God is a good idea

Murray asked a good question after my post on Resurrection. Actually a few good questions.

Murray: “Were the stories of Jesus re-appearance to the disciples then just stories?”

I would say they are legends but not "just stories".

I can imagine that the stories developed from initial comments made by the first disciples: “I was sweating it out upstairs, wondering when the knock on the door would herald my own crucifixion, when I had this epiphany: Jesus said, ‘Peace be with you’ and I felt the Spirit move me to courage!” Through retelling and embellishment these comments became the stories we have now.

Alternatively, the writers of the gospels may have deliberately embellished what they knew and used stylistic idiom to indicate that the story fits into the legend genre. We may not be able to appreciate this style from our modern perspective and so take the stories as historical fact.

But I don’t think they were “just stories”. They are powerful, regardless of their historical content. I wouldn’t say that Dead Poet’s Society was “just a story”. It affected me deeply and challenged me. Similarly, I am sure that Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat is a far cry from the original story in the Bible - let alone whether the original can be called history - but both remain a single powerful story for me.

Murray: “Were they further parables to show ideas and values that Jesus taught, before He died? And if the answer is 'yes', then does that change how we understand the concept of the Trinity?”

I think legend is a specific genre distinct from parable, but I do think that part of the reason for presenting the story as legend would be to highlight Jesus’ teaching. It was also to make Jesus’ character larger than mortal life. One of the clear aims of the legend genre is to put a personality on a pedestal. In the case of Jesus this makes thematic literary sense because of the Incarnational message of Jesus: God becomes human so that people can become God.

Viewing the stories of Jesus’ resurrection appearances as legend does change one’s conception of the Trinity. In fact, it actually worked the other way around for me. I changed my ideas about God and that helped me make sense of the questions I had about the stories of the Resurrection.

And I guess that is were the rub comes. I now cross my Rubicon (drum roll please, warm up the heretic stake…):

I believe God is a Myth. It is very, very important that people read that statement within the context of what follows…

When I use the word “Myth” I do not mean “invalid” or “untrue”. I am saying that it is an idea that has power in my life, but is not objectively verifiable. Let me explain

I have long struggled to reconcile two ways of understanding the world that are both incredibly important to me and, while these worldviews are often pitched against each other, they were born in the same impulse: the desire to understand our world and our place in it.

I value both a theological and a scientific view of the world and think both are powerful means by which humanity can make sense - and a future - out of the mess we are in now. I also believe that one without the other is asking for trouble. But it has been a long and painful journey trying to work out in my head how I live with both consistently. Most of the time I have been resigned to a kind of schizophrenic ping-pong, picking and choosing between the two – but that makes me feel like a selective fundamentalist.

The crux of the matter is that science will never be able to prove that God exists or doesn’t exist. It is simply beyond the ability of the scientific method. But science weighs in heavily on the side of “does not”. Religious experience can be shown as a function of chemistry in a particular part of the brain. Theological insight (revelation) can be seen as cultural constructs common to a range of groups both near and far from each other. The universe demonstrates no evidence of design; in fact what one sees is very messy and clumsy. So the tentative, if sometimes forceful, opinion of science is that God, for all practical purposes, does not exist.

I agree: God is not objectively verifiable. There is no evidence that God exists.

However, I still think believing in God has merit. Whatever the existence of God actually means, God is a good idea (Crusades and Jihad not-with-standing).

I see science and theology as two ways of knowing, one based on objectively verifiable information we receive through rigorous testing and re-testing of our world. This is science. It helps us make sure that what we see, actually exists in such a way that we can accurately predict what will happen tomorrow. The other is theology: a way of knowing that tries to grasp at reasons and meaning that science cannot explain; indeed, to extract from apparent chaos, some semblance of sensibility.

Within the scientific framework it is not a useful question to ask, “Does God exist?” It would be like asking “Does love exist?” I can identify the hormones, observe the behaviour and write it off as just so much chemical interaction and social instinct. But no scientist worth their salt would propose such a thing for a scientist is still human and capable of love. There is a magic – a mystery – beyond the data that is more than the sum of its parts. In fact, most good science would add to the wonder of love, by demonstrating its intricate complexities at the chemical and social level. It is theology’s task (with the other “art” disciplines) to help humanity become more than the sum or its parts.

I find a “eureka” experience when turning to a more appropriate question of the God-stuff: “How do humans experience God?” Science, in all its disciplines comes up with some marvellous gems when asking that question.

