Culture/Counter-Culture

This is good to see. Episcopal Bishop Stacy Sauls ("chief operating officer" of the Church) incisively rebuts a Wall Street Journal columnist who accuses the Episcopalians of caving into the culture by, among other things, opening up marriage rites to include same-sex unions:

...The church has been captive to the dominant culture, which has rewarded it with power, privilege and prestige for a long, long time. The Episcopal Church is now liberating itself from that, and as the author correctly notes, paying the price. I hardly see paying the price as what ails us. I see it as what it means to be a follower of Jesus... 

The Episcopal Church is on record as standing by those the culture marginalizes whether that be nonwhite people, female people or gay people. The author calls that political correctness hostile to tradition. 

I call it profoundly countercultural but hardly untraditional. In fact, it is deeply true to the tradition of Jesus, Jesus who offended the "traditionalists" of his own day, Jesus who was known to associate with the less than desirable, Jesus who told his followers to seek him among the poor. It is deeply true to the tradition of the Apostle Paul who decried human barriers of race, sex, or status (Galatians 3:28)....

Related, somewhat: A rebuttal as well to Ross Douthat's recent New York Times column on liberal Christianity.

(via Sightings)

A Passing Thought on Pro-Censorship Unitarians

At UU World, Christopher Walton has a short note about a new book that recounts the history of the Watch and Ward Society, which promoted censorship a century ago.

It strikes me that the 1980s movement to fight pornography and other forms of sexually oriented entertainment from a feminist/progressive stance(Andrea Dworkin, Catharine MacKinnon, etc.) -- a movement that I briefly sympathized with, but later rejected -- were the intellectual heirs of that earlier group.

Relatedly, I believe that some Unitarians and Universalists also joined in with religious conservatives in that earlier era to promote prohibition.

FWIW...

'A Church for Atheists'

The Rev. Andy Pakula explains in a very nice post how Unitarian/UU churches welcome atheists as well as theists.

It reminds me of a story I heard from an Englishman (Andy happens to be in England, too, but he is originally from the U.S.) when I was at my Church-Away-From-Home sometime last year.

My English acquaintance told me of his friend who had moved in retirement from London to a small community up in the North of England.

As the retiree got to be known in the community, someone realized his general acumen and approached him about joining the vestry of the local Anglican church.

Flattered, the retiree nonetheless demurred. "I'm an atheist," he explained, apologetically.

His inviter was unperturbed. With a shrug and a wave of his hand, he responded, "Oh, that doesn't matter!"

My Episcopalian mother, and one of the priests at her church, found this story as funny as I and the man who told it to me did.

On Bullying

I don't have any purple clothes, or I would be wearing purple today.

I certainly had my encounters with bullies in my lifetime, and to my shame, there have been times when I have been the bully. But I don't have much to say that's original or especially eloquent on the topic.

Instead, I want to acknowledge the best two things I've read about this subject, and the larger issue captured in the "It gets better" campaign, are this today by Coffee Em, and this a few days ago by Desmond Ravenstone.

Both are calls to action. Both are prayer in its best form.

To which I can only say, Amen. May it be so.

Update: When I refer to my own bullying, I'm not speaking in the context of anti-gay bullying. I'm thinking of times in the past when I've lashed out inappropriately in other contexts. Just thought I'd make that clear. Not that it makes it any better.

Quote for the Day: On Our Polarized Culture and Politics

I recall nearly two decades ago standing up during a talkback, or maybe during Joys and Concerns, to express my distress at the then-dominant mode of political discourse: The reckless demonizing of different opinions.

It has only grown worse, as Krista Tippett, host of the public radio show Being (formerly Speaking of Faith), observes.

What we once called the red state, blue state divide is now more like two parallel universes where understandings of plain fact are no longer remotely aligned. This leads to a diminishing sense of the humanity of those who think and live differently than we do. And that is the ultimate moral slippery slope, for everyone on it and for the fabric of our civic life.

For months I've been planning to write a post on why I've come to hate politics. I still may write that, but this eloquent summary touches on a part of the answer.

Awesome video

OK, probably everyone else already knows about it, but I just learned of it today, thanks to commenter Blue Jean at it's all one thing.

The Lawsuit Myth?

I'm a huge fan of Free Range Kids, whose proprietor was a grad school classmate. This post is no exception. But I especially liked this comment -- which called into question an assumption that even the free-rangers tend to blithely accept:

Everyone says “sue happy America” much like everyone says “the world is such a dangerous place.” It is basically the same thing – an impression from the media as to this with no definitive evidence of such.

Now, one anecdotal comment on an Internet blog is not the singular of data. But I've long suspected that the notion of America as being extraordinarily litigious is at best overblown, at worst an out-and-out falsehood perpetrated by those who would like to shield the powerful (incompetent doctors, manufacturers of shoddy products, etc.) by eviscerating about the only form of legal redress available to the powerless.

