2015 - The Christian Century
Transcription
2015 - The Christian Century
Biweekly $7.95 January 7, 2015 Thinking Critically. Living Faithfully. When a congregation dies Cosponsored by the CHRISTIAN CENTURY and the Wisconsin Council of Churches Join us for four and a half days of ecumenical worship, plenary presentations, discussions, spiritual renewal, and recreation in an idyllic setting off the coast of Door County, Wisconsin. WASHINGTON ISLAND FORUM June 22–26, 2015 Reappropriating the Word The Curse of Literacy: Most Christians in every age have either been unable to read scripture or have not had access to a Bible. Yet these people have much to teach us about scriptural literacy. with John Bell In this series of talks, John Bell will go beyond a Protestant preoccupation with “what the Bible really means,” focused on a “right answers” mentality. Bell will open up a more holistic appreciation for the Word of God that values its intentionally diverse character and is informed by his interactions with scripture in contexts of social deprivation. Registration: $299 John Bell, from Scotland, is a member of the Iona Community. He is a liturgist, preacher, and collector and composer of church music. His work takes him frequently to Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australia. He is well known in North America from numerous speaking tours and musical compositions published by GIA. Retell Me the Old, Old Story: Some of the most familiar biblical texts fail to excite, incite, or bless us because the way they’ve been commonly read and expounded owes much to the cultural norms of a previous era. Missing Women: Finding a monogamous Jewish patriarch requires almost as much work as finding a virtuous woman in the Hebrew scriptures. Why is this and can the situation be redeemed? The Importance of the Imagination: The imagination is sometimes seen as the bogus gift of the Holy Spirit. Without it, our understanding of scripture will most certainly be diminished. What Shall We Tell the Children? Are there other pertinent scriptures to teach young people besides Moses in the bulrushes, Daniel in the lion’s den, and the Baby Jesus asleep in the hay? For more information go to wichurches.org and look under “events.” Or call Wisconsin Council of Churches at (608) 837-3108. by John M. Buchanan What the church is made of FREDERICK BUECHNER has been my companion and mentor over the years without even knowing it. I’ve learned a lot from him and have thoroughly enjoyed reading his graceful, descriptive, and imaginative writing. I suspect that I’ve read almost everything he wrote, and I continue to pull his books from the shelf: The Sacred Journey, The Magnificent Defeat, and The Clown in the Belfry: Writings on Faith and Fiction. Buechner is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), but as far as I know he doesn’t pay much attention to denominational affairs. Yet when he writes about church I listen. In a chapter in Secrets in the Dark titled “The Church” he writes, “Jesus made his church out of human beings with more or less the same mixture in them of cowardice and guts, intelligence and stupidity, of selfishness and generosity, of openness of heart and sheer cussedness as you would be apt to find in any one of us. The reason he made his church out of human beings is that human beings were all there was to make it out of. In fact, as far as I know, human beings are all there is to make it out of still. It’s a point worth remembering.” In my own experience of the church, I was grateful for the reminder many times. Two sentences at the end of his essay pop into my mind everytime I hear that the nones are the only religious category that’s growing, that denominations are running out of money, or that another congregation is leaving its denomination over this or that issue. “Maybe the best thing that could happen to the church would be for some great tidal wave of history to wash it all away—the church buildings tumbling, the church money all lost, the church bulletins blowing through the air like dead leaves, the differences between preachers and congregations all lost too. Then all we would have left would be each other and Christ, which was all there was in the first place.” In this issue Angie Mabry-Nauta makes the startling announcement that nine U.S. churches close their doors for good almost every day (see p. 22). Those who are left in oncethriving congregations love their church deeply and have important lifelong memories. They often believe that if they simply hang on, the good old days will return. Mabry-Nauta describes congregations in Tucson, Plano, and Chicago that were declining. She lists three criteria for judging their viability: critical mass, adequate finances, and vision. She reports that all three churches made the difficult decision to close. Adam Joyce adds to the conversation with his article on how institutions can die well and makes fascinating parallels to the role of hospice in the process of human dying. There’s a monumental amount of hand-wringing and blame that goes with all of this. I’m convinced that our energy would be better spent on dealing honestly with the realities we face. We are holding on to a model of church that doesn’t work for everybody in every place. Small, aging congregations are trying desperately to raise enough money to fix the roof of a crumbling building and to pay a full-time clergyperson. Yes, there are large urban and suburban churches that are thriving and growing. But many neighborhood and rural congregations require courageous new thinking if they are to survive—new thinking on the part of denominational executives, pastors brave enough to walk into challenging situations, and people willing to let go of a church model that no longer works. In the meantime I’m glad for Buechner’s reminder that we have Christ and one another—and that is quite a lot. EXPLORE OUR ARCHIVES christiancentury.org/archives 3 Christian Century January 7, 2015 January 7, 2015 Vol. 132, No. 1 Editor/Publisher John M. Buchanan Executive Editor David Heim Senior Editors Debra Bendis Richard A. Kauffman Associate Editors Amy Frykholm Steve Thorngate 6 News Editor Celeste Kennel-Shank The busy Sabbath Contributing Editors Martin E. Marty James M. Wall Dean Peerman Trudy Bush Jason Byassee 7 Rape on campus The Editors: Beliefs and facts 8 Poetry Editor Jill Peláez Baumgaertner Editorial Assistant Janet Potter CenturyMarks Rehabilitating fighters, resettling refugees, etc. 10 Advertising Manager Heidi Baumgaertner Hope for hurting bodies Katherine Willis Pershey: Making sense of chronic pain Art Director Daniel C. Richardson 12 Production Assistant Diane Mills The war within Michael Yandell: A veteran’s moral injury 22 Comptroller Maureen C. Gavin The last Sunday Angie Mabry-Nauta: When it’s time for a church to close Marketing Consultant Shanley & Associates Editors At Large M. Craig Barnes Ellen Charry Lillian Daniel Beverly R. Gaventa Belden C. Lane Thomas G. Long Thomas Lynch Kathleen Norris Lamin Sanneh Max L. Stackhouse Miroslav Volf William H. Willimon Carol Zaleski Letters 26 Final gifts Walter Brueggemann Martin B. Copenhaver William F. Fore L. Gregory Jones Leo Lefebure Robin W. Lovin Bill McKibben Stephanie Paulsell Donald Shriver Barbara Brown Taylor Grant Wacker Ralph C. Wood Adam Joyce: How institutions can die well 30 Texas tough Kyle Childress: Religion in a rough place Cover photo © Aleksejs Jevsejenko NEW S 14 IN 34 Interfaith couples choose ‘both/and’; Caught between two worlds, Druze in Israel right for their rights; Vatican ends inquiry of nuns in U.S. 22 RE VIEW Books Philip Jenkins: Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms, by Gerard Russell Lawrence Wood: Curious, by Ian Leslie Amy Frykholm: Found Theology, by Ben Quash Gerald J. Mast: Sorry About That, by Edwin L. Battistella 43 Me dia Kathryn Reklis: Trial by podcast 47 Art Heidi J. Hornik and Mikeal C. Parsons: Jonah and the Whale, from an early Christian sarcophagus COL UMNS 3 Editor’s Desk John M. Buchanan: What the church is made of 20, 21 Living by the Word 12 Diane Roth 33 Faith Matters M. Craig Barnes: Lesser-known heroes 45 Church in the Making Carol Howard Merritt: Sharing the peace POET RY 10 11 12 24 Greg Huteson: Plastic Santa Paul Willis: Oregon grape Sarah Klassen: Incarnation Shari Wagner: The farm wife muses upon her Miracle Tree SUBSCRIPTIONS & CUSTOMER SERVICE: Tel.: 800-208-4097. E-mail: [email protected]. The CHRISTIAN CENTURY, P.O. Box 429, Congers NY 10920-0429. Fax: 845-267-3478. Subscriptions $65 per year; $105 Canadian; $125 other foreign. Online only subscriptions available at christiancentury.org: $4.95 for four weeks; $24.95 for six months; $39.95 for 12 months. EDITORIAL OFFICE: General queries to [email protected]; 312-263-7510. Letters to the editor: [email protected] or the CHRISTIAN CENTURY, Attn: Letters to the Editor, 104 S. Michigan Ave., Suite 1100, Chicago, IL 60603. For information on rights & permissions, submissions guidelines, advertising information, letters to the editor: christiancentury.org/contact. Established 1884. Renamed the CHRISTIAN CENTURY 1900. Copyright © 2015 by the CHRISTIAN CENTURY. All rights reserved under the International Copyright Union, Universal Copyright Convention and Pan-American Copyright Convention. The CHRISTIAN CENTURY, (ISSN 0009-5281) is published biweekly at 104 S. Michigan Ave., Suite 1100, Chicago IL 60603. Periodicals postage paid at Chicago, IL, and additional mailing offices. Canada Post Publications Mail Product (Canadian Distribution) Sales Agreement No. 1406523. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to CHRISTIAN CENTURY, P.O. Box 429, Congers NY 10920-0429. 47 HOW MY LET TERS MIND HAS CHANGED Essays from the Christian Century 13 prominent Christian theologians speak of their journeys of faith and of the questions that have shaped their writing and scholarship. “This illuminating volume, the most theologically diverse in the series, is a compelling and worthy successor to the five that preceded it.” —Gary Dorrien, Union Theological Seminary “These essays will light the reader’s path through his or her own struggles with continuity and change.” —Richard Lischer, Duke Divinity School Web price: $12.80 wipfandstock.com/cascade_books (541) 344-1528 Christian Century January 7, 2015 The busy Sabbath T he war against rest,” by Benjamin Dueholm (Nov. 26), is spot on with one exception: no mention is made of the institutional church’s role in eroding the Sabbath by creating environments of busyness. If 40 years of pastoral leadership has taught me anything, it is that a “busy parish” is not necessarily a spiritually healthy one. In fact, teaching people to say no to a variety of activities designed to raise money, create fellowship, or just generate social capital is a perennial challenge. Congregational efforts to make space for quiet contemplation, prayer, teaching, and spiritual renewal often experience competition from activities that more often resemble those of the Kiwanis or country club. In and of themselves, those activities are fine, but when families come to church and find themselves inundated by things to do instead of opportunities to just be, then the church colludes in eroding the Sabbath. Michael Tessman Wakefield, R.I. T hanks for this important refocusing of the issue. I’d like to point out, however, that churches are very much in the game of destroying Sabbath. Sundays at church, Wednesday evenings, Thursday mornings, and midday weekdays have become bonanzas of busyness, meetings, conference calls, and the like. Kathleen Hirsch christiancentury.org comment T his war against rest is quickly becoming the tragic flaw of our consumerist society. The very thing we want is taking away the thing we most need. I highly recommend Walter Brueggemann’s Sabbath as Resistance, which speaks of God’s desire for us to use the Sabbath to be free to reconnect with God, promoting wholeness not only for 6 ourselves, but for our families and communities, especially those in need. Chris Bright christiancentury.org comment Origin stories . . . I t is always interesting to see how different religions intertwine, especially the big three (Islam, Judaism, and Christianity), because it offers a bit of a background as to how they began (“The other woman,” by Debbie Blue, Dec. 10). For example, studying Judaism offers a way for people to understand Christianity a little better, because Christianity came from Judaism. It is very interesting to wonder whether Islam would have been created if Ishmael were welcomed into the family instead of being sent out. It’s by faith that we as believers continue to pray and believe in what we know to be the true faith. However, we should not disparage the other religions, but accept them as being different. H. Hwang christiancentury.org comment A time to compromise . . . T he editorial “Is compromise always good?” (Nov. 26) was timely. But incremental changes can be brought about through responsible compromise in the legislative process. Surely there are “something is better than nothing” scenarios, always with a plan to move forward in the next session. Compromise in the legislative process does not mean you have given up what you truly believe. Patience and a little wisdom are needed. Bill Holmes Louisville, Ky. January 7, 2015 Rape on campus A mong advocates for victims of sexual assault, it has become a truism that victims’ stories should be believed. Sexual assault is habitually underreported, and victims’ accounts are often dismissed because they are inconvenient. The National Victimization Survey found that 80 percent of college women who say they were raped did not report the rape to the police. This approach seems to have shaped the November Rolling Stone article about rape at the University of Virginia, which opens with a vivid account of a gang rape at a fraternity party in 2012 that was not reported at the time. The alleged victim, a woman named Jackie, had been reluctant to tell her story— to friends, police, college administrators, or the reporter from Rolling Stone. She told journalist Sabrina Rubin Erdely that she would tell her story only if the alleged perpetrators were not contacted. It is difficult to know why a reporter would consent to a request not to investigate the facts. As it turns out, nearly every detail of Jackie’s story crumbled under scrutiny. Rolling Stone was finally forced to declare: “We should have not made this agreement with Jackie and we should have worked harder to convince her that the truth would have been better served by getting the other side of the story. These mistakes are on Rolling Stone, not on Jackie.” In the aftermath of Rolling Stone’s apology, many commenters insisted on the importance of believing Jackie. The Twitter hashtag #ibelievejackie gained a following. People feared, perhaps rightly, that the Rolling Stone case would generate more disbelief of those claiming to be victims of a sexual assault. But as Slate writer Amanda Hess points out, a crime like sexual assault is not a question of belief, it’s a question of facts. The term belief, she wrote, “suggests faith in something that lies outside the bounds of human knowledge. To put claims of rape in this category is to buy the idea that rape reports are by nature ambiguous, and that feelings override facts.” Erdely’s article, much like those who dismiss victims’ claims, is interested only in the facts and feelings that supported its version of truth. But attaining justice for victims of sexual assault cannot be a matter of belief or disbelief. Victims of assault are individuals, not symbols of a cause, and each case must be heard and weighed. To that end, under pressure from the White House, student groups, and sexual assault victims’ advocates, universities are beginning to change the way that sexual assaults are handled on campuses. They are creating support services for victims, aligning college policies with state and federal laws that define sexual assault, adopting clear reporting procedures, and developing models for investigation. Such efforts are needed to serve both justice and truth. Sexual assault is not a question of belief. 7 Christian Century January 7, 2015 NEAR DEATH: Dr. Ian Crozier contracted Ebola while treating patients at a government hospital in Sierra Leone. He nearly died from the disease. His family feared that if he survived he would suffer severe brain damage. But he pulled through, thanks to aggressive treatment at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. Afterward he talked about the excruciating experience of treating patients with Ebola. He also reported moments of grace: mothers who fed the babies of other mothers who had died, and three young brothers with the disease who stuck together after their mother had died and their father was absent. Crozier hopes to return to West Africa in February or March (New York Times, December 7). SECOND CHANCES: European countries are asking how to deal with hundreds of young Muslims who went to Syria to fight and then returned home. Denmark is experimenting with rehabilitation rather than incarceration. Returning fighters are treated not as criminals but as troubled youth who lost their way and need a second chance. The program, first used with neo-Nazi youth, is voluntary and includes counseling, mentoring, opportunities for more schooling, and meetings with parents. So far the program seems to be working. Denmark has the second highest number of foreign fighters per capita. They “only become ticking bombs if we don’t integrate them” back into society, said a Danish psychologist (New York Times, December 13). GIVE US YOUR TIRED: The United States has been criticized for its slow response in resettling refugees from the Syrian civil war crisis. So far only 300 have been accepted out of more than 3.2 million who have fled from the Syrian conflict. The State Department is expecting a surge of thousands in the next few years and is now considering 9,000 resettlement applications. The vetting process to screen out potential terrorists can take up to two years. Only those in dire need are considered—the very young, the elderly, the sick, and those who have been persecuted by their government (Chicago Tribune, December 11). OFFICE CHAPLAIN: Marketplace Ministries, based in Plano, Texas, is the nation’s largest provider of workplace chaplains, a growing service industry. It has an annual budget of $14 million and sends thousands of chaplains into workplaces around the world. Although almost all workplace chaplains are Christian, their job is not to proselytize, and they relate to employees of any or no faith. Their job is more to listen than to speak. Company executives are discovering that productivity goes up when stress goes down (NPR, December 11). EDIFICE COMPLEX: Construction of religious buildings is at its lowest level since record keeping began in 1967. Declining participation and financial funding and a shift away from megachurches are cited as reasons for the decline. Congregations are also deciding to put more money into ministry rather than structures. The building of religious structures peaked in 2002 and has been decreasing ever since, though there are signs that it may have bottomed out in 2013. Mormons and Christian Century January 7, 2015 8 “ Muslims, both with growing populations, are exceptions to this trend (Wall Street Journal, December 4). Do you want me? UP NORTH: Muslims in Anchorage, Alaska, have been working for 15 years to build a mosque—the first ever in the state—but they need another million dollars to complete the project. The mosque sits next to a Presbyterian church with which it will share a parking lot. Alaska’s Muslim population is extraordinarily diverse, including people from African, Eastern European, Middle Eastern, and Asian countries, as well as from the lower 48 states. One challenge for Alaskan Muslims is deciding when to hold prayers, since they typically are timed according to sunrise and sunset. In summer in Alaska, the sun never sets entirely. The congregation is currently using a storefront in a strip mall (Al Jazeera, December 5). HOLOCAUST DENIAL: Gilbert Achcar, author of The Arabs and the Holocaust, believes that Holocaust denial in the Arab world would go away if the Israeli-Palestinian conflict were resolved. The higher the tension between Israel and Palestinians, the greater the amount of Holocaust denial in the Arab world, he maintains. Likewise, the greater the Israeli-Arab tension, the more Israelis tend to deny what the Palestinians call the Nakba, the catastrophe in 1948 when many Arabs were driven from their homes. Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority, has acknowledged the Holocaust, saying it was “the most heinous crime against humanity.” Denial of the Nakba is the official stance of the Israeli government. Achcar notes that Arabs had nothing to do with the Holocaust, whereas Nakba was caused by Israelis (Center for Middle East Studies Occasional Paper Series, No. 3, University of Denver). OUT OF THE SHADOWS: Gay Christians who have chosen celibacy are increasingly coming out from the shadows. A blog titled spiritualfriendship.org draws thousands of visitors a month. Leaders in this movement of conservative Catholics and evangelicals emphasize the positive side of developing relation- ” — Four-year-old Sweetie Sweetie, an Ebola orphan in Sierra Leone, speaking to a visitor at the group home where she is living (New York Times, December 13) “ It is now time to take action. The individuals responsible for the criminal conspiracy revealed in today’s report must be brought to justice, and must face criminal penalties commensurate with the gravity of their crimes. ” — Ben Emmerson, the United Nations’ top special investigator for counterterrorism, calling for the prosecution of senior U.S. officials who authorized and carried out torture as part of national security policies (USA Today, December 10) ships that don’t involve sexual intimacy. Celibate gays elicit varied responses: other gays and lesbians often criticize them, saying celibacy is untenable and a denial of equality and authenticity, while some conservative Christians affirm celibate gays for their commitment to celibacy but are uncomfortable with their openness about their sexual orientation (Washington Post, December 13). ROADSIDE CHAPEL: For nearly 75 years, travelers on the Pennsylvania Turnpike could pull off the highway and walk up the steps to St. John the Baptist Catholic Church to pray or attend mass. The church features rich wood and handcarved accents, a beautiful staircase to a loft, and 14 Tiffany stained-glass windows. But the days of the “Church of the Turnpike,” 90 miles east of Pittsburgh, could be numbered. A highway widening project is under way that will permanently remove the legendary steps in two or three years (RNS). DOGGIE HEAVEN? Some people think Pope Francis opened the door to believing that animals have an afterlife. Speaking of the “new creation” God intends, the pope said, “It is not an annihilation of the universe and all that surrounds us. Rather it brings everything to its fullness of being, truth and beauty.” An Italian newspaper concluded that the pope was broadening the hope of “eschatological beatitude to animals and the whole of creation.” But a retired professor at the Pontifical Urbaniana University in Rome cautioned against that conclusion, saying that there will be continuity and transformation between the new and old creations and that the balance between the two can’t be determined (Guardian, November 27). IMMIGRATION DIVIDE SOURCE: PUBLIC RELIGION RESEARCH INSTITUTE Religious response to President Obama’s executive action allowing some 5 million undocumented immigrants to remain in the United States for three years without being subject to deportation: IN FAVOR OPPOSE White evangelical Protestant 60% 36% White Catholic 63% 34% White mainline Protestant 66% 32% Catholic 73% 26% Minority Protestant 76% 23% Unaffiliated 80% 19% Due to rounding, totals may not equal 100%. 9 Christian Century January 7, 2015 Ma k i n g s e n s e o f c h ro n i c p a i n Hope for hurting bodies by Katherine Willis Pershey YEARS AGO, I encountered a graphic crucifix in an old Mexican church. It was too kitschy to elicit holy horror; the gashes on Christ’s face and body looked more cartoonish than redemptive. I am glad I never pushed the image from my mind, though. It has become for me a sort of icon of the banality of pain—even divine pain. For all the competing theories of atonement, there is a singular fact about the crucifixion: it hurt like hell. I was still in elementary school the first time I woke up with a stiff neck, and I have grappled with bouts of severe neck and back pain ever since. When I was 22, a chiropractor glanced at my X-ray and told me I had the spine of a middle-aged man. I’ve sprained my back by carrying an amplifier and lifting a canoe. I’ve suf- fered through postpartum spasms that were worse than actual childbirth. Once I ended up on bedrest for days because I sneezed wrong. I’ve seen physical therapists and pain specialists, gotten monthly massages and an inconclusive MRI. I’ve swallowed painkillers so strong I couldn’t hold them down, and I’ve fretted about whether doctors will think I’m an addict if I appear too desperate for Demerol. In her classic essay on migraines— another excruciating and mysterious affliction—Joan Didion remarks, “That no one dies of migraine seems, to someone deep into an attack, an ambiguous blessing.” There have been times when I could almost consent to this terrible sentiment. When the pain comes, the only thing I want—the only thing I am capa- Plastic Santa L It’s January and plastic Santa still plays his golden sax outside a store on Jinhuapu Lu. His mechanized twiggy legs are barely hid as they twitch in tandem in his thin flannel pants— Christmas red, of course, and his lips as brown as tofu hang a full two inches behind the sax’s cracked reed. Poor man! Even the dogs— Pekingese, Chihuahuas and others— step around him as they snuffle for a swatch of sun to jazz their bones on this cold day. Greg Huteson Christian Century January 7, 2015 ble of wanting, it seems—is for it to leave. “Whatever else it does,” writes Barbara Brown Taylor, “pain offers an experience of being human that is as elemental as birth, orgasm, love, and death.” For this reason I’ve often pondered—not in the throes of spasms, but before the last twinges have faded away—the relationship between pain and incarnation. The story goes that God got a body, a body that grew in a mother’s womb and suckled at a mother’s breast. The body of a boy: a boy who skinned his knees and got too much sun and went through puberty. The body of a man: a man who knew the pleasures of food and wine, a man who may not have known a woman but nevertheless knew what it felt like for a woman to pour precious oil on his feet and rub it in with her hair. A man who was beaten and crucified and pierced with a sword. 10 ast spring, I was at a conference when one of my familiar afflictions descended. The constellation of knots that line my neck and shoulders is uncomfortable and immobilizing—turning my head becomes instantly impossible—but the knots aren’t debilitating. I was still able to participate, albeit gingerly. One night at dinner, a friend noticed when I winced. I long ago learned that my aches and pains are boring to other people (my apologies), so I admitted the condition and quickly changed the subject. She changed it back. The whole table listened as she shared a bit of testimony: after years of severe back pain, she read a book by John Sarno and, upon fully accepting his mind-body philosophy, had experienced healing. Sarno’s theory is fairly simple. Some pain has physiological roots: torn muscles, broken bones, slipped discs. But other pain is psychogenic, real pain provoked by underlying stress: repressed anger, subconscious anxiety. Certain personalities are more susceptible to psychogenic back pain. Another factor is a culture that tends to be more sympathetic toward When I don’t know where my pain comes from or what purpose it has, all that’s left is hope. Hope for healing, however it comes—through shots, through prayer, through downward facing dog. But I need a hope that stretches farther, too, a hope that will sustain me even when the shots wear off, the prayers go unanswered, and I collapse When pain comes, the only thing I want is for it to leave. physical than emotional pain: it’s safer to cope with back pain than something as socially unacceptable as rage. To treat psychogenic pain the way one would treat physiological pain is as ineffective as trying to cure osteogenesis imperfecta with the power of positive thinking. My friend works the Sarno program, regularly searching for sparks of anger and anxiety before they can set psychosomatic fires to the nerves in her back. And my friend is free of back pain. I ordered one of Sarno’s books that night. I wish I could say I’m healed. Attending more carefully to my spiritual and emotional health does seem to loosen the neck and shoulder knots. On the other hand, I recently chucked the book across my bedroom—in an entirely unrepressed expression of rage—during one of the worst episodes of muscle spasms I’ve ever experienced. Either the Sarno method doesn’t always work, or my new chiropractor’s structural diagnosis is correct. Part of coping with pain is imbuing it with meaning. But my inability to discern the reason for my pain makes it all but impossible to craft a theory of its purpose. Maybe labor really was worse than the back pain ten days later, but there was an enormous difference: the labor pains were going to end with a baby. If there must be pain, let it not be in vain. Let it make us stronger, or wiser, or more compassionate. If the lamb of God must be slain, at least let him take away the sins of the world. on my yoga mat in tears. I need a hope that stretches me beyond my own small suffering, that encompasses the great torment of the whole seemingly godforsaken world. I need an eschatological hope. There is a case for such hope, even for aching bodies. God is not in the business of simply gathering ephemeral spirits in heaven. N. T. Wright contends that in the New Testament, the word soul, though rare, reflects when it does occur underlying Hebrew or Aramaic words referring not to a disembodied entity hidden within the outer shell of the disposable body but rather to what we would call the whole person or personality, seen as being confronted by God. To proclaim the bodily resurrection of Christ is to affirm that his whole person was restored to life. Paul assures us that we will be united in a resurrection like Christ’s. Life is fully embodied on both sides of eternity, but suffering doesn’t survive death. Perhaps it is yearning born of desperation. Yet the hope of resurrection— my own bodily resurrection, my naked soul before God—cuts through my despair. Jesus’ new body bore the scars of what he had suffered. They were deep enough for Thomas to wedge his hand into. But I know the signs of pain, and the risen Lord wasn’t in any. His agony was finished, just as he said as he breathed his last. Oregon grape (Mahonia nervosa) Oregon grape, what makes you so sour today— or every day, for that matter? Your blue berries, ripe to bursting, look delicious but they’re not. Some native peoples would not eat them altogether. Others, only intermixed with sweeter berries from other plants—huckleberries, for example. Are you jealous of your upland cousin, thriving in subalpine meadows, you stuck down here in the woods? Listen: your little leaves in bending ladders, dark green and shining like the holly, lift me into holiday spirits. I’m serious. With you it is Christmas in the gloom. If you could just be happy about it, I might forgive you for your flavor. —Ross Lake National Recreation Area Katherine Willis Pershey is associate minister at First Congregational Church in Western Springs, Illinois. Paul Willis 11 Christian Century January 7, 2015 A ve te ra n ’s m o ra l i n j u r y The war within by Michael Yandell I SERVED IN the army from 2002 through 2006 as an explosive ordnance disposal specialist, including six months in Iraq. Recently, a soldier from my old unit, who had been deployed multiple times to Iraq and Afghanistan, was in Texas, where I am studying at a seminary. Eager to see him after nine years, I drove down to San Antonio and met him at a shopping mall food court. We chatted about our new lives, our rou- place in the world. The spiritual and emotional foundations of the world disappeared and made it impossible for me to sleep the sleep of the just. Even though I was part of a war that was much bigger than me, I still feel personally responsible for its consequences. I have a feeling of intense betrayal, and the betrayer and betrayed are the same person: my very self. Calling my experience “disillusion- What I lost in the Iraq war was a world that makes moral sense. tines, our hobbies. At one point he said: “I haven’t slept much since the wars started.” I also didn’t sleep much when I returned from Iraq. I could not sleep because I was disturbed—disturbed by the war and by my attempt to reenter a consumer-driven civilian life. I was bothered by a feeling I could not quite identify that I suspect keeps many from sleeping. “Moral injury” is a name for it. For me, moral injury describes my disillusionment, the erosion of my sense of ment” does not describe how I feel about those with whom I shared military service. Nor have I become disillusioned with the ability and dedication of the U.S. military to meet specifically identified objectives. What began to erode for me in Iraq in 2004 was my perception of good and evil. What I lost was a world that makes moral sense. One of my favorite movies illustrates this loss. A Man for All Seasons is a romanticized story about Thomas More, Incarnation God is carnal? Yes! God has got to be flesh and blood. Bones too like any one of us. A child can’t go to sleep in a dark room unless someone is right there beside her. Someone with some skin. Sarah Klassen Christian Century January 7, 2015 12 a friend of King Henry VIII and chancellor of the realm. At one point More is urged to arrest one of his enemies, but More refuses, because the man has broken no law. More’s soon-to-be son-inlaw, William Roper, asks, “So now you give the Devil the benefit of the law?” More replies, “Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?” Roper, with all the certainty of youth, exclaims, “Yes, I’d cut down every law in England to do that!” More responds: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned ’round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Humanity’s laws, not God’s! And if you cut them down, and you’re just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake! This is what moral injury is—the winds that blow when all the laws, all the understood ways of relating to other human beings have been laid flat. For when we release the terms good and evil and start applying those terms to human beings and whole groups of people, we allow ourselves the capacity to lay flat any moral qualms in order to pursue the enemy to the ends of the earth. I was 19 when I left for war. I did not know I was leaving a world that made sense—a world where people respected one another’s lives and dignity, a world where violence and murder were understood to be wrong and punished by laws— STOCKTREK IMAGES DUTIES OF WAR: During a training exercise, a U.S. armed forces technician wearing an ordnance disposal suit inspects the material remaining from a disrupted improvised explosive device. and entering a world where all bets were off. I was a willing participant in this war. For the sake of pursuit of the enemy, we started to ignore things that would not have been acceptable to me in other circumstances: noncombatants being pulled from their homes in the dead of night, with black bags placed over their heads; people dragged to a prison compound and kept there with no avenue for recourse or appeal, no law of any kind Can we heal from that? I am not sure. I sleep well nowadays. In part, this is simply because of the space and time between me and the experiences of the war. I have become adept at avoiding thinking about it. For moral injury is more like a chronic illness than an acute one. It is something like the pain of arthritis or an old, bad knee that someone complains about when it rains. The war is a part of me, yet who I am rejects what war is. determining how long they could be kept or for what reason. Wartime violence was no longer a bad thing: it is sought after as a quality of character. Such a monumental shift in one’s perception of the world, however, cannot be temporary. I expected to be able to return to the solid foundations of the world I had left, with its understandings of moral truth. But when I arrived home, I could not. Everything was laid flat. I returned, like so many others, to sleepless nights and to the thoughts and memories of war. There is no moral shelter when all is laid flat. The pain manifests itself in strange ways. I have experienced spontaneous tears of rage while driving to the grocery store that seem to bubble up from nowhere. Sometimes I cannot look a family member in the eye after she has thanked me for my service. Sometimes when I see the children in the youth group with which I work, who are surrounded by loving parents and church members, who anticipate lives of opportunity, my mind wanders to the streets of Baghdad and to the children who asked me for candy, who grew up in the midst of war. 13 I know that plenty of civilians feel terrible about U.S. involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan. But as a veteran, I cannot quite clearly distinguish the war as something “out there” or in the past—it is like something I own personally. It lives in me. Sometimes I feel condemned not only by my own actions, but by the war as a whole. I do not mean condemned by some cosmic force or condemned by society. I mean that I condemn myself. This is a paradox. Of course the war is a part of me. I cannot avoid it. I cannot escape my experience. And yet who I am rejects what war is—and what I was in the war. I categorically reject the unleashing of “good” and “evil” as fundamental ways of understanding human beings, the notion that we can place ourselves on a moral high ground and, having done so, completely disregard any moral obligation to avoid violence and death-dealing. I reject the notion that the value of life can be laid flat to be reclaimed later. Once war is over, what remains? Who or what will stop those winds from blowing? Michael Yandell is a student at Brite Divinity School in Fort Worth, Texas. Christian Century January 7, 2015 Interfaith couples choose ‘both/and’ J ean Tutt was a freshman at Harper College in Palatine, Illinois, when she met Brian Saucier. He had long hair and wore a denim jacket with skulls on it; she had more the button-down cardigan style. He was a member of the College Republicans, while she was a fairly uninterested Democrat. The fact that she was Jewish and he was Roman Catholic barely registered. Then the two got to know each other better. Jean liked Brian’s sarcastic sense of humor and found him to be incredibly kind. They started dating, and by the time they graduated, they’d decided to marry. And then religion did matter. Though they hadn’t cared much about their faith differences while dating—an attitude still held by the majority of Americans under 35—they wanted to get a better sense of how their family would work before they tied the knot. Neither wanted to convert, the standard solution a generation ago when people of different faiths wanted to get married. And neither wanted to drop his or her religious affiliation, which is another typical path today for the rapidly growing number of American interfaith couples. Then they discovered the Jewish Catholic Couples Dialogue Group—a support network for interfaith couples connected to the Chicago Interfaith Family School, which teaches both Catholicism and Judaism. The people involved were welcoming and said it was possible, even advantageous, to raise a family that was actively part of two religions. Over the past 50 years, the United States has seen a dramatic growth in both the number and acceptance of interfaith marriages. In what scholars see as a steady progression since the 1960s, the country has morphed from a society in which religious intermarriage was relChristian Century January 7, 2015 atively rare (one in ten marriages at the beginning of the 20th century) to one today in which it is more likely that couples marrying will come from different religious backgrounds. And in 2008 about 80 percent of adults age 18 to 23 approved of intermarriage. On a Sunday morning this fall, in the cafeteria of the Albert Einstein High School in Kensington, Maryland, about 250 people arrived for the regular gathering of the Interfaith Families Project. Led by Julia Jarvis, a pastor, and Harold White, the former Jewish chaplain at Georgetown University, the group recited the interfaith responsive reading, written by members of the Palo Alto, California, interfaith community: Leader: We gather here as an Interfaith Community to share and celebrate the gift of life together. All: Some of us gather as the Children of Israel; some of us gather in the name of Jesus of Nazareth; some of us gather influenced by each. They also recited the Shema—a core prayer in a Jewish service—and the Lord’s Prayer and sang a number of songs that the spiritual leaders had picked for this service, such as “Return Again,” by Shlomo Carlebach, and the Shaker hymn “Simple Gifts.” Then, after a short reflection from White, the group broke up into an adult discussion group and a bustling Sunday school. The fifthgraders went to their class to learn about the life and times of Jesus. Next door, a teacher gave a lesson on the Hebrew alphabet. The teenagers started debating the definition of a meaningful life. Washington’s IFFP started in 1995 with four families. Now, with 300 active members and more joining every month, 14 it is one of the largest such organizations in the country. “For a long time, I believe people thought we were just nuts,” said Jarvis, who joined in 1998. “We’re not so much an anomaly anymore.” Jarvis and many in interfaith organizations see themselves as “taking different paths up the same mountain,” putting the truths and beauty of different faiths over human interpretations. IFFP “provides a community where neither spouse feels excluded,” said Susan Katz Miller, a member of IFFP and the author of Being Both. R esearch shows that not only are more Americans marrying people of other religions, but a rapidly growing proportion are choosing to remain interfaith families. In a paper released earlier this year, David McClendon of the University of Texas at Austin crunched survey data and found that the proportion of interfaith marriages that remain with mixed-faith partners had shot up to 40 percent in the early 2000s from 20 percent in the 1960s. (Those couples who do not hold on to their differing faiths tend to take one of three paths: one spouse converts, both pick a new religion together, or they drop religion altogether.) Often partners who keep their own religions go their separate theological ways; one goes to church and the other goes to synagogue, for instance. But there are studies that suggest significant numbers of families—like those attending the Chicago Interfaith Family School or IFFP—are pursuing a joint, intentional interfaith existence. While JewishChristian groups are most common in the