I can imagine that some will say that “God is a good idea” is not the same as saying “I believe in God” Semantically, I agree, but essentially, what’s the difference?

The person who says “I believe in God” has a concept in mind, one that every good theologian will admit is a dim shadow of God. God is in the end unknowable because finite human minds cannot grasp an infinite God. The concept in the believer’s mind is an idea. It is a powerful idea because it demands the allegiance of the believer. But it is not an unchangeable idea. Of course, how that image, or concept, of God plays out in the person’s behaviour will help determine whether that particular idea of God is “good” or not, but let us assume that it is good. Essentially the believer has an idea in their head about God, which is good; i.e. “God is a good idea.”

Someone can reply: “But I believe that God is objectively verifiable.” Apart from the fact that this is an impossible task, it is still a statement born of an idea. Just saying it, doesn’t make it so.

An ultra-Darwinist might interject: “But believing in God is patently childish!” To which I would reply, “Tell that to the people whose faith kept them strong in the face of death as they fought for freedom.”

I believe in God, because God is a good idea.

Murray: “I wholly agree with the idea, I just can't seem to fit it together with the Doctrine that is held as truth.”

By now, you are probably keenly aware that I may well be playing outside Doctrine – whatever that may be. I don’t mean to be flippant - I value the Christian tradition. That tradition has given rise to both science and modern theology. Both have delivered scarcely believable advances in our understanding of ourselves and our world. Both have enlarged our awe of God, but both have caused us to question God’s nature and even existence. So, I may be seen as a heretic, but I prefer to think of all this as honest wrestling. You be the judge…

Who is the enemy? by Omar Al-Rikabi

The following piece came to me via sojomail. It's worth subscribing to if you haven't already done so.

I have been on the road a lot in the last three months, taking different road-trips to New Orleans, New York City, Nashville, and Dallas. Constantly in the shadow of the endless line of 18-wheelers, I noticed that one particular trucking company had this sign posted on most of their trucks:

Support our troops whenever we go!No aid or comfort to the enemy!
No way!

So who is the enemy?

Last summer my older cousin Ali was able to come in from Ohio to be at our wedding. I think it was really good for my dad to have someone from back home who was able to be there, and he filled in as my grandmother's escort, sitting with her on the front row.

Ali was forced to serve in the Iraqi Army in the first Gulf War. Other cousins were also conscripted, stationed on the front lines and in Kuwait City. Some of them were rounded up in the mass-surrenders after the ground war began, and they all made it home. But Ali had a different story. He was a field surgeon on the front lines with the Republican Guard. Sadaam thought that if he placed the medical units close enough to the rest of the soldiers then the Americans wouldn't bomb and shell them. He was wrong.

Somehow the Iraqis knew when the American ground troops would be coming over the dunes, and so they were given a five-day pass to go home to Baghdad and say their goodbyes. Ali knew it would be a meat-grinder, and he knew that under Sadaam desertion meant death and trouble for your family. So while he was in Baghdad he had another surgeon friend take out his perfectly good appendix. While he was in the hospital, his entire unit was annihilated.

Around that same time a Marine friend of mine named Nelson had been part of an artillery outfit that was shelling Iraqi positions inside Kuwait. Suddenly an Iraqi artillery shell slammed into the hood of the truck Nelson was standing next to, but it was a dud and didn't go off. He lived to come home and tell me that story.

Also at our wedding, only four rows back from Ali, was my friend Joe, who is an Army Ranger veteran. On the other side of the isle from Ali was one of my two mothers-in-law, whose stepbrother was part of the Army forces that moved through the same area of Kuwait where Ali had been. On another pew was my friend Johanna, whose husband has served in Afghanistan and is now training for Special Forces duty in the Middle East.
I could go on, but you get the idea. The best phrase came from a taxi driver in Cairo, right after the invasion of Iraq three years ago, who upon finding out that my brother was half Iraqi and half American said, "Ahhh ... is funny. Your country is attacking your country."
I have often become frustrated when I have heard people in my church make statements like, "Remember who we're fighting here," before they lead prayers for our military victory. A professor here at Asbury once said that the only two choices we have is to either "convert them or keep them from hurting us."
Well ... first of all you can't fight and win a "war on terror." Terrorism is a method, not a country or ideology. I once heard it said that fighting a war on terror is like having the flu and declaring a war on sneezing: you're only attacking the symptoms. As long as there have been people, there has been terrorism.

