"In Praise of the Altar Call," or, "There's No Such Thing As A Private Christian"

A book I am reading for seminary, "Life on the Vine: Cultivating the Fruit of the Spirit in Christian Community" by Philip D. Kenneson (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1999), highlights a troubling trend within some congregations of contemporary Evangelicaldom, the culturally-approved bent toward "private religion." Apart from vague appeals to God or even Christianity from both political parties during this recent election season, most Americans, though they tend to claim belief in God on some level (and many claim to be a Christian of one brand or another), most in practice seem to prefer to keep their faith to themselves, feeling it is a "private matter" better left discussed at their own places of worship, their home, or--for many—only between themselves and God.

Kenneson feels this stems from a popularly held dualism that separates the “spiritual” aspects of life and reality from the “material” and mundane. Religion, being exclusively “spiritual” many believe, is therefore something to be kept private, for oneself and those (somehow) already like-minded alone. Kenneson notes that “Most Christians at other times and places believed that disciples of Christ needed to make a public profession of faith.” (93) But today, with the “privatization” of the faith of many, altar calls and other forms of one’s public conversion have been replaced with simply praying “a silent prayer to themselves (and presumably to God) in order to welcome Jesus into their hearts.” (Ibid)

Traditionally, baptism has been the time in which a convert publicly confesses Christ to the congregation and receives the initiatory rite into the faith. In the Evangelical church since the 19th century, the altar call, in which the repentant are asked to come down to the front of the church to pray with elders to receive Christ or to begin that process has been quite popular as another public expression of entering faith. Either way, the Church has long viewed conversion as a public experience, one in which a person joins the body of Christ, of which she or he is only a part. The private prayer version encourages “Lone Ranger Christianity,” where it’s just “me and Jesus.” Churches need to set the tone by providing opportunities for those who wish to come to Christ to be embraced by the body of believers, as initially awkward as that might be. Like the old saying about marriage, you aren’t just receiving a spouse; you’re joining a family!

The Next U.S. President and the Abortion Debate

A Facebook group forum discussion for members of the Christian denomination I belong to asks this question: "Can Christians, in good conscience, support Barack Obama for President? Yes or No? Please explain.” To this, I wrote in response:

"Personally, I am throwing my vote in for McCain, but yes, I believe a Christian can vote for Obama. I know people at my Foursquare church (a fairly diverse one) who will be voting for Obama. They highlight his strengths (and I do think he has some) just like I highlight McCain's (and he does have some weaknesses). I agree that abortion is a horrible evil, and I grieve that it is so "acceptable" in our nation right now. In fact, one thing that really turns me off about Obama is his (at least historical) support for partial-birth abortion, a barbaric practice that isn't even legal in "Liberal" and "Post-Christian" Europe. I wonder what kind of man could support such an act. That being said, NO President will make abortion illegal, in fact a co-worker of mine went to R. Reagan's church and said that he said privately that he could openly be pro-life bec in the end he couldn't do anything about it, so it was basically lip service, so sometimes I think it's said just to get Christian votes. A change in abortion legislature will have to be decided by the courts--BUT the next Pres will be appointing more Supreme Court positions, so that makes a difference there. However, having abortion legal doesn't cause abortions--the question is what are we as a society doing to discourage them and help pregnant mothers in bad situations, legal or not? And the better question is how are WE living as Christians and as the Church? Are WE living missional, just and holy lives in the midst of a corrupt generation? Whether the current administration supports the mission of Christ's kingdom or not? Sure, I want our nation to reflect Biblical values and we have a great framework for that, and we could do more in that arena and I will do my little part to work towards that--but I won't depend on the gov to do the job for me. Obama or McCain or whoever--I am serving the Lord, and may His kingdom come, His will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven. Amen!"

Cowboy Church Article

In regards to the article "Where Prayers Come With a Twang"

I wrote:

I read a reprint of this article in the Los Angeles Times, and was glad that cowboy churches were getting the exposure.(I don't attend a cowboy church myself, but I am familiar with them, having attended a few before.)