United States, there are small groups or web forums that focus on Muslim- PHOTO BY ANN HERMES / THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR KEEPING BOTH FAITHS: Julia Jarvis and Harold White, a pastor and a rabbi, spiritual leaders of the Interfaith Families Project of Greater Washington, D.C., say a blessing during the community’s weekly gathering. Christian intermarriage, Jewish-Hindu marriage, and others. “I have thought about the connections between Judaism, Islam, and Christianity more than I ever did before,” said Trina Leonard, a member of IFFP who is Catholic. Her family joined IFFP after trying a number of religious institutions; it was the first place she, her Jewish husband, and their teenage son, Daniel, felt fully welcomed and faithfully embraced. “I remember going to church, trying synagogue, and really not liking either,” said Daniel Leonard, 16. “I actually like coming [to IFFP because] it’s a community where people care about you, they understand you.” Families find commonalities between doctrines and beauty in difference, they say. And working through religious quandaries is a good exercise in the sort of faith searching that many go through as adults. “I am squarely in the ‘both’ camp,” Daniel Leonard said. “I love and feel part of both religions. IFFP has given me a positive outlook on both.” A big part of interfaith religious education, say those involved with interfaith Sunday schools, is providing children with enough religious literacy that they can follow their own faith paths. “At the core of this trend toward interfaith families is a very American way of thinking about religion,” said David Campbell, a University of Notre Dame professor who cowrote the book American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us. “In other parts of the world, preference is the wrong word. Religion is not a preference; it is something you are born with.” Naomi Schaefer Riley, author of the book ’Til Faith Do Us Part, points out that Americans today tend to marry at the most secular part of their lives—in their twenties, a time when young adults have moved out of their parents’ orbits (and churches) but haven’t started families. This is the age group most likely to tell researchers they have no religious affiliation. And most couples, Riley said, don’t discuss religion or the faith in which they’ll raise their children before they marry, underestimating “how important religion is in our lives later,” she said. Only when a baby is on the way do previously secular couples focus on the religious fit, Riley found. Many mixedfaith couples opt out of religious activity, but this was often an unhappy decision for those involved, she said. “A lot of the individuals I interviewed felt themselves spiritually thwarted,” Riley said. “They were not able to fully practice, or not able to fulfill their own spiritual dimension.” A number of studies—though contested—show a greater divorce rate among interfaith couples than same-religion couples. That is why, according to Jean Saucier, interfaith communities can be so valuable. It is not always easy to figure out 15 how to bridge the difference between her Judaism and Brian’s Catholicism, she said. She struggled with the idea of having her child baptized—ending up with an interfaith ceremony that was both a Jewish baby naming and a baptism. Other couples may wonder whether to make plans for both partners to be buried in a Jewish cemetery, say, or a Christian one. But going through these decisions with a network of others helped her and Brian come to peace, Jean said, and a new faithfulness that feels more spiritually fulfilling than either of their religions alone. “For people who don’t work at it—who don’t really consciously come to agreement, it really won’t work,” Jean said. “Someone will feel slighted; someone will feel disrespected. We wanted both of us to be comfortable in our home. We wanted our children to have an identity that makes sense. I think we’re achieving that, but it’s not always easy.” —Stephanie Hanes, The Christian Science Monitor Caught between two worlds, Druze in Israel fight for their rights Bullet holes pepper the front windows of the old city council office and paramilitary police in armored jeeps patrol the main street in the mixed Muslim and Druze village of Abu Snan in the Galilee region. In November, more than 40 people were injured in a brawl between the two communities, most of them by a grenade thrown into a group of Muslims. Abu Snan, which is about half Muslim and a third Druze (the remainder Christian), has seen rising tension between Muslim Arab citizens of Israel and their Druze neighbors—adherents of a monotheistic religion whose roots lie in Islam but which today forms a distinct faith. In 1956, the state of Israel passed a law mandating military service for the Druze, and ever since they have served on the front lines of Israel’s wars. More than 83 percent of eligible Druze enlist in the Israeli army, higher than the 75 percent enlistment rate Christian Century January 7, 2015 PHOTO COURTESY OF BEN HARTMAN / RELIGION NEWS SERVICE MIDDLE EAST MINORITY: Druze and Israeli flags flying next to each other in Daliyat al-Karmel. for Jews. The Druze say they have a sense of duty to the state, and they also want to maximize their job prospects and ensure themselves a better future. The Druze are a small sect almost entirely based in Lebanon, Syria, and Israel. They range from 1 million to 2 million people, with several hundred thousand in Syria, the largest Druze community. In Israel the population numbered around 130,000 as of 2011, according to Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics. Most are in northern Israel, including some 20,000 in four villages in the Golan Heights, which was annexed by Israel in 1981. More than 90 percent of the Golan Heights Druze have refused Israeli citizenship out of loyalty to Syria, where most have family ties. The Druze broke off from the Shi‘ite sect of Islam in tenth-century Egypt. Arab in culture and language, they are for the most part not considered Muslims by the wider Muslim world, and they do not follow the Five Pillars of Islam. Druze service in the Israeli army has been a point of contention with their Arab Muslim neighbors, who for the most part identify with the Palestinians and see the Druze as fellow Arabs. Locals in the village were reluctant to speak on the record or acknowledge that there is rising tension between the two communities. Local council head Nuhad Mishlav, a Druze, said relations are fine and the brawl was simply a personal dispute between two local men—one Druze and one Muslim—that spiraled out of control after one stabbed the other at a local café. When asked about DruzeChristian Century January 7, 2015 Muslim fights in the local high school, which have reportedly broken out for political reasons, he blamed Facebook and other social media, which he said students use to spread gossip and insults among their classmates. “For generations we’ve had great relations with each other here, but this younger generation is violent,” he said. “There is real fear here and more so at night.” The fear was palpable at the home of Bilal Taha, a Muslim man whose son Najib was badly wounded by shrapnel in his legs, groin, and back after a grenade was thrown into a crowd of Muslims. Neither Bilal nor Najib said that there are frayed ties between Druze and Muslims. One of Bilal’s relatives was the Muslim man stabbed in the café fight that sparked the brawl, and Bilal also said he saw it as personal. But he added that if police did not arrest the man who threw the grenade and if the Muslim man still hospitalized in critical condition dies, things would again become violent, possibly worse than before. “Every day it calms down here more, but our great fear is that one person dies and it could all start up again,” he said. Meanwhile, ongoing violence and “lone wolf” terror attacks have hit mainly in Jerusalem. In two of these attacks, one on the Jerusalem light rail and the other at a synagogue, Druze policemen were killed in action. One of the Druze policemen, Zidan Saif, was first on the scene when two Palestinians killed four worshipers in a West Jerusalem synagogue. Saif was shot by one of the assailants as they exited the synagogue; he died later that night. His heroism inspired Israelis across the country, but a couple of days later the government led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu began pushing forward a law that would officially recognize Israel as the nation-state of the Jews, drawing the ire of non-Jewish Israelis, including the Druze. “I feel that now I have to encourage [Druze] youths not to enlist in the army,” said Murad Saif, Zidan’s brother, to Channel 10. “Either way, they’re going to treat us as Arabs, so why enlist and fight?” The spiritual leader of the Druze in Israel, Sheikh Muwaffak Tarif, said the Druze are proud to serve as long as they are assured equal rights. 16 “We love and respect the Jews and serve alongside them,” Tariff said. “We have a blood alliance with the Jews, but we also need an alliance in life. Our young people are angry and frustrated. We are giving a great deal to the state, and we’re not getting it back. We’re neglected, there aren’t jobs, our young men can’t get building permits for a house.” Amal Nasereldeen is a former member of the Israeli parliament who founded a memorial to the 405 Druze soldiers and police who have fallen in the service of the state of Israel. The complex also includes a military preparatory academy with 38 cadets and sits on a hill atop the Druze town of Daliyat al-Karmel. Gunmen who infiltrated from Jordan in 1969 murdered one of Nasereldeen’s sons; a second was kidnapped in the Palestinian city of Jenin in the 1990s and has never been found. A grandson was killed in 2008 in the Israeli Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip. Nasereldeen said he constantly sends letters to the government about the unemployment, poverty, and housing shortage faced by discharged Druze soldiers, and he said he views the state’s treatment of the community as a failure. “The Druze are an inseparable part of the country, but they want their rights and rightfully so,” he said. “The Jews don’t have any friends in the Middle East or the world like the Druze.” —Ben Hartman, Religion News Service Vatican ends inquiry of nuns in U.S. The Vatican ended an inquiry begun six years ago into U.S. nuns with a report designed to bury their differences and celebrate their contribution to the Catholic Church. Known as an Apostolic Visitation, the inquiry took place between 2009 and 2012 and included a questionnaire, personal interviews, and visits to approximately 90 religious institutions across the United States. The results of the inquiry were released by Cardinal João Braz de Aviz, who heads the department responsible PHOTO BY PAUL HARING, COURTESY OF CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE END OF INQUIRY: Brazilian cardinal João Braz de Aviz (left) speaks with Sister Sharon Holland (right), president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, at the conclusion of a Vatican press conference to release the final report of a Vaticanordered investigation of U.S. communities of women religious. 17 Remembering Chuck Colson, bipartisan federal panel aims to reform prisons Chuck Colson turned seven months behind bars into an opportunity to start over. Now the Justice Department is looking to his example as it tries to reform the federal prison system. The bipartisan Charles Colson Task Force on Federal Corrections kicked off its work at the Capitol on December 9. Former representative J. C. Watts Jr. (R., Okla.), its chairman, said its aim is to make the federal prison system safer, less costly, and more humane. “His faith encouraged him to believe that there was no such thing as a lost cause, in or outside of prison,” Watts said of Colson, who became a born-again Christian shortly before he went to prison in 1974 for his deeds on behalf of a disgraced President Nixon. The experience inspired Colson to build the nation’s largest prison ministry during the second half of his life. He died in 2012. The task force is made up of nine experts, including Jim Liske, president and CEO of Prison Fellowship Ministries, the group Colson founded. It will meet five times during the next year and release recommendations in December 2015. The group also includes former representative Alan B. Mollohan (D., W. Va.), its vice chair, as well as a federal judge, a criminology professor, a corrections official, a former U.S. attorney, and the head of a clemency project. PRISON REFORM: Former representative J. C. Watts Jr. (R., Okla., left) speaks during the kickoff of the Charles Colson Task Force on Federal Corrections. Former representative Alan B. Mollohan is at right. Christian Century January 7, 2015 PHOTO BY LAUREN MARKOE / RELIGION NEW SERVICE for consecrated life, and three senior U.S. nuns at the Vatican on December 16. “Since the early days of the Catholic Church in their country, women religious have courageously been in the forefront of her evangelizing mission, selflessly tending to the spiritual, moral, educational, physical and social needs of countless individuals, especially the poor and marginalized,” the Vatican report said. The inquiry was ordered under Pope Benedict XVI after concerns arose about a so-called secular mentality among U.S. nuns. While Vatican officials noted that 266 superiors general (or 78 percent of the total) had participated in the visitation, they did not say how many of America’s 50,000 nuns or religious institutes declined to respond to questionnaires. “We are aware that the Apostolic Visitation was met with apprehension by some women religious,” Braz de Aviz said. “While this was a painful disappointment for us, we use this present opportunity to express our willingness to engage in respectful and fruitful dialogue with those institutes which were not fully compliant with the visitation process.” The investigation is one of two Vatican studies that have provoked widespread anger among members of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, an umbrella group representing the majority of U.S. nuns. They feared an attempt to bring them under the authority of the Holy See’s male-dominated Catholic hierarchy. The report noted a closer alignment with Pope Francis, stating U.S. nuns “can resonate” with Francis’s insistence that “none of us can think we are exempt from concern for the poor and for social justice.” Mother M. Clare Millea, the nun charged with overseeing the nationwide visitation, said it offered many opportunities for reflection, dialogue, and communion among women religious, pastors, and the faithful. “Congregation leaders, including those who expressed resistance initially to this initiative, have shared that the process has yielded surprising positive results,” she said. Millea fought back tears several times during a media conference releasing the report. “It’s a very moving moment for me,” she later said. “I deeply love religious life, and I gave three years of my life to the revitalization of religious life in my country.” Sister Sharon Holland, president of the LCWR, who also attended the Vatican media conference, said her members would be “affirmed and strengthened” by what she called an “honest report,” while stressing it was not a “document of blame.” Asked if it defused the differences between the Vatican and her members, she said: “It is not a truce. We are not at war.” She also said Francis was having a positive effect and that there is a “certain freshness” in the church. Nevertheless, the Vatican inquiry revealed dramatic structural change in the number and age of women religious as well as financial hardship within U.S. religious institutions. Total numbers have dropped to fewer than 50,000 this year, according to the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University. There were 181,000 nuns in 1966. The inquiry found that women religious are struggling to attract new recruits, and aging nuns are struggling with the rising cost of health care. Still to come is a separate inquiry into the LCWR begun by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in 2009. The LCWR, led by Holland, is the main association for the leaders of women’s orders, representing around 80 percent of nuns in the United States. —Josephine McKenna, Religion News Service The task force intends to study several successful state efforts to reduce overcrowding and recidivism in prisons. The federal prison population has grown by a factor of eight since 1980, with 214,000 prisoners at the close of fiscal 2014. The system costs nearly $7 billion annually, a quarter of the Justice Department’s budget, according to the task force. Representative Frank Wolf (R., Va.), who heads the congressional panel that led the effort to fund the task force, and who accompanied Colson on prison visits, said he hopes its final report will honor “what Chuck did with his life and the bond that he had with people who were serving, and with people who had served.” —Lauren Markoe, Religion News Service Survey finds one in three in U.S. don’t want clergy for civil marriages Christian Century January 7, 2015 Kenyan Christians alarmed by increased persecution from militants in region Church leaders say attacks by Somalia’s al-Shabaab militants in the northeast region of Kenya are increasingly taking on an anti-Christian tenor, including targeted executions of non-Muslims. At a news conference in Nairobi in mid-December, the leaders said Muslims must redouble efforts to preach religious tolerance and end youth radicalization. In what the leaders describe as a dangerous trend, 64 Christians were executed in or near Mandera, a town on the border 18 with Somalia, in two incidents in the past three weeks. In both incidents, nonMuslims were separated from Muslims. On December 2, militants shot 36 quarry workers. The militants asked workers to recite the Shahada, the Muslim profession of faith, and shot those who refused. On November 22, al-Shabaab militants hijacked a bus and killed 28 nonMuslims, 21 of them teachers returning home for Christmas. “This situation regrettably leads us to conclude these attacks, perpetrated by people claiming to be al-Shabaab, are taking a religious angle,” Anglican archbishop Eliud Wabukala said at the news conference. Roman Catholic, Anglican, Presbyterian, Methodist, and evangelical African Inland Church leaders said Kenya had witnessed more than 20 attacks this year alone, which had left more than 200 people dead and many others injured. The attacks, which initially targeted Christian places of worship, now target Christians on public transportation and in workplaces, according to the leaders. “They must move beyond merely condemning the attacks to initiating practical steps to reach out [to] the sympathizers of terror and help us build bridges between faiths and communities,” Wabukala said. Catholic cardinal John Njue said that although recent executions displayed religious patterns, Kenyans should avoid statements that further divide the country along religious lines. —Fredrick Nzwili, Religion News Service PREACHING PEACE: Kenyan church leaders, including Cardinal John Njue (left), and Archbishop Eliud Wabukala (2nd from left), address a news conference at the All Saints Cathedral in Nairobi. PHOTO BY FREDRICK NZWILI / RELIGION NEWS SERVICE Two surveys released in December by LifeWay Research show some support for separating religious marriage from civil marriage. In a survey of 2,000 American adults, the Nashville-based Christian research company found the following. • Nearly six in ten Americans (59 percent) say marriage should not be “defined and regulated by the state.” • Nearly half (49 percent) say “religious weddings should not be connected to the state’s definition and recognition of marriage.” • About a third (36 percent) say clergy should “no longer be involved in the state’s licensing of marriage.” However, more than half (53 percent) disagree. • Those most likely to favor a split between religious weddings and government or civil marriage include 54 percent of men, 53 percent of Catholics and 45 percent of Protestants. LifeWay also conducted a parallel survey of 1,000 Protestant pastors. It found that one in four favor separating the religious rites from their signature on a government-issued marriage license that makes the ceremony legally binding. This is how it’s done in many foreign countries already, but not—so far—in the United States. Ed Stetzer, executive director of LifeWay Research, called it noteworthy that so many pastors are willing “to stop saying ‘By the power vested in me by the state’ during a church wedding.” Last month, the magazine First Things launched a campaign for clergy to pledge to stop signing marriage certificates. So far, more than 330 clergy have signed the pledge. The “I don’t” campaign to alter the “I do” patterns has support from liberals as well. “The state doesn’t tell you how to celebrate Christmas or Ramadan, and it shouldn’t tell you how to get married,” Paul Waldman wrote in the American Prospect in July. Meanwhile, many brides and grooms are voting with their feet—away from involving clergy at their wedding. For more than a decade, state offices of vital statistics have not distinguished between clergy and nonclergy wedding officiants, so there are no national statistics to prove a trend. However, an unscientific 2010 study by TheKnot.com and WeddingChannel.com found a shift away from clergy ceremonies: 31 percent of the websites’ respondents who married in 2010 said they used a family member or friend as their officiant, up from 29 percent in 2009, the first year of the survey, according to the Washington Post. —Cathy Lynn Grossman, Religion News Service ■ Jonathan Greenblatt, a special assistant to President Obama, will succeed Abraham Foxman as head of the AntiDefamation League, which was founded to combat the hatred of Jews and Judaism. “Since its inception, ADL has had a tremendous impact on making America a more inclusive society for all people while defending the rights of Jews to freely practice their faith and be full participants in society,” Greenblatt, 43, said in a statement. He will take the helm of the ADL in July when Foxman retires after 27 years. Greenblatt currently serves as director of the Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation in the Obama administration’s Domestic Policy Council, where he has worked on gun violence prevention, among other issues. Greenblatt, the grandson of a Holocaust survivor, also founded Ethos Brands, which created Ethos Water, a bottled water company funding global clean water campaigns. Greenblatt “brings to ADL an impressive track record of leadership in both the nonprofit and for-profit sectors 19 PHOTO COURTESY OF THE ANTI-DEFAMATION LEAGUE ■ In a lengthy interview in the Times, Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby predicted that the Anglican Communion might not hold together because of strong disagreements over the ordination of women as bishops and full rights for LGBT people. The interview came at the end of Welby’s visits to each of the 38 provinces that make up the Anglican Communion. Welby said that although individual churches remain “strong, resilient, and thriving,” the differences among them remain profound. “I think, realistically, we’ve got to say that despite all efforts there is a possibility that we will not hold together, or not hold together for a while,” he said. “I could see circumstances in which there could be people moving apart and then coming back together, depending on what else happens.” Rod Thomas, chairman of Reform, an evangelical network of English and Irish Anglicans opposed to women bishops and LGBT ordination or unions, agreed with the archbishop’s assessment. “If, as an Anglican, you believe more or less the same things but you just can’t reach agreement on something that is terribly divisive, you do go your separate ways,” said Thomas, who is also a member of the governing body of the Church of England. “That will mean that the heads of various Anglican churches around the world won’t be able to meet together and say ‘Look, we’re all united’ in the same way they did in the past.” Welby said that some churches, particularly in Africa, may find it difficult to remain in a single global Anglican Com- and a deep and abiding commitment to our mission of combating anti-Semitism and defending the civil rights of all people,” said Barry Curtiss-Lusher, ADL’s national chair. —Lauren Markoe, Religion News Service munion. But he insisted, “It would take a long time for the latent underlying link of Canterbury to cease to be an important factor in the way people looked at life and the Communion.” Canterbury is regarded as the mother church in the Anglican world, but its authority is being challenged by a global network of conservative Anglican churches known as the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans, which was formed in 2008. The fellowship is made up of leaders in African, Asian, Australian, South American, and some North American churches. The archbishop’s tour took him around the world—from Brazil to South Sudan and from Rwanda to South Korea. In the interview, he spoke about when to call another Lambeth Conference, the summoning to Canterbury of all Anglican Communion leaders typically held every ten years; the last was in 2008. —Trevor Grundy, Religion News Service ■ The Senate confirmed David Saperstein as the State Department’s ambassador-atlarge for international religious freedom, making him the first non-Christian to hold the job. Saperstein, 67, who led the Reform Jewish movement’s Washington office for 40 years, focusing on social justice and religious freedom issues, was nominated by President Obama in July and confirmed by a 62-35 vote on December 12. “Religious freedom faces daunting and alarming challenges worldwide,” Saperstein said at his confirmation hearing in September. “If confirmed, I will do everything within my abilities and influence to engage every sector of the State Department and the rest of the U.S. government to integrate religious freedom into our nation’s statecraft and foreign policies.” Saperstein, named the most influential rabbi in America by Newsweek magazine in 2009, was the first chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, which was created as a watchdog group in the same act of Congress that created the ambassador-at-large position in 1998. The Washington-based Interfaith Alliance applauded Saperstein’s confirmation. “When David steps into this position he not only achieves a remarkable capstone to what has been a long and successful career, he brings to our nation’s foreign policy a wealth of knowledge and a fierce dedication to religious freedom and the rights of religious minorities,” said C. Welton Gaddy, president of the alliance. “David’s work has always been guided by the Jewish commandment to repair the world—he has now been given an incredible platform to do just that.” —Lauren Markoe, Religion News Service Christian Century January 7, 2015 PHOTO COURTESY OF THE RELIGION ACTION CENTER OF REFORM JUDAISM PHOTO © EPISCOPAL DIOCESE OF CENTRAL FLORIDA (VIA CREATIVE COMMONS) People dangerous. This mission drives Jesus back to the wilderness to wrestle with the devil, and it leads him to places of suffering, chaos, and despair. When God hears the cries of the creation, God sends Jesus—armed with the power of the Holy Spirit and with his identity and mission as the Son of God. The baptisms where I preside have been orderly and relatively tame. Still, I suspect that the danger of the river is present, that the heavens are again torn apart so that this new child of God bears with us both Jesus’ name and his mission. It is both comforting and dangerous. The river with its power is present, even if we mostly miss this presence. Sometimes I wonder if we can do more to point out that something powerful is happening at a baptism. Perhaps, like Annie Dillard once suggested, we should all wear crash helmets and life preservers. Perhaps we should issue warnings with our baptismal certificates: “This is a passport to places you never thought you would go, to be an emissary of the living God in the desert and the wilderness, to plant seeds of hope and healing and life.” The young woman’s question haunts me, and not simply because I have never done a river baptism. It is because I realize that it is in part the dangerous possibility that holds me back, that makes me want to stay safe in a place with ceilings and heating, with order and liturgy. And when I wonder what about a river baptism attracts her, I know the answer: it’s life. The life of the river attracts her, the idea that a river is flowing, moving, coming from somewhere and going somewhere else, Sunday, January 11 Mark 1:4–11 HAVE YOU EVER done a river baptism?” We were in the church library when she asked it, a large group of us sitting in a circle and talking about baptism. Later at our evening service there would be two babies and a two-year-old baptized in the font in our small chapel. But for now, we were sitting around talking about what would happen that night, why it was important to us, and what we believed about it. “I have been reading about river baptisms lately,” she went on. “I think it would be really powerful to be baptized in a river.” I had to admit that while I wasn’t against river baptisms, I had never done one. All of my baptisms have been indoors, in fonts of one sort or another, in places with walls and ceilings and central heating. When she first said “river baptism,” I thought of the Mississippi, which flows not too far from our church. A baptism in the mighty Mississippi could be dangerous. You have to know what you are doing in a river. Still, her fascination with river baptisms got me thinking— about the wildness of rivers, the wildness of creation, the wildness of baptism. Mark’s account of Jesus’ baptism is spare. There is no description of the people being baptized or of the scribes and the Pharisees watching. There is no conversation between Jesus and John. But there is this: Jesus is baptized in a river, in the wilderness. And when Jesus is baptized, he sees the heavens torn apart. Not just opened, as in Matthew and Luke, but torn apart. Opened heavens might plausibly be seen as good news. For them to be torn apart, however, seems dangerous, like the river. But like the woman attracted to the power of a river baptism, so Israel yearned for a powerful God who would tear apart the heavens. In Isaiah 64, the cry goes up: “O that you would tear open the heavens and come down.” It is the heart’s cry of an Israel subdued, put down, mocked by those who would deny its God. Israel yearns for God to come and right wrongs, lift up the poor, set free the captives, bring power to the oppressed and healing to those who suffer. When Jesus is baptized, God tears apart the heavens, and a voice declares the truth of Jesus’ identity: “You are my Son, the Beloved, with you I am well pleased.” This has, more often than not, been the focus of the baptisms that take place around our font (not at the river), these words that I have marked as comforting. But at his river baptism Jesus is given not just an identity, but a mission—and his mission is not just comforting, but Our baptisms are passports to places we never thought we would go. Christian Century January 7, 2015 receiving and giving life. When the heavens are torn open, something new emerges; a mystery once hidden is revealed, a presence once absent is now among us. The heavens torn open mean that God is somehow with us in a new way. Not that God wasn’t with us before, but that something new is being born—a different kind of relationship, both dangerous and comforting. The wildness of the river is not tamed by the font or by the order of the liturgy. God’s words—“You are my Son, my child. With you I am well pleased”—promise us a wild ride into the current of God’s justice, passion, and mercy. Though I eschew the danger of the river, I know that it is where God leads me, because I bear God’s name. God whispers in my ear and pushes me out to places I am afraid to go. This is what you get for having the water poured over your head, for being called a child of God—whether that water flowed in a river or a font. 20 Reflections on the lectionary realize that what he is hearing is the voice of God. And it is night as well for Israel. The first verse of chapter three sets the tone: “The word of the Lord was rare in those days. Visions were not widespread.” How often might God be trying to speak to us, but we are not listening? Is it possible that we don’t even recognize the sound of God’s voice? If so, who can teach us? Is it possible that the very young and the old among us, those most often dismissed, are the ones with the insight, the wisdom, and the openness to teach? “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening”—Eli knows these words, but perhaps he hasn’t spoken them in years. He has long since ceased to expect God’s voice. I used to think that this was the end of Samuel’s story: he learns to listen to God. Strangely, I wasn’t curious at all about what God has to say to Samuel. I didn’t wonder about the particular word that God has for him. Perhaps I just assumed that it’s something affirming or heartwarming—something like the daily devotions I usually read that remind me that I am God’s child, that God loves me even in the midst of adversity, even when the light has gone out. Sunday, January 18 1 Samuel 3:1–20 A COUPLE OF YEARS AGO, my congregation decided to do lectio divina as part of our midweek Lenten worship. After our opening liturgy and prayer, we entered into this ancient Benedictine practice of scripture reading and expectant listening. Three times we heard a word from God; three times we trained our ears to pick out the voice of God in the silence. Each week we began our time of lectio divina with words from 1 Samuel 3:9: “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.” What more appropriate verse could there be, I thought? Eli teaches Samuel that God is calling him. He teaches him to listen, expecting God to speak. If we use Samuel’s words, we will know that God is speaking to us, too. Our congregation tried this practice specifically during Lent because we were convinced that one key to revitalizing our congregation was learning again how to listen—to God, to one another, and to our neighbors. When we start believing that God speaks to us—and even more than that, that God is calling us—this is when renewal begins. As for me, I used this verse from 1 Samuel intentionally as well. I have loved it for a long time. I used to wonder why “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening” was not a part of our regular Sunday liturgies. The words just sounded like they belonged in worship, like a line of poetry. So I grabbed at the chance to make it part of lectio. I have known the story of Samuel since I was a small child, when my grandmother gave me a narrow maroon book with gilt edges called Children of the Bible. It featured realistic pictures of Miriam, Isaac, Joseph (and his coat), 12-year-old Jesus, and of course Samuel. I remember that Samuel was depicted as a curly-headed, dark-eyed, and very young child. He is in bed but sitting up, listening. He is listening for the voice of God, just as Eli instructed. “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.” The verse is a fulcrum for all that comes before and after. In the stories of my childhood, the lesson always ended here, when Samuel finally gets it right, when he finally realizes that God is calling him. It is a story that takes place in the darkness. It is night, and Samuel is sleeping in the place where the Ark of the Covenant is located. (I never noticed that detail as a child.) It is night for Eli, whose eyesight is dimming and who has forgotten what God’s voice sounds like. It is night for Samuel, who doesn’t Is it possible that we don’t recognize the sound of God’s voice? These are good messages. They are not, however, the particular message that God has for Samuel. God’s word for Samuel is a word of judgment on the house of Eli. This must be a hard word for the young boy to hear, a hard word to tell. Yet ultimately it is a good word, because it is a word about the renewal of Israel. I can’t help thinking that the lessons of lectio divina and the lessons of Samuel are similar. In order to hear we need to expect that God will speak to us, that the word of God will come to us. But the word we receive is never general, always particular— and it is a good word but not necessarily an easy one. God will not just tell us to forgive people; God will send us to forgive a particular person. God will not just tell us to love people but will send us on a particular mission of love, embodied. When we say “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening,” perhaps we are opening a can of explosives. Who knows where God will lead us? The author is Diane Roth, a Lutheran pastor who blogs at Faith in Community, part of the CCblogs Network. 21 Christian Century January 7, 2015 W h e n i t ’s t i m e fo r a c h u rc h to c l os e The last Sunday by Angie Mabry-Nauta ON AN AVERAGE day in the United States, nine But how does a group of church leaders come to such a noturning-back decision? How have other churches done it? churches close their doors for good. This isn’t often talked about, partly because it’s not exactly breaking news. Church professionals know the trends: church membership and religious affiliation are declining. Relatively few churches are growing. It’s particularly hard to talk about your own church’s demise. It’s not easy to say what sometimes needs to be said: “It’s time for our church to close.” On the first Sunday of Advent in 2013, the Reformed Church in Plano, Texas—where I had been a member for 16 years—celebrated the beginning of a new church year as usual: royal purple and evergreens, a single lit candle on the wreath. Then, right before the benediction, the two copastors asked everyone to be seated as the members of the church’s consistory approached the podium. Their somber faces reflected a decision that the congregation knew was coming. After much prayer and deliberation, said John Weymer, the vice president, the consistory had decided that the church would close at the end of January 2014. “We made the decision that we felt was best for the church and its members,” Weymer said. “We had the choice to keep limping on as a dying church, or to close our doors with dignity while we still can. People need a vibrant faith community, one that can care for them, challenge them, and disciple them—all for the purpose of sending them out into the community in mission. We have been unable to provide that for quite a while now.” The easier choice would have been to hang on—hang on to memories of what once was, to the good that yet remained, to outside chances of survival, to the tightly knit groups that were like family, to the “what ifs.” A church’s tougher choice, the one of the narrow gate and the road less traveled, is to recognize that it cannot shepherd its flock adequately and to avoid becoming a stumbling block in people’s faith journey. If courageous church leadership includes knowing when a church’s death is best for its people, RCP’s pastors and lay leaders fit the bill. “The church’s bias has always been that you do whatever you can to keep a congregation going,” noted Wesley Granberg-Michaelson, former general secretary of the Reformed Church in America. “This is neither a healthy nor correct Christian theological approach. Death is never the last word, and the new is always seeking to break in.” Christian Century January 7, 2015 W hen Rosemont Community Church in Tucson, Arizona, contacted John Cameron Foster in 2011, the congregation was worshiping with about 50 people in attendance. Foster is an interim minister trained specifically to help churches in crisis and transition. His task, he says, was “to give Rosemont one more chance to become viable.” Foster led the church through a program aimed at helping a congregation take an honest look at its past, assess its present, Rather than limp on, some churches make brave decisions. and discern its future. Eventually he asked whether the congregation thought it could make necessary changes and “move into a positive future.” Many people, however, wanted instead to continue with things the way they were, maintaining that they didn’t need a pastor and could get by on pulpit supply. “The hardest thing for a dying church to do is change graciously,” Foster said. He describes a “three-legged stool of viability”: critical mass, financial viability, and vision. “Sadly,” he said, Rosemont’s leadership “did not want to own up to” the church’s lack of viability in all three areas. Everything changed in September 2013 when, at the RCC consistory’s request, representatives from the classis—the RCA middle judicatory—met with leaders. Through a twohour conversation, the consistory came to understand the breadth and depth of the church’s circumstances. Three months later, it voted to close the church. Foster describes closing a church as one of the hardest pastoral experiences he’s had. “Call it a funeral to the tenth power,” he says. Edie Lenz closed a church in her first call out of seminary. When Lenz came to Church of the Good News in 2002, the RCA mission church near Chicago’s Wrigley Field had already Angie Mabry-Nauta is a writer, speaker, and Presbyterian Church (USA) minister. 