becoming more and more prevalent) that advocate a theology that includes but goes far beyond personal piety.

2) A document was released yesterday entitled An Evangelical Manifesto. The following is from the document’s website:

“An Evangelical Manifesto is an open declaration of who Evangelicals are and what they stand for. It has been drafted and published by a representative group of Evangelical leaders who do not claim to speak for all Evangelicals, but who invite all other Evangelicals to stand with them and help clarify what Evangelical means in light of “confusions within and the consternation without” the movement. As the Manifesto states, the signers are not out to attack or exclude anyone, but to rally and to call for reform.”

The document is signed by a remarkably diverse group of 80 well known evangelicals including Dallas Willard, Jim Wallis, John Ortberg, and Fuller’s president Richard Mouw, and is supposedly meant to be a bit of a self-critique. It is currently sitting on my desk, but I haven’t had a chance to read it yet (although I very much look forward to it).

The evangelical community is most definitely needs to do some soul searching, so hopefully this document will be a good start. I myself often hesitate to call myself an “Evangelical” simply because of the well-earned litany of negative connotations the word has. Right-wing evangelicalism, I fear, has alienated many young people who love Jesus but are frustrated at the disconnect between the teachings of Jesus and the public issues that tend to attract the most attention from the evangelical community. Sadly, in many cases, this leads to disengagement, rather than a creative and theological search for a more holistic, Jesus-centered spirituality. The shame that many young people feel even at what the word “Evangelical” or the word “Christian” connotes can be seen in something as simple as what Christians tend to put on the “Religious Views” field on their facebook profiles. Responses range from “I love Jesus” to “JESUS!” to “grace” to “disciple” to “the cross”, nothing listed. There is nothing wrong with that (I myself have the religious views field empty), but it does reflect, I believe, the sense of alienation that many young people feel.

The entire 17-page manifesto can be found my following the link above.

3) My wife has been studying the gospel of Luke on her own recently, and wrote a great post last night discussing some of the things that she has learned. I have enjoyed talking with her about some of her insights, and her post is well worth reading.

5) I’ve been thinking about pacifism lately. Partially because I’m reading The Politics of Jesus by noted pacifist theologian John Howard Yoder, partially because of some of the ideas from Augustine’s City of God that I just came across which expand the definition of peace far beyond the absence of armed conflict, and partially just because it seems like something Jesus is a fan of (though I’ve thought that last part for a long time). More on this later…

5) And finally…the Padres suck. They really, really suck.

The end

I’ll admit it…I’m a big fan of the quotes on the sides of Starbucks cups.  You know, the “The Way I See It” quotes?

There, I said it.

As someone who probably has close to half a dozen meetings at Starbucks every week, I always look forward to reading the quote on my cup.

Maybe that means I’m inquisitive.  Maybe that means I’m a raging dork.  I’m not really sure.

At any rate, I liked the quote on my cup this morning. It related to a lot of issues I have been thinking through lately.  I am becoming increasingly annoyed with what I perceive to be a lack of fair-mindedness in our culture.  In other words, I am finding in several different arenas that there is a growing intolerance for differing opinions, and there is a growing tendency of those with one particular perspective to demonize and mischaracterize those who do not share this perspective.  In other words, public dialog has been replaced, in many cases, with intolerant, dogmatic preaching.

This became especially clear to me about two years ago when I briefly subscribed to Sirius Satellite Radio.  The main reason I subscribed was to listen to talk radio in an effort to stay informed about what was going on in the world.

I lasted two weeks.  I couldn’t stand it.  I actually found that I showed up to work angry in the morning after 20 minutes of political talk radio.

On the conservative stations all they could do was talk about how liberals are idiots that are consciously conspiring to destroy America.  On the liberal stations all they could do was talk about how conservatives are idiots that are consciously conspiring to destroy America. There was no dialog.  There was no attempt at mutual understanding. And it was flat out intellectually dishonest.