Initially I was frustrated, though, with the repetitive use of both Christian and "cowboy" cliches in the article, at the best, naive towards both cultures, at the worst almost disrespectful. I re-read the article here online, and then realized that the Times had edited it some for length, unfortunately weakening the article and leaving some rather broad statements unexplained.(Which, of course, you have no control over!) I asked my father, a well-known religious news journalist, if it was common for papers to do that, and he said yes, but was surprised that they did so considering that it was placed in the front section!

As for the original article by Torriero printed here, I realize that a journalist wants to be interesting and clever and readable, but I did roll my eyes at the statement "Hamson strikes the fear of God in his parishioners..." That is a strong statement, which is not the impression that I get from the description of Hamson in the article--that he's some fire-and-brimstone type of preacher. This, and other Christian cliches inappropriately used in the article (perhaps unintentionally) paint pastors and lay evangelical Christians as hokey, insincere, stupid, and/or subversive (all too common images in the press), and tend to spin what is a serious commitment for these people as a novelty. As a Christian I guess I just get tired of hearing these types of phrases coming from professional news agencies, who are usually careful and successful at treating other religious groups with respect--this protocol should include refraining from worn-out puns.

I work for the Autry National Center's Museum of the American West (so you know where I'm coming from with all of this) and I also get tired of so many ancient Western cliches. I can understand a few, but it seems like they fill this article, reinforcing the Hollywood version of the West over the real one. One point I don't understand is the section about religion in the "Wild West" (not exactly a technical term, but we get the point!). What was said is true, but then Torriero (or the article's editor) then jumps to the claim that contemporary cowboy churches embrace more of "entertainment's" version of the (mythic) West than "cowboy lore." What I don't understand here is not in inclusion of the historic change in the religious landscape of the West, but the lack of acknowledgement that cowboying is a job that, though at its greatest prominence in the 1880s, is still being done--it is a LIVING tradition, and Hollywood and Nashville don't own the trademark. Sure, the "cowboy" image extends far beyond wage-laborers on cattle ranches (and the broadening of that image into popular culture goes back to the 1880s! So, really, was it EVER possible to completely separate the two...), and it serves today as a broad icon for the Westerner, but my point is many of the people in this article ARE Westerners and/or are horsemen, farmers, etc. They ARE cowboys in the broad sense of the word, so how is this LIVING tradition defined or qualified by its earliest years or by Hollywood? In other words, why are modern-day cowboys (ranchers, horse people, rodeo performers, etc.) treated as second-rate, drugstore versions of the "real" thing? The cowboy isn't dead and what these people do IS cowboy culture--today. I'm just saying...

Thanks, again, for your article!

So. Baptists Encouraging Creation Care

An "independent coalition of Southern Baptists who are passionate about caring for God's creation" have penned "A Southern Baptist Declaration on the Environment and Climate Change," available for viewing at Southern Baptist Environment & Climate Initiative website at: http://baptistcreationcare.org/

This declaration initiates a HUGE potential for increasing awareness and hopefully action by a large population of Evangelical Christians. Although an independently-produced statement and not a convention-wide one, this is a major step for members of the nation's largest Protestant body, one that has become increasingly doctrinaire on issues of Biblical interpretation, doctrine, ethics, etc. over the past decade (it's amazing to me how many times this Statement references their commitment to pro-life and traditional marriage issues, like that has anything to do w/the topic at hand), but one must understand that its target audience includes many who dwell in the "global warming is a myth" camp and the "wow, I don't know about us entering this hippy/feminist/'Liberal' group of tree-hugging environmentalists" camp.

What the Statement does well is lay down a theological basis for caring, as Christians, about how we act and legislate and produce/consume in relation to the natural world around us. Its two main points are: one of God's revelations of Himself to mankind is through the created, "natural" order, so for us to mar His creation is to mar His witness as well as to deface what is essentially His property, not ours; the other is that the potential negative effects of global warming would hurt the poor the most. Therefore, subversively, this document also reinforces the Christian commandment to care for the poor and oppressed, another important Biblical injunctive, sometimes unfortunately downplayed by Conservatives due to the rhetoric of the political Left.