But what frightens me is the mindset in this country, and in the church, that seems to think terrorism was born and raised in the Middle East, and if we can take out the Muslim Arabs then the world will be a safer place. Put this idea up against the idea in large segments of the Arab world that America has, in a sense, created terror herself with her policies toward the Middle East. So the cycle continues, and we have "become a monster to defeat a monster."

So who is the enemy? I believe that on this side of the cross, according to the scriptures, that "we are not fighting against people made of flesh and blood, but against the evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against those mighty powers of darkness who rule this world, and against wicked spirits in the heavenly realms" (Ephesians 6:12)

If you track through the whole story of scripture, you see that while God may have fought battles on Israel's behalf in the Old Testament, the trajectory was always towards to the cross, which redeemed God's intention for creation. Jesus set for us an example of living and witnessing that intention through loving, serving, and forgiving our enemies. The way of Christ was not to kill and destroy those who had abused and killed him.

Imagine what would have happened if the entire mass community of Christians who prayed so fervently for our troops to "defeat the enemy" would have instead prayed against the real Enemy and for peace between humanity.

So who is the enemy? We must first remember that the enemies of America are not the enemies of God. I have Iraqi Army veteran family and U.S. Army veteran friends. I have been raised by Southern Methodists and Shiite Muslims. I cannot abdicate the gospel message of Christ to a bomb, but can only bear the cross: the ultimate battlefield victory over the Enemy.

Omar Al-Rikabi is the son of a Southern Methodist mother from Texas and a Shiite Muslim father from Iraq. He is in his final year of earning a Masters of Divinity degree from Asbury Theological Seminary, and a declared candidate for ordination in the United Methodist Church.

More 9-11

Jim Harnish is a preacher I respect and am challenged by. He has posted some of the sermons he preached before and after the fall of the Twin Towers. It is uncanny how well he hits the mark. A few days before the attack he preached on "Why do people suffer?" using the test where Jesus speaks of the collapse of the tower Siloam. I encourge you to

Resurrection - tall order or rising high?

I ended my last piece on “hell 2” with the question that that piece begs: “What about resurrection?” I also said a while back that I would have appreciated someone in my life to give me straight answers. One of the reasons people may have hesitated is that a straight answer often begets more questions. But here goes…

I believe in resurrection, but I don’t believe in life-after-death in the conventional sense of my sense-of-self continuing after I die.

Resurrection is the idea that death cannot contain a person who has truly lived to the full. There is more to the idea than just that, but at the very least, everyone understands it thus far and I think almost anyone can agree to that. People whose lives have been touched by someone who has died continue to hold that person in their memory. The more fully that life was lived, the greater the reverence for their memory both in quantity of people (fame) and quality (authority?).

Going further requires a belief system that I have long since come to doubt. This is not to say I have dismissed it entirely…

The Christian idea of Resurrection is that one day all believers will be bodily and spiritually reassembled to live together for eternity. I have already expressed my doubts about an eternal life-after-death so I won’t go into that here.

Just as science has helped us to see that St. Paul and co had the wrong idea about how the universe is arranged, I believe science is unravelling the substance of physical resurrection. St Paul assumed a three-tiered arrangement of the universe: an underworld of spirits or hell; the earth (flat); and heaven above. He was wrong about that. St Paul also believed in a resurrection of all souls who believed in Jesus, something he thought would happen very soon – even in his lifetime. He was wrong about the timing and I think he was wrong about the bodily resurrection.

But I won’t go into the historical debate here. I think this quote says it all:

"The truth of the Resurrection shouldn't be the real battleground. I think what we want to do is try and rise above that and ask, 'What is the metaphoric truth of Easter?' The real power of Easter is the transformation that, as Christians, we believe continues to happen in people's lives....If Easter is about proving the veracity of some historical event that happened 2,000 years ago, that misses the point." Rev. Steve Huber of St. Columba's Episcopal Church

That about sums it up for me. (You can read more at Religious Tolerance.)

St Paul may have been wrong about the three-tiered universe – a forgivable shortsightedness given that he didn’t have a telescope. But that doesn’t stop us looking heavenward when we pray. Why? Because it is a helpful idea to imagine God and heaven as larger than us – above us – beyond us: God draws us toward an ideal. The metaphor has survived scientific scepticism. I have the same orientation toward the Resurrection. The story of Jesus’ rising from the dead is a powerful metaphor of his new Body in the form of those who choose to follow him and continue his memory in their own lives and commitments. If I doubt the historical validity of the Resurrection that does not impinge on that metaphor and therefore my belief is the more powerful.