I find this sort of rhetoric in the “God” debate as well.  Those in the new atheist movement characterize people of faith as deluded and feeble-minded people who are living in denial of plain evidence, and they often use words like “extremist” to describe Christian or other faith-based organizations.  Then again, their Christian counterparts characterize atheists as, well, deluded and feeble-minded people who are living in denial of plain evidence, while using words like “militant” to describe outspoken atheists.  This sort of condescending and disrespectful rhetoric is, again, intellectually dishonest, and it does nothing to encourage understanding between the differing perspectives. Something that I appreciated at Francis Collins’ book The Language of God was that I felt he avoided this sort of argumentation. He certainly had a particular point of view, and he sought to assert that point of view’s superiority, but he did so in a way that clearly was not seeking to belittle those of differing perspectives, be they atheists/agnostics or young earth creationists.

I’ll be the first to admit that I struggle with fair-mindedness when it comes to issues that I am passionate about.  There are numerous political and moral issues where I find the alternate perspective to be badly wanting.  I am learning, however, the importance of listening, and the importance of being teachable.  I certainly am not saying it’s easy, nor am I saying that the answer is to become wishy washy in our beliefs and convictions.  I suppose all I’m trying to say is that there is value in being willing to listen to other perspectives (and respecting the humanity of those with such perspectives), whether the issue is the war in Iraq, abortion, the existence of God, presidential candidates, or the best team in the National League West.

I find it somewhat ironic that while our society is becoming more and more pluralistic, as individuals we are becoming more and more dogmatic. In college ministry I personally am struggling with how to help students and others fully understand and live out their faith while also learning to understand and dialog with other perspectives.  In other words, our goal is that all of us have living and active relationships with God that we can express and live by without appearing dogmatic and judgmental. I should say that, while it is a struggle, I fully believe that it can be done.

All that being said, here’s the quote from the cup that sparked all of these thoughts:

“You can learn a lot more from listening than you can from talking.  Find someone with whom you don’t agree in the slightest and ask them to explain themselves at length.  Then take a seat, shut your mouth, and don’t argue back. It’s physically impossible to listen with your mouth open.”

As you saw in my last post, I’ve been reflecting quite a bit on the idea of motivation lately, namely the importance of staying motivated.  I’ve been working through the book Learning to Lead for my Org. Leadership class at Fuller, and towards the end of it I came across two terrific quotes that relate, in a sort of roundabout way, to the idea of motivation.  One is from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in a letter from the Birmingham jail, and the other is from CSU-Northridge then-president Dr. Blenda Wilson’s Inaugural Address in 1993.

“I am coming to feel taht the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than the people of good will.  We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the vitriolic works and actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people.  We must come to see that human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability.  It comes through the tireless efforts and persistent work of men willing to be co-workers with God, and without this hard work itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation.  We must use time creatively, and forever realize that the time is always ripe to do right.” - Martin Luther King, Jr.

Dr. King’s quote struck me because I believe it is so easy to simply point out the bad while failing to contest for the good.  The corruption and moral depravity of our world is evident everywhere we look, from our president who refuses to outlaw waterboarding to a New York governor who has sadly shown himself to be a hypocrite, we needn’t look far to find poster children for the unfortunate state of our world.  The reality is, however, that good does not come from criticizing the bad, but as Dr. King said, it comes from the “tireless efforts and persistent work of men willing to be co-workers with God.”  It’s easy to throw rocks and point fingers…harnessing the motivation to take responsibility and seek to move the world forward is much more difficult.

Dr. Wilson’s quote below is interesting to me simply because of the language that she uses as the president of a secular university:

“In all we do, we must affirm an unyielding moral vision–that the next generation is entitled to participate fully in reinventing and benefiting from the American future.  If we believe in ourselves, we will find and create a vital and paricipatory community in which every student, faculty, and staff member is valued and respected, in which we recognize that we share common values as educated and ethical human beings, and in which the bonds of community are stronger than the habits of cultural ignorance.  That is our fervent goals.

“If we believe in ourselves, we will create the kind of learning environment and campus community that will prepare our graduates for a lifetime of learning, ethical conduct, global sensitivity, and service.  Those institutions that will succeed in achieving a 21-century version of academic excellence will be those institutions that believe–in their students, in their communities, in themselves–and as a consequence of that belief, will take risks and design radically new approaches to embracing the imperative of change.“

I had never heard of Dr. Wilson before reading this quote, nor do I know anything else about her.  But what she articulates is a compelling moral vision worth following, and it is a vision that can be implemented, in perhaps a nuanced way, in settings far beyond a university.