The Believer's heaven

You have to see this, but the scabby people who put it up prevented it from being embedded, so you have to follow this link.

Thanks for the tip, Todd!

JAS

Virginia Tech Massacre - Lesson One

It's difficult to imagine the personal reality of those who were there watching Cho walk around and kill their classmates. It's also difficult to imagine that worse horrors than this occur every single day outside of our relatively safe borders. If we are at all sympathetic to the victims (dead and living) of Virginia Tech, let’s also be mindful of those people who suffer this kind of tragedy every day.

Last year the first scientific analysis of the Iraqi death toll announced that as many as 655,000 people died as a result of the invasion, which is an average of an extra 2519 people per week attributed to our presence in Iraq (33 people died in Virginia). Even if the figures are not universally accepted, we're still speaking about ridiculously large numbers of people.

In the last two years, somewhere around 300,000 people have been killed or died specifically due to the violence in Darfur. Currently, two million Sudanese people from Darfur are displaced and living in aid-dependent camps in Chad, many dying from abject neglect.

So sure, Virginia Tech is a tragedy, no doubt about it . . . I want that kind of thing to stay as far away from me and my family as is possible. But our reaction to it, in the media in particular, demonstrates the inequity of our concerns for human life. Christianity is supposed to be a global concern for the entire human race. At one Christian university I know about, they’re having a prayer vigil for the people at Virginia Tech.

I only mention this because it seems to be a fairly standard response by churches and Christian organizations and it is indeed a good and proper response. But, I’m yet to see popular prayer vigils for the literally millions of people who have suffered because of our presence in Iraq, or for the two million displaced from Darfur, almost all of whom have lost loved ones due to the violence there. I’m yet to see popular prayer vigils for the millions of people world wide adversely affected by our economic and environmental practices.

What I walk away with here is that Virginia Tech and other tragedies like it evidence that popular Christianity here in the US has a deeply seated materialism (big surprise!): it’s only worth praying about if it could happen to us. If it’s happening elsewhere and there’s no danger of it hurting us, then we can comfortably ignore it. No prayer vigil necessary.

Pot Calls Kettle White - an interesting article

Nick the Eloquent included this link in a comment in the last blog. It's to an article written by a Black journalist and it lends credence to the claims of the blog entry.

Pot Calls Kettle White: Race Relations, Don Imus, Jesse Jackson and Mr. S. Dog

I understand from some of my enlightened friends who are more sensitive to American culture and history that my own perception of the race-relations in the US is wanting. Note that I don't think it's wanting; otherwise I'd change my mind.

I'm really surprised, to be honest, that there's been so much backlash against the Imus comments. Not that I think they were okay, but really, they were par for the course in his work: he makes horrible comments about everybody, Hillary Clinton in particular, which personally offend me . . . as a human being.

However, why is it that when he says something about African Americans, suddenly, the gloves are off and he needs to resign? Moreover, why are people not calling for the resignation of the CEOs of record companies who produce the most atrocious and vile descriptions of black women and others?

Witness the following outrageous comment by the guy with the ridiculous name: "Snoop Dog" or whatever on earth it is. Apparently Mr. Dog was asked about the comparison between his own voluminous toxic vitriol and the cranky comments made by Imus. MTV then transmitted his response:

"It's a completely different scenario . . . [Rappers] are not talking about no collegiate basketball girls who have made it to the next level in education and sports. We're talking about ho's that's in the 'hood that ain't doing shit, that's trying to get a nigga for his money. These are two separate things. First of all, we ain't no old-ass white men that sit up on MSNBC going hard on black girls. We are rappers that have these songs coming from our minds and our souls that are relevant to what we feel. I will not let them mutha-----as say we in the same league as him." (This quote comes from here.)

From my perspective, people like Jesse Jackson legitimate this kind of cancerous attitude by ignoring it on the one hand and on the other hand by going after every (specifically) white person who steps across the perceived line. I simply don’t buy as a socially acceptable reality that it’s okay for Mr. Dog to abuse women because he’s a black man. The irony is, Mr. Dog is a hero to many (obviously unfortunate) young people and his lack of apology for being so misogynistic actually validates his perspective among his followers and fans, whereas at least Imus has publicly apologized.