I also think that believing in a metaphorical resurrection is more consistent with the idea of Incarnation: God becoming human. When I say, “Jesus lives!” I am declaring that Jesus’ teachings, values and power are real, present and available right in front of me by virtue of the activities of those who follow him.

"For the Son of God became man so that we might become God" Athanasios the Great, Archbishop of Alexandria

Resurrection draws us toward the divine ideal of a fully alive human being who transcends death by virtue of the power of their ideas, commitments, actions, values, teachings and so on.

I am more than merely a “skin-encapsulated ego”. Resurrection is something that begins even before death as my values, ideas, memories, loves infect the people around me. Resurrection is most apparent at funerals where people avoid the bad stuff, preferring to highlight the good. This is not always a bad thing, or at least we should acknowledge that to reconcile ourselves to a person’s mistakes begins the work of resurrecting their life and honouring their memory.

He said it...

In light of earlier posts on heaven and hell as well as today being the anniversary of Gandhi's naughtiness, I want to point to a foreword writen by his grandson Arun Gandhi. He expressed better than I could hope to what I believe. What's more, he says it in so few lines.

9-11

I am reminded by Tobias Winright of Sojourners that today is the 100th anniversary of Gandhi's first act of civil disobedience in Johannesburg. The Gandhi Institute has some useful information about present day attempts to make non-violence a useful part of social change even when dealing with terrorism.

Some people believe that non-violence and civil disobedience are useful strategies when it comes to individuals and groups trying to exercise social change from grass roots but that it has limited applicability to international relations.

It is worth remembering that things like the the Land Mine treaty are ventures that involve nation states. The fight for a World Court (that has teeth) is similarly an attempt to deal with violence at the level of macro politics.

The point of non-violent direct action is that it requires creativity to be exercised as a first resort so that one's dependence on the conventional means of resolving conflict are slowly displaced by more life-giving methods that emerge from one's context. No one method is universal because all situations are unique. Violence is universally failing yet we return to it so often!

Hopefully the UN can use diplomacy (or even sacntions) to prevent war in Iran where the US and UK were quick to rush to war with Iraq.

While you are at it, check out Ze Frank. Oh, and this one too.

Hell 2

Flop this is long!

I started wondering about heaven and hell once. More specifically: who made hell? If God made everything, then surely God created hell, which means God must take some credit or blame for it, depending on your point of view. This is true even if hell is something somebody else created because, presumably, God created somebody. The nature of hell has a marked effect on to what extent God’s creation of hell is palatable. Is hell a place of eternal pain – a consequence of a lifetime of sin? Is hell another chance to change one’s ways? Is hell something we create for ourselves while we are alive? Is hell something we are living in now?

These are all ideas I have entertained and still use to some extent in the sense of Myth. Each one deserves a paragraph or two.

The first idea doesn’t make sense to me. How can “3 score years and 10” of life determine an eternity of pleasure or punishment? The maths seems unjust. Surely those enjoying eternal bliss have a troubled conscience? “Hey Dudes, wanna go watch the Aurora Hades tonight? I hear the conditions are just right for a spectacular display. There’s been a new unseasonably large influx of the damned what with population explosions and contextual theology and all.” Let’s not even begin to talk of the people I love who qualify for hell and how I’m going to feel if I’m on the other side of the fence.

OK, so maybe it’s like a supplementary exam. You failed the first time. You got enough points to get a rewrite, which means you spend your holiday studying but, hey, at least you get a second chance. Problem is, it’s a no-brainer. Someone sits me down and says: “You screwed up and this is your last chance or we put the cement shoes on and dump you overboard. No more Love Boat.” I know what I’m going to do. Which begs the question: how come all the confusing life-stuff in the first place? Why not just get to point and say that? It’d save an awful lot of pain and angst… and paper.

The answer could be that life is a test of one’s character. This begs the question as to what the correct answers are. It still seems jolly unfair cos some people’s circumstances make passing all the more possible according to their own criteria. Furthermore, nowhere is it made clear what the requirements are. Most people just end up following the path of least resistance. And even those who seem to break the mould – well, what is the mould? And who says the mould should be broken. It all boils down to not knowing what the pass mark is…

Somewhere in the equation, life and eternal consequence have to match up in a sensible way. Maybe, my actions in life create the conditions of life-after-death. Nothing much changes, it’s just that I get to see it all in glowing heavenly colours – no more denial. Imagining the worst hell for someone like Hitler best captures this idea. Such a hell would be to spend eternity with the 6-million+ people whose death he engineered, especially if they were kind and forgiving. Which opens the opportunity for Hitler to actually accept that forgiveness and we’re back with the “why not just get to the point,” question again.

