Me and Lili Von Shtupp Both

We're tired!

For almost a month, now, I've been working Sunday through Thursday, because of the sudden departure of my weekend auditor. Why change me from Monday through Friday? Because the Front Desk Manager - who is filling in for weekends - doesn't like to work alone at night. Fine. I'm a team player. I wasn't hired as management, I'm not salaried, I don't make managerial money, which she does, but that's fine.

But, in this economy, with people desperate for jobs, it's taking a month to find someone to work on the weekend? Really?!

Our choir director retired today and I couldn't even stick around after church for the reception/farewell party because I had to get home and get to sleep. And, of course, coming home after a social event, it takes hours - HOURS - to power down and sleep, so every Sunday gives me about 3 - 4 hours of sleep, which I then spend the rest of the week trying to make up, while - shock! - having to do all the same things anyone else who works a day shift has to do when they get home. Several men have applied. I'm the only man working here. One man was hired, then, when the General Manager - who constantly makes disparaging "jokes" about men - got involved he "just didn't work out." I keep being told how wary they are of women working alone at night. It's fine for me.

All this seem like a pattern to anyone?

Now, the best part: this coming week, they want me to work an extra shift because the Front Desk and General Managers are taking vacation time! While we are short-handed!

I'm going to do it because I need the money. And for one other reason: when the owner, who complains about unavoidable overtime of a whole 15 minutes or so a week, sees me getting 8 hrs of overtime, in addition to the extra eight hours of holiday pay for Labor Day, I bet we'll be able to get a weekend auditor PDQ.

If I had anything else to go to, I would.

Article on the New Rector

I don't read the local rag, so I didn't see this until today:


Youth Served at St. Patrick's - I think the article title alone can explain why I don't read the local paper.

So, Hate Me If You Want . . .

You'll be shocked, horrified, dismissive, perhaps feel smugly superior because of what I'm going to write here, but I have to get it out of my system, whether it's prophecy or poison.

It begins with evolution, and has the potential to spiral into a Nietzschean-Third-Reich nightmare. It may come from tiredness and a growing, and, I fear, terminal bitterness toward humanity and its inevitable destruction. It has elements of objective positivism, which makes me feel ill and dirty, because I loathe Ayn Rand and her attempt to codify adolescent selfishness into a philosophy.

Simply put, over the past 30 years of more-or-less attentive life, I've noticed a difference in people. I put this down to evolution. Some of us have been able to develop a broader, intuitive, and compassionately world-based vision, which eschews sectarianism, while not denying spirituality. We are of varying levels of intelligence, but all seem to be of a fairly high degree of creativity and vision. We tend to be called liberal - I prefer progressive.

Opposing us, calling themselves predominantly conservative, are those of a different evolutionary degree, stuck - by no fault of their own - in a view of the "mud" of the world, that life is nasty, brutish, and short and must be. Their view is that those who try to change the world for the better are trying to take something from them. In fact, it is a largely brutish and animalistic worldview predominant in sectarians and fundamentalists of all religions. Look at the past eight years of damage to a world super-power, selected and inflicted by the "people" themselves. Look at the present, with these people dashing themselves against the rocks to oppose universal healthcare, all on the basis of what, to any rational being, is a concoction of lies. This is not racial. Blacks, whites, orientals, latinos all fall into both levels of evolution. There are the twin poles of Desmond Tutu and Peter Akinola, Dalai Lama and Kim Jong Il, and on and on.

Evolution on the physical level is largely complete, at least at the level we can intellectually deal with. Mental and - for lack of a less nebulous term - spiritual evolution is next.

To state the unthinkable, we are the higher evolutionary level.

We don't like to think these things, much less say them. It's rude, it's exclusive, it's self-important. All these responses are part of the evolutionary development, but not all are useful in every situation. We have become surrounded by people whose view of the world is that it - and everyone in it - must be beaten into submission. They see no higher purpose or consciousness in others because they have none. They are an evolutionary dead end. They have prospered and expanded and become dominant because we, in our evolutionary development of compassion and non-violence, have allowed them to prosper and participate. This is not bad, but it has become unbalanced. We are in danger of being ridden right over. Many point to change, but this is an evolutionary knife-edge - we can easily be wiped out, and the violent mindset of those on the lower evolutionary edge makes that a very real threat. Evolution is growth and maturation; devolution is stagation and death. Mankind is in the balance.

South Carolina - too small to be a nation, too large to be an insane asylum

So, the "bishop" of South Carolina, Mark Lawrence, has decided to leave TEC without really leaving TEC (wink, wink, nudge, nudge).

THIS is why I've been saying we need to be willing to use the tool of excommunication. Now, because we are so weak and soft, there will be endless years of fighting and posturing, subterfuge and court politics which will carry harm and destruction into the generations to come - if there are any in such a profoundly indecisive institution as TEC.

