Red Letter Christians

Wheat and Weeds: Thoughts on Cancel Culture

Mon, 03 Aug 2020 17:30:17 GMT

I’ve never been particularly pleasant amid outdoor labor.

Unless my mind is made up, or the weather is that of October, I’m quite happy indoors where my neck stays dry and fewer things have stingers. But some seasons call me out; some reasons require my presence and action.

This past weekend, one of those reasons consisted of the rampant flowerbed weeds of summer—wild and crisp at the edges, suffocating the beauty around our home. Now, I’m worn out; let’s say that first. Life has been easy for few these last six months. I’d list our collective trauma and losses and injustices and anxieties, but you know them. Instead, I’ll nod toward them to make this point: I entered weed-pulling already tired. And if I had ripped apart my whole garden, good and all, few would blame me. “It’s all too much,” the neighbors would say, “We get it.”

But “gone” is not my goal. “New” is.

“Jesus told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field. But while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away. When the wheat sprouted and formed heads, then the weeds also appeared. “The owner’s servants came to him and said, ‘Sir, didn’t you sow good seed in your field? Where then did the weeds come from?’ “‘An enemy did this,’ he replied. “The servants asked him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’“‘No,’ he answered, ‘because while you are pulling the weeds, you may uproot the wheat with them.Let both grow together until the harvest. At that time I will tell the harvesters: First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned; then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn.’”—Matthew 13: 24-30

There’s a knock-out rose bush tucked between two hedges in our backyard, all planted by a former resident whose legacy I’m trying to uphold. This spring, when the world held its breath while the red of pandemic graphics spread over vector globes like a Kool-Aid spill, like blood, that bush burst forth with a constellation of lipstick-fuchsia blooms. For the first time in worried weeks, I took a deep breath upon seeing them and said, “Good things still grow, even now. Even here.” Those petals saved my hope; I’m not lying.

Presently, in the sticky heat of a Louisiana August, deep rooted and spindly weeds have surfaced, taking hostage the rose bush’s branches. As I stood before their entanglement on Saturday, armed with hole-ridden gloves, I thought about how I’m just tired enough to uproot the whole thing, and no onlooker would blink an eye.

But, God, it’s a garden I want. Not unblemished soil at any cost: concrete, by any other name.

We’re in a reckoning, a few actually. Between #MeToo and #BlackLivesMatter and the inequalities of our society put on blast for the most avoidant among us thanks to the novel coronavirus, it seems now more than in recent decades that Sam Cooke was right and a change is sure enough gonna come. Organizers are working desperately to see that steam is not lost before a page can actually be turned in our history books. And minds are changing. Minds we never thought would change are changing. For some of us, those minds are ours.

There is another phenomenon accompanying (and in many cases assisting and ushering) this revolution of values. and that is our online existence. Social media has offered an unprecedented level of accountability, education, and mobilization for these crucial movements. And the corroboration of narratives and leveling of platforms have been resources for real transformation. Who can deny it?

READ: Have We Reached a Kairos Moment?

But I recognize something at play in and among all this progress that I worry threatens it, and that is the enemy of good being perfection, not in our expectations of ourselves but of our neighbors. I’m speaking of cancel culture, though I say the words with fear and trembling. I know there are many valid opinions around the practice, and a justifiable question of how a reckoning is to happen without such extremes (even the word “extremes” is debatable when compared to the wrongdoing often being perpetuated). I also know that as a white woman with socioeconomic advantage, it can be a privilege in and of itself to have an opinion about cancel culture. Still, I have recognized a recent willingness within myself and others to silence someone’s voice or end someone’s involvement without love or strategy because they didn’t get it quite right. And I worry what the normalization of such a mode of operation will produce in the long run.

Several times now in the last few months, I have witnessed and experienced the quick reflex of change-seeking communities—and of myself, personally—to abandon a whole person or group of people because that person or group did not exhibit a flawless and entirely evolved existence immediately. Their wheat had weeds. And in many cases, we have decided that there is no more time left for weeds. Let me be clear, there’s not. But there’s also no time to self-sabotage, burning the beauty because it hadn’t entirely and quickly rid itself of the bad. It is precisely because there is no more time left for weeds that we must approach them scrupulously.

