Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Cedarville University, Christianity, election, God, Obama, Politics, religion
On a brutally hot day in the summer of 2008, Barack Obama visited a blue-collar town in the Appalachian mountains. That town is my town, and I was there to hear him speak. My friends and I had waited in line for hours, and sweat had glued my shirt to my back. I hate waiting in line. I hate getting up early. But I held out, and when I finally walked into that high school gymnasium I realized that the wait had been worth it.
You have to understand where I come from, and what kind of family I have. I am from the South, and I am the direct descendent of slave owners. In fact, my family still has the ledger with the slaves’ names, ages and prices. We are not racists any more, but that is my history. It is the history of many Southerners. There is a reason why Martin Luther King Jr. was killed in the South, and it is not because the South is an open, tolerant place.
Years of hearing racist jokes from my classmates and years of watching the Confederate flag displayed in pickup trucks had not prepared me for what I saw in that gymnasium. The South had come together. The gym was equal parts white and black. I never had any hope that I would ever see such a thing but on that day, I did.
The coal miners sat beside the residents of our low-income housing complex and cheered. As for me, I was busy absorbing the scene around me. I am a cynical person, and I boast a healthy distrust of politicians. I’d supported Barack Obama before he came to my hometown, but that morning convinced me that there was something unusual about this campaign. Obama had done what no other politician had been able to do. He had brought us together.
Fast forward to my return to campus. The reaction to Obama was what you’d expect from 3000 conservative Christians. I had my salvation questioned. I was called ignorant and foolish. I was told that Obama was the Antichrist, and I was told that even if he wasn’t the Antichrist his government would lead to the end of the world.
And do you know something? It already has led to the end of the world. The world as we know it is changed. It is over. And I believe that is a very good thing. Last night, I attended an Obama party thrown by a campus organization called P.E.A.C.E Project. It was the rowdiest party I’d ever attended. There were McCain supporters there, but they were there to support us. No one criticized anybody else. I saw people dance with complete abandon. I saw people with tears running down their faces. I heard a McCain supporter apologize for not understanding what Obama’s election meant to us.
We had been brought together again. Of course, this second time was not just Obama’s doing. God was there that night. And while I doubt he has a political affiliation, I think He was content. On that night, the descendents of slaves and the descendents of the men and women who had owned them danced together.
If I ever have children, and if those children ever ask me about this election, that is the story I will tell them. It is the story that warms me in spite of the insults I hear from ignorant people. It is the story that, for a moment, brought me frighteningly close to patriotism. It is the story of a people, and how they fought, and how they won.
Congratulations, President-Elect Barack H. Obama. Don’t let us down.
Filed under: Christianity, Real Life | Tags: Christianity, God, hypocrisy, Jesus, religion, whining
I have come to the painful realization that I am a whiner. It’s painful because like most people, I tend to think I’m better than everyone else. Now, if you asked me if I thought I was better than everyone else, I would say “Of course not!” But that would be a lie, if an unintentional one. The unvarnished truth is that I am selfish and bitter and angry, and I like to get my own way.
Yes, I am a hypocrite. I leave plates of food uneaten because I don’t like how it is prepared, and then I criticise the wasteful habits of Americans. I complain about my grades when it is usually my own fault for being lazy. I call my friends intolerant for daring to voice their own opinions, and then complain when the same is said of me. I whine with the polished drama of an operatic diva. I am small and petty, and worst of all, I claim to follow Christ.
If I really followed Christ, I would be struck dumb with gratitude at the incredible bounty I’ve given. Then I would seek to give that bounty to other people. I don’t do that. I talk about it and I encourage other people to do it. Somehow I avoid actually following through. If I really followed Christ, I would be gracious to people with other opinions. I would listen, and acknowledge the possibility that my own views are wrong. If I really followed Christ, I would be compelled to perform to the best of my ability in everything I did because I everything I do reflects Him.
