OLI: Omnibus Layman's Intrigues

No Pill Can Cure this Decree

2012-02-01T16:43:00.004-06:00

Last week, I broached a topic over which I've heard a few Republicans commiserate.

Commiserate quietly, of course; and completely hypothetically.

Considering the weak qualifications of the Republican Party's current slate of presidential candidates, the question has been asked in some corners: should conservatives simply let President Obama win four more years in the White House, and use those four years to find some far more respectable candidates to consider in 2016?

Last week, that seemed like something worth at least discussing.

Now, however, whatever attractions we saw in the idea have faded almost as rapidly as they appeared. Especially now that news of the Obama administration's insistence that all health insurance plans cover contraception has begun to sink in.

Cut Obama a lot of slack if you want to regarding an economy whose worst bits he may have inherited, your personal philosophy on social justice, and the Democratic Party's lip service to the poor and needy. Give him a lot of grace regarding his foreign policy, or lack of it. But when it comes to insisting on forcing religious groups - and not just fringe groups, but Roman Catholics, the world's largest religion - to adhere to a politically-motivated mandate like health insurance for contraception, then the door is blatantly, obviously, incontrovertibly, and unmistakably wide open for who knows what other encroachments upon religious liberty in the United States of America our leaders might machinate.

It's not that birth control itself is the penultimate religious-conscience suffering under Obama's decision. While Catholics, along with many orthodox Jews and Greeks, take a hard line against contraceptive tools, many evangelical Christians either are on the pill or have no problem with those who are.

Rather, requiring religious organizations with healthcare plans to provide free contraception to their employees strikes at the very heart of government's unilaterally-assumed ability to mandate policy that directly opposes a recognized system of faith. And it should frighten us.

Technically, Obama's decision is an interpretation of his healthcare legislation and addresses the meaning behind terminology referring to "preventive health services." Liberal feminist advocates have been pressing his administration to force a blanket provision in Obamacare for free and unfettered access to contraception, and this is his political kill-two-birds-with-one-stone tactic: clarifying a nebulous phrase in the law, and appeasing a volatile left-wing constituency during an election year.

Knowing that evangelicals probably wouldn't take this issue to seriously, and that they'd still vote Republican regardless, and that many Catholics will still vote Democratic regardless, this was likely seen as a relatively benign issue for Obama and his team.

After all, many Catholics are on the pill. It's no secret that pretty much the staunchest critics of contraception in Roman Catholicism are male priests who aren't supposed to be having sex anyway. Evangelicals, meanwhile, have been taught that not only is sex a procreative exercise, it is also a bonding exercise, and that being able to determine when you want to have kids is about as American as apple pie.

So throw out the whole contraception notion in this matter. Because that's not what really matters here. What matters is the Obama administration's overt refusal to acknowledge the rights faith-based organizations have to determine what healthcare benefits they deem proper.

Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of Obama's health and human services agency, asserted that forcing Catholics to ignore one of their core teachings on the sanctity of life "strikes the appropriate balance between respecting religious freedom and increasing access to important preventive services.”

If this is what she and Obama consider to be an "appropriate balance," then people of faith - whatever the faith - let Washington get away with such thinking at our own peril. The reason this is so serious involves the reality that society is getting more complex, not less. If it's this easy for a president to wipe away faith-based conscientious objections to legislation, what other pillar of American liberty will be next?

The decision by the Obama administration wasn't exactly a surprise, although it's certainly been a severe disappointment. The Catholic Church, along with some other sexually-strict organizations and church-rights groups, have already begun assessing their legal options. In keeping with the politically-charged tenor of his decree, Obama has delayed the deadline for compliance until next year, well after this fall's elections. So it's possible that he can still overturn his decision, depending on the results of this election, or give his succeeding administration time to kill it when they arrive in Washington next January 20.

All of which means things aren't over yet, at least as far as providing free contraception is concerned. But even with contraception, why is it so vital for the government to mandate that private employers pay the $15 to $50 monthly cost of contraceptives for employees who apparently can't control their own sexual urges?

I understand that preventing pregnancies can help lower healthcare costs, since less kids will be born in the process. But at what point should our government stop stepping across the threshold of private bedrooms and let people figure out for themselves when they should defer carnal pleasures until they can either afford the pill or afford the kid that may result without the pill?

And why make religious groups make it easier for their congregations to defy their religious scruples? If we really wanted to mess with the "conscience clause" that usually protects religious groups - even the fringe ones - in the United States, I think I'd be less upset if the Obama administration tried to force Muslim women to quit wearing those identity-obstructing, terrorism-facilitating burqas. Actually, speaking of conservative Muslims, wouldn't it be interesting if they joined with Catholics and Jews in petitioning Congress to overturn Obama's decree regarding contraception? Talk about a faith-based initiative.

I have to admit that I was somewhat heartened to learn that Obama had overruled Sibelius on her morning-after mandate, where he exercised his paternal protectionist instincts for his two daughters and agreed that he would want to know if they were wanting to take the morning-after pill.

But that was then. Now, whatever good graces that decision may have allowed me to hold for him have been trumped by this latest travesty of government over-reach.

I guess that means I'm going to have to start trying to find the good in Mitt Romney... (deep sigh).

Okay, let's go.

Number One: He's not anti-religion like Barak Obama apparently is.

Number Two: ... let me get back to you!
_____

To learn how you can share your opinion on this issue with Congress, please click here.

Rich or Poor, Life's Still a Chore in NYC

2012-01-31T19:14:00.003-06:00

I've said it before, and I'll say it again:

New York City is full of contradictions.

Take, for example, the city's sizable public housing demographic. A demographic that lives in remarkable proximity to some of the world's most exclusive neighborhoods. Stereotypes abound regarding each lifestyle, and some are truer than others. Especially in the Big Apple, where the more things change, the more other things stay - unfortunately - the same.

Yesterday, the New York Times reported on two local stories which make handy bookends representing the polar opposite ends of New York's - and America's - sociopolitical spectrum. A spectrum that, at least in Gotham, leaves plenty of room for conflict and irony.

Good Fences Don't Make Good Neighbors

On the bottom end of the spectrum, for example, comes the story of some chain-link fencing being installed along a pedestrian bridge between two sections of an otherwise nondescript public housing project.

For years, juvenile delinquents from the Ingersoll projects in Brooklyn's Fort Greene section have delighted in tossing items from this pedestrian bridge onto the street below. Last summer, however, a brick they threw at an unsuspecting bicyclist passing underneath actually hit him, causing him to crash and injure himself.

By this coming Friday, the city will have finished installing chain-link fencing along the railings of both sides of this pedestrian bridge to discourage the discharge of items from the bridge onto items below the bridge. The chain-link fencing is angled towards the top, but the sides don't meet or enclose the walkway. It's not even guaranteed that they'll provide any retention of objects skillfully tossed at an angle up and over the bridge.

But the howling has already started by some residents in the projects, who have decided that the fencing's very presence sends a punitive message about them and their neighborhood.

“That’s caging us,” resident Sharvelle Vinson, speaking on behalf of residents opposed to the safety measures, told the Times. “It’s going too far.”

Really?

A representative of a local neighborhood group characterized the walkway's fence as oppressive. “On one side of the cage are the people it is protecting, and the other side are the villains,” she complained to the Times.

Why can't she see that the fencing actually protects people on both sides of it?

Of course, the answer is simple: because of generational poverty, many people in subsidized housing - which in New York City, is still mostly public housing projects - have lived there all of their lives. They've grown up to view the outside world as their oppressor, instead of full of all sorts of opportunities.

That's not what public housing was supposed to do. Originally, public housing was designed to provide temporary accommodations to families in transition, mostly from job to job. Public housing was not supposed to be where people were born, lived their entire lives, and died. Yet at least one of the people quoted by the Times in this article has apparently lived in these same projects her entire life.

And she things the chain-link fencing on their bridge is offensive?

The consternation residents of Ingersoll Houses feel justified in expressing towards the fencing - and the upper-middle-class white guy from a nearby gentrifying neighborhood whose injury served as the impetus for the fencing - reeks of the self-indulgent "entitlement" mindset about which conservatives have been complaining for years. It's not as if the city is going broke erecting a massive edifice to wall off the projects. It's not even likely that the fence won't be without many gaping holes after Ingersoll's teenagers get done modifying it with their wirecutters.

Oops - is that an overgeneralization? I'm sorry - it must be the hyperbole from Ingersoll's indignant residents rubbing off on me.

What really takes the cake in the Times' article is the quip from another Ingersoll parent who says that instead of putting up chain-link fences to keep their kids from pelting passers-by with bricks, the city should be providing more activities and after-school programs for their kids to keep them better occupied.

As if babysitting duties is a normal obligation of city government.

Houston, We Have a Problem

Meanwhile, in what would seem an entire galaxy away, if it weren't just across the East River, there's the case of excessive success in Manhattan's wildly popular SoHo neighborhood. Apparently, in the land of seven-figure studio apartments and parking spaces whose monthly rents run higher than most car payments, the throngs of tourists and shoppers which regularly descend on the uber-trendy enclave have turned it from chic and urbane to filthy and congested.

Not only do trashcans fill up quickly and overflow profusely, but with impunity, unlicensed street vendors selling everything under the sun - most of it counterfeit - manage to set up their bulky carts wherever they can claim a patch of open concrete.

Some local businesses have gotten together and petitioned the city to begin a business improvement district, or BID, to help keep the neighborhood cleaner and the unlicensed street vendors out. In a BID, property taxpayers within a specific boundary are taxed an additional surcharge to help pay for extra amenities such as enhanced sanitation, special landscaping, and even mass transit facilities.

BIDs have worked relatively successfully not only in other parts of New York City, but in other cities in the United States. It's a relatively benign concept, since BIDs are pursued by the entities who will be paying the additional tax.

In SoHo, however, what was supposed to be just another benign BID application process has exploded into an unexpected war between affluent residents who don't see why they should have to pay extra for something local businesses need, and already-thriving businesses which want to generate even more pedestrian traffic in the area.

And you have to admit: the logic just doesn't seem to be there if all we're talking about is more trash cans, more frequent emptying of those trash cans, and enforcement of the city's rigorous street vendor regulations.

You need a BID to do that? Isn't that all... well, compulsory for most municipalities?

Not, obviously, in New York.

Why can't some of the larger storefronts simply get permission from the city to put out extra trashcans on busy business days, and pay a trash collection service to maintain them? Plenty of office towers maintain their own trashcans, and if SoHo is as profitable a place as businesses claim it is, why not consider the extra expense of extra trash pick-up simply part of the cost of doing business in a high-density urban environment?

It's not like this section of Broadway is home to fledgling mom-and-pop stores any more. Verizon, Forever 21, Armani Exchange, Converse, Hugo Boss, Banana Republic, Guess, Old Navy, and even a Bloomingdale's boutique are just a few of the big-name corporate retail tenants between Houston and Canal streets, which comprises the extent of the proposed BID's boundaries (remember, New Yorkers pronounce it "how-ston").

I'd make a crass comment about why tourists want to flock to this area of Broadway anyway, where almost all the stores are the same ones they'd find in suburbia, but I once made the mistake of asking two ladies why they were planning a shopping trip to New York and the very same department stores we have here in Dallas, and they looked at me like I was the crazy person.

Anyway... for a city with a bad reputation of being tax-happy, doesn't it seem as though thriving businesses should be more eager to pay out of their own pocket for keeping streets in front of their establishments clean from the detritus their customers leave behind? Would they really save that much more money by writing-off the extra tax they'd pay to fund the BID than by simply buying an extra trashcan and some garbage bags?

Whenever you hear of otherwise tax-and-spend New Yorkers complaining about an extra tax - complaining, mind you! - people should listen up. Especially when most of that tax would be going for something that already-profitable national retailers should be logically doing themselves.

And as for the street vendors and pushcarts which are operating illegally, it sounds more like the city is already not fulfilling its obligation to the vendors and retailers who have the proper permits. What guarantees are there that extra tax money will go to hiring more code enforcement officers? And will that really solve the problem?

At least in these two cases, the incongruity expressed between the Ingersoll residents and the Soho retailers is equally baffling - a rare thing indeed!

Not that it's rare for baffling things to take place in the Big Apple. It's simply rare that both poor and rich are equally capable of perpetrating them.

Maybe they're more alike than they think?
_____

Whose Scandal in Tax Bluster?

2012-01-30T17:34:00.000-06:00

Scandalous!

According to Dr. Mark W. Hendrickson of The Center for Vision and Values at Grove City College, the way Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney's personal taxes have been berated by the media is scandalous.

Writing in an article which appeared on Crosswalk.com last Thursday, Hendrickson breathlessly exudes:

"It is scandalous that so many journalists and commentators have gotten their basic facts wrong [by claiming Romney's tax rate is too low]. They have conflated average “effective” tax rates with statutory rates. Under our complex and convoluted tax code, no American pays an effective rate that is as high as his top marginal rate (the statutory rate on the last dollar of income). As it turns out, Romney’s effective tax rate of 14 percent is higher than the effective tax rate of approximately 97 percent of taxpayers."

So, who's complaining? Even the New York Times pretty much agrees with you, Dr. Hendrickson.

Nevertheless, he goes on to commiserate, "an even greater scandal is that Romney’s tax rate is as high as it is."

Oh, the ignominy!

Hendrickson then jumps into an economic quagmire of class warfare soundbites and dubious assertions about money and workers that he backs with about as much research and data as the liberal media does with their own soundbites and dubious assertions.

In other words, Hendrickson writes a crassly political blurb for an evangelical website with the hopes of stoking right-wing resentment against liberals and creating the illusion that taxation - particularly at what they consider to be high rates - is unBiblical. Ironically, the conservative business site Bloomberg.com ran a story admiring how low Romney's tax rate is.

Might Hendrickson be misunderstanding why Americans are marveling at Romney's tax rate? From what I can tell in the legitimate business media, the surprise doesn't come from comparing his rate with average taxpayers, but by comparing it to the 24% generally paid by people in his income bracket.

Unfortunately, even if he's precisely on-target with his assessment, Hendrickson's nonetheless bitter attack represents what's become a tired trick by politically-savvy right-wing evangelicals. Banking on the knowledge that many modern-day people of faith understand about as much of the US Constitution and our country's tax code as they understand the Bible, agitators like Hendrickson take the practice of taxation and paint it with as heinous a brush as any bona-fide sin.

Problem is, the only thing sinful about taxation is if believers don't pay theirs.

That's all the Bible has to say about taxes. "'Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's,'" remember?

Now, don't get me wrong: I don't like paying taxes any more than people like Hendrickson do. Living in America, we citizens have the right to petition for the lowest possible taxes upon which our nation can possibly function. But whatever Romney's tax rate may be, whether it's too high or too low, or less than the average taxpayer, it is not scandalous in the faith-based sense, as Hendrickson would have us believe.

What is scandalous - and it's perplexing that a professor at a Christian college misses this one - is the fact that Newt Gingrich's charitable contributions totaled a miserly 3% of his income last year. Romney's was 13% - almost equal to his tax rate.

Actually, that's not really scandalous, either, even though Gingrich's ingratitude for the wealth he has seems more left-wing than right. After all, people with a healthy attitude about money aren't threatened by charitable deductions.

No, the scandal is that Hendrickson thinks people of faith need to spend our time getting all worked up over how much taxes everybody pays.

Instead of rendering to God the things that are God's.
_____

Might Waiting be Better than Winning?

2012-01-27T17:21:00.000-06:00

Shhh!

It's the big question some conservatives have started contemplating.

Contemplating in ponderous blog posts and whispers in private conversations.

Do we have to vote Republican this year? Would an Obama victory be as disastrous as we've been led to fear? Can America survive another four years of the Obama presidency until Republicans get their act together and run a slate of candidates who can beat Obama on the merits?

After all, the Republican Party has pretty much cratered this year, offering its faithful one of the worst slates of candidates from which to choose. Everybody knows it, although few prominent conservatives will admit it. Now that the primary race appears to be coalescing around Mitt and Newt - blatant clues to each of their characters - the bitter reality is beginning to sink in: can either of these guys win against the guy who captured Osama bin Laden?

Can either of these guys win against the guy with better morals than Newt, and the guy who is less elitist than Mitt?

We certainly don't want eight years of either of these two GOP guys, since if one of them lands the White House this year, we'll be forced to support him again in 2016.

Gulp!

Would 4 More Years of Obama Be Worse than 8 Years of Newt or Mitt?

So maybe four more years of Obama won't be as bad as a possible eight years of Mitt or Newt. After all, we've weathered these past four years; not well, mind you, but America has survived. Since none of the primary candidates wanted to remind voters of their GOP predecessor (George W. Bush, remember?) and the disappointment his eight years turned out to be, maybe we've pretty much admitted that at least some of the problems Obama has been dealing with during his first term were inherited. Think bank bailouts, auto industry bailouts, soaring unemployment, and two unwinable wars.

Bush inflated the government's payroll wildly, fumbled immigration reform, and foisted federal "no child left behind" standards onto local school districts - which has created the oppressive test-taking culture now crippling public school education. All Obama has done is simply fail to lead in much of anything, which is what Republicans generally hoped would happen. Sure, his inability to forge alliances, and fear of political compromise, sparked plenty of vitriol. He continued Bush's spending frenzy so our national debt continues to spiral out of control. And he pandered to his liberal constituency with some blatant left-wing ideology. But don't forget - he stunned leaders in his own party by ruling that teenaged girls should not have unfettered access to morning-after pills. If evangelical Christians didn't disdain him so much, they'd have thanked him effusively for that unexpected show of paternal bravado.

Not that Obama has been a good president. It's just that maybe he's not as bad as what we'd have to endure from our own so-called conservative kind. If they beat Obama this fall, neither Newt nor Mitt will win with significant political capital, as Bush himself found out even after he claimed he had in 2004. Those two guys have spilled so much political blood already in these early days of primary campaigning that their credibility as national leaders has likely been severely tarnished. We know Mitt has as much of a socialist bent as Obama when it comes to healthcare, and we know Newt has no loyalties when it comes to women or even politics, since he has as long a record of flip-flopping on major issues as Mitt does.

Believers Voting Democratic, and Why Blacks Who Are, Do

I'd seen a couple of online articles and blog posts about conservatives skipping this fall's presidential election, but hadn't really taken the question too seriously until a dear, long-time friend of mine posted a FaceBook link to a watch party for Obama's State of the Union speech this past Tuesday. My friend is a devout, born-again Christian, a devoted wife and mother of two, and black. And she's not my only black, born-again friend who supports Obama. What do such people whose only difference from me is their skin color see in somebody for whom I wouldn't otherwise be able to bring myself to vote?

Indeed, plenty of white evangelicals look at each other, dumbfounded, and ask, "how can anybody be a Christian and support a Democrat, let alone one who is pro-choice?"

Now obviously, I can't speak for an entire race, but I've been told in the past by two other die-hard Democrats - who are born-again Christians who happen to be black - that although abortion is the big deal-changer for most evangelical voters, it's not with them.

After all, what is it about abortion that makes it a deal-changer?

Life, right?

Well, what do Republican conservatives do to support life outside of the womb? They're crazy about protecting life inside the womb, but for socially-liberal believers who are members of a race which has received some pretty nasty treatment from whites for generations, life on either side of birth has equal challenges. Perhaps blacks aren't necessarily eager to become one-issue voters when that would mean they'd be supporting a political party that doesn't have the best track record when it comes to social supports. Generally speaking, some evangelical blacks who linger in the Democratic Party take issue with white evangelicals who refuses to acknowledge that some entitlement programs - the safety net disproportionately relied upon by minorities - have a greater validity than is popularly acknowledged.

Personally, I believe that entitlements like welfare, public housing, and other government programs need significant overhauling to make them serve their clients better, and encourage their clients to be more responsible for their own lives. But many Republicans talk as though welfare and public housing need to be completely abolished, even though such a mindset betrays more an ignorance about the value of social safety nets than the tough-love compassion - or even a fiscal prudence - that right-wing blowhards like Rush Limbaugh like to parrot.

After all, the Bible has volumes more to say about looking after the poor, being lavish towards others with the money God gives us, being fair, and refuting racism than it does about abortion, a word that's actually never mentioned in the scriptures. Abortion has become a political machination to cover for moral turpitude, more a symptom of societal decay than the cause of it. Perhaps that sounds like rationalizing away the pro-choice platform of the Democratic party believers who vote Democratic tacitly endorse. But if abortion is hatred for life, hating people on this side of the womb is equally heinous to God, since He equates such sin to murder.

And maybe white folk like me just don't understand how proud blacks are to have Obama in the White House. I'll be honest with you - even though I didn't vote for him, on his inauguration day, I was proud that the United States had finally - at least symbolically - broken the race barrier in the Oval Office. It was just too bad the person was a liberal, instead of a conservative.

Uneasy Lies the Head that Has to Vote

However, with all due respect to my believing friends who are as saved as I am, and with whom all of us Elect will be spending eternity, I would far prefer having a proven fiscal and social conservative on the Republican ticket this fall. Although things are bad in the GOP field, I consider it highly unlikely that the situation would ever become dire enough for me to vote for President Obama directly, even though a vote for either Mitt or Newt might have the same effect.

I simply think it's a testament to the deep dissatisfaction - and even, raw disappointment - that is growing among Republicans that talk of waiting out yet another term of somebody who's supposed to be the opposition is even seeing the light of day.

Right now, let's just not even think about having to endure eight years of Mitt or Newt. Might waiting to see if a better selection of candidates can be found for 2016 actually be in the best long-term interests of the GOP, even if there's some short-term pain?

Can you actually win by losing an election? The fact that other people - not me! - have already started asking that question means the answer is not as clear as it should be.
_____

Right-Wing Duplicity Fouls the Air

2012-01-26T17:19:00.004-06:00

Environmental regulations.

They're onerous, big-government, job-killing, left-wing farcical drivel.

Unless, apparently, they're not.

Many right-wing conservatives talk a big talk against environmental regulations. Indeed, protecting the environment is code-language for stealth commie-pinko anti-disestablishmentarianism.

Environmental regulations are killing American productivity. Or so these right-wingers claim. They fight to protect industrial polluters in places like Midlothian, Texas, for example, home to several smog-belching concrete plants. Concrete plants about which people have been complaining for years, since they contribute significantly to the air pollution with which north Texas increasingly suffers.

Yet for as long as people have been trying to force them to move to a far less populated corner of the state, these concrete plants have enjoyed fierce protection from their local Republican congressman, the ultra-conservative Joe Barton.

Midlothian is south of Dallas, a smallish blue-collar town of middle-class tract homes, fast-food restaurants, and truck stops. Relatively conservative, mostly white, but hardly affluent, it's a far cry from the suburbs north of Dallas, and cities like Frisco, which hardly even existed ten years ago.

Ahh, yes: Frisco, Texas.

Today, Frisco lies on the outer bands of north Dallas' exurban halo, boasting an upscale white-collar lifestyle with high-priced restaurants, exclusive shopping, sleek corporate campuses, and sprawling gated communities choked with luxurious McMansions and foreign luxury cars.

All very white, very affluent, and very Republican. All built around a little battery recycling plant which used to be on the outskirts of town. Back when Frisco was just another hick village stuck out in the dusty Texas prairie.

But for all of the so-called egregious environmental rules that conservatives have managed to skirt for the concrete plants south of Dallas, conservative voters in Frisco have suddenly found value in them, hurling those same rules against the little battery plant in Frisco. They want that battery plant gone. It's contaminating the environment. And destroying their quality of life.

Battles like this illustrate why conservatives have a hard time mustering credibility when it comes to the environment in general, and pollution in particular.

Exide Technologies built their battery recycling plant back in 1965 on a plot of land several blocks south of Frisco's placid Main Street. Since then, thousands of people have moved to Frisco, and they've decided Exide isn't a good enough neighbor in a community now boasting seven-figure homes. A neighborhood group calling itself "Get the Lead Out of Frisco" has begun agitating for Exide to shut down its operations in town.

Frankly, Exide's Frisco plant has been listed as one of the 16 top lead polluters in the nation, but its existence was no secret when developers started plowing under Frisco's old farms for new subdivisions. It's a classic case of poor research by homebuyers, many of whom seem to have been caught off-guard by learning they've moved near a four-decades-old industrial polluter.

This past January 17th, Frisco's city council voted unanimously to begin the process of revoking the permits Exide needs to operate the plant. For their part, Exide is expected to mount a vigorous lawsuit to keep its plant operational in Frisco. If the plant is forced to shut down, about 135 jobs would be lost.

Either way, it will likely be years before Exide's fate is decided. Although their Frisco facility isn't very large, it's part of a large enterprise with operations in 80 countries. Frisco may have its state senator in its corner, the powerful Republican Florence Shapiro, but Exide has plenty of political influence itself - plus some pretty deep pockets. It's not acting like it's going anywhere, even stating that it will continue to modernize the Frisco plant and introduce new environmental safeguards as if everything is business as normal.

That's not what Frisco wants to hear. But it's similar to what Midlothian residents have been hearing for years. In October of last year, Republicans in the House of Representatives voted to further delay new regulations for cement kilns based principally on Republican Representative Barton's unwavering loyalty to the cement manufacturers in his district south of Dallas County. Although some perfunctory improvements to reduce industrial emissions have been made at Midlothian's three mammoth concrete plants over the years, they've failed to significantly maximize the available technology that can minimize pollution.

Air quality studies in Midlothian consistently affirm that pollution is at safe levels, although environmentalists and some experts say the tests are flawed. Republicans like pointing to such bickering as proof that the fuss over cement kiln pollution is exaggerated, but up in Frisco, the lead pollution is only significantly detectable within a one-mile radius of the plant, above land mostly owned by Exide. So why the fuss in Frisco?

This is where the double-standard in conservative politics rears its ugly head. Why is it that the poorer, blue-collar environs of Midlothian get snubbed when it comes to questioning the pollution belched out by three enormous cement manufacturers, while the far richer, white-collar exurb of Frisco feels entitled to run out of town one of the area's long-term employers?

Surely capitalism should be allowed unfettered reign wherever it's planted in the Lone Star State. Wasn't that one of Governor Rick Perry's presidential campaign themes?

Or, might environmental regulations simply be onerous... until they become a convenient tool for one's political base? If it wasn't for government-mandated environmental regulations, Frisco wouldn't have a case. And without those regulations, Midlothian still doesn't have one.

Either way, Republicans lose credibility on an issue that should be important to us all:

Clean air.
_____

Works Show God's Work

2012-01-25T16:56:00.001-06:00

Do your deeds prove your faith?

If you'd asked me that question before I'd had my devotions this morning, I'd have likely retorted, "I'm saved by grace, not works."

But that's not what the apostle Paul is saying when he explains to King Agrippa in Acts 26:20 that Jews and Gentiles "should repent and turn to God and prove their repentance by their deeds."

If you don't like how the NIV translates that verse, here are a couple of other takes on it:

From the American Standard Version: "...they should repent and turn to God, doing works worthy of repentance."

From the English Standard Version: "they should repent and turn to God, performing deeds in keeping with their repentance."

And from the New Century Version: "they should change their hearts and lives and turn to God and do things to show they really had changed."

Hmm... what do I do that shows I've really been born-again? What do you do?

From Darkness to Light

Remember, Paul isn't saying that people are saved by the things they do - or don't do. We've got to take this verse in context, like we should do with every verse in the Bible, and not just hang it up on a clothesline like a damp shirt and treat it as some singular directive.

Paul is in Caesarea, explaining to King Agrippa why the Jews want him dead. The apostle recounts his bizarre conversion experience on the Road to Damascus, and summarizes how, since then, he's been preaching the Gospel to both Jews and Gentiles. In verse 18, Paul explains that God would work through him, in His own words, "'to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.'"

Wow - so it gets even heavier. Not only are we to perform deeds in keeping with repentance, but those deeds should reflect how we've been turned from darkness to light.

How do I make that leap? By following simple grammatical correlations between the work that God does within all whom He saves (opening their eyes and turning them from darkness to light) in verse 18, and then how that work is manifested in the daily lives of believers (doing works worthy of repentance) in verse 20. The works we're to do follow, not precede, the salvific work God does in us. So, relax: Paul's teaching is completely in accordance with orthodox Christianity: we are not saved through works.

How Works Work

But works help show that we're saved.

It's a concept a lot of modern believers don't appear comfortable embracing. I don't know - maybe we've never wholeheartedly liked the idea that our daily actions should mirror the change from darkness to light that we say we celebrate in church on Sundays. A lot of us actually like the dark side. It's fun, so we think, or have been led to believe. Besides, we don't need to prove we're saved; otherwise, we risk being legalistic.

But is Paul saying we prove we're saved by doing good works, or that good works are a natural outflow of a life changed from darkness to light? The organic goodness that emanates from our actions, and indeed our motives, should tell other people that we don't walk in darkness.

I'm reminded of that famous passage in Ephesians 2:10, where Paul explains that we're "created in Christ Jesus to do good works." Unfortunately, it's at this point where legalists come in, and start structuring a matrix of do's and don't's to which we people of faith must adhere. The more we grow in our faith, however, I think the less concerned we become about lists and do's and don't's, and more on why's and why not's.

Why? Because we love God and want to honor Him.

I suspect the more we live with that perspective, the things we do will show we really have been changed. Changed not through our actions. But that because of what Christ has done for us, we allow the Holy Spirit to guide us in behaviors characteristic of light, rather than darkness.

Perhaps the more we resist that concept, people living in darkness around us will be less able to determine why our faith matters to us.

If, in fact, we truly possess the faith we claim to.

Without Fault in a Depraved Generation

Remember where, in Philippians 2, the apostle Paul exhorts us to "work out our salvation with fear and trembling?" Here's his exact quote, starting in verse 12:

"...Continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, 13 for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose. 14 Do everything without complaining or arguing, 15 so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe..."

Here again, Paul isn't saying that salvation rests on what we can do for God. Rather, he's describing the process of sanctification as people of faith allowing the Holy Spirit to continually mold themselves into the saints He wants them to be. Still, we're to be God's children, "without fault in a crooked and depraved generation."

And then Paul revisits the imagery of light he used with King Agrippa, calling for us to "shine like stars in the universe." Stars whose light, which is the reflection of the Son, pops out into our sight against the blackness of space's void.

May God help us to shine for Him in all we do.

So even our works testify of God's work in our lives.
_____

Oh, What You Hear in Church!

2012-01-24T17:29:00.002-06:00

Isn't it amazing the things you hear in church?

At least in my church, Dallas' Park Cities Presbyterian, the things I hear can run the gamut.

Obviously, being in a church, you expect to hear good things. Even amazing things. About God, His love for us, His grace... right? And you expect to hear bad things, like how evil our sinful selves are.

Sometimes you hear new things, even if you've attended church for so long that you've heard countless sermons preached on the same favorite passages of scripture.

This past Sunday was one of those Sundays for me. The Reverend Dr. Michael Oh spoke for my church's missions Sunday, and he made two bold claims that I'm pretty certain I've never heard anybody else make in church before.

One was that "suffering exists because God ordained that Christ would suffer for our sins."

Wow! Have you ever heard it put that way before?

The second was that money in church should be like blood - flowing freely throughout the body, serving all the members. Dr. Oh questioned whether the common assumption that Christians love money too much is really a fallacy - that, in fact, we don't love it enough.

Have you ever heard that before?

I hadn't.

Why Human Suffering Exists

Does suffering exist because God ordained that Christ would suffer for our sins?

That's what Dr. Oh claimed as he preached on Psalm 22. It may not a classic Bible passage for missions, but then, Dr. Oh isn't your ordinary missionary. Born in Philadelphia of Korean parents, he earned three Masters degrees, including an MDiv, plus a PhD, before moving to Japan and opening Christ Bible Seminary, affiliated with the Presbyterian Church in America. All that, and he's still younger than me.

As he worked his way through the familiar exhortations for engaging in cross-cultural evangelism - which, of course, is what "missions" is - Dr. Oh sought to peg everything we do - whether as people who go overseas or people who stay behind and support them - on the supremacy of Christ and the omnipotence of God.

Reconciling the pain and suffering described by the psalmist in the early portion of Psalm 22 with the global in-gathering of the saints starting in verse 27, Dr. Oh pointed out that almost all of us incorrectly view suffering from the eyes of humanity. We're myopic on the subject. Rather than resting in God's sovereignty, we figure some supreme power doesn't like us or care about us, or that we ourselves simply can't do enough good to compensate for our badness.

Either way, suffering is the result.

And then he tucked in his claim that the reason we have suffering in the world is primarily because God needed it to secure our own salvation through Christ. Christ needed to assume the sins of the world onto Himself, and how else would that be possible without being exposed to extreme suffering? After all, that's how heinous our sin is. That's how despicable we are in God's sight without Christ's blood cleansing us. It wasn't so much the beatings, the insults, or even the crucifixion that Christ suffered, as it was His subsumption of all our sins.

"Amazing love! How can it be that Thou, my God, should die for me?"