8/11/09

Feeling sad, useless and poor, right now.

Sometimes, I feel it all winding down. Not a scary feeling, but grateful.

This Past Sunday

I was so wrapped up in my head that I forgot to report that this past Sunday, Fr. Jay officially took up his post as rector at St. Pat's!

The church was packed, and everything went quite smoothly during the service. Alison, Fr. Jay's wife, is a lovely, outgoing young lady.

I think the Weldons are going to work out quite well for us!

Reflecting Upon It - III

The third and fourth misconceptions are really the opposite side of the coin, one the inverse of the other.

Both come, hopefully enough, from a realization that whatever we are doing is clearly not working. The answers, though, are reactionary.

THE THIRD MISCONCEPTION

The only way we can save Christianity is by going back to the orthodoxy of the past!

This is obviously not true.

Why obvious?

If what we are doing is clearly not working, then, just as clearly, what we have done hasn't worked or we wouldn't have done something else. Don't believe me? The most conservative estimate puts Christianity - organized, institutionalized Christianity - at some 1,600 years of age. If it was working, we'd all be at Peace, or at least Christian, by now. Instead, we've had break after break, all very acrimonious and frequently bloody, rather than a wise tolerance and faith.

The past hasn't worked any better than the present, and it is both unwise and faithless to assume an end to revelation and guidance in the present age, as does our past-looking traditionalism. Indeed, the only "revelation" allowed in such a stagnant view is that which is absolutely verified by Scripture and Tradition, which is not revelation in any sense.

At the same time, ongoing revelation does not mean something "novel" or that God has "changed His mind," but that we are humble enough to realize that we - the corporate we all the way back to the original disciples and patriarchs of the OT - didn't comprehend completely.

THE FOURTH MISCONCEPTION

We have to abandon the past and create something entirely new!

While this seems, at first blush, a good idea, we can see that it's really just a repetition of the past. In fact, every schism or reformation or counter-reformation has been about "ditching the past." The result has been the same turmoil.

Humans crave entertainment and novelty. Mega-churches are able to mega-church because they offer novelty. When that wears off or is gotten with greater benefits at a lesser cost, the mega usually dies out.

Humans also crave being told what they want to hear, which is "Whatever you're doing right now, what you're comfortable with, that's just right!" Yet, we have evolved enough to have learned that such comfort is often not an indicator of growth or health. At the same time, the novelty - and yes, it is novelty - of fundamentalist puritanism makes the tragic error of overlooking actual harm and clinging to the "rule book" come hell or high water! Both are ways of finding that illusory comfort.

What is needed is work, and discernment. Which is why a truly effective church will always be a small one, because most people are going to be lured away by the easier lifestyle.

Between the two misconceptions, there lies the old thesis-antithesis-synthesis of Hegel (I think it was Hegel), but ours has to be something that is not automatic, a sort of autonomous function, but a sifting and discerning, both of past failures and successes and present demand and knowledge, enthused by an experimental, risk-allowing spirit.

Rather than thesis-antithesis-synthesis, we might think of a more active dynamic - from our perspective - of Adapt, Adopt and Improve.

Reflecting Upon It - II

As something of a corollary to the first,

THE SECOND MISCONCEPTION

Only one of us can possibly be right!

Again, no.

Life is expansion and contraction. To put it another way, Truth to a mind unready is as good as a lie.

There must be a place for those who cannot - simply cannot - move beyond a certain point in comfort level. The complexity of human nature gives us the many churches to accomplish this. There are places in which there is strict liturgical and dogmatic structure, a liberal dogma and complex liturgy, a free-form worship and strict dogma, etc. There are, also, areas in which dogma is strict or free, depending on the church; where there are significant differences from congregation to congregation in worship, or theology or both. Life is also complexity, diversity.

Death and stagnation - a mummified corpse - that's fairly simple and straightforward.

So, what can we do?

Though we are more doctrinaire, by nature, than the Buddhist religion, we can look to them for some example.

The most basic division, of which there are many, in Buddhism is between Hinayana and Mahayana. The "Little" or "Inferior" Vehicle and the "Great" or "Supreme" Vehicle. Obviously, the division had its contentiousness, as the polemic possibilities of the names imply, yet both schools still exist, and in harmony in many varying forms.

Simplifying it for Christian structure, Hinayana is "little" because it focuses on the Enlightenment/Salvation of the individual and transcendence, whereas Mahayana is "great" because is focuses on Universal Enlightenment/Salvation and immanence. NOTE: Again, this is meant to illuminate Christian constructs, not to comprehensively explain the two main schools of Buddhism.