I dwell in my bitterness, and I savor my anger. I elevate my own hurts to the level of sacred wounds. I take up a cross, but it’s my own cross: I built it myself and I nailed myself to it. And then the light sneaks in. I pause the pity party long enough to remember Jesus, and all my pettiness burns away to a single tiny pinprick like I’ve been staring into the sun. I am a whiner, but I don’t have to stay that way. I am hurt, but I can be healed. I’ve been freed, so why do I insist on remaining enslaved?
So I step outside my box. I come down from my petty cross. I walk away, and walk forward into that gleam of light. Whining isn’t necessary when you realize you already have everything you could ever need.
Filed under: Christianity, Real Life | Tags: anger, Christianity, emergent, emergent church, evangelicalism, God, Jesus
I was thinking about Jesus earlier. Yes, profound. But before you start thinking I’ve turned to the light side of the force, the only reason I was thinking about Jesus was because I was pissed at His followers. I was so tired of the typical trite evangelical BS: Pray and you’ll feel better. Jesus loves you as long as you fit into our box. God is only happy with carefully organized services in shiny big buildings on designated days of the week. Use the same old hymns, say the same old things, preach and yell and thump your big old Bible because that’s how Jesus whoops it up, y’all. Good Christians are conservative Republicans. They salute the Bible and the American flag with the same gesture. We’re just all Good Christian Soldiers in a war I only hear about on certain Sundays in certain churches. Don’t touch the opposite sex, boys and girls, because you never know when today’s handshake can turn into tomorrow’s abortion.
Ridiculous. I swear to you, on my honor as a hell-bound liberal, that the Christians I know are more obsessed with clothing, music and sex (or the lack thereof) than any atheist I have ever met. And what good does that preoccupation do? Create a generation of young adults who are more disturbed by the sight of a misplaced piercing or NIV Bible but don’t flinch when they hear about the latest violence overseas? Or if they do flinch, it’s only because they think it’s their patriotic duty. Who cares about the Iraqis killed? Who cares about the families of dead insurgents? Yes, let’s support Israel (cue special music here) but who gives a damn about the Palestinians?
I bet that Jesus would–or does, actually. I bet that Jesus doesn’t care what Bible version you use or how many metal studs you stick in your nose. Can you name the 20 different people groups in Afghanistan? Do you know the difference between Sunnis and Shiites? Jesus does. Do you know the name of the bag lady on the corner? Jesus does. Do you want to know why people get piercings, or cut themselves, or drink? Jesus does. What’s your excuse?
It’s time to release the Deity from the box He’s been squeezed into. He’s not a tame lion, after all. He doesn’t give a rip about romances between fictional Amish girls and city boys. He doesn’t care about the difference between a Baptist and a Methodist. He doesn’t have a denomination. He doesn’t a version. He’s God, and He’s above all that. Why aren’t we?
Filed under: Christianity, Real Life | Tags: Christianity, emergent christianity, faith, God, liberal christianity, religion
What’s a radical Christian?
Is it someone who eats granola and makes his own clothes? Is it the preacher spitting fire and brimstone at his congregation? Maybe it’s both; maybe it’s neither. The truth is that I don’t which one is more ‘Christian,’ which is ironic since I was raised in a Christian home. I did the rounds of Awana and Sunday School. I even went to a Christian school for two years.
The result is one very confused nineteen year old. What I heard in Awana and Sunday School means nothing to me. It leaves me cold and empty. The God I learned about as a child is not a God I want to serve. In fact, I’m not so sure that I want to serve anyone at all. I’m not good at serving people. I grumble. I judge and I begrudge. I serve out of a sense of duty and nothing more.
However, that’s not enough for me anymore. The Christians I’ve met recently have something that I don’t have. They’re alive in a way I’ve never known. I’m afraid of what they have, but I want it badly. What would it be like to really know God? To actually feel Him, and not a collection of sermon-induced emotions? I sense that there is Something there, and it is missing from my life.
Maybe being radical is wiping the slate clean and starting all over again. It certainly feels radical, to admit that I really know nothing about God. Sometimes I’m not even sure that He exists. I think that I have been feeling that way because the God of my childhood doesn’t exist. I’ve been looking in the wrong places for the wrong Person, and I think it’s time that I opened my eyes to the God that’s been there all along.