Did I say I was tired? I was so tired. Yet, I crouched my aching body into the dirty Bermuda grass and began unwinding the vine from my rose bush. Carefully, strategically—with care and resolve—releasing that to which it had been clinging. When its form flopped to the ground, I had to take my gloved fingers and dig down until the weed’s roots were exposed, wiggling them loose like a stubborn molar tooth. Because I wanted the roses to thrive, and I wanted the weed to not return.

There are things in this world and in this time that arguably need total and complete upheaval—namely, our unjust systems. When it comes to systemic injustice, we must deconstruct, defund, demolish, dismantle now and with courage. But when it comes to people? We may be served best by not destroying the wheat for the weeds before the harvest. In an interconnected Body, it could ruin us all.

Maybe this means that sometimes we let them grow together for a while. Maybe this means that sometimes we get on our hands and knees and do the meticulous work of soil surgery to loosen the roots while preserving the roses. Maybe this means allowing them to be our mirror for how we too nourish both progress and harm within ourselves at different times. What it doesn’t mean is that we get to police anyone else’s reactions, especially when it comes to marginalized groups. But maybe it means that we take the time to evaluate our personal actions and postures towards another while approaching unjust realities with a relentless amount of urgency and people with a relentless amount of mercy.

“In the final analysis,” Dr. King said, “love is not this sentimental something that we talk about. It’s not merely an emotional something. Love is creative, understanding goodwill for all [humans]. It is the refusal to defeat any individual. When you rise to the level of love, of its great beauty and power, you seek only to defeat evil systems. Individuals who happen to be caught up in that system, you love, but you seek to defeat the system.”

This is not a case for excusing bad behavior. This is a case for strategically addressing it with love and humanity, as Jesus did, knowing that no one is damned to how we experience them in one given moment, that we may actually reach the promised land, and if possible, together.

The Disease Within a Disease

Thu, 30 Jul 2020 12:00:33 GMT

As the novel coronavirus continues to wreak havoc on our health and, indeed, on our way of life, researchers are scrambling to find a solution. As a result, we’re learning a great deal about the science behind this menace. But we are also learning a great deal about its social consequences. And those demographic findings indicate that within this disease lurks another, deeper disease.

The cumulative data clearly show the disproportionately devastating impact of this virus on the African-American community. According to governmental statistics culled by The COVID Tracking Project at The Atlantic magazine, Black Americans are more than twice as likely as whites to contract the virus and 2.5 times more likely to die from it. This is not a marginal difference; it is truly double trouble.

Naturally, our most immediate concern is for the lives lost, for the bodies ravaged, and for the holes torn in the fabric of families and communities. But we cannot ignore the pattern in these color-coded outcomes. Nor should we suppose that there is no cause behind this effect.

We know some of the proximate causes that make African Americans more vulnerable to this disease. These include an enormous wealth gap, the type of work in which Black people are more likely to engage, the location and density of Black populations, and their more limited access to health care. Note, however, that these conditions are not mere accidents of history. Something or somebody caused these causes.

It’s tempting to lay the blame on slavery and Jim Crow and other forms of historic discrimination—that is, on evils committed by previous generations. But while that history helps to explain how our racial hierarchy arose, it doesn’t explain why it endures well into the 21st century—much less why we’re not trying very hard to get rid of it. Could it be that there’s something about this asymmetrical arrangement that actually suits those of us who are members of the white majority?

Well, certain material benefits do undoubtedly accrue to those at the top of a racialized social pyramid. It turns out, however, that we also have a significant psycho-spiritual incentive to protect our status. This incentive arises from a moral flaw embedded deep within white identity. I call it racial haughtiness, a condescending attitude that reflexively organizes the world around it to conform to its superior pretensions.

