It's Time to Man up about Christian Feminism

 


 I grew up in a Christian denomination that discriminated against women. It took me years to admit this, and I don't think the congregations of this group did so out of maliciousness or ill intent. Rather they had adopted a hermeneutic (a method of reading scripture) that led to the conclusion that Paul's instruction for women to keep silent in church assemblies was a universal rule that should be followed in the church for all time.

Rachel Held Evans has been posting a very good series of blogs on egalitarianism (rachelheldevans.com), and my friends Melanie Springer Mock and Kendra Weddle Irons have a lively blog that regularly addresses the ways images in evangelical Christianity limit the freedom of women to live out their calling before God (deconstructingchristianimages.blogspot.com). I want to stand in solidarity with these women and throw my own small pebble into the stream of discussion.

What I don't want to do in this post is to engage in biblical exegesis. That's what I did in the early years when I first became aware of the "women's role in the church" issue, as it was called. I tried to analyze and slice and dice all those New Testament passages, tried to understand what the Greek word for submission really meant, pondered whether it was elder Junia or elder Junius, and whether Phoebe was really a deacon (or a deaconess!). While interesting, those efforts often seemed to end in confusion and frustration. It just seemed impossible to arrive at any solid conclusion.

I'm not saying those kinds of biblical explorations don't have value. Rachel Held Evans does a great job in her blog series of surfacing and explaining all those questions, so if you want to go down that path, I recommend checking out her series.

So instead of focusing on biblical interpretations, I want to share a bit of my own story. I want to talk about the process by which I arrived at my current views and identify some influences along the way. My hope would be that my story might provide some insight into why people change their views on issues like this. Maybe someone out there might even identify with my journey. If not, this may be an exercise in self reflection and exorcising my own demons, and that's not all bad either.

First, just to be clear, here's pretty much where I'm at these days on the "women's role in the church" issue:  “Decisions about who should do what [in the church] should . . .  be made on the basis of individual gifts and not on the basis of gender—any more than we would automatically allocate tasks and resources on the basis of skin color, ethnicity, or class” ( A Sword between the Sexes? C. S. Lewis and the Gender Debates by Mary Stewart Van Leeuwen. Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos Press, 2010, 188). 

The last part of this quote is significant for me. My real movement on this question came about when I began to see it, not as an issue of biblical hermeneutics, but as an issue of social justice. That was the game changer for me.

I could write tons on this topic, but I will limit myself to two observations about my story.

First, my changing views on this issue came about not through intellectual argument, but through my experiences and my relationships in churches and in the workplace. When I think about my attitudes and opinions on the role of women in the church, my mind goes--not to books, not to seminars, not to bible class discussions, but to people, both men and women, whose life and actions spoke to me. One of the first people I think of is Oliver Howard. Oliver was one of the most brilliant biblical scholars I've ever known. His theological degree was from Hebrew Union, but at the time I knew him he was a practicing corporate attorney in Tulsa. He was the one who first introduced me to the biblical questions and conundrums surrounding this issue. But Oliver's actions spoke louder to me than his words. You see for years Oliver spoke at my denomination's lectureships, hoping to open peoples' minds to more freedom for women in the life of the church. But Oliver and his wife had three daughters--bright, capable, excellent public speakers. Ultimately Oliver and his wife realized that their daughters would never be given the opportunity to use their gifts, and so he and his family left and joined a denomination that practiced equality in ministry for all members. 

My views also changed because of the many wonderful, spiritually gifted women I worshiped with over the years: Carol Sherwood, Suzanne Wood, June Breninger (I could go on). As I listened to these women share their hearts and spiritual insights in small group or Bible study settings, it began to dawn on me that they were prohibited from sharing those same spiritual insights with the larger congregation. This didn't seem right. I began to wonder what we were missing by effectively silencing half the church.  A fairly recent stage on the journey for me has been working at George Fox University. The Friends movement has a long history of equality for women in ministry, and even though my Quaker colleagues tell me that there are still struggles in many of their churches about women's leadership, I've observed a marked difference that occurs in a faith tradition that begins with the assumption that all members are equal in gifts and ministry.

One of the characters in Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead, says that during the Civil War, he had to leave his Presbyterian church and “go sit with the Quakers” for awhile—to get away from the Christian patriotism and expressions of support for war in his own church. I’ve felt somewhat the same about my last three years, and I’m thankful for the change of scenery religiously that has given me space to reflect on what I feel and believe about women and ministry.

In my faith tradition, I also saw how this religious practice influenced the ways women were treated (and mistreated) in the life of the church and in the workplace. Sometimes this manifested itself in subtle ways, sometimes more blatantly.  I'll give a couple of examples from the religious colleges where I taught. In the college setting, of course, women were not prohibited from teaching or chairing committees or achieving academic honors. However, because of denominational beliefs, there were certain things that female faculty members could not do that male faculty members could do. For example, a female faculty member could not speak in chapel. At one college a capable, theologically prepared female faculty member was asked to teach a freshman Bible course; however, enrollment in the course had to be limited to women because, obviously, a woman could not exercise a teaching role--at least in a "Bible" course. Never mind that other female faculty members were no doubt "teaching the Bible" to their male students in a variety of English, History, and Psychology courses. At another college, an Academic Dean opened a faculty meeting by reading scripture and making some devotional comments. She was later visited in her office by a couple of concerned (male) faculty members, who suggested that, next time, she should ask a male faculty member to lead the devotional. Presumably, it was OK with these male faculty members that the female dean could craft a college mission statement, oversee the curriculum, and hire and fire faculty--just so long as she didn't intrude on their sacred patriarchal privilege of reading and interpreting scripture.

