Category Archives: fundamentalism

story telling

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When I was a child, “story-telling” was just another expression for lying.  If someone said something that we saw as false, we would immediately declare with great passion, “That is not so!   That is a story!”  If someone had a history of telling falsehood, he/she was labeled with heavy opprobrium, “He/she is a story-teller.”  Even a benign “story”…such as a fairy tale…was a “story” because it was clearly made up.  The implicit assumption of that cultural verbal contrivance was that there was an objective reality and anything that differed was “a story.”

But story-telling was being maligned.  Story-telling is a wonderful way of conveying information; one could even say, “truth.”  And, technically the best we can every do is to tell stories and even history itself is a story that has evolved over the millennia.  Let’s take U.S. history, for example.  When I was taught this subject in the mid-sixties I found the subject fascinating and didn’t have to worry about critical reading or anything like that.  The story of U.S. history was merely a factual account of what had happened and I found it very interesting.  It was only in college that I learned to approach history…and the rest of our knowledge-base…with a critical mind.

Another powerful story in my youth was the Christian tradition.  But it was not presented as a “story”; it was presented as a factual account of what had happened two thousand years earlier with the life of Jesus.  I now see that too as a “story” but with that approach I have been able to glean great meaning which would have eluded me otherwise.  I see Jesus as an historical character who was an extraordinary spiritual presence.  The early Christians were captivated by the story of his life and death.  And they had little difficulty in believing that, yes, he had been raised from the dead.  These early believers perpetuated this story and contributed significantly to it.  Christian history has from that point been an unfolding of this original story, an unfolding that continues even today.

Let me close with an observation made by Harry Crews in the story of his own life:  Nothing is allowed to die in a society of a storytelling people.  It is all—the good and the bad—carted up and brought along from one generation to the next.  And everything that is brought along is colored and shaped by those who bring it..

It is important that we formulate and tell our stories.

The wrath of god

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Michelle Bachman noted Sunday re the recent natural disasters, “I don’t know how much God has to do to get the attention of the politicians. We’ve had an earthquake; we’ve had a hurricane. He said, ‘Are you going to start listening to me here?'”

So Bachman again trotted out her Old Testament world view but then, conferring with her handlers, realized this was imprudent and tried to explain she was only speaking in jest.  “No, Michelle.  You can’t get out that easy.  Your mind is teeming with that…ahem…stuff.”   Her religious affiliations and her speech has been replete with material which reflects the view of God as some vengeful, punitive tyrant.  And, as is always the case, our perspective on God always reflects our perspective on life itself and reflects our own view point on life.  As the Bible says, “As a man speaketh, so is he.”  And, “out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.”

And, this perspective she offers is the reason she is a marketable political commodity in our current world.  Our country has millions of people who function on the basis of “concrete operational thinking.”  (See Jean Piaget re stages of cognitive development.)

The Power of Now

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I refer often to Eckhart Tolle, especially his best-selling book, The Power of Now.  The central emphasis of this book is that our culture is captivated by our orientation to past and future.  (T.S. Eliot in The Four Quartets notes, “Time past and time future” and then claims that we “cling to that dimension.”)  And Tolle is only one of numerous gifted souls, men and women, who are aware of the shallowness of our particular culture and the unwillingness of organized religion to address the ensuing spiritual malaise.

Tolle emphasizes “the Now”.  Though he recognizes the importance of past and future and the imperative that we pay proper respect to “that dimension”, he encourages us to look below the surface, beyond the pale of the normal hum-drum of day to day life, and recognize the present moment.

But this is a very subversive notion.  It flies in the face of our most basic assumptions about life and suggests that there is more to life than meets the eye.  This “subversive function” is paid lip-service to in theological and ecclesiastical circles as the “prophetic function” of the gospel.  But most churches and spiritual teachings are unwilling to take on this “subversive function”, preferring to amuse themselves with the gospel-eze version of those “well-worn words and ready phrases that build comfortable walls against the wilderness.”  (Conrad Aiken)

It is astounding that a book of this sort has been so well-received.  It speaks of the hunger of the modern human heart, a hunger that is rarely addressed with traditional religion.   However, I do believe that this heart-hunger could be addressed with many world religions…and certainly the Christian tradition…but it would require a clergy that was willing to follow Jesus (and other Holy men and women throughout the ages) into a desert experience.