Blood Like Money in the Body

As if that wasn't enough, blood came back later in Dr. Oh's sermon, as he was talking about different reasons why funding mechanisms for cross-cultural missions seem to always be playing catch-up. You've probably heard many pastors lament the human preoccupation with money, saying that we love it too much. And yes, "the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil."

Yet Dr. Oh suggested that in a way, many believers don't love money enough. Although he used the term "love," I think that the term he should have substituted is "cherish." Because what he means is that many evangelicals don't understand that to God, money is like blood. Money should flow through His body, the church, like blood does within our human temples. Money is a tool, not an objective. In his teaching on social justice, Tim Keller of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City basically says the same thing, although I've not heard him compare money with blood.

Still, the analogy is powerful, isn't it? Instead of hoarding vast sums of money, like virtually all of us do - or aspire to do - our money should be flushing throughout our communities of faith, carrying with it the nutrients of mortal existence so that everything we need can be paid for and furnished regardless of one's individual importance or location. Pardon the pun, but it's a rich description of what a healthy church should look like, just like healthy human bodies rely on richly healthy blood for survival.

Blood Flowed - in Righteous Anger - Because Money Got Stagnant

But just as many human bodies are not healthy because the blood coursing through their veins is laced with cancers, fatty acids, and other destructive elements, so many of our churches are unhealthy because financial wealth has stagnated at one end, being prevented from flushing through the congregation. Ultimately, this hoarding gives some people within the church body a greater sense of importance than the money they're letting calcify was supposed to provide.

Take, for example, the abominable comment I heard after the wonderful sermon by Dr. Oh this past Sunday at church. I mourned for the rest of the day.

By way of background, I attend a 5,000-member church boasting an $11 million budget, which means that even though its congregation is large, it's made up of people rich enough to support an extraordinarily large budget. We have at least one billionaire as a member, plus CEOs of major corporations. We have many members of a fabled Texas oil family, plus a slew of lawyers and doctors. As you might imagine, our demographics skew hard to the white, right-wing side of Dallas society.

Not that I'm bigoted against the rich. Some of my best friends are rich!

I did not witness this incident personally, but after the service on Sunday, during the postlude, a friend of mine told me about a white family that had recently left our church. They had adopted a black girl, who once ran down the center hallway of the children's ministry downstairs. A white woman, another member of our church, who didn't know who this black girl was, stopped her and scolded her saying, "little girl, on this side of the tracks, you're going to have to learn some manners."

Like many of our own rich white kids aren't spoiled brats.

Needless to say, the little girl's family was devastated. Even I myself, as imperfectly colorblind as I am, reeled in dismay as my friend told me the story. It truly was disgusting, but - and this made it even more disgusting - I wasn't surprised. I've heard people in church making derogatory comments about their Hispanic household help. Actually, I've heard white Republicans cracking rude jokes about Barak Obama in front of people I secretly know are Democrats. Indeed, GOP fever runs so strong through my church, members who are Democrats live like Christians in China as they worship amongst the rest of us.

The dichotomy between sitting in a congregation of mostly white folk, listening to a Korean-American missionary to Japan teach us about suffering and money in the context of missions, and then learning that people in this same congregation can be so despicably hateful to a little black girl on our property made my brain blow a fuse. It was surreal, almost.

From what she knew - and my friend is in a position to know much more about the incident than most folks - nothing was done to pursue reconciliation between the family who'd adopted the little black girl, and the white woman who - even if she's dirt poor - has more money than sense. Or love.

And that's the crux of everything, isn't it? We can talk about missions all day long. We can sit in awe of powerful statements on suffering and money being like blood, and we can be smug about the desire of somebody with Dr. Oh's pedigree wanting to preach at a church like ours.

We can also be complacent from knowing that twenty percent of our church's budget goes to missions. And that we've planted dozens of churches around the world. Indeed, one of the reasons I've attended Park Cities Presbyterian these past 13 years is because I know there are many people there who truly desire to worship God through cross-cultural missions. And many of them are quite financially blessed.

But doesn't cross-cultural missions begin at home? Even here in Dallas?

If you automatically think a little black girl running down a corridor at church is a token welfare case the church is helping out through our urban ministries department, then who's the one living in poverty?

All that money is choking off the blood supply to not only your brain, but your heart.

In a round-about way, that's also why suffering exists.
_____

What Paterno Avoided Became His Epitaph

2012-01-23T17:35:00.000-06:00

"Man, that was quick."

As America responded to the passing yesterday of legendary college football coach Joe Paterno, this seemed to sum up the general theme.

He'd only been diagnosed with lung cancer this past November. He'd only been fired from his historic position at Penn State literally days before that.

Back then, the country was still reeling from news about his former assistant coach, Jerry Sandusky. Accusations of child molestation, a 50-count indictment, and lurid testimony from a fellow coach about a horrific shower scene he stumbled upon involving Sandusky and a young boy.

All in a football program whose motto, zealously crafted and guarded by Paterno himself, was "victory with honor."

After a 46-season career, building all of Penn State - not just its football program - into a national powerhouse, everything for the 85-year-old icon seemed to implode within a matter of days. And now, merely three months later, Paterno is dead. Yet another victim of lung cancer. And probably a broken heart.

When Good Men Do Almost Nothing...

Officially, Paterno was never charged with any crime. He had no clue about Sandusky's alleged pattern of child abuse until Mike McQueary, who witnessed the despicable shower episode, went to him with the news. Paterno acted within the the requirements of Pennsylvania law - if not the spirit of ethical accountability - by simply reporting McQueary's testimony to his own superiors at Penn State. He did nothing more about the matter, even though he could have.

Couldn't he? Paterno wielded significant influence and authority at Penn State. One would think that a man as devoted to his family, personal morality, community pride, and the school's honor as Paterno was would be as eager to make sure justice was secured regarding one of his former coaches as he was promoting the school's athletic and scholastic integrity. Why didn't he, then, either confront Sandusky himself, or repeatedly pressure the school's senior administrators to do so? Even if he didn't want to get personally entangled in the process, he would be excused for allowing the chain of command at such a large organization to deal with such accusations, if for no other reason than to legally protect both one's own self and the organization as a whole. Indeed, the administrators who should have pursued the allegations against Sandusky didn't, and they've been rightfully charged with crimes. But by all accounts - including Paterno's - he made a perfunctory, obligatory report, and never revisited anything related to McCreary's account ever again.

What may to him have seemed a satisfactory response at the time proved to be his own undoing. Because even though it wasn't illegal for Paterno to shrug off McCreary's report, one would hope that a person as responsible for the welfare of young people as a college football coach is supposed to be would have had the same zero-tolerance for disreputableness among his coaching staff as among his players. When Paterno was fired, it wasn't because he had broken any laws, it was because people were so incredulous that he could literally pretend the accusations against Sandusky in no way affected him.

Just over a week ago, on January 14, the Washington Post published an exclusive interview Paterno gave to Post reporter Sally Jenkins, in which the cancer-stricken, wheelchair-bound former coach provided some insight as to how he could assume such a thing. Both he and McQueary have admitted that the account McQueary shared with him wasn't as graphic as what McQueary would later tell a grand jury convened to bring charges against Sandusky.

"You know, [McQueary] didn't want to get specific," a contrite Paterno recalled about the conversation they had regarding the Sandusky shower. "And to be frank with you, I don't know that it would have done any good, because I never heard of, of, rape and a man. So I just did what I thought was best. I talked to people that I thought would be, if there was a problem, that would be following up on it."

By all accounts, Paterno is an old-fashioned Italian when it comes to matters of personal intimacy. And, sure, there's nothing wrong with living a life in which you try to remain distanced from sordid tales of social dysfunction. But Paterno was a college football coach at a major institution, and it was part of his responsibility to know about factors that could impact the kids he coached. And that includes what his coaches were doing to other kids.

It Takes the Diligence of a Village

Undoubtedly, Penn State provided seminars to staff members on recognizing, reporting, and preventing child abuse. Every large school conducts these programs not only at the behest of their insurance companies and human resource departments, but out of sheer desire to protect those who may not be able to protect themselves. There's no way Paterno was not aware of the existence of child predators in society, and the abuse of power over kids by authority figures, even if such topics sent shivers up his spine whenever mentioned within earshot. Such topics should rightly send shivers up anybody's spine, but that doesn't mean you pretend they don't exist.

Yet how many of us do the same thing in our own spheres of influence? For example, how many of us scoff at church rules down in the childrens ministry areas designed to prevent unauthorized people from interacting with kids? When I worked at a large church in the 1990's, at the dawn of modern child protection systems in large churches, it wasn't uncommon to have an unauthorized adult pitch a fit when they were refused access to a specific area, or told they couldn't sign-out a child because the parent who checked-in the child hadn't approved it.

If you're really interested in protecting your child, you'll follow the rules. And if the rules don't make sense, then work with whomever's in charge to fix them. More than likely, however, it's not the rules that are as onerous in these cases as are the parents.

One time, a parent involved in a heated custody battle after a protracted divorce fight tried to claim their child against the wishes of the other parent. Thankfully, the person manning the discharge desk enforced the church's policy, and likely prevented the child from being abducted by the unauthorized parent.

Read more here: http://www.star-telegram.com/2012/01/14/3660331/paterno-didnt-know-which-way-to.html#storylink=cpy

I didn't work in the childrens ministry, so I didn't witness any of these situations first-hand. I worked in the accounting office, and the only reason I heard about these problems was because parents complained to the church administration when they couldn't fudge the rules to benefit themselves... more often than not, to the detriment of child safety.

Now, obviously, rules imposed by churches and other organizations entrusted with the care of children are only as good as their logic and enforceability. Stupid rules don't necessarily keep anybody safe, because of the irresistible temptation to ignore them. And unenforced rules might just as well not exist at all.

But these are conversations that organizations need to have, regardless of the comfort level among affected parties. The aloof Paterno-esque disposition that likes to pretend such crimes never happen cannot coexist with reality. And even people of such mythic or idolized status as Joe Paterno cannot be held in such demagogic esteem that raw testimony such as McCreary's cannot be shared, however uncomfortably, with them. Paterno could have even asked McCreary to follow-up on the incident if he was too baffled by it himself.

As we all now know, McCreary did Paterno no favors by not being completely descriptive with what he saw. And neither one of them did the victims in this situation any favors, either. Whether the victims are the boys who've made allegations against Sandusky, or even Sandusky himself, who may yet be innocent of these allegations, no matter how unlikely that may currently appear.

Don't Walk Through Life Wearing Blinders

If Paterno's fall from grace teaches us anything, it is that if a person was ever able to march through their chosen career or life walk, doing whatever they wanted to do without allowing themselves to get bogged-down in the nitty-gritty dirty ancillary work involved with responsibility and accountability, you can't live that way any longer. These days, all of us need to be aware of things happening around us. If something is brought to our attention, even an unsubstantiated allegation involving possible harm to somebody else, we need to at least stop and make sure we do what we can to remediate the situation.

Apparently, Paterno wanted to coach, and that's all. Unfortunately, he neglected to realize that coaching is much more than teaching kids how to excel in the mechanics of football. It's nice - albeit quaint - that he was held in such high regard by his assistant coaches that McCreary apparently thought it would disrespectfully embarrass Paterno if he told him everything he saw. But nice and quaint don't cut it anymore when we're talking about child abuse. Nice and quaint isn't the world in which we live.

Yes, the response, "well, that was quick" may have been the first thing people thought of upon hearing of Paterno's passing yesterday.

But then, "it's just so sad" pretty much sums up the rest of everyone's reaction.

So sad, because for Paterno's legacy at least, it's an epitaph that didn't have to be.

So sad.
_____

Letter to a Mississippi Jail Inmate

2012-01-20T15:47:00.000-06:00

I've been having a good old-fashioned snail-mail conversation about faith with a friend of mine recently incarcerated in a federal penitentiary located in Mississippi.

In order to earn himself some protection, my agnostic friend has joined the "church" which meets in this prison every Sunday. Apparently, inmates don't pick on you as much if you go to the services. Or at least, going to church implies you have some moral scruples to keep you from doing all the rest of the ugly stuff other prisoners do to bide their time behind bars.

My friend grew up Catholic, but hasn't been to mass in years. I believe the only evangelical Protestant church he's ever been in is mine, Park Cities Presbyterian in Dallas, when he attended a Christmas concert several years ago with his boyfriend.

I'm not going to tell you what he did that got him incarcerated, because that's not significant right now (no, he didn't kill or rape anybody). And the only reason I'm telling you his sexual orientation is because in prison, he's learning that even previously-die hard heterosexuals, um, aren't.

Suffice it to say that he's suddenly got lots of questions about things that we rarely talked about when he was living foot-loose and fancy-free here in north Texas. And I've decided to be as blunt with him about my faith as I am with anybody else who reads this blog.

But since I'm no evangelist, why don't you read this letter over my shoulder and see how accurate I am? Please at least pray that the Holy Spirit would work in my friend's heart to receive these truths.

Especially if you discover something I could have worded better!
_____

Preachers, Sermons, and Pain

So, you say you’re not learning much about God in the prison's church? You say the preachers they bring in speak down to the congregation of inmates? Well, unfortunately, that’s not entirelyuncommon, whether you’re inside prison or outside it!

Yes, personal Bible study can be a better way to learn about God, but the way “normal” evangelical church is done, the sermon should be designed for you to learn something. It may not provide a completely new learning experience every week; sometimes, finding a new insight on a passage of scripture or a new application for your personal life is what takes place instead. But I would expect some sort of discovery or affirmation of faith each week.

A number people in the church I’ve attended for 13 years make the same complaints about our current preacher as you do the ones in prison. Not that our pastor harps on “prison, prison, faith, faith” all the time! But they expect more in-depth teaching than what our pastor does. I know it might sound funny to you, but I’m learning to be patient and see if I can learn something in sermons that even I agree can be more “milk of the word” than “meat of the word.”

I suppose some of the preachers you get in prison assume they need to be aggressive and raw in their speech to get your attention. Yet I’d agree with you – it’s best to preach and teach from one's strengths, and if someone's never been incarcerated, don’tpretend to know what it’s like. When talking about your faith, you don't need to try to empathize with your congregation as much as you need to simply speak the truth in love.

No, the preachers you get likely have no idea what it's like to live in a confined environment where you can't escape the rapes, extortion, and stabbings. But try to ignore their ignorance. God never promises His believers that we won’t have problemsin life. However, it’s not thesufferings themselves, but how we respond to them that is more significant. It’sa life-long process to learn how God allows trials for our ultimate good, and fordeveloping our faith and trust in His ability to work all things – bothpositive and negative – for our good and His glory. God knows everything that happens to all of us before it happens– He’s known since before He created time. That may not provide much comfort in the moment of pain, but the more wetrust in His ability to work things for our betterment, the less fearful weshould become.

Purity, Homosexuality, and Grace

As far as Christ and purity are concerned, did I really say,“Christ is the bridge to purity,and purity is the way to God?" Or are you trying to paraphrase? If I did, I probably meant that since God ispure, we cannot simply approach Him in our unworthiness and depravity. We need a substitute, and Christ is that substitute. Christ is our purity, so that we canapproach God as if He’s our father. “Nobody comes to the Father, except through Christ” (John 14:6).

Why did God make you gay? Well, I’m not an expert on human sexuality, but I find logic in theprogressive evangelical line of thought that says that people born with certainemotional traits actually are more likely to adopt homoerotic dispositions iftheir father figure (for boys) or mother figure (for girls) is either absent orparticularly aloof. This is not a definitiveblame-the-parent scenario; sometimes, parents and kids just don’t connect inthe most beneficial of ways. And I alsothink that the age-old condemnation of homosexuality (an excessive sanctimony,considering that same-gender sex, while listed as a sin in the Bible, is noworse than gluttony, gossip, and greed) can actually exacerbate homoeroticproclivities in some people. It’s anissue that I think the evangelical church is only now beginning to examine andflesh-out according to literal interpretations of previously-ignored texts.

So while I would not say that God “made” you gay, I wouldsay – and hey, you asked – that over time, you’ve developed a sin patterninvolving homoeroticism that was based in some measure (as yet not understood)on your genetically-based personality and some combination ofparental/nurturing habits. Maybe thatsounds like a cop-out to mix both “nature and nurture,” or just another way tore-frame Christian gay-bashing. Butyou’re a close friend, so you know I’m not bashing you. Frankly, on the sin scale, I’d say your gayness is no worsethan my gluttony. Theonly unpardonable sin is denial of Christ’s deity. I struggle with all sorts of immoral sexual thoughts and desires,as do virtually 99.99% of Christians. Ithink the ones who bash gays the most are the ones who haven’t been able toreconcile the imperfections of how they were raised. But none of us have perfect parents. Just because we can’t get into Heaven based on our parents’faith, we’re not denied Heaven just because our parents weren’t perfect.

I don’t look at you as a homosexual. I look at you as a creative, witty, skinnyguy with a Roman nose who is obsessed with Apple products and is gay. More importantly, right now, God looks atyou as a sinner, but not a gay sinner. He looks at you as a person who has yet to believe that His Son, Christ,died for your sins so that you could have fellowship with Him. God looks at me as a sinner saved by grace –His grace, in leading me to the knowledge and belief in His Son – and anadopted child of His. Adopted from theways of this world to His family of believers.

Trinitarian Theology

The “road to salvation” can be lonely, because as I saidearlier, it’s not based on anything else except you and your faith – or lack ofit – in God and Who He is. It’sparticularly lonely when we don’t have the Holy Spirit living inside ofus. The Holy Spirit is the third Personof the Holy Trinity, comprised of God the Father, God the Son (Jesus Christ)and God the Holy Spirit. I’m sureyou’ve heard of “Three in One,” describing the Trinity. The Chinese government even callsChristianity the “Three Selves” church.

Perhaps I should explain the role of each Person of theTrinity: God the Father is the Creator,Sustainer, and Ruler of all things. Godthe Son is the perfect Sacrifice for our sins. God the Holy Spirit is the “deposit” of our eternal reward who revealsGod’s truth to us.

Nobody is led to saving faith in God through Christ without,first, the Holy Spirit revealing the truth of Who Christ is to them. Plenty of people claim to know Who Christis, but they don’t truly believe that He is the Son of God. And that’s because the Holy Spirit is notliving in them.

How can you tell, then, who is saved, and who isn’t? Well, that’s not supposed to be a terriblyimportant thing for people to be able to do. But there are ways we can determine the people within whom God isworking. There are things called the“Fruit of the Spirit” that the Holy Spirit enables every believer to demonstratein their life. These are love, joy,peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, meekness, and self-control.

Since none of us are perfect, no believer will ever have allof these “fruits” perfectly demonstrated in their life here on Earth. But if we don’t even desire them, or pray toimprove in them, or value them, or seek to emulate them in some convincing way,then we’re allowed to discern that the Holy Spirit is not working in andthrough this person, which means they’re not saved.

Not that we’re supposed to walk through life pigeonholingpeople by whether they’re exhibiting the Fruit of the Spirit in profoundways. But since in the Bible, God callsus to be careful to prevent unsaved people from corrupting the church, we’resupposed to be on guard for people who don’t possess this fruit. This is important, because even thoughplenty of “good” unsaved people can mimic most of these, it can be hard to tellwhether it’s just their personality (for example, some people are doormats, andwimpiness can look like meekness) or whether the Holy Spirit is truly guidingthem in these attributes.

But maybe that’s a bit too much information to dump on youall at once! I’m including a bulletinfrom this past week’s church service to hopefully help put some of theseconcepts into a context of what they look like in my church.

And if you'd like me to get you a Bible, please let me know.

You can fact-check everything I've said against it.
_____

Bow Wow, Kodak

2012-01-19T19:25:00.000-06:00

A sampling of reader comments from the New York Times story of Kodak's bankruptcy announcement:

"First Twinkies, now Brownies. My childhood is going bankrupt!" - Wasting Time, DC
"How could Kodak be so over-exposed?" - Technic Ally, Toronto
"Kodak's recipe for decline parallels that of all too many companies too many MBAs and too many corporate lawyers running things, and not enough visionaries and technical people - this, no less, from the company that pioneered digital imaging." - mancuroc, Rochester NY
"Excellent, part of Kodak's corporate turnaround strategy is to become a patent troll suing other companies." - omalley69, Toronto
"A note to Perez - it's too late to sell patents to buggy whips." - Shining Light, North Coas

_____

Was it management incompetence?

Take a look at the selection of opinions above. I've never said right-wing capitalists are wrong when it comes to the moderate business mindset of the New York Times and its readers!

Whereas capitalists esteem Capitalism as a power that can do no evil, the Times and its readership aren't always so sure. Classic proof of this can be seen in such responses to Kodak's bankruptcy filing, in which management gets skewered for completely bungled the switch from film to digital photography over the past couple of decades.

According to information reported in the Times, part of Kodak's proposed restructuring under bankruptcy protection will be to aggressively sue other companies allegedly violating Kodak's copyrights on a vast assortment of technologies. Not exactly a textbook gameplan for long-term fiscal sustainability, is it? They've already been trying to sell some of their patents, even though it's unclear how patents they couldn't profit from themselves could be so valuable to anybody else. Kodak also intends to complete what many consider to be a misguided transformation from photographic film inventor into a desktop printer manufacturer, much like Apple's transformation, shifting from laptops to iPods.

Trouble is, according to skeptics, Kodak's current CEO is no Steve Jobs.

No Longer on a Roll

Perhaps not surprisingly, however, reader comments to the same news from Kodak has been decidedly different on the Wall Street Journal's website, where a pronounced defense of the MBA culture - plus some hostility at Kodak's rank-and-file employees and professional engineers - runs through many posted opinions.

It's a popular ax for pro-management pundits to grind, even as they're likely trying to protect the value of their own MBAs: Kodak is yet another big business that has suffered at the hands of its workers.

Considering how many tens of thousands of its employees Kodak has laid off over the past decade, isn't that argument a bit dubious? But then again, Kodak's besieged CEO, Antonio Perez, has replaced most of his executive suite's old guard since taking over in 2005, and that hasn't helped the company yet, either. So deciphering which employee group is to blame for the storied corporation's fall from grace may be left for history to confirm. Indeed, while it's certainly obvious that the film producer completely screwed up its response to society's digital transformation of photography, how it could and should have anticipated and engaged with digital imaging will likely be the topic of debate for some time.

Actually, the debate has already started! Across the Internet, highly-educated engineers who have either retired from Kodak, or were fired from it during incessant waves of layoffs, have written articles for business websites and blogs about the intransigent corporate culture at Kodak's storied headquarters in Rochester, New York.

Although the company could attract engineering and executive talent from around the globe to that smallish urban outpost near Lake Ontario, once executives became ensconced in the city Kodak's founder built, they tended to congeal into a boardroom groupthink. While engineers down in the labs kept on churning out inventions - including, to Kodak's everlasting shame, the digital camera itself - company management scoffed at the notion that its core film business would ever go bust.

The Tail Wagging the Dog?

Yet herein may lie yet another culprit for Kodak's inability to re-invent itself.

The legendary George Eastman didn't invent photography, but he invented roll film, which brought photography to the masses. He founded Kodak and developed it into an economic powerhouse by hiring gifted inventors who continuously improved his original product. Kodak thrived on innovation, but it was innovation fueled by gifted engineers, more than the boardroom machinations by MBA's. Eastman treated all of his employees well because he understood that innovation is best nurtured within contented employees, and executives don't mix photographic chemicals to create the products from which profits are derived.

However, as current CEO Perez has been thrashing about, trying to salvage Eastman's legendary brand, it doesn't appear that he's realized the secret to Eastman's success. Did Eastman announce a goal, and then push his engineers to pull products to support it out of a hat? Or did Eastman hire brilliant engineers, build state-of the-art laboratories, and let his people tinker, innovate, and bring their inventions to his executives to sell?

Granted, Eastman died decades before Kodak began to fall apart at the seams, but he created a culture of discovery and development that his predecessors ultimately turned on its head, where the tail started wagging the dog.

Witness Steven Sasson's digital camera, which he invented in 1975. Kodak's executives obviously weren't looking to bring a digital camera to market. They didn't know what to do with it, primarily because they had already succumbed to the corporate groupthink that would bring the company to this day of bankruptcy.

Ever since the rumor mill started churning through Kodak bankruptcy gossip last year, Perez has been under fire for what observers claim has been his inept leadership, but isn't it possible that his tenure at Kodak has simply been too little too late? Didn't Perez inherit a corporate culture that no longer knew what to do with technology or how deep innovation should run?

If corporate management is supposed to know how to assess trends, evaluate new opportunities, and capitalize on product development - even products consumers might not yet know they need - then the legend of Steve Jobs, who never finished college, let alone got an MBA, provides a compelling parallel to the dysfunction in Kodak's corporate suite.

Can Innovation Burn in this Crucible?

Not that an MBA, in and of itself, is a bad thing. It simply isn't the magic elixir corporate America thinks it is.

And maybe all of the things the Journal's readers criticize Eastman for - free dental care and other generous employee benefits, plus lavish civic philanthropy, for example - are unsustainable in today's corporate world. At least for a purveyor of ultra-competitive consumer technology.

But might one of Eastman's strategies - letting his cracker-jack engineering department set the pace for his company's products - be something today's Kodak should consider re-implementing?

Perez has said he's pushing whomever's left in his engineering labs to develop new products to fit his new business model for Kodak, but not only does Kodak not have a good track record with change, it's never had to scramble to meet such top-down changes. Does Perez not understand that inventors can't always react immediately to orders for making square pegs fit round holes?

To the extent that Perez may actually be making more of a valiant effort to keep Kodak afloat than many people are willing to credit him with, then hopefully, this bankruptcy will give him the time and, unfortunately, the finances salvaged from collateral damage to employment and pensions, to succeed.

But in how many ways is Kodak not at all like Apple? It's older, with a more deeply-ingrained methodology, and what must be a severely disillusioned and threadbare workforce.

Engineers and inventions used to lead the company, and corporate followed along to find and stock markets for their innovations.

Now corporate is trying to engineer a re-invention of the company by commissioning innovations that have historically occurred through scientific experimentation, not bankruptcy timetables.

Can the tail wag this dog back to good health?
_____

Sopapillas Would be More Effective

2012-01-18T16:29:00.000-06:00

As a citizen of the Internet - which is what you are, since you're reading this online - you've undoubtedly been inundated today with messages regarding SOPA-PIPA.

And if you're tired of it already, I'm sorry, because you're gonna get an earful from me about it as well.

Because SOPA-PIPA isn't simply an altruistic legislative scuffle, or fodder for jokes about fatty, starchy Mexican pastries (sopapillas, anybody?). It could severely impact the way you use the Internet.

By way of full disclosure, there's also an international anti-piracy law in the works, the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, or ACTA, but that doesn't fit in cleverly with acronyms which sound like wholly unhealthy - yet delicious! - sopapillas.

Anyway... as you may already know, the combined term SOPA-PIPA refers to two bills in Congress that propose pervasive restrictions on, and penalties for, certain types of Internet content. Individually, the acronyms stand for the House of Representative's Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), and the Senate's Protect IP Act (PIPA). But however you slice them, they're both chock-full of restrictions, penalties, and outright censorship tactics that will virtually shut down innovation currently exploding all over the Internet.

Innovation which, by the way, is being indisputably led by entrepreneurs in the United States. This is our baby. We created it, thanks in no small measure to government scientists (take that, you anti-government Tea Partiers). We have the most active users (so far, anyway). And American companies already generate the most online profits of any other country.

Indeed, my sole source of revenue comes from what I write for the Internet. So you'd think that it would be to my benefit to support SOPA-PIPA, since I have a vested interest in stopping online piracy, which is the ostensible objective of both of these bills.

And I do think online piracy should be fought. I believe that anybody who creates intellectual property should automatically own it, or at least be able to control it. The articles I write for Crosswalk are technically theirs for at least a year, but I agreed to that in the contract I signed with them. I know where my content is supposed to be, and I trust Crosswalk to use it properly. If I didn't want to abide by that arrangement, I was under no obligation to sign the contract.

But with Internet piracy, I lose control of my intellectual property... or, perhaps more accurately, the property I consider to have intellectual value. Granted, with the stuff I write, few other people would ever want to claim it as their own. And if anybody else can figure out how to make more money off of it than what Crosswalk pays me, then I'd be all ears!

Flaw Number One

Plenty of other Internet content, of course, is worth far more than mine. Intellectual property like feature movies, TV shows, best-selling novels, photography, graphics, songs, and music videos have all been pirated online. But is this really a new problem? The illegal distribution of counterfeit products has been the bane of the intellectual capital world for generations. And it's usually been up to the creators and distributors of that original content to devise ways of protecting their products at the point of distribution.

But the Internet is not actually their point of distribution. And this is where the fallacy of SOPA-PIPA first appears. The Internet is a distribution mechanism, but for any product, the last line of defense against product piracy is before it leaves the factory, not as it's being distributed. In other words, the Internet is like the truck that delivers content to you, much like the truck that used to deliver movie reels to a theater in Des Moines, or modern DVD's to a Best Buy in Schenectady.

Does Hollywood sue all of the world's trucking firms because some of their products get pirated? No, but they can sue an individual firm if they can prove that its employees were actively engaged in stealing freight and re-selling it on the black market. Otherwise, if the Hollywood studios cannot prove the freight companies were culpable in hiring criminals to pirate intellectual (well, for Hollywood, we'd better just stick to "creative") property, then it's up to them to thwart the piracy by ensuring the product is protected both in-transit and even after delivery.

After all, stealing DVD's out of the back of a delivery truck likely isn't as common as a person buying a DVD retail, and then pirating the DVD's content for illicit re-sale in the black market. That's hardly the freight company's fault, is it?

With SOPA-PIPA, in effect, Hollywood is saying it is.

Those of us against SOPA-PIPA believe that just as it's Hollywood's responsibility to protect its product before it's distributed in the bricks-and-mortar world, it's their responsibility to protect its product in the online world.

Does this mean that organizations which host content on the Internet - the web's "trucking companies," if you will - bear no responsibility for any pirated content their users may upload? Perhaps currently in practice, but not in theory. It's just that the "fix" for the lag between technology and law enforcement does not exist in SOPA-PIPA.

Flaw Number Two

Remember when people would sneak into movie theaters and videotape first-run movies from their seats? Bootlegged videos would then show up a few days later. But did Hollywood go chasing after the theater owners, forcing them to close because a bootlegger had been using a seat in one of their venues to ply his illicit trade?

Or take the pirating of music videos. Has the recording industry gone after the electric utility companies which provided the electricity which enabled the music video pirates to play the videos in the first place? Wouldn't that be completely stupid to blame the electric company, or the television manufacturer, for the crimes some people committed with the aid of ancillary equipment?

Penalizing the Internet would be just as incongruous. The Internet is a public utility. It has become almost as essential to modern American life as electricity, even if not everybody (like my Luddite mother) takes advantage of it. The Internet is just the latest venue through which criminals have been able to develop their thievery of commodities that don't belong to them. But the Internet isn't like a store that the Feds can raid and shut down.

Those of us opposed to SOPA-PIPA believe that since the Internet serves a vastly broader purpose than disseminating intellectual property, sweeping laws with draconian effects on all sorts of content would basically shut it down. Just as you can't ration electricity to just households which promise not to pirate software or DVDs, you can't ration the Internet. It is, or it isn't. It's on, or it's off. People either have rights to it, or they don't.

Does this mean that we just throw up our hands and say intellectual property rights don't exist on the Internet? Of course not. But neither does it mean that just because we haven't figured out a better way of protecting property rights, we need to turn the Internet into a police state.

Creators of any material that could end up on the Internet need to understand both the rewards and the risks of our online world. Right now, for many creators of intellectual property, the risks appear to outweigh the rewards, and that has led to the unsustainable proposals inherent in SOPA-PIPA.

But just because we don't yet have a workable alternative to something as drastic as SOPA-PIPA, should we just run with what we've got? Absolutely not, because just as intellectual property is valuable, so is intellectual freedom, and the ability to create and consume the very intellectual property we value.

Shutting down one of the world's greatest inventions because our laws can't keep up with parts of it does not make for logical public policy.

So... do you like honey with your sopapillas?
_____

You Really Can't Legislate Morality

2012-01-17T17:31:00.003-06:00

Sometimes, when a phrase gets used a lot, it's easy to assume people actually know what it means.

But like a lot of things, popularity in use doesn't always denote comprehension. Consider, if you will, this relatively common phrase: "You can't legislate morality."

I use the phrase frequently, because it's true. In fact, I used it in my most recent article for Crosswalk, "Keeping Matrimony Holy Starts with Singles." Although, I didn't use the phrase "you can't legislate morality." I said, "virtue cannot be encoded into law."

Still, the point of the phrase is this: just taking a moral principle and turning it into a civil law is not, in and of itself, going to actually change the ways people perceive, appreciate, honor, respect, and uphold that moral principle.

"You can't legislate morality" does NOT mean that you cannot simply take a moral principle and turn it into a law by which people need to abide.