Mmm… I hear someone saying “freewill”. That’s important. Life is about exercising choice and life-after-death is the consequence of those choices. I also hear some heckler shouting “grace”. Spoiler. I was on a roll.

I still think that exercising choice and then accepting the eternal consequences doesn’t make sense. I can’t imagine why I would want to stop using freewill after I die. There may come a moment when I get fed up with the 70 virgins and the all-you-can-eat-no-way-it’s-fattening buffet and decide to rebel – just for the hell of it J. What then? Is there another tier to this arrangement, a hidden level in the matrix? Or maybe I just get booted across the divide to spend some time with homosexuals and Hindus. Hopefully I’ll find that sufficiently intolerable that I will see the error of my ways. Can I bounce across again?

Ah, grace. Ja, that’s a good one. We only get into heaven by virtue of God’s grace. There is nothing we can do – we are damned anyway. But forgiveness is ours if we choose to take it. So when do I get to choose: only now in life? Why not after death? Is there a free will off-switch in the coffin? That makes no sense at all. Heaven would be a pretty boring place filled with automatons going, “I told you so.”

Which brings us to the “empty hell” idea. That’s just a nice way of saying hell doesn’t exist. We die and we all hang out together for eternity and we gotta sort out the mess then too, just like we’re trying to do now. Only God’s a little more REAL, so we’re all REALLY motivated! So, again, why not just get to the point! What’s up with the cloak and dagger stuff – now you see God, now you don’t. Ho hum, in circles we go…

Either God has a bizarre sense of humour or there is no life-after-death.

Either: God sets up this world so that we live our lives constantly wondering whether God exists, wondering what the rules are - or not; hoping like crazy we’re getting life squared up – or not; sometimes realising it’s a lost cause and we may as well just give in and love – or not. Then one day we’re taken up to meet the Dude and it’s “Where is your ‘accepted forgiveness’ visa?”

Or: Hell and Heaven are a fiendishly clever idea to make us think about these things so much that we’ll realise the urgency of fixing this planet up quick cos THIS IS IT.

I believe… There is no heaven and hell. Death is final in the sense that my self-awareness will one day cease. If there is a heaven and hell, then - to the extent that one can speak of such things in geographical terms - I believe it will be a single place something like Hitler making friends with 6 million Jews. I just can’t see two places working very well.

I still believe that heaven and hell are useful Myths for describing earthly realities. Our choices do have consequences, but the ultimate value of these choices isn’t felt in eternity; these choices affect the here and now. We are creating heaven and hell all around us, all the time. “Who’s in and who’s out?” is not a helpful question anymore. It’s more about “What do you want and what are you prepared to do to help get it?”

Resurrection? One thing at a time…

Out

When I started this blog, I had a hidden agenda. A long time ago, I started wondering if I really believed this Christian stuff. It has been a long struggle to figure out what I believe. I tell people almost daily that they must take responsibility for what they believe, but those words sound hollow, when I have seldom done so myself. I decided a while back that I needed to do so for the sake of my integrity, but also because ideas do not develop and mature without challenge.

So far I have expressed opinions on this blog that tend toward the fringe of what is considered Christian, but it remains within those boundaries. Most people who read this blog have been supportive, occasionally offering questions and even resonance. But I have yet to venture – publicly, at any rate – into the more… err… disturbing (?) ideas that I now consider my own. That is not to say that they are original, but rather that I own them, take responsibility for them and accept the consequences.

This is another reason I named this blog “Dassies Bounce” – I want to see if my ideas can stand the test of debate – can they bounce – “does he bounce?” I have no doubt that I will change my ideas as people respond to what I write – that is part of growing. But will the fundamentals change? That is what I want to see…

I started asking questions very soon after I became a Christian in 1986. I found it irritating when people evaded giving straight answers. Sometimes people would do this because they were covering up ignorance, other times because they hoped the mystery would keep me searching, I guess. I really would have liked some straight answers, especially when I asked, “What do you believe?” but even more when I asked, “But how then can you reconcile…(add conundrum of choice)?” So, stop me if I start to sound like I’m beating around the bush.

I look forward to your interaction. Keep watching to see if something tickles or itches.