W. H. Auden summarized it so beautifully:

ll those who follow me are led

Onto that glassy mountain where are no

Footholds for logic, to that Bridge of Dread

Where knowledge but increases vertigo:

Those who pursue me take a twisting lane

To find themselves immediately alone

With savage water or unfeeling stone,

In labyrinths where they must entertain

Confusion, cripples, tigers, thunder, pain.

The sky is falling! The sky is falling!

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Chicken Little’s apocolyptic warning never ceases to be relevant.  For, anytime a natural disaster such as earthquakes or tornadoes threaten, the doomsayers crawl out from under their rocks and announce, “The end is nigh!  The end is night!  It is a sign of the end times!  Jesus is coming back soon!”  Glen Beck was one of the best at this, as apocalyptic doom was a stable of his chart-laden dog-and-pony show.

Now sooner or later one of them is going to be right.  For example, a mutant gene could run amok and wipe us all out.  Or some right-wing crazy with a nuclear weapon could annihilate us all.  The heavenly bodies, all so routinely dancing with intricate precision, could suddenly hiccup and this simple little planet could be smashed into the cosmic gruel it used to be.  And, the scientists say that one of these days this universe will stop spinning, will grind to a halt, and sink back into oblivion anyway.  See, we are doomed!  We are all going to die, individually and collectively!  And, when it does happen, someone will be shrieking, “The sky is falling!  The sky is falling!”  At that time I hope they all feel good about themselves and get appropriate tv news and talk-show coverage!

But these apocalyptic nut jobs just need to get a life and stop terrorizing people with their cosmic insecurity.  You see, this is all about death and death is something we have a life time to prepare for.  Someone in mental health has noted, “Those that are afraid of death are afraid of life.”  The issue in death, the “sting of death” spoken of in the Bible, is just our fragile ego sensing its finitude and realizing that it could be snuffed out like a candle at any moment and will, at some point, meet that fate.

And I’m not ready for my own little “flickering candle” to be snuffed out.  I want it to continue to burn brightly for years.  But, I’ve accepted that this is not going to happen and have determined that the best thing to do is to accept this fact, to trust my Source which gave rise to me in the first place, and to busy myself taking care of hearth-and-home and trying to offer something to the world.  It would be self-indulgent and spiritually immature to constantly bemoan my death or the death of the species.

Thousands of years ago Aeschylus noted this insanity, simply noting, “The gods created disaster so that the people will have something to talk about.”

“humility is endless”

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Richard Rohr, a Catholic monk, is one of the most discerning spiritual teachers in today’s public forum.  His book, The Naked Now, is a powerful explanation of the need of “non-dual thinking” in today’s world.  “Non-dual thinking” eschews the tendency to bifurcate the world into categories, especially the oft spoken of “us-them” paradigm.  He also has a daily blog and will also send you a daily meditation which is always right to the point and powerfully worded.

In today’s meditation he declared, “When you truly know, the giveaway is that you do not know.  And by “do not know” he means that you “do not know.”  There is a pseudo-humility available in which you announce that “you do not know” but in the depths of your heart you are very sure of yourself and willing to pound people with the fact that “you do not know.”  This is just another version of Tolle’s “egoic consciousness” masquerading in liberal sophistry.

The “not knowing” he is advocating is a simple awareness that you do not know anything ultimately and that you are only offering one perspective.  Many others will have a different perspective and they too are blessed by God’s Grace.

It is our task to merely be willing to share our perspective here and there but not to get carried away with it and begin to wield it as a weapon.  When we do that we are merely another example of pig-headed fundamentalists attempting to bludgeon others into our world view.