I'm sure it's a lot more complex, and there's always the "Whose ox is being gored?" factor; I'm a journalist, so naturally I'm concerned about runaway libel juries. I'm just saying that the assumption of lawsuit-happy America is one worth examining much more closely.

Speechless

I cannot summon the words to express my sadness and outrage at this particular news development.

Juneau County DA warns districts on sex ed law
Teaching curriculum could lead to criminal charges against teachers, he writes

Plus: Debra Haffner puts this disturbing story in a larger, even more disturbing context, but also offers a bracing response.

"Playing with matches"

David Pyle looks thoughtfully at the emotional state of the far right -- and speaks from the distinct vantage point of one who has been there.

"I do not want to write about this to cause fear, because I do not think there really is much for society as a whole to fear. But for individuals on the political left who have been identified as targets, there is certainly reason to be cautious right now… because I believe the far-right of American Politics is an emotional tinderbox, and certain conservative politicians and media icons are playing with matches."

The rest is here.

(Note: The only reason this one isn't categorized under "Stuff I wish I'd written" is because I simply would never have qualified to write it. But I admire it all the same -- if not more.)

I am not making this up

A public school in California contemplates banning a dictionary because it includes a definition for "oral sex."

Reminder to self: File this anecdote for the next Our Whole Lives meeting at church.

Update: Salon's Broadsheet says it best. Read all the way to the end. (h/t DairyStateMom)

White anti-racist privilege

I've been following for some time, with great interest, Will Shetterly's ruminations on race and class and how our culture responds to divisions along those respective lines.

Will's biography gives him a distinctive insight on this topic.

His post today is a particularly pungent critique of white anti-racism academics, activists and consultants and of their frequent blindness to issues of class.

The closet Christian

That's what Ada Calhoun, writing at Salon, calls herself. (Thanks to DairyStateMom for the link.)

Retitled and updated: A personal epiphany

This was originally called "An American in China reflects on Keillor's 'buzz off.' It's grown and changed direction some.

Like a rubbernecker turning around on the highway to go back and stare at the car wreck, I've been monitoring Internet reaction to that GK column, in the blog-UU-sphere but also beyond. I won't post everything I see, but this at MinnPost.com resonates especially with me, perhaps because of the 3 weeks I spent in China 7 years ago.

And now, the update:

Some more stuff up today; here is one. And here or two more very strong responses, one responding to Keillor and the other inspired both by Keillor and by a Slate commentator who made a passing diss at UUs.

Which brings me to my 'aha' moment: As one who has for years laughed jokes at the expense of Unitarian Universalism, my spiritual community, I am becoming increasingly embarrassed by my own tolerance of same. Reading this as well as this (the relevant passage begins 8 paragraphs from the end) from Rev. Thom really brought that home for me. And in an indirect way, so did reading this.

It's just hitting me: I still think they can both be very funny men, but on the subject of faith, Bill Maher and Garrison Keillor are two sides of a tarnished coin. I have never liked Bill Maher's cheap shots at Christianity and at religion in general--even at religious beliefs that I find impossible to accept.

The least I can do is to show as much respect toward my own.

Confidential to Chalicechick: At least when it comes to Keillor's jokes about us, you were right all along.

Regarding that story about the atheist some were trying to bar from office...

A letter writer to Andrew Sullivan calls it a manufactured controversy.

Another country heard from

Is it just a coincidence? In the wake of the Keillor flap (and especially his seemingly anti-Semitic throwaway line) this New York Times commentary from the singer Michael Feinstein couldn't have been more timely.

(Thanks to DSM for bringing it to my attention.)

Another sign of UU cultural hegemony

There's a new poll out from the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life that documents the religious eclecticism of Americans.

There's much to dive into here--far more than I can get to in one post right now.

But to start with, it's one more example of how the pluralistic values at the heart of Unitarian Universalism are mirrored in the wider culture far beyond our own tiny numbers.

To be sure, there's also a much larger discussion to which this can give rise, about the tension within religion between being a cultural force and a counter-cultural one. I may try to post some thoughts about that later, too.

Rebutting the "War on Christmas" meme

We went to DairyStateMom's church yesterday, which I always find bracing. For the First Sunday in Advent, the senior pastor introduced what will be a series of sermons on the 4 canticles that punctuate Luke's narrative of the birth of Jesus.

She also took time to admonish (in a gentle and humorous but nonetheless firm manner that is her hallmark) those in the congregation who wanted Christmas carols in the liturgy before December 24. And in the same vein, she addressed the overweaning commercialism that surrounds the holiday, and made the cogent point that Christmas is not found in those commercial venues, but in the church.

