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1st Chapters of Books: The New Materialism

I can not tell you how often I start a book and find myself thinking “This is going to be great!” ContentImage-63-220729-ContentImage63163974CrockettRobbins2

It doesn’t always turn out to be great… but there is almost always something in the 1st chapter that I would love to quote/riff on/incorporate.  The problem is that the rest of the book may not be very good OR it may turn into something that I am not sure I want to associate with/defend later.

I’m reading a book entitled “What Color Is Your God: Multicultural Education In The Church” right now. The subtitle is ‘examine Christ and culture in light of the changing face of the church”. The first chapter has some rockin’ quotes but I am nervous about the trajectory that the authors have set for the book.

I have also started an in-depth reading of “Religion, Politics, and the Earth – The New Materialism” by Clayton Crockett & Jeffrey W. Robbins. I have skimmed the book in prep for a series of HomeBrewed Christianity podcasts on the subject but this time I am prepping for a reading group that starts next week.

I have been thinking for a while about sharing great quotes that I find here. My hesitation is that someone will get nit-picky about not having the whole context for the content … but I think that I am just going to do it anyway.

So without further ado, here is a challenging quote from the beginning of that Crockett and Robbins book:

We are witnessing the exhaustion of contemporary culture, a devolution to consumerism, greed, mindless entertainment, and the corrupt appeal of money and military power. We encounter numerous scenarios of apocalyptic crisis and collapse both in the popular imagination and in the real world. Globally—culturally and economically—our world has become tied together to an unbelievable extent, just to the point where it is fraying and fragmenting apart.
Witness the vapidity of most popular cultural modes: the saturation of consciousness by “reality” shows, recycled commercial jingles and right-wing talk radio, and the bleeding of news into cynical infotain-ment, the dumbing-down or corporatization of education and other phenomena.3 The most invigorating buzz is usually tied to a sporting event or an advertising campaign.

I’m going to try this over the next month as a fun experiment – sharing stuff I find intriguing.

I would love to hear your thoughts on the totally out-of-context introductory section.

 

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After Easter Update

Well that was a grueling Lent! Between the work at the church, research design at UCLA and my blog focus on Neighbors and Wisemen ... that was an interesting two months. cross-150x150

I also had the odd occasion to do some cleaning up behind the scenes on this blog. It turns out that I have a bunch of new conversation partners I didn’t even know about. Subscriptions are not only up but are dispersed all over the globe. I a really excited about this and it has given me some new inspiration to try something different.

I decided last week that I am going to use this platform for my conversation pieces that are not full-fledged theological reflections like I post over at HomeBrewed. I have so many things that I would love to throw out and hear back from people on – so I will start peppering them in here along with the big substantial posts.

I want to thank everyone for their support and encouragement! Occasionally I attempt to read the comment section on other blogs  and am horrified and how contentious and mean-spirited they are.  I rarely experience that here or at HBC. 

What that has done in me … it has inspired me to throw out more ideas and invite more conversation.

Looking forward to this!  -Bo

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Thank You For Your Prayers: a quick update

I just want to thank everyone who has been so supportive through a difficult period.   I appreciate the notes, emails, Facebook messages and voicemails. Knowing that I am prayed for is really encouraging.

Just a quick update:

– I made it through my final semester of course work. I was able to complete my big papers in Urban Education and Post-Modern Approach to Sociology (my self-designed directed study with Barry Taylor that gets me ready in one of my cognate fields).

– My wife’s health is better now. After the ruptured ovarian cyst and subsequent bladder infection – on top of continuing Lyme’s disease… it has been a doozy.

– It was good to go back East for Christmas and see my family. My mom’s health continues to deteriorate.

– The Loft has really taken off and my ‘partner pastor’ is back from his emergency paternity leave.

– My wife’s sister and brother-in-law (along with our nieces) have been living with us as they prepare to move to Thailand and the girls return to school (college here in LA). They all leave us this week.

– I am doing research design at UCLA one day a week. It is part of my PhD requirement to have a research language. I am studying qualitative and quantitative research design so that I can do my dissertation proposal next year.

I have said publicly that November and December 2012 were the worst two months of my life. I am glad to see them go.

Thanks again for the thoughts and prayers. They are more appreciated than you know!

-Bo

Blog Note: Now that course work is over, I plan to do some more personal reflections here along with the theological ones that initiate on HomeBrewed. I often have smaller thoughts that don’t need to be the big productions that I post over there.

Looking forward to it!

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It’s moving day

The past month has been a wild one for me personally.  Starting tomorrow, my computer will be out of my hands for 5 days.
I thought this was the perfect opportunity to move over some blogs from Homebrewed and then I can respond to any comments via my phone!

So I am going to load it up today – and then over the next week, I would love to chat with anyone who wants to dialogue about any of it.

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Place, Direction and Perspective: changes since I was a pastor

Last week I had chance to return to the place where I had been a pastor for 11 years. I have been away for 4 years pursuing higher education. It was great to reconnect with folks that I love very much. The trip also included a chance to head out into the woods with a group of guys for a week-long canoe trip in the Adirondack Mountains.