As I mentioned earlier, the Declaration spends what would seem to be an inordinate amount of time defending the group's commitment to other, extremely peripheral, issues like Biblical inerrancy and the right to life, and it spends several paragraphs in carefully-worded affirmations on the limitations of science, the fact that "anthropogenic" global warming isn't proven and that there is a significant minority of scientists who disagree w/the theory, etc. But again, given the audience, this is hardly unnecessary. I love what the statement does do, where it comes up weak is that it ends at theory and intention and the recognition that there is an issue. Granted, this is a huge beginning for many in the SBC, but it falls short of giving any guidance for WHAT we should do to begin to address these issues. It's like sharing the Gospel with a person, they convert and accept Christ, and when they ask "How now shall we (I) live?", you fall silent. There is no framework, no guidelines, no points for further action in the Declaration.

The most the website offers in this area is a list of "Resources": several books on creation care and a few links to groups like Christian environmental organizations and some "safe" secular ones like EnergyStar. These are vaguely helpful, but a few, simple, non-political action steps that everyday individuals and families could take to begin to live a "greener" lifestyle would have been wonderful and even more pro-active help from a group that deeply cares about this issue and sees the God-connection with it all.

Another thing that confounded me is its focus on the global warming debate. Why, if global warming is so controversial, does the Declaration spend so much time focusing on it? Let's suggest for a moment that global warming doesn't exist, would a Christian's responsibility for thoughtful environmental stewardship cease? Why does it take such "huge" issues like this to get us to start doing what we should have been doing all along? Think of the parallels in our personal lives. So often, God needs to hit us up on the side of our head to get us to pay attention to an important area that we have been neglecting for so long, be it a relationship, our finances, our health, our spiritual growth, etc. It's sad that it has had to come to this--potential ecological disaster--before we get serious about everyday issues like pollution, rapid deforestation, energy sources and usage, refuse disposal, unsustainable agricultural practices, unchecked consumerism, etc. Shouldn't these have been "Christian" issues all along? Loving your neighbor as yourself is a pretty huge aspect of serving Christ Himself, and when we look at these issues and how many of our lifestyle, government and business practices have gone awry due to flesh-issues like selfishness/greed, the love of money, and the rejection of wisdom and long-term thinking, the spiritual connections to these issues become apparent.

Natural causes aside, and even potential global warming-related issues aside, the immediate, contemporary problems of smog, acid rain, species extinction, etc. are reasons enough to get us to think both theologically and practically about these issues, and to actually care enough about them to be willing to alter our lifestyles enough to reflect Biblical, neighbor-loving principles.

Kudos to this group of Southern Baptists for taking an important initial stand on this critical area of life, and may more SBC folks join them, as well as those from across the broader Christian community! The group rightly points out that our historic neglect and even dismissal of these issues has caused us to seem uncaring to non-Christians, so kudos to us rightfully improving the church's P.R., and more importantly, that of Christ.

Life or Traditional Marriage: Which is the Most Critical at this Gray Moment?

In response to a Huck PAC poll about which issue his PAC should tackle first, I wrote the following response:

The right of the unborn to life is a huge issue, but there are already wonderful groups that work to lobby and educate on that front. The acceptance of gay marraige is a HUGE cultural shift that is surfacing, but is one that we can still prevent before it becomes entrenched in our society and lawbooks. I live in California, so I know we are on the verge of something huge that is really unprecedented in history, ours or anyone else's. This isn't just an evangelical Christian issue, there are very few societies historically of any religious or cultural persuasion that have had same-sex marriages on an equal status w/heterosexual ones. I am not really big on legislating every private moral issue, but for the government to officially endorse such a union is a whole 'nother issue. This isn't just about civil liberties for gay couples, this (at least in CA) is about how we teach about family/sexuality/gender in the public schools from the earliest ages on up; it is about restricting free speech regarding what we can and cannot say about this moral issue; it is about how popular culture w/reinforce these values; it is about a dramatic, socially-engineered shift in the very fabric of society. THAT is why I think we need to speak up on this critical issue before it is too late. I am not a fear-monger or conspiracy theorist, I am being realistic.