It doesn’t matter whether we “think” Imus means it or not, it’s a social gesture to apologize publicly and it reinforces, publicly (!), that we as a society do not approve of such behavior. Yet by contrast we publicly accept Mr. Dog’s anti-social behavior. I think the bigger part of the guilt here should be laid at the feet of the self-appointed media-hungry leaders of the African Americans, people like Jesse Jackson. The reason: because they’re in the best position to do something about it, but they don’t. In fact, when a real Black leader, Bill Cosby, attempted to address this very problem, he was criticized as some kind of Uncle Tom by Jesse Jackson, et al. WORSE, Jackson is a self-proclaimed Christian!

So what is Imus really guilty of? He’s guilty of saying a lot of bad things about a lot of people. But up until now, no one really cared what he said or about whom. So why now? Because he said it about some black women. But then so does Mr. Dog. So what’s the difference? Imus is white.

Sounds like a real red-neck cliché, “guilty for being white,” I know. But tell me, if a black man can make a filthy rich living by uttering the most profane things about black women and not be censured, and a white man calls some black women “nappy headed ’ho’s” and is publicly humiliated and protested against, I have to assume it’s because he is white. And tell me, when the Black man’s rationale is “well, the women I call ‘hos’ are ‘hos’” clearly we are a LONG way from anything approaching a reasonable treatment of Imus.

If Jackson weren’t so racist himself (that’s what it’s called when you attack another person because of his race, as did Imus), and protested against ALL such unjust and anti-social behavior (specifically including that committed by such intensely ego-centric black heroes as Mr. Dog, and P something and Phat someone, et al.), then I’d be right behind him, supporting him all the way.

For now, though, it seems to me that this is a situation in which a few people who smelled weakness and saw a chance to promote themselves went after it with all the ferocity they could mount in order to prop themselves up in the estimation of those whose adulation they crave. This in itself is anti-social behavior (just ask Hitler how it worked for him).

If I’m wrong here, help me understand.

Hyper Milers

Brad commented in the previous post about these Hyper Milers (people who squeeze over a 100 miles per gallon from a Prius and outrageously high miles out of other standard cars). Here's the article, if you didn't follow his link; its really worth the read.

I think the reason this is worth reading, btw, is that most American males think people interested in saving fuel are long haired hippies who are probably gay and French. But what we have here seems to be just an all-American bloke with a big screen TV, three cars (two are SUVs), ride-on lawn mower, and all that. And yet, he sees the value of saving on fuel. He sees it from a practical perspective that would make Hank Hill offer a warm smile of camaraderie: in short, it's just a big fat waste not to save fuel. He was admittedly driven to this via fear about national reliance on foreign oil, but I appreciate his American pragmatism kicking in here.

Making this guy's story even more pragmatic is that you can e-mail this to your macho friends as a starting point for a discussion without threatening their sexuality.

Hey, what about having a manly competition in your group of friends or church to see who can exceed the manufacturer's reported mileage by whatever percentage (so V8s could compete with 4-Cylinders). As a prize to attract the competition, you could offer raw meat right off the bone of a freshly killed deer or something.

The Earth God Made: The Politics of Christian Responsibility

Just a quick note before I make my point about this. I was talking to my friend Brad or Brad during lunch this week (see favorite lunch in the side column) and he put a nice term on a lot of what I’ve been trying to do here (as he and others are doing elsewhere): "reclaiming Christianity." I’m wearied, as is he, of the way in which the term “Christian” is employed to legitimate greed, the pursuit of power and the destruction of other people’s lives. We have to be restless in our efforts to reclaim the identity of Christianity. Worse, this abuse comes from Christians themselves who ignorantly confuse their (secular) cultural ideals with Christianity.

To the point:

Christians readily confess to “not being perfect, just forgiven.” Of course, there’s a big difference between reluctantly accepting our weaknesses as humans and happily ignoring our responsibilities. These days, most Christians are unaware of the theology which undergirds our behavior as a culture when it comes to our resources.

