The pastor has been identified, and it seems to me that she (the pastor) is sorrier that she got caught and publicly humiliated than she is for actually doing the deed. Yet another example of a Christian who has veiled their avarice with piety and passed it off without consideration of justice. As someone who worked several years in the restaurant industry (Olive Garden and Steak 'n' Shake), I certainly sympathize with the server—far too many Christians don't know that servers depend upon tips just to make ends meet. Most (though not all) servers make only half of the state minimum wage.
The Facebook group Pastor Alois Bell Should Be Fired has received well over 600 likes today alone. Yet perhaps the Jesus-like way of dealing with this problem would be for the disgraced pastor to apologize to Chelsea, help her find a new job, and actually pay the tip owed her from the meal (and then go and learn what Matthew 23:23-24 means). That would be a truly divine act of penance. But we don't see many Facebook groups being formed around that idea, do we?
To anyone reading this who might think Christians are selfish, self-righteous, unjust, and judgmental: I am so, so sorry that this is the most exposure you have to followers of Jesus. Trust me in my saying that pastors like Alois Bell are more like the Pharisees Jesus criticized than they are like Jesus himself.
Never in my whole life have I spent such a focused, extended period of time thinking about death.
For the last two weeks I have been a part of an intensive module course at a local seminary. The class is called "Resurrection in the New Testament," and is a theological approach to how death, resurrection, and judgment are depicted in the NT. We just finished discussing our secondary text for the class, Anthony C. Thiselton’s Life After Death: A New Approach to the Last Things (Eerdmans: 2012), and I’m perhaps even more confused now than I was before. The fact is that many people in the Church simply do not think about life, death, and the “Last Things” nearly as thoroughly as they should. Below are some of the thoughts that have challenged me these last two weeks.
1. Eternity
What exactly is time? We flippantly throw around the idea that God is eternal, but what exactly does "eternity" mean? Is it a really, really, really, really long period of immeasurable time? Is it another dimension, outside of the four with which we are already familiar? Does God really exist outside of time? If so, how then does Christian tradition allow for such a deity to enter into the human story and be affected by it? How is it possible to have “a relationship” with a being that exists outside of time? How did you or your church define eternity when you were young? How do you feel about it today?
2. Hell
Two years ago, if you'd have asked me if I believed in Hell, I would have responded, "Absolutely not." These days, I’m not so sure. Thiselton presents three distinct streams of thought that have deep roots in the tradition of the Church, with each also being somewhat grounded in scripture:
a. The view of Iranaeus that afterlife consisted of “conditional immortality.”
Sometimes this view is called “annihilationalism.” It’s based on the belief that, upon death (or perhaps more accurately, at the time of the resurrection), the faithful will live while the “wicked” perish, simply slipping into nonexistence. This is partially supported by Paul, who claims that “the wages of sin is death.”
b. The view most prominently held by Gregory of Nyssa, which is similar to what today we would call universalism.
Move over, Rob Bell! As early as the fourth century, this Cappadocian Father was preaching that “It is the peculiar effect of light to make darkness vanish, and of life to destroy death…Cleansing reaches those who are befouled with sin; and life, the dead…Error may be corrected, and what is dead is restored to life.”[1] Gregory believed that the ultimate goal of God (again, supported by Paul) was that God become “all in all,” even if it meant that the “wicked” must be purified by fire before entering the Kingdom. This view caused quite a bit of controversy recently with the publication of Rob Bell’s book, Love Wins.
c. The Augustinian view of a conscious, eternal torment.
Hellfire, burning, eternal torture. This is perhaps the most commonly accepted understanding of Hell in the Protestant and Evangelical tradition. A person chooses to turn away from God, and is burned for all eternity as a consequence. However, Thiselton acknowledges that this view is particularly problematic: "The greatest difficulty of the 'everlasting punishment' view may be partly the relation between eternity and time; but even more fundamentally how we can conceive of God eternally sustaining both the life of believers in fellowship with [God], and also that of a group who are in every other sense 'separate' from [God]."[2]In other words, if God is truly the sustainer of life and is fully present with those who take part in the resurrection, how can a life exist outside of that life-giving presence?