The best thing we can do for the life issue is to help prevent people from having unwanted pregnancies in the first place, and then providing viable options for when people do get pregnant and don't want to raise the child, to reduce abortions. As Huck has mentioned before, we also need to improve the chances for these children to grow up in healthy homes and have equal opportunities to live fulfilling lives and become productive citizens, rather than simply products of a flawed foster care system.

Whether it be abortion or the gay marriage issue, lets face it, laws alone won't stop people from having sex! But they can affect how we teach about family and marriage in the public schools and what type of relationship we sanction as a legitimate marraige and it isn't too late to start off on the right foot on this one!

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Comments, reflections?

Rebel Flag Controversy

In response to an iReport.com story done by a guy in FL about a large Confederate battle flag being flown close to a major freeway at the site of a Sons of Confederate Veterans memorial park that is being built (visit online video article here), I wrote this response (aimed more at some others who commented on the video than the video itself):

Cldart // 31 minutes ago

I'll try to keep my thoughts organized: A. As horrible as slavery was, the South wasn't trying to be anti-American, because unfortunately slavery built America into a viable economic power and wasn't illegal. Future President & Union General U. S. Grant kept his own slaves until Emancipation--after the War--unlike Gen. Robert E. Lee, who freed his before the War. Lee only reluctantly fought for the Confederacy. The last straw for... I'll try to keep my thoughts organized: A. As horrible as slavery was, the South wasn't trying to be anti-American, because unfortunately slavery built America into a viable economic power and wasn't illegal. Future President & Union General U. S. Grant kept his own slaves until Emancipation--after the War--unlike Gen. Robert E. Lee, who freed his before the War. Lee only reluctantly fought for the Confederacy. The last straw for him was when Federal troops invaded Virginia. Before you claim the "re-writing" of history, go and actually read some history books written for an audience above the 8th grade! You'll learn a lot--life (esp. war) isn't so black-and-white. B. As far as the North=good / South=evil paradigm, the worst race riots took place in the North, after the Civil War as recent "white" immigrants fought for the same jobs as Blacks moving North, and many abolitionists (including Lincoln) were racists who wanted the freed slaves to go back to Africa. Post-War Southerners fell into 3 main camps, the only reason the highly racist and reactionary "radicals" gained power was because of the radically oppressive policies of Reconstruction, put in place by Pres. Johnson, who hated the South. (Lincoln would have done things differently, more like South Africa after apartheid.) C. Free speech is protected in the U.S., and flying a historical flag is included, though I agree the Stars and Bars would have been a wiser (& more accurate) choice. D. As far as "America" won, or the "North" won so give up already attitude--do you guys hold the same feelings for "conquered" Native American tribes? No sovereignty or "rights" or cultural identity left for them? Just "give up already" and "assimilate!" How "Liberal" do you sound now? What about recent immigrants who are still proud of their own ethnic identity and wave the flags of their homeland, even though they are also proud Americans. Should that also be outlawed? Examine your own prejudices, people...

Now, I am a Californian and the proud "son" of a Union veteran, but having studied some about the bloodiest conflict in U.S. history, I have learned that the issues are complex, and it gets me upset when people automatically associate the South with racism. I stand for the right of Southern Americans to respectfully display symbols of their heritage, and exercise the same freedom of speech as other Americans enjoy.

I feel that more than actually caring about history or racism or other "real" issues, most people simply want to not have to think or feel or care about anything, and would rather be "comfortable" and not have to deal with controversy or ideas or the complexities of pluralism or perhaps their own racism. Life isn't supposed to be "easy," just good.