Can you see the difference? Sure, most laws are based on a moral principle, but they don't necessarily change a person's intrinsic attitude towards that principle. And while forcing a change in behavior may be necessary, only an attitude change can validate the moral being imposed.

After all, buy-in for a moral principle only takes place when people embrace its value as a worthwhile behavioral mechanism. Simply making people do something doesn't intrinsically validate the action you're wanting them to do. And it's the value of that moral code that can benefit society, not the law itself.

Speed limits, for example, include a moral component, since we know that the faster we drive, the less control we have over our vehicle in an emergency situation, and that lessened control could compromise life and health.

But when you drive, how often are you caring about the health and welfare of drivers around you as your speedometer creeps - or surges - past the speed limit? Sure, you might be a sweet angel of a driver and putter along consistently one MPH below the posted speed limit (incurring the wrath of every other driver unfortunate enough to get stuck behind you). Quite frankly, however, the only reason I abide by the speed limit as much as I do is because I'm afraid of getting a speeding ticket if I don't.

For pragmatists, the end result is the same: I abide by the law (usually). Just so long as I'm not posing a danger to myself and others by exceeding what is considered to be the maximum speed for a particular stretch of roadway, then the law is being effective.

But the law isn't making me care any more for my fellow road warriors, is it? So although its basic objective has been met - road safety - any moral pretense has been thrown out the window. Like all those bits of litter blowing alongside our freeways.

Not that codifing morality is essentially a bad idea. Speed limits are a necessary evil, just like laws against murder, theft, rape, extortion, and even wearing seatbelts. All of these laws have a moral component to them.

But when it comes to more esoteric practices, maybe like wearing seatbelts, but more certainly like preserving the sanctity of marriage, the phrase "you can't legislate morality" really begins to speak volumes. Because when it comes to things like the sanctity of marriage, outlawing divorce won't make husbands and wives love each other more.

That's what is meant by "you can't legislate morality."

Outlawing abortion, although I think that is something that should be done to protect innocent - albeit unborn - life, won't make biological parents love their pre-birth offspring more.

Outlawing guns won't make angry people less anxious to kill somebody.

Outlawing murder won't make people stop killing each other.

The reason this distinction is significant lies not only in how it impacts our socialization patterns as a civilization. Indeed, what we think and how we feel about rules and expectations play crucial roles in how we behave and interact with others.

But also, this distinction is significant because God looks at our hearts. Why we do what we do betrays our true selves more than our actions do. Remember the purpose of the Old Testament laws? They were to prove our sin, but they couldn't save us. When we trust Christ in faith for His substitutionary sacrifice, the Holy Spirit helps us develop a moral perspective for why good things are good and bad things are bad. Truths with which we may have complied before, but only because of the law's compunction. Now, however, we see the ethical dimension, which isn't always discernible outside of the Holy Spirit's power.

Laws trick us into thinking we're good people, because laws tell us how to look good.

But morality doesn't lie.
_____

No Wonder They're in Love

2012-01-16T17:29:00.000-06:00

Traveling is not my thing. Some people seem to live on jet airplanes, or in their automobiles.

Me? I haven't been on a road trip since, um... about 2003, I think. And the last time I flew was to Detroit for Christmas in 2009, the same year Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab tried to blow up his family jewels.

On those rare occasions when I do fly, it's almost always on American Airlines, out of their massive hub here at the sprawling Dallas - Fort Worth International Airport. Ever since American Airlines relocated their corporate headquarters to Texas from New York, they've been its dominant carrier. I flew Continental to Houston on a business trip once several years ago, and it was the oddest feeling, almost like I was betraying a long-time friend.

Not that American Airlines is a friendly airline. It consistently ranks last in consumer satisfaction surveys, and it's the last of the legacy airlines that got so big they could demand business by virtue of the sheer scale of their flight schedules. To have them currently in bankruptcy protection has disappointed some people, but surprised far fewer. I've even heard hopes that this bankruptcy will feed American a steady enough diet of humble pie that when they emerge from Chapter 11, they'll be hungry enough to want to woo their customers instead of ostracize them.

Where's the Love?

Against this backdrop of me hardly ever traveling by air, and when I do, almost always traveling on American out of what we call the "Big Airport" here in north Texas, I found myself experiencing a bit of culture shock last night. A friend of mine who hasn't been in town for about seven months was due back last night, and while a mutual friend was officially scheduled to pick him up, I happened to be in Dallas, so I swung by the smaller airport, to the terminal of a smaller airline, and received an unexpected lesson in how customer service is done in another sector of today's airline industry.

Back before Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport was constructed, the Dallas metropolitan area was serviced by a typical 1950's-vintage municipal airport, Love Field, located a little north of the city's downtown business district. Fort Worth had an even smaller municipal airport, Meacham, on its north side as well. But in those days, Cowtown was still, well, Cowtown, whereas Big D really was growing in population and prestige.

Growing so much, in fact, that Love Field couldn't keep up with it all. Landlocked by residential neighborhoods and an aging industrial district, there was no room for it to expand. Meanwhile, Fort Worth wanted part of the corporate relocation action Dallas had been enjoying, and regional planners in north Texas were working with state leaders to get funding for a new airport better designed for international travel.

In the early 1970's, what was then a state-of-the-art airport complex was opened on a wide patch of scrubland between the two cities, and whatever was left of passenger service Meacham Airport quickly dried up and blew away. Today, it's a respectable commercial aircraft services facility, but little more.

Dallas' Love Field, on the other hand, managed to retain much of its passenger business. You see, although the western flanks of the airport were quickly degenerating into strip clubs, liquor stores, and rusting warehouses, Love Field's eastern side was enticingly close to the city's two most prestigious enclaves, Highland Park and University Park, where scores of business owners and corporate executives lived.

Sure, the new international airport wasn't too far away, but if you were just needing to fly domestically, why bother schlepping practically to Fort Worth when Love Field is in your back yard? Several years earlier, Southwest Airlines had been launched at Love Field, and its management was busy building it into what has become one of today's most popular no-frills airlines. Why not keep Love Field going, Dallas leaders rationalized, as a domestic, convenient alternative to the Big Airport?

Dallas Loves its Airport

Fast forward to last night, when, after Bible study at a friend's home about ten minutes away from Love Field, I drove down the old airport's main entrance boulevard, well-paved, well-lit, and attractively landscaped. Plenty of signs directed me to where I assumed I needed to go; Southwest having only one terminal, and one baggage claim pavilion. After all, you don't need to know a passenger's arriving gate anymore, do you? You just need to know where they're going to be picking up their luggage. And fortunately, the only escalators from the arrival mezzanine at Love Field's Southwest terminal is right next to the hallway towards baggage claim.

Not that I've ever flow into or out of Love Field, but I remembered what the layout was like from the couple of times I've dropped-off friends there in the past.

The parking garage was well-lit, also. I'm commenting on how illuminated everything was at 10:00pm because, remember, Love Field is owned and operated by the City of Dallas. And Dallas isn't known for replacing streetlights - or low crime rates, for that matter. Sure, about two blocks to the east, the McMansions of Dallas' Park Cities elite grace well-tended neighborhoods of ease and tranquility, but right across the airport's western fence lie abandoned buildings and auto lube shacks which were closed - at least for the night.

A well-tended walkway - again, well-lit - guided me from the clean, modern parking garage to Southwest Airline's main entrance (yes, the terminal is small enough to have multiple doorways but only one main entrance). Being 10:00pm on a Sunday night, the terminal was almost empty, with only a Cinnabon shop still open for the late arrivals.

Several cleaning crews were making their rounds, as well as security guards, and a few airport personnel, apparently just going off shift. I found the baggage claim area to be the only place humming with any considerable amount of activity, as passengers were quietly getting their luggage off of the old-style loopy-patterned conveyor belts. Dallas-Fort Worth International has wide, oval-shaped luggage carousels slanted to look like Mayan temples, and they clatter and scrape something awful. It was almost absurd to notice what appeared to be original equipment at the much older Love Field barely making a humming noise as luggage glided past.

Things I Saw at the Airport

My friend's flight was running early, according to the electronic flight messaging board, but still, I'd have to wait for about 40 minutes. I knew I was early anyway, so I didn't really mind. I soon discovered that I'm a dying breed: of the several flights which arrived while I waited, only two other people came to meet arriving passengers. Maybe more people were idling in their cars outside of the baggage claim doorways, but only three of us came inside. I remember the days when waiting areas (up at the arrival gate, remember?!) would be terribly congested with loved ones anxiously awaiting sight of their deplaning family and friends.

After noticing how people don't greet planes anymore, I was tempted to mentally meander into the social reasons for that. Maybe flying has become so ordinary? Maybe the lack of sufficient seating for people who want to wait, since non-ticketed folks are now banned from the main part of airport terminals - has virtually erased the once-common sight of airport reunions.

Anyway, I soon realized that in addition to the changing habits of air travelers and their loved ones, I was witnessing what a lot of frequent Southwest Airlines passengers have been raving about for years: no-hassle flying. I've known Southwest customers love their airline, but I thought it was mostly because of their reasonable fares.

Like clockwork, a group of about forty or fifty people would glide down the escalators from the mezzanine, most of them obviously tired, but few of them agitated or stressed-out. Some of them had their one bag with them (no, not their spouse!), so they headed straight for the exit doors, which were only a few feet away from the escalator. The majority of passengers - obviously frequent travelers through Love Field - turned automatically to their right, down the hallway to baggage claim. Hardly anybody talked - only a couple of people were chatting softly on their cell phones. Many of them - both young and old, although the majority of passengers were young - were texting busily, hardly watching where they were going, taking that automatic right turn like they were programmed to do so.

No anxiety, no stress, no anger; just the periodic wave of humanity washing down the escalators and turning towards baggage claim. Where they got their bags and left.

Wave, after wave, after wave.

After a while, I couldn't help but notice how orderly the baggage claim process was going. Maybe last night was a fluke. Maybe it was the first time in ages that things have run that smoothly at Love Field. Maybe the fact that Southwest's workforce is non-union - nope, they've got all the traditional unions at Southwest, so that can't be it.

Granted, Love Field is not a large airport with dozens of flights arriving at the same time, and this was a Sunday night, after 10 pm, on a day with good weather, and most of these travelers were Dallas-area residents.

Although I did here one guy complaining to a security guard that he couldn't get any of the cabbies lined up outside to drive him to Oak Cliff, a dicey Dallas neighborhood, especially at night.

Yet even as multiple flights were disembarking and having their luggage combined on two carousels, there was hardly any talking. Hardly any grabbing for luggage, hardly any pushing, and hardly any nose at all. At American Airlines, at our Big Airport, in Detroit, and especially at New York's LaGuardia - the three airports which I've most frequently experienced - there's usually any number of shovers, violent grabbers of unwieldy luggage, shouting and raised voices, noisy luggage carousels, and generally, a higher level of anxiety than one might expect from people simply picking up their baggage.

At Love Field's baggage-claim, however, throngs of passengers would traipse down the long hallway, stand silently near the carousels, and within minutes, watch as bags popped through the little openings in the wall. Almost at some secret signal, every piece luggage would be claimed, and people would be on their way.

There were no stacks of unclaimed luggage. And there were no groups of disgruntled passengers having to file claims over missing baggage. Yes, Southwest Airlines had a luggage service counter open, but - and get this! - it was for people who had arrived early for their originating flight, and their luggage had managed to get to Dallas on an earlier plane! How often does THAT happen these days?

Something Special in the Air

By the time my friend's flight arrived, aside from marveling at how calm things were running, I was seriously bored. There had been no drama of any sort, except maybe for the guy who couldn't get a cabbie to take him to Oak Cliff. I'd estimate that several hundred people had made their way through the terminal just while I had been there, and everything was running like it was supposed to.

My friend said that whenever he could, he avoided using the Big Airport, preferring the low-stress vibes at Love Field - even though, due to a bit of crafty legislation known as the Wright Amendment, which sought to curtail Love Field's popularity, many destinations further away from Texas cannot be non-stop. Like many travelers, my friend is willing to endure the inconvenience of longer travel times to and from Love Field so he can avoid the agony of Dallas - Fort Worth International and the legacy airlines like American which dominate it.

On my drive home afterwards, I got to thinking: maybe this was a taste of what the "golden age of flight" was like? When planes arrived on-time or early, when you didn't need to hike across acres of marble flooring to get from your gate to baggage claim, and when baggage claim was effortless and everybody left happy. No noise, no drama, no fuss.

No wonder most of these travelers appeared to be seasoned Southwest Airlines customers.

No wonder American is in bankruptcy.
_____

Dear Candidates: Grow Up!

2012-01-13T15:59:00.000-06:00

An Open Letter to All 2012 Republican Presidential Candidates:

Yesterday, your party officials met in New Orleans, Louisiana, and admitted to the national media that the campaigns you're running are embarrassing and way off-message.

But then, the American people already knew that. And we're already embarrassed and disgusted.

You're picking on the richest one of you because he made his money doing the same thing the rest of you used to bank your investment portfolios on: the employment-killing venture capitalist industry. Why bother attacking him now? And he's shooting back at you with quips about firing even more people. Meanwhile, the negative ads - a tactic which the American public has already said we don't like - keep churning away. But not even against the opposing party: against opposing candidates within your own party!

Where's the logic in that?

Let's face it, guys: none of you are stellar candidates. None of you. None of you match the caliber of candidates Republicans have been assuming we'd be able to choose from this year.

None of you comprehensively typify the traditional Republican qualities of reasonable (not just limited) government, frugal taxation, beneficent capitalism, and social conservatism.

None of you have provided us a coherent strategy or platform that you intend to follow should you win the presidency. Indeed, none of you are telling us much about what makes you such a good candidate.

None of you have stellar foreign affairs experience.

None of you have an impressive military background, and only two of you even have military service.

None of you reliably champion legitimate conservative social values.

Yet all of you like to bicker and squabble. Those might be acceptable qualities for Congress, at least if the behavior of our Legislative Branch's current members means anything, but not for the presidency.

All of you think the public - and the Democrats - will forget your bickering and squabbling amongst yourselves by the time Election Day rolls around.

And all of you assume you'd be a better president than Barak Obama.

If that's the case, then prove it to the American people. Tell us what sets you apart. Tell us what parts of your background make you the ideal competition for our current president. Tell us your vision for your presidency, and what you plan for your agenda. Give us numbers and promises and even platitudes, not to denigrate your opponents in this primary race, but to prove to us that you're the person we should nominate.

Good grief, guys. You're acting like a bunch of spoiled teenagers. You're kicking up dust and sand like a petulant coach screaming at a referee. You're pointing so many fingers at each other nobody would guess you have only ten of them.

Grow up, gentlemen. If we can still call you that. This election year was supposed to be handed to the Republican Party on a silver platter. Obama's once-radicalized youth vote has evaporated. His tenure in the Oval Office has been plagued by anemic job growth, runaway bureaucracy, political paralysis, unsatisfactory military efforts, tepid foreign relations, and plenty of people in his own party starting to freak out over their chances of holding the White House this November.

Well, hey - you've been too busy bickering and squabbling to notice, but Democrats aren't freaking out about losing the White House anymore. Obama is raking in the campaign cash - a whopping $42 million just last quarter. Op-ed columnists are starting to crow about all of the collateral damage being inflicted upon the Republican Party by its very candidates.

If you guys think what you're doing is good electioneering, then maybe you're not good politicians after all. After what we've witnessed just in Iowa, New Hampshire, and now in South Carolina, how are you supposed to kiss and make up after the nomination, dust yourselves off, straighten your ties, and say, "Aww, we're all good now! We're all behind that guy who just yesterday we claimed to be unsuitable."

If you think the electorate is that stupid, maybe you don't deserve our vote. If you think President Obama is that impotent a campaigner, then maybe you're not competent enough to run against him.

Suck it up, boys, and grow up: you're on the verge of throwing away this presidential race, and none of you have even been made the party's official candidate!

We didn't really like much about any of you before this election started, and you haven't won many friends since then. You need to prove to us that you're worth voting for, not just that somebody else is worth voting against.

Is winning the nomination more important to you than winning the election?
_____

Review My Reviews

2012-01-12T19:01:00.001-06:00

Thanks to my generous editor at Crosswalk.com, I'm beginning to write more book reviews. I've created a separate page for them on this blog, and you might want to check them out!

And, if you'll allow me a moment to gush, I'd like to share with you the feedback I received from one of my earliest authors to review, Erin Healy. She wrote, "Tim, thanks for giving my fiction a try, and for rewarding me with such a thoughtful and articulate review. I appreciate the personal depth with which you approached the story--no author could ask for anything more. Thank you."

How cool is that?

Oh yeah; I'm tinkering with the name of this blog again, too. Please bear with me, and send along any feedback you might have.
_____

Millennials Aren't Occupying Church

2012-01-11T16:58:00.000-06:00

They're probably the most over-named group of people in history.

North America's current twentysomethings. Also known as Generation Y, the Millennial Generation, Millennials, Generation Next, Net Generation, and Echo Boomers.

Good grief - if anybody is entitled to an identity crisis, it's these folks.

Of course, in every generation, whether it was in 411 BC or 1972, older people usually cast aspersions at twentysomethings. They're fresh out of college, or otherwise "on their own" for the first time in their relatively young lives, and they tend to act in ways older generations don't consider entirely appropriate. That's one reason, for example, car insurance rates are higher for twentysomethings than sixtysomethings.

So perhaps it should come as no surprise that of all the worries older generations have of our Millennials, one of them involves church attendance. And why so many young people have begun leaving the organized church.

That was a question posed recently by Relevant magazine, a publication geared to today's religious-leaning twentysomethings. Why aren't young adults coming back to church when they graduate college? Whereas in previous generations, a reliable percentage of churched teens disconnected with church after leaving home, these days, that reliable percentage is increasing dramatically. Some church growth experts fear this will soon spell a drastic decline in church attendance, and have begun wringing their hands over how to stop it.

From the Mouths of Babes

Perhaps some helpful perspective on the situation can be gleaned from this generation's church drop-outs themselves, twentysomethings who responded to Relevant's article in feedback comments. Here's a brief sampling of their opinions, typos and all:

"I think our generation seriously questions the validity and effectivness of institutions in cultivating community, accountability, teaching and worship. As such, we're disenfranchised with such institutions and desparate to find any alternative."

"God's Church is not a Denomination, a Building, or an institution, or a big business with a CEO fulfilling his vision....We are His Church...God's Church is His Bride, The Ekklesia, One Body in Intimate Relationship with Jesus, finally getting to Know who God really is and Just how much He Loves us, smothered in Grace and Love ,not man made religion or mans agendas....These things can only keep people locked in for a time... a Hunger for Freedom will hopefully always break through the lies."

"I suppose the criteria for choosing whether to stay or leave a local parish has not been whether the majority of parishioners agree with me; but whether they respect my freedom to respond to God's Grace as my conscience dictates even when my convictions pose a challenge to their psychological comfort zones."

"i think it's as simple as making friends. watching movies together. having bbqs. just hanging out. without the pressure to shake hands with those around you right before offering is lifted. once the relationships become intimate enough you feel comfortable to read and pray together."

"Please don't stay frustrated with us, but be thankful that we care SO MUCH about Jesus and following him that we aren't willing to 'stick it out' in the institution that we believe has more of a focus on budgets and fancy programs than on the basic aspects of community and our relationships with Jesus."

"I think the number one reason that many young adults leave church is because a 'up front show' style of church doesn't mesh with their priorities of intentional relationship... This generation wants relationship and they want to see the gospel 'work' practically in real life - community is what they are looking for and can't seem to find on Sunday mornings."

"I left because of people who are constantly judging my life, and what I do with it. (Not gently giving wisdom, but judging. The difference is subtle but important)."

Oddly enough, some of the excuses sound just like the ones people in every generation have used for not going to church. One young woman bluntly complained, "I'm not a morning person and I've never gotten much out of Sunday morning services."

Perhaps it's proof that the more things change, the more they really do stay the same!

What Are They Saying?

Then too, it may be that today's twentysomethings really are the first generation of socially-disenfranchised automatons. So individualized by years of cultural dissonance that they can't grasp the concepts of community, shared responsibility, sacrificial love, extending grace to others, or even the definition of grace itself. Life is entirely about them.

Generally speaking, they think they know what intimacy is, but they don't. They're too narcissistic and impatient to be deferential, which is what genuine intimacy requires.

Reading these responses, the dearth of Biblical knowledge betrayed by many of these young people who claim to have grown up in church is depressingly striking. For the past twenty years, many churches and churched parents apparently have completely wasted their opportunity - and privilege - of teaching their children from and about the Bible. All these Biblically illiterate twentysomethings provide painful proof of that.

And while an intellectual immaturity has always seemed to exist in young adults, simply because of their relative inexperience at life, perhaps that immaturity has been exacerbated in today's iteration of this cohort by public education's emphasis on test-taking instead of acquiring wisdom and extrapolating information.

Meanwhile, reading these responses with a Reformed perspective reveals the same old misunderstanding about what church is supposed to be that has permeated conventional evangelicalism for the past 50 years. The same twisted purpose for church that spawned the seeker-sensitive travesty and many rock-concert trappings of contemporary "worship." Corporate worship is no longer oriented towards the worship of God but the entertainment of an audience who can write off the experience on their taxes. To the extent that most of today's evangelical churches perpetrate these fallacies, it shouldn't surprise anybody that today's twentysomethings - the first generation to be weaned on technology and artificial stimulation, and desperately seeking legitimacy - avoid them.

Why This Phenomenon Likely Won't Matter Much

At the same time, however, a Reformed perspective also provides some rationale for dismissing virtually all of these excuses from today's twentysomethings for not attending church. Because after all, aren't these opinions by Relevant's readers merely petulance disguised in false piety?

Are these twentysomethings so much better than the Baby Boomers and thirtysomethings who love the rock-concert worship services? Are they that much more grounded in their desire for an Acts-type early church experience? They so crave a sense of community that they're willing to obfuscate the methodologies which helped nurture previous generations of saints in the Faith and punish us by not attending.

Spare me such impertinent overtures of sanctimony! I don't like rock concert worship any more than most of these Millennials, but I don't loathe the Boomers and Busters who do, or claim their faith is inferior to mine. Misguided, yes; but not intrinsically inferior. Aren't these insolent cries of a purer faith from Millennials nothing more than another way for the Devil to wiggle into the hearts and minds of people to further undermine the Body of Christ?

Nevertheless, while I scoff at much of the entitlement expressed by these commenters, I don't fear it. God's Elect will always be claimed by Him, regardless of whether - or where - they go to church. A lot of the people who stayed in church after college in previous generations may have done so out of obligation or some other compunction other than true faith in Christ. So perhaps what we're seeing now is a literal weeding out of the chaff from the wheat, as today's twentysomethings perform in our faces the divestiture of the unsaved from the saved.

Not that church attendance proves a person is saved. Or that not attending church proves they're unsaved. It's just that if you don't have faith to begin with, and you don't have the cultural proclivity to attend church just because its the socially-acceptable thing to do, then I don't blame you for not wanting to go. And it's not a crisis for the church if you don't.

No matter how you slice it, the evangelical church is probably shrinking not because fewer people are being saved, but because God's true church is simply losing a lot of the hangers-on that have traditionally occupied pews and deacon boards - and even pulpits - in congregations across North America.

Seeker Church Is No Longer Contemporary

And yes, I admit finding some satisfaction in seeing how the defiance of non-churchgoing twentysomethings supports some of my own contentions about North America's contemporary church. Many of Relevant's readers complained about the polished rock concerts, the drive for performance perfection and the amount of money it costs, the vapid praise music, the trite sermons, the fashionably beautiful worship leaders, the impersonal campuses, and everything else that creates more of the dissonance between faith and community that I join Millennials in loathing about contemporary churches in general and seeker churches in particular.

You know the popular saying in these contemporary churches that "we strive for perfection in all we do to honor God?" I've known since day one that it was code-language for "our pastor is a type-A micromanager who wants to impress as many people in as many ways as possible." And sure enough, it's been an exceptionally off-putting dogma for today's jaded young adults who think they want perfection, but know it's too elusive to be real.

So to hear these things from the very target audience towards which churches have been tilting for years now - the young hipsters - is actually refreshing. Chasing the youth market is a never-ending - and ultimately, ineffective - battle, since that market is always shifting away from you. Youth is forever racing into the future, while all of us - even today's youth, and tomorrow's - incessantly age. It was interesting to note how one Millennial scoffed at the 1990's music in the church he left, music which was cutting-edge during the early frenzy of the seeker movement, but awkwardly dated today. It proves what I've claimed for years: church based on a singular demographic simply doesn't work, particularly if that demographic is all about youth.

The Take-Away From this Paradigm Going Forward

The value of listening to these twentysomethings lies not in their imperious snubbing of the hypocrisy in church - hypocrisy to which they're inadvertently contributing by their duplicitous estimations of their own spiritual condition, since they think they're actually benefiting from abandoning church - but in the proof that it provides regarding the purpose of church.

If you're attending church to make friends, to feel significant, to check off a religious activity for your works-based salvation, to help solve social ills in the world, or to be validated no matter what you think or do, then you're going to church for all the wrong reasons. No matter how old you are. And no matter the congregation you're proud of dismissing as irrelevant.

Corporate worship is for the unadulterated adulation of the Trinity by its redeemed Elect. Then it's for instruction, then for service and discipleship. In the process, worshipping alongside like-minded saints who are also on their journeys of sanctification, you'll probably become friends with some of them, and you should be placing yourself under the leadership of disciplers in your congregation who are also helping you disciple others. And so on, and so on.

In fact, it's at the point where you're not thinking about yourself, but about God and others, that you'll probably find yourself less concerned about why church may not be relevant to you, but more encouraged that it's become an intrinsic part of your life. Because when all is said and done, not forsaking the assembly of ourselves together may be a bit messy at times, and not always edifying, yet it's something the Bible instructs us to do. It's a way we demonstrate to God and the world that we worship because He loved us first.

Corporate worship is all about Him. Not you, not me, or anybody else.

And if you can't believe that, then maybe the Holy Spirit is not in you. Because there's no other valid reason to attend church. It could just be that we've hit a generation of unsaved twentysomethings who are too calloused by pretense to care about putting on a charade in church and lack the Holy Spirit's urging to attend anyway.

And you know what? That's OK. Because now, the rest of us have a clearer understanding of who our mission field is.
_____

Doing Church Without One

2012-01-10T19:21:00.001-06:00

"It's extra-Biblical."

A friend of mine who, like me, celebrates Epiphany, was commenting last week about why many evangelicals don't observe the Christian calendar.

The main reason, aside from the Christian calendar smacking too much of Catholicism for most Protestants, is that it's not found in the Bible. It's based on a contrivance of cultures and schedules. It's extra-Biblical.

Which of course, it is. Our Christian calendar exists without Biblical ordinance, and it's based on cultural interpretations of religious and doctrinal themes. But these don't make it wrong, do they?

Of course not.

Oddly enough, the same people who say the Christian calendar is extra-Biblical may also be folks who meet in a church building every weekend. I say "weekend," because some people worship on Saturdays because worshipping on Sundays is, also, extra-Biblical.

But they still go to corporate worship at a church, don't they? Why do they do that, since church buildings are, um, extra-Biblical, too?

If you're going to get your knickers in a twist over the lack of a Biblical timeline to support a Christian calendar, then I hope your church is a house church. Because, regardless of whether it's a glorious cathedral, a stately New England style chapel, or an ugly megachurch, meeting in a religious building is beyond the requirements, expectations, or even Biblical precedent for New Testament believers.

The Church's Church History

God commissioned a tabernacle in which the Israelites were to worship, and the Israelites later built a temple in which to worship God. Christ Himself taught His Gospel in the temple, as did Paul and the apostles. But that was a Jewish facility. The early church was not exactly welcomed by Jews, and although some large gatherings of believers were held in temple courtyards after Christ's ascension, for the most part, believers met in private homes for worship, fellowship, and service.

Indeed, from the Book of Acts onward, numerous references to house churches can be found. In Acts 2:46, we learn believers would gather to pray in the temple, but they would fellowship "from house to house." The apostle Paul sends numerous personal greetings to fellow believers in house churches (Romans 16:5, Romans 16:23, 1 Corinthians 16:19, Colossians 4:15, Philemon 1-2). As persecution against believers grew more intense, Christ-followers spent less time worshipping in public, and more time praying in secret. Remember when Peter was released from prison, and he went to John-Mark's home, where he knew the believers would be praying? He certainly didn't run down to First Baptist's family life center on Main Street.

Fast-forward three centuries, and historians credit the Emperor Constantine with encouraging the establishment of church buildings after he proclaimed Christianity as the religion of the Roman Empire. A few historic references to buildings retrofitted to hold large numbers of worshippers can be found before that time, but nothing of significance. On the other hand, Constantine could be considered the world's first megachurch developer. Among the first exclusively Christian churches ever built were his epochal Church of the Holy Apostles and the spectacular Hagia Sophia, both in what was then called Constantinople. Today, a mosque sits on the site of the long-since-destroyed Church of the Holy Apostles. Remarkably, much of Hagia Sophia, which fully translated means "Church of the Holy Wisdom of God," still dominates what is now Istanbul, Turkey, although it's no longer a Christian facility. In fact, it served as a mosque for over 470 years, until it became a museum, shortly before World War II.

Not that Christians and Muslims have been the only religions to build and maintain distinct houses of religious worship. Consider the mysterious Mayan and Incan temples in Central and South America, respectively, and Angkor Wat in Cambodia. Indeed, religious structures have played an important role in cultural expressions of architecture around the world, and have even been worshiped as much - if not moreso - than the deities they were constructed to honor.

Maybe that's one reason why China's Communist leadership has sought to stifle religious expression in all forms for the past several decades. Christianity is not the only oppressed religion in China, but it's one of the religions towards which China's Communists have been the harshest. With the exception of some "Three Self" government-regulated churches that meet in approved buildings, discreet house churches are the norm there. Not surprisingly, house churches tend to flourish in many countries with governments hostile to the Gospel, as hidden clutches of persecuted believers meet in private dwellings, persevering in their faith without a publicized address.

Here in North America, on the other hand, house churches are considered bizarre, cultish, and even totalitarian. Not just by the unsaved and the unchurched, but by conventional Christians. By far, the norm among evangelicals is to maybe start out meeting in a home, but only until they scrape up enough money to rent a bigger space, and then buy their own property. And this isn't exclusively an American tradition. We got it from Europe, home to the world's greatest Christian edifices, where centuries ago, the vibrancy of each town centered in large part on their church - or churches.

Four Walls and a Roof

These days, most American cities have lots of churches, but civic life doesn't revolve around them. Even for many evangelicals anymore, family life revolves less around church than it does work, or kids' sports, or school events. Church is where you go to satisfy that compartment of your life that involves religion. It's not the center of importance unless you want to get married.

So, why do we hold on to our church buildings? Because we're suckers for tradition? Naw, that can't be it, since most churches despise hymnals and choirs and classical worship styles.

Because they're such beautiful architectural gems? No, that can't be it either, since most churches these days look more like warehouses than a place to celebrate sacraments.

Because they add so much value to a community? Here again, most newer churches have all the charm of big-box discount stores, but at least those stores pay property taxes. Churches don't. Here in Arlington, Texas, we taxpayers got socked in the gut when a sprawling corporate headquarters complex shut down after moving operations to Mexico and sold their valuable campus, at the intersection of two major freeways, to a clone of Houston's farcical Joel Osteen empire.

I suspect one of the reasons church buildings remain so popular is because they help centralize responsibilities within a community of faith, and therefore help insulate individual church members from needing to get too involved. Having a few elders and deacons attend meetings requires a lot less personal investment than having each of those leaders meet with the same 20 people every week, year after year.

Second, there is something to be said for having strength in numbers. Twenty people meeting in a cul-de-sac don't have as significant a visual impact on a community as 100 people meeting in a chapel with a sign out front. You can't have sizable music programs, or kids' ministries, or men's breakfasts. Of course, how effective those 20 people in the cul-de-sac are with ministering the Gospel within their spheres of influence can provide a far more powerful impact that the larger tribe in the chapel - but within many communities of faith, ministering the whole Gospel isn't really what people want to do when they go to church.

Which brings up the major factor we need to consider when evaluating the merits of church buildings versus home churches. Christ says that "wherever two or three are gathered together" in His name, He is "in their midst." So basically, whenever you have more than one believer in attendance someplace, you've got a quorum for corporate worship.

Proponents of house churches say that the spirit and function of "family" within a congregation operates more organically in a private home environment. Having fewer people means more of them can minister to - and be ministered by - each other in an exceptionally spontaneous and efficient manner. Of course, that's a scary concept to many of us churched folks, who like our personal space.

Home churches also help conserve financial resources, which means their members can better control how - and how much - money goes towards ministry objectives valued by the group.

