Blessed are the poor . . .

The matter is quite simple. The Bible is very easy to understand. But we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers. We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know very well that the minute we understand, we are obliged to act accordingly. Take any words in the New Testament and forget everything except pledging yourself to act accordingly. My God, you will say, if I do that my whole life will be ruined. How would I ever get on in the world? Herein lies the real place of Christian scholarship. Christian scholarship is the Church's prodigious invention to defend itself against the Bible, to ensure that we can continue to be good Christians without the Bible coming too close. Oh, priceless scholarship, what would we do without you?

--Soren Kirkegaard

More Democracy or More Connection

I'm including this discussion on Democracy Now! from today because I think it reflects such a wonderful diversity of viewpoint.  Michael Moore suggests that what we need more of in our current economic climate is democracy.  I couldn't agree more.  Then philosopher Grace Lee Boggs chimes in to critique Moore and says what we need is more connection.  I couldn't agree more.  I think they are both right.

I think it democracy and connection are what we have lost in this whole fiasco that has the right frantically screaming to let them be free to earn as much money as they want.  In our economically un-democratic, individualist system we have bent the system so far over that it is now at the breaking point.  God created the world on pillars of justice.  If we do not abide by those pillars, the world will continue to crumble.

The economically poor and the earth are the warning signs that the system is beginning to crumble.  Scripture teaches that again and again.  The system is most fully healthy and complete when the economically poor and the earth are remembered.  In other words, God's presence is most fully known in those places trying to bring about the healing and care of the poor and of the earth.  If we were faithfully wise, we would be in solidarity with God in those places seeking out not only the healing and care of the poor and the earth but our healing and care as well.

Take a look at the Michael Moore and Grace Lee Boggs discussion.  It happens at about 53:30 in the video.

Stones in the Road

by Mary Chapin Carpenter

When we were young, we pledged allegiance every morning of our lives
The classroom rang with children's voices under teacher's watchful eye
We learned about the world around us at our desks and at dinnertime
Reminded of the starving children, we cleaned our plates with guilty minds
And the stones in the road shone like diamonds in the dust
And then a voice called to us to make our way back home

When I was ten, my father held me on his shoulders above the crowd
To see a train draped in mourning pass slowly through our town
His widow kneeled with all their children at the sacred burial ground
And the TV glowed that long hot summer with all the cities burning down

And the stones in the road flew out beneath our bicycle tires
Worlds removed from all those fires as we raced each other home

And now we drink our coffee on the run, we climb that ladder rung by rung
We are the daughters and the sons, and here's the line that's missing

The starving children have been replaced by souls out on the street
We give a dollar when we pass, and hope our eyes don't meet
We pencil in, we cancel out, we crave the corner suite
We kiss your ass, we make you hold, we doctor the receipt

And the stones in the road fly out from beneath our wheels
Another day, another deal, before we get back home

And the stones in the road leave a mark from whence they came
A thousand points of light or shame, baby, I don't know

The Return of Patriarchy

I have always believed that one of the sure cures to terrorism is feminism.  But even more than the barely covert race messages being bandied about these days, there is an overtly negative and violent overtone toward women.  Rush spews critique about the "femi-nazis" without so much as blinking an eye.  He does not need to be careful in his nasty rhetoric towards women.  Meanwhile, he navigates and tiptoes around to find euphemisms for rhetoric about race.

Pulitzer prize winning journalist, Chris Hedges, recently bemoaned our flight from print media to video mediums.  Books and newspapers offer nuance and invite us into more and more complexity.  Video mediums offer more simplistic mythologies and are less about complexity than they are about "image."

Generally and stereotypically, print media are female ways of knowing.  Generally and stereotypically, video media are male ways of knowing.  Neither one is wrong.  Neither one is right.  Each can inform and measure the other.  Print media can introduce us to a necessary complexity but can overload us with so much information that we have no way to go forward.  Video media give us necessary hooks or images that help us categorize and organize but can over-simplify the world to leave us without finer textures and understandings.

As Hedges notes, what we face today is an over abundance of video media without any balance of print.  The screeching sent to us through cable or the internet on a day to day basis asks us to choose between black and white, ruin or salvation. Much like men in our society are enculturated with less emotional spectrum or complexity, our national dialog has devolved into a patriarchal fight over who has the bigger penis.  Journalists do not measure stories for veracity but see their job as presenting the far right view and something not as far right.

I imagine that is why Caesar Obama is so appealing to so many people who feel the loss of real life complexity.  He seems to offer a point of dialog, a willingness to see more hue and color, a reasoned though confident and emotional plea.  My concern is that the results do not bear out that greater dialog, a broader perspective, a more reasoned policy approach.  War, torture, and rendition still all seem to be a part of the playbook.  "Don't worry your pretty, little head about the country, hunny, I'll beat the hell out of whoever might threaten us."  So though Caesar Obama offers us our violence with a velvet glove (rather than the stumbling, bumbling, arrogant iron fist of Caesar W), he still offers us the violence of patriarchy.