T.S. Eliot, in The Four Quartets, declared, “The only wisdom we can hope to acquire is the wisdom of humility.”  And then he noted, “And humility is endless.”

Let the dead bury the dead

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In Matthew 8 Jesus is calling for disciples.  One scribe responds, “Yes, but let me first go bury my father.”  Jesus responds, “Follow me and let the dead bury their own dead.”

Now taken simply, without any use of hermeneutical discipline, this statement can be interpreted to mean that Jesus saw the whole of humanity as “dead” and doomed to eventual eternal damnation.  And this interpretation is very ego rewarding to readers who relish being part of a very select crowd of believers who are going to bask in eternal glory for eternity while the rest of those “damn heathen” roast in hell.  It is so rewarding to know that one has “seen the light”, that one is “saved” and that most of “those wretches out there” don’t see the truth.  But that is not what Jesus was saying.  I believe he was pointing out that most people do live their life in “darkness”, they have never escaped the blinders they were born with, and they go their merry way without addressing the fact that there is another dimension to life.  It does not mean they are inferior to those who have been “enlightened”….or whatever you wish to term it…it just means they are ensconced in commonplace reality and are apt to stay there.

Ronald D. Laing once noted that he believed most people live their lives in a “post hypnotic state of early childhood.”  They go through life on automatic pilot, having imbibed the cultural mandates of the little corner of the world into which they were born, and having dug their heels in with no intention of ever leaving that safe haven.  This is what Jesus meant when he called them “dead.”  But it does not mean they are stupid and certainly it does not mean they are going to roast for eternity in hell.

But some Christians thrive on being “right.”  It is so intoxicating to know that you are “special.”  But, if spiritual discernment were practiced, if “mindfulness” were present, one would see just how egotistical this comforting elixir is.  Believing one to have been “enlightened” or “saved” or whatever, one has actually taken on a bigger blinder than the one he/she was born with.

Now I do believe that “being saved” and “being enlightened” is possible.  But it just does not mean you are special or cool or destined for eternal bliss that others will be deprived of.  For ultimately God’s Grace covers us all.

Please government, please intrude!

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Michael Pearl and his wife Debi were in the news last week for their controversial publications which encourage corporal punishment and do so with an emphasis that the punishment inflicts pain. One couple took their teachings seriously and actually beat one of their children to death for which they are now looking at decades in prison. Their web site is entitled No Greater Joy and if you check it out it is apparent that there is not a whole lot of joy around that domocile.

Pearl and his ilk represent one of the extremes that our culture permits to the great detriment and abuse…and even death…of our children. One essential theme in that mentality is that children belong to them, especially the father as the “head of the home” and that it is his responsibility as head of the home to “train up a child in the way he should go.” And, an important dimension of this is that to “spare the rod is to spoil the child.”

Now it won’t be in my lifetime and probably not for a long time thereafter but we are going to have to realize that children, in an important sense, belong to all of us and that we cannot allow them to be abused or even born into abusive, stupid, hell-holes like that of Pearl and his ilk. Yes, yes, yes, this will involve “government intrusion” but there are circumstances where government does need to intrude. We did it with domestic rape! I remember when the notion of “domestic rape” was just being toyed with and was, in my youth, given pause with the reasoning, “Well, doesn’t a man have the right to have sex with his wife?” Well, now it is a no-brainer to myself and to most people that “No” he doesn’t if she says no. Why was it ever otherwise? Well, the answer is that women were property and being a sex object was a huge part of their role in life. But our government has intruded and in doing so has changed reality on the issue, by and large. And what about race? When I was a child, blacks were inferior and were looked upon with scorn in the deep South where I was raised. The government intruded and changed reality and had they not done so blacks would not have the equality that they have today.

Yes, government intrusion can go too far. But there are instances in which it does not go far enough. And when it comes to child abuse and maltreatment, I really think we should get heavy-handed about it.