I also saw how this religious stance played out in more subtle ways. I can recall several meetings where it was obvious to me that a female faculty member or female administrator's ideas were being discounted--not because they were bad ideas--but simply because the person presenting those ideas was female. I'm not even sure the male faculty members and administrators were aware of what was going on, but it was obvious to me. I could see it in the way a male faculty member interrupted a female speaker in a meeting or the way he dismissed a woman's suggestions without consideration. As I look back on it now, it's actually surprising to me that more of this kind of thing didn't go on. After all, if you live in a religious system where women are silenced in arguably the most important hour of the congregational life of the church on a weekly basis, where women are relegated to proscribed roles like teaching children's classes and Bible classes where only "ladies" are present, and, further, where men are likely to be taught that the role of their wives in the home is to submit to their God-given male leadership authority, what would you expect to happen?

Second, my views changed when I began to look more at the way Jesus treated women. As a result, I came to view the debate in terms of social justice. It seems clear to me as we read the stories recorded in the New Testament about Jesus' encounters with women we notice that his tendency was always to move in the direction of more freedom of expression and more voice and more significant spiritual standing for women--and that this tendency was diametrically opposed to the cultural and religious assumptions of his own day. Can you really imagine Jesus silencing a woman who wanted to pray or share a Bible verse? Can you really imagine Jesus advising a woman not to teach a man? I think Jesus was fully aware that women in his society were oppressed, and, as a result, he always tried to grant more freedom, more opportunity, and more dignity to the women he encountered. For me, this example of Jesus is much more convincing and much less confusing than trying to sort out the advice Paul gave to 1st century churches. 

I remember Oliver Howard once posing this question to a group of church leaders: if a woman were to approach you with a request to share a prayer or a devotional thought with the congregation on a Sunday morning, what would you do? Would it be right to deny this woman the opportunity to share what she believes is her spiritual gift? Or would it be right to allow this woman to share? WWJD?
If you have to err, would you rather err on the side of law and restrictions? Or would you rather err on the side of grace? 

Looking back, I suppose that was the day I became a Christian feminist. 

I mentioned that I now see women's equality in ministry as a social justice issue, so here's another analogy that's been helpful to me. I've always admired the Freedom Riders who stood up for equality in the segregated South. While I realize that the black Freedom Riders were risking more in the struggle, I've always been impressed with those White Freedom Riders who chose to stand in solidarity with their black brothers and sisters, risking life, limb, and reputation because they believed in the rightness of the cause, not because it necessarily affected them personally. 

Perhaps it's time for a similar freedom ride where guys like me stand in solidarity with their Christian sisters: To stand against discrimination and oppression and misogyny in all its forms. To declare clearly and boldly that "there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus" (Galatians 3:28).

A Wisdom of the Head and a Wisdom of the Heart

 


I've been thinking a lot lately about change--not global change or political change or climate change or religious change. My focus is more personal than that.  I want to consider why I change and why you change your beliefs, opinions, attitudes, and actions, and I want to use a literary and a biographical example to do so.

This spring I reread Charles Dickens' novel Hard Times with my Great British Writers class. As one of his shorter novels, it's a great introduction to Dickens' world. It contains all the glories of character and all the faults of sentimentalism of this great Victorian writer. To me, the most interesting character in the novel is Thomas Gradgrind, the retired merchant turned schoolmaster, who speaks these words at the opening of the book:  "Now what I want is Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out everything else. You can only form the minds of reasoning animals upon Facts: nothing else will ever be of any service to them. This is the principle on which I bring up my own children, and this is the principle on which I bring up these children. Stick to the Facts, sir!"

Within the societal context of the novel, Gradgrind (whose name describes his educational philosophy well) stands for the Utilitarian philosophy that scientific principles could be applied to social problems and thus create the greatest good for the greatest number of people. What Dickens reveals as the novel progresses, however, are the tragic consequences of Gradgrind's philosophy when applied to his own children. His son, Tom, becomes  a thief, and his daughter, Louisa, forced to accept an arranged marriage with the much older Josiah Bounderby (because it is the practical and sensible thing to do), grows unhappy in her marriage and comes dangerously close to adultery with the unprincipled aristocrat, Harthouse, saving herself at the last moment by running to her father's house and confessing her deep unhappiness to him.

His daughter's confession is both crushing and life giving for Gradgrind. "The ground on which I stand has ceased to be solid under my feet," he says to Louisa the next day. But it turns out that this disorientation was necessary to bring about change in one who had been so firmly committed to his system of "nothing but Facts." Gradgrind is essentially the only dynamic character in the novel. Dickens shows us the extent of his transformation through this climactic speech: "Some persons hold .  .  . that there is a wisdom of the Head, and that there is a wisdom of the Heart. I have not supposed so; but, as I have said, I mistrust myself now. I have supposed the Head to be all-sufficient. It may not be all-sufficient: how can I venture this morning to say it is! If that other kind of wisdom should be what I have neglected, and should be the instinct that is wanted, Louisa--" Gradgrind's experience gives him the courage to end the marriage between his daughter and Bounderby, and his transformed beliefs and values are demonstrated by his actions in the rest of the novel.

We see the same principle of change operating in the life of C. S. Lewis. In the 1940s, Lewis published his first apologetic work, The Problem of Pain, in which he took on the question of human suffering, specifically: how can a God who is both good and all-powerful allow suffering? It was the book that launched his career as a popular apologist for the Christian faith. It attracted the attention of the director of religious broadcasting for the BBC and led to the series of radio talks that were later published as Mere Christianity. In The Problem of Pain Lewis explored intellectual and philosophical questions about human suffering. It demonstrated, in Thomas Gradgrind's words, the "Wisdom of the Head." Some twenty years later Lewis was to experience something that caused him to question much of what he had written in that early apologetic work: the struggle with cancer, remission, reoccurence of cancer, and death of his beloved wife, Joy Davidman. As he saw, up close and personal, his wife's suffering and the ultimate ineffectiveness of his fervent prayers (in which Lewis even asked God that he be allowed to take Joy's pain into his own body), he came to the realization that "Experience is a bitter teacher. I've just come up against a bit of experience" (Shadowlands). Following Joy's death, Lewis wrote a book under a pseudonym called A Grief Observed, which recorded his grieving process. The emotions in the book are so raw, so honest, that it makes for difficult reading. I would suggest that if Lewis' early apologetic work expressed the "Wisdom of the Head," A Grief Observed expressed Lewis' "Wisdom of the Heart."