22 PHOTO BY ALEKSEJS JEVSEJENKO In April 2009, a consultant led a group from Bethlehem in discussing the congregation’s history and remembering its accomplishments. She also helped them begin discerning possible scenarios. Three emerged: merge with another church, share the building with another church, or close. “There was no blame,” MacPherson recalls, “and there was relative calm.” The congregation tried both merging and sharing, to no avail. That August, it voted to close. “We felt a sense of freedom once the plan to close was set because no more decisions had to be made,” said MacPherson. “Also, the remaining members formed themselves in a different way as the remnants. Their mind-set seemed to be, ‘We’re the ones who are left, so let’s be nice to one another.’” Each of these three churches suffered long-term membership decline. Each engaged in an assessment process, with help from judicatory leaders. Two experienced significant leadership challenges. All made painfully brave decisions to close rather than limp on. seen urban redevelopment and gentrification begin to scatter its congregants and partner organizations. Economic and demographic changes soon brought the church to a crossroads. Would it make radical changes in its vision and mission to accommodate what was happening around it? Or would it follow its people out of the community? In a 2007 classis-wide assessment, church-health experts visited CGN to gauge its health and effectiveness. They suggested closure. Lenz believes that it was neither the ongoing money issues When is it time to move beyond mere survival? nor this outside recommendation that led CGN to decide to close. The church’s leaders—those who were left—were overburdened and overwhelmed. “We did not have a full consistory, and those in leadership on consistory were not all actually leaders,” Lenz recalls. “There were several who did their best, but they really were not equipped to serve. It is exhausting to keep going knowing that you carry the load mostly alone.” Church of the Good News held its final worship service in May 2008. Nearby Bethlehem United Church of Christ closed the following year. During Wayne MacPherson’s 17-year tenure as senior pastor, neighborhood changes took their toll, as did a building in need of renovation. Programmatic ventures—new worship practices, evangelism efforts—were unable to attract new interest. In 2008, with giving and membership down and an aging remnant remaining, Bethlehem’s leadership met with the UCC Illinois Conference to explore their options. B efore my church in Plano closed, a team of leaders spent two years researching the church’s situation, gathering statistics spanning a decade. They visited other churches to gain perspective. They made themselves available to the congregation for questions and comments. All the while they reported to the consistory and the pastors. The team’s findings were painful. They revealed a church in long-term decline and in need of radical change if its ministry was to continue. Yet worship was vibrant, and a faithful band of 135 members remained strongly committed to their church. RCP’s leadership discerned the facts, felt the resistance, and ached for better days. The tension immobilized them. 23 Christian Century January 7, 2015 Two months later, church leaders hosted three forums in which members were presented with the hard facts—and with five possibilities for RCP’s future: Something had to give, and eventually one member of the lay team rose to the occasion. A child of the church since sixth grade, now a husband with children of his own, he sent an email to the whole team. “It is with great pain but clear vision I write that I believe RCP needs to close,” he wrote. “Our vitality is all but gone, and we are merely surviving, rather than thriving for Christ. This isn’t what church is supposed to be about.” It was difficult to read. Several church leaders got angry. But, Weymer says, this e-mail was a catalyst to more open discussion of the issue at hand. 1. Make no change. RCP would continue operating as it had been. Depleted funds would force the church to close within six to nine months. 2. Restart. RCP would close its doors and sell its property. A small, dedicated group would then become part of a new church—new name, new location, new identity, new DNA. 3. Relocate, rename, rebrand—but without actually closing RCP. The farm wife muses upon her Miracle Tree 4. Make new ties. A different denomination might be better situated to provide local support. RCP could join as a stand-alone congregation or merge with an existing one. Everyone laughed when it arrived in a legal-sized envelope and I showed them 5. Close. RCP would set a date to close its doors. A final sermon series and a closing worship service would celebrate 35 years of ministry and mourn its end. Church leaders would assist members in finding new church homes. the ad: “For 19.99, watch it reach your roofline in a year.” Just as that stick, plain as a toothpick, unfurled a leaf Pete clipped it with the mower. That’s it, These options were presented as independent from the course to be taken by the pastors, who were discerning their own options. Before the benediction on the Sunday following the forums, the pastors announced that they’d be leaving. They would stay to lead worship and provide administrative support only until they were called elsewhere. The consistory would assume responsibility for pastoral care and RCP’s remaining ministries. When the pastors shared this news, a deep silence filled the air. Sniffles and throat clearings sounded overamplified. A palpable awareness of the church’s mortality grew. The next week RCP’s leadership conducted what would be the final congregational survey. “Would you be willing to commit to the next phase of RCP’s ministry without our copastors leading us? Please specify how you will serve.” A range of responsibilities was listed: making coffee, leading a small group, inviting friends to worship, serving on the leadership board, nothing at all. The consistory needed to know what energy, if any, RCP had for continuing without a pastor. The survey’s results were the final nail in RCP’s coffin. More than 70 percent said to shut it down. The leadership made the plans, and soon made the Sunday announcement. I thought, but it grew back above the red petunias I added ’round its base. We could use a miracle here, with the cows gone and the house in reverse mortgage. But when it spouted slender branches with narrow leaves even the Schwan Man who measured each week lost interest. I ponder the name Salix babylonica and how merchants traded sprigs of those trees along the Silk Road. Already it weeps like a woman, I write in my diary. Already C hurch closure is painful. Not talking about it is tragic. Guilt and shame may prevent a church from sharing the wisdom it has gleaned from the process, wisdom that instead remains locked behind the shuttered doors. The following suggestions, gleaned from those quoted above, are hardly exhaustive but may be useful. my neighbors dismiss it as a dirty tree. Shari Wagner Christian Century January 7, 2015 24 For congregations: For pastors: • Keep your pastor(s) through the end. Releasing the pastor may seem like an obvious solution to money problems. But struggling churches need a consistent pastoral presence. RCP’s pastors led and served until the last day, offering a life vest in an uncharted, turbulent sea. • Take care of yourself. If you don’t, no one will—and you will have nothing to give. • Love and feed your sheep. Be prepared for an increase in emotional tension after a church decides to close. Some will blame one another; others will blame you. Tongues that are typically still might fly with vicious speed. More than ever, pour out love upon the congregation. • Keep giving. As Bethlehem UCC grew short on money and volunteer energy, people felt taxed and unable to give more. This is common in dying churches, and it’s understandable. Yet 150 people chose to stay and give through Bethlehem’s end. It’s a gift to savor God’s continuing activity through a dying yet beloved faith community. God’s call to worship and mission never ends. • Rejoice that the body and mission of Christ are bigger than your congregation. Your church may be dying, but God is not. God’s call to worship and mission does not cease. • Work with your denomination. Judicatories exist to support their member churches. A pastor is not expected to close a church alone and shouldn’t try to. “What we need is a real letting go,” commented GranbergMichaelson—letting go “of the past, of our fears, of power, of tradition. . . . It’s too hard to break through the present when the church is on life support and the concern is keeping the doors open.” The alternative: cling to resurrection and to the life of the larger body of Christ. This may make it possible to allow a church to die when it is clear that its time has come. • Preach resurrection. The congregation needs to hear about life beyond the church that is dying. Death does not defeat God’s children, and it doesn’t defeat God’s church. When a church dies, new life sprouts elsewhere within the body of Christ. 2015 NEW CLERGY CONFERENCE Sustaining and Enriching Clergy Leadership for Congregational Life Week One: June 27–July 4, 2015 Chautauqua’s interfaith New Clergy Program is offering one week-long Conference this summer, and invites applications from interested clergy in Christian, Jewish, and Islamic faith communities. During this week, Chautauqua Institution will provide full accommodations for clergy and their spouse or partner. Participants will reside on the Institution grounds, share meals, and meet daily with the program’s directors, faculty, and distinguished chaplains and lecturers participating in Chautauqua’s Department of Religion program. Discussions will focus on issues and experiences relevant to theological growth, leadership, renewal, and issues specific to the dynamics of those new to ministry. Conference participant grants are awarded to women and men of the Abrahamic traditions who have been in congregational ministry between 2 and 5 years, and are made possible through the support of various Foundations. These grants cover residency, meals, gate pass, and access to the full Chautauqua Amphitheater program. Participants are responsible for their own transportation arrangements and expenses. C H A U TA U Q UA INSTITUTION • CHAUTAUQUA, 25 NEW This will not be a vacation week; the program is designed for adult professional interest, interaction and development, and will maintain a rigorous schedule. As such, Chautauqua’s New Clergy Program is not conducive to the inclusion of children; and spouses, while encouraged to come, will not be included in some aspects of program interaction. For further information and for an application, access http://www.ciweb.org/religion-new-clergy All applicants are asked to submit application electronically to Nancy Roberts [email protected] Application deadline: February 15, 2015 Dr. Robert M. Franklin, Jr. Director, Department of Religion Chautauqua Institution Dr. Derek Austin Director, New Clergy Program YORK • WWW.CIWE B . O R G Christian Century January 7, 2015 H o w i n s t i t u t i o n s ca n d i e w e ll Final gifts by Adam Joyce THE NUMERICAL DECLINE in churches, the graying of the mainline, and the growth of the nones (people who claim no religious affiliation) have generated lots of talk about institutional death. The activities of death and decline in the church happen quietly: endowments atrophy, sanctuaries are deconsecrated, and church bodies strain to make the membership losses seem less obvious. In almost every conversation I have about this phenomenon—especially with ecclesial leaders—the idea of institutional crisis and renewal comes up. A common theme is that crisis—the threat of death—presents an opportunity for renewal. The language of crisis and renewal (borrowed from the world of business management) is paired with the theological categories of death and resurrection. The church needs to experience a death in order to experience a resurrection, the argument goes. For example, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori said this in September to the Episcopal Church’s House of Bishops: “This Episcopal Church is in the throes of creative ferment, yearning to find a new congruence that will discover emerging life in new soil and refreshed growth in the plantings of former years.” The signs of institutional decline are seen as laced with promises of new life. Didn’t Lazarus have to enter into the tomb in order to be resuscitated? It’s comforting to think that death might be the very thing to bring a church or institution back to life. But talk of resurrection in this context may be a way of denying death, a way to stuff our ears with eschatological cotton balls, refusing to think about where we are and who we are. The resurrection—God’s undoing of death—is not a church growth strategy. This easy invocation of the resurrection can be a way to disregard or avoid the hard work of preparing for death. We want a resurrection without the dying. When you ask individuals how they want to die, many say they want it to be quick, preferably as they sleep. But many deaths involve a slow decline, punctuated by aggressive and costly procedures enveloped in an atmosphere of fear. Surgeon and author Atul Gawande, in his 2010 New Yorker article “Letting Go,” describes the fraught relationship the dying have with technology: “Technology sustains our organs until we are well past the point of awareness and coherence. Besides, how do you attend to the thoughts and concerns of the Christian Century January 7, 2015 dying when medicine has made it almost impossible to be sure who the dying even are? Is someone with terminal cancer, dementia, incurable congestive heart failure dying, exactly?” This description could easily apply to segments of the North American church. Institutional deaths mirror our individual deaths in being expensive, drawn out, and full of fear. Institutions need to think and talk about how to die well. Often, both individually and institutionally, we are, as Gawande says, “unprepared for the final stage.” This lack of A good institutional death can be an act of faith and an act of worship. preparation leads to either an abrupt ending or what some have called institutional zombification. Minister and activist Will D. Campbell once held a funeral for a town—Golden Pond, Kentucky. It was an odd act but showed how the practices of death and dying are for more than individuals. So how do institutions die well? Author Andy Crouch says that “one of the mistakes institutions make is to defer facing their failure to the point that they have no more resources to attend to the end. They just collapse rather than exit.” Surviving is not synonymous with faithfulness, and death is not failure—unfaithfulness is. If the church is to start thinking about what a good death looks like, it should draw from the wisdom and practices of those who provide hospitality and care to those closest to death: those who work in hospice. G awande reports on the work of a hospice nurse, who tells him that “the difference between standard medical care and hospice is not the difference between treating and doing nothing. . . . The difference was in your priorities. In ordinary medicine, the goal is to extend life. We’ll sacrifice the quality of your existence now—by performing surgery, providing chemotherapy, putting you in intensive care— Adam Joyce is editor in chief at The Curator and works for Docent Research Group. 26 PHOTOS.COM holy deaths look like in their remembrance of martyrs. The death of the martyr bears witness to Christ, typically in the face of persecution. (However, concepts of self-martyrdom were present in the asceticism of individuals like the third-century monk Anthony.) Institutions that are dying may not face persecution, but they can learn from the tradition of martyrdom that it is possible to lay down one’s life for Christ. As Rowan Williams says, “Martyrdom affirms that there is something worth dying for, and it is the grace, the love, the infinite compassion of God. . . . Martyrdom is one form of Christian ‘excess.’” A good institutional death may look like a kenotic martyrdom. It involves the institution giving itself away—an excessive self-emptying. for the chance of gaining time later. Hospice deploys nurses, doctors, and social workers to help people with a fatal illness have the fullest possible lives right now.” Generally, hospitals aim for cures, and hospices aim for care. However, there is no cure for mortality. Hospice recognizes that there are times when certain procedures should not be performed and that a good end of life sometimes means that not everything that can be done to extend biological life is done. As Stanley Hauerwas says, “You don’t have to do everything necessary to keep your body alive.” The same insight applies to institutions. Churches may spend time and resources bringing in outside speakers and consultants, going to conferences, purging the bureaucracy, targeting one interest-based group after another, building drum cages, buying nicer coffee, and importing a pastiche of practices and ideas from other industries and communities. These are not inherently wrongheaded activities, but they may detract or deflect from real end-of-life flourishing. Flourishing at the end of an institution’s life involves asking different questions: What should we grieve? How do we celebrate our work? How do we give faithful and final gifts with our resources to those around us? Instead of seeking simply to extend life, institutions should concentrate on the laments, the joys, and the giving of gifts. The second lesson hospice teaches is that the work of dying isn’t done alone. A good death takes a team, or better yet, a community. Institutions should die in dialogue and relationship with other institutions. Dying well involves knowing the needs that surround you, the opportunities (and risks) that your resources present, and the legal and financial regulations that surround an institutional shuttering. Christians have done a lot of thinking about what good and L ast summer, Tony Campolo’s ministry, the Evangelical Association for the Promotion of Education, closed its doors. The EAPE existed to nurture organizations that combined a concern for evangelism and social justice in working with impoverished communities. In an interview with the online magazine Faith & Leadership, Campolo said: “The ability to scale down is important. How many organizations exist when their reason to exist and their ability to get the job done have long since come to an end? . . . As though there is something ungodly about saying, ‘It’s time to stop.’” Campolo forced EAPE to ask tough questions, eventually leading it to consider how to close down thoughtfully. The process took over a year, with legal proceedings and meetings and attention to numerous details. Eventually EAPE gave its resources to some of the ministries it had helped found, and it asked its donor base to direct support and money to these other ministries. 27 Christian Century January 7, 2015 WHAT DOES THE CHURCH AND SEMINARY LOOK LIKE IN MISSION TOGETHER? Students receiving their seminary education without leaving their cities Theologians and pastors training leaders together for the renewal of the city Partnering in special MA and MDiv degrees offered by Western Theological Seminary LEARN MORE AT: www.newbiginhouse.org Spiritual renewal will only happen when “local congregations renounce an introverted concern for their own life, and recognize that they exist for the sake of those who are not members, as sign, instrument and foretaste of God’s redeeming grace for the whole life of society.” – Lesslie Newbigin not synonymous with Christ. It bears witness to how death EAPE didn’t fail, or collapse, or lumber along looking for is not the final word. Good deaths do not deny death, but new resources to consume. EAPE exited. And it ceased to exist point to death’s undoing. Christ lives even amidst and after by thoughtfully and slowly dialoguing with others and passing our individual and institutional deaths. Humanity has more parts of its life on to them. to it than bodily life. There is more to God’s kingdom than Crouch comments, “Stewards of an institution in the hospice us. phase need to ask, ‘How do we send out the image bearers who Clinging to life is not the same as living. At the end of their have found dignity, agency, authority, and vulnerability in this life, institutions should begin the slow and thoughtful process institution to join other settings where they can flourish?’ There of public repentance, joyfully remembering their ministry, is a responsibility to not just throw people out, but to ask what pointing to Christ, sharing their wisdom, and giving away is transferable from this institution to others?” their gifts. Oddly enough, a good death sounds a lot like a Institutional deaths should be slow, but slow for the right good life. reasons. EAPE’s death was slow not because it spent everything—people, time, money, and places—for the sake of survival. It was slow because it spent time identifying the needs of fellow institutions and carefully directing its resources to them. For an institution, kenotic martyrdom CHRISTIAN SCHOLARSHIP involves more than giving away resources and IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY wisdom. It also involves the dual act of public Prospects and Perils repentance and joyful celebration. Every Thomas M. Crisp, Steve L. Porter, church, school, denomination, or nonprofit has and Gregg A. Ten Elshof, editors wounded others. Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s theoTen eminent scholars offer deep and thought-provoking logical equation in Life Together, “Confession is discussions of the habits and commitments of the Christian discipleship,” holds true for institutions at the scholar, the methodology and pedagogy of Christian scholend of their lives. arship, the role of the Holy Spirit in education, Christian Repentance of institutional sins requires the approaches to art and literature, and more. truthful exercise of memory. While the capacity ISBN 978-0-8028-7144-2 Ɣ 208 pages Ɣ paperback Ɣ $22.00 for truthful memory escapes many institutions during their lifetime, perhaps an impending RETRIEVING ORIGINS AND THE CLAIM death can provide the opportunity for it. A OF MULTICULTURALISM good death means that institutions take responAntonio López and Javier Prades, editors sibility for past (and current) wrongs, publicly Preface by Angelo Cardinal Scola naming them, and asking for forgiveness. “Antonio López and Javier Prades merit high praise for this Public confession and repentance are possifascinating volume. . . . The distinguished contributors ble only if an institution enters into its demise represent diverse Euro-American standpoints, but all wish to thoughtfully, reflecting on its history and how it re-propose a transcendent and lasting vision of cultural diverhas interacted with others. Confession paves the sity. . . . I cannot think of a more necessary or creative project way for the institution to remember and gratethan the one undertaken in these pages.” fully celebrate its ministry. This gratitude should — Peter Casarella point to and proclaim Christ, recognizing the ISBN 978-0-8028-6990-6 Ɣ 208 pages Ɣ paperback Ɣ $29.00 grace that allowed the community to participate in God’s redemption of all things. SECULAR GOVERNMENT, RELIGIOUS PEOPLE God’s gifts to us are not “fully realized until Emory University Studies in Law and Religion series they are given away,” writes Lewis Hyde in Ira C. Lupu and Robert W. Tuttle The Gift: Creativity and the Artist in the Mod“For well over a decade now, the scholarly team of Ira Lupu ern World. Just as Christ reveals that there is and Robert Tuttle has been a valuable and distinctive voice in something worth living for, he also reveals that conversations about religion, law, and government. Secular there is something worth dying for. InstituGovernment, Religious People reflects the mature, comtions can die for the larger church, for Christ, prehensive culmination of that collaboration. . . . This is a for the mission of God, and for the flourishing formidable book that will have to be reckoned with.” of others. When it comes to institutional death, — Steven Smith the holiness is in the how. A good death is an ISBN 978-0-8028-7079-7 Ɣ 279 pages Ɣ paperback Ɣ $25.00 act of worship. A good death teaches other institutions how to die. A good death can be At your bookstore, faithful. or call 800-253-7521 4522 A church’s kenotic martyrdom bears witwww.eerdmans.com ness to how the church (or any institution) is NEW from EERDMANS 29 Christian Century January 7, 2015 Texas tough by Kyle Childress Rough Country: How Texas Became America’s Most Powerful Bible-Belt State OUTSIDE THE LARGE First Baptist Church in the small West Texas town where I grew up, a handful of men gathered every Sunday morning to smoke one last cigarette before going in to worship. They were ranchers and farmers mostly, and their conversation consisted of three things: how dry it was, the prospects of the high school football team, and how dry it was. Before going inside, one of them loved to repeat an old Texas saying: “It’s 250 miles to the nearest post office, 100 miles to wood, 20 miles to water, six inches to hell.” Sociologist Robert Wuthnow seeks to show how living in such an unforgiving and challenging land has shaped the perspective of its people and especially its religion. This rough country has been observed and experienced and often written about in letters and diaries by the settlers of the Texas frontier; in it, Wuthnow says, “nearly everything is rough: the land is rough, earning a living is rough, the people are rough, even the preachers are rough.” He goes on, “What to make of this roughness, and how to overcome it, are the most basic questions of everyday life.” Mixing historical anecdotes gleaned from newspaper accounts, memoirs, and diaries with demographic studies and sociological analysis and using historical narrative as a framework, Wuthnow shows how this rough state with its rough religion and its rough relationship with race became such a powerful force in Bible Belt politics. During the formative history of the state, people living “at the margins of civilization existed in daily fear of attack from hostile Indians, outlaws, and renegades.” One person wrote about life in the city of Galveston, “Nobody who cares for his life ventures out after dark.” Men there “shoot and cut up each other on the least provocation” and “bowie knives and pistols are conspicuous ornaments.” At the same time, there was fear of slave insurrection and fear of Mexico with its threatening Catholic religion. Slaves were treated roughly and Texans of Mexican descent were mistreated. With so much “evil” out there, efforts at resisting it, restraining it, changing it, and even destroying it were paramount. Either attack it or convert it and civilize it through the building of towns, roads, schools, businesses, churches, and other institutions. According to Wuthnow, religion was preeminent in affirming the social order and combating evil. Texas seemed to have more Baptists than people and, as one Roman Catholic said, Christian Century January 7, 2015 By Robert Wuthnow Princeton University Press, 664 pp., $39.50 the place seemed to be “crawling with Methodists and ants.” Wuthnow says that a heavily Baptist and Methodist version of Christianity provided a language to express worries and fears, gave strength and solace in the face of enormous difficulties, and offered hope for a better future both in this life and the life to come. And because Baptists were such a powerful force in Texas, religious liberty of conscience with its concomitant emphasis Religion in Texas is shaped by life in an unforgiving land. on separation of church and state was a major aspect of religious and political life. “In practice, liberty of conscience deterred clergy and lay leaders from bringing their faith in an official or organized way into the political arena.” All of that was fine and dandy, especially with Texas’s own version of civil religion. As Texas writer Robert Flynn remembers, it was hard to keep all those Texas heroes separate when he was a boy: Sam Houston, King David, Davy Crockett, Robert E. Lee, Moses, Samson, and Stonewall Jackson. These martyrs and founding figures combined with a minimalist understanding of God formed Texas’s civil religion, says Wuthnow. A longside and mixed in with the generalized civil religion were the more particular Baptist and Methodist types with emphasis on the spiritual: individual sin and salvation, personal morality and regeneration. And as long as all this religion along with other social institutions were all going in the same direction of civilizing the rough world and fighting evil, liberty of conscience was carefully Kyle Childress serves as the pastor of Austin Heights Baptist Church, Nacogdoches, Texas. 30 1970s and 1980s, and on to today’s battles over homosexuality, immigration, and taxes. Wuthnow brings this story up to date through the governorships of George W. Bush and Rick Perry, the rise of the Tea Party, and the election of Ted Cruz to the U.S. Senate. Wuthnow touches also on the rough dissenting and reforming stream in politics, religion, and race. For example, during the height of Jim Crow and the Progressive Era the figure of Jessie Daniel Ames emerged. She was a Methodist woman who, because of her faith, became involved in suffrage and active in the anti-lynching movement—mostly led by women. There was also the East Texas judge “Cyclone” Davis, a Populist one-term member of Congress who, in old age during the Depression, denounced social injustices and plutocrats, quoting scripture. And there were others, tough and scrappy and as unrelenting as the powerful figures they opposed. observed. Clergy kept to preaching on the spiritual life which undergirded the schools, organizations, and institutions that built society. The problem arose when society and the churches felt threatened. What is interesting is what was considered threatening and what was not. Racism was not. Wuthnow says that from the black perspective, religion gave hope and courage in the face of extraordinary hardship and indescribable violence, but for whites, religion supported the racist status quo. Wuthnow tells Unlike other Bible Belt states, Texas has oil and the money that goes with it. shocking stories of lynchings, often witnessed by hundreds, sometimes thousands of local townsfolk, most of whom were o what makes Texas different from any other Bible Belt active churchgoers. Often the lynchings were privately critistate? Other states have more Baptists than people, are cized by clergy, who rarely condemned the actions publicly. suspicious of the federal government, have a history of Indeed, many white clergy felt that though lynching was regretracism and violence, and more than enough rough people to go table, it served the interest of law and order. around. What makes Texas different? Since racism and violence did not seem to challenge white Oil. And the money that comes from oil. Wuthnow says the religion and society’s view of combating evil and spreading greater resources of Texas, along with its large size and popucivilization, what did? Wuthnow says that white clergy’s first lation, have given it a power beyond other states. For example, real challenge to the social status quo was the fight for Prohibition. About the same time, evolution also threatened the social order, and with Democrat Al Smith’s nomination for president in 1928, the assumed social order was furBringing Poetry into the Life of Your Church ther upset since Smith was Roman Catholic and was for the repeal of Prohibition. All this served as precedent for political activism on the part of churches and clergy. Conference with Yale faculty Wuthnow continues his story through organized by David C. Mahan, the Depression and Dust Bowl and the director of the Rivendell Institute at Yale clergy’s response to the New Deal, which though greatly needed, raised Inspiration and practical guidance for many people’s fears of federal governchurch leaders in the many uses of ment’s intrusion into areas of charity poetry for worship, liturgy, meditation, and service perceived to be the exclusive and education to shape the minds and responsibility of churches and civic hearts of contemporary congregations. organizations. In 1930s Texas, memory stretched back to the frontier when christian wiman, keynote speaker there was little or no federal government close enough to do any good and Maggi Dawn · David C. Mahan · Janet Ruffing to Reconstruction, in which the federal Thomas Troeger government was perceived by whites as the villain. By the 1950s these old habits and doubts coalesced into outright fear; social order was threatened again and Susan Sohl: “Polyhymnia” again—by communism in the 1950s, civil Information and registration at ism.yale.edu/poetryconference2015. rights in the 1960s, the role of women Presented by Yale Institute of Sacred Music and the debate over abortion in the S “Love bade me welcome” may 12–14, 2015 · yale university 31 Christian Century January 7, 2015 with more school districts than any other state, Texas is highly influential in the textbook publishing industry. During the Depression a few Texans grew wealthy from oil and its related industries. Some of those Texans used much of their wealth in supporting churches and evangelists, their organizations, and their use of media such as publishing, radio, and television. Oil wealth was also used to support politicians with the same goals in mind. I found myself wishing throughout the book for more on one or another aspect of Wuthnow’s story, and he confesses that there is much beyond the scope of his study. Wuthnow is a FIND A WELCOME AT PRINCETON SEMINARY careful sociologist and his research is meticulous; he is a master of telling what happened and how it happened. The why is for others to explain. Why is much Texas religion heartfelt and at the same time racist, hostile to difference, and at ease with violence? Why the affinity between corporate money and religion? Why does such a religious state have so much inequality? Why does this Texas version of Christendom—the intertwining of religion, politics, and culture—persist? Why should anyone in another part of the country read this book about Texas? Wuthnow says that while “it was never possible to regard Texas as a microcosm of America—or indeed any way of being small,” there is a great deal that parallels with America. This Texas story is America’s story, albeit refracted through a specific locale. And with so much conflict and division in American politics and religion, perhaps we can better understand the whole while looking at the particular. Molly Ivins, a longtime Texas journalist, used to refer to Dallas as a city with “Big Buildings, Big Hair, and a Big Jesus” (she also said Dallas would have pulled for Goliath in the contest with David). The same can be said for Texas if you add Big Oil, Big Money, and Big Influence. Texan Bill Moyers tells the story of a fellow who saw a fight out in the street. He ran over and shouted, “Is this a private fight or can anyone join in?” Maybe we Texans just like to fight. I don’t know. I used to think that the fights of our past were clearly defined. Rough Country reminds me that most of the fights were more complex than I thought. The one thing that hasn’t changed is that there are some things worth fighting for. SUBMISSIONS If you would like to write an article for the Century, please send a query to [email protected] or to Submissions, the Christian Century, 104 S. Michigan Ave., Suite 1100, Chicago, IL 60603. Allow four to six www.ptsem.edu click on “admissions” weeks for a response from our editors. We do not consider unsolicited manuscripts for our regular columns or book reviews. Christian Century January 7, 2015 32 by M. Craig Barnes Lesser-known heroes HE HAS an unpretentious name—Ralph Hamburger. If Pastors spend every day of their ministries behind an iron curtain that is determined to separate us from the splendors of holiness. Those in the pews on Sunday morning have been bullied by the screaming call to succeed in a futile exercise of selfconstructing a life that will be fulfilling, whole, or at least not hurt so much. And all the pastor has is a still small voice that suggests there’s another way. Into this dangerous terrain the pastor subversively claims that self-construction only leads to self-destruction. “We have a Creator for our lives who is not done,” the pastor keeps saying. “We have a Redeemer for all of the tragedy we have created by acting as if we were gods. We have a Spirit who will not abandon us to the mess we’ve made of ourselves and the world.” The pastors who say this are mostly just as ordinary as they can be. They are unheralded, ordinary Ralphs who sacrificed the comfortable options to live on the other side of the secular curtain. Instead, they live in beat-up parsonages their churches cannot afford to repair—for the sole purpose of using their lives to say, “Behold.” At the end of long years of service there’s a small reception in a church fellowship hall adorned with a few balloons and a hastily hung banner with “Good-bye” scrawled across it. A couple of people say kind words of appreciation. Someone presents a gift and plaque. After the receiving line runs out and the tablecloths are being taken away, the old pastor’s spouse whispers that it’s time to go. There were so many middle-of-the-night phone calls that sent the pastor to an emergency room, so many heartbreaking funerals, so many babies held in the pastor’s arms as the waters of covenant were placed on another tiny forehead. There were fancy weddings where the pastor fought through anxieties about the dog and pony show to proclaim something about holy covenants, and there were harsh words and conflicts offered as a reward for every effort at leadership. So many times the pastor climbed behind the pulpit to try again to reveal the holiness on the other side of the curtain. Through all of those unspectacular days the pastor was always a subversive outlaw to a secular society. But for Ralph it ends by quietly heading off to an unimpressive retirement home. Where is the distinction in such a life? Only heaven knows. That’s the good news. Heaven knows. you heard him say it at a party, you would be tempted to smile and look over his shoulder for someone else to greet. But the name fits him well. There’s nothing about Ralph that pretends. He grew up in Holland, where his family was part of the resistance movement. They hid Jews. After the war he came to America, received a college education, and attended Princeton Seminary. He was ordained as a Presbyterian pastor and served a congregation here until he could return to Europe, where he spent the rest of his ministry pastoring underground congregations behind the iron curtain. There were very few days when he was not an outlaw, always in danger of being thrown in jail. His life sounds similar to that of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who also left this country to enter the fray of a culture dangerous to his convictions. Everyone is ready to bow a knee at the mention of Bonhoeffer’s name, but precious few of us have heard of Ralph. I learned about him when his daughter nominated him to receive our seminary’s Distinguished Alumni/ae Award, which we bestowed upon him in October. I will never forget the high honor of surprising the audience with his story. Then I watched this 91-year-old man walk to the podium under thunderous applause to receive our inadequate award for a life of unpretentious heroism. At the podium, hunched over toward the microphone, Ralph said a few tender words about his wife, who is confined to an assisted living facility. Then he made us all want to take off our shoes as he described the holiness he found in the dangerous ground upon which he lived his life. How did we miss such heroism along the way? One of the things about Ralph’s life that makes him distinguished is the reminder that there are many unpretentious, undistinguished pastors in the world who are quietly doing heroic things. Most of my Sundays are spent on the road as the guest preacher for a congregation. When the worship service is over, the host pastor accompanies me to the doors of the church where people greet us before leaving. For some reason I am always placed ahead of the pastor. When the parishioners get to me they typically say, “Thank you for being with us today,” or maybe “That was a lovely sermon.” But then they move past me to their pastor and say things like, “Marge’s surgery is scheduled for Thursday. I hope you can stop by the hospital to pray for her.” They need to believe their pastor believes God is with us. M. Craig Barnes is president of Princeton Theological Seminary. 33 Christian Century January 7, 2015 Endangered faiths by Philip Jenkins G erard Russell has written a wellcrafted and readable book in which an acute observer tells an intriguing and significant story, drawing heavily on personal observation. Yet the book’s subject matter makes it difficult to read. A hundred years ago, travelers regularly reported their travels among the religious and ethnic minorities of the Middle East, endlessly fascinated by the wonders they encountered. Today, though, most of those groups are on the verge of extinction in the region, and in some cases Russell may be describing the last of their kind. The elegiac quality of his account makes it heartrending and often infuriating. Russell’s book successfully walks the thin line between reportage and academic scholarship. Throughout, his accounts are based on firsthand encounters that he experienced during his years as a British diplomat. Russell has a sharp eye for telling details, for surprising quirks of speech or dress. He has also read widely in the relevant scholarship on often arcane religious traditions, and he presents his findings accessibly. Even his useful chapter on sources and further reading is highly user-friendly. Russell makes an excellent travel companion and guide. Even if you know the history of the region, you will learn much. Most of the now-disappearing groups he describes have very deep roots, and their continued existence seems astonishing. To give an imaginary Western example, we would have to think of a remote province in western France, say, where a group of Valentinian Gnostics still maintains a church they founded in the second century, complete with its original scriptures and liturgies. Or imagChristian Century January 7, 2015 ine coming across a surviving Essene monastery in Spain, founded as a direct offshoot of Qumran. If those examples seem far-fetched, look at the Mandaeans, who long flourished in what were once the rich marshlands of southern Iraq. Their religion is distantly related to Christianity and Second Temple Judaism, but in highly Gnostic forms. The Mandaeans’ complex scriptures have been a gold mine for scholars of Gnostic and Manichaean ideas. The group’s obscure origins might predate the Christian church. Might the Mandaeans be descended from followers of John the Baptist who fled threats of massacre during the Jewish Wars of the 60s? Conceivably, one alumnus of the movement could have been the thirdcentury prophet Mani, whose new faith maintained the status of a world religion for over a millennium. Just in the past half century the Mandaeans have been devastated, mainly by a marsh drainage scheme that Saddam Hussein launched with the deliberate goal of uprooting and disrupting minority communities. Subsequent wars and the rise of radical Islamist movements have made life impossible for such groups, who scarcely enjoy even the tenuous protection of being “People of the Book.” Some 60,000 still survive, but almost all in diaspora outside Iraq. As Russell remarks, “Their departure ends a chapter in human history that was opened more than eighteen hundred years ago.” Similar remarks may soon apply to the Ezidis (Yazidis) of northern Iraq. Over the millennia, these descendants of ancient Zoroastrians have borrowed heavily from neighboring faiths, and their angelic hierarchy includes Malak Tawus, 34 Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms: Journeys into the Disappearing Religions of the Middle East By Gerard Russell Basic Books, 352 pp., $28.99 the Peacock Angel, who has misleadingly been identified with Satan. This theological quirk has long excited Western observers, who have speculated about the dark deeds of the “Yazidi devil worshipers.” Like the Mandaeans, the Ezidi people have the tragic misfortune to live in war-torn Iraq, where most recently they have been targeted by the Islamic State and its ludicrous restored caliphate. T he other groups Russell portrays include Zoroastrians (Parsis) in Iran, the Druze of Lebanon and Syria, and the Samaritans of Israel. Russell’s most obscure example is the Kalasha, a mysterious people living in Pakistan’s border regions, whose historically recent conversion to Islam has not prevented them from retaining many older pagan customs. Except for the Kalasha, all these groups retain vestiges of ancient faiths that were once much more widespread than they are today, making them at least distant cousins of Jews and Christians. Samaritans, for instance, are familiar to readers of the New Testament, and in that era they constituted a major portion of the population in the larger Jewish world. Now, though, they number fewer than a