Many large churches counter that the small group model they've established for weekly Bible study and fellowship meet those noble advantages of the house church model. Which is true, as far as getting to know other people goes. But you've still got the extraneous budget requirements and maintenance tasks of the church building eating away at your resources. Meanwhile, believers in Majority World countries worship corporately in tents and shacks, or even out in the elements, since most of them have been evangelized by Westerners used to church buildings instead of house churches.

Granted, living standards are different across the globe, as are economic opportunities, political climates, cultural expectations, and adaptability in the midst of crisis. I doubt few of our brothers and sisters in Christ who will never worship corporately in a church like yours or mine begrudge us the structural comforts we Americans think we need or deserve. Oddly enough, it's the believers who've organized themselves into clandestine home churches in places like China who, since evangelism is sweeping through their country, may be proving how non-essential any church building is to the Great Commission.

Same Purpose, But in Residential Bricks and Mortar

Not that home church advocates believe church buildings are evil. From what I've read about one of America's leading home churches, Christ Fellowship in Kansas City, Missouri, home churches aren't as anti-building as they are anti-bureaucracy. Layers of pastors, staffers, programs, and ministries require bigger and bigger buildings to house them all. But it's the lack of connectivity between church leadership and the rank-and-file congregants that many home church proponents want to avoid.

So it's not the brick-and-mortar built environment which home church advocates deplore as much as it is the built environment of anomie and interpersonal disconnects of conventional, larger churches. I suspect that if they could develop and benefit from solid discipleship relationships in mainstream churches, then the justification many home church advocates claim for their preferred methodology would be muted. However, I think we all know that human nature tends to work against spiritual intimacy in larger, rather than smaller, groups.

Still, I'm not ready to give up on conventional church just yet. Frankly, I appreciate my church's pseudo-Gothic, 1930's-vintage architecture and stained glass windows worth upwards of a million dollars. I deeply love the fact that this group of believers has been able to pool its resources and purchase a fantastic, large pipe organ for the sole purpose of glorifying God. Have I mentioned before that twenty percent of my church's budget - off the top - goes to cross-cultural missions? Yes, a large chunk of its budget goes towards salaries, but I don't believe ministers of the Gospel should live in penury. How many times have you heard me say, "a worker is worthy of his wages?" That means professionals like seminary-educated pastors shouldn't be denied compensation for their expertise. And generally speaking, most house churches can't afford six-figure salaries for Ph.D.'d leadership.

Do I have the same level of personal intimacy with other believers at my church as I would have in a home church? Probably not. But then again, I don't really want it. Can I be honest here? Isn't that what we're talking about? I'm not a touchy-feely kind of guy. Just as there are benefits to interpersonal connectedness, can't those relationships go just as wrong in a tight-knit setting as they can in a conventional congregation? I don't want lots of people getting into my business, just as I don't really want to get into everybody else's business. Yet I appreciate the dynamics of the larger church.

Yes, there are trade-offs between "sanctuary-church," as some home church advocates call conventional churches, and the home-based model of early New Testament believers. But maybe since there were so few believers back then, the evolution of a worship structure for the new Christians took longer to develop than God considered essential for the Canon?

Meanwhile, the crux of the issue probably has less to do with whether a body of believers meets in a church building or somebody's living room. God cares more about what's happening within and among His people than where it's taking place.

Which probably means that just as "sanctuary-churches" are extra-Biblical, so are house churches, since God never tells us they're the sanctified template. House churches are Biblically historic, but they're not mandated.

So, you can "do church" without one. But you can't do church without "The One."
_____

An Epiphany of the Epiphany

2012-01-06T15:18:00.001-06:00

Greetings on this glorious feast day of Epiphany!

At least, it's a glorious day here in north central Texas, where the temperature is about 70 degrees and there's not a cloud in the sky.

Yet even if our weather here was as nasty as winter weather can get, even for Texas, January 6 would still be a day for glorious celebration of the Epiphany, or the welcoming to the world of the Christ child by the wise men.

Not that the wise men actually found the Christ child 13 days after His birth; Epiphany, like Christmas itself, is more symbolic than literal. Epiphany, which can mean the same thing as "stunning realization" or "new truth," commemorates the wise men being the Bible's first documented foreign visitors to the Christ child. Why is this important? Because it signifies how Jesus was born to save not just one class of people, or one race, or one caste or social group, but that as God incarnate, He would not be a respecter of persons. Anyone of any race, ethnicity, economic status, or even prior religion, can be saved through Him.

Hallelujah?

Indeed, Christ's very first visitors were the humble shepherds, called to the manger from the hills around Bethlehem. They were most likely Jews, or at the very least, people who had relatively close ancestral links to the lineage of David. But the wise men from the East were obviously of a far more distant people group. It has been estimated that it took about three years for them to "come to the place where the child was," which by that time, was in Nazareth.

And just to be clear: nowhere in the Bible does it say there were three kings. They were men of nobility, probably, and importance, obviously, but they could have been their generation's version of NASA scientists, and there could have been two of them, or dozens. We just know there was more than one of them, and they came from the East.

Christ is indeed the Savior of the world. And at least to me, that's what Epiphany celebrates. Cross-cultural missions, which is the extension of the significance of Christ's international purpose, is part of what Lutherans celebrate at Epiphany, which I think is appropriate.

Christ's Gospel is for His elect, but His elect is scattered across the globe. His elect is comprised of the rich and the poor, and everything in between. That's why it's fitting that before Christ ever "officially" began His earthly ministry, he'd already been greeted - heralded, even - by people representing the spectrum of human existence.

Isn't that incredible?

In the Christian Calendar, the season of Epiphany started last night, with what's called "the Twelfth Night," corresponding to the traditional Twelve Days of Christmas. Epiphany will run until the Sunday before Ash Wednesday, upon which day Lent begins.

Twelfth Night and the Start of Epiphany

Last year, I attended my first- ever Twelfth Night service at a relatively conservative Episcopalian church in Dallas' tony University Park enclave called St. Michael and All Angels. It started at dusk, and ended well after nightfall. After the service inside their towering, 1950's-vintage sanctuary with the massive marble wall across its chancel, we congregants were led outside to a mobile metal altar, where boughs and branches of evergreens had been piled high. These had come from decorations which had been arranged throughout the church during Advent and Christmas, which meant they were dry and brittle - perfect kindling.

About two hundred of us gathered around the mobile metal altar, underneath the spreading branches of grand live oak trees (they're called "live oak" because they keep leaves all year long). After a short prayer, one of the priests, wearing a striking white robe in the surrounding darkness, lit the stack of evergreens, which had already been doused with lighter fluid.

FOOMPSSSHHH!

The entire pile of dry evergreens went up in a flash of white, orange, and yellow; a grand burst of light, energy, and heat. The conflagration initially looked high enough to torch trees whose branches hung about twenty feet overhead, but the mobile altar had been strategically placed beneath an opening in the trees' canopy, and soaring fingers of flame licked up through the opening, probably another ten feet or so, until dying down to just below the canopy ceiling.

Impressive? You bet! Rush-hour traffic which had been crawling along the street in front of the church (does rush hour ever really end in Dallas?) practically came to a halt as passers-by stopped in amazement. They knew it was a controlled burn of some kind - the church's forecourt was crowded with people, and the priests with their white vestments stood near the street, one of them holding a sparkling brass crucifer.

The reaction amongst us in the crowd was equally noticeable. We gasped and shrank away at first, when the initial flash consumed the evergreens. Then we quickly grew comfortable with the drama of the fire, and even appreciative of it, since it was chilly outside - yes, even Dallas gets cold around Christmastime - and the warmth contrasted so nicely with the winter air.

Officially, the service was over, but it took several minutes before the first few people started to walk away, either to the parking lot and leave, or to the church's fellowship hall, where a 12th Night "feast" had been prepared. As I stood, lingering, letting the glow of the fire caress my face, even as my backside continued to complain about the cold, it struck me: what symbolism from this fire, and the fire of the Holy Spirit!

I got it.

It was its own epiphany!

Not the Holy Spirit - I've had Him ever since I was saved, just like any believer. No, what I "got" was the symbolism that many of us evangelicals have thrown out along with our very ambivalence to liturgical ceremonies like the 12th Night and Epiphany. How more dramatic staging of the work of the Holy Spirit than a pile of dead evergreens ignited in the darkness?

This Little Light of Mine

What kind of witness could we be to our world - wherever in the world we've been called to serve - if we let the light of Christ, through the power of the Holy Spirit (depicted as a flame in the Bible) shine through us? Of course, if we're just a flash-in-the-pan, like this symbolic bonfire was, then we wouldn't be much use at all. But that's not the point of this little tradition, is it? Obviously, we've got to put the fire out. St. Michael and All Angels probably had to obtain a permit from the University Park police to even have an open flame outdoors like that. But can't you stop and enjoy the imagery?

Here we are - by outward appearance, we look green, like those evergreen branches did, even though, upon further inspection, you could tell they were dead, brittle, and dry. Useless except for being turned into mulch, perhaps, or better yet: fire, light, and heat!

Traffic on the street outside the church practically stopped, remember? Surprised, yes, but also intrigued by the impressive flame and the light it gave off. Those of us standing around were soothed by the heat, even though none of us wanted to get too close!

If you'll permit me one of the axes I can't help but grind, a hallmark of seeker-sensitive, contemporary churches is refuting tradition so that our tactile, object-oriented culture can "relate" to the Gospel. Meanwhile, I say that the 12th Night observance is just the traditional object lesson our seeker-sensitive churches, despite their cynicism of tradition, could use.

Sure, the 12th Night is extra-Biblical. No, it's not a necessary component of worship. And if you can't do it if it's raining on January 5, it's no huge loss to anyone's faith.

But it certainly helps, doesn't it? And what's wrong with that?

"So, Mr. Liturgy-Lover," you may be asking, "if this 12th Night was so great, why didn't you go back this year?"

Because in his homily last year, the rector preached that the reason Christ came to Earth was so that we could communicate better amongst ourselves.

That's what he said. No atoning sacrifice. No propitiation for sins. Nothing but being the equivalent of the first cell phone, or Mark Zuckerberg.

What pitiful theology, right? To cap it off, an elderly gentlemen down in the front of the nave actually had the temerity to elicit a satisfied "Amen!" at the homily's conclusion. An amen that echoed like a hollow punctuation mark in what was a grand room, yet a room I realized held little true faith.

And that's the problem with liturgy, isn't it? Not that the liturgy itself is a problem, but that it's mostly faith-less churches that perpetuate the liturgy. Liturgy that should be owned by God-led, God-worshipping, and God-preaching congregations. In order that the glory of His name can be broadcast in at least a fraction of the gloriousness with which we describe days like this one here in Texas.

So... in Lone Star State parlance: happy E-piffnee, y'all!
______

Judging is Biblical

2012-01-05T16:58:00.001-06:00

Yesterday, I used the "J" word.

"Judging."

It's one of the things many Christians think we're not supposed to do. We're supposed to be loving and supportive, even if it means ignoring flagrant sins in the body of Christ.

But how accurate are passages like "judge not, lest ye be judged" when we strip them of their Biblical context and hang them out to dry all by themselves?

Well, let's see, shall we?

Here's the famous "judge not" passage from the book of Matthew. Sure enough, "do not judge" anchors this whole section, but do those three words exist apart from the rest of what Christ teaches?

"Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye." (Matthew 7:1-5)

This is not a trick question: Does Christ actually teach us to not judge others? Or, does He teach us to judge without hypocrisy? It's the latter, not the former; right? We're to "first" repent of our own sins "and then... remove the speck" from the person we're criticizing. In other words, exhort your brother with humility and with a regard for your own sin.

Don't believe me? Then check out a similar passage where Christ's doctrine of correct judgment is expanded:

"Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you." (Luke 6:37, 38)

What is expected of a believer who feels compelled to evaluate the actions of another believer? And basically, since Christ is teaching His disciples here, we can assume these instructions are primarily for those of us in His fellowship, although they're also useful when evaluating people outside our community of faith.

Christ expects people to make judgments based on the Fruit of the Spirit, doesn't He? Love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, meekness, self-control. In the case of making judgment calls, that means that we can be stern yet loving, convinced yet contrite, and even angry, as Christ was on occasion, but always self-controlled. After all, throwing out the money-changers from the temple required Christ to make a judgment call on their behavior, didn't it?

Paul helpfully explains why judging others is essential within the body of Christ:

"But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat. What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. 'Expel the wicked man from among you.'" (1 Corinthians 5:11-13)

Wow - Paul instructs us to not even eat with people who get drunk or who are greedy. In the Presbyterian church, drunkenness and greed get winked at a lot! But we're not even to share a meal with people who make a habit of these acts. Instead, we're supposed to "expel" them because they're "wicked."

We don't hear that preached very much these days, do we? Might I be taking any of this out of context? Paul says right there to "judge those inside" the church. Seems pretty contradictory to me, if people still insist that Christ tells us to judge not.

Which isn't what Christ tells us, is it? But then, perhaps we should look to Christ as our model for what a good judge is, and not just take my word for it!

"A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit. The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him - the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of power, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD - and he will delight in the fear of the LORD. He will not judge by what he sees with his eyes, or decide by what he hears with his ears; but with righteousness he will judge the needy, with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth." (Isaiah 11:1-4a)

Christ judges with righteousness, and He treats us all as needy beggars, the poor of the earth. I suspect this terminology hearkens back to how we are to judge each other in a forgiving and giving manner.

Which means that I have some work to do myself on the way in which I judge and evaluate the trends, people, and circumstances among evangelical Christianity. You can judge me on that - I've never claimed to be perfect, and I don't mind being proven wrong. But the emphasis has to be on the "proven" bit. Just saying I'm wrong without backing that up with facts - which, you'll notice, I try hard not to do when I say others are wrong - is unBiblical, because nowhere in any of these passages does the Bible teach that unsolicited criticism for the sake of personal preference is helpful for the body of Christ.

Look, I struggle with the concept of grace like most believers do. Some of us err on the side of not dispensing enough of it, and some of us dispense too much of it. Very few of us dole out grace in appropriate measure most of the time.

But I've learned that I cannot use "do not judge" as a defense for something I may find disturbing, or challenging, or targeted at me personally.

Because the Bible teaches that we should. As I wrote yesterday, Christ expects His followers to use discernment, to evaluate the words of those who claim to follow Christ, to exhibit holiness in their lives, to follow His teachings, to judge fairly, and to separate themselves from people who follow false doctrines.

Like you, I want to honor Christ by what I say and do. So if you catch me lacking discernment, exhibiting a lack of holiness, judging unfairly, and advocating false doctrines, you need to judge me. And if you do it properly, it will be for my own good.

Whether I like it at the time, or not.

By God's grace, we'll grow in grace together, and perhaps the more effective we become at judging, the less conflict our fellowship of faith may experience. After all, judging doesn't always have to involve conflict, does it? Making judgments is simply evaluating the reality we see. We judge both the good and the bad.

Maybe the more we judge the bad, more good can take its place.
_____

Taking Mother Teresa at Her Words

2012-01-04T17:28:00.000-06:00

In the words of Mother Teresa, "words which do not give the light of Christ increase the darkness."

So taking her cue, shall I provide some more of the sainted Calcutta nun's quotes?

"Whether you are a Hindu, a Moslem or a Christian, how you live your life is the proof that you are fully his [God's] or not." (Life in the Spirit: Reflections, Meditations and Prayers)
"Mary … is our patroness and our Mother, and she is always leading us to Jesus." (Worldwide Retreat for Priests, 1984)
"I’ve always said we should help a Hindu become a better Hindu, a Muslim become a better Muslim, a Catholic become a better Catholic." (multiple sources)
"One day I met a lady who was dying of cancer in a most terrible condition. And I told her, I say, 'You know, this terrible pain is only the kiss of Jesus--a sign that you have come so close to Jesus on the cross that he can kiss you.'" (speaking to the U.S. Congress at the 1994 National Prayer Breakfast)

If you are a born-again evangelical, the heresy in these statements should be readily apparent. These very words from Mother Teresa "do not give the light of Christ." It's an important distinction to make, particularly as some people of faith insist on perpetuating the fallacy that Mother Teresa was saved.

Not only did Mother Teresa not hide her pantheism, but as a devout Catholic, she considered Mary, the mother of Christ, to be a conduit to Him. And she had the audacity to compare human suffering with the substitutionary suffering of the Son of God on the Cross as He prepared to take away the sins of God's people. Unless Mother Teresa repented of these wholly unBiblical beliefs before she died, which reviewers of her private writings don't believe she did, then she was not saved.

Period.

Spare those of us who claim this truth your protests of judgmental attitudes. Re-read all of the passages you use to get out of having to make tough decisions about whether other people are sinning or not and take them in context. Christ actually expects His followers to use discernment, to evaluate the words of those who claim to follow Christ, to exhibit holiness in their lives, to follow His teachings, to judge fairly, and to separate ourselves from people who follow false doctrines.

Isn't even deciding you're not going to judge somebody a judgment? Deciding I'm wrong about Mother Teresa's faith is a judgement in itself, isn't it? There's no way any believer in Christ can go through life without making judgments about what is right or wrong. There's no way any believer in Christ can go through life without judging whether certain doctrines are right or wrong. And there's no way any believer can go through life without judging whether a person is exhibiting sound doctrine.

Some people insist that because of all the intensely counter-cultural work Mother Teresa performed in slums, that God will give her a waiver for any sin in her life and grant her a pass through the Pearly Gates. But works-based salvation isn't how Heaven works, is it?

Couple Mother Teresa's heretical theology with tales of her Indian clinics reusing hypodermic needles because of a shortage of supplies, even as a reported $50 million sat in the charity's bank accounts, and a lack of credibility begins to mount not only regarding her Christian faith, but the legitimacy of her efforts on behalf of Calcutta's poor.

She withheld painkillers from patients in her simple clinics, even as she secured for herself world-class medical care in the best hospitals. She cheered the news of Princess Diana's divorce while chiding the Irish for pursuing pro-divorce legislation. Are these the policies of a saint?

Not that it matters if they are. Whatever mortal sins of Mother Teresa, they're no more heinous than yours or mine in the eyes of God. How wonderful to know that His grace and mercy cover a multitude of sins! Except one, of course. What counts to Him is whether or not we accept His holy Son as the sole sacrifice for our sins. Through her own words, Mother Teresa says she didn't.

"You will know them by their fruits," according to Matthew 7:16.

Can you see the darkness increasing around Mother Teresa's legacy?

_____

Bursting Bubble for Dallas Cowboys?

2012-01-03T17:22:00.001-06:00

Did you watch the Cowboys - Giants game this past Sunday?

No, it's not a trick question. Surprise! This is a genuine football reference!

Even though I don't really care for the sport, since this was Dallas' last chance to enter the playoffs, I admit it: I watched most of the game, with mild interest. If they lost, I knew that basically our local media here in north Texas would shut down all football coverage for the next eight months. If they won, we would be subjected to the continued hype about "da Boyz" until the next game they lost.

So Dallas lost the game this Sunday up at the new Meadowlands stadium in New Jersey that the New York Giants share with the New York Jets.

Dallas lost badly.

And for the past two days, our local media has been ripping Jerry Jones apart. Jones, you see, is the egomaniacal billionaire owner of the Cowboys, a storied NFL franchise that hasn't won much of anything in over a decade. The fabled powerhouse of Tom Landry lore - the coach Jones unceremoniously fired immediately upon buying the team - won three Super Bowls during the early days of Jones' ownership, but in the "what have you done for me lately" mentality of American sports, he's having a hard time keeping a legitimate claim on the Cowboy's lofty motto, "America's Team."

After Landry, Jones, as the team's Supreme Owner and self-appointed general manager, burned through so many coaches, it's hard to keep track of them all. And of course, after every losing season, Jones blames his coaching staff, even though he's the one who notoriously prowled the sidelines during games like a back-seat driver - at least until the inimitable Bill Parcells, frustrated at Jones' second-guessing, summarily banished him to his luxury suite.

If you've read my blog for any length of time, you know I'm not qualified to write much about football. And I'm not going to, except to say that Sunday's loss may have more to say about good - and bad - business practices than just sports.

I will, however, compliment Jerry Jones, who actually, since he built his stunning new football palace for the Cowboys here in Arlington, has been fairly generous to our town. I don't know how it compares to when Jones' team played in nearby Irving, and I wouldn't say he's drenched Arlington with cash from his private bank accounts, but he and his wife have helped fund some local charities, which has been appreciated. He seems to genuinely respect the leadership at our city hall, even after our fire marshal ruled the sloppily-installed temporary seating for last year's Super Bowl here unsafe, forcing hundreds of suddenly seat-less fans into a class-action lawsuit against Jones and the NFL.

But there was a story on a local news website today about how the Cowboy's continuing dearth of championships is affecting newer generations of fans. Most of the teams' faithful, die-hard fans today are old enough to remember their last Super Bowl victory, back in 1996. Which was also their last Super Bowl appearance.

But 1996 was 15 years ago! Any teenager these days won't remember Dallas' last Super Bowl, and they're more likely to wonder why their parents like the Cowboys so much, instead of other more successful teams.

Jones' three aging trophies might be enough to sustain rabid enthusiasm elsewhere, but they're now ancient history here in the football-crazy Lone Star State.

Granted, the Dallas Cowboys still top most charts when it comes to team merchandise sales and the worth of each franchise. But that's today. Most of the merchandise and tickets are purchased by people older than 15. What's going to happen as today's teenagers matriculate up through college, and then start their own families, and maybe even develop allegiances with other sports teams with fresher trophies?

Plus, are the Cowboy's large national TV audiences tuning in to watch Dallas win... or be beaten by their home team? TV ratings can work both ways.

Might the value Jones has indisputably built into his team, despite their recent record, be just another bubble ready to burst? Are the Cowboys cresting, at least in terms of how much they're worth to their owners? Will the Cowboys become the tech bubble and sub-prime debacle of the NFL?

That's what Jones and his minority ownership "partners" need to be thinking about during this off-season.

At least, in my uneducated sports opinion.
_____

Southernization Rising

2012-01-02T18:53:00.001-06:00

Texas may be south of the Mason - Dixon line.

But make no mistake: its natives are Texans first, and Southerners second.

Only then will they grudgingly admit they're also Americans.

When my family moved to the Lone Star State from the Empire State in the late 1970's, times had just begun changing rapidly for this sprawling land. Here in north Texas, the mammoth Dallas - Fort Worth International Airport had been open only a couple of years, an event which just about everybody credits with sparking the phenomenal growth of this part of the southwest.

My father's company relocated us just when American Airlines moved its corporate headquarters from midtown Manhattan to the hardscrabble prairie just south of what we now call "the Big Airport," an area now swallowed up by freeways, apartment complexes, and hotels.

In a sense, American Airlines, which traces its roots to Fort Worth's historic airfields, was coming home. But unlike the grand welcome corporations were receiving as they flocked to Texas from "up north," individual families like ours were shocked by the anti-north vitriol we encountered here.

Yankees, Go Home

We were called "Yankees" in decidedly derisive tones. I wasn't even sure why "Yankee" was a bad thing, or why it applied to us. I'd been raised to think it was a term used by foreigners to describe our soldiers abroad during two world wars. Alternatively, my Mom's parents who lived in Maine were called "Yankees," because that's what New Englanders have historically been called.

But why were these Texans calling us Yankees? I was born in New York City, like my Dad, and my brother was born in a town near the Adirondacks. Since we weren't from New England, and Texans were Americans, weren't they as much Yankees as we were?

Son, come 'ta find out, them 'er fightin' words here in the South. "South," with a capital "S." Whereas when I was a kid, we played Cops-and-Robbers, or Cowboys-and-Indians (however politically-incorrect that was), kids down here were playing North-against-the-South.

Seriously. The Civil War hadn't yet ended in Texas.

One of the songs kids at our new church here liked to sing was, "Freeze a Yankee! Drive 75, freeze 'em alive! Governor Briscoe promised us that if any d--- Yankee raised a fuss..."

Governor Dolph Briscoe was a rascal of a politician, in the true tradition of scrappy Texas electioneering. During America's oil crisis of the early 1970's, Briscoe reputedly cheered on his fellow Texans in what was the nation's largest oil-producing state by reminding them how, if they wasted enough fuel by speeding (an overt rebuke of President Gerald Ford's 55 mph mandate), there'd be that much less home heating oil for people trying to survive those brutal Yankee winters.

It was surreal. And a bit silly, right? But then, when we'd say so to Texans, they'd sneer that Yankees would find it silly only because we'd won. Not that we should worry - the South would rise again!

Still with the Civil War rhetoric, the pain of defeat burning on their lips. Then they'd whoop and holler like congregants at a tent revival meetin'.

The Southernization of America

Fast forward to America's current political quagmire, in which right-wing conservatives have hijacked the Republican Party and are blaming liberal Democrats for Washington gridlock. According to some political watchers, it's becoming clearer and clearer that what the South lost in 1865 they're tryin' like the Dickens to win today.

They call it "Southernization," or "Southernism," describing the perceived effort over the past three decades by Southern conservatives to transform political ideology in America's Bible Belt into a moral force to be reckoned with across the nation's political stage.

Not that there aren't any conservatives, or Republicans, in the North. It's just that conservative Yankees never wrapped the Cross of Christ in the American flag quite like Southerners have.

And as the theology quotient in America has been dumbed-down over the years, many evangelicals both in the North and the South seem to be having a hard time distinguishing between what the Bible teaches about taxes, good governance, social justice, and what people like Rush Limbaugh say.

Geography doesn't entirely explain the rise in neo-conservative activism within the Republican Party, of course, but in hindsight, it's enough of a factor to help explain why moderate Republicans want their party back.

Think about it: several pundits - including his adopted son - say that were Ronald Reagan to run for president this year, he'd probably get his be-hind whupped. Turns out, his actual record doesn't match the admiration many poorly-educated right-wingers hold for him. For example, Reagan did lower taxes once, but he later raised them several times, wiping out half of his initial reduction. He also negotiated with Iran, expanded government employment, granted amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants, and tripled the national debt.

His former budget director, David Stockman, has called what many Republicans say of Reagan today "outright revisionism if not fabrication of history."

Interestingly enough, Reagan served during a particularly robust period of America's epic migration from the North to the South. Maybe because so many of us were packing and unpacking, we didn't pay as close attention to everything going on in Washington during those years as we think we did. I still say Reagan was the last great president America's had to date, but he wasn't perfect. He wasn't the grand hero right-wingers currently imagine him to have been. He was more of a moderate who understood - even if he didn't like it - that politics runs on compromise.

A Great Political Migration?

Then again, maybe having Reagan, a Californian, as president while the densely-populated, politically powerful North lost millions of "Yankees" to previously low-population, low-influence states like Georgia, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Virginia, and even Texas, had little to do with Southernization. Maybe today's Southern-leaning politicians are simply trying to ride Reagan's legendary coattails, banking on the voting public's dimming memories of the Great Communicator. Either way, politics in virtually all of these states has either turned into - or been fortified as - ram-rod, right-wing conservatism.

The majority of people relocating to the South were employed, and being transferred by their employer. I suspect that many of them were probably moderate Republicans up North, and when they came down here, it didn't take much for them to be co-opted towards stricter and stricter conservative politics in their new home states. States where welfare, unions, and taxes were viewed with stronger contempt than they were up North.

Meanwhile, as employed suburbanites continued draining down South from the North, they left behind vast metropolitan areas of generally liberal voters, areas which managed to fill back up again with immigrants from overseas and, at least in New York City, Boston, and Chicago, less-conservative young people from the South who wanted the urban vibe of the older inner cities.

After several decades of this voter swapping, along with concerted efforts by groups like the Moral Majority, moderate Republicanism along the lines Reagan and Jack Kemp surreptitiously morphed into today's caustic haranguing of Newt Gingrich, Rick Perry, Eric Cantor, Karl Rove, and the irascible Limbaugh.

Part of the problem, of course, is that people like Limbaugh earn fat salaries by talking up their political bravado and trumpeting aggressive viewpoints that appeal to primal assumptions about how government works. It's a lot easier to view the political spectrum through black and white lenses that omit the vast seas of grays that comprise day-to-day governance.

While this may mean that superfluous legislation may not get done, it also means that important legislation doesn't get done, either.

Remember the Virtue of Moderate Conservatism

Political extremists claim their work is difficult because staking out positions and ruthlessly defending them is fierce business. Yet I suspect the inverse is likely the truer reality. Might the virtue of moderate conservatism lie in its issue-by-issue pragmatism? After all, politics isn't about administering a set of absolutes as much as it is a balancing of dynamic cultural forces. Making relevant policy requires hearing more than one side of an idea. It's not selling-out for the lowest common denominator, but the highest common denominator. Even if it - gasp! - requires knowing when to cross partisan aisles to preserve the greatest benefit.

Moderate conservatives generally understand that governance by the few - the fringe groups - doesn't really work in a democracy. For example, saying the United States is a "Christian" nation, like many Southernists do, simply acknowledges history without accommodating raw facts about religious freedom in our country. Decry the dilution of Christian principles in the moral fabric of our society if you like, but since America is not a theocracy, it's hard to blame the government for that moral decline.

Or expect government to unilaterally reverse it.

Perhaps unfortunately, religion is one of the hallmarks of Southernization. It's not that the North never had churches, but that the South uses churches as social clubs. It's been ages since attending church in the North benefited anybody socially or economically. But here in the South, many people, regardless of their income, pick their church based on who they want to be seen with, or who has the best selection of business professionals with whom they can trade business cards between services. Even if every church in town is decidedly middle-class, you still are held in higher estimation by the community if you attend church compared to if you don't. Up North, nobody really cares one way or the other, and if they do, it's usually to your detriment.

Generally, as the South has become more politically powerful, it has allowed its pronounced Judeo-Christian mindset to frame much of its dialog. Personally, I'm not bothered by that, since I believe Jesus Christ is the Son of God and Savior of His people, and that He is honored when we seek to honor him in all areas of life, including politics. Yet I can understand why other Americans who don't believe this are getting tired of what can appear to be the Southern thinly-veiled yearning for a theocracy.

Would it be a different story if Southerners weren't so hypocritical when it came to religion and politics? Slavery, of course, corrupted our country's history, even as many Southerners today still refuse to admit that it was the key reason for America's Civil War. Although racism wasn't - and isn't today - confined to the South, the massive fraud of institutionalized bigotry many Southerners perpetrated against blacks found an ally in Southern pulpits, where inaccurate assumptions about the Bible's references to slavery were used to justify it.

Hypocritical political activists who claim to be Christians continue to mock morality, such as Republicans like Newt Gingrich who are serial fornicators, and also Democrats like Bill Clinton and John Edwards. Indeed, as I point out many times, the divorce rate between churched and unchurched Americans - either Yankees or Southerners - is statistically equal. Yet Southerners still yell the loudest when, for example, it comes to displaying the Ten Commandments in courtrooms, even though adultery is forbidden by the seventh one.

It's hard to carry the banner for morality when society's basic building block, the family, is crumbling at the same rate regardless of party platform.

Proving a Point, but Drowning in the Process?

I've lived in Texas now for most of my life. For people just arriving in the Lone Star State, that may be enough to qualify me as a Texan, but for natives, it only means that I've got more sense than people who still live up North.

Actually, I don't mind living in Texas. Live here isn't perfect, of course, but we have a relatively low cost of living, compared with many other states. Taxes are not oppressively high, belligerent unions don't run our cities, and I don't feel like a freak for going to church every Sunday. In these aspects, Southernization wouldn't be the worst thing to invade the North.

At the same time, however, it's entirely possible that just as native Texans bristled at all of the Yankees moving down here decades ago, people finding themselves adversely affected by Southernization will require a considerable amount of time to adjust to the changes right-wing conservatives want. In fact, just as neo-conservatives have their own agenda, so do liberal Democrats, and some of the designs left-wingers have for our country are what keep our political dialog in what appears to be an unsalvageable juggernaut.

To the extent that moderate conservatism can bridge that which divides our country, and win solutions tilted more to the right than the left, Republicans in both the South and the North should seek out our collective best interests and work towards those, rather than succumbing to partisan bickering which only fosters a deep lack of productivity.

Isn't the worst that can happen with moderate conservatism better than what could happen if Southernization ends up backfiring?
_____

Lukewarm Faith or Politics?

2011-12-30T16:04:00.000-06:00

God does not tolerate lukewarm Christians.

He says so in Revelation 3:16: "So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth."

Moderate faith is evil. We know that.

But are moderate politics?

I ask, because despite the fervent right-wing partisanship held by many people of faith, I can't find a Biblical justification for extreme politics. In other words, although we believers need to be strong in faith, political moderation is not a sin.

True, being politically moderate means that all government policy may not fit our Christian worldview. It means that compromise plays a key role in making sure enough gets done that suits our sensibilities, since we do not live in a church state, and our laws are civil, not religious. Yes, we may end up not favoring some social policies, especially since hard work, sexual purity, and living within one's means are Biblical concepts. But faith does not hinge on productivity - whether as a Christian, or as an American.