I am particularly fond of Gregory of Nyssa’s view. However, I acknowledge that it has its shortcomings. Many of the early Christians sought universal salvation as “something to be hoped for,” even if it wasn’t a solid reality. I would like to hope for the idea that the Creator with restore all things in the end, as well, but I have this crazy notion of justice that keeps me from fully believing it. Which brings me to my final topic that I have been pondering:
3. Justice and Mercy
The United States is a place of "liberty and justice for all." In many ways, we still operate on the foundational social code of Hammurabi: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. In most states, those convicted of first degree murder are often considered for the death penalty. Kill, and we kill you. That's how justice works, right? Thiselton suggests that in reality, we have a skewed understanding of biblical justice (Heb: tzedekah, Gk:δικαιοσύνη). A better translation of both words is perhaps “righteousness,” the idea that God is going to “put things to rights,” as N.T. Wright says. In essence, there is no conflict of justice and mercy in God. Righteousness includes a freeing of the oppressed, in whatever form their oppression might take. This entails a profoundly different understanding of the word justice; rather than God submitting to the back-and-forth of human right and wrong, God fixes the root of the problem. In other words, it's as if a mother chided her two children for fussing, and one of the children responded, "He started it!" to which the mother answers, "And I'm finishing it." What matters is not that God repays all wrongs tit-for-tat, but that in the end, God makes all things right. That is the righteousness of the Deity.
The Church has struggled with these questions for the better part of 2,000 years, and humanity itself has pondered the same issues since the first people began to consider their purpose in the cosmos. Honestly, I don't yet believe that there are any real answers. However, these are the questions that effective ministers should be struggling with. Death is always around us, regardless of whether our culture admits it. The families of those coping with the suicide of a loved one, or the young man who died of a drug overdose, or the child who fell victim to cancer—these are all problematic to the Christian worldview of an all-loving God. But it is precisely these circumstances that call for real, humble ministers, who approach such great questions with fear and with trembling.
[1] Gregory of Nyssa, Catechism 25, quoted in Thiselton, 147.
Anyone who knows me or who reads my blog with any regularity can tell you that one of my favorite movies is Martin Scorsese's adaptation of Nikos Kazantzakis's novel, The Last Temptation of Christ. Actually, it's kind of a joke among my friends that I quote the film more than I quote the Bible.
One particular reason for my fondness of the film is that it captures a single but important tension that I have struggled with now for years. Not long after Jesus is baptized in the film, he is sitting with John the Baptizer discussing the tension between the love of Yahweh and the wrathful judgment of Yahweh:
Later, when Jesus is driven into the desert and is tempted, he comes to the realization that the "tree is rotten to the core," and receives a vision of John, who shows him an ax and an apple tree, which Jesus proceeds to chop down.
Upon returning to the disciples from this period of solitude, Jesus proclaims, "God is inside of us. The devil is outside of us, in the world all around us. We'll pick up an ax, and we'll cut the devil's throat. We'll fight him wherever he is: in the sick, in the rich. Even in the temple. I'll lead you. If you have sheep, give them away. If you have family, leave them. I believed in love. Now I believe in this..." He punctuates his point by brandishing an ax.
To me, almost all Christian belief boils down to the question of what medium we choose to deliver the message. Love? or the Ax?
Jesus? or John the Baptizer?
Oh yeah? Well to Hell with you! Literally!
One of the reasons I appreciate Scorsese's depiction of John the Baptist is that I have a huge fondness for the Hebraic tradition of prophecy. When I was in college I began to study the Minor Prophets, because since we didn't talk about the prophets much in church, my only understanding of them was that they were judgmental and wrathful. They probably wanted to send you to Hell for premarital sex, or cussing too much, or something.
But what I found in the Prophets was the continual painful admission that we live in a despicable world. Consider Amos, who is sent to Israel from Judah to call the rich out for trampling on the poor. Or Hosea, who is told to marry a prostitute, and to give his children names like "Not-My-People," and "Not-To-Be-Pitied," to symbolize Yahweh's estranged relationship with the Jews. Or think of Jeremiah, caught between an angry God and an angry people, sent as a young boy to bring a message of repentance to the Hebrew people—a message which ultimately costs him his life.
Living is painful, and that pain is usually brought on by our own rotten actions, or the rotten actions of those in power—in today's terms, think of banks that foreclose on the homes of the poor, or bankers and CEOs who still receive millions in yearly bonuses while people are starving on the streets of our country's cities. Or, in a more immediate sense, think of the hate or greed in our own hearts, and how that hurts the people around us.
I. am. PISSED. And I feel like God is too, and that God has something to say about it.
However, this can lead to closed-mindedness, fear, and more hatred. People are usually far too anxious to take on the role of prophet, which is why we have Chick tracts and bullhorns.
Jesus: "Trust me, this hurts me way more than it hurts you."
What about love? Is there a way of avoiding calling out the sins of the world, and instead simply trying to live out Christ's teaching to love our enemies? My heart sees the injustice of the world, and is disgusted by it. Do I attack with all my might and risk falling away from the love and humility of Jesus? Or do I practice love and humility instead of getting angry?