One night around the fire, someone asked

“so you have learned a lot and changed a lot since you were our pastor, bring us up to speed. What has changed in your thinking in 4 years?”

It was a question that I hoped would come up and had given it a lot of thought as I flew across the country from LA to NY.

 I said that there were 3 big changes – that I had added 2 things and gotten rid of 1 thing. 

Directions: 

We had a saying that oriented us over those 11 years I was pastor: Upward – Inward – Outward: it must be all 3 – they must be in that order. I have learned that there is a 4th direction: downward. 

When we look downward, two things happen:

  1. We see the earth. This awakens us to things like where our food comes from, ecology, and location – the importance of place. Christianity is an incarnational religion and it is a spirituality that is em-bodied. Location is central to the practices of christian community.
  2. We see those less fortunate or less powerful. This awakens us to issues of justice. Cornel West is the one who has helped me see the importance of not just looking around (which is vital for awareness) and looking up (where our strength come from) but looking down for those who might need some help.

Adding this 4th direction brings in issues of environment, locatedness, and justice. It illustrates the importance of embodying the gospel in a place – none of us are from everywhere.

 Critique and Create:

One of the things that I have learned in my travels (from folks like Zizkek, Cornel West, Marc Ellis and Diana Butler Bass) is that there are 3 broad kinds of churches in North America:

  • Prophetic – that critique the system
  • Therapeutic – that help you adjust to the system
  • Messianic – that look to escape the system

We were great at two of them. We had a natural Messianic element because our denomination is staunchly and passionately pre-millennial (the soon coming King! is one of our big 4 things). We also had a good dose of the Therapeutic and helped a lot of people be the best version of themselves within the existing structures.

If I got to do it again, I would add a Prophetic element and address the systems and structures that hold so much sway in our communities and in the lives of our congregations.

The example that I used was routinely praying for a guy with a limited skill set to get a job. “Jesus – please help ‘J’ to get a job”.  By not addressing the relationship of local government with factories and manufactures in our area … we were relegating the answer to our prayers to the ‘powers that be’ and J was perpetually disappointed with God and discouraged in his faith. We nearly set him up to fail.

 Those are the 2 things I have added: a 4th direction and 3rd element. But I have also gotten rid of something – I no longer believe in the supernatural. 

Why the Natural is super:

I am convinced that the church has made a major mistake in adopting the language of the super-natural. Since the epic flub with Galileo and Copernicus the church has allowed science to have the natural (things that make sense) and has been relegated to watching over things that increasingly don’t make sense and retreating into words like ‘mystery’ and ‘faith’ as cover for that which is just not reasonable.

I do not believe in a realm (the natural) that is without God. As a Christian, I believe that God’s work is the most natural thing in the world. I am unwilling to concede the natural-spiritual split and then leave less and less room for God as science is able to explain more and more. The church is foolish to accept the dualism (natural-supernatural) and then superintend only the spiritual part.

No wonder 85% of our kids walk away in their 20’s. This stuff is unbelievable. 

I would prefer to reclaim the language of the ‘miraculous’ (surprising to us or unexpected) and ‘signs’ from the Gospel of John (that point to a greater reality).

So that is what has changed since I was Senior Pastor four years ago. I look down now (at the earth, for location, and for issues of justice). I hear the Prophetic critiquing the system. And I have gotten rid of the super-natural while embracing the miraculous.

 It was so great to share these thoughts and hear the feedback from my friends as we shared the week together. I would love to get your feedback or to hear how you have changed in the past few years.  -Bo 

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wake up in the Adirondacks – go to sleep in Los Angeles

This past Saturday I had the unique experience of waking up in the Adirondacks (upstate NY) and falling asleep that evening in West LA (California). This is a surreal experience.

To complicate matters all the more, my wife had been on a trip at the same time – to Seattle, Washington in the Pacific NW. That Saturday night we had the opportunity to compare notes and trade stories.

Here are just 3 of my general thoughts since then:

1. 3,000 miles is a long way. Never mind how long it used to take to cover that distance by wagon, then car, and now plane. It isn’t about speed, its about distance. We may live in a era when you can get from Upstate NY and Los Angeles to Seattle in less than a day – but they are still very far apart. To a contextual theologian like myself this is vitally important.

2. Airports comprise what can be considered their own culture. Air travel is so unlike the rest of your life that it becomes almost its own creation. For both the business traveler and those who have the luxury to travel as a lifestyle, airports and airplanes are a distinct aspect of civilization. The sociologist in me is itching to examine this. For a pastoral angle and a christian concern, it is notable that we may want to keep those folks in our congregations who fly a lot in our prayers as they are constantly navigating not just the cultures of their host and destination cities but also this airborne culture as well.

3. Being away for more than a week and then returning – both from places that we used to live – is a very challenging, while potentially helpful exercise.   Unique questions come to the surface about what one values, how time is spent, what role friends play, how one utilizes technology, etc. I am struck at these moments by how seldom numbers come up and instead how vital stories become.  Rarely do I hear someone say 45% of my former youth group is ____, or 8 out of 10 couples are _____, or the homes in our former neighborhood hood are $35,000 _______. It’s weird but I am struck by how absent numbers are sometimes.  Names and stories provide the snapshots.