Does political moderation mean that we Christ-followers should, for example, give up the battle against abortion? Of course not. Why should anybody - whether us evangelicals or any heathen unbeliever - abdicate their Constitutional freedoms of advocating for their worldview in civic matters? It's just that since we live in a fallen world, and God never guarantees us that we will reign anywhere on this current Earth, and we all have equal rights in our country, there will be some issues of conscience upon which everyone will not agree.

However, just because Christ's Gospel does not directly address issues like the judiciary, or how much tax is too much, we do know what He expects. Christ's Gospel tells us how to conduct ourselves as we debate in the public square, since God is less concerned about the size of government than He is the size of our hearts.

Does that sound heretical? If so, perhaps that's because many Americans on both sides of the partisan aisle have bought into years of fire-and-brimstone political rhetoric that has been based on... lukewarm theology.

A Faith Greater than Politics

Politics consumes scant space in the Bible precisely because God is neither a Democrat or a Republican. This has meant that many Americans who consider themselves to be religious - both liberals and conservatives - have taken it upon themselves to craft public policy in frameworks of faith. While I agree with this practice in principle, since God's Word is applicable to all areas of life, I'm not sure it teaches that in a republic, we should be surprised if those who do not trust in Christ for salvation do not endorse the way we believe things should be done.

Isn't compromise on issues not pertaining to doctrine taught, at least indirectly, in the Bible? Remember, the Fruit of the Spirit isn't capitalism, small government, low taxes, and the right to bear arms, as good and beneficial as they may be. The Fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, meekness, and self-control. We believers are in the world, but not of it. God wants us, as much as we can, to live at peace with our neighbors. Oh yeah - we're supposed to love our neighbors, too.

How can we do that and live out the rest of our faith? A faith that, increasingly, is at odds with popular culture? The Book of Proverbs is replete with instructions for how to interact with people whose worldview is different from ours. Wisdom and logic are taught as essential to everyday life, which implies we will encounter many situations that are not as black and white as we like to think they are.

If all we had to do in politics was make automatic decisions based on Choice A or Choice B, why would we need wisdom or logic? Remember, Proverbs isn't about intelligence - the ability to automate actions based on quantifiable facts. It's about wisdom - the ability to analyze and evaluate, even when quantifiable facts are absent. We can be intelligent without being wise. You can be wise without being intelligent. But wisdom requires a mental dexterity that intelligence doesn't.

Picking the Right Battles

I'm all about picking battles wisely. Sometimes I pick the wrong battle, but there's an art to sizing up the opposition, crafting an appropriate line of reasoning, and knowing how long to sustain one's inflexibility on an issue. Part of picking battles wisely involves knowing the right time to start considering compromises - and how much compromise can be sustained before you actually begin to suffer defeat.

After all, in the grayness of politics, defeat isn't so much a set point in time, or dollar amount, as much as it is the perception of weakness. But Who became weak for us, at least in the world's eyes? Does God call His people to win elections and force through legislation, or does He call us to honor Him by, um, protecting widows and orphans, treating other people more highly than ourselves, not loving money, and sharing each other's burdens? Every one of these scriptural mandates involves compromise - compromising what we want to do, even very good things, for the sake of others.

When it comes to testifying before other of the grace God has bestowed upon us, which our United States Constitution gives us plenty of opportunity to do, can politics remain primarily an ideological battle? Yes, we're free to stand against civic ills like bureaucratic waste, high taxation, and unbalanced budgets, but don't forget that God didn't send Christ to save His people from these things.

Has America's evangelical church gotten to the point where we've become so spoiled by prosperity and political freedom that we feel entitled to make enemies out of partisan opponents simply because, well, they don't vote the same way we do? What yanks your chain more: listening to California Democrat Nancy Pelosi, or Redeemer Presbyterian's Tim Keller?

Indeed, perhaps a good way to judge if you've become one of the irrational evangelicals regarding politics and opinions on political moderation would be to evaluate whether you get more excited by Rush Limbaugh or the Sermon on the Mount.

And if enough evangelicals would reconsider their political priorities, not in terms of what we should value, but how we work to protect these values, maybe some real change could start taking place in the United States.

Is political moderation truly the evil evangelicals consider it to be? Or, might political intransigence actually be a sign of spiritual moderation?
_____

Peggy Railey's 25-Year-Long Death

2011-12-28T17:05:00.000-06:00

Peggy Railey has died.

Twenty-five years ago next April, Peggy was attacked in the garage of her comfortable Dallas home, strangled so severely that she remained in a vegetative state until her death.*

Twenty. Five. Years.

During that time, many of us Texans have let the memory of Peggy's horrific ordeal slip from our consciousness, but as news began to surface yesterday about her final passing, it's been hard to avoid the waves of disbelief, disgust, and anger that revisit our minds upon hearing that last name.

That name she shared with the man we all think tried to kill her: her husband, the Reverend Doctor Walker Railey.

Railey. Railey. Railey. What images of evil that name can still conjure up.

Twenty-five years ago, Walker Railey was the young, ambitious senior pastor at Dallas' historic First United Methodist Church downtown. With thousands of members, a grand building, and a prestigious reputation, First Methodist in Dallas was - and remains - a plum pastoral assignment. Would somebody sophisticated enough to command its pulpit be stupid enough to try and kill his wife? As the city and church quickly became embroiled in the details of Peggy's attack, suspicion began answering that question, trumping disbelief that Walker would give up so much just so he could keep his secret girlfriend.

After all, that was the motive, right?

Walker, Texas Faker?

He must not have anticipated the incongruity the public would sense in his plan. It just didn't add up. If it wasn't Walker, how else could a demure north Dallas mom, an organist, and the wife of a respected pastor in a liberal denomination, be almost killed? Dallas has its violent streets, but murder in this fashionable neighborhood was extremely rare. How could Peggy possibly have such ruthless enemies?

Banking on festering scars from Dallas' sordid abuses of civil rights, Walker clumsily floated the idea that he and his family were a target of skinheads unhappy with his advocacy of racial unity. He left an unconvincing trail of phone messages to his wife in which he tutored her on personal safety. Anonymous notes with mysterious threats appeared, and he had his church pay for a mobile phone to be installed in his car - a novel amenity at the time - ostensibly for security reasons. But no angry skinheads ever surfaced, and police eventually deduced that the "security" messages from his car phone were all hoaxes.

Several years later, after still more allegations piled up against him, Walker took the Fifth Amendment 43 times in front of a grand jury convened to indict him.

Forty. Three. Times!

Basically, Walker refused to say anything officially about the attack on his wife. The only reason we know he was having an affair with Lucy Papillon, the twice-divorced psychologist daughter of a former Methodist bishop, is because she admitted it without batting a false eyelash.

The two of them moved to California, where it's believed they still live today, albeit not together. The Walker's two children grew up with their protective guardians in an undisclosed place outside of Texas, and have not been heard from in years.

Peggy's parents, who had retired from Wisconsin and moved to east Texas before she was attacked, arranged for her care at a nursing home near Tyler. They visited her every day until they succumbed themselves to Alzheimer's and diabetes. Peggy's brother quit his job, sold his house, and moved to Tyler to help care for all three of them. He's the one making the private arrangements for her funeral, 25 years after everything but her breath was stolen from her.

Indeed, this story is as breath-taking as it is morose. A beloved pastor's wife from a high-profile church and her husband with the free-spirited mistress. Throw in a bizarre suicide attempt by the husband, a botched prosecution of his case which let him go free, and nary a visit by him to his vegetative wife's bedside in 25 years. Not that she was still his wife - he divorced her before too long, and got out of having to pay any alimony by declaring personal bankruptcy. Even their own kids thought their father had done it, and would practically freak out on the rare occasions he tried to visit them in their new home.

Then to cap off the miserable tale, Peggy dies on the day after Christmas,* 2011. Alone, except for her brother, after being a prisoner of her own incapacitated body for a quarter of a century. Being in a vegetative state, but not comatose, leaves open the possibility that for the past 25 years, Peggy could cognitively interpret what was going on around her, yet she physically could not respond to any of it. How utterly horrible a scenario.

Reporters from the Dallas media have identified Walker as being on FaceBook, currently with 265 friends. Nobody seems to know where he's working, although it's been said that he served on staff for a while at a Nazarene church in Pasadena. Papillon apparently practices some combination of psychology and spirituality out of an office on Beverly Hills' posh Wilshire Boulevard, and has her own website.

Is it mean-spirited of me to not be glad they've been able to move on with their lives?

Are Methodists Like Birds of a Feather?

A former co-worker of mine, back in college when I sold mens' clothing at Jas. K. Wilson, had been hired by Walker at First Methodist Dallas shortly before Peggy's attack. G.W. was a good ol' boy's good ol' boy, a bow-legged giant of a man who smoked a pipe on our store's selling floor and had been, years before, senior pastor of a large Methodist church in suburban Dallas. That is, until his wife caught him having an affair with his church secretary.

But G.W. wasn't like Walker - he didn't try to hide much. G.W. divorced his wife to marry the younger secretary, and left the ministry to work in retail. At least, until Walker, who I presume was an acquaintance from Southern Methodist University, their mutual alma-mater, invited G.W. to serve as First Methodist Dallas' pastor to senior adults.

I can't remember why, but one morning in the early days of the Railey travesty, before Walker left Texas, and years before his criminal trial, I found myself driving past First Methodist's imposing edifice on Ross Avenue. And I recalled that G.W. had extended to me an open invitation to stop by and visit him anytime. I'd never been close to G.W., but now having him be a connection with the sinister goings-on ripping First Methodist apart, I figured now was as good a time as any to exercise his invite. I found a place to park and ambled on inside.

Somewhat to my amazement, G.W. was pleased to see me and wasted no time in giving me a tour of the church's old, impressive sanctuary. I'm sure he knew why I was there, and it wasn't long before we were talking about the Raileys. G.W. insisted that he believed in Walker and his innocence, not only because Railey had generously offered him a relatively prestigious job despite his personal history as a pastor, but because only a fool would try using murder to cover up something as, well... relatively benign as an affair.

And I figured G.W. had enough expertise in that last subject to know what he was talking about. At the time, since Railey had yet to practically trumpet his guilt by pleading the Fifth 43 times, and he'd yet to divorce his wife, or run off to California with a bleached blonde, I suppose I was willing enough to give Railey the benefit of the doubt.

After all, G.W. got caught cheating on his wife, and the Methodists didn't hold it against him forever.

Today, though, looking back through a jaded lens of memory, in which overwhelming circumstantial evidence usually proves to be terribly accurate, I think good ol' G.W. was snookered by Railey.

Just as Texas' legal system was. Although Peggy's family won a civil lawsuit against him, inexplicably, at Walker's criminal trial, the prosecutors from Dallas County never bothered introducing the bit about the Railey's son telling cops he saw his dad strangling his mom in their kitchen. The poor kid was only five. Do 5-year-olds make up that kind of stuff?

At least for the sake of Peggy, who met her Maker on December 26,* Walker will one day meet his, too. According to Hebrews 9:27, "it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment."

I'm thinking Walker's repentance now, before he gets there, could make a big difference in how that celestial meeting will go.
_____

*Note: This essay was written with information gleaned from multiple news sources stating Mrs. Railey died on Sunday, December 25. It has since been reported that her actual date of death was December 26, 2011.

Any Story Behind My Top Ten Stories?

2011-12-26T12:49:00.000-06:00

As the Year of Our Lord Two Thousand Eleven winds down, a lot of media sites will be spending the "dead week" between Christmas and New Year's by cataloging what has transpired over these past 365 days.

They'll look at who died this past year, the natural disasters which shook our planet, and other major events which will soon become the topics of history books.

Or, perhaps more accurately, history e-readers.

I'm not a huge fan of nostalgia, but readership of this blog will likely be fairly low this week, since many people are on vacation, so I've decided to do something similar to other websites. Today, I've run the numbers on this blog, and posted which essays have had the most activity from my readers this year.

And the list isn't exactly what most of my readers might expecting.

Granted, it's no surprise that this year's most-read essay was my report on judging at a debate tournament of homeschooled teenagers. I e-mailed the link to some friends of mine who either homeschool their own kids, or were homeschooled as kids, and they told two friends, and so on and so on.

Harbor inaccurate assumptions of homeschoolers being a sheltered, technologically-illiterate lot if you like, but they're an exceptionally wired group of people. And if that doesn't square with your stereotype of today's new breed of homeschooling, you definitely need to read that essay of mine!

Inexplicably, however, is the second most-researched post this past year: my end-of-year summary post I wrote - last year, in fact, during the dead week between Christmas and New Year's - about an even earlier essay about the Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest building.

You'd think that with all of my tirades on matters related to the Christian faith, or even American politics, those would be the top attention-getters on this blog. But unless Google Analytics, the user-friendly software I use to track activity on my blog, isn't as user-friendly as I think it is, and the real data on this blog's activity is hidden elsewhere, my take on the Burj Khalifa somehow has captured a lot of attention. Oddly enough, not nearly as many readers clicked on the link to read the full article as read my summary article about it. So weird.

Google Analytics has not recorded access to my website from web servers in Muslim countries - probably because no Muslim countries allow server farms to link their people to the outside world - so I'm not sure who my audience was for this year-old essay. I could flatter myself and imagine Tom Cruise and his handlers were referencing it while researching the Burj Khalifa for their new Mission Impossible sequel, but... I kinda doubt it.

Of further curiosity, four of the top ten essays this year were actually written last year. I guess "going viral" takes longer for some Internet articles than others.

Overall, however, this list helps to explain why I've been rather eclectic in my topics as I've written my essays this year. After all, I've had access to Google Analytics' reports on my blog since last year, and this isn't the first time I've compiled this list for my own reference. During the year, I've known that my essay on the Burj Khalifa has remained consistently popular, even though I've been thinking surely something else will eclipse it. I like to think that my amateur hobby of architectural theory has at least some merit, but I'm not sure this data provides overwhelming evidence of that.

Indeed, I wish people would provide more feedback to me about where they saw my essays referenced, how they found my blog, and why they were interested in a particular essay. With Google Analytics, I can see the referencing sites, and even the keywords people use to find my content, but I'd like to know if people were satisfied with the information I provided, or at least intrigued by the perspective I offered.

Alas, I suspect it's as my editor for Crosswalk.com has told me: sometimes, no feedback means that you either did a good job, or at least you didn't offend or anger anybody.

Somehow, I find the latter hard to believe, at least in relation to this blog!

1. Thoughts after serving as a juror for a debate tournament between homeschooled teenagers

2. Architectural critique of the world's tallest building, the Burj Khalifa, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates

3. Reflections on Japanese ethics in the wake of that country's severe earthquake and tsunami this year

4. Architectural critique of Antoni Gaudi's iconic Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, Spain (another essay from 2010)

5. Thoughts on Detroit, Michigan's historic population decline

6. Blunt perspective on the solution to generational poverty and the welfare state (another essay from 2010, perhaps because entitlements came under so much fire this year?)

7. Sharing my intrigue over the new stay-fresh packaging for Oreo cookies (this was relevant in 2010, but why did people find it interesting this year?)

8. Reaction to the record-setting purchase price of a Silicon Valley trophy house

9. Analysis of a wildly controversial pro-life advertisement in New York City

10. Exploring how aquatic theme shows can prioritize profits over human life
_____

Christmas Eve Eve Concert

2011-12-23T11:47:00.001-06:00

I'm supposed to be showcasing my writing on this blog, but since we're about to embark on the first - and precedent - of our Christian calendar's two holy-days, I wanted do something unique that celebrates the faith uniting us.

And I thought, why not program an online concert for you dear readers, who faithful trudge through my essays with me day in and day out? I could share with you some of my favorite Christmas music, and the stuff you may not like you can just skip, proceeding to the next entry in this order of worship.

Although... I don't think I have any readers left who can't pry open their mind and expose it to some music they might have never heard before. And this music isn't all from old, dead composers anyway - two of the pieces are quite new, putting a delicious twist on the assumption that "contemporary" needs to be flaky.

Just be forewarned: you might find yourself enjoying some truly great musical masterpieces!

Indeed, I invite you to consider this a worshipful experience and take out about an hour of your day sometime this weekend and work your way through this playlist in a contemplative, yet celebratory fashion.

So, without any further ado, let us proceed with our virtual concert. Just click the link on each music title. Please be sure all other communication devices are either turned to "mute" or "off," and allow me to also remind you that any recording or photography during this concert is not permitted.

(That was a joke!)

And now, would you please join me as we invite the Lord's blessing on this time:

"Oh great God, Who in your divine providence has granted us salvation through your holy Son, Whose birth we commemorate this season, help we your people to worship you in spirit and truth, not just as we join in these praises to you, but as we continue throughout this weekend of celebration for your many good gifts to us, not the least of which is our very reason to be joyful, since it's in the name of your dear Son we do pray, even our Lord, Jesus Christ: Amen."

Opening Fanfare
J. S. Bach, "For the First Day of Christmas (Part 1)" from the Christmas Oratorio

Contemplation
"Of the Father's Love Begotten" Divinum Mysterium by Aurelius C. Prudentius, 413 A.D., translated by John. M. Neale and Henry W. Baker

1. Of the Father's love begotten, Ere the worlds began to be, He is Alpha and Omega, He the Source, the Ending He, Of the things that are, that have been, And that future years shall see Evermore and evermore.

2. Oh, that birth forever blessed, When the Virgin, full of grace, By the Holy Ghost conceiving, Bare the Savior of our race, And the Babe, the world's Redeemer, First revealed His sacred face Evermore and evermore.

3. O ye heights of heaven, adore Him; Angel hosts, His praises sing; Powers, dominions, bow before Him, And extol our God and King. Let no tongue on earth be silent, Every voice in concert ring Evermore and evermore.

4. (Not sung on this recording, unfortunately) This is He whom Heaven-taught singers Sang of old with one accord; Whom the Scriptures of the prophets Promised in their faithful word. Now He shines, the Long-expected; Let creation praise its Lord Evermore and evermore.

5. Christ, to Thee, with God the Father, And, O Holy Ghost, to Thee: Hymn and chant and high thanksgiving And unwearied praises be, Honor, glory, and dominion, And eternal victory Evermore and evermore!

Anticipation
"Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence"

Incarnation
"Once in Royal David's City"

The Narrative
"From the Squalor of a Borrowed Stable" by Stuart Townend

Despite its sub-par audio quality and quaint aesthetics, I chose this video because the girls who are singing come from an African orphanage, helping to represent the global breadth of God's salvific plans through the incarnation of His Son.

The Invitation
"O Come, All Ye Faithful"

An Affirmation
Hector Berlioz, "The Shepherd's Farewell" from L'enfance du Christ

Thou must leave thy lowly dwelling, The humble crib, the stable bare. Babe, all mortal babes excelling, Content our earthly lot to share. Loving father, Loving mother, Shelter thee with tender care!

Blessed Jesus, we implore thee With humble love and holy fear. In the land that lies before thee, Forget not us who linger here! May the shepherd's lowly calling, Ever to thy heart be dear!

Blest are ye beyond all measure, Thou happy father, mother mild! Guard ye well your heav'nly treasure, The Prince of Peace, The Holy Child! God go with you, God protect you, Guide you safely through the wild!

Awe
"O Magnum Mysterium" from the ancient Matins for Christmas; this version composed in 1994 by Morten Lauridsen of Los Angeles, California

Latin text: O magnum mysterium, et admirabile sacramentum, ut animalia viderent Dominum natum, jacentem in praesepio! Beata Virgo, cujus viscera meruerunt portare Dominum Christum. Alleluia.

English translation: O great mystery, and wonderful sacrament, that animals should see the new-born Lord, lying in a manger! Blessed is the Virgin whose womb was worthy to bear Christ the Lord. Alleluia!

The abrupt ending of this video cuts out the concluding prayer, so I took the liberty of crafting the last sentence:

"Eternal God, Who made this most holy night to shine with the brightness of Thy one true Light, bring us who have known the revelation of that Light on Earth to see the radiance of Thy heavenly glory through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever, Amen.

"Christ, Who by His incarnation gathered into one things earthly and heavenly fill you with peace and goodwill, and make you partakers in the joy of His love; and the blessing of God almighty, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, be upon you and remain with you always. Amen."

Exultation
J. S. Bach, "Gloria in Excelsis Deo" and "Et in Terra Pax" from the Mass in B Minor

Yes, we have South Koreans singing in Latin! The Gospel isn't just for English speakers, is it? I hope I don't need to translate, but just in case, "gloria in excelsis Deo" means "Glory to God in the highest," and "et in terra pax" means "and peace on earth."

Ascription
G. F. Handel, "Hallelujah Chorus" from Messiah

(And yes, tradition dictates that you now rise to stand in honor of the King of Kings.)

I've chosen our new friends in South Korea to lead us in Handel's penultimate worship song - literally with tears in my eyes - as I rejoice with saints around our world who are celebrating the birth of our Savior this weekend along with us! They sing the famous text from the Hallelujah Chorus in their native language, yet we don't need a translator to join along with them in joyous proclamation that He whose incarnation we commemorate will truly reign forever and ever!

Hallelujah!
_____

Cancelling Worship Because it's Christmas?

2011-12-22T14:59:00.000-06:00

Oxymoronic.

That's what it is.

Churches closing for the day on Christmas Sunday.

Okay, maybe more "oxy" than "moronic." Yet it's still counter-intuitive.

Sure, a lot of Christians today don't go to church when Christmas falls on Monday through Saturday. But maybe we should. When I was growing up and my family spent our Christmases in Brooklyn, we always went to Golgotha Finnish Congregational Church on 44th Street every Christmas night. There was something about spending at least a short amount of time at church on that holy day that seemed appropriate.

Even if, every year, the service was rather inappropriately capped off by the minister's wife, Mrs. Salo, donning a Santa outfit and masquerading as Joulupukki down the center aisle of the sanctuary, handing out plastic fishnet stockings filled with hard candy to all us kids.

But we won't get into the Santa thing right now. Her heart was in the right place! Besides, it was less questionable because Joulupukki (pronounced "YOL-eh-bu-kee) is just a kind-hearted Finnish mortal, not an omniscient American deity.

Meanwhile... fast forward back to today, and consider the practice of evangelical churches hardly ever opening for corporate worship services when Christmas Day happens during the week. Just because we don't go to church every Christmas Day now, you'd at least think believers in the day's Namesake would want to go to church and worship Him on what we call His birthday - on the same day we ordinarily go to church.

You'd "think" that would be the case, anyway, but in America, you'd likely be wrong. Local media here in north Texas are reporting that over 60 relatively prominent Protestant churches are cancelling corporate worship services this Sunday.

Not that you're a heretic for cancelling church on a Sunday. Or that 60 churches not meeting this Sunday is a huge percentage of the total number of churches here in this religion-saturated part of the country.

Or that it's blasphemous to deny the sanctity of December 25.

There's nothing intrinsically sacred about the date. It's almost a fact that Christ wasn't born on December 25. History didn't record the date of His birth, and experts tell us it was more likely sometime in the spring than at the beginning of winter. European tradition and the Roman Catholic Church selected December 25 more out of cultural contrivance than authentic historicity. So December 25 is incidental, not inerrant.

But shouldn't what this date represents for Christians be symbolic and worthy of respect? The incarnation of the one, holy, true God of the universe. God with us - Emmanuel. Christ, the Lord. The most utterly fantastic miracle ever to take place on our planet.

And we're too busy unwrapping presents under conifers to bother ourselves by going to church? Because, really: that's the only reason churches are cancelling Christmas.

Haven't we gotten the cart before the horse? I use that imagery even though I hesitate at comparing the incarnation of our Savior to a horse. But isn't that what churches are doing? They're not even bothering to acknowledge the "reason for the season," like the trite saying goes. It's too inconvenient. It's not practical to expect enough Christian families to stifle their materialistic urges and assemble together for corporate worship. We can't force people to attend by putting them on a guilt trip if they don't. Maybe if we have Christmas Eve services instead, our congregants who are upset about us not having church the next day will feel better.

Plus, with all those kids being deprived of their raids under the Christmas tree, knowing that every other kid in the world is being showered with toys at that very moment (as if even that were true), the service would be a cacophonous mess with parents shushing their squirming kids, and agitating themselves for the preacher to wind things up before Uncle Joe and Aunt Sally arrive for Christmas lunch.

Yeah, there's too many logistics to overcome for families to put aside everything else and congregate for worship. Too many sacrifices to be made. After all, Christ came to give us freedom, not shackle us to church schedules. He wants us to be happy and enjoy our holidays free of church responsibilities.

Well, with that attitude, why not chuck corporate Sunday worship services out the window completely? If we can't set aside the presents for one day every seven years (like the Jewish practice of forgiving debts every seven years - go figure) and attend church just because it's Sunday, and we're Christians, who serve Christ, Who tradition says was born on this day... then what is our faith worth?

Probably not much more than a plastic fishnet bag in the shape of a sock filled with hard candy.
_____

On Not Getting the Write Job

2011-12-21T10:47:00.000-06:00

Even though I blog almost every weekday, I like my privacy.

I write about personal convictions, yes, but they're convictions I'd tell almost anybody.

For example, I've written about my stance against gay marriage, but one of my best friends is gay, and I've already told him the same things I've blogged for you. He doesn't agree with me, but we're still friends.

I've written about my centrist political opinions, even though those same opinions seem to cause more friction between my evangelical friends and me than my gay marriage opinions do between my gay friend and me.

Odd, huh?

Occasionally, I've even allowed myself to wander off into some musings about unemployment, an exceptionally personal subject for me, since aside from my monthly writing gigs with Crosswalk.com - for which I'm extremely grateful - I recently completed my second year of being jobless.

To be honest, I really don't like talking about myself. At least when it comes to topics where I'm seen as weak, unproductive, and insignificant. Three things almost every working American considers the unemployed to be.

Weak, unproductive, and insignificant.

Conservatives figure something's drastically wrong with my work ethic, while liberals say I'm proof our economic system is broken. Either way, in our culture, for the most part, if you're unemployed, you're disenfranchised socially.

Perhaps I've been woefully naive in thinking that if I could prove myself at writing, I'd be able to get a writing job. My supportive editor at Crosswalk.com, upon learning that I wanted to write, suggested that about a year and a half of three blog entries each week oughta provide a decent portfolio for prospective employers to evaluate.

Which may be true... if anybody was hiring. What few connections I have in the writing world paint as depressing an employment scenario in all forms of publishing as exists in virtually any other profession. Basically, it seems as if employers in the United States - except for the federal government - are holding their collective breath, waiting for the current White House occupant to be voted out of office so they'll know what to expect tax-wise. If there's one thing capitalism doesn't thrive upon, it's fiscal uncertainty. And that's what we've got in Washington these days.

Not that it's just President Barack Obama's fault, especially since none other than the Wall Street Journal came out yesterday with an uncharacteristically negative assessment of Republican leadership in both the House and Senate.

But I think something else, other than national politics, may be at work. Not just in America's employment numbers, but my own individual experience as one of the chronically unemployed.

God may be allowing our society to experience some fundamental changes in the way we view work, employment, financial rewards, and the purpose of money.

Living off of credit card debt and generous gifts of cash from family members isn't a healthy long-term plan for anybody. But it's what many unemployed Americans - not just me - have been doing for a while now. We're assuming that good times will return, and that debts will be repaid, and that we'll become givers again, instead of takers.

But the cynic in me increasingly wonders if, whenever any "good times" return, they will take more the form of adequate provision rather than abundance.

We were told that education is the key to financial reward, but these days, plenty of under-educated people can earn salaries larger than over-educated professionals in fields like education and healthcare. Just ask anybody looking for employment, and anybody responsible for hiring, and they'll tell you that interpersonal connections weigh far more than education and experience in today's job market. Statistically, it may still appear as though the more education people in our society receive, the more money they can earn; but individually, that's far from any guarantee.

Granted, I can't hold my BA in Sociology as a get-a-great-job-easily card. But I never expected to get rich off of it. I never thought it would be so worthless in our economy, either. Liberal arts alumni, for all the gushing corporate America does over people qualified to think wholistically, have probably become the least-employable people on the planet, since it seems companies don't want employees who extrapolate information as much as they want robots to blindly process that information.

I can do both in a job. Shucks, like many liberal arts majors, I've spent years doing more of the latter than the former in a variety of jobs! But as many employees become less human in the eyes of their employers and more of a cost factor, the pay available for the mundane jobs continues to slide. At least in terms of the cost of living, and executive pay.

We're told that it's because we're not worth as much as we used to be, now that we have a global economy. Which may be quite true. But at some point, even $10 an hour won't pay the expenses corporate America still expects the working class to accrue. After all, ours is a consumer-based economy, and if the working class doesn't have the money to buy the stuff companies make, then whose fault is it that our economy suffers?

We hear of how our new generation of college graduates would prefer flex time over higher wages. We're told that the conventional 9-to-5 job is quickly becoming outdated. But how much of this is a product of employees actually getting what they want in our job market, and employees having to settle for what the job market offers them?

Even supposing I'd long ago given up on surviving on a simple BA and plowed ahead into a law degree, like many unemployed (or, as employers claim, "unemployable") liberal arts people do, have you heard how many lawyers are getting laid off these days?

Meanwhile, as I pass through yet another Christmas season as an unemployed person, with my meager mutual fund long ago scraped clean, my savings account bone dry, and plenty of people telling me I write well - but none of them able to give me a job doing so for a living wage, I've come to see that one of my few options is to evaluate what God may be telling me about how I've spent money in the past, how grateful I should be for those who give me money now, and how I should leaven my desperation for employment against the writing I thought He was guiding me into over two years ago.

And frankly, it doesn't help me to realize that I'm not the only person in this predicament.

Actually, I'm surprised more Americans aren't concerned that so many people like me exist in our country. Not so that I can feel an outpouring of sympathy, because sympathy is the last thing I and most of America's unemployed want. Or need.

But because if our economy can limp along for three years now, with all of us out of work, who says it can't absorb the impact of even more people losing their job?
_____

Pay the Innocents from an Equity Bucket

2011-12-20T15:10:00.000-06:00

"I am innocent."

"These charges have no basis in fact."

"I will vigorously defend myself against these charges."

Oh, be sure your sins will find you out, you liars.

Are you as tired as I am with all of the public figures who get accused of a major crime, insist they're innocent, and then either get proven guilty in a court of law or end up pleading guilty themselves?

They're never held to account for the way they misled the public by insisting they were innocent, even as they most likely knew all along their claims were bogus.

Case in point: disgraced Brooklyn State Senator Carl Kruger, who when arrested and charged with $1 million in kickbacks this past March, claimed through his lawyer, Benjamin Brafman, that he'd never accepted bribes or abused his position.

Granted, considering the cost of living in New York City, breaking the law for a paltry $1 million seems a little stupid on Kruger's part. If he'd been smart, instead of simply saying he was not guilty, he'd have pled his case to his fellow New Yorkers: "Hey, how far do you think I could go on $1 million in this town? Do you think I'd forfeit my reputation for such cheap bribery?

Well, turns out, he did just that. Today, after nine months of feigning innocence, Kruger turned himself in to the United States District Court in Manhattan to plead guilty on four of the five charges pending against him. He's agreed that he's guilty of two counts of fraud conspiracy and two counts of bribery conspiracy, which add up to a maximum of 25 years in prison.

It's hard to tell which is more embarrassing for him: being forced to admit he's been lying all this time, or getting caught over a sum less than most one-family houses sell for in Brooklyn's best neighborhoods.

Granted, a New York State politician pleading guilty to corruption is hardly newsworthy in and of itself. If the state really wanted to, it could probably turn its sprawling Modernist capitol complex into a prison to hold all of their corrupt public officials, and run the state's business out of a nearby Starbuck's with whomever's left.

The point is that just like so many other people who've been indicted and know they're guilty, former Senator Kruger - he resigned before pleading guilty to avoid being automatically terminated upon his plea - lied to the public without impunity for months. Sure, a lot of people probably didn't believe him, but it could always be said that "a man's innocent until proven guilty." And Kruger banked on that rhetoric to continue holding his Senate seat and exploiting a lavish - garishly gaudy, actually - lifestyle on the Brooklyn waterfront.

Yeah... about that lifestyle. The never-married Kruger, 61, has been the State Senator for 16 years representing an upper-middle-class enclave called Mill Basin, along the murky shoreline of southeastern Brooklyn. He lives with a pair of brothers, who are both unmarried gynecologists, and the brothers' divorced mother. In a farcical stucco palace originally built for a Mafia crime boss. A guy who reputedly had the architect for his home knocked off, probably for agreeing to design such a horrible-looking dwelling.

At four stories of somber gray walls and navy blue stripes - yeah, hideous, right? - with goofy white clip-art-looking decorations haphazardly stuck on, the "mansion" Kruger shares with the gynecologists and their mother boasts its own private dock, which was built on public land. Metal sculptures sprout from the yard, evoking warped planking left over from some Mafia construction project. A fake miniature mountain, replete with scraggly pine trees and disturbing statues of children, completes the bizarre homestead.