Feminism and democracy go hand in hand.  They seek out mutuality, multiple voices, complexity, and solutions that are more than the sum of our parts.  Patriarchy and authoritarianism also go hand in hand.  They seek out individual saviors, black and white simplicity, and solutions that tell us who wins and who loses.

As a country, we can no longer afford to speak the word "democracy" without making that real economically. Most often, making economic democracy real means that we are to raise the boats of our women and children.  Throughout history, lifting the boats of women and children has been the tide to raise all boats.

We also need to begin calling out patriarchy and the violence it supports.  To not do so begins to normalize the violence and help hate hold sway.  Supporting feminist movements in countries who sponsor terrorism (including our own) would undercut the very definition of terrorism.  We no longer hear about those women in Afghanistan we needed to save through our violence.  Caesars often try to sell us that bag of goods, telling us that violence leads to victory leads to peace.  Christianity at its best, as seen through feminist eyes, knows that the only real road to peace is paved through justice.

Maria Lugones puts forward nine criteria (Making Face, Making Soul/Hacienda Caras:  Creative and Critical Perspectives by Women of Color, Aunt Lute Books, 1990, pp. 400-401) for feminist practice, which she terms as "play."  I have always loved them and believe they would save the world if we regularly practiced them.  Each practice is about removing the eye of arrogance.  I offer them as a blessing and in a hope that we might turn away from our continuing practice of patriarchy.

• Openness to surprise
• Openness to self-construction
• Idea that no rules are sacred
• Openness to creativity
• Openness to being a fool
• Not worrying about competence
• Not being self-important
• Not taking norms as sacred
• Finding ambiguity and double-edges as a source of wisdom and delight

Lilly-Livered Liberals and the Phobia of Class

No race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem.
                                                                   --Booker T. Washington


Even with Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Lou Dobbs, et al,  screeching day and night, some folks have asked why liberals, progressives, or whatever you want to call those with a different viewpoint, just cannot get a movement started.  Why are we confounded, frustrated, and unable to create those big numbers that would form a political or theological tipping point?


I think the first answer is, as Gil Scott-Heron sang, "The revolution will not be televised."  We need to know that all kinds of grass roots movements are happening around the world, and even in the United States. Noam Chomsky has pointed out that the protests against the Iraq War included numbers it took the Viet Nam War far more many years to wax up in the streets.  Judy Woodruff, CNN correspondent at the time, harumphed about the protesters complaint that CNN would not carry the protests more often.  Yes, Judy, the administration brings you, on your knees, whenever they so desire, 24/7.  In a democracy, why would protestors get more than a blip on your radar?  Again, the revolution will not be televised.  We need to remember that "The Beast"* or "The Borg"* has no interest in televising a movement that would look to defeat or dissimilate it.  The hope is that God's purposes are being worked out, and hope is the certainty of things that cannot be seen.


On this Labor Day, however, I believe the liberal or progressive movement needs to take a good long look at itself to see the incredible classism and urbanism that exists among us.  We look down on and are suspicious of blue-collar and rural folk, believe they have nothing to offer us and we have everything to give them.  They must attend our schools, our workshops, and speak our language before we give them any credence.  A tremendous amount of open racism still exists among rural and blue-collar folk, to be sure, but that is certainly countered by the covert racism found in institutions among white collar, urban elites.  I would argue that the classism found among white collar, urban elites is even more damaging to the world God created to be founded upon pillars of justice.


One of the few ways I can express this truism is through the all too little experience I had working with organized labor and rural folk in suburban communities.  I remember sharing with a church board member at a white collar congregation the work I had done regionally and how I was celebrated for that work.  She returned the next meeting to say that she googled me to see what papers I had published or awards I had received and had come up empty.  The regional work I had done in the labor movement was not interested in my papers or handing me awards.  They expressed their thanks through the authority they gave me at their events, asking me to write or speak on their behalf.  


I have experienced splits in LGBTQ communities where white-collar, suburban or urban elites refer to people within their own community as "disgusting", not recognizing the different landscape LGBTQ folk in rural and blue-collar communities must navigate.  


To a degree, there is this want in white-collar, urban or suburban communities to intellectualize the struggle.  We have a difficult time getting into the grit, the muck, and the mire to sometimes confront, sometimes nuance, sometimes translate our journey that makes sense for people who must decide how open they will make their need, how that need translates into every day realities, and how much rural and blue-collar communities are about community rather than individualism.