So what makes people change their beliefs, opinions, attitudes, and actions? I don't know all the reasons people change, but I do think that a big one is life experience. People don't change easily, so I'm thinking that often it takes some pretty significant events, perhaps even dramatic and catastrophic ones to bring change about. A couple of biblical examples come to mind. Near the beginning of the book of Acts we have Pentecost: a rushing, mighty wind; tongues as of flame; and people hearing the gospel in their own language. I imagine those pilgrims who came expecting the same old Pentecost celebration got more than they bargained for--and, as a result, their beliefs and lives were changed forever. Later in Acts, when God wants Peter to go preach to the Gentiles, he sends him a dramatic vision on a roof to declare that all foods are clean, rocking Peter's world, introducing him to a new reality in which "God is no respecter of persons." That life experience would change Peter's worldview and practice forever (though one does wonder why the Pentecost experience wasn't enough for Peter).

So one conclusion I want to draw is that life experience is a catalyst for change. These experiences are often surprising and unsettling and often unpleasant. They disorient us. After such an experience we may say, with Thomas Gradgrind, "The ground on which I stand has ceased to be solid under my feet." But that disorientation is temporary and can lead to a new way of seeing and being in the world. It may even lead us to the recognition that there is a whole realm of understanding and a way of relating to other human beings that we never knew existed. As a result, we may attain to the Wisdom of the Heart.

Have you had those kinds of experiences in your own life? In a future post, I hope to explore this idea of change more and use a personal example of how I've been led to change my beliefs, opinions, attitudes, and actions based on life experience.

Life According to Anne Lamott

I discovered Anne Lamott's writing about ten years ago when I was doing my best (without much success) to teach a creative writing course. After searching in vain for a textbook suitable for the class, I stumbled upon Bird by Bird, in which Lamott shares her experiences as a writer. It was too late to order the book for the class, so I began many class periods by reading aloud her witty and practical observations on the writing life. I'm not sure how much the class members got out of it, but reading Lamott was lifegiving for me. She was such an encouraging and honest guide that at times she almost made me believe I could be a writer (and even that I might be able to teach creative writing). The first, I like to think, has turned out to be the case to some extent, the second, not so much.


From there I moved on to Traveling Mercies, the autobiographical work where she recounts her childhood, her addiction, her failed attempts at being a writer, her faith journey including finding a church community that nourished her, and her eventual writing success.  Of the many things I appreciate about Lamott, one of the greatest is her vulnerability and honesty about her own life. She's willing to put herself out there as she is, with all her fears and anxieties and screw ups. She admits that life is hard, that she doesn't have all the answers, that she needs the help of friends and fellow followers, and, most of all, God's help just to make it through most days.


Recently, on Twitter, Lamott referred to a commencement speech she gave at Berkley in 2002. Having just sat through something like my fortieth commencement ceremony, I was interested to see what kind of advice Lamott might give to an undergraduate audience. In her Twitter post, Lamott said that the speech contained pretty much "all she knows." I think it's her honest and forthright approach to life and faith that make her an excellent guide for all of us, but I especially commend her thoughts to the students I teach at George Fox University. You could pick many worse voices to listen to as you leave the safe confines of GFU and begin a new phase in your life. Herewith are a few excerpts from Lamott's graduation speech followed by some of my reflections. Enjoy!

So from the wise old pinnacle of my 49 years, I want to tell you that what you’re looking for is already inside you. You’ve heard this before, but the holy thing inside you really is that which causes you to seek it. You can’t buy it, lease it, rent it, date it or apply for it. The best job in the world can’t give it to you. Neither can success, or fame, or financial security — besides which, there ain’t no such thing. J.D. Rockefeller was asked, “How much money is enough?” and he said, “Just a little bit more.”

I'm a bit older than 49, and I'm still trying to learn this one. This seems a great antidote to all the competing voices you tend to hear when you are graduating telling to look outside yourself or to something you can do or accomplish for contentment. Anne's right. It won't work. As a bumper sticker I saw recently put it, "Begin within."

I do know you are not what you look like, or how much you weigh, or how you did in school, and whether you get to start a job next Monday or not. Spirit isn’t what you do, it’s … well, again, I don’t actually know. They probably taught this junior year at Goucher. But I know that you feel it best when you’re not doing much — when you’re in nature, when you’re very quiet, or, paradoxically, listening to music. 

I know you can feel it and hear it in the music you love, in the bass line, in the harmonies, in the silence between notes; in Chopin and Eminem, Emmylou Harris, Bach, whoever. You can close your eyes and feel the divine spark, concentrated in you, like a little Dr. Seuss firefly. It flickers with aliveness and relief, like an American in a foreign country who suddenly hears someone speaking in English. In the Christian tradition, they say that the soul rejoices in hearing what it already knows. And so you pay attention when that Dr. Seuss creature inside you sits up and says, “Yo!”

Because music has been such an influence on me throughout my life, I resonate with the idea that we can identify and feel our spirit when we listen to the music we love best. And it doesn't hurt that she mentions Emmylou Harris, who is one of my favorites and whose music will be in evidence at my memorial service someday if my surviving family members carry out my wishes. 

We can see spirit made visible in people being kind to each other, especially when it’s a really busy person, taking care of a needy annoying person. Or even if it’s terribly important you, stopping to take care of pitiful, pathetic you. In fact, that’s often when we see spirit most brightly. 