READ: Healing America of Its Sickness Through Truth and Conciliation

Of course, this current crop of white Americans did not create our racial hierarchy. But an undeniable moral solidarity binds us to our forebears. For the same haughtiness that incited them to perpetrate a racialized social structure even now incites us to perpetuate it. And the caretakers of injustice cannot escape its stench.

Not only do we have a disease within a disease; this inner disease is itself multidimensional. At first glance, the disparate impact of this COVID crisis between Black people and white people looks like a public health problem. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Because that public health problem arises out of a social equity problem. Dig a little deeper, and you discover that the social equity problem is ultimately a moral problem.

Of the two diseases, the inner variety is actually far more insidious. It has been with us as long as we have been us, and throughout the history of this country racial haughtiness has produced far more suffering and death than the coronavirus ever could.

It’s tempting to think that once we get past this current crisis—once we defeat the disease—then perhaps we can double back to these deeper issues. But moral accounting, particularly our own, never draws a crowd. As soon as we don’t have to think about this matter, we won’t.

So, why not take some small portion of the time we spend in endless prattling about the disease and dedicate it to an honest discussion about its inner dimension? If we can ever overcome this disease within a disease, we will be not only a healthier nation but a better one.

Political Propaganda is Destroying Christianity

Wed, 29 Jul 2020 18:00:50 GMT

Throughout history, Christians have been susceptible to both embracing and spewing political propaganda. Huge segments of Christianity were transformed into political machines, commandeered by political adherents for the purpose of administering all sorts of evils.

Christian propaganda helped facilitate the bloodlust of the Crusades, the cruelty of the Spanish Inquisition, the Colonialism of entire populations, the theft of “discovering” new lands, the genocide of Indigenous peoples, slavery, racism, the KKK, Nazism, xenophobia, sexism, endless wars, and a litany of other evils. All of these atrocities were spurred on by “Christianity”—not in spite of it.

As early as the 4th century, when the Roman emperor Constantine credited an important military victory to a miraculous vision from the Christian god, Christians have been co-opted by political propaganda. That Constantine may have used Christianity as propaganda to consolidate power is often overlooked by Christians, who instead revel in the fact that Christianity gained historic “influence” during this era.

Constantine is still regarded as a great Christian historical leader within much of Christendom, yet the fact remains that he murdered his son Crispus and boiled his second wife Fausta to death. But when political leaders grant Christians significant amounts of carnal wealth, power, and influence, Christians are susceptible to overlook spiritual flaws—such as immorality…and the brutal executions of their closest relatives and political rivals.

In many ways, Roman Christianity’s acceptance of Constantine’s “God-ordained government” marked a distinct historical change in the way many Christians would forever corporately manifest their faith. From that point on, instead of emulating Christ as the ultimate example of Christian leadership, Christians also start looking to politicians, rulers, and forms of government as divine manifestations of their faith. The rest is history—a very bad, bloody, and horrific timeline of Christendom brutally oppressing the world around it.

Christians fall prey to political propaganda when their allegiance to a political party is valued more than their allegiance to the kingdom of God. When nationalism and patriotism are idolized more than following Jesus, and the power of statecraft is trusted more than the power of the Holy Spirit. Propaganda whispers the lie that our spiritual power can come from sources beyond God.

Propaganda caters to selfishness, not sacrificial love. It preys on fear, not hope. It hates, blames, and oppresses. It refuses to show empathy, and is devoid of grace, mercy, and forgiveness. Unlike the fruits of the Spirit, it doesn’t contain love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, and self-control. Its message will almost always be beneficial to some (us), but detrimental to others (them). It attacks others. It villainizes and dehumanizes. It doesn’t view everyone as loved by God and made in God’s divine image.

READ: Christians Don’t Understand How Horrible Christendom Was (and Is)

When Christianity becomes poisoned by political propaganda, partisan opinions supersede the words and actions of Jesus. Scripture becomes a weapon to rationalize and even support political agendas, and the churches that fail to quickly and boldly speak out against such deceits eventually succumb to becoming sectarian machines themselves—doing the bidding of worldly rulers rather than a divine God. Or worse yet, churches become fearful or apathetic bystanders, uselessly refusing to provide hope, help, and love.