The theological condition of our cultural behavior is called the “cultural mandate.” It’s based on Genesis 1.28 “. . . subdue [the earth] . . . ” Here’s how the argument goes: since God told us to subdue the earth and since environmental concerns apparently have no similar theological basis, concerns about the environment are not Christian concerns.

So the cultural mandate has been used to legitimize how we assume we can go about using the resources of the earth. But is it really the case that there is a biblical mandate to do whatever we feel like with the earth God made? That is, is it the case that while, according to the Bible, humans are given authority over the earth, we can therefore abuse it? Think of it like this: parents have authority over their children (also a biblical principle), but does that mean that the parent can do whatever he or she feels like doing to the child? Of course not, the Apostle Paul even warns against it.

Surely it’s reasonable for us to assume that just because we believe we have “authority” over the earth, does not at the same time mean that we have no regard for the well-being of the earth.

Here’s another way to think about it: why not?! Why not bother to care for the earth? There’s only one single reason: selfishness. And let’s note that selfishness is the behavior most disdained by the teachings of Jesus and the behavior most opposed to dominant biblical ethic: love.

This selfishness manifests itself in our personal laziness, insofar as we simply do not want to be inconvenienced. We have a standard of living we are just not willing to give up, so we deliberately choose to ignore all the Christian ethics that question the legitimacy of that standard. The worst, though, is the way our selfishness manifests itself in the alluring green hue of the mighty dollar. This is where it gets insidious.

Currently, it’s the “Christian” (mainly evangelical) position to support political candidates who don’t support environmental concerns. Why? Because such political candidates tend to be politically conservative (whatever that means), and Christians equate conservative politics with Christian values. The same candidates, to the degree to which they reject environmental concerns, support the very corporations doing the most damage. Furthermore, these politicians (the ones assumed to be supportive of Christian values), use their political muscle to protect these corporations from having to either change their practices (which costs money) or invest in environmentally safe processes (which costs money).

Note these two things: (A) just this last week, the Supreme Court decided that the Federal Government had the authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time, (B) last week, the most dire report on the environment came out from a prominent panel of scientists from around the world. The big point of this report was not so much that the earth is warming and that much damage has already been done, and that there are countless tangible and measurable results (that much we already knew). The big point was that the effects of all this are going to hit with the greatest severity the poorest people on the planet. That is, the wealthiest are creating conditions which destroy the conditions of the poorest people. Surely we really don’t have to point out how profoundly un-Christian and unbiblical this is?

The United States is five percent of the world’s population (300m out of 6B). However, we produce twenty-five percent of the world’s green house emissions. Now, we also produce things for other parts of the world, but even so, the figure represents a certain poverty of global stewardship. If American Christians claim that we should be a Christian nation and influence the world thusly, then are we not all the more responsible to take care of that over which we were given stewardship? And let us note: we’re talking about the “whole earth” not just the USA.

You’d think so, but after the Supreme Court ruled this week, what was George Bush’s response? It was that (A) we’ve already done enough and (B) we’re not doing anything until polluters like China do. What kind of global leadership does this exhibit? More importantly, is it the Christian norm to say “I’m not going to stop sinning until that sinner over there does”?

Why would someone have this deeply selfish attitude? Let’s note it clearly: this is not at all a Christian perspective. This is about money and the power to make more money. It is not about right and wrong. This is not a moral or ethical issue for George Bush. It is simply and only about money. Admittedly, Bush and his advocates might attempt the feeble claim that this is about national security, which, in the end, only means they equate money with national security, because for Bush, security and peace come from power. These are not the politics of Jesus.

We’ve been given the earth (however we may understand that), and what an infinitely wonderful gift it is. But what kind of depraved people would we have to be to take that gift and destroy it before the one who gave it to us?