These lines make me think of stories about Jesus, who seemed to be often interrupted by needy and, I'm sure, sometimes annoying people, yet who accepted those interruptions with grace and responded with love. And he also took time to care for himself, retreating for a time to regain his focus.

You’re here to love, and be loved, freely. If you find out next week that you are terminally ill — and we’re all terminally ill on this bus — all that will matter is memories of beauty, that people loved you, and you loved them, and that you tried to help the poor and innocent.

These lines remind me of an Emmylou Harris song that goes, in part, "When you're gone, long gone/ The only thing that will have mattered/ Is the love that you shared and the way that you cared/ When you're gone, long gone."

So how do we feed and nourish our spirit, and the spirit of others?

First, find a path, and a little light to see by. Every single spiritual tradition says the same three things: 1) Live in the now, as often as you can, a breath here, a moment there. 2) You reap exactly what you sow. 3) You must take care of the poor, or you are so doomed that we can’t help you. 

You don’t have to go overseas. There are people right here who are poor in spirit; worried, depressed, dancing as fast as they can, whose kids are sick, or whose retirement savings are gone. There is great loneliness among us, life-threatening loneliness. People have given up on peace, on equality. They’ve even given up on the Democratic Party, which I haven’t, not by a long shot. You do what you can, what good people have always done: You bring thirsty people water; you share your food, you try to help the homeless find shelter, you stand up for the underdog. 

I particularly appreciate the wide view of spirituality Lamott presents here. I sometimes fear that our Christian university students only hear spirituality addressed from one perspective when there are, in fact, innumerable traditions from which we can learn. And, as Lamott reminds us, what we often find in studying those traditions is a surprising unity about some of the stuff in life that matters most.

Anything that can help you get your sense of humor back feeds the spirit, too. In the Bill Murray army movie “Stripes,” a very tense recruit announces during his platoon’s introductions, “My name is Francis. No one calls me Francis. Anyone calls me Francis, I’ll kill them. And I don’t like to be touched — anyone tries to touch me, I’ll kill them.” And the sergeant responds, “Oh, lighten up, Francis.” So you may need to upgrade your friends. You need to find people who laugh gently at themselves, who remind you gently to lighten up. 

Rest and laughter are the most spiritual and subversive acts of all. Laugh, rest, slow down.

It wouldn't be Anne Lamott without humor, and she delivers here. Any commencement address that quotes from a classic movie like "Stripes" is alright in my book!

If you're a university student or a recent graduate reading this, I hope you'll take Lamott's words to heart. And I might add one more piece of Lamott wisdom. It occurs in her writing book Bird by Bird when she suggests that one of the most important lessons to learn as a writer is the lesson of "shitty first drafts." (I think I may have edited this statement in my creative writing class; the college I taught at then was pretty conservative.) In a great chapter, Lamott tells her own harrowing tale of having to scrap a novel that she had worked on for months and start, virtually, from scratch. What I want to suggest, however, is that this truth applies not only to writing but also to life. How many of us can look back on our past life events and identify some things that didn't work out so well the first time around. Perhaps it was a really bad first job or a terrible relationship or a depressing place to live. We're going to make bad choices and we will suffer for them, but we don't have to live there. We can always start over or try to revise those first attempts into a satisfying and compelling narrative. 

Here's how Lamott closed her address. Blessings to you.

So bless you. You’ve done an amazing thing. And you are loved; you are capable of lives of great joy and meaning. It’s what you are made of. And it’s what you’re for. So take care of yourselves; take care of each other. Thank you.

 

The Problem with Certitude

Like you, I've seen lots on the news and in Facebook posts this past week concerning President Obama's expression of his personal support for same-sex marriage. As I've read and listened to people's, specifically, Christian people's reactions in the wake of Obama's interview, I've felt (occasionally) encouraged but more often discouraged. My discouragement doesn't come because of my personal views about same-sex marriage, which are not the point of this post; my discouragement and disappointment come from the nature and tenor of the conversation itself. Specifically, I'm distressed by the way many Christians seem to feel called to take definitive and certain stances about complex issues, and the rhetoric they use to state and defend these positions, rhetoric that tends to divide rather than unite and close discussion rather than open it.

I'm interested in exploring what it is about the Christian religion, and perhaps more specifically, evangelicalism that results in such an approach.

In 2009, I published a book about C. S. Lewis' writing style (http://www.kentstateuniversitypress.com/page/4/?cat=5&snap=R) in which I argued that a major reason for Lewis' popularity among evangelical Christians in the 1940s and 1950s was his style of certitude. Lewis was writing in a time where scientific discoveries and religious liberalism were challenging the assertions of conservative Christianity. In a period of doubt and questioning, Lewis' clear pronouncements about the truth of miracles and the validity of key Christian doctrines were welcomed by his audience. In an age when traditional doctrines were being questioned, readers found in Lewis a Christian (and an intellectual, no less) who knew what he believed and stated it in no uncertain terms. To give one example, to those who said that Jesus might have been a great moral teacher but not the son of God, Lewis responded that Jesus must be either a liar, a lunatic, or Lord. No other options. Case settled. Lewis seemed to have a way of cutting through complex arguments and reaching a simple solution that was convincing to his readers.