"Blessed are you..."

To truly change the world, we have to make ourselves vulnerable. That is part of the essence of the Jesus idea. That vulnerability, while offering hope to the world, can lead to our own demise.

Gunmen recently attacked Yabonga, the organisation Yvette works for. They made off with computers, cell-phones and money. Fortunately, no one was hurt. As a result of this trauma, the staff at Yabonga are considering closing down their VCT project. They correctly recognise that the attack is a direct result of their increased vulnerability as a result of this project.

VCT stands for voluntary counselling and testing. The service is free to the public and anyone can come and be tested confidentially for HIV and receive counselling before and after. The attackers made an appointment earlier on the day of their attack and so were let in without suspicion.

In South Africa, this service is more important than any other single service currently offered in the sector of HIV. Behavioural change most often happens when people are engaged in relationship that is non-judgemental, but informed. If South Africa hopes to overcome this disease, it will be through the implementation of more sites like this.

I believe that there are ways that Yabonga can increase their security without diminishing the accepting nature of the VCT service or doing away with it. But right now the most important thing is for the staff to know that what they are doing is important, even if it is frustrating and bruising.

Perhaps you would consider writing to them – just a sentence or two – to give them courage.

Fresh

My favourite time of the day is the morning. My favourite pasttime has always been running, although biking is catching up. My favourite daughter is Katie. Jurgen, my running partner and Althea, his wife, joined me for an early morning up to Rhodes Memorial. The photos are lekker.

Dhilbert... Dilbhert

Again, thanks Marc for keeping me sane:

http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2006/08/silent_h.html

Hell 1

This was from Marc who shares with me an interest in alternative explanations of hell. Marc thinks he might believe in an "empty hell" which is an idea some Christians have borrowed from Universalism. Check the wiki article for more on that. I'll tell you a little of what I believe about hell soon... But first:

Bonus Question on Chemistry Exam (apparently:-):

“Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?”

Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle's Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant.

One student, however, wrote the following:

First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving. As for how many souls are entering Hell, let's look at the different religions that exist in the world today. Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell.

We can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially with birth and death rates as they are. Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle's Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added. This gives two possibilities:

1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, and then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.

2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over.

So which is it?

If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, "It will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you," and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night, then number two must be true, and thus I am sure that hell is exothermic and has already frozen over. The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct... leaving only heaven, thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting "Oh my God."

No safety in number 1

A friend, Clare Davidson, has written an interesting article on the insurance consequences of Katrina. What interests me is the important connections between people that our society refuses to acknowledge. "My wealth is mine, I earned it" - yet there are, in fact, real ways in which individual wealth springs from the unconscious benevolence of others if not the deliberate exploitation of others. Read it at:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/5273974.stm

I got this from Mom and thought it was an opportune connection:

A mouse looked through the crack in the wall to see the farmer and his wife open a package. "What food might this contain?" The mouse wondered. He was devastated to discover it was a mousetrap. Retreating to the farmyard, the mouse proclaimed the warning. "There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!"

The chicken clucked and scratched, raised her head and said, "Mr. Mouse, I can tell this is a grave concern to you but it is of no consequence to me. I cannot be bothered by it."

The mouse turned to the pig and told him, "There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!" The pig sympathized, but said, "I am so very sorry, Mr. Mouse,
but there is nothing I can do about it but pray. Be assured you are in my prayers."

The mouse turned to the cow and said, "There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!" The cow said, "Wow, Mr. Mouse. I'm sorry for you, but it's no skin off my nose."

So, the mouse returned to the house, head down and dejected, to face the farmer's mousetrap... alone. That very night a sound was heard throughout the house - like the sound of a mousetrap catching its prey. The farmer's wife rushed to see what was caught. In the darkness, she did not see it was a venomous snake whose tail the trap had caught. The snake bit the farmer's wife. The farmer rushed her to the hospital and she returned home with a fever. Everyone knows you treat a fever with fresh chicken soup, so the farmer took his hatchet to the farmyard for the soup's main ingredient. But his wife's sickness continued, so friends and neighbors came to sit with her around the clock. To feed them, the farmer butchered the pig. The farmer's wife did not get well; she died. So many people came for her funeral, the farmer
had the cow slaughtered to provide enough meat for all of them.

The mouse looked upon it all from his crack in the wall with great sadness.

Ha Ha Ha

Restless Rock just hocked a huge luugy: http://peterwoods.blogspot.com/2006/08/leeeeb-meeeb-alohnnd.html and check the snotty comments.