We can, in this simplified model, see a direct, if imperfect, reflection of the two main divisions of Christianity. We complicate it with presenting issues that lead to division, but simply put, the division in Christianity is between those who (1) see the created Universe as fallen into darkness and irrevocably corrupted, necessitating a departure from the physical universe to find final happiness, which is necessarily an individual pursuit and (2) those who see the created Universe as tarnished and misguided, but inherently good as a Creation of God, and who believe the Kingdom of Heaven will come here, necessitating a group effort toward bringing that joy and fulfillment to all. The important point is, both groups have good basis for believing as they do and no more pressing evidence that they are completely right. I have been in both groups at various times of my life. It is a dichotomy in that, one cannot accept both utter fallenness and incurable ignorance and possible enlightenment and fulfillment in the same space. The harmony is that, both are apparently valid views and both provide a place for a particular way of interacting with our environment.

Avoiding blame or praise and forgiving my clumsy, often irreverent, expression, we see this in the differences between the evangelizing of both groups. The first group will seek to follow a set of pre- and proscriptions for life, viewing this life as sort of "the price of admission" to the Paradisal Afterlife. Part of that set of rules makes the spread of that salvation, hence the adherence to those rules, an important part of paying admission - thus, the almost-compulsive nature of the first group's insistence on following this or that set of laws and rules, perceived as aggressive and meddling, and their view of the second group as, perhaps, relativists and hedonists.

The second group sees growth and potential in this life and seeks God and fulfillment in God here. This group takes the concept of bringing the Kingdom as seriously as the first group does the concept of attaining the Kingdom. To this end, the second group focuses on ongoing revelation as a means to justice, on learning through experience as evidence of God, on personal conscience and societal concerns as evidence of Immanence and God's ongoing compassion and understanding. This group is often perceived as militant and altogether secular, while viewing the first group as rigidly, even wilfully and stupidly, doctrinaire, backwards and prejudiced.

The thing is, both are right in their own bailiwick and both are wrong. Both have failed and both have succeeded. There are good and bad in both.

Most importantly, both are necessary as there are, broadly, both types of people, and God informs both as both need.

Reflecting Upon It - I

I've really been trying to understand the divide in Christianity here, a "way forward" that is actually a way forward and not simply a way to establish a holding pattern.

Many workable ways have been suggested, but they all hinge on a peaceful coexistence which is simply not possible at this juncture. The blame is equally-distributed on both sides; whether we wish to see it or not, many on the progressive end of the pole are just as much committed to "Total Victory" as those on the conservative end. I've been perceived as one of those, because of my desire to excommunicate the far-right cheerleaders from TEC. This is not the case.

THE FIRST MISCONCEPTION

Dividing up into separate churches is bad!

No, it isn't.

It just isn't.

No one is dividing up the Body of Christ, as so many people graphically put it.

Despite the claims of the Orthodox or the Roman Catholic, no church is Church. We can excommunicate from an ecclesial body as discipline or to protect that body and its particular charism - usually a developed, rather than decided upon charism - but we can't "cast out" from the Church. The Church is the body of believers, doing their separate and communal -relatively-speaking - thing as God gives us to do. I may rail and rant against whomever I like, but only by destroying them and their God-given charism can I make a scar on the Body of Christ.

Remember, the Kingdom of Heaven is almost always compared in Jesus' parables with a growing thing. Thus, the Church is always a growing thing and never complete. There was one cell, then another, then another. We had been, during the Reformation particularly, in a cancerous state, not because of "cellular" proliferation, but because the "cells" were each trying to destroy one another. The race-memory of the horror of those days has led us to embrace a vision of a One World United Church conceived as a single ecclesial unit. The irony is that, as a result, the cancer's coming out of remission! This because we cannot be one unit without sacrificing all charism to a sort of bland, entirely-secular, entirely-ineffective structure. We are at war, in this misguided attempt at unification, because God won't let us homogenize into one thing. He has a function and plan that requires many doing many things. Why? You and I don't need to know, and cannot until it all comes together.

So, enough of this nonsense of all of us being of a piece "just like the good ol' days" before the Great Schism. It was never that way, and being that way is the disordered state. The order comes from each part of this Great, Growing, Increasingly-Complex Body of Christ doing its part, while allowing the others to do their own. We don't need to meddle in each others' internal functions, or "have our rightful say" about their way of doing things - the only "rightful" say comes from God.

Now, I'm aware that there are objections, "What about community? What about the 'family' of the Church? What about mutual accountability?"

Saying that these things are unanswered by separate structures is like saying there is no world community or economy or cooperation because we have different countries. There is no family of humanity because we are under different governments. We have no influence or accountability on any other nation.

Living things grow. Cells divide to do that.

Belated

I've been meaning to post this for a while, but forgot, and forgot, and forgot.

THE SLATE FOR THE CANDIDATES FOR BISHOP OF THE EPISCOPAL DIOCESE OF GEORGIA

Quite a rogues' gallery, isn't it?