thousand. The Druze, an Islamic sect whose beliefs probably draw on an Philip Jenkins teaches at Baylor University and is the author of Laying Down the Sword: Why We Can’t Ignore the Bible’s Violent Verses. an ancient polytheism, are far more numerous. Even so, Druze leaders express alarm over the possibility that Islamist extremists will expel them from the Middle East, together with the remaining Christians. All these groups are agonizingly aware of the Jewish experience in the region. Egypt, Iraq, and Syria were all home to large and thriving Jewish communities in recent times. Jews made up a third of Baghdad’s population in the 1930s. Now almost no Jews remain in those countries. If the Jews could vanish so rapidly after a presence of more than two millennia, can any other community possibly feel secure? One jarring moment in Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms comes when the author moves from these obscure peoples and presents a chapter on Egypt’s Coptic Christians. Surely that inclusion must be an error? Unlike the Mandaeans or the Ezidis, the Copts are part of a mighty global faith, and their numbers, while difficult to ascertain, might run to 8 or 10 million. “Disappearing” they certainly are not, but the political circumstances in Egypt might ultimately make their position tenuous. The Jewish precedent stands as a nightmarish warning. However diverse their beliefs or ideology, such minorities over time come to share certain common ways of thinking and acting that are essential to ensuring their survival. In extreme cases, such as that of the Druze, adherents maintain strict silence about their beliefs and often seek geographical seclusion. Commonly too, minorities have survived in well-defined regions that are not easily accessible to the forces of the state and religious orthodoxy, and their culture acquires the distinctive ways of those fastnesses, whether in the marshes, mountains, or deserts. It would be unfortunate if readers approached Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms as a catalog of expiring spiritual traditions, of living fossils of faith. The book is above all a testimony to how minority movements can survive almost indefinitely under exceedingly harsh and unpromising conditions, and the degree to which they maintain their integrity under those circumstances. It is difficult to read such accounts without a sense of awe at human persistence and ingenuity. Curious: The Desire to Know and Why Your Future Depends on It By Ian Leslie Basic Books, 240 pp., $26.99 Building on its expertise in Islamic Studies and Christian-Muslim Relations and continuing the success of its breakthrough International Peacemaking Program, Hartford Seminary proudly announces C uriosity seems to be a word of the moment. It’s a staple of TED lectures, a buzzword of educational reformers, and an advertising theme of Vanity Fair magazine. (“Were you born curious?” asks an ad. “Tell us your curiosity story.”) Now comes this book by Ian Leslie, full of such stories, and a very curious book it is. Almost every page of Leslie’s book springs a surprise. Stories that sound inspiring prove cautionary: for example, a man learns over two dozen languages, only to rue that he has not chosen one for deeper study. Stories that sound cautionary—two boys with a loaded pistol— demonstrate a hunger for knowledge. In Leslie’s telling, curiosity is far from a valued quality. It has long been disparaged by schools, businesses, and especially the church. Augustine, he notes, equated curiosity with temptation. Even today the word suggests something not quite right. On the other hand, he says, “we romanticize the natural curiosity of children and worry that it will be contaminated by knowledge, when the opposite is true. We confuse the practice of curiosity with ease of access to information and forget that real curiosity requires the exercise of effort.” Counterintuitively, Leslie argues that modern conveniences undermine curiosity rather than encourage it. Because we can answer almost any question by checking our smartphones, our mental muscles have atrophied. Worse still, our attention has become diffuse. “Unfettered curiosity is wonderful,” he says, “unchanneled curiosity is not.” But even as he argues for sustained exploration of a single field or theme, Leslie leaps from one example to the next. His interests take him from Edmund Burke to Lady Gaga, from business school to the Kalahari Desert. Reviewed by Lawrence Wood, senior minister of St. Andrew by the Sea, a community church in Gulf Shores, Alabama. 35 Hartford Seminary Peacemaking Fellows A one-year, all-expenses-paid residential program of interfaith study and practice for young American Christian leaders seeking to work for peace among the religiously diverse communities of the United States. Funded by the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations, these Fellowships will be awarded through a competitive application SURFHVVWRWZRKLJKO\TXDOLÀHG and motivated applicants who are passionate about interfaith relations and peacemaking. Scholarships include: • Travel • Housing • Stipend • Full tuition Contact Dr. Jonathan B. Lee, [email protected], for more information. www.hartsem.edu Christian Century January 7, 2015 In the span of two pages, he draws on F. Scott Fitzgerald, Agatha Christie, The Wire, Citizen Kane, Shakespeare, physicist Freeman Dyson, inventor Ray Dolby, Einstein, and the Rubik’s Cube. Leslie is a diverting writer of the Malcolm Gladwell school—sometimes too clever by half. So it’s not surprising that he appreciates the power of story. We will keep watching even a bad movie, he says, just to see how things turn out, because we are so curious about the experiences of other people. This empathic curiosity is one of the distinguishing gifts of humankind. All the sadder and more ironic, then, that we can be so lazy in our relations. As one wit has said, “I possess a device, in my pocket, that is capable of accessing the entirety of information known to man. I use it to look at pictures of cats and get into arguments with strangers.” THE PILGRIM’S REGRESS Wade Annotated Edition C. S. Lewis Edited and Introduced by David C. Downing “An outstanding contribution to Lewis studies.” — Alan Jacobs “Downing’s consistently thorough and well-informed annotations do a superb job of clarifying and enlivening this difficult, but very important, early work by C. S. Lewis. All readers of Lewis will be grateful.” — Peter Schakel “It is no exaggeration to say that David Downing’s superb annotations allow those of us who do not share Lewis’s vast philosophical, literary, and linguistic background to understand and enjoy this classic work in a way not possible before. A must for all serious Lewis fans.” — Devin Brown ISBN 978-0-8028-7208-1 Ɣ 263 pages Ɣ hardcover Ɣ $25.00 At your bookstore, or call 800-253-7521 www.eerdmans.com Christian Century January 7, 2015 Leslie is no Luddite; he merely believes that true learning requires effort. Curiosity doesn’t deserve the name without it. Knowledge can’t be retained without it. But here again Leslie has a surprising perspective. In one breath he celebrates the young Abraham Lincoln, who came from unlettered folk and had to work hard for his lessons. In the next breath, he reflects poignantly on the limits of effort—on why those with advantages add to them and those without them fall farther behind. Intellectual curiosity, he decides, is not enough on its own—it must be planted in the fertile soil of a classical education. Otherwise we miss cultural references and fail to make connections. At times he takes on a polemical tone as he defends educational classicists like E. D. Hirsch and draws the reader into yesterday’s minor controversies. More often Leslie’s wide-ranging mind refuses to take sides. The Internet is not to blame for stupidity: “The only person or thing that can make you stupid, or incurious, is you.” He refuses to disparage mundane tasks in menial jobs, for they can be enlivened by questions. As part of his tendency toward balance, we get a retelling of the oft-heard adage about the fox and the hedgehog, with Leslie suggesting that what a business needs is a foxhog. In a chapter on global conflicts, he suggests that a sympathetic imagination can make peace between any warring parties. He quotes retired general Stanley McChrystal, who led American forces in Iraq: When we first started, the question was, “Where is the enemy?” That was the intelligence question. As we got smarter, we started to ask “Who is the enemy?” And we thought we were pretty clever. And then we realized it wasn’t the right question, and we asked, “What’s the enemy doing or trying to do?” And it wasn’t until we got further along that we said, “Why are they the enemy?” At his best, which is often, Leslie evokes wonder at the world around us. In the brilliant final chapter, about a longtime code breaker, he draws a lovely 4554 36 distinction: “A puzzle is something that commands our curiosity until we have solved it. A mystery, by contrast, never stops inviting inquiry. . . . When we come across a puzzle of any kind, we should always be alert to the mystery that lies behind it.” Curious brings to mind another recent book, On Looking, by Alexandra Horowitz. The eloquence of this book comes in its limited scope. Horowitz keeps walking around one city block near her home, first with her toddler son, then with a geologist, a graphic designer, an artist, a physician, and so on—11 companions in all—and moves toward a deeper and deeper understanding of a neighborhood she once thought she knew fairly well. The experience is revelatory. If Leslie were to slow down from his brisk tour and walk around Augustine’s block one more time, he might be surprised to find how much they agree. “Free curiosity has a greater power to stimulate learning than coercion,” the great saint wrote in the Confessions. “Yet the free range of curiosity is channeled by discipline under Thy law.” Found Theology: History, Imagination and the Holy Spirit By Ben Quash Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 336 pp., $34.95 paperback T he cover of Found Theology features the work of British artist Anna M. R. Freeman, who frequently goes to junk shops for inspiration for her painting. There she finds the history mixed with discovery that fuels her art. She sees junk shops as places where the past is not just remembered but re-membered: old objects are given new contexts and placed into relationship with new things. But in and of themselves, the objects do not mean much. They require the vision and imagination of the artist to draw out new meanings. This is Ben Quash’s theological argument in a nutshell. For Quash, scripture and tradition are givens. They come to us without much choice on our part. We Reviewed by Amy Frykholm, CENTURY associate editor. The Lecture Series of University Congregational United Church of Christ PRESENTS Robin R. Meyers “Beloved Community of Spiritual Resistance” Feb 6 & 7, 2015 Tickets on sale now Lauren Winner “Wearing God: Clothing, Laughter, Fire, and Other Overlooked Ways of Meeting God” March 29, 2015 Tickets on sale Feb 16 MISSING AN ISSUe? Diana Butler Bass “Grounded” Oct 9 & 10, 2015 Tickets on sale Aug 31 Information & Registration universityucc.org Call or email at: P. (206) 524-6255, ext 3447 E. [email protected] THE LECTURE SERIES University Congregational United Church of Christ Contact CHRISTIAN CENTURY subscription services for back issues. 4515 16th Ave. NE Seattle, WA 98105-4201 Call (800) 208-4097 or go to our website: christiancentury.org. 37 Christian Century January 7, 2015 recite the creed that our ancestors recited. We read the same biblical passages they read. We inherit our parents’ choices as well as the choices of their grandparents and great-grandparents. But like the artist in the junk shop, our task is to discover and reinterpret what we have been given for new contexts and in relation to new circumstances. This work— pneumatological at its core—is what Quash calls “found theology.” In some ways Found Theology merely offers a theory for what we as humans do inevitably all the time: we take what is given to us in the physical world and rework it to make meaning for the present moment. Even theologies that claim to be orthodox or neoorthodox have the work of rearticulating orthodoxy for the present, and in that rearticulation, they inevitably shift orthodoxy because language and meaning are constantly shifting. What per- off E v o l u tandi o n the PLENARY SPE AKERS I N C LU D E : Fa l l MARCH 26-28, 2015 Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary EVANSTON, IL colossianforum.org/forums/ecf Christian Century January 7, 2015 38 haps makes Found Theology unique is Quash’s embrace of that reality and his search for the work of the Holy Spirit within the ongoing processes of history. Quash is concerned with connecting theology to art, science, and interreligious dialogue. He is interested in a method for Christian theology that allows deep and meaningful interaction with these critical contemporary forces. As he proceeds, he opens up large vistas for the future of theology. Quash works back and forth between theology and history, scripture, art, and poetry. In all of these, human imagination is a vehicle for the work of the Holy Spirit. The scripture that we have received comes to us with what Quash— borrowing from Jewish scholar David Weiss Halivni—calls “maculations”: flaws, oddities, gaps, and inconsistencies. Quash points to the moment when English Bible translators began to undo the “singleness, univocity and therefore . . . dream of universality” of the Latin Vulgate. As they did this work, they found new ambiguities in the text. They reached backward for Greek and Hebrew and found still more difficulties. The act of translating the Bible into English uncovered not the “plain meaning,” as Tyndale had hoped, but instead multiple meanings that were made all the more ambiguous by the historical moment of translation itself. Translation required acts of the imagination, leaps across the maculations of the texts, new meanings for old things. It is no wonder that the Latin-reading establishment found this activity so threatening. Drawing on Peter Ochs, Quash argues that these textual ambiguities are helpful to the work of the Holy Spirit. God uses maculation to “beckon” human beings into the texts to participate in further acts of interpretation. The text becomes a source of generative creativity as the work of interpretation goes on and on, and God continues to reveal the meanings of the text with the aid of human agency and human imagination. No act of interpretation is universal or complete because every historical moment in which it is read is different. Quash believes that the Torah and the Gospels can both be read as “properly maculate; properly as a troubled and creatively troubling text.” These troubled and troubling texts obviously have readers, but in the history of Christian theology, the fact that readers shape texts has usually been neglected. Perhaps this is because reading is so intensely personal and unstable. Texts seem to change under our eyes from one reading to the next. Quash believes that by paying attention to readers and the reception of ancient texts, we will be better able to draw those texts into our present moment—conscious that drawing them forward is an act of agency and imagination. As a guide to our study, Quash offers a 15th-century work of the Venetian painter Vittore Carpaccio: a painting of the body of the dead Christ. Carpaccio has situated the body of the slain Jesus in the foreground and his tomb in the background. In the center of the painting an old man sits under a tree contemplating the body of Christ. Quash reads that old man as Job, who, Quash argues, was found by Carpaccio in his search for resources to understand his own particular historical moment, particularly the massive destruction of the bubonic plague. Carpaccio’s painting is a question more than an answer—it is created in what Quash calls the “interrogative mode”—and Quash believes that this is why it appeals to contemporary viewers. The old man under the tree is a puzzle, and he also appears to be contemplating a puzzle: the dead Christ. The questions embedded in the painting require us to be active interpreters, encountering the painting with understandings of our own. Although Carpaccio’s own context can answer some of the questions the painting proposes, it can’t answer all of them. Reception theory, as Quash wants to use it, does not say that physical objects exist only in the eyes of the reader or viewer. Instead it insists on a relationship between viewer and object, reader and text. History can interact unpredictably and generatively with texts, and texts also shape history, in a reciprocal relation. To read scriptures, art, and history, we need a form of human logic that Quash, borrowing from philosopher Charles Peirce, calls abduction. This is the capacity of human thought to make imaginative leaps that are rooted in experience but are not based wholly on facts. Abduction is the tool we use to “read the signs” of the world and interpret what they mean when a reasoner “is faced with a challenge to her fixed marks.” For example, when scientists first encountered marine fossils in a landlocked area, they had to go beyond their fixed marks to offer theories for why and how they might have come to be there. By reading the signs of the landscape, they reasoned that an upheaval had taken place and that the land had changed in some fundamental way. Gradually a narrative about this change emerged, as new facts and experiences were added to old. Quash sees theology behaving similarly. It can function in interrogative and narrative modes, instead of imperative and declarative. It also can think in a more ambitiously comprehensive way— drawing on science and art to do its work rather than narrowing its focus and building boundaries to keep other discourses out. Art, more often than not, works analogically, by bringing signs into relationship with one another and with the observer. This is what theologians must also learn to do: use imagination to draw the given into relationship with the found. The Holy Spirit, who makes the world more known to us through “unfolding-in-connection,” is fundamentally relational—binding us to God, the world, history, and ultimately the future. The Spirit “binds absolute beginning with absolute end, in the life of a Godhead that enfolds rather than opposes difference and time.” Found theology is the work of linking revelation and reception, as humans “interpret and re-interpret what has been given, find and re-find it.” Quash hopes to make Christian theologians open to the world in front of them: to art, nature, science, and its various dialogue partners. Theologians who believe that the Holy Spirit is guiding us through a changing landscape can become skilled retrievers of the past, inter- “Delivery, Delivery, Delivery!!!” –Demosthenes WHAT you say about the Gospel deserves attention to HOW you say it! Join us in New York City for our next two-day workshop on Delivering the Gospel with Karen DeMauro, Director, the Acting Center, New York City John M. Stapleton, Minister, the United Methodist Church Celebrating a second decade of inspiring you to utter the Good News in your best preacher’s voice “Unlike anything I had in a seminary classroom or elsewhere.” “I am amazed that, good as he already was, you enabled him and enriched his work to be even more interesting and powerful.” “Both of you sit on my shoulder along with my homiletics teacher when I preach.” Limited Enrollment To Insure Maximum Participation For more information contact: [email protected] or (803) 642-1999 39 Christian Century January 7, 2015 preters of the present, and perhaps prescient seers of the future, but always in dialogue with others, and having the humility to acknowledge limited vision. Quash is very clear about who his main theological dialogue partners are: Ochs, Dan Hardy, and Rowan Williams are a few of them. Unfortunately, he is less clear about who his theological antagonists are. Found theology, as he describes it, seems like such a natural human capacity that it is difficult to imagine any theology that is not found theology. But we can perhaps distinguish found theology from any theology that imagines a purity of the past, and any theology that imagines itself as a closed system that need only speak of and to itself. Church of the Village UMC, New York City SHARE all C E N T U R Y articles online Visitors to christiancentury.org can now read a few articles of their choosing each month, without subscribing. So when you read an article you find useful, you can e-mail it, tweet it or share it on Facebook—and your friends and colleagues will be able to read it, too. Learn more at christiancentury.org/share Sorry About That: The Language of Public Apology By Edwin L. Battistella Oxford University Press, 232 pp., $24.95 W hen the popular televangelist Jimmy Swaggart was blackmailed into confessing his sexual liaison with a prostitute, he cried many tears during the televised address to his church and said, “I have sinned.” However, he did not discuss the liaison. Despite his silence about the details of his sin, Swaggart’s 1988 public confession was regarded at the time as an effective response that saved his ministry, even though critics noted the absence of substance. The divided public reception of Swaggart’s confession is a prime illustration of the confusion in American culture about the meaning and purpose of public confession—confusion that rhetorical scholar Dave Tell has described as “confessional anxiety.” According to Tell, in his book Confessional Crises and Cultural Politics in Twentieth-Century America, we experience confessional anxiety because