Is it really that difficult to accept that the gift of the earth comes with the responsibility to care for it? If we don’t accept that as a biblical mandate, can’t we at least accept that it’s not a bad idea to take care of a gift so deeply precious. And even if we still cannot even accept that, then surely we have to accept that to deliberately and knowingly hurt another human being is contrary to countless biblical mandates, since this is what we know our disregard for the environment has been and is doing at this very moment.

My Rights / Your Rights - A Christian perspective on American individualism

All "isms" are fraught with uncritical assumptions. Individualism in the US is no different. When I first arrived in the US , the notion of individualism as it related to individual rights was immediately marked off in my mind as problematic. I'd never really given it any further thought until just a couple of years ago.

My first encounter with this issue was listening to a (rabidly blue-collar, right wing AM) radio show where callers would call in and complain about this and that. One woman, however, made the mistake of calling in to complain about hunters hunting in the woods (legally) adjoined to her own premises. Apparently they would start shooting in the wee hours of the morning and wake her up. The response of the radio host surprised me: “it’s their right to hunt in those woods and you can’t infringe on their rights.” To which she immediately responded with, “what about my right to sleep?”

I’m not sure either of these “rights” are actually included in the Bill of Rights, but I know that at least in most parts of the US there are legal statements to the effect that no one is allowed to disturb the “normal” lives of those around them (whatever that may mean). For me, I tended to side with the woman, but noted no one was breaking the law. Although, if they were hippies having a party in the woods and playing music loudly, rather than exercising their “right to bear arms” by killing animals for fun, I’m sure the radio host would have had a different view.

On the surface this looks like an impasse: each person grabbing for his or her respective rights, but to do so requires the other one to surrender his or her rights. This is where the notion of rights gets caught in the sticky “ism” part of individualism. Neither of these are actually rights, but the “ism” allows us to cook up all sorts of ways to define individual rights which in the end amount to one person insisting that another person does or does not do what another person wants or doesn’t want that person to do.

Basically, the “ism” factor allows us here in the US to act childishly but to coat that childish demanding behavior with a veneer of legitimacy. But it’s only apparently legitimate, it’s not actually legitimate. Playing the “you’re infringing on my rights” card is actually just a way to make it sound like you’re not just in an argument with another individual, you’re actually challenging the history and cherished values of the entire United States of America. But really, you’re likely not going to be in that situation unless you try to stop someone doing something expressly stated in the US constitution and its amendments.

The pursuit of happiness is an idea stated in the US Declaration of Independence. Some people think therefore that anything they do, so long as it makes them happy, is in harmony with the founding ideas of the USA. But clearly, we already infringe upon that popular notion the moment we condemn a pedophile for raping a child. One person’s pursuit of happiness may cause harm to another. I think we should be thinking of this pursuit of happiness in broader terms: i.e., the national/social pursuit of happiness.

Along with that, I think it’s time for us to rethink our approach to the “ism” part of individualism. Not to get rid of it (can’t be done) but to rework it and produce what I personally believe (after reading through some early American lit) is something closer to what the early Americans were aiming for.

In a nutshell, we want to shift the idea of individual rights away from something we grab and make sure we get, to something we ensure other people get. That is, individual rights can only work as a popular system (an “ism”), if it’s about our making sure another person’s rights are respected and not about our making sure our own rights are respected. This is the Christian path to social peace and a well articulated New Testament ethic (Philippians 2:1-4 clearly says to consider other people as more important than yourself.)

The problem is that we tend to forget that an individual is always networked into a society. Promoting the well-being and interests of a society therefore promotes the well-being of the individual. To assume that we should pursue individual interests over and against society’s interests is to deny your own interests as a human being. America is what it is today because the early Americans thought in terms of the individual’s responsibility to society. The pursuit of individualism over and against that ideal is a recipe for social and thus national decline (why China is heading for a meltdown).

The sooner we make life about making it better for others, the sooner it will be better for us. If we then revisit the radio call above, the conversation should have been: “I respect your ‘right’ to shoot at defenseless animals for fun early in the morning and rouse me from my sleep,” or “I respect your ‘right’ to sleep without being woken up by my seeking personal enjoyment through killing defenseless woodsy creatures with my guns.”