I was in my late twenties when I did my initial research on Lewis, and I have to say that in those days I was one of those readers. As a young Christian in a conservative denomination, I, too, found Lewis' confident answers to complex theological questions reassuring. I remember quoting Lewis' famous liar, lunatic, or lord explanation approvingly in articles and presentations. Years later I discovered that this very famous argument for Jesus' divinity could be more accurately described as a logical fallacy because there could be other options than the three Lewis enumerates. As my views on faith have changed over the years and I've been called into a wider, less fundamentalist view of scripture, I've grown less and less enamored with the clear, confident Lewis whose words and style seem to say: "here's the way it is; I'm not asking for debate; take it or leave it." Today the passages I'm drawn to in Lewis' writing are the ones where he expresses humility, even doubt--passages where he admits that he doesn't have all the answers and even encourages the reader not to feel compelled to agree with the opinion he's defending. A good example would be the passage in Mere Christianity where he leaves the door open for people to come to Jesus who don't know Jesus. The fictional representation of this idea is found in the last Narnian chronicle where Emeth, a follower of Tash, is admitted into Aslan's country based on his pure heart and good character even though he was not, in name, a follower of Aslan.

So what does all this Lewis stuff have to do with today's Christian rhetoric?  What I've heard and read from those who oppose Obama's position on same-sex marriage are most often appeals to some kind of certainty.  For example, I was listening to an NPR interview of some of the audience for Mitt Romney's commencement speech this weekend at fundamentalist, evangelical Liberty University. In the speech itself, Romney only addressed the issue once, but he addressed it in tones of certainty: "Marriage," he declared (to roaring applause),  "is a relationship between one man and one woman." Period. End of discussion.  Here's what an audience member had to say when asked about her position on same-sex marriage: "It's wrong. There's nothing else to say about it. It's in the Bible." Case closed. No discussion wanted here. This audience member's attitude was pretty close to the old bumper sticker: "God said it. I believe it. That settles it." Among my Facebook friends, I've seen a number of posts that begin with the phrase, "The Bible clearly teaches that homosexuality is sinful."  I want to respond: Is it really, really so clear as all that? Don't you want to open up some room for discussion here? Are you aware that some Christians who read the Bible arrive at a different place? As one of my colleagues pointed out this week, when someone opens with the phrase "The Bible clearly teaches" it's a sign that she's stopped listening to and trying to understand the other person's point of view.

These statements of certitude about this complex issue (and many others we could bring up) are, it seems to me, unfortunate at best and damaging and divisive at worst. Instead of certainty, I want to argue for uncertainty. Instead of definitive positions, I wonder what would happen to the climate of discussion if more people said things like "I don't really know what I believe about this issue" or "I would like to hear more stories from my gay and lesbian friends before I develop my position." Or even, as President Obama said prior to his interview, "my position on this issue is evolving."

I found it interesting that before he stated his personal view in the interview, Obama was being criticized by religious conservatives for not taking a definitive stance on the issue. His "my position is evolving" statement was seen as a political tactic. I even read Facebook posts that declared (confidently and certainly) that Obama was going to wait until after the election to "come out" with his true feelings. In this regard, I applaud our President for taking the political risk to state his personal views. Regardless of whether you agree with him or not, you have to admire his honesty and courage.

What I'm suggesting here is that there is a cultural tendency in evangelical Christianity that does not leave room for "evolving" positions, complexity, uncertainty, or doubt.  In fact, in my history as a Christian I often felt I was expected to know exactly what I believed about all sorts of issues and that if I didn't I was somehow a slackard as a Christian. I remember that passage in Timothy being quoted to the effect that we should always "ready to give an answer for the hope that is in us." Guess I just wasn't aware then that included as part of that hope was my position on same-sex marriage!

Another tendency I deplore is the one that assumes there is one proper or appropriate or approved position that all Christians must take on any given issue. For me, this started back in my Bible classes at my Christian College where we would discuss questions like "Can Christians serve in the military?" or "Should Christians dance, or play the lottery, or drink alcohol, or ____________ (fill in the blank)?" I'm not saying that some of these weren't worthy questions to discuss; what I am saying is that each began with the assumption, which I now see as flawed, that using the Bible as their guide, all Christians would ultimately be able to agree on the "Christian approach to" or the "Christian view of" whatever issue was on the table. Here's a current day example: I was following a comment thread on Facebook about the same-sex marriage debate where a commenter had made an inclusive plea for LGBTQ folks to be embraced in Christian fellowship. The next commenter asked, "_____, are you a Christian?" Well, it doesn't take much analysis to deconstruct that question. The commenter had obviously assumed that anyone who could suggest that the LGBTQ community be loved and accepted in the Christian church could not (de facto) be a Christian.

So here's my modest proposal. When discussing these controversial issues as Christians, can we exercise enough humility to temper our statements? Can we resist the temptations of certitude, realizing that they tend to draw lines in the sand and reinforce stereotypes that non-Christians already carry about those of our ilk? Can we learn the use of conditional phrases like "Based on my understanding of scripture" or even "I might be wrong about this" or, God forbid, "my views on this are evolving"?

Doubt is not a four-letter word--even for Christians, as Richard Rohr reminds us:

It is probably necessary to eliminate most doubt when you are young:
doing so is a good survival technique. But such worldviews are not 
true--and they are not wisdom. Wisdom happily lives with mystery,
doubt, and "unknowing," and in such living, ironically resolves that
very mystery to some degree" (Falling Upward: A Spirituality
 for the Two Halves of Life)

 

Cleaning gutters, reflecting on life

In several stints in life as a homeowner, I would have to say that cleaning out gutters ranks at the top of my list of least favorite jobs. It's one of those things that has to be done, but I never look forward to it, and since I don't enjoy it, I tend to put it off. This year I put it off until the eve of Christmas eve. It's not as if I didn't have good reasons for delaying. There were finals to grade and Christmas preparations to be completed. I also reasoned that it made sense to wait until the gigantic black walnut tree in our backyard was devoid of leaves. I didn't, after all, want a repeat performance.