Which strikes me as the ultimate rebuttal to the phony claims of a "war on Christmas." As The Rev. John Buchanan at 4th Presbyterian in Chicago said in a sermon some years ago (and I'm liberally paraphrasing), the commercial adoption of "Happy Holidays" or "Season's Greetings," besides being sensitive to the multicultural and multi-faith world we live in, renders to God the things that are God's: Intentionally or not, it respects the religious dimension of Christmas by not trying to appropriate it.

Update: The Rev. Victoria Weinstein, a/k/a PeaceBang, preached on Christmas commercialism this weekend, too. I like what she had to say.

More like this, please

In the New York Times of November 23: Three Clergymen, Three Faiths, One Friendship

What distinguishes the “amigos,” who live in Seattle but make presentations around the country, is a unique approach to what they call “the spirituality of interfaith relations.” At the church in Nashville, the three clergymen, dressed in dark blazers, stood up one by one and declared what they most valued as the core teachings of their tradition The minister said “unconditional love.” The sheik said “compassion.” And the rabbi said “oneness.”

The room then grew quiet as each stood and recited what he regarded as the “untruths” in his own faith. The minister said that one “untruth” for him was that “Christianity is the only way to God.” The rabbi said for him it was the notion of Jews as “the chosen people.” And the sheik said for him it was the “sword verses” in the Koran, like “kill the unbeliever.”

h/t to DairyStateMom for the link.

And Happy Thanksgiving to all

On hate crimes, comic strips, and offending the reader

For most of my life, I probably was a reflexive supporter of the notion of prosecuting certain acts as "hate crimes" and of extending the umbrella of hate crime legislation to protect more and more marginalized groups.

Over the years, I've come to conclude that the attempt to define and prosecute hate crimes is misguided. I says this somewhat reluctantly, because I do believe the desire to recognize and prosecute hate crimes comes from a basically honorable motivation.

The blogger Andrew Sullivan first got me thinking about this differently (the link is to a representative comment by him on the subject), and just recently Paul Oakley's take on the issue was for me compelling enough to clarify my own thinking once and for all.

Now comes word that, in response to pickets, the paper Newsday is apologizing for, and wishing it hadn't published, a cartoon mocking the notion of hate crimes.

The timing, I'll admit, was unfortunate. Just a week before the cartoon ran was the one-year anniversary of the death of an Ecuadorean immigrant at the hands of teenagers who stabbed him to death. And the paper's coverage of immigration issues became a lightning rod for protesters. I'm unable to judge the paper on that specific subject, but I do know that Newsday has a long and basically good reputation for serious community and investigative journalism, although its ownership has changed recently.

But the fact is, the cartoon in question (an episode of Mallard Fillmore) makes a point, although perhaps not as deftly as one would want. And I say this as a non-fan of Mallard Fillmore who was quite happy when one of our local papers dropped the strip a few years ago.

The strip (description courtesy of Richard Prince, quoting a Newsday report on the controversy)

depicted a larger dinosaur chasing a small one. The bigger one says, 'I'm not chasing you because you're a pachycephalosaurus. . . . I'm chasing you because you're delicious.' The smaller dinosaur responds, 'Oh, thank goodness. I was worried that this might be a hate crime.'

Dead is dead. Beaten is beaten. Maimed is maimed. Raped is raped. Doesn't it make sense to punish people based on the consequences of their actions, rather than the thoughts in their heads? If a mugger kills me for my wallet, or kills my friend because he's gay, does the reason for the killing really warrant a different kind of sentence?

Now I'm not against labeling an act, where appropriate, as a hate crime--but I see that basically as a sociological exercise. I just have trouble seeing how that's relevant from the strict standpoint of criminal justice.

One other thing disturbs me about the Newsday episode.

"We expect the cartoons we publish, many of which are nationally syndicated, to amuse, stir and entertain, but never to offend," a spokewoman for the newspaper said in a statement.

Hmmm... Regardless of my own opinion on hate crimes -- is never to offend really the standard that the paper expects to reach? That seems to set the bar so high that all that would pass is pablum.

Sad about Maine

We had had a glimmer of hope that the people of Maine might, indeed, become the first state to ratify marriage equality at the ballot box. It was not to be.

I do have faith, though, that somewhere, sooner or later, it will happen.

Where we live, our fellow residents fairly soundly passed a state constitutional amendment banning gay marriage three years ago.

Since then, though, we've been seeing billboards like these pop up around the area.

They touch me every time I see them.

And I think that's what it's going to take: More and more people finding out that people who live near them and interact in their lives just happen to be gay. Over time, I hope they'll come to see that the rights and privileges all of us get who are fortunate enough to be able to marry the partner of our dreams belong to those whose partners, and dreams, are different from their own.