we swim in a sea of personal stories—memoirs, interviews, and testimonies—that claim to disclose the real truth about a controversy or a disputed event. Yet, such disclosures are also typically partisan speeches designed to deflect criticism and, frequently, to take sides in cultural battles over such issues as sex, race, religion, and violence. The emotional authenticity that we value in confessional speech betrays the truth that we seek from the confessor. Behind Swaggart’s tears was a calculated silence about his misdeeds designed to protect his moral image and maintain the financial standing of his ministry. The story of Swaggart’s empty confession is only one of numerous accounts of historic apologies presented by linguistics scholar Edwin Battistella in this anecdotal study of public apology. By examining the grammatical and rhetorical structure of such apologies, Battistella shows that our anxieties and confusions about confession are rooted Reviewed by Gerald J. Mast, who teaches communication at Bluffton University in Bluffton, Ohio. Christian Century January 7, 2015 40 in a deeper ambiguity that defines the genre of apology more broadly: the tension between the culpable self and the apologetic self. Battistella, who teaches in the writing program at Southern Oregon University, draws on the work of sociologist Erving Goffman to explain that a successful apology must distinguish the guilty self from the apologizing self. The latter must disavow the former and become identified with those whom the former has offended. Such dissociation of selves is difficult, and in the apology process there are many opportunities for failure—or at least inadequacy. For example, when professional golfer Frank “Fuzzy” Zoeller made a racially tinged remark in 1997 about his competitor Tiger Woods, he apologized with the commonly repeated refrain: “I’m sorry if I offended anyone.” Such a statement fails to fully identify the apologetic self with the offended party. Zoeller also said, “I didn’t mean anything by it”—denying guilt by invoking purity of intention. When Dan Rather apologized during the 2004 presidential election for questioning President George W. Bush’s National Guard service on the basis of faulty documentation, he said, “We made a mistake in judgment.” Such language refuses to fully identify the self with the offense by shifting responsibility to the collective we for what is presented as a regrettable blunder rather than a morally flawed decision. Apologies also run into trouble when they are offered on behalf of a group or a nation. As a presidential candidate, Ronald Reagan sided with veterans groups and other political leaders who opposed a national apology to Japanese Americans for their internment in relocation camps during World War II. However, after Reagan became president, he changed his mind and signed the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, which included both an apology and reparations. National leaders presume to speak on behalf of an entire nation when they support or refuse to support such collective apologies. Inevitably, not everyone pre- CAN’T IMAGINe The worlD wIThoUT THE CENTURY? Help us guarantee that the CENTURY will reach future generations of thoughtful Christians: make a bequest to the CENTURY in your will. Please send me information regarding the following: ____ Bequest language for including the CENTURY in my will and estate plans ____ How to become a CENTURY ASSOCIATE ____ How to give a onetime gift to the CENTURY Name: _______________________ Address: _______________________ _______________________ City/State/Zip: _______________________ Phone: _______________________ E-mail: _______________________ Send to: The Christian Century 104 S. Michigan Ave. Suite 1100 Chicago, IL 60603 Or call (312) 263-7510 ext. 229 41 Christian Century January 7, 2015 fers to be spoken for when an apology is issued on their behalf. Collective apologies are also complicated by the fact that they are often offered long after the death of both the offenders and the victims, as was the case when the Massachusetts legislature decided in 1957 to pardon Ann Greenslade Pudeator, who had been convicted and executed for being a witch during the Salem witch trials in 1692. Some who opposed the pardon argued that it might require reparations to Ann’s living descendants. Others were concerned that the pardon was an effort to change history and to avoid its lessons. Running through most of Battistella’s accounts of flawed or imperfect apologies is reluctance to completely repudiate the actions of the previous self, even if one has regrets or is sorry about what happened. This reluctance seems most prominent in apologies by men. Accused of plagiarism in the production of his book The Wild Blue, historian Stephen Ambrose at first responded with an apology: “I made a mistake for which I am sorry.” Faced with evidence of more extensive plagiarism in other works, Ambrose turned defensive and attacked his accusers. “Screw it,” he said in an interview not long before he died, “If they decide I’m a fraud, I’m a fraud.” Ambrose came from the post–World War II generation of American men who had been trained to see apology as a sign of weakness, a lesson gathered from the strong, silent male hero figures of John Wayne films. Such a gender code, perhaps overlearned, according to Battistella, was visible in then vice president George H. W. Bush’s famous campaign statement in 1988, after a U.S. missile shot down an Iranian passenger plane, killing 290 people: “I’ll never apologize for the United States of America, ever. I don’t care what the facts are.” Richard Nixon also followed this postwar gender code and refused to apologize for his role in the Watergate affair, although he did express regret. It is instructive to compare Stephen Ambrose’s defensive response to plagiarism charges with the more complex response by another American historian— Doris Kearns Goodwin—to charges that she had plagiarized a significant portion of her book The Fitzgeralds and the Kennedys. Christian Century January 7, 2015 42 Like Ambrose, she described her plagiarism as a “mistake.” Unlike Ambrose, she followed up with actions that displayed penitence: resigning from the Pulitzer Prize Board and the Harvard University Board of Overseers, as well as taking a leave from her role with PBS. Her actions and her subsequent high-quality work helped to reestablish her credibility and authority. Still, even Goodwin insisted that her past actions were just a mistake, thereby denying full moral culpability. Like most of the apologists described in Battistella’s book, she was caught in the bind of needing to distance herself from her past actions, but not so much as to undermine the integrity of her present self—rooted as it is in her past self. Battistella is more descriptive than analytical, but he draws on Tell’s work to show how modern people are deeply shaped by unreflective patterns of confession exemplified by the writings of the modern philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau. In his autobiographical Confessions, Rousseau described the successes and failures of both his private and public life with minimal inquiry into his motivations and without apology for his “depravity.” Even a religious confession like Swaggart’s is shaped more by the instinctive and emotional reporting of Rousseau’s confessional legacy than by the introspection and self-disclosure encouraged by the deeper Christian confessional tradition. In Rousseau’s model, sin and failure are an inevitable part of the human condition; it is best to acknowledge that and get on with your life. In other words, if we accept Goffman’s definition of apology as a matter of dividing the self, modern people are very reluctant to completely renounce the former guilty self and thus typically fail to actually apologize. For an example of complete selfrenunciation, Battistella turns to the ancient Confessions of Augustine. Unlike Rousseau, Augustine had no trouble probing the depths of sin that lay behind his youthful misdeeds, providing a public accounting of his personal motivations and delusions. Augustine succeeded where modern apologists fail, in part because he had no trouble blaming his former self completely; that unconverted self, as Battistella points out, was for Augustine “a person who no longer exists.” Trial by podcast T he premise of Serial, a podcast spin-off of the WBEZ Chicago radio show This American Life, is that people love stories. The first season, which is still unfolding, recounts the murder of 17-year-old Hae Min Lee in 1999 and the subsequent arrest and conviction of her ex-boyfriend Adnan Syed, who began serving a life sentence for the crime in 2000. Adnan maintains his innocence to this day. Telling this story one segment at a time over many weeks adds suspense and intrigue. As listeners live with the story and the questions it raises, its characters become a part of their lives. But “recounts” isn’t exactly what Serial does, since no two people interviewed on the show have the same memories or experiences of the events surrounding the murder. The show circles these events, following the trail of fragmented memories from each new witness to a collection of old letters that were never used in court to the unreliability of cell phone records to inconsistent alibis and an improbable sequence of events. The result is captivating storytelling with real-life events becoming stranger—and denser—than fiction. Serial has been described as “the best television on the radio.” And the best television in recent years has been described as the rebirth of 19th-century novels in visual form. Serial host and executive producer Sarah Koenig has compared the podcast to the novels of Charles Dickens, which were serialized before they were collected into bound volumes. There is one significant difference, however. Serial isn’t fiction. The show promises to follow the story “until it is resolved” and “wherever it leads.” But what does that mean? Until the host and production team become convinced of Adnan’s guilt or innocence? Until they construct a satisfying account of one day in January 1999? Until Adnan has exhausted all appeals? The show’s creators don’t know what they mean, and they’re honest about this. There’s no genius in the writer’s room figuring out how to wrap it up. On the series website, the show’s creators say that their investigations keep leading them back to two central questions: “How can you know a person’s character? How can you tell what they’re capable of?” Koenig is concerned about being “taken in” by Adnan. It’s easy to feel sympathy for him and question his guilt. But what if he is just playing Koenig, and us? Like Koenig, I want to know if we can believe Adnan. But I can know Adnan only through Koenig’s accounts of him. The depth and care of the storytelling that unfolds over a long time period make me feel like I’m working alongside Koenig. Just as when I read a good novel or watch a great TV show, I both feel sympathy for the characters and pass judgment on them. But the genre of nonfiction induces moral vertigo. Millions of people are listening to this story, concocting whodunit theories, and passing judgment on Adnan. When we do that, do we have a moral obligation to him or to Hae Min that we don’t have to, say, David Copperfield? It’s one thing to dismiss a fictional character because he seems duplicitous or vile. In fact, recognizing his duplicity 43 SERIAL TRUTHS: A podcast blends journalism with compelling storytelling. might be part of my own moral formation. When the person under judgment is real—has a life independent of the story through which I “know” him—what is the nature of my relationship to him? Perhaps “not being played” falls under Jesus’ injunction to be wise as serpents. But where does that intersect with the command to love unconditionally, even our enemies? Although she doesn’t frame these questions theologically, I think Koenig and her collaborators feel this moral burden too. Part of what is so fresh about Serial is the relationship it creates between Koenig and Adnan and, by extension, between listeners and Adnan. Koenig is not just reporting a story; she is crafting one. She is vocal about how her own emotions and experiences shape the process. As a result, the show experiments with a new genre at the nexus of investigative journalism, journalistic essay, and fictional story. As I listen, I find myself extending my question about my relationship to Adnan to the stories of the people who cross my path every day. Do I have the patience to hear them this fully, with this kind of complexity? Am I willing to extend that time and patience even if I might get played? I am hopeful that this new genre of storytelling might be one way to help me do that. The author is Kathryn Reklis, who teaches theology at Fordham University. Christian Century January 7, 2015 TRINITY INSTITUTE INVITES ESSAYS ON THE THEME OF ECONOMIC INEQUALITY The essay competition aims to inspire theological scholars to examine our post-2008 economic context and offer solutions about how best to pursue God’s promise of abundant life against the backdrop of the global financial crisis. FIRST-PLACE PRIZE A public lecture at Trinity Wall Street, publication in the Anglican Theological Review, and a $10,000 award RUNNERS-UP Two awards of $2,500 The deadline to submit essays is July 1, 2015 For details about the topic, rules, format, and how to submit papers, visit: trinitywallstreet.org/tiessay CHURCH in the MAKING by Carol Howard Merritt A group of peacemakers gathered at Stony Point Center, about an hour north of New York City, where modest living quarters nestle in a circle, capped by a cafeteria and meeting space. A chapel, a labyrinth, and vegetable gardens grace the outlying areas. I always breathe a little deeper at Stony Point. The conference center’s welcome includes what’s on my dinner plate. The chef uses the freshest local ingredients to create amazing dishes and breads. I know that the food did not travel thousands of miles to reach my plate. It did not waste petroleum nor did it have to be genetically altered to endure the journey. I’m drawn to Stony Point by the ideas and work shared there, and by the culture of the place. On a theological level, this pastoral nook has gathered interfaith peacemaking thinkers and activists—people working on issues of civil rights, gun violence, and the sanctuary movement. The land vibrates with the legacies of men and women who risked much for their ideals. As someone who wasn’t alive in the 1960s, I’m often in awe of what happened during the civil rights movement and am relieved when current peacemaking efforts move beyond acts of nostalgia. Each time I visit Stony Sharing the peace associate director of PPF. “We wanted people who were doing vibrant work in particular neighborhoods. We wanted intentional communities, oriented around peace.” PPF partnered with seven communities, giving them grants and gathering the leaders for an annual meeting. (Full disclosure: my husband is a member of one such community.) The seven communities focus on different aspects of peacemaking. For example, Albany Catholic Worker in upstate New York engages in urban gardening in vacant lots. It formed the New Sanctuary for Immigrants, which serves vulnerable immigrants and those who lack legal documentation. Hands and Feet of Asheville, North Carolina, a yearlong service program for young adults, aims to break down power structures and build up the reign of God in down-toearth ways—through direct service, intentional community, and theological reflection. Alianza2638 in Chicago holds a ministry of prayer in a lavandería, or laundromat, and is an ally of the global work of Christian Peace maker Teams. Through these organiza- Point I end up in a conversation with a rabbi, professor, or international student and walk away amazed at the convergence of our intentions. Stony Point Center is directed by Rick UffordChase, along with his wife, Kitty Ufford-Chase. He is also the executive director of the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship, a network engaged in God’s nonviolent work of love, peace, and justice whose board meets at Stony Point. The PPF supported conscientious objectors during World War II, and it continues to support voices committed to peace. Under Ufford-Chase’s leadership, the PPF board realized it had a couple of choices. It could invest in full-time staff and in regional coordinators to make sure that the institutional structure of PPF remained strong, or it could invest in the innovative work that peacemaking communities were doing on the ground. The choice was between building an institution and building a movement. The board decided to put its resources into the movement. “We were looking for newer, diverse groups with a commitment to nonviolence and Jesus,” said Fritz Gutwein, tions, PPF is supporting immigrants, calling for minimum wage increases, building community gardens, and accompanying vulnerable citizens in Colombia. PPF and the communities it supports long to transform the church and, through the church, the world. Some of this happens at the annual meeting. “When communities come together,” Gutwein said, “they look into each other’s lives, share their stories, and share their passions. Excitement happens when you realize you’re not alone. You realize that other people have been doing this for a long time. You gain encouragement and insights of what possibilities are there.” As they meet together, participants build a network that takes part in theological, practical, and cultural work, which marks an important transition for the organization. “The Peace Fellowship has been a bunch of individuals who have been connected,” Gutwein explained. Now the group is asking, “How can we be a group of communities that are gathered and connected? How can we transform the world through the church?” Carol Howard Merritt is author of Tribal Church. 45 Christian Century January 7, 2015 C L A SS I F I E D rAteS: $1.75 a word, ten-word minimum. Phone numbers, e-mail addresses, and urLs count as two words; zip codes count as one word. All ads must be prepaid; deadline is four weeks prior to issue date. Please send ads to [email protected] or Classified Department, the Christian Century, 104 S. Michigan Ave., Suite 1100, Chicago, IL 60603. to inquire about display ads or online advertising, contact the advertising department at (312) 263-7510, x229, or [email protected]. AVAILABLE Now available from Amazon, FIRST PERSONAL: Imagination and Scripture, by Br. Matthias O.S.L. Join us at the INTERFAITH CONFERENCE ON DRONE WARFARE at Princeton Theological Seminary, January 23–25. Sponsored by national denominations, conference is first religious convening on drones. Learn more: www.peacecoalition.org/dronesconference. YOUR BRAIN ON GOD. Go to www.oqcollaborative.com for insights to deepen your faith and ministry. POSITIONS AVAILABLE BRIDWELL LIBRARY FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM 2015– 2016—Bridwell Library of Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University is accepting applications for the 2015–2016 Visiting Scholars and Ministers Fellowships. Six twoweek fellowships, including a $2,000 stipend, will be awarded. The fellowships are designed to encourage in-depth use of the library’s collections for study and research. The program is open to all active scholars from Ph.D. students to retired professors and to religious leaders of all faiths. Deadline for applications is Sunday, March 1, 2015. Awards will be announced by Monday, March 16, 2015. For more information see: https://www.smu.edu/Bridwell/About/ResearchStudy/Bridwell Fellowships; call (214) 768-3483; or e-mail: [email protected]. St. Paul Lutheran Church (ELCA), Davenport, IA, is conducting a national search to fill the open position of DIRECTOR OF FAITH FORMATION. This position is responsible for planning and developing imaginative adult learning opportunities, providing administrative leadership for a large and high-powered confirmation ministry, managing a range of existing and new learning and support-based groups within the church, guiding a learning team of colleagues, and offering spiritual leadership. To learn more about this position and the St. Paul Lutheran Church setting, we invite you to visit: stpaulqc.org/employment. ADVER TISE HERE Only those who care for others know what it’s really like to care for others. That’s why AARP created a community with experts and other caregivers to help us better care for ourselves and for the ones we love. aarp.org/caregiving or call 1-877-333-5885 To contact our advertising department, call (312) 2637510 ext. 229 or e-mail: [email protected]. Christian Century January 7, 2015 46 HIP / ART RESOURCE, NY Jonah and the Whale, from an early Christian marble sarcophagus in Rome (fourth century) S cenes from the story of Jonah were among the most popular in early Christian art. The Old Testament story of the reluctant prophet who, after a detour in the belly of a whale, travels to Nineveh to proclaim God’s message was compelling in its own right. This fourth-century Christian sarcophagus depicts the moment in which Jonah is tossed overboard in an effort to quell a raging storm that threatens the lives of all those aboard. The story took on additional meaning for early Christians, who interpreted Jonah’s emergence from the whale after three days as referring typologically to Jesus’ death and resurrection. This interpretation is found very early in Christian tradition (see Matthew 12:38–42) and grew in popularity over the next several centuries. Art selection and commentary by Heidi J. Hornik, who teaches in the art department at Baylor University, and Mikeal C. Parsons, who teaches in the school’s religion department. 47 Christian Century January 7, 2015