About that black walnut tree.  When we bought our home a couple of years ago, we saw it as great feature. It would provide lots of shade, after all. As we've lived with the tree for two falls now, however, we've come to understand its downsides. First it's huge. Its branches spread, not only over our detached garage, but also over the roofs and yards of two of our neighbors, so when the leaves begin to fall, daily raking is required to keep the yard leaf free. This, of course, irritates not only us but our neighbors and makes it unlikely that we will win the "best neighbor" award anytime soon. Finally, those black walnuts are slimy, gross, and heavy. They fall with a sickening thud to the ground, and each family member has come close to being beaned by one of the mini-cannon balls, which could cause serious head injuries. The quotes we've received to remove the tree have been in the $3,000 range, so for now we live with it and make the best of it, and try not to make eye contact with the neighbors.

But back to the gutter cleaning. There's several reasons I dread this job. To begin with, I'm scared of heights, so being perched on a twenty-foot ladder for a couple of hours is not my idea of a good time. It's also gross: handling smelly, wet leaves and muck, even with heavy plastic gloves is enough to take the best appetite away. And it's physically demanding. My calves ache for several days from climbing up and down the ladder, along with other random muscles that apparently are only exercised by the gutter cleaning process.

But as I discovered this year, sometimes even the most despised job can bring unexpected realizations. I had been cleaning the most difficult gutters to reach and the ones most loaded with the produce of the black walnut tree for about an hour when I decided to take a break and drink some water. It was one of those beautiful Oregon winter days: the sun was shining; it was crisp but not too cold, one of those days when a sweatshirt and jeans are all you need and you never get too hot or too cold. As I sat on my front porch, I felt the sun on my face. I felt the mild ache in my calves and shoulders, not that painful ache that would come in a day or too, but that pleasurable feeling of aliveness that comes with physical activity.

And then I thought about my dad. He's just turned 90 and lives in a nice retirement apartment, but his body is wearing out. Throughout his long life (and no doubt one of the reasons he's lived this long), he's valued physical activity: golf, tennis, outdoor jobs around the house. Well into his 80s he was still mowing his own lawn, playing weekly rounds of golf, and swimming laps in the athletic club pool several times a week. These days, he uses a motorized scooter to get from his apartment to the dining area and a wheelchair or walker to get from his scooter to his bed. I wondered what he would give, for just one day, to be physically active again, to feel the sun on his face and the ache in his calves after doing some necessary work. I wondered if he wouldn't even mind cleaning out gutters to feel that vitality in his body once again.

Dylan on Writing

Recently it's occurred to me how many of my friends really like the music of Bob Dylan. Actually, "like" is too weak a word for some. "Obsessed with" would be more like it.

For example, my former pastor and current friend, Mark, writes regularly and eloquently about Dylan's music on his blog, called "Dylan on a Sunday." (You can check it out at http://lovesramblings.blogspot.com.) One of my colleagues in the English Department at George Fox University recently took the time to post on Facebook her favorite lines from each of the top 70 Dylan songs selected by The Rolling Stone. These types of time-consuming endeavors, both by people who do other things in life besides write, are examples of uncommon devotion to this singer/songwriter.

And this devotion to Dylan is not just among those who happen to be, like me, children of the 60s and 70s, who grew up on Dylan tunes. I frequently come across Dylan fans among the college students I teach. If I'm performing for college students, a Dylan cover is almost sure to be warmly received. My son, who's 24, spent a good part of a summer in Alaska, as he said, "listening to some Robert Zimmerman." Since he has much better musical taste than I, his opinion carries weight with me.

My purpose here is not to offer explanations for Dylan's enduring popularity but to share some insights gained from reading through Bob Dylan: The Essential Interviews (New York: Wenner Books, 2006), edited by Jonathan Cott. Dylan fans will find many fascinating revelations here, for example, his remarks about religion and Christ during his "Christian phase": "Well, religion is repressive to a certain degree. Religion is another form of bondage which man invents to get himself to God. But that's why Christ came. Christ didn't preach religion. He preached the Truth, the Way and the Life. He said He'd come to give life and life more abundantly. He talked about life, not necessarily religion."

I spend a good deal of my time as a teacher trying to help university students become better writers and produce better writing. So, as I read through Dylan's interview comments, I was especially tuned in to what he had to say about his own creative process. Throughout his career, Dylan has been praised for the artistic quality of his music, perhaps especially for the poetic quality of his lyrics. I wondered if such an accomplished songwriter might have some interesting things to say about why he writes, how he writes, and where his ideas come from. Turns out he does.


On why he became a songwriter . . .
Question: Was writing something that you'd always wanted to do?
Dylans' answer: No, not really. It wasn't a thing I wanted to do ever. I wanted just a song to sing, there came a certain point where I couldn't sing 'cause nobody else was writing what I wanted to sing. I couldn't find it anywhere. If I could, I probably would have never started writing.

Dylan's comment made me think immediately of a similar statement made by C. S. Lewis about the fantasy literature written by him and Tolkien. I'm paraphrasing here, but basically Lewis said that Tolkien had to write The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings and he had to write The Chronicles of Narnia and the space trilogy because no one was writing the kind of books they liked to read. Dylan's comment also reveals that he perhaps saw himself, first, not as a writer, but as a performer, and his incessant touring and consistent live performances through so many years would tend to support that. Of course, Lewis and Dylan's comments also speak to the need for writers to have an original vision that adds something unique to the world of literature or music.


On artistic imagination and the creative process . . .
Well, what a songwriter does, is just connect the ends. The ends that he sees are the ones that are given to him and he connects them.
Question: It seems that people are bombarded all the time with random thoughts and outside impulses, and it takes the songwriter to pick something out and create a song out of them.
Dylan's answer: It's like the painter who lives around here--he paints the area in a radius of twenty miles, he paints bright strong pictures. He might take a barn from twenty miles away, and with the sky on some certain day, and the light on the trees from another certain day. A person passing by will be painted alongside someone ten miles away. And in the end he'll have this composite picture of something which you can't say exists in his mind. It's not that he started off willfully painting this picture from all his experience . . . That's more or less what I do.