Maybe there's no law against having bad taste, but if there was, Kruger would already be in jail.

As the Feds were building their corruption case against Kruger, they compiled a series of recorded telephone calls in which the senator and one of the gynecologist brothers shared obvious proof of an intimate interpersonal relationship, yet even knowing the tapes will undoubtedly be played in court for the world to hear, Kruger has maintained that he's not gay.

And no, it's not a crime to be gay, either. But continuing to insist the evidence proving the fact is wrong seems more of a case of serial denial than logical public relations. After all, this is Brooklyn. And a liberal part of Brooklyn, too. He's already bought-off plenty of voters, back when he could still run for office. What's he got to lose by at least being honest about his sexual orientation?

It's as though he's living in a fantasy world, where reality is only what your lawyer can't get you out of.

Sadly, Kruger isn't the only public figure guilty of playing the public for a fool in this way. He's just one of today's more interesting perpetrators of this deceit.

Unfortunately, all of these claims of innocence that inevitably get blown out of the water when the truth comes out do have victims. The victims are all of those people who are accused of something they really didn't do. They get hauled off to the courthouse, they're forced to do a perp walk, they hold impromptu press conferences pleading their innocence, all to the deaf ears of the public.

The court of public opinion is often woefully unfair.

We've become desensitized to cries of innocence because "where there's smoke, there must be fire." But by the time an innocent person is proven to be so, the public doesn't care anymore, or the story isn't relayed properly, or the wrongly accused has already lost too much credibility and social standing to make up whatever they've lost while living under suspicion - if indeed they can even get back to where they'd been before being wrongly accused.

So, I have a solution to this inequity.

We should create an "equity bucket."

Everybody who gets accused or arrested for something and proclaims their innocence should be encouraged to put a significant amount of money in the "equity bucket." If they manage to get all the way through a trial with proof of their innocence - and their integrity - intact, then they get all of that money back. Plus interest - kind of a "we're sorry" for putting an innocent person through the wringer like that.

How does the amount paid out in interest get funded, you ask? If the accused person finally admits that yeah, they're guilty as sin, or the courts prove they're guilty, the person forfeits all of the money they put into that "equity bucket."

Something tells me there will be more than enough money left over after the truly innocent are proven to be so, that the "equity bucket" will probably never run out of funds.

Unless enough people who are guilty of crimes actually 'fess up when they're caught. And forgo the charade of innocence in public.

Because just as people who know they're guilty hope their claims of innocence can somehow morph into corroborating proof in a court of law, too many innocent people lose too much getting lumped in with all of the genuine losers.

"Be sure your sins will find you out."

That works most of the time.

Except if you were innocent to begin with.
_____

Rev. Driscoll - the New Dr. Ruth?

2011-12-19T17:43:00.003-06:00

Sex sells.

Just ask Mark Driscoll, the controversial pastor of Mars Hill Church in Seattle, Washington. Driscoll came under fire in 2009 from several evangelical corners, including noted theologian John MacArthur, for preaching a saucy - some say heretical - set of sermons in Scotland from the Song of Solomon.

And I use the term "sermons" loosely. He's been quoted as recalling for his Scottish congregation, like a jock in a locker room recounting romantic conquests, the time he asked his wife to promenade in front of him down a supermarket aisle so he could admire her, um, assets. And that's just about the only family-friendly bit of the sermon I can relay on this blog. For an outline of Driscoll's sex-saturated theology, click here, but you have been warned.

Now Christian blogger Tim Challies reports that Driscoll and his wife have co-authored a new book entitled Real Marriage, ostensibly following in the footprints of Tim Keller and other popular Christian writers who've penned how-to tomes about the holy covenant between husband, wife, and God. Except the Driscoll's have thrown in a chapter they hope sounds smutty enough - without triggering morality censors - which they've entitled "Can We ____?"

Wink, wink. Nudge, nudge.

Basically, Rev. and Mrs. Driscoll run through the broad spectrum of positions and practices available to lovemaking couples and then evaluate whether they're Biblical or not.

O-kay.

Let's think for a moment about all of the issues confronting the evangelical church today. Famine in Africa. War in Africa. Terrorism. Syria. Churches being burned and Christians being persecuted from Egypt to Indonesia. Gay marriage. National debt. Household debt. Unemployment. The collapse of public education. Elder care. Child abuse.

Into this vast panoply of ills and dilemmas, Driscoll thinks oral sex deserves a hearing?

Is this really what evangelical couples are worrying about these days? Of course, a lot of them probably did grow up listening to Dr. Ruth Westheimer on the radio.

When I first read Challies' gentle incredulity regarding some of Driscoll's theology, I half thought he was joking, until I browsed the reader comments and researched the racy Scotland sermons. Churched people, just like the unchurched, seem to really be taking sides on what Christian spouses can do to each other in the bedroom.

And, by the way, not to deny Driscoll any royalties from the book; but basically, Challies reveals that Driscoll and his wife finally say everything is good between the sheets - and anyplace else, for that matter - except the two things we already know to be wrong: abortion and abuse.

Thankfully, Challies points out that while actual practices may be both allowable and beneficial, the reasons why people pursue them may not be. Plastic surgery, for example. The reason why a person undergoes plastic surgery is more important to God, Challies rightfully clarifies, than whether the actual body part should be modified. What a critical aspect for any pastor to omit from a book about Christians and sex.

Granted, I don't agree with Challies about everything all the time, but in his three blog posts on Driscoll's book, he's crafted a careful rebuttal on a delicate topic with a genuine desire for truth and minimal confrontationalism that are worth the read.

Unfortunately, some of Driscoll's defenders can't appreciate that. Which only further highlights the possibility that we're getting to the point with this saint from Seattle where too many lines are being crossed for integrity to continue to be marginalized.

Back when another group of bloggers on Cripplegate had blasted Driscoll for yet another of his unwise ministry pursuits - at the time, Driscoll had become oddly obsessed with denouncing the Reformed doctrine of cessationism - they created a list of five ways many fans of bad theology insist on defending their favored preacher, whether it's Driscoll or anybody else. These were described as the "Five Uninvited Guests" on every blog wall where reader responses are welcomed. In their feedback, these readers regurgitate the same five spurious reasons why Christians shouldn't point out the errors in the theology espoused by other believers.

It's another clever read that helps explain why so much bad theology persists in North American evangelical Christianity.

Suffice it to say that while Driscoll has as much right to preach what he wants to preach, just as I have as much right to write what I want to write, there remains a benchmark of unwavering truth against which anybody can measure what we say and write. The Bible doesn't leave as much open to interpretation as we sometimes want to think it does.

For Driscoll and his wife to be enthusiastic about sex is one thing. Indeed, sex is a gift of God for marriage partners intended not only for procreation, but enjoyment and sharing mutual affection. And having yet another book about Christian marriage probably isn't the worst thing in the world, considering how weak many marriages of churched people have become.

Yet it's hard to corroborate Driscoll's juvenile libidenousness from his Scotland "sermons" with the legitimate pastoral advising he and his wife purport to provide in Real Marriage. He says his book answers all the questions parishioners wouldn't dare ask their own pastor, even in private.

Which makes me wonder: if those are the questions with which Driscoll's fans have been struggling, questions that have heretofore gone unanswered, then why hasn't their presumed theological astuteness in so many other areas - where they apparently have less urgent questions - been able to resolve their issues in the bedroom?

Challies says the new Christian sex book is due to be released on January 3. Just in time for the post-Christmas sales slump his publisher is probably hoping to avoid.
_____

S'No Leadership Fabrication

2011-12-16T11:41:00.000-06:00

What is the definition of "leadership?"

If leadership can be defined as the ability to get good people to do great work, despite your own inadequacies, then this story will show I'm probably a good leader.

Otherwise... not so much.

Many Christmases ago, while living in New York City, I attended historic Calvary Baptist Church on Manhattan's West 57th Street, a major cross-town boulevard. Desperate for Christian fellowship in the big bad city, I had joined the volunteers at Calvary's primary outreach to the city's singles, a Friday night coffeehouse ministry featuring contemporary Christian music.

I know - I know! Contemporary Christian music has never really been my thing, but as I said, I was desperate to connect with Christians of my own "age and stage" in a meaningful way. And the Solid Rock Cafe, as the ministry was called - after the famous Hard Rock Cafe restaurant down the street - needed volunteers.

Plucked from Obscurity

Calvary in general, and the Solid Rock Cafe in particular, were wonderful microcosms of the city's diversity. We had a college student of Indian descent who set up the lighting, a photographer who set up the sound equipment, a Ford fashion model who ran the kitchen, and various other believers of all backgrounds, professions, and skin colors who filled in wherever they were needed. Surprisingly, perhaps, considering the evangelical wasteland most of America's Northeast has become, almost all of the musicians we auditioned lived in and around New York City. And while some were obviously better than others, I don't really recall us ever having anyone who was downright awful.

As it happened, a few weeks after I joined this group, the woman who'd been leading the ministry announced she was pregnant and would be stepping aside. Not to worry, however; Amy had been one of the few married volunteers. She and her husband had purchased a house out on Long Island, and now they were starting their family. So everything was great.

Except that all of the other long-time leaders in the ministry who could have stepped into her shoes had defected from Calvary to join Tim Keller's fledgling church, Redeemer Presbyterian. And although Calvary didn't mind former church members volunteering at the Solid Rock Cafe, church leadership wanted a Calvary member in charge for accountability reasons.

One evening, while still living in Brooklyn, I got a call from Amy asking me to consider taking over for her. I was floored - I hadn't yet joined Calvary as a member, and I was still learning the ropes - but since I was eager to get further involved, I accepted. Calvary's pastor who oversaw the ministry, an associate pastor named Ken, met with me and agreed with Amy's selection. And since nobody else already in the ministry wanted the additional responsibility, they welcomed my promotion with open arms. And probably a fair amount of relief that somebody else was willing to take over instead of them.

Hey - I was young and naive. I didn't know until later about all of the intricate church politics at Calvary that squeezed Ken through the ringer sometimes. Music-wise, Sunday mornings were strictly classical and traditional at Calvary, and I loved that about the church. Yet even though I'd come from a church here in Texas that had gone completely contemporary, I didn't fully appreciate how threatened some of Calvary's long-time members were by the rock music going on downstairs every other Friday evening.

Off-Off-Off-Off-Off-Broadway

On coffeehouse nights, we'd set out a sandwich board sign on the sidewalk along 57th Street outside Calvary's sanctuary doors. We'd bring up a table from the basement and collect the modest $5 cover charge right there in the narthex, often with the doors wide open, until Calvary's deacons decided - wisely, probably - that having a cash box right by an open door along a major cross-street in Manhattan wasn't the safest idea. We later moved our welcome table back downstairs, to a mezzanine below the sanctuary near the fellowship fall, our usual coffeehouse venue.

When I say casual and understated, that's what our operation was.

One time, while sitting at the welcome table with the narthex doors opened to 57th Street, I watched as a few tourists walked by, and they saw our sandwich board announcing "Solid Rock Cafe." They stopped, shook their heads, and then lamented something about how even New York's Baptist churches were going to Hell in a handbasket.

That's why to this day, despite my strenuous objections regarding most contemporary Christian music, and my contention that "Christian rock" is an oxymoron, I choose my words extremely carefully. During my tenure at the Solid Rock Cafe, I learned that there is a difference between the music and the hearts of its performers, even though sometimes that difference is difficult to discern.

At any rate, since I was in charge, I instituted a regular schedule of administrative meetings for the entire volunteer staff, so we'd all be on-board with what was taking place in the ministry. Not that we did anything earth-shaking. I would draft agendas for our meetings, give everybody a copy, and we'd work through them at a steady clip. In my youth and naivete, I thought that's how all church meetings ran, until Ken remarked that our meetings were among the quickest he'd ever endured during his years of church ministry.

And indeed, attendance at the meetings actually grew as more of our volunteers realized they were efficient and respected their time. Somehow, we'd manage to address everybody's concerns and feedback without hopping onto a lot of rabbit trails - something I myself am woefully guilty of instigating during meetings for which I'm not in charge.

During one of these meetings, we came up with the idea of hosting a special Christmas concert for the Solid Rock Cafe, where we'd feature a catered meal and a major talent. (That's show-biz lingo for a popular musician.) We'd had large concerts before, with the likes of Kathy Troccoli and Scott Wesley Brown, but they were conventional productions in the sanctuary. This time, we'd do something more intimate, with tablecloths and special lighting, making it more of an event than just a generic night out.

The first Christmas we sponsored this concert, featuring Calvary member and Broadway actor George Merritt, our concept was very well-received. So the next year, we decided to take it a step further.

White Christmas in Fellowship Hall

Calvary's fellowship hall is like many Baptist fellowship halls - more functional than fancy. To fix that, at least temporarily, we needed an inexpensive yet striking solution.

I learned that as a member of 57th Street's business association, which included such famous neighbors as the Russian Tea Room, Steinway Hall, and Carnegie Hall, Calvary had a standing offer for discounts from a fabric store down the block. Apparently, 57th Street used to be part of New York's fabric district, and a few venerable shops remained nearby.

Remember, I was young and naive. I came up with the wacky idea of completely covering the drab off-white walls of our fellowship hall with yards and yards of white fabric, with maybe some silver thread in it to conjure up the idea of snowbanks with softly glistening flakes. Ken's secretary went down to the fabric shop and selected what seemed like miles of white fabric with silver string woven into it, which the shop sold us for next to nothing. Granted, it wasn't stylish fabric; I wouldn't have wanted to wear anything made out of it. But it suited my idea, and the price was certainly right. So the Thursday night before our Christmas concert that year, I met with several volunteers after work to drape it around the room.

Except... all of the walls were concrete. Duhh... it was a basement room, after all, and the walls were structural! For some reason, I had assumed we could just tack the fabric discretely into the walls, but we quickly determined that we'd need a staple gun, or a hammer and nails. But remember - this is New York City, a place where things like staple guns, hammers, and nails aren't necessarily in ready supply. Fortunately, somebody with keys rummaged around in the locked janitor closets and found a huge hammer, and finally some small tacks.

We had a tall stepladder, which I, as the leader, proceeded to climb, so I could tack the cloth up against the cracks between the walls and the suspended ceiling. Except, as you might imagine, the tacks wouldn't hold much weight for very long. Oh, it was so frustrating, getting this shiny fabric put in place, only to have tacks fall out after you'd moved the stepladder along a few feet for another attachment job.

I've never been known for my patience. I had a pounding headache and could barely breathe from an intense sinus infection. I was tired, I hadn't had any dinner, since I'd rushed uptown to the church from my office downtown, needing to project an image of responsibility and authority by being early for the project. For some reason, none of us expected this to be a complicated endeavor. Yet we were making no progress at all.

How many times I dropped the hammer onto the floor while trying to nail those small tacks, I can't recall. We had enormous, surprisingly heavy bolts of fabric that I didn't want to cut - even though doing so would have made our job easier - because I wanted seamless rolls of the glistening white fabric wrapping around the room.

Finally, I dropped the hammer one too many times - into my face, as I was looking up - and it fell into my left eye socket, popping my glasses off of my nose. The falling hammer pushed my glasses awkwardly into my face, bending the metal frames, and cutting a small section of skin around my eye. I could immediately feel it turning black and blue.

Of course, the tack bounced to the floor below, followed by the hammer, so I asked my friends to pick them up for me so we could continue. But standing on the tiled floor, they all looked up at me on the ladder, and told me that enough was enough. It had been a good idea to decorate the fellowship hall so elaborately, but we were wasting our time trying to make it work. We didn't know what we were doing, and by now, we'd wasted so much time figuring out that we didn't know what we were doing, that we'd run out of time to do anything right. It was late, I'd nearly gauged my eye out, fabric walls weren't essential to the concert, and we all had to go to work in the morning.

Their logic was irrefutable, so ruefully, I concurred. We fixed up a couple of other minor details in preparation for the next evening's event, turned off the lights, and went home.

No Dreaming of This White Christmas

At work the next day, my sinus infection made me miserable physically, but my ineffectiveness at our decorating efforts the night before humiliated me - even though nobody at the office had any idea about it. The scar around my eye didn't turn out to be as bad as it looked Thursday night, and I don't think any of my co-workers had even paid much attention to it. I managed to make it through the day, so bundling up my dented pride, I ventured back uptown to salvage the concert that evening.

Tired, with throbbing sinuses and another empty stomach, I trudged up the steps from the Subway at 7th Avenue, across from Carnegie Hall. I turned the corner and made my way down a blustery 57th Street to the church. I pulled open one of the sanctuary's heavy wood doors, and plodded down the corner stairs to the fellowship hall, where I could hear my volunteers already bustling around in preparation for the evening's program.

What a reliable group of people, I thought with a weary smile.

I made my way through the mezzanine towards the balcony overlooking the fellowship hall, and there was Ken. With two of my volunteer staffers, Krista and Michelle, who had been helping Thursday evening as well.

And behind them I could see a beautifully-decorated fellowship hall, swathed with glistening white fabric from floor to ceiling!

Ken was beaming. Krista and Michelle were, too. The two women had each taken the afternoon off from their jobs to come in and figure out how to hang the fabric.

Stunned.

I was stunned. Floored. Embarrassed. Immensely grateful. And then, proud. Proud to have such friends, fellow servants in Christ, who would do such a thing. Not for me, necessarily, although they said they really felt sorry for me after the hammer fell onto my face.

But they wanted our Christmas concert to be what we had envisioned it to be during our planning meetings - something special, and a bit unique.

When I tell people today, "some of the best friends I've ever had, I made when I lived in New York City," this is the caliber of people I'm talking about.

Follow the Leader

Throughout that evening, I remember a number of our patrons telling me they couldn't believe they were in the bowels of Calvary's bland fellowship hall! We dined on a full-course gourmet meal prepared by a church member who used to own an exclusive catering firm. Then another member of the church, who ran both a public relations firm and a popular solo singing career, provided the lush music for our concert. And the room glistened not only with people enjoying themselves and being ministered to, but the faint twinkles of what - if you squinted hard enough - could have been snowflakes sprinkled along the softly-lit floor-to-ceiling fabric.

To this day, I still don't know how Krista and Michelle managed to hang the fabric and keep it on the walls without causing permanent damage. I'm sure they told me, but I was too stunned for it to register. Today, I thought of e-mailing Michelle, with whom I'm a FaceBook friend, and asking her again, but I think I like keeping this part of the story a little mystery. For all I know, they duct-taped the fabric on the walls, and incurred the wrath of Calvary's sextons who had to repair the damage when it all came down. I have no recollection whatsoever of who took it down, or when. Usually, we were responsible for leaving fellowship hall looking like the Solid Rock Cafe had never taken place. But I was so humbled by the efforts of my friends that my mind has blocked out what we ever did with all that fabric.

I moved from New York City before the next Christmas concert, but even years later, a friend at Calvary relayed to me that they were still using that fabric for Christmas events at the church.

These days, I've become disenchanted with the incorporation of snow themes with Christmas. Experts tell us that even though we don't know the exact time of year in which Christ was born, it most likely wasn't anytime in December. Or even the winter. And Israel rarely gets snow, even if it was.

Not only may the European traditions of Christmas corrupt the historical integrity of the birth of Christ, they could be becoming increasingly insignificant as more and more people around the globe learn about the Son of God. People who have never even seen snow. And have no idea how or why it figures into the Nativity.

Nevertheless, to me now, it's not so much that the fabric with the silver threads looked like snow on the walls of Calvary Baptist Church's fellowship hall. It's that my friends thought it was a cool-enough idea to try and create the effect by quietly, willingly taking time off from work, and figuring out how to make it happen.

A really good leader would have probably forced themself to think up a way to make that happen on their own. Or at least have done a bit more reconnaissance around the venue before determining an effective course of action. Or maybe even pressured the sextons to hang the fabric themselves, since they're the facility experts.

Ultimately, however, I'm satisfied appreciating the fact that volunteer staffers, without being asked, were willing to make extraordinary efforts out of kindness, and with no guarantee of reward.

After all, that's what God wants in all of His true servants, right?

Whether we're called leaders or not.
_____

Don't Ban Logic in Cell Phone Debate

2011-12-15T16:11:00.001-06:00

So, you say letting other people driving while using cell phones is dangerous.

But you don't want the government banning you from doing the same thing.

Granted, the chances of banning drivers from cell phone use aren't very good. It would take an extraordinarily gutsy politician to carry that banner in his or her state, and politicians don't like to be gutsy.

In the meantime, however, reaction to the news that the National Transportation Safety Board recommends a ban on cell phone use in the drivers' seat has brought a ton of anti-government ravers out of the woodwork, all squawking about how the Nanny State Police will soon smother the United States with silly laws.

And while I agree that we shouldn't need a law banning stupid behavior - like using cell phones while driving - plenty of Americans (myself included) have already proven that we're more than willing to risk this extraordinarily dangerous behavior simply because we can.

The only penalty we receive comes if we damage our vehicle - or ourselves - in an accident.

Precedents and Enforcement

But is banning cell phone use, even though it sounds like a draconian measure, entirely un-American?

Consider the rules imposed by the Federal Communications Commission against certain swear words and sexually-suggestive terminology on the nation's airwaves. Rules that, were they abolished, would elicit howls of protest from many of the same people protesting the proposed ban on cell phone use.

And cuss words don't kill anybody.

To a degree, roadways are like airwaves, are they not? They're both a form of public domain, shared by society, and intended for our overall protection, productivity, and enjoyment. Yet just as we recognize the need to police the airwaves for the good of our entire society - particularly to protect children who do not need exposure to such content at such vulnerable ages - don't we also need to protect drivers and their passengers on our roadways?

Granted, one of the strongest arguments against outlawing cell phones is the question of enforcement. For government to create a Nanny State law is one thing, but for it to create an unenforceable Nanny State law is rubbing salt into the wound.

Unfortunately, the only realistic way to force drivers to hang up and drive is to tie penalties to such a driver who gets involved in an automobile accident. Their cell phone records would have to be researched by the police. However, that doesn't sound like a terribly efficient process. Neither am I sure whether a search warrant would need to be issued, or how much liability might be linked to the trail of cell phone activity.

Indeed, Canada and some US jurisdictions already ban most forms of cell phone use, and some experts claim that crash rates have not declined in those areas. They try to draw the conclusion that laws banning cell phone use don't work. Yet might this apparent proof actually reflect a woefully ineffective enforcement of those laws? In other words, the reason current laws don't seem to be reducing the number of accidents may have less to do with these laws being misguided and more to do with these laws incorporating unreliable enforcement methods.

The same number of people may be driving and using their cell phones, even with new laws against such behavior, knowing they won't get caught or penalized. If and when they do get in a wreck, maybe they just don't tell law enforcement. After all, who's gonna know, if the police don't subpoena their data records?

Isn't the enforceability issue a red herring anyway? Wouldn't a well-written cell phone ban be about as effective as laws against driving without car insurance? Haven't most of us resigned ourselves to the fact that only a law will force some people to maintain proper car insurance? But people driving without insurance don't get caught unless they get stopped for some other infraction, or they're involved in an accident. So in a sense, laws already requiring insurance are about as "unenforceable" as a cell phone law would be.

The point is that people can throw opinions on the wall of objections all day long, hoping enough will stick to create a plausible scenario of justification as to why banning cell phones is a bad idea.

Is it the Nanny State's Fault that We Need One?

But it really isn't, is it? It's unpopular, it's inconvenient, it's government-creep... but we Americans have a bad habit of taking liberties and taking them for granted, and in the process, abusing them. It's like children whose parents give them an inch an they take a mile, only to recoil in distress when the parents realize that their kids can't handle the responsibility.

Ultimately, working through the logistics of banning cell phone use won't be an exercise in futility - even if broader bans on the practice never materialize - as long as Americans realize that driving while on the phone truly is a dangerous distraction, and we collectively make concerted efforts at curbing our own dangerous behavior.

As for making yet another law, just know that the distance between being accountable for your actions and being protected from people who don't sometimes requires a law prescribing just how much unaccountable behavior society can withstand.

And the longer it takes a society to figure out what that amount is, more lives generally end up being at stake.

I hope we can live with that.
_____

Making a Call for Safety

2011-12-14T15:04:00.002-06:00

This past Saturday, when rehearsal for our church choir's Christmas concert concluded, I walked to my car.

I got inside, checked my cell phone, and saw that I had two new messages. So, I listened to my voicemail, and I returned my calls.

As I did so, I noticed three other choir members make their way individually to their parked cars, get inside, and then sit, like I was doing, listing to their cell phone messages and returning calls. I could tell, because they kept holding little cell-phone-shaped devices up to their ears.

So there we all sat, in one of our church's parking lots, in our vehicles, conducting personal business on our cell phones.

Before we drove away.

We got on our cell phones and got done what needed to get done before we got onto city streets and freeways. That's how responsible drivers use their cell phones.

Childishness by the Public Usually Leads to the Nanny State

Unfortunately, my fellow choir members and I this past Saturday are in the minority. Not only because our church still has a chancel choir, and not even because we sing in it. But because we respected our responsibility as safe drivers.

When other drivers abdicate that responsibility, who needs to compensate for that? This is the question our government has decided it needs to answer by recommending a ban on using cell phones while driving.

Admit it: we haven't needed our National Transportation Safety Board to identify drivers' use of cell phones as a dangerous behavior. We all know it is.

The question is who protects the driving public from drivers who refuse to discontinue dangerous behaviors like cell phone use while driving?

I'm looking around, and I don't see anyone else but the government. As unpleasant a notion as generating even more legislation may seem.

Not that banning cell phones in the interest of public safety would be a precedent. A similar argument was used for creating mandatory seat belt laws. The theory goes that even though a seat belt won't keep you alive in every automobile crash, people who wear them have a greater survival rate than those who don't. Plus, wearing a seat belt helps keep drivers behind the wheel where they can better maintain control of their vehicle before they ever crash. And hopefully avoid an accident altogether.

But with cell phones, the argument that banning their use strikes at more than just personal safety. Many people conduct business on their cell phones while driving. They check up on their kids, or their spouse. They order dinner, they console a friend, or they call for directions out of a dangerous neighborhood.

You have to be flat-out ignorant to ignore the safety benefits of wearing a seat belt - benefits which help ameliorate the consternation of having government-mandated seat belts. Nevertheless, the fact that we need to have a law requiring seat belt use demonstrates how belligerent the driving public can be when it comes to common sense. But cell phones aren't exactly seat belts; they have so many uses, and they've rapidly become practically indispensable for many people.

Couple the cell phone's perceived indispensability with our distaste for draconian laws against popular behavior, and the NTSB isn't winning many friends with their recommendation yesterday to ban all forms of cell phone use by drivers of moving vehicles. Such a ban would include not only hand-held phones, but hands-free phones and texting. The only exception would be in case a driver needs to call 9-1-1.

Although I'd like to think that we don't really need such a law, the statistics appear to prove differently. And even anecdotal evidence suggests that far too many people assume they're the exception to the rule when it comes to distracted driving. We've all driven or ridden past vehicles where the driver is floating around their lane, obviously so engrossed in their telephone conversation that what's happening on the roadway is of secondary concern at best.

Many of us - even when we're not on the phone as we drive - have forgotten that driving is not supposed to be a solitary activity. When we turn on the engine to our vehicle, and back out of our driveway, we automatically begin a civic endeavor, becoming a joint user of a public conveyance. We enter a realm in which we share reciprocal responsibilities with every other driver. A realm in which safety for all of us is Job Number One.

Just getting from Point A to Point B doesn't matter if we cause a wreck along the way. Or get involved in one.

Driving is not blank time. It is not the dead zone between Point A and Point B. Just because driving is so routine doesn't make it any less important as an activity. Cars don't have autopilots, like planes do, because our pathways aren't as restricted as those for airplanes. We don't ride on rails, like trains, whose courses are controlled by engineers hundreds of miles away. And as America's streets become more and more congested, drivers are getting bombarded with more and more things to compromise safety.

In addition, our driving public has had more than a decade's worth of practice to adapt to driving while on cell phones, and we just haven't done a good job of it. When cell phone technology was first introduced, America's drivers had a prime opportunity to demonstrate that we could handle the responsibility of driving safely while on the phone, but unfortunately, we blew it. Maybe not you specifically, or me, but drivers in general.

Clarifying the Conversation Conundrum

Admittedly, frequent rebuttals to this idea include the valid contention that oftentimes, a person-to-person conversation with somebody riding in a vehicle with the driver can also be distracting.

Yet consider the difference in scenarios between passengers in the same vehicle all having a conversation, and people in two different places having a conversation. Everybody riding in the same car likely will have a greater awareness of their shared surroundings, and be able to interpret compromising situations, cutting off conversations so the driver can make impromptu maneuvers to avoid danger. Things like bumper-to-bumper traffic, or a car weaving towards yours at high speed: everyone in the car shares a vested interest in letting the driver address each situation with minimal distraction.

Compare that to talking with somebody driving a vehicle you're not inside of. You're completely excluded from the driver's immediate environment. You aren't aware of the moment-to-moment conditions they're facing and needing to accommodate. In such conversations, both you and the driver will more likely attempt to continue an active dialog regardless of safety threats encountered by the driver and completely unbeknownst to you. Or, the driver will slow their vehicle down so dramatically - or weave about mindlessly as they talk to you - that they become a hazard to other drivers.

You know you've seen it happen. Maybe you're guilty of it yourself. Even when no accident takes place, what makes up for the fact that as a distracted driver, you put yourself and other people at risk?

Do it enough times, and the law of averages starts to work against you. And the rest of us.

Equality Under the Law - This Does It, Right?

For better or worse, as a society, we bring laws upon ourselves to combat actions - or inaction - that sufficient numbers of our fellow citizens have proven as detrimental to our overall safety.

So don't blame the government for saying we need laws preventing cell phone use while driving. Blame your fellow Americans for botching years of opportunity in which they could have proven such a law isn't necessary.

And if you're pro-life, like I am, what's the difference between legally recognizing behaviors that can imperil life either inside or outside the womb, behaviors about which too many people maintain a dangerous ambivalence?

Besides, for all of the businesspeople who have begun squawking that a cell phone ban would cripple their ability to conduct commerce: take heart. Since the law would apply to everybody, it would mean that your competition wouldn't be able to make calls behind the wheel, either.

You can still pull into a parking lot to make an important telephone call or check messages.

Just like my fellow choir members did.

And if all that just sounds too old-fashioned for you, then think of it this way: if America's drivers had proven we still can incorporate old-fashioned logic and common sense when it comes to safety, cell phones, and driving, we wouldn't be needing another law to protect us.

From ourselves.
_____

Scoring Tebow-mania

2011-12-12T10:27:00.000-06:00

Tim Tebow.

You don't need to be a football fanatic to have heard of him.

He's the sports cause célèbre of the moment; a new, young, dynamic, and photogenic NFL quarterback with a tall frame ensconced in enormous muscles and crowned by an all-American visage.

And claiming a faith in Jesus Christ he doesn't let anybody forget about. Even as some of his fans in the sports world would rather dwell on his stellar athleticism instead.

So Young, and Already a Star

During his high school years, Tebow exhibited such outstanding football acumen, his parents rented an apartment in another district to establish residency so he could play on a better team. Even despite his being homeschooled. Today, as homeschooling continues growing in popularity, the precedent Tebow's family helped establish in Florida is directly contributing to new rules for letting homeschooled athletes in other states play on public school teams.

It was the multiple-award-winning collegiate pedigree Tebow accrued at the University of Florida that has given the sports media big expectations for his NFL career. Perhaps Tebow's biggest prize to date came early, when he became the first sophomore to win college football's coveted Heisman Trophy. While he was being groomed for prime time, however, Tebow's faith never lingered in the background. Before graduating, he appeared as a national pitchman for conservative Christian advocacy group Focus on the Family, whose pro-life commercial airing during Super Bowl XLIV elicited howls of protest from pro-choice advocates.

The controversy fomented by the Super Bowl ad ultimately gave the commercial far more exposure to both the pro-life movement and Tebow than they otherwise might have gotten. It also provided proof that Tim Tebow could attract broad, national recognition - whether it was good or bad, contributing to his allure in the media.

Turned out, too, that Tebow's mother had been encouraged by her doctors to abort his fetus due to some medical complications during her pregnancy with him, but she refused. The contrast between that desperate hour years ago and the vibrant young man the Tebow's have raised doesn't favor the pro-choice agenda, after all. It's the same faith-based belief of abortion equalling murder that Tebow, the football star, continues to profess in his own life. And that continues to compete for attention with his gridiron prowess.

His is a faith that is not only Christian, but evangelical Christian, a flavor which has lost favor with many folks in our society. And is misunderstood by many more. For example, some sports pundits have begun crediting Tebow's faith with the improbable success Tebow's NFL employer, the Denver Broncos, has discovered this season; the Bronco's first season with Tebow, and Tebow's first post-college team.