Christians are often targeted by propaganda because of the Christian religion’s prominence within many societies, and especially the influential role it has had within American politics. Because of this, Christianity is a constant battleground for those vying to win political and cultural influence. The gospel is constantly being manipulated, compromised, and spun in a way to gain votes, leverage popularity, and promote various political platforms. Yet no political party ever has, nor ever will, have the market cornered on Christianity.

Jesus himself was the target of propaganda. Of all the weapons Satan could’ve used to tempt Jesus, he used the bible, quoting scripture in an attempt to mislead Jesus. This should serve as an important reminder to Christians that propaganda will often pretend to be forms of “Christianity” itself. Bible verses, pastoral endorsements, theological rationalizations, religious rhetoric, and spiritualized nationalism will all put on guises that pretend to be “Christian.” Like Satan’s attempt to overcome Jesus, “Christianity” will be manipulated and used to the point of undermining itself.

Instead of loving our neighbors, “Christian” propaganda will tell us to deport them, ban them, incarcerate them, discriminate against them, outlaw them, and even bomb them. It will attempt to silence the oppressed and amplify the oppressor. This is how propaganda works. It erodes truth by any means necessary, preying on our biases, desires, fears, and ignorance. Disguising itself as spirituality, faith, and even morality, it can be deceptively subtle. It can also be blatantly outrageous yet embraced by populist furor, accepted by our own delusions, or even allowed by our moral cowardice and apathy.

Since “Christianity” can mean anything to anyone, it’s absolutely essential for followers of Christ to clearly define what the purpose, meaning, and intent of Christianity is. Without this core understanding and confidence, beliefs can be molded according to fraudulent influences.

Christianity is ultimately about Christ.

So if something doesn’t look, act, and sound like Jesus—it’s not an accurate representation of what God desires of us. Jesus himself said the two greatest commandments were to love God and love our neighbors. These foundational values should be the cornerstones of our faith, and the life of Jesus showed us the perfect example to follow.

Instead of being content with following Jesus, and trusting His life as the blueprint to follow, Christians have used propaganda to transform their governments into pseudo-theocracies, creating an authoritative branch of Christendom that can legislate morality and dictate their preferred religious society. Instead of loving their neighbors, these Christian-run governments have sought absolute control, even to the point of enacting slavery, genocide, war, and all sorts of evils.

While it’s certainly justifiable for Christians to incorporate their faith into their political systems, political systems themselves have proven to be particularly horrible conduits of the gospel of Jesus. As a missional strategy, attempting to incorporate a “Christian” government—with “Christian” politicians, laws, and religious rhetoric—has decisively failed throughout history. Not because a “Christian” government hasn’t happened, but because when they do, they’ve never looked anything like Jesus. In fact, they’ve almost always brought about oppression, violence, and death. In the entire history of the world, has there ever been a “Christian” government that hasn’t been anything other than an oppressive form of Colonialism?

Christians have always failed to redeem political systems, but contrarily, political systems have always succeed in corrupting Christians. Even the very best examples of Christians who used their activism to do good work, individuals such as William Wilberforce, Martin Luther King Jr., and Dorothy Day, were pursuing goodness and justice against political systems and societies that were largely considered “Christian.” They were examples of Christ-like followers who helped restore the damage done by political Christendom.

In the same way, we must do our best to emulate Jesus within whatever political system we live in—but never idolize that political system, or its propaganda, as our final hope or deity. May we always stay true to the gospel, which points us to Jesus, the King of Kings, and our only hope for salvation. And in turn, Jesus always points us towards loving our neighbors. God help us.

A Sabbath of Forced Compliance

Wed, 29 Jul 2020 12:00:45 GMT

Through this COVID-19 pandemic my thoughts frequently have turned to the concept of Sabbath. According to the passage in Exodus, three months after the Israelites were delivered from Egypt and the oppression of Pharaoh’s system of extraction and exploitation, Moses ascended Mount Sinai to see God and was given what we have come to know as the Ten Commandments.