The problem is, I want to believe in both. I want to scream at all the injustice of the world. I want to chop the rotten tree down. I want to burn the infested forest until there is nothing but a pile of ash from which we can start over. I want to be a prophet.
But I also want to be like Jesus. I want to love my enemies. I want to practice self-control and discipline. I want to speak intimately with God as a friend. I don't want to worry about what tomorrow will bring. I want to forgive others.
The problem is, Jesus seems pretty conflicted on this whole struggle, himself. It doesn't take an in-depth reading of the gospels to see the things that enrage the Son of Man. Look no further than the so-called "cleansing of the Temple."
"What is justice?" I asked my friend Jennifer in a purposefully ambiguous question last night. I wanted to stir discussion. I'll get to her answer later.
Another question:
In an earlier post, I mentioned Pilate's questioning of Jesus: "What is truth?" he asked. Indeed, how are my perceptions of what is true different from the truths of others? When I find myself "debating" with other--usually more conservative--Christians, a common response I get is "Well, that's your truth. I have my own truth" (Incidentally, I find this ironic, since most of these are the types of people who would be the first to make claims about the Bible holding absolute truth, but that's another post for another time). This stretches beyond petty disagreements between friends on facebook, and has implications on an international, interfaith scale. For instance, take a look at this quote by Osama bin Laden, spoken in 2004:
"Allah knows it did not cross our minds to attack the towers but after the situation became unbearable and we witnessed the injustice and tyranny of the American-Israeli alliance against our people in Palestine and Lebanon, I thought about it. And the events that affected me directly were that of 1982 and the events that followed – when America allowed the Israelis to invade Lebanon, helped by the U.S. Sixth Fleet. As I watched the destroyed towers in Lebanon, it occurred to me punish the unjust the same way (and) to destroy towers in America so it could taste some of what we are tasting and to stop killing our children and women."
An ad I saw on facebook shortly following Pres. Obama's
announcement. Not even joking.
This is bin Laden justifying his actions because he perceives America as being the perpetrators of evil. And in a few of his points, he's not far from wrong. All this goes to simply say that everything we believe--right wrong, evil, good, whatever--is all relative, and dependent upon the perceiver. Think about it long enough, and this is kind of troubling.
When I first heard President Obama reveal to the nation that bin Laden had been killed and his body retrieved, my first feeling was relief. Alright, I thought. Now the families of those thousands of people finally have closure. Amid the enthusiastic thunder of expressions of patriotic American "Christian" approval of the covert CIA operation that "took out" this terrorist, I came to a sort of peaceful rest with the whole situation.
But upon further reflection, I've found that Osama bin Laden's death has lead to a bit of a deeper theological conundrum for me, namely, How are Christians supposed to react to this?
I know the American way. As an American, I want to say, Hell yeah! Get 'im, Uncle Sam! But there is something that deeply disturbs my soul about this approach. The more I study, the more I pray, the closer I grow to my God and my Jesus, the more I realize that the American Way and the Jesus Way are nearly incompatible. How can we possibly rejoice in the fall of our enemy?
I know what the scriptures say:
As I live, says the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from their ways and live; turn back, turn back from your evil ways; for why will you die, O house of Israel? (Ezekiel 33:11)
Do not rejoice when your enemies fall, and do not let your heart be glad when they stumble... (Proverbs 24:17)
But I say to you that listen, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. Give to everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them again. Do to others as you would have them do to you. (Luke 6:27-30)
But I also recognize there are just as many verses in which God's people are begging Yahweh for the destruction of their enemies--and God follows through. (For more information on imprecatory passages of the Old Testament, check out this fantastic blog post by Two Friars and a Fool)
Back to my friend Jennifer. That answer she gave about justice? This is why I love my seminary friends so much:
"For me, justice is the oppressor fully understanding the pain s/he caused. It leads to healing, to restoration," she said. I asked her if she felt justice had been carried out with Osama bin Laden. "Not in any manner that we have seen," she answered. If the killing of one man is considered justice for the killing and oppression of many, while pain lingers and loss endures... that is pitiful justice."
As a Christian--one who believes in the power of scripture and the teachings of Jesus--and as a person that admires the practices of Buddhism and the traditions that brought forth divine rebels like Mohandas Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., I can't for the life of me bring myself to that place of moral abandon that allows me to rejoice in my enemy's defeat--or even to the desire of my enemy's destruction. We are all God's children. When one suffers, we should all suffer. The world is such a disgusting, broken place. How can we expect to change the world that produces men like Osama bin Laden without first leaving behind us our hatred and our will to violence?
Please leave your comments below. I'm interested in your thoughts, largely because this issue has me so troubled. Speak a word.