It's an old superstition that refuses to die: assuming God takes sides in sports. Remember the late, great Tom Landry? Even many Christians claimed he experienced success because of his faith, part of the long-observed fallacy that only good things happen to "good" people. Yet the Bible teaches that the wicked sometimes prosper, while the righteous sometimes suffer. And the countless "blessings" which God bestows on His faithful children don't necessarily come in the forms mankind considers desirable.

When it comes to sports, particularly since sometimes teams win for no good reason, and lose despite the odds in their favor, invoking the pleasure of God really only attempts to give the pastime more credibility than it deserves.

Football as the Catwalk Where Tebow Models His Faith?

To his credit, Tebow makes a point of supporting virtues like sobriety, chastity, and clean speech that have been marginalized in our society. Unfortunately, however, he sometimes appears to feed this stereotype about God, human performance, and the conventional Christian sports persona. He makes a now-famous spectacle of bowing to pray on one knee during games, and predictably gushes about God whenever a microphone is stuffed in his face.

Not that gushing about God at every opportunity is a bad thing. But it could eventually become ineffective as a ministry tool. It's like the age-old dilemma between street preaching and personal evangelism. In the same way that the Bible never tells us to literally couch every public interaction with overt theology, claims that Tebow is overdoing it with his constant proselytizing are not only understandable, they're not exclusive to the secular media. After a while, making a dramatic public display of devotion to God after key plays during a game tends to appear more like sanctimonious shtick than sacrificial praise.

But even then, mocking Tebow's demonstrativeness like many in the media and public do, however questionable those acts may be, is a dangerous practice. God does not suffer lightly those who belittle any of His servants, whether it's Tim Tebow, or you, or me.

Interestingly, after he graduated from the University of Florida, the NCAA banned one of Tebow's favorite - and most intriguing - evangelism tools. Tebow had become famous for wearing eye paint emblazoned with Scripture verses that tens of millions of people would Google after his games. The NCAA maintains that other college athletes did the same thing, albeit with non-religious messages, and they wanted to end the trend before it got out of hand. What's interesting about the NCAA's actions, though, is that plenty, far more questionable practices continue to abound in college sports than what athletes wear under their eyes.

Because that eye paint messaging in college - and a questionable residency switcheroo so he could play on a particular high school team - comprise the only remotely scandal-esque episodes attributable to Tim Tebow, there's not much controversy about the guy. His squeaky-clean image, coupled with his proven athleticism, have helped Tebow become a media darling. But not because the media adores his morality any more than their consumers do. Tebow is a media darling precisely because his lifestyle so starkly contrasts with our culture, and ironically, Americans can't seem to get enough of it. Not to emulate it, necessarily. But to ogle at it, and maybe even watch to see how long it lasts.

Fame, Faith, and What the Media Really Wants to See

Tebow news doesn't just run on the sports pages anymore. We read about it in mainstream newspapers, we surf it on social blogs and websites, and we chat about it on FaceBook and Twitter. For the most part, America's media machine either pretends it's really charmed by the guy, or at least convinced his undeniable success is more fluke than farce. Yet increasingly, it's hard to escape the media's cynical build-up of a public character that many people may privately hope self-destructs in some dramatic fall from grace.

Because in the end, that's what entertainment in America has come to these days. Not celebrating a person during the good times, but gloating about a person's weaknesses during bad times. Might spending all this time and effort on favorable coverage of Tebow be the price Big Media has to pay in order to score the big bucks when scandal eventually hits?

Perhaps not surprisingly, a lot of this is due to the fact that most writers and producers in American media don't have a clue about salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Nor do most of their consumers, if over 90 million viewers - ninety million! - have to Google "John 3:16" to know what it is. To them, Tebow is speaking some ancient language of some relic religion that does more to validate his naive Southern upbringing than affirming adherence to a creed more powerful than anything on this planet.

Just today, in conjunction with a similarly-themed article, CNN ran a reader poll on its website asking, "Is the success of Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow attributable to God?"

But that's not the question, is it? Success in sports victories is not the type of reward God grants His followers simply because they're His followers. What about all the athletes of faith who never make the team? What about any of the born-again football players against whom Tebow has ever played?

If CNN knew what it was talking about, they'd have worded the question, "Is Tim Tebow attributing his success as the Denver Broncos quarterback to God?"

And I think that even people who don't believe in God would admit that yes, he is. Not all of us may agree with how he's doing it, but nobody can deny that he's doing it. And isn't that more than can be said for most of us?

Which also means that those of us who share his faith need to pray for him. After all, he's good-looking enough to make really squalid headlines if he falls into sexual sin. He's already won enough sporting awards to make imperious sports reporters crow incessantly should he collapse under the media glare. And whether it's been through his own extraordinary effusiveness or the media's preoccupation with his faith, if Tebow compromises the Gospel, Christianity will likely take a massive public relations hit.

Not that people of faith live to relish the praise of others. Or that Tebow needs to live under a constant fear of failure. Yet to the extent that he's participated in the creation of a Christian sports persona for himself, we believers should care about him enough to not assume that Satan isn't watching from the sidelines, salivating at the chance to so publicly wreak a little havoc against the Kingdom.

After all, even with all that he's accomplished, Tebow's still only human. With abilities that are more easily visible to the naked eye, surely, than perhaps yours or mine. Yet with a soul just as significant to God as yours and mine.

To the extent that Tebow wants his fame deferred to His Creator, then let's prayerfully support him as we would any of the rest of us who name the name of Christ.
_____

New York's State is the Empire

2011-12-09T09:39:00.001-06:00

Unbelievable!

Almost unbelievable, at least. And even though I'm laughing as I type this, so very sad.

I'd already begun writing today's rant - excuse me - today's "essay" with my topic about fiscal waste in New York State firmly in mind (that's not the funny part). Then I noticed on one of my source websites a new headline about cops for a New York government agency earning over $200,000 per year.

Here it is: New York-New Jersey Port Authority beat policeman earns $221,000 a year

It's a poorly-worded headline, to be sure, since the Port Authority doesn't beat anybody but taxpayers. But then again, maybe that's the true hidden meaning here.

Doing the Math in a High-Tax State

Turns out, 66 police officers employed by the Port Authority, funded by both New York State and New Jersey, have racked up over $41 million in overtime this year - and the year isn't even over yet. The highest-paid cop has already taken home $265,059, which is more than most of the Port Authority’s executives earn in a year. Shucks, the PA's top dog earns only $289,667 a year.

It's not as though the region around New York Harbor doesn't have other law enforcement agencies. Each city and town has their own police force, dwarfed by the mammoth NYPD itself. Then there's the transit authority's police department, two state police departments, who knows how many private security firms, plus redundant federal law enforcement agencies.

And then there's the Port Authority, with its own cops. Patrolling mostly facilities where the feds share jurisdiction, like airports, bridges, tunnels, wharves, and commuter trains. Sure, they're all significant terrorist targets, but it's not like patrol officers from the PA don't have Homeland Security personnel providing heavy backup. Or, for that matter, access to the highly-effective resources of the supremely-equipped NYPD.

Now, I wasn't intending to warm the cockles of my right-wing readers' hearts by blasting fiscal waste in New York. Nor was I attempting to engender some conservative bona-fides on my part by playing the low-tax hawk. Particularly after Wednesday's critique of Tony Perkins' theologizing about capitalism.

No, I was merely going to lament the tawdry state of financial affairs and abdication of logic on the part of my fellow New Yorkers in my home state.

And then, the Port Authority beats me to it!

For the record, my original examples of funny money in the Empire State come from two depressing stories out of Syracuse. The first involves a proposed remodeling project for a 100-year-old dilapidated mansion for which the developers flatly projected a loss of at least $200,000. The second involves the announcement yesterday in Albany, the state capital, of $104 million in "economic development incentives" to non-profits around Syracuse.

When Doing the Math Still Doesn't Add Up

Preserving a community's heritage is important. But it's not like Syracuse is running out of old buildings. The gritty, aging city, decimated by suburbanization after World War Two, still boasts a hearty stock of ornate Victorian and Queen Anne manses that have been carefully preserved and painstakingly updated. Then there are the many more, um, "antique" houses of dubious architectural distinction and even less credible aesthetic authenticity sitting all around town, in various stages of repair.

At the bottom of the scale rests an unfortunately high number of completely vacant structures, many of which have served as single-family homes, then apartments, then small businesses, and now finally, empty shells. In their day, they may have been grand, but today, they're eyesores, havens for crime, and drags on nearby property values.

Surprisingly, despite its terrible economy and continuing erosion of jobs, Central New York in general and Syracuse in particular have managed to preserve a decent standard of living without significantly compromising an all-American quality of life. This means that even though taxes are horrendous, old homes in inner-city Syracuse can still fetch respectable prices, considering how much it costs to heat those large domiciles during the state's frigid winters.

Which also means that all is not lost when it comes to trying to salvage an established neighborhood's respectability and pride. So after looking at one of the city's more aggrieved, abandoned eyesores for more than twenty years, members of Syracuse's University Neighborhood Preservation Association near the acclaimed campus of Syracuse University announced a $1.1 million restoration project for the old pile.

Their aim is to clean up the three-story, two-porched, turreted, and grandly-proportioned house on a lushly wooded corner lot and turn it into four multi-storied condominiums. Ranging in price from $125,000 to $200,000 apiece.

You do the math.

Four condos, even at the premium price, only gets you to $800,000 out of an estimated $1.1 million remodeling pricetag. Even with some creative financing to make up part of the differential, the neighborhood association anticipates losing about $200,000 when all is said and done.

A herculean task of retrofitting a former one-family house, last used as a Jewish veterans group's headquarters, into four individual condominiums. Accommodating historic preservation rules and environmental hazard laws, while incorporating all the modern conveniences people expect when paying $150,000 for a condominium in a small city. In the Rust Belt. Where property taxes beat you down even more than the weather does.

All that work, and they know going into it that they'll lose - lose! - the equivalent of constructing a brand-new house. That could probably be sold for a profit, since the vibrant university community is so close-by.

It's great that these urban pioneers love their neighborhood so much that they're promoting the opportunity to take a bath on such an expensive gamble. But what does that say about their ability to recognize what fiscal solvency looks like?

High Taxes Paying for Economic Development? Go Figure

Then there was the much-heralded announcement yesterday that Central New York State would be receiving over $100 million in state economic development aid.

I was wary about that news from the start. Where does any government get "economic development aid" except from taxpayers?

Sure enough, not only is this money coming from already-overburdened taxpayers in New York State, but not a single for-profit organization is included on the list of recipients. Indeed, every penny of that money appears to be headed for the many large non-profit organizations which subsidize life in this otherwise economically-desolate part of the country.

Incredibly, several for-profit small and mid-sized businesses that had applied were actually excluded from the list of groups awarded money. Money that is coming from taxpayers who, if their taxes weren't so high, wouldn't be needing "economic development" grants from the state to begin with.

Top it all off with today's revelation that the Port Authority is bent on turning its patrol officers into One Percenters. At least in terms of annual income, which for One Percenters has a threshold only a few thousand more dollars more than what these guys have earned so far this year.

And what else can you do but laugh? And feel sorry for those people in places like Syracuse, some of whom don't even realize that losing $200,000 on a $1.1 million construction project isn't a good investment.

For years, I've thought that the motto, "the Empire State," meant that New York's capitalistic might was unexcelled.

These days, I'm thinking that the motto means the state IS the empire.
_____

Don't Put a Dollar Sign on Faith

2011-12-06T14:34:00.001-06:00

Time was, bad theology told previous generations of America's Christians that activities like going to the movies was a sin.

Almost two centuries before that, bad theology led Christians on witch hunts in New England, staging religious trials which today we're learning were probably ploys to deprive unpopular women of their property.

Nowadays, Christians not only represent a significant market for Hollywood, they even produce movies themselves. Even lonely old widows are today pursued by faith-based organizations hoping to be included in their wills. Proving that over time, people of faith can managed to work through a lot of bad theology. So does that mean evangelicalism in the United States is finally legitimately authentic?

Of course not. Today we have people bent turning America into a religious state by melding weak interpretations of Scripture with passionate patriotism. People, for example, like Tony Perkins of the Family Research Institute, who wrote on CNN.com Tuesday that Jesus championed free markets and wouldn't have endorsed the recent Occupy Wall Street demonstrations.

Perkins claims that "Jesus rejected collectivism," even though Biblical accounts of the early church actually show them practicing it joyfully. And Perkins claims "the parable of the king and the servants endorses the principles of business and the free market," although the Bible never teaches of Christ personally endorsing any economic system.

*Sigh.*

If Perkins was alone in his contention that Christ and the Bible preach capitalism alongside salvation by grace, then his editorializing on CNN wouldn't matter much. Unfortunately, however, free markets being the God-endorsed economic system for all mankind has become a stunningly prevalent and popular idea among many American evangelicals. Many of America's politically conservative evangelicals, that is.

The Gospel is Not Salvation by Money

Why has capitalism become a virtue of Biblical proportions among Republicans of faith? Might viewing America's economic system through such a theological lens help us protect the wealth many of us have managed to amass here in the United States? Might preaching capitalism also help deflect personal responsibility? Not the personal responsibility we accuse impoverished people of forsaking because they apparently don't work hard enough. But the lack of responsibility rich people feel towards helping out the less fortunate?

Not that capitalism and free markets are wrong in and of themselves. Or that America's welfare system hasn't degenerated into a morass of generational poverty.

All things considered, even in their excesses and abuses, capitalism and free markets represent the best systems for managing an economy. For proof, just look at the two Koreas: robust South Korea, and shriveled North Korea. But as good as capitalism and free markets are, they still were never ordained as God's financial rubric. For Perkins to draw that conclusion from the words of a Man Who literally owned only the clothes He was wearing is gravely misleading. The fact that Christ refers to making a profit in the parable of the talents is to help explain that, as Perkins surprisingly manages to state correctly, "there are no excuses for doing nothing" with the resources God has given you.

If Perkins can take this parable and extrapolate a doctrine of capitalism from it, then can't somebody else take Christ's command for the rich young ruler to give away all his possessions as a doctrine of communism?

Ultimately, Perkins blows his credibility a few paragraphs later when he claims "wins and losses are determined by the diligence and determination of the individual." Wow. Not only is that stunningly unsympathetic towards the legions of hard-working Americans who've lost nest eggs in Wall Street's recent travails, it is frighteningly heretical if Perkins is precluding God's sovereignty over the affairs of man.

Let's just hope Perkins didn't mean it the way he wrote it.

Some semblance of a free market economy obviously existed within Israel during the time of Christ's earthly ministry, so it would be only natural for Christ to incorporate the principle of investing as He taught His disciples. Indeed, to a large extent, economic principles from what we today call free markets and capitalism today were used even in Old Testament times in terms of rewarding labor, commercial transactions, and ownership of property. But just because free markets and capitalism are the most useful and productive tools for a nation to grow its economy doesn't mean God deigns to lower Himself to be a pitchman for socioeconomic paradigms.

The Bible is God's story of redemption from sin. That includes being freed from the love of money. It also, actually, includes being freed from debt every seven years, not charging excessive interest, sharing with those in need, paying all your taxes dutifully, and running your businesses so you can provide jobs for God's people. All things that are quite counter-cultural to us Americans. In fact, speaking of being counter-cultura, the Gospel of Christ is applicable for His children who live in remote Papuan jungle villages, oppressive Burma, Communist Cuba, and Socialist Greece, just as it is applicable for the believers who lived during feudal times, or who live today in converted condominiums literally across Broad Street from the New York Stock Exchange.

Perkins, myself, and all Americans benefit greatly from the economic system we enjoy in this country. Is it perfect? Of course not. Has greed corrupted some of the basic principles of capitalism? Of course it has. But Christ was never, ever concerned with helping His disciples establish a financial economy on Earth. He instructed at least one rich guy to give all his money to the poor. Gulp! Christ cherished the Widow's Mite, while blasting the monied classes who only gave a token of their wealth to the temple. Not one of the rich people celebrated in the Bible were hoarders or miserly with the money with which they'd been entrusted. How many middle-class Americans - let alone our One Percenters - would be so commended by Christ if He returned for a 21st Century checkup of His Church?

Talents and the Irony Thereof

When He gave the parable of the talents, was Christ expecting His followers to assume He simply meant to go out and earn money until He returned? Or was Christ teaching that with whatever resources He may choose to bless us, and in whatever amount, we are to deploy those resources for His glory? Yes, those resources may take the form of money, but they could also be an education, a particular skill like fixing toilets, or an ability to make other people laugh at honest humor.

Your talent may even be reaching out to people desperate for meaning in their life, like money-lovers who lust after financial wealth, or those who lust delusionally after other forms of satisfaction instead of salvation by grace.

Just this past weekend, an unemployed drug addict died of an apparent overdose at one of the Occupy camps here in north Texas. He was just 23 years old.

Was he simply another lazy loser, as one of the commenters on the story has posted online, or was he, as Perkins insinuates about the Occupiers from his caustic editorial, enjoying the "luxury" of being unproductive?

Frankly, I didn't think too much about the story of this guy's death when I first heard about it on the news, either. But then today, I learned that the drug addict was a nephew of a friend of mine. A woman who, ironically, is practically part of the much-reviled One Percenters. She isn't one by income, since her take-home pay pales in comparison to that of her clients. But she almost could be one by virtue of the fact that her clients are international banks with offices sprawling throughout the world's major financial centers. Clients for whom she works long hours as a financial management consultant.

She told us on FaceBook one morning this past fall of standing outside the Lower Manhattan skyscraper housing a major Japanese bank, one of her clients. She was talking on her smartphone, wearing a navy pinstripe suit, with a leather briefcase in her other hand, the picture of Wall Street power, being ogled by a gang of roving Occupy Wall Street protesters. She said it was an oddly eerie feeling, suddenly being cast as a One Percenter by people who didn't know who she was.

She manages a team of consultants from Europe to Asia, all of them worlds away from her less-vaunted status as an aunt to a homeless, 23-year-old drug addict in Denton, Texas.

Now, granted, I haven't exactly been lavishing the love on America's Occupiers myself. But I have acknowledged that in their more lucid moments, Occupiers have been able to at least remind the rest of us that our economic system has injustices - or, at least, discrepancies in functionality - that need to be fixed sooner rather than later. To the extent that Perkins points out how productivity benefits society more than petulance does, I can echo his sentiment. But why do I have the nagging suspicion that Christ looked down on the Occupiers with less sorrow over their sociopolitical ideologies than concern over their eternal destinies?

One of Wall Street's legitimate power brokers will be joining with her family to bury a dead Occupier in the next couple of days. Economics couldn't save Darwin Cox, my friend's nephew, just as it can't save anybody else.

That's why the Gospel isn't about money. But rather, the extent to which our love for it - indeed, our love for any created thing - can take the place of our love for Christ.

Mr. Perkins, I hope you agree with me: this is not bad theology.
_____

Pro-Life or Just Pro-Laws?

2011-12-06T09:11:00.001-06:00

Back on October 24, I wrote this regarding abortion:

"It's a subject about which I rarely write. Mostly because I consider it a settled issue."

And at least for me, abortion is a settled issue. It's wrong. It's the denial of life. And I don't think there's much to argue about it.

But apparently, I've been wrong. At least, wrong about that last part, about the abortion issue being a topic over which little additional discussion is necessary.

Since I first admitted that I rarely write about abortion, abortion has become a flash point. Not between liberals and conservatives, necessarily, but among evangelicals. Evangelicals who appear to be "going rogue" over the methodologies by which America's pro-life lobby has been pursuing Roe v. Wade.

I'd never heard about the Personhood Movement until it flamed up in Mississippi this past autumn, driving a wedge between rash, pugnacious legal agitators for the cause and longtime pro-life advocacy groups like the National Right to Life committee and the United States Council of Catholic Bishops.

The idea of the Personhood Movement was to re-write state constitutions to define a legal person as one whose protections begin at the point of conception. Which sounded good in theory, but left many other legal doors wide open for misinterpretation and even more crushing applications of the very ruling which started it all: Roe v. Wade.

Fortunately, two Personhood attempts in Colorado and one this fall in Mississippi failed at the ballot box. I say "fortunately" not because I'm pro-choice, but because I believe that in order to right the wrong of Roe v. Wade, we need to be crafting a far more robust strategy based on irrefutable legal integrity on the federal level. After all, since when is murder a states-rights issue?

Then yesterday, I learned of the Heartbeat Bill being pursued by more rogue pro-lifers in Ohio. On its face, this new measure sounds a lot more competent than the Personhood agenda, since it directly addresses parameters for both life - a heartbeat - and when abortion would be illegal: upon the detection of a heartbeat. Such a measure would be hard for even some ambivalent pro-choicers to ignore, since a heartbeat is a pretty basic proof of life.

Yet here too, the Heartbeat Bill may be the right fight, but it's being fought in the wrong place. A state law cannot trump federal law. Period. This is a national issue, not an Ohio issue, or a Mississippi issue, or something for just politically-conservative states. Plus, assuming conflicting laws regarding abortion will force a Supreme Court verdict amenable to pro-lifers does not justify the rancor, disharmony, and flat-out lack of logic that rogue pro-lifers have been perpetrating in their quest for success.

Brashness has become an admired trait among many conservatives in general and evangelicals in particular. Being the bull in the China shop is now a desirable thing to be. Words like "reckless" and "risk" have become popular terms in the church lexicon. It's cool to be rude, casual, and unscripted. Because we've grown fond of acknowledging that Christ's Gospel is offensive to unbelievers.

Yesterday, as I struggled to craft an essay reflecting my heartfelt views on the subject that carefully admonished - yet came short of denigrating - our friends in the rogue pro-life camp, I found myself coming back to one incontrovertible fact.

Some evangelicals prefer to handle the abortion issue as a purely legal matter, not a human one.

Many of us seem far more willing to bash the practice of abortion than we are willing to stoop down and minister to people struggling with a pregnancy they think they can't handle. But after all, abortion on demand wouldn't exist if it wasn't for people thinking they needed it.

Let's think this through, instead of simply reacting to it emotionally. Does the abhorrence we people of faith project about abortion revolve around an anger over a medical procedure? Does abortion anger us because it represents the sordid narcissism of our culture? Or do pro-lifers appreciate the gravity of a cultural ethos which helps drive some parents of pre-born children to consider abortion to be an acceptable, albeit unpleasant, option?

Frankly, isn't it a lot easier to vilify pro-choicers as amoralists than to sit down with real, hurting, human beings with complex sexual problems (which is what causes unwanted pregnancies, after all) and deal with these problems on a one-to-one basis?

So, in other words, is the pro-life movement concerned with simply outlawing something, or trying to minister to the root of the dysfunction which results in abortion on demand? Because if all pro-lifers want to do is pass a law - ostensibly to save lives - but they have little concern over the people who think abortion can be a solution to an unwanted pregnancy, might even if we in that battle, we lose the war?

The war isn't just saving lives of unborn, unwanted children, is it? Abortion is sin, but it's no more heinous in God's eyes than our refusal to love sinners who make what we consider to be heinous decisions. Remember, there's only one unpardonable sin, and that's denying the deity of Christ.

What is the pro-life movement supposed to be about? The sanctity of life, and how God is honored by life. Right? It's not about laws as much as it is honoring God. After all, to Him, our laws are mere mortal technicalities over which we like to spin our wheels. Is outlawing abortion going to reduce the prevalence of unwanted life in our society? It will save lives, definitely, and that is a good thing. But is banning murder of any kind the same as ministering God's grace to our neighbors? Remember, 20% of evangelical women report having had an abortion at some point in their lives. So this isn't just about unchurched, heathen women, but women you and I may sit next to in church each week. How do we speak the truth in love to these women, especially when we reckless compete amongst ourselves with contrivances to outlaw a particular behavior? Even if it's in as noble a cause as outlawing abortion?

Make no mistake about where I stand: abortion is evil and should be outlawed. But until we can address the demand for abortion, will simply making it illegal - regardless of whether it's through Personhood, Hearbeat, or federal initiatives - truly impact our society for the Kingdom?

Love. Joy. Peace. Patience. Gentleness. Goodness. Meekness. Self-control. Even while Christ was throwing the money-changers out of the temple - the story many evangelicals rely upon to justify their brashness - He was teaching them verbally about His Father's holiness.

As we work to overturn Roe v. Wade, let's do it as a ministry, not an exercise in legal posturing.
_____

Logic Escapes Rogue Pro-Lifers

2011-12-05T17:24:00.001-06:00

Logic.

It's something about which I write a lot. Because it's incredibly important in life.

Yet apparently, logic can also be an inconvenient fact of life. As the abortion war heats up again, some conservative activists seem to be using less logic than raw emotion.

Probably because emotion makes them feel like they're doing something, even when they're not.

First we had the Personhood Movement that voters in Colorado and Mississippi have thankfully defeated three times. Personhood advocates hoped that declaring a fertilized egg as a legal person would force an end to abortions in those two states. And that the inevitable legal wrangling between the poorly-worded Personhood legislation and federal laws stemming from Roe v. Wade would magically align on the side of life.

It wouldn't.

Now we have a Heartbeat Bill in Ohio that rogue pro-lifers insist will accomplish what the Personhood Movement could not.

But still, they're fighting the right battle in the wrong place.

Righteous Impatience or Impertinence?

I call them "rogue" pro-lifers because several of their leaders have splintered from the venerable National Right to Life campaign that has been working with the United States Council of Catholic Bishops for over four decades to eliminate legalized abortion. These rogue pro-lifers have become frustrated with the slow pace of legislative action on the national front, so they've got it into their heads that attacking the abortion scourge will go faster if they trigger a legislative crisis on the state level. And to do that, they've got to find a state that can pass some sort of bold pro-life law that flies in the face of an over-ruling federal amnesty for abortion.

The hope - and it's a long-shot kind of hope - is that the quandary created by conflicting state and federal laws on abortion will lob the issue up to the Supreme Court for a victorious defeat of Roe v. Wade. But there's hope, and then there's logic. Hope is one thing; getting a group of judges to rule in your favor is quite another.

Of course, this isn't the first time right-wing evangelicals have worked themselves into a lather over the pace of change in the United States. Witness the Tea Party movement, which has scored some significant victories at the ballot box with the help of hefty numbers of evangelicals, but has pretty much only managed to foment one of the most intransigent, unproductive, and bitterly-divided governments in American history.

Granted, the Heartbeat Bill has better logic behind it than the Personhood Movement. Banning abortions upon the detection of a fetal heartbeat is a more conventional legal approach, it doesn't tinker with the legal definition of a "person," and it's far more definitive in terms of what it does and doesn't do. In other words, prohibiting an abortion on a fetus with a heartbeat is pretty frank and uncomplicated, whereas the Personhood legislation left many associated laws in limbo.

In fact, if it weren't for the pesky little fact that state law doesn't trump federal law, I wouldn't have any problem with the Heartbeat Bill.

But state law does come second to federal law, and that's the critical flaw in Ohio's Heartbeat Bill. Abortion is not a states rights issue, just as murder of people outside of the womb is not a states rights issue.

And because we haven't yet seen a miracle in the abortion war even as people of faith have been unified against it, I have a hard time understanding why God would bless rogue pro-lifers with a miracle after they force division in an otherwise rightly-focused campaign.

Abandoning Grace for Gusto

Frankly, I'm not aware of everything the National Right to Life committee and the Council of Catholic Bishops have been working on to weaken - and indeed, eliminate - Roe v. Wade. Have they made bad decisions during these decades of methodical advocacy for the unborn? Most likely. Has the process been mercilessly slow? Yes. Do evangelicals have a right to be frustrated at the pace of progress? Of course.

But welcome to reality, people. How many times does it need to be said that we cannot legislate morality? Wouldn't a better tactic be to approach the overthrow of Roe v. Wade through cogent, legally practical, and purposefully cohesive tactics? Tactics that will create a solution that can withstand whatever further legal challenges pro-choicers will attack it with? It seems as though Ohio's rogue pro-lifers think a miraculous Supreme Court victory is not only a fait accompli, but a final hearing on the matter. In order for abortion to be abolished permanently, we need a solid legal argument; not something slapped together with legal cracks pro-choicers can turn around and wrench apart.

After all, it's not even like the pro-life movement is on its last leg. The Gallup organization has numbers suggesting that Americans may be getting increasingly intolerant of abortion on demand. Although pro-lifers now comprise about 51% of the population, and that's still too few to mount a Constitutional change, it's already a step in the right direction. We may actually be winning this fight in the court of public opinion! Might creating factions within the pro-life camp now simply risk the unity that's gotten us over the 50% hump?

Remember, no state law banning abortion will be effective as long as Roe v. Wade is the law of the country. But just as rogue pro-lifers say hope is all they've got with these legal shots in the dark, progress on the federal level is not beyond hope, either.

Before threatening to undermine decades of diligent work to overturn Roe v. Wade, rogue pro-lifers must consider whether their petulance and arrogance is even Biblical. Can they identify anything anybody at National Right to Life has done that has defamed the cause of Christ? Anything that has irreparably set back the pro-life movement? Anything that could spell the imminent demise of the many pro-life pregnancy centers across the country currently ministering to desperate women and their impregnators and sharing the Gospel of Christ with them? After all, just making abortion illegal won't stop unwanted pregnancies, will it? And the fact that we're having an epidemic of unwanted pregnancies is the real problem here, not just the fact that it's presently legal to kill those unborn unwanteds.

We have enough factions, infighting, hurt feelings, and ineffectiveness within evangelical Christianity already in the United States without balking now, causing schisms within a hardworking group like the National Right to Life, and seizing on illogical attempts to ramrod half-baked legislation through a Constitutional system like square pegs through round holes.

I don't have any loved ones working with the National Right to Life organization. I'm not sure that if I knew everything they did - and how they did it - I would affirm it all, but I know they've been diligent servants on this issue longer than I've been alive. If that makes National Right to Life too out of touch with how to get legislation done in Washington, then somebody besides short-term-thinking rogue pro-lifers needs to prove it.

Christ wants unborn lives protected even more than we do. He also wants us to live in peace with each other. As long as legitimate efforts at overturning Roe v. Wade on the federal level are proceeding, what right do we have at causing dissension over something that stands an overwhelming chance of not working in the long run?

Some rogue pro-lifers would probably counter that in order to capitalize on that small chance of the Supreme Court tightening access to abortions, we need to pray our socks off for the Lord to make that happen. Yet I ask you: do you think believers haven't already been praying their socks off for the sake of the unborn at the hands of Roe v. Wade? Why do you think the Lord hasn't already answered those prayers? What makes attempts at undermining years of diligent legal maneuvering a more righteous prayer request than those diligent legal maneuverings you're trying to undermine?

Might we need to remind ourselves Whose battle this is? God knows the heart within each one of us. He knows the hearts of those desiring to protect the unborn through prudent application of the law, and He knows the hearts of those desiring to protect the unborn through reckless applications of legal interpretations. The former appear to have faith that God is in control, while the latter appear to have faith that God can fix their mistakes.

Trouble is, although God always forgives us, He doesn't always fix our mistakes so that we don't have to live with the consequences. If the consequence of poorly-crafted attempts at subverting Roe v. Wade end up backfiring in the Supreme Court, do we really want to live with those consequences?

For that matter, could the unborn?
_____

Facing the Monster of Abuse

2011-12-02T11:47:00.001-06:00

If it were easy, we'd have figured out how to do it by now.

Determining the legitimacy of child abuse accusations.

Proving guilt or innocence of the accused. And indeed, preventing child abuse in the first place.

Ever since the explosive charges against Jerry Sandusky first crashed onto the national stage from idyllic State College, Pennsylvania, Americans have been forced to acknowledge things that we'd just as soon not: not only do sexual predators exist, but we don't deal with their existence well at all.

Until Sandusky is tried in a court of law, we won't know if a jury will find him guilty or innocent. Notice, I didn't say a trial would tell us whether, in fact, Sandusky is guilty or innocent. Most of us are jaded enough by trials gone wrong to know that unless a smoking gun can be found to irrefutably prove things one way or the other, suspicion will forever haunt Sandusky. Or maybe even his accusers.

Granted, right now, things don't look good for his ever being able to convince all of us that he's utterly guiltless of the charges against him. Enough circumstantial evidence and eyewitness accounts have already been revealed to pretty much seal his fate, not only in the court of public opinion, but with his employer, his longtime boss (who's also lost his job), and the legions of Penn State alumni and fans whose continued support of the school is in doubt.

What's the Distance between Penn State and Syracuse?

Fast forward a few weeks from when the Sandusky scandal first broke, and old allegations of child sexual abuse returned to rock the prestigious hilltop campus of Syracuse University in New York State. It wasn't football this time, however, but Syracuse's storied basketball program, and its long-time assistant coach, Bernie Fine, at the center of the storm.

Back in 2002, Fine had been accused of child abuse by a former lodger in his home who claimed Fine had molested him when he was a teenager. The accuser, now an adult, went to the Syracuse police with his claims, but the police, in what has become a small scandal of its own in the Syracuse area, apparently dropped the ball on investigating the allegations.