Mixing Taale

My mom-in-law, Jeanne, works in the Overberg and brought back two stories from a fishing village school. You won't get this if you don't understand Afrikaans.

The teacher asked her class to name as many fish as they could. So they listed Galjoen, Hake, Snoek and so on. The list was long but the teacher pushed them a bit saying, "Surely you know more than that coming from fishing families?"

One little boy eventually piped up, "I know one more! Break-vis."

During a geography lesson she asked the class to think of places that began with letters in the alphabet, but the class struggled with "f" until some bright spark volunteered "f-lone."

Sermon: wives and husbands

I found Sarah’s comments on the lectionary helpful. Please take moment to read her piece.

Ephesians 5:21-33 has been used to justify the hierarchical arrangement of family life, with the husband as head and the wife as second-in-command. It has been used to justify the deliberate oppression of women in other spheres of life too. Sarah reminds us that this is based on a mistranslation of the original text.

Take, for instance, the New American Standard Version, which places verse 21 (“Submit to each other out of reverence for Christ”) as the concluding line of the previous section which deals generally with how the community should behave with each other. It then inserts a heading and proceeds with the first line of this new section being “Wives submit to your husbands.”

Here are the two ways of rendering the translation of Ephesians 5:20-22:
New American Standard

“…always giving thanks for all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God, even the Father; and be subject to one another in the fear of Christ.
Heading: Marriage Like Christ and the Church
Wives, be subject to your own husband, as to the Lord.”

New Revised Standard Version

“…giving thanks to God the Father at all times and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Heading: The Christian Household
Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ.
Wives, be subject to your husbands as you are to the Lord.”

The effect in the NRSV is to make verse 21 the introduction of the section dealing with wives and husbands, so that the idea Paul is talking about here is about being mutually subject to one another in marriage. He then goes on to explain this in detail for wives and then husbands. We are talking about nothing less than a feminist agenda nearly 2000 years before the Suffragettes contemplated it.

It is interesting that Paul uses more space to explain this idea to husbands than to wives. As Sarah reminds us, boys grow up into power, assuming leadership and decision making with relative ease because they are groomed for it. Similarly girls are taught from an early age to be servile. Girls do not easily take on the yoke of power, and wear it uncomfortably when they do. Similarly, boys struggle with humility and serving others. Paul knew this and so spent a little more time explaining this radical idea of mutual service to men who need a little remedial work where humility is concerned. He didn’t spend much time explaining it to wives, as he assumed they were already accomplished. Paul compares the submission of husbands to that of Christ, who, though Divine, humbles himself and becomes a servant of his own creation, even being prepared to die for his beloved.

The other lectionary reading for this week is John 6:60-69, where Jesus challenges those who find his teaching difficult. It is no wonder that at this point in Jesus ministry people are disappearing back home, no longer able to sustain the hard choices he exacts of his disciples. No wonder! Jesus asks of the 12 if they too will leave and Peter responds, “To whom else can we turn?” An interesting response…

Sarah recalls the story of one of Peter’s first encounters with Jesus. He was fishing that day but had had no luck; his nets always empty. Jesus came near on the beach and shouted to the men in the boat to cast their net on the other side. This would have involved rearranging the configuration of men and nets, a tedious process which would go against the grain as these men would have developed an habitual tendency to use one side of the boat. But eventually realising they had nothing to lose they did so. Suddenly, they cannot find enough hands to bring up the net now heavily laden with fish.

Peter caught a glimpse of what Jesus was offering.

“In other words, in one moment the big question on Peter's mind changed from ‘Will I catch enough fish today to survive?’ to ‘Can I gather enough people to take in all of this abundance?’ That's what made Peter a fisher of people.” (Breuer).

Peter went from the anxiety of his poverty to seeing how this poverty might be reversed. It was this that made him follow Jesus. He wanted a society in which he and people like him, no longer had to look forward to a lifetime of drudgery. This was the reason so many women followed Jesus, because he offered them the “good news” that the oppression they had suffered for so long could be reversed. It is why, even today, the church is still one of the few places where women are over-represented – because here they can exercise power in ways (almost / sometimes / should be) equal to men.

To follow Jesus is always to engage with the possibility of making a world that is more just. But it is always premised on the change beginning personally. If I want to see change in the world, I must be ready to change my own heart.