 

					

		
		
	


	

				

			
						

				Saved vs. unsaved
			

										

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Martin Buber, in his monumental work, I and Thou, eloquently describes human tendency to bifurcate reality into an “us-them” paradigm.  On our side are those who “believe right”, “act right”, and “vote right”.  In Christian circles it often appears in the form of a “saved-unsaved” paradigm.  We are so quick to define “saved” and do so in such a fashion that we are carefully ensconced in the “saved” category.  It is so rewarding to belong to the club.  But, we fail to understand that “the club” would not exist without the meaning provided by those who are excluded.  One could even say that the “unsaved” category is created and perpetuated by our insistence on maintaining the “saved” category.


Our need is that our faith be more inclusive, that the boundaries between “us” and “them” be more permeable.  And this will only occur when the individuals ensconced comfortably in the domain of  “us” be more open to the Spirit of God, to “mindfulness”,  and can relax those boundaries.  I believe there is a relationship between our ability to relax those boundaries and our ability to relax the boundary that exists between ourselves and God.

					

		
		
	


	

				

			
						

				Review of novel, Middlesex
			

										

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Jeffrey Euginides book, Middlesex, is about the integration of an extended family of immigrants into American culture in the 20th century, from the perspective of an hermaphrodite.  The fictional narrative of the social and political upheavals of the 20th century is fascinating in itself.  But the most powerful punch of the book is about the narrator’s sexuality and his/her struggles in adjusting to the cultural mandates re gender and sexuality.


Euginedes makes the reader vividly aware of how tenuous our sexual identities are and how intense the social pressure is to conform to the prevailing mandates on this issue.  He delves into the biology of sexuality and gender and its powerful influence on what it means to become male, female, or some combination thereof.


By tackling sexual/gender identity, he assails one of the lynch-pins of what I like to describe as “the way things are.”  This palpable entity is a template through which we see the world in our day to day life.  It consists of myriads of basic assumptions that we subscribe to, and to which we must subscribe, if we are to become human.  And sexuality and gender identity are two of the most basic of these “basic assumptions.”  Common sense tell us what it is to me a man or a woman.  But, Euginedes makes us very aware of just how specious and culturally determined “common sense” is.


One reason that hyper-conservatives are so virulently opposed to the gay-rights issue is because in the depths of their heart it addresses the issue of what is real and what is un-real.  To let go of this lynch-pin (sexuality and gender identity) is to accept that real and unreal are very nebulous terms  It would entail accepting what the sociologists describe as The Social Construction of Reality.  ( book by Peter Berger and Thomas Luckman)


Note:  Forgive me for not delving into the difference between gender identity and sexuality!






					

		
		
	


	

				

			
						

				the enemy within
			

										

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He that hath no rule over his own spirit is like a city that is broken down, and without walls. Prov. 25:28


He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city. Prov. 16:32.


Boundaries are an essential issue in human experience. If we don’t learn to set boundaries, and respect those set by others, we are going to be in trouble real soon. These two Proverbs describe it as “ruling your spirit.” We are ultimately merely bundles of impulses, energy if you please, and learning how to handle these impulses is essential to life.


“Taking a city”, in Proverbs 16:32, was perhaps the greatest example of power that one could exercise. The writer was noting that can one who can harness that internal energy is “better than the mighty” that can take a city. It was an image of masculine prowess.


Proverbs 25:28 emphasizes that this ruling of one’s spirit is essential in “keeping the enemy out.” He was saying that if you don’t rule your spirit, it is like the walls of a city breaking down, allowing “the enemy” to enter. Now in one spiritual tradition, Christianity, “the enemy” has been labeled Satan. To them, this verse means, “You don’t set boundaries, Satan is going to get in.”


I like to think of it in terms of energy. We are all the aforementioned “bundles of energy”, some of which is adaptive and some of which is maladaptive. I think “the enemy” is the maladaptive energy that we all have in the depths of our heart. Jung termed it the shadow.