Sounds easy, huh?  I would love to "more or less" be able to write like that! I do love the "connect the ends" comment and the painting analogy.

On where ideas for songs come from . . .
Buddy Holly's songs were much more simplified, but what I got out of Buddy was that you can take influences from anywhere. Like his "That'll Be the Day."  I read somewhere that it was a line he heard in a movie, and I started realizing you can take things from everyday life that you hear people say. That I still find true. You can go anywhere in daily life and have your ears open and hear something, either something someone says to you or something you hear across a room. If it has resonance, you can use it in a song.

Sort of Dylan's version of the common advice given in creative writing texts: keep a writer's journal with you at all times to record scenes and dialogue that can be used in your writing.

On not trying to repeat or duplicate past successful songs . . .
There was one thing I tried to do which wasn't a good idea for me. I tried to write another "Mr. Tambourine Man." It's the only song I tried to write "another one." But after enough going at it, it just began bothering me, so I dropped it.  I don't do that anymore.

Not bad advice for writers--or movie producers who attempt one too many sequels!

On avoiding message songs . . .
I've stopped composing and singing anything that has either a reason to be written or a motive to be sung.
Question: You've said you think message songs are vulgar. Why?
Dylan's answer: Well, first of all, anybody that's got a message is going to learn from experience that they can't put it into a song. I mean it's just not going to come out the same message. After one or two of these unsuccessful attempts, one realizes that his resultant message, which is not even the same message he thought up and began with, he's now got to stick by it; because, after all, a song leaves your mouth just as soon as it leaves your hands. You've got to respect other people's right to also have a message themselves. Myself, what I'm going to do is rent Town Hall and put about 30 Western Union boys on the bill.  I mean, then there'll really be some messages. People will be able to come and hear more messages than they've ever heard before in their life.

These are forceful statements about the difference between art and propaganda. Was it Ezra Pound who said, if you want to send a message, send a telegram; don't write a poem?


On interpreting his songs . . .
I'm not good at defining things. Even if I could tell you what the song was about I wouldn't. It's up to the listener to figure out what it means to him.

I'll use this one next time one of my Introduction to Literature students asks me to "just tell me what this poem means" or wonders why there's not just one correct way to interpret a poem.

On poetic language . . .
Commenting on his song, "Just Like a Woman": This is a very broad song. A line like, "Breaks just like a little girl" is a metaphor. It's like a lot of blues-based songs. Someone may be talking about a woman, but they're not really talking about a woman at all. You can say a lot if you use metaphors.

I don't think in lateral terms as a writer. That's a fault of a lot of the old Broadway writers . . . .They are so lateral. There's no circular thing, nothing to be learned from the song, nothing to inspire you. I always try to turn a song on its head. Otherwise, I figure I'm wasting the listener's time.

On the influence of poetry and poets on his songwriting . . .
I had read a lot of poetry by the time I wrote a lot of those early songs. I was into the hard-core poets. I read them the way some people read Stephen King. I had also seen a lot of it growing up. Poe's stuff knocked me out in more ways than I could name. Bryon and Keats and all those guys. John Donne. Bryon's stuff goes on and on and on and you don't know half the things he's talking about or half the people he's addressing. But you could appreciate the language. Someone gave me a book of Francois Villon poems and he was writing about hard-core street stuff and making it rhyme. It was pretty staggering, and it made you wonder why you couldn't do the same thing in a song. I'd see Villon talking about visiting a prostitute and I would turn it around. I won't visit a prostitute, I'll talk about rescuing a prostitute. Again, it's turning stuff on its head, like "vice is salvation and virtue will lead to ruin."

On the Beat poets . . .
The idea that poetry was spoken in the streets and spoken publicly, you couldn't help but be excited by that. There would always be a poet in the clubs and you'd hear the rhymes, and Allen Ginsberg and Gregory Corso--those guys were highly influential.

When teaching poetry, I often ask students to think about the similarities and differences between song lyrics and poems and to share a favorite song lyric, identifying the poetic techniques used by the songwriter. In my opinion, songwriters fill the role in our day that used to be reserved for poets. For example, in the eighteenth or nineteenth centuries, when a significant public event happened, it would be commemorated, mourned, or celebrated by a poet (e.g., Whitman's elegy on Abraham Lincoln). Today, when a significant public event occurs, songwriters respond (see, e.g., the 9/11 inspired songs of Springsteen, Jackson, Young, etc.). But while there are many similarities between song lyrics and poems, there are also marked differences. To me, the above comments by Dylan highlight the similarities, while his comments below highlight the differences.

On sounds and words . . .
Question: It's the sound that you want.
Dylan's answer: Yeah, it's the sound and the words. Words don't interfere with it. They--they--punctuate it. You know, they give it purpose And all the ideas for my songs, all the influences, all come out of that. All the influences, all the feelings, all the ideas come from that. I'm not doing it to see how good I can sound, or how perfect the melody can be, or how intricate the details can be woven or how perfectly written something can be. I don't care about those things.
 
On the composing process . . .
Question: Which comes first, the words or the music?
Dylan's answer:  Well, you have to understand that I'm not a melodist. My songs are either based on old Protestant hymns or Carter Family songs or variations of the blues form.

What happens is, I'll take a song I know and simply start playing it in my head. That's the way I meditate. A lot of people will look at a crack on the wall and meditate, or count sheep or angels or money or something, and it's a proven fact that it'll help them relax. I don't meditate on any of that stuff. I meditate on a song.

I'll be playing Bob Nolan's "Tumbling Tumbleweeds," for instance, in my head constantly--while I'm driving a car or talking to a person or sitting around or whatever. People will think they are talking to me and I'm talking back, but I'm not. I'm listening to the song in my head. At a certain point, some of the words will change and I'll start writing a song.