Fine's accuser then approached the Post-Standard, central New York State's regional newspaper, with an audiotape ostensibly containing a recording of Fine's wife on a telephone call in which she alluded to her husband's sexual appetite for boys and men.

After reviewing the audiotape and attempting to independently determine its veracity, the Post-Standard decided not to go public with the accuser's claim. So in 2003, he went to ESPN with his audiotape, and ESPN reached the same conclusion as the Post-Standard. It was a classic case of unsolicited evidence failing to meet a sufficient level of proof, especially as Mrs. Fine, when contacted for her version of events, protested that the accuser could have spliced together snippets of various telephone calls to create an allusion of reality contrary to the actual content of each phone call.

In other words, it was a typical he-said/she-said conundrum.

Might the Syracuse police department, the Post-Standard, and ESPN all have decided to not pursue the allegations because of who Bernie Fine was? Perhaps the credibility of the accuser also played into their decision, since he was from a troubled home and had been living voluntarily in the Fine's basement as a babysitter for their young children. Oh, and there was a question of several thousand dollars the Fines had either loaned or given to the accuser that hadn't been repaid. Was that hush money, or was the accuser trying to get out of a debt?

We don't know. The police raided the Fine family's home last weekend after another man came forward, claiming to have also been victimized by Fine when he was a child. Unfortunately, the new accuser has his own criminal problems in Maine, where a teenager has accused him of molestation. So it looks like we'll have to wait until everybody gets under oath in a courtroom for the truth to - hopefully - be proven.

Standing for the Victim

All this to say that even when it looks like a child predator gets outed, it's rarely a smooth case of guilt and innocence or crime and punishment. For Sandusky, if the eyewitness account from one of his own staffmembers holds up under further scrutiny, the accusations against him will certainly be seen to have more integrity than Fine's accusers currently possess. Which only makes the prospect of reporting the perpetrator of child abuse that much more frightening a prospect for the victim, since perhaps moreso than most other crimes, deceit and background baggage can quickly gum up the wheels of justice.

Which, of course, is a major part of the child abuse problem we have here in the United States. Perpetrators know that they have a good chance of explaining their way out of any allegations, particularly if, as is suspected in the latest accusation against Fine, your accuser becomes emotionally scarred by the abuse and ends up committing his own antisocial behavior. Continuing the cycle that nobody seems capable of stopping.

Indeed, who knows but whether Sandusky and Fine were themselves victims of abuse when they were children? That's pure speculation on my part, of course, and even if true, cannot ever be an excuse. But at least it could be an explanation. And perhaps even some glimmer of hope if we're ever to stem the tide against child abuse. Because if we better learn those patterns which contribute to the crime, we might be able to intercept those patterns and keep them from replicating.

A friend of mine, J.C. Derrick, recently wrote an op-ed piece for the Washington Post about his own history as a victim of child abuse. At first, he'd kept silent about the abuse for 15 years, only then to confide in a close circle of relatives and friends, otherwise keeping it all a secret. Until now.

Derrick's abuser had passed away, as had the statute of limitations, before he told his parents. So there was nothing criminally to be pursued even after he broke his silence to them. But as the Sandusky scandal continued to rage last month, Derrick felt he could no longer keep what had happened to him - and how he felt about having to quietly endure the public's distorted reaction to Penn State's fiasco - bottled up any longer.

After all, Derrick thought to himself, HE wasn't the criminal. He hadn't done anything wrong. He was just a kid, way back then. A child; somebody his abuser - not only as an adult, but especially as a family member - should have been protecting.

So he told his story to none other than one of the world's most prestigious and widely-read newspapers. I guess if you've decided to finally tell your story to a wide audience, that's an effective way to do it!

Walk This Way

Obviously, not every victim of child abuse has that opportunity. But my friend took a crucial step in combating child abuse: he told his story. Not for money, or fame, or to make his family proud of him. Indeed, he worried about how friends would feel about learning such a major fact of his life from the newspaper.

He knows the stigma victims of sexual abuse - whether it took place when they were a child or an adult - endure in our sex-obsessed society. So many aspects of the covenant of marriage - of which sex was originally intended to play a supporting (not central) role - have already been perverted in our culture. Many of us even let the most fleeting of ignoble thoughts cross our minds when we learn that someone we know was sexually abused. Might they have been obsessed with sex themselves to the point of misconstruing what they say happened to them?

Skepticism. Wariness. And maybe even a suspension of credibility. Not for the alleged perpetrator. But the victim. What is the extent to which modern America's fascination with sex - even to the point of our being unaware of how fascinated we are with it - twists the very responses we need to extend towards victims of child abuse?

See? It's not an easy question to answer. None of the questions about child abuse are easy.

But should that be our excuse for letting this current wave of attention to the matter fade into obscurity? Inevitably, the public's disdain for the subject will outweigh its curiousness about the present allegations, and it will settle back into the abyss of our cultural dialog until the next spectacular scandal erupts.

A scandal that might have been prevented if we seize the day and linger over the things we could be doing now to help end child abuse.

My friend J.C. believes talking about it is a step in the right direction. He's also told me that he'd like to see every case documented in a standardized fashion, so that notes can be more methodically compared in terms of developing techniques to help thwart the most common predatory tactics.

Not a quick fix, of course, but does it sound like it's worth a try?

Good. Let's keep walking. And talking.
_____

Which Rich Tax Tack?

2011-12-01T11:08:00.001-06:00

He may be one of the richest guys you've never heard of.

Nick Hanauer earned over $6 billion when he sold one of his start-up tech firms to Microsoft in 2007. He's a venture capitalist in Seattle who's co-founded the True Patriot Network with Eric Liu, a former speechwriter for President Bill Clinton.

It's easy for conservatives to write off True Patriot Network and its "progressive patriotism" shtick as a liberal think tank in right-wing clothing. But having Hanauer write an op-ed piece for the strictly-business Bloomberg.com should be compelling, if for nothing else but the sheer irony.

After all, Hanauer writes a provocative commentary in the official blue-blood One Percenter's online stock market bible eliciting an appeal to the masses for raising taxes on Bloomberg's readership base. His curious assertion is that America's One Percenters aren't as good at creating jobs as our middle class is. In other words, it's not the millionaires who deserve tax breaks, but the rest of us, since we're the ones upon whom our economy lives or dies.

It's All in the Math

Consider, he suggests, the storied purchasing power we like to imagine One Percenters enjoy. Apart from the large homes and private planes rich people buy, most of them don't contribute much more to our economy than average folks. Mostly because there are much fewer of them than there are of us.

Think of it as a matter of volume spending. When the rich exercise their lavish purchasing power on a $2,000 suit while the rest of us can only spend $400, their ability to do so is actually less significant than when many more poorer Americans spend less money individually purchasing more suits collectively.

Which benefits America most: when one person buys a $5 million house, or when 100,000 people each purchase a $120,000 house? Or, when one rich person spends $100,000 on a car, isn't that less important to our economy than when 100,000 middle class drivers spend $25,000?

To the extent that America's consumer-driven society needs people with spending power, logic dictates that having more people with enough to afford a satisfactory standard of living is better than having only a few people being able to afford a luxurious lifestyle.

Where Do Jobs Come From?

Which means that for a middle class to flourish in the United States, middle class people need lots of jobs. Which is where many Republicans claim that taxing the rich disproportionately will cost us the very jobs we need. But, as Hanauer asks, does taxing the wealthy automatically mean that employment rates suffer?

When it comes to creating companies that employ people, Hanauer points out that oftentimes, entrepreneurs use other peoples' money do to that. Bank loans, venture capital - which is what he himself does now - and even government loans provide the bulk of start-up capital or long-term financing that pays salaries, secures raw materials, keeps the lights on, and acquires updated technology.

Eventually, of course, an enterprise needs to start making money so it can pay off its debts, stash away reserves in case of an emergency, develop new products, and grow. In other words, everything that was happening before income taxes were lowered for the rich starting back in the 1960's. According to Hanauer, anyway.

Rich people rarely use their own money to hire people, other than perhaps their household staff. Besides, most hiring is done by corporations these days, not individuals, so where's the drastic economic impact on individual executives?

In other words, might the scenario of higher taxes decimating employment be more of a Republican myth than economic certainty? Hanauer thinks so. And frankly, I tend to agree with him.

In the past, I've argued that our middle class has become a marginalized asset, not only by the rich, but by many conservative middle class voters who apparently view themselves with the same contempt as their economic betters.

Overlooking the Obvious

But that's about as far as I think I can go with Hanauer's ideology. Because although he makes a beguiling analysis of economic forces at work between the classes, he fails to recognize one key aspect of conservative conviction.

The government, to which taxes are paid, is not the answer to all our problems. In fact, oftentimes, it is the problem.

Raising taxes on anybody - rich, middle-income, or poor - isn't a good way to fix what's currently wrong with America's economy. Doing so fails to address some fundamental problems with government itself.

We have a bloated bureaucracy which wastes taxpayer dollars. We have a terrifying debt crisis that grows worse by the minute. We have entitlement programs that, in and of themselves, are well-meaning, but are woefully fraught with corruption, mismanagement, and outright failure. We have a needlessly complex tax code, insufferable regulations, and entrenched redundancies, all of which are being managed by a political coterie of duplicitous micromanagers more concerned with re-election than stewardship of our nation's resources.

Resources which include not only its revenue, but the people who provide the revenue. No matter their income.

Neither am I convinced that disproportionately high taxes on a certain class of taxpayer is fair. Just as I wouldn't want middle-income earners shouldering an unfair tax burden, I don't think we should expect the rich to do so just because they could more readily afford it. Taxation shouldn't be a penalty for wealth, no matter how little or much of it you have. Instead, taxation should serve as the basic mechanism by which government collects the minimum it needs to fund the services most of its citizens consider essential.

Therefore, we should not be talking about raising taxes just for the sake of raising taxes. Nor should we talk about raising taxes on anybody before we address the flagrant waste taking place in our government bureaucracy.

If, after we've weeded out the excesses in our federal, state, and local bureaucracies, we still need to raise revenue to pay off our staggering national debt, then maybe we can look at taxing top income earners at a greater rate than the rest of us. After all, several of them have already asked us to.

A Conservative Pipes Himself Aboard

But even so, on this same day the liberal Hanauer has written on conservative Bloomberg.com about taxing the rich, conservative Republican Tom Coburn has written on liberal CNN.com about stripping the rich of their ludicrous tax breaks.

In his equally provocative editorial for CNN entitled "End Welfare for the Wealthy," Coburn blasts his peers in Congress for being unwilling to strip $30 billion in perks such as interest deductions for luxury yachts and mansion remodeling from the tax code.

Coburn writes, "it's hard to understand how limiting the mortgage interest deductions for yachts will hurt working families. Defending spending in the tax code is not conservative. Providing tax earmarks and deductions to millionaires is a tax increase on everyone who doesn't receive the benefit."

Now, speaking as somebody with relatives in job-starved Maine, where companies which construct luxury yachts provide desperately-needed work, I can kinda see where somebody from land-locked Oklahoma wouldn't understand how tax subsidies benefit the middle class. But will rich people stop buying multi-million-dollar watercraft simply by losing its tax benefit? Owning trophy boats is a status thing that rich people use to determine their pecking order in their stratified world. In fact, I'm sure that those same folks could use the amount of money they pay in taxes each year as yet another calculation for their standing in the social register.

Fairness or Money?

At the end of the day, however, none of this is about money. At least, it shouldn't be. It should be about what's equitable. Unfortunately, money controls American policy more than fairness does. Especially when it comes to taxes.

The time may have arrived for middle-income conservatives to take stock of how much longer we can afford to be taken advantage of, by both abusers of our entitlement programs, and by One Percenters who think they can scare us by threatening to shut down even more jobs if their taxes get raised.

In capitalism, demand for products should stimulate job growth. Not whether the rich think they're being taxed to death. Otherwise, wouldn't we have an economy in which the rich give us work only because they can afford to? What kind of capitalism would that be?

Where's the innovation? Where's the national pride? If it's come to blaming our economic woes on taxes the rich are or aren't paying, then what does that say about how spoiled we've become? All of us?

Maybe that's why I get a bit intrigued when One Percenters like Nick Hanauer say they should be paying higher taxes because they need a viable middle class.

Sure, he can talk, since he's got his six billion stashed away now and he's set for life. Financially, at least. Still, good for him, I say. So why do some conservatives want me to feel guilty about wanting to be able to survive on a fraction of such wealth?

I don't get it. Unfortunately, if they have their way, I probably never will!
_____

Cain Proves Why Ethics Still Matter

2011-11-30T15:38:00.001-06:00

He could have held out for Vice President.

Granted, nobody who embarks upon a campaign for United States President has their sights on landing the Number Two spot on the ticket.

But Herman Cain could have gone a lot farther in his campaign than where he'll likely end up: in the dump.

Earlier this week, yet another woman came forward with claims of sexual promiscuity on Cain's part; this time, in the form of a 13-year extramarital affair. This latest accuser says she's publicizing her story now because a third party threatened to go public with their secret. Cain's alleged mistress would have us believe that she has nothing to gain by broadcasting her identity as a woman whose repute is beyond something I care to publish on my blog. And she's probably right. If not about the former, then at least about the latter.

By now, however, the she-said he-said in Cain's campaign has become a mute point. Despite his desperate whining that political foes are sabotaging his campaign, does it matter anymore if Cain is right or not? Haven't too many women come forward, ostensibly putting their own self-respect on the line, for some thread of truth to not exist between their accusations? For his part, simply denying they're all liars doesn't work when you're running for an elected office as prestigious as President of the United States.

Cain apparently hasn't been able to come up with any proof of his innocence. He hasn't furnished any evidence that might shed the faintest of credibility on his strenuous denials. Nor has his wife characterized the typical spouse who's as clueless as Cain claims to be about all these claims. Unless she's been a complete and utter basket case behind closed doors, his wife has been remarkably stoic to apparently endure these allegations against her husband and her marriage with only the quiet chagrin she's displayed. Or maybe she's simply tired of yet another rumor to add to what she's already managed to learn about her husband's skirt-chasing. Whether any of that, over the years, has been proven false or not.

And why Herman Cain anyway? Suppose he's right that his political enemies are out for blood. Why attack the first black Republican to successfully mount a presidential campaign? If it was racism, aren't there more subtle ways to do it? After all, the Republican Party isn't exactly colorblind, but it's not stupid, either. He-said she-said dilemmas always leave the door open for skepticism, whereas to destroy somebody's political career, and commit the deceit and fraud to do it, wouldn't you want something far more fool-proof and decisive than some women claiming marital infidelity?

Undoubtedly, with his blunt style and unconventional pedigree - a conservative black pizza king from Atlanta? - he not the favorite of the Republican elite. At least, not to head the ticket against Barack Obama.

But he might have been a useful Veep choice, considering how many suburban middle-class blacks are becoming disillusioned with liberal Democratic policies, and the fact that Cain is enough of a political outsider to attract the Tea Party vote.

The Allegations Aren't Cain's Main Problem

Alas, we'll never know whether any of this could have been. Because as I pointed out early on when the first of these accusations surfaced, Cain blew his chance at salvaging any credibility in this race.

It was not his denial of the sexual abuse claims that initially tripped his campaign. It wasn't even the credibility of the women who were making the claims. It was Cain himself, who, upon first hearing reporters questions him on the allegations, pretended to never have been accused.

That charade, more than any of the allegations, made everything else he said unreliable.

As the press kept wheedling away at him, Cain finally recalled that yes, there'd been some accusations, but one of them had been settled out of court. Unfortunately, that was too little, too late - even if it was true.

It should be Ethics 101. What Cain should have done was, upon initially announcing his candidacy for President, cut the media off at the pass by bluntly and plainly informing them that yes, in his past, there were two women who had misinterpreted some of his gestures and folksiness, and some lawyers had to come in and sort things out. No, he'd never had sex with any of them; no, he'd never wanted to have sex with any of them; they were just honest mistakes on his part, being a friendly, sincere, fun-loving kinda guy.

If the media had sat there during his press conference and heard him aw-shucks his version of those events, they would have been deprived of any malicious ammunition that Cain has since accused them of wielding. As I've said before, you never want to leave something for the media to find later on. If they discover anything like a secret past, particularly if it involved sex, it's like giving candy to ADHD kids. Especially if you are innocent of the charges that could be used to malign your integrity.

But Cain didn't do that. He apparently hoped none of this would come out in the wash, that somehow even being accused of something he never did would never come up during the world's most closely-watched political race.

In fact, that's why Cain isn't presidential material. He didn't take the race seriously enough to consider what the press wants to cover in the 21st Century. People don't really care that you managed to salvage Godfather's Pizza. Most of them probably don't really even care that you're black. Voters want integrity, now so more than ever. But they love even the hint of scandal. Yet by admitting any past indiscretions, if there were any, and any claims of abuse, even they were false, that hint of a scandal would have hung in the public's consciousness for about three seconds. Until the next politician made a far more public blunder, like Rick Perry's been doing for weeks now.

Cain could have neutered the press and even his campaign rivals if he'd just told the truth from the beginning. If either the press or his political rivals brought up the subject, he would be in the position to simply admonish them with "I've already told you that." And that would have been that.

Yet Another Teachable Moment in Politics

Please understand: This is not an exercise in kicking a guy when he's down, or playing an easy blame game. Whether he'd guilty of the sexual allegations against him is one thing. But Cain is incontrovertibly guilty of not manning-up to things he's been accused of, and not allowing those things to be dealt with honestly and fairly as he embarks on a mission of this magnitude. He's certainly not had the guts to take the offensive. Marital infidelity is one thing, but pretending it never took place when pointedly asked about it only makes things worse. Especially if you're innocent of the original charges. Why is that so hard for many people to see?

Perhaps it's because personal ethics have become such a muddled thing these days. People assume ethics are more subjective than objective, so they try and pick and choose those errors or sins that are worse than others. Forgetting, of course, that all sin is evil in God's eyes.

The voting public may be more gracious than public figures assume they'd be to a person who admits remorsefully to certain sins and indiscretions. Even our legal code views such things as lying under oath about sexual infidelity more grievous than the infidelity itself. But it's all equal to God. Equally bad.

So when we insist on pretending that some things are worse than others, especially if we have skeletons in our closets, and particularly if we're vying for a public office that we know will be excruciatingly scrutinized, trying to be open and honest about it all might be a good step in righting any wrongs we might have done, or further taking ownership of our own innocence.

True, you still might not get the top job. But you won't automatically disqualify yourself from the next best thing.
_____

Who's Flying This Plane?

2011-11-29T12:06:00.001-06:00

Thud.

That's the unfortunate sound of the world's last legacy airline filing for bankruptcy. And the door finally closing on whatever scraps were left of flight's golden age.

Delta, Continental, United, TWA, Northwest, PanAm... they've already been through the economic blender that has been deregulation, 9/11, exorbitant fuel costs, and intransigent unions. Today, after years of struggling against the tide, it is American Airlines' turn.

One of the world's first airlines. And the first to glamorize flight with luxury airport clubs, the first to computerize their ticketing, the first to offer flyer rewards, and the last to pretend that flying today is as enjoyable as it was back in the 1960's.

Technically, American's parent company, AMR, is the entity filing for bankruptcy, an eventuality about which experts have been speculating for months, if not years. Somehow, as all of the other major traditional airlines crashed onto the runway of brittle economics and either went out of business, merged, or patched themselves up for the new reality of flight in the 21st Century, American kept dodging the bankruptcy bullet.

Which bullet finally brought American to its knees is presently up for debate: was it the unions for pilots and flight attendants, which have fought with management for years over new contracts? Was it the oil industry's crafty toying with energy prices that neither the automotive nor airline industries could tame? Was it the hub-and-spoke business model that American had pioneered, and had been reluctant to significantly modify? Was it lingering issues from its rocky merger with TWA shortly before 9/11? Was it simply the ability of smaller, more nimble airlines like Southwest and JetBlue to react more efficiently as incessant waves of economic instability wafted through the industry? Or, as is most likely, was it a combination of all these factors which created a downdraft too powerful for American to remain aloft?

Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection will give the still-mighty airline some time to consider how much each of these factors influenced today's decision. Indeed, American's board and executives have undoubtedly been analyzing all of these issues for the past several years as they've staved off bankruptcy time and again. Yet to what extent will these executives at American be willing to consider the effect their own nicely-padded salaries and bonuses have played into today's announcement?

Not the actual dollar amounts for these salaries and bonuses, but the mentality with which these rewards were paid.

Blame the unions for waging a bitter public relations war over their contracts if you like, but corporate has never been able to mount a convincing campaign to prove that the good-will used to secure hefty employee concessions after the trauma of 9/11, when two American flights were lost, wasn't also destroyed by subsequent executive rewards. Substantial pay and benefits reductions were agreed upon by all of the unions at American, with the understanding - however unofficial - that as profitability returned, so would those things lost to concessions. Instead, as flashes of profitability did indeed flicker across AMR's bottom line for a few budget quarters, it was the suits in corporate that got the rewards, not the rank and file workers.

Granted, American has fewer executives to reward than flight attendants and pilots, but considering that many of the corporate personnel who received handsome financial upgrades were already being paid far more than some senior pilots, the inequity wasn't really rationalized very well.

Something about the price of good corporate talent being far more expensive than retaining good pilots. At least that's how it sounded. As if American Airlines was all about corporate strategy, instead of flying planes.

Think about it: Having MBA's without pilots licenses claiming that good talent costs a lot of money doesn't fly when the people responsible for literally keeping your customers alive have to undergo rigorous testing and training multiple times throughout their careers. And every flight they pilot spans the gap between profit and loss for any airline.

After all, when was the last time an airline accountant or sales executive avoided a midair crash, saving hundreds of lives? When was the last time a senior analyst had to land a plane during a blizzard? How many senior vice presidents can control a plane after a bird has flown into one of its engines?

American Airlines employs an estimated 12,000 pilots, many of whom earn over $100,000 per year, making this group of employees one of company's most significant cost factors. And it's been argued that American's pilots are among the best-paid in the entire industry. Indeed, it's hard to claim that these professionals are under-paid.

But that's not really the point, is it?

Corporate America, not just American Airlines, but across the board, has become awash in excessive executive compensation. Warren Buffett, the spectacularly successful investor, has complained for years that salaries, perks, and golden parachutes for America's corporate elite defy economic logic. At American, however, the pilots have been particularly aggrieved by corporate's apparently willful abrogation of good faith after post-9/11 cost-cutting. Do people who spend their days in meetings and analyzing data deserve far more compensation than the people who literally keep thousands of passengers from dying every single day?

It's this apparent discrediting of whatever good-will AMR tried to present during union negotiations that likely contributed to the persistent chill that has choked any possibilities of agreements between labor and management at American. That's not to say that union leaders have been model employees during these years of negotiations, or that they've demonstrated good reasoning skills. But by falling into the tired old trap of labor-management distrust to retain, ostensibly, a coterie of high-priced back-office talent has obviously hurt the airline.

By way of a meager defense, it's not exactly AMR's fault that our economy's corporate narcissism favors pedigreed executives with rewards incommensurate with their individual contributions to the organization. Most bonuses are awarded based on calculations of a company's worth which, while subscribing to shrewd metrics of value, are still more arbitrary than fact. After all, the stock market rewards assumptions, not historic data. No single corporation - or industry - will be able to change that, even as stocks continue losing their mainstream allure.

Meanwhile, although pilots do have a highly personalized incentive to get their planes from airport to airport in one piece every day - namely, their own lives - the mere mention of Captain Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger, "the Hero of the Hudson," should make the board of any airline sit up and reconsider their own worth relative to the people sitting in their cockpits.

Not that being more conciliatory towards their pilots could have saved American Airlines from bankruptcy today. But it could have resolved one particularly onerous piece of their financial puzzle based solely on respecting the responsibility with which the company vests each of their pilots.

Respect for responsibility should still go a long way in our society. Today's bankruptcy announcement and this one factor in that announcement could serve as a microcosm of corporate greed and its rampant deconstruction of our nation's economy these days. Not that I'm naive enough to hope, however. What's more likely is that corporate America is already salivating over whatever spoils it might be able to pick from American's carcass.

Yes, our airline industry faces far more daunting challenges than pilot pay and executive compensation. But I've said it before, and I'll say it again: on those rare times when I fly, I want my pilots happy. Oddly enough, though, I really don't care how happy the executives at their airline feel. I suspect most of the flying public who wants to get home safely feel the same way.

That perspective may not win airlines many friends on Wall Street or in corporate boardrooms.

But I think the rest of us can live with that.
_____

Disclaimer: I am not a relative of a commercial airline pilot.

Shall the Circle be Unbroken?

2011-11-28T17:45:00.001-06:00

So much for the first Monday of Advent this year.

I had hung our usual Christmas wreaths on our house last Friday. One on the front door, one on the brick post between the garage doors, and a big one - about five feet wide - between two front windows. The big one has about 400 white lights on it that look elegant at night.

Except that as I drove away to a dinner party Saturday evening, I noticed that one section of the lights on the big wreath were off. Creating a black, gaping chunk in the circle of elegant white dots, like an incomplete "G".

Rats!

So this morning, assuming the fix would be as easy as replacing a burned-out bulb, I went out with some spares and found what I believed to be the miscreant bulb. And replaced it.

No good. Half of the strand still wouldn't light.

Two hours later, and about a dozen of those itty-bitty fuses that I'd popped in the process, I managed to get the lights working... as much as they had been before I started my little project. Along the way, I'd managed to short out half of the wreath, and had to figure out what fuses I'd blown where to get back to the functionality I had two hours earlier.

I'd also cut wires around what I refused to admit might not even be the miscreant bulb - could some other short somewhere be the culprit? - and spliced together the wires in several combinations before managing to find something that wouldn't pop even more fuses. In retrospect, I suppose I should be grateful that along the way, I didn't take my neighborhood off the grid for a little while, although I did touch live wires more often than was probably good for me.

But hey - they were only little jolts.

So after two hours and only just managing to salvage the project to the point where I'd begun, with only the short section not working, I figured that my only available option would be to unwind the section of lights from the wreath, buy a new strand at the hardware store, and replace the lights.

Except that when I started unwinding the existing strand, I discovered that little green clips were holding each light in place. Did I mention that this wreath was pre-lit, or pre-strung, or whatever they call it? Back when I'd been employed, several years ago, I'd paid about $100 for this pre-lit wreath, figuring it would save all the hassle of trying to string lights on a large wreath by hand. Considering how planned obsolescence is built into everything these days, maybe the several years we've enjoyed this wreath has been longer than its manufacturers had hoped it would last anyway.

But getting back to those little green clips. Each one was doing its noble job exceptionally well - keeping the wires for each light tightly bound to its fake evergreen branch. Even though they were plastic, they were surprisingly sturdy, and before long, I realized I was stripping most of the flimsy, fire-retardant evergreen leaves off of the branches as I wrestled with removing the clips.

Who'd have thought de-lighting a wreath would be so destructive a process?

I ended up getting my clippers and snipping the electric wires around those lights I'd been working on, so as to minimize the overall damage to the wreath. Forget the lights, I figured; we'll save money on electricity, and the wreath can still look nice for anybody who sees it during the day.

Plus, my father has never liked Christmas lights on houses. Reminds him too much of tacky Coney Island, he says. And quite frankly, from my many memories of Christmases spent in Brooklyn, I know what he's referring to. Row houses boasting garish displays of blinking lights and cheap plastic illuminated ornaments in each window would line the streets, assaulting passers-by with a dizzying spectacle reminiscent of the midway at Coney Island or even Times Square.

Not that my one large wreath could mimic those gaudy Brooklyn displays. In fact, compared with the light displays some people here in Arlington pay professionals to install each Christmas, it could almost be considered insignificant. So, I guess this year, when darkness falls each evening, and my three wreaths become shrouded by night, passersby won't have a clue that they even exist.

That's not the worst thing in the world, is it? At least, with all the lights off, the circle is unbroken.

I was never interested in giving the legendary Clark Griswold any competition anyway.
_____

Tuesday Update: A neighbor with whom I shared my plight took it upon herself to purchase some new strands of white lights for me when she was at a hardware store last night! So yes, the circle will be unbroken yet again.

Amount Isn't Key in Income Inequity

2011-11-23T16:59:00.001-06:00

Class warfare is a bad thing.

So is wealth redistribution.

I get that.

But when I hear some conservative pundits talk about these issues, particularly regarding income inequity, why do they sound threatened by America's middle class?

In his op-ed today on FoxNews.com, Michael Goodwin of the New York Post gives a curiously half-hearted stab at validating the existence of income inequality in the United States.

He allows that income inequality "is real, and growing." And that our middle class "is losing ground and deserves help."

But he doesn't seem to realize that a vibrant middle class doesn't mean everybody becomes rich. In an economy, isn't the percentage of folks in the lower, middle, and upper brackets just as important as the dollar amount that puts them there? And it's the shrinking of the percentage amount occupied by middle income Americans that's a problem. Right? Because something's happening to deplete the middle class, and we're the people who provide the economic and political stability for our country.

Yet talking about it seems to make conservatives uneasy. And not entirely logical.

Asking the Right Question

Goodwin quotes economist David Malpass as questioning "whether our goal as a society should be higher incomes for all, or less disparity between incomes.”

But is that really the question? In a healthy economy, a rising tide of incomes lift all boats. At least, all the boats of people willing to work for their income. Malpass assumes this to be the preferred scenario, and I'd agree with him.

Yet that's not what's been happening, is it? Instead, the wealthy have been increasing their net worth by laying off the middle class to save costs. They haven't been inventing new products or refining old ideas. Unemployment is stubbornly high and incomes for those who still have jobs have been sinking relative to the cost of living. Goodwin claims that "income equalizers are pitting Americans against each other," which may be true of some liberal politicians. However, through their machinations of the employment sector, haven't the high-income-earners already been pitting themselves against the middle and lower classes? Haven't they already been "redistributing wealth," not by taxation, but their own cutthroat business practices?

I am not opposed to wealth, and I don't think many other Americans are, either, yet Goodwin seems to assume otherwise. Like many people of both conservative and liberal stripes, he views this issue through a lens of dollar figures, instead of the methods people use to acquire their wealth. Wealth in and of itself is not a bad thing, but how it is acquired can be. And it certainly appears as though the wealth America's top income earners have amassed has come at the expense of the middle class.

Goodwin's mistake is in assuming that the inverse of imbalanced income can only be a "what's mine is mine, and what's yours is mine" mentality, instead of "income equity," meaning income that has been earned equitably.

Many conservatives think we should all be clawing our way up career ladders and finding our rewards in the affluence which comes with mastering capitalism. But that scenario can't possibly work in capitalism, can it? Not everybody can get the top job in a capitalist system, can they? Otherwise, it wouldn't be the top job. Not everybody can be senior management, either. If everybody was a manager, who'd get the work done? If everybody was out inventing something, who'd build it? If everybody was working on Wall Street, who'd fix dinner?

We're not all going to be rich. Otherwise, with everybody worth roughly the same amount, wouldn't that look more like Communism?

Capitalism depends on a stratification of labor, doesn't it? Which means a stratification in incomes based on the importance of various jobs to the overall economy. It's not an inherently bad system, as long as people get paid what they're worth. And in theory, Goodwin probably would have no argument with that logic.

Ask "How?" Not "How Much?"

But being paid what they're worth is all most middle class Americans want. They know they're not running a multi-billion-dollar corporation, but they're putting in enough energy and sweat equity to be treated better than they've been treated lately in our economy. They know waste needs to be trimmed so that profits can be plowed into more research and development to grow their company, but that's not what's happening.

When investors swoop in and clean up after an acquisition followed by massive layoffs, how does that help the overall economy of the United States? Doesn't it put more people out of work, which means payroll dollars - and taxes - are being drained from the nation's coffers? Since so many wealthy Americans have developed a hoarding mentality, instead of a long-range industrial growth strategy for their money, what opportunities are being created for the masses in the middle class to launch their own enterprises?

Chances are, many of the people being laid off in corporate mergers and downsizings are smart enough to launch their own companies if they had the capital to do so. But who's going to give them the money to do that, since these laid-off employees could become viable competitors to the companies that dismissed them? Wealth can certainly survive better without competition, but can wealth be created in a vacuum?

Maybe Goodwin prefers letting the wealthy suck up everybody else's wealth through their housekeeper's vacuum.

But is that good for America's long-term economic health? Of course not, for just the same reason redistributing wealth via Robin-Hood style taxes wouldn't. Nor the Democrat's continued avoidance of sweeping welfare reforms to try and staunch the government-sponsored fallacy of generational poverty.

So, what reason is that? Quite simply, it matters how wealth is created. No matter what amount that wealth is. What processes have been allowed to exist - and even flourish - that may have disproportionately benefitted the wealthy at the expense of the lower classes? Can we trust money and our greed for it to provide the best determinant for our nation's future?

Remember, it's not whether everybody should have an equal income. It's whether everybody has an equal opportunity to enjoy "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

Happiness, in fact, that can't be bought.
_____