The Association of White Male Oppressors (AWMO)

Ladies and... no, sorry... Gentlemen! Come one, come all to the greatest... oh, wait... OK, if you're White (and preferably Protestant) ... and ideally from a predominately Northern and/or Western European background ... Then come and join our EXCITING fellowship of... fellows! The Association of White Male Oppressors! (AWMO for short...)

What do we do? Well, let me tell ya! It's quite a hootenanny, all right! Well, on a typical evening we hang out at my trailer, play Bud Light beer pong, listen to classic country music, and dine on Beenie Weenies and Saltines (we don't like the word "Cracker") and Cheez-Whiz! (Heck, if it's your birthday we'll even deep fry some Twinkies for ya! Hoo wee!)

But then the REAL FUN begins... once we're all sauced up we have a "pow-wow" of sorts... folks, we spend hours upon endless hours plotting and scheming and fanangling how to oppress all of those BELOW us, YOU KNOW... the usual suspects: women, Blacks, Mexicans, Chinese, the disabled, poor folks (those who aren't White, obviously), entire Third World nations, American Indians, etc. (I'm using "PC" language here gentlemen since this is a "family" website...) Then we scratch ourselves a bit, trade stocks, fart and think of novel ways to stay on Top of the World! Boy, it's a good day to be The Man!!!

We try to come up with new ways to put down Jews and Catholics and them Hin-doos. And Democrats!!! Boys, it's a hoot! We figure out ways to raise the cost of health care and keep them colored folks in the ghetto ignorant and hopefully killin' each other! Boy, you'd be amazed at what we have planned for next week! We haven't finalized plans just yet, but it's either going to be an old-fashioned "Dress Up Like Your Favorite Vigilante Leader" party OR we are FINALLY going to start circulating those petitions to get Hee-Haw back on the air! For exercise (Men, you gotta stay strong to be effective during your volunteer Border Patrol duties), we'll probably play an inspiring round of "Smear the Queer!" I LOVE that game! And for musical entertainment, we'll be rehearsing for our annual Blackface Minstrel Show fundraiser in order to ensure our precious White children can ALL afford quality copies of Mein Kampf for Little Folk and the entire Dick and Jane Learn to Colonize series for their Pinko-free homeschools.

Sounds like fun? Visit us online at: http://thisiswhatliberalextremistsmustactuallythinkaboutwhiteguys.org/ and be SURE to have your Illuminati membership # handy.

Welcome!

Welcome to my butt-spankin' new blog: Cultural Ponderings in a Gray Moment. Here I will, well.... ponder the varied significant and inconsequential ponderings of my rather labyrinthine mind. To try to keep myself moving in some discernable gear, (many of) my topics will have something to do with culture, especially American culture (aesthetics, politics, religion, philosophy, Krispy Kremes), trying (like a good grad student of American Studies should) to make sense of the very idea, and trying, with idealistic vision, to project a more perfect version of what we could be. Because I believe that the personal is political, I am not necessarily trying to build some ideal framework for our entire nation-state (at least not on Wednesdays or Fridays), but am rather trying to find a cultural direction for my own person and those who might be fellow travellers in one form or another.

My personal starting point/bias: I am a 33 year old male of mixed northern European ancestry (though my family line has been here roughly since the mid 1600s on both sides) who was born and raised in a suburban area of north Los Angeles, CA. I am a Christian and I take my relationship with God seriously. Politically, I tend to sit just a little to the right of "center," though some of my views waiver from this fulcrum point, sometimes in atypical ways. I am passionate about music and the arts, value sincere thought, and like to have fun, too, believe it or not.

I am really here just to think out loud, sort of, and try to explore--ponder--and develop my own worldview. So, please, keep in mind that a lot of what I will write here is just that--pondering--and not necessarily indicative of any firm or entrenched viewpoint of mine (though there are exceptions to every rule, and the things that are entrenched in my mind I am most likely to be the least self-aware of), and this rule does not apply at all on Tuesdays or Sundays.

Now, without any further ponderings on pondering...