So there you have it. I resisted the urge to entitle this post, "Ten Steps to Great Songwriting" or "Songwriting Tips from Bob." Dylan would resist any such formulaic approach. In fact, his comments reveal that he respects the mysterious and intuitive nature of the songwriting process too much to present any kind of canned approach. And knowing his tendency to maintain his privacy and to make cryptic statements to interviewers, the real possibility exists that he fabricated some of the above quotes just to get an interviewer off his back.

So, want to write like Bob Dylan? Don't we all. Perhaps some of the above comments might help, but being a creative genius is also helpful. Just keep in mind that next time you thing I'm engaging in conversation with you, I may be composing "Mr. Tambourine Man, II" in my head.

Song for Adam

I'm thinking of my friend, Adam, today.  I met Adam Langford when he moved to Portland to join his brother, Ben, who was at the time coaching soccer and teaching Bible courses at Cascade College.  Adam was young, bright, energetic, and just plain fun to be around.  He loved and cared about people, and people loved to be with him.  He quickly found his way into the hearts of the teenagers at East County Church.  One parent said that Adam was a living example to her kids that you could be cool and be a Christian.  Adam had tons of talent.  I never saw him play, but I heard tales of his soccer prowess.  He had played collegiate soccer, and I think he was good enough to earn a pro tryout.  He also had a knack for business, and was a financial advisor for American Express.  Adam was doing well in his job and was likely on the fast track for promotion or starting his own firm. But then something happened that would change his life and those of us who knew him, forever.

Adam's older brother, Ben, and his sister-in-law, Kym, made a decision to join a mission team in Jinja, Uganda.  When Adam went to visit them in Africa, he was intrigued by some of the business/social initiatives that the Jinja team had put in place including helping provide trees and water for villages and a redemptive business called the Source Cafe.  Adam quickly grasped a vision for how his skills in business and finance could be used, and he fell in love with the people of Africa.  Shortly after that trip, Adam made the decision to quit his job and move to Uganda.  Adam adapted quickly to the culture and was soon involved in several efforts to improve the physical lives of the people in Jinja and the surrounding villages. 

I'll never forget the call I received from Lewis Robinson, East County's Minister of the Word, telling me that Adam had been riding on one of the treacherous mountain roads and was bringing back a supply of coffee for the Source Cafe when the vehicle he was in went off the road.  As far as we know, Adam and Moses, the Ugandan manager of the cafe, were killed instantly.  Adam's death shocked the East County church family and all who knew and loved him.  We mourned together and questioned God, asking why a young man who was so obviously doing God's work in a place where it was needed so desperately had to be taken away.  We struggled together to understand what was not understandable.  We composed psalms of lament. We planted Adam's tree on our church's front lawn.

In one of Adam's last posts on the mission team's web site, he reflected on the depth of hunger, pain, suffering, disease, and death that occur in Uganda daily.  He admitted to being overwhelmed with the magnitude of the problems.  He confessed that his naive view that he, or a host of missionaries, could solve the problems of that African country had left him long ago.  He closed by saying that all he could think of to do most days was to suffer with those who were suffering.  A few days later, Adam ended his tour in Uganda by joining finally and completely in the suffering and dying of the people he had come to love and serve. 

Today, the East County Church celebrated the safe return of Ben and Kym Langford.  There was much celebration but also moments of  sadness, and it was obvious that, for most of us, the wound of losing Adam is still very much open and tender.  One member said that of all of Adam's unique qualities the one he remembers most was his ability to love people very different from himself. 

I've been thinking a lot lately about the poor reputation of evangelical Christianity.  Living in the Pacific Northwest, I see evidence almost daily that Christians are viewed with mistrust, if not downright disdain, by many in our culture.  The thing is, I can't say that I blame them.  By and large, I think North American Christianity has communicated a message of intolerance and exclusivity.  The political activity of conservative Christianity has left many with the impression that Christians are primarily about protecting their own doctrinal and political views and excluding those who don't share those views. Anne Rice, the ex-horror novelist, who converted to Christianity and said she would henceforth write only "for the Lord," announced recently that she is done with being a Christian because she can no longer stand to be "anti-gay, anti-feminist, and anti-liberal" among other antis. (See the documentary, "Lord, Save us from your Followers" for a detailed and creative exploration of this phenomenon.) It saddens and depresses me that all many in our culture can see of the message of Jesus as it plays out in the 21st century in America is a long list of antis. 

But it is just here that the story of Adam breaks in to give me hope.  The work that Adam gave his life for, and the work that the Langfords and their team members have done for the last six years and the work that Brent and Heather Abney and their team members did before that has not been about antis.  It has not been about drawing lines and taking a stand against.  It has been about entering into a culture and a social situation and standing with and for the people.  It has been about living with, suffering with, mourning with, and celebrating with Ugandans.  It has been about providing clean water, and planting trees, and enabling people to make money with their own hands and skills.  It has been about being and modeling community. 

I don't plan to spend too much more time worrying about the image of Christians in America.  But I do plan to spend some time thinking about how I can participate in and support works like the Langfords.  I somehow think that if as Christians we are spending our time living with and for the poor, if we are seeking ways to give life and hope to the sick and food to the hungry, if we are clothing the naked and visting those in prison, that image thing will take care of itself.  Adam's life tells me it is so.

Though Adam was a friend of mine, I did not know him long,
And when I stood myself beside him, I never thought I was as strong.
Still it seems he stopped his singing in the middle of his song.

I sit before my only candle.
Though there's so little light to find my way.
Now this story's been laid before my candle.
And it's shorter every hour as it reaches for the day.
Well I feel just like a candle in a way.
I guess I'll get there,
But I wouldn't say for sure. 

(From "Song for Adam," Jackson Browne)