Peter and his men had to overcome their habits to cast the net on the other side. Then he had to give up his livelihood and spend long months away from his family. Several times he had to completely re-evaluate his world-view. Even after he became the Rock on which Jesus built the church we find Peter caught in a radical realignment of his prejudices as Paul and others force him to grapple with the Gentile question. Eventually, even Peter, the conservative Jew, dispenses with the requirements Jewish law and Gentiles become equal citizens in God’s Kin-dom.

Becoming a Christian is not about arriving. It is about starting a journey in which every day challenges one’s perceptions, habits and prejudices. One can never become comfortable. But the energy for this process of constant revision is afforded by the hope that the world these changes are making is a world worth living in.

Frentik

I've been swamped and finding it difficult to reflect on life, let alone write.

For those who read this blog, I want to ask your thoughts and prayers for SHADE as it approaches Jamboree V. It is a stressful time and as always, we are short of money.

Also, please remember the Methodist Church. The debate about same-sex unions has become intense with Parliament discussing a Civil Union's Bill. Our Executive have ruled against any minsiter conducting a marriage ceremony for gay or lesbian couples. We intend to protest, and if necessary to defy this ban.

Gun Free SA has been working hard at making sure the Firearms Controll Amendment Bill does not weaken the Act. So far we've been relatively successful, but it strains the organisation's resources at a time we need to be focussing on community work. GFSA also needs to raise a wopping R600 000 to finish the year.

Mmmm, where'd I leave that Lotto ticket...

Cowboys don't cry

This sad story comes from Yvette:

Recently she was driving through to one of the service centres of Yabonga with a colleague when they happened upon a man running toward Jooste Hospital pushing a wheelbarrow. In the wheelbarrow, they could see someone covered by a blanket. They stopped to offer assistance but by the time they had turned around and met up with the man again, staff from the hospital - who must have been alerted by someone else - had already arrived and were helping out.

Yvette’s colleague found this incident sad and wept openly.

He then confessed that he used to work for an undertaker where he was also a driver, ferrying coffins between churches and graveyards. It was a well-paid job, which he was sad to lose. Apparently he was asked to leave because he would cry at the funerals. He found them terribly sad, even though he did not know the person being buried.

I guess that wouldn’t work… the undertaker crying…

Hot water!

Check out Magali's comment for June 06. She sent me a pic of her geyser. Anyone prepared to venture the depreciation on Magali's house as a result of this terrible happenstance?

Check out Wikipedia's excellent article on synchronicity.

One of the most important aspects of my job, is creating significance from seemingly meaningless events, so I take a perverse interest in how human minds recognise patterns - even when patterns aren't actually there.

For instance, people need comfort when grieving and the natural temptation is to resort to the stories of my tradition, like heaven and "God's will". Thus we impose a pattern on a person's life which makes sense of their death. The problem is that the patterns can be more disturbing than comforting: God's will becomes God's punishment.

I prefer to think of life as chaotic and unpredicatable. Coincidences, like Magali's geyser, serve only to illustrate for me how chaotic the world is and how absurd our pattern recognition system can be if we look for patterns without consistency.

The essential thing about being human is choice. Our freedom means we can overcome the chaos of life. But this means being consistent in our choices. By such consistency, I impose upon the world an order. It is a tiny - no, puny - order; a logic which is completely overwhelmed by the magnitude of the universal stream of chaos.

And yet, it is significant. How? The scientific endeavour is a clear example of how the cumulative weight of thousands of tiny, logical efforts has been able to offer humanity the chance at controlling the chaos. Democratic (more than just the ballot) process also demonstrates a remarkable power to "change" history.

If there is a mysterious power at work in the universe, we don't need to alarmed. It is not in bar-codes and 6 coloured rainbows. No, this power is human and the results are far more surprising! What do these numbers mean to you? To me they represent the ingenuity and resilience of the human animal:

1994 Year of South Africa's freedom
1919 Year of the creation of the formula for the chlorination of drinking water
2003 Year of the newest democracy on earth: East Timor
299,792,458 Speed of light in metres per second
3.14159 26535 89793 23846 26433 83279 50288 41971 69399 37510 Pi

Fear

I thought Ze's missive on the recent Heathrow scare a timely wet blanket on the hype. All the inconvenience aside, let's be realistic about what we need to be afraid of. Who are you more afraid of, the fundamentalists in Iran who might be starting a nuclear arms programme or the US Senate, many of whom believe that Israel's recent war on Lebanon is a precursor to the Second Coming and who have their collective finger hovering over a button that controls the biggest nuclear arsenal in the world?