It was nice to have a break from blogging during finals and then being away. I am looking forward getting back into this e-conversation with you all and I feel like I have renewed understanding about the role that this venue plays in my connection-community. Tomorrow I will fire it back up. -Bo

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Melatonin has ruined my blog

I have always called myself a night-owl. I have an odd type of insomnia. I sleep either 3 hours, 6 hours or 9 hours … and here is the fun part … I never know which one it will be!  It makes for an odd collection of half-read books, watching classic movies, theological research,  and of course, blogging.

I go to bed around 10 every night, I just never know how long I will be there.

It has been like this since my early 20s and I have just gotten used to it. I build in variables each night and through out the week, I chip away at my to-do list and blog about the stuff on my mind. After close to 20 years, the erratic nature of my sleep cycles became as much a part of the routine as erratic things can become.

For the past 4 years I have invested lots of late night hours into my various blogs and projects. People always comment that I am prolific, but in reality I just can’t sleep.

Well, about 3 weeks ago something changed. My wife suggested that I try taking melatonin before bed. I am not a big fan of ‘taking stuff’ but this is something that your body produces naturally but can decrease as you age.

So I gave it a try 3 weeks ago and for the past 21 nights have slept through the night getting between 8 and 9 hours of sleep!  The upside is that I feel like a new man. Not only do I feel 5 years younger but my eyes are not fatigued and I don’t have to wear glasses. It’s amazing.

The downside, however, is that I no longer have the time that I formerly spent writing. I get up in the morning, do some reading, head to work, come home for dinner, walk the dog and then either do homework or watch a movie with my wife.

Don’t get me wrong: I feel fantastic. I am happy about the change. All I’m saying is that melatonin has wrecked my blog.

Oh sure, I will still put out 3 posts a week  but it looks like the seasons are changing… unless, of course,  after this semester I can adjust my daily routine. I just wanted to A) say thank-you to everyone who has made this past 4 years an amazing conversation and faith and everyday life  B) I wanted to let you know about the obvious changes around here.

my the grace of God lead us on together – Bo

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Self inflicted injuries hurt twice as much

The other day I did something stupid. I don’t want to talk about – its embarrassing. I was late to work because I had to lay on the couch for an hour with cold rag on my eye and I had to walk around the rest of the day with a visible mark.

As a pastor I get to talk to a lot of people who suffer under shame. Guilt is one thing – it reminds us of what we have done. Shame is a different animal – it goes after who we are.

As I went through my day I had two things going on. One was the pain from the injury. The other was from the embarrassment. There are times when you want a little sympathy and you hope that someone asked you about your injury. A self-inflicted wound is not one of those times.
I walked around hoping that no one would ask what happened. I sat in office and felt vulnerable like a sitting duck.

In sermons I often say


Guilt is feeling bad about what you did.
Shame is feeling bad about who your are.

Pastorally I have great concern for those who walk around everyday under the burden of guilt and shame. This little incident was a chance to come face to face with my ego and my image in a small way. Ever since then I have thinking about and reading up on pastoral counseling for those who are walking wounded.

I can’t help but but wonder if self-inflicted wounds don’t hurt twice as much. First at the place of pain and second at the outward embarrassment. It makes sense why it then become difficult to fulfill the encouragement of scripture to “bear one another’s burdens” (Galatians 6:2) when we don’t want to show the wound or tell the story behind it.

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You don’t seem judgmental … for a Pastor

Recently, I was guest preaching and I began by talking about how much I hate the question “what do you do?” I just don’t like telling people that I am a minister. The conversation always changes afterward and not in a good way!  Don’t get me wrong – I LOVE being a minister. It’s just that I enjoy a good conversation and this is a conversation killer.

Once I tell them they either:
A) don’t want to talk to me
B) hate religion and want to tell me why
C) love religion and want to tell me why

Either way, whatever we were talking about is gone.

Fast-forward to this week. I am at the bank and a new teller was being trained. He was taking a long time to do anything and so the women supervising him was small talking me. Then the three of us got in a really good conversation about different aspects of living in LA (none of us were native) and then the question comes.

They asked me what I did for a living. I said that I was a minister. They were both taken back. (it must be my age or face because I was wearing a long sleeve jacket ). Then he says:

Really? You don’t seem judgmental.

I’m not kidding. It was one of the oddest responses I have heard. Turns out he is from the Bible-belt and both his parents are of different nationalities and religions. His brother has become a fundamentalist Christian and thinks both mom and dad are going to hell. The supervisor is a 1st generation American and of another religion. Her son has become a charismatic and thinks that she is going to hell.

I showed them my tattoos and said “they both probably think that tattoos are wrong” and they both gasped and said “Oh yeah … they would not like that.”  From there the conversation took a wonderful turn.

It was the first time I have liked the reaction I got.

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