I think artists like Emmy Lou Harris, DJ Davey D, Pete Seeger, Joan Baez, John Mellencamp, Baldemar Valesquez, and Bruce Springsteen all seem to get that reality in a way that helps build movements.  We need younger artists who will make that same transition.  I am saddened by my denomination's "Praise" hymnal that does not remember those old union, civil rights, or just plain movement choruses which should help us pitch a wider tent.  Beautiful images and catchy melodies, sure.  But it's all about our head.  I'm not sure there is enough grit there, much dirt under your fingernails struggle for the movement there, much rage against the machine there.  


I think that will be the challenge for my denomination, the United Church of Christ.  If we can stop being the denomination that is unable to get out if it's white-collar head to become something more, God may see fit to save us.  Otherwise, we may be much too arrogant for God to care.


*An ancient and more modern metaphor for the "kosmos", powers and principalities, or systemic and structural evil.

The Quest for Superiority

by Wallace Shawn



Wally Shawn helps us to understand why we work so hard against democracy. How even those liberals who march in protest against the war love being a part of a nation that can crush others.

Demonizing the Poor

In our quest to all be middle class, average Joannes and Joes in our country, we have chosen to demonize the poor in a way that is profoundly frightening. And it is a lie. While the rich leverage a system of sub-prime loans, derivatives, bank bailouts, financial penalties, and golden parachutes, our culture tells us that it is the poor who get the handouts, get paid for doing nothing, and take advantage. Huh?

This past week I led a delegation from Algonquin Congregational UCC to Postville and Decorah, Iowa. This group had done a seven week study session on immigration and wanted to learn more through a hands on experience of two communities which have been dramatically affected by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raid in May of 2008. Postville, in particular, was decimated by this federal raid and continues to feel its effects. What I continue to experience, every time I am in Postville and Decorah, is the very tangible and very real presence of God moving, working, and standing in solidarity with these two communities. I am so grateful for the hospitality we received in both communities.

My favorite part of the delegation was listening to the Rev. David Vasquez, the campus minister at Luther College in Decorah, link the Biblical story to the events in our own country. He remembered the story of Queen Esther and Mordecai, aliens in Empire, whom the consultant to the king, Haman, sought to have killed. In the Veggie Tales retelling of this story, Rev. Vasquez shared with us the song sung by Haman: "The law must be adjusted, there are those who can't be trusted." Indeed, in every age it would appear that Empire must adjust the laws to punish those who can't be trusted.

Rev. Vasquez helped us remember the story of Joseph and his coat of many colors. He compared that story to Irma, an immigrant who had come to the United States to follow the process of production. Irma had worked to ship flowers marked to ship to the United States. That plant was shut down after five years and Irma lost her job. Irma had worked to package coffee marked to send to the United States. That plant was shut down after five years and Irma lost her job.

Apparently, the North American Free Trade Agreement allows multinational corporations to operate tax free for five years. So when the five years is up, many companies pull up stakes and move to a new location to begin the five year process all over again.

After packaging products marked to ship to the United States, losing two jobs, and Irma without further recourse, she decided to follow the process of production or commerce to the United States. She left to see if there was any regular work in "El Norte."

So it is with the Biblical character Joseph. He is sold off to traders from Shechem or Ishmael, we aren't sure from where, because there are so many traders coming through this route. Where does Joseph end up? In Egypt, of course, the center of the Empire. There, Joseph the immigrant, becomes a prince only second to the pharaoh.

As the story goes, the sun rises on a new pharaoh who does not know Joseph the immigrant. And this king is fearful that this immigrant people will become too populous in the land and overtake the Egyptians. Can't you just hear Lou Dobbs asking us to be fearful that the Mexicans eventually plan to retake California? You know I'm not kidding, right? Lou Dobbs actually tries to convince people that Mexicans are plotting to retake the American southwest. He does this on that liberal CNN...not Fox.

Empires educate their people to hate the poor. It is a function of Empire. It is what Empire does.

Worse, many of the undocumented workers working at the Agriprocessors meat packing plant before it was raided were/are Guatemalans. Many of them were orphans from the Guatemalan civil war that began with a United States led coup of a democratically elected government in 1954. The Guatemalan president we overthrew cited FDR and Abraham Lincoln as two of his heroes.

Worse still, many of the undocumented workers in Postville had to leave Guatemala because of the free trade, neo-liberal policies (our process of production) implemented by our government. They could choose to die with their families in Guatemala or hold out hope for something different in the United States.

So we destroy their country with war, ravage their communities with our economic and trade policy, and then raid the places where they are at work in the United States. We throw vitriol and hate at these people, blaming them for our current crisis. God forgive us. God have mercy upon us. God, help us to repent.

Frontline had a fifteen minute video of one man's deportation from Postville back to his native Guatemala. I encourage you to watch it. Knowing the history, I bawled the first time I saw it. I believe the Heart of God is broken from such stories. Please do watch it. I hope its truth will raise your anger, incite your action, bring you to fuller compassion for our immigrant poor.

Such stories can lead us to despair. I believe that is where God's hope begins--when our hearts are broken by the things that break the heart of God.