In periods of contemplation, I’ve inserted myself into this story: as an observer, as Moses, and even as God. I often try to imagine the tone in which God spoke to Moses. This is difficult because we have been conditioned by expressions from the imaginations of film producers, actors, artists, pastors, etc. who have depicted the scene with great solemnity and gravitas. We are encouraged to hear the booming, basso profundo voice of a distant God and to see Moses cowering in fear. To be fair, the texts speak of booming thunder, loud trumpet blasts, and a fearful prophet trembling in the presence of God’s glory, but these also may have been produced from the imaginations of the authors, or editors, of Exodus and Deuteronomy.

Sometimes I imagine another side to this deep, reverberating reverence. I imagine God speaking softly to Moses in a gentle tone. After all, God loved Moses, and it is written in Deuteronomy and Exodus that God spoke to Moses “face to face, just as a man speaks to his friend.”

In this version of the conversation, the phrases “thou shall” and “thou shall not” can take on a very different perspective. Perhaps we can imagine a loving mother instructing a young child not to touch the burners on the stove, an instruction given firmly, but lovingly, for the safety and well being of the child. In this imagining, the commandments that are written as “thou shall” and “thou shall not” may be taken as firm instructions given to ensure the safety and well being of God’s chosen people. They come across as instructions rather than commandments, designed to strengthen the sense of community for a group of wandering nomads who are learning to deal with newfound freedom and to maintain solidarity and a tight knit social fabric.

We find a unique quality in the language of the so-called fourth commandment. It doesn’t read, “Thou shall remember the Sabbath.” The people are instructed to simply, “Remember the Sabbath.” The tone is softer, more like a reminder than a commandment or even an instruction.

It begs the question, what does the use of the word “remember” signify? The most basic interpretation is to always observe Sabbath, every week, without fail, without interruption. As Walter Brueggemann writes in Sabbath as Resistance: Saying No to the Culture of Now, “Moses knows that prosperity breeds amnesia.” Observing Sabbath is a culturally defining practice for this group of people as they are establishing specific faith identifiers. It is a cultural marker within a hostile environment.

As we read further in the text, Moses is reminded that God created everything in six days and rested on the seventh. Observance of Sabbath, therefore, aligns us with the rhythms of God’s activities. It is a form of worshipping a God who rests, one who sets aside a specific time to rest, and one who blesses this time.

This, too, is a defining characteristic of God’s covenant with Israel. It is a commemoration, solemn as well celebratory, of deliverance from slavery and from Pharaoh’s oppressive system of endless production and acquisition, a system in which the slaves did all the hard work and Pharaoh reaped all the rewards. Sabbath is an observance of resistance to this oppressive system. It proclaims life is not defined by the production and consumption of material goods. It is an alternative to the system that ultimately reduces everything to commodity goods.

Twenty first century America also operates within a system that reduces everything to a commodity. For example, time has been commodified, and the culture has produced many adages that bear witness. “Time is precious,” so we better accumulate it. “Time marches on,” so we better keep up. “Time waits for no one,” so we better not be complacent. “Time is on my side,” not yours. “We’re in a race against time,” so time is an adversary. And my personal favorite, “Time is money,” needs no further exposition.

READ: Don’t Just Wash Your Hands: Scripture, COVID-19, and Mass Incarceration

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused tremendous pain and suffering on so many levels. We suffered the deaths of our loved ones and debilitating sickness within our families and among our friends. We have endured long stretches of isolation and limited social interaction. As a result, we have experienced heightened levels of anxiety, depression, loneliness, and uncertainty.

Leaders in the health community devised guidelines to slow the spread of the virus and we relied on our government officials to enact policies to that end. Data indicates that stay at home and shelter in place policies produced the desired effect. However, they wreaked havoc on the economy and working class families. Many people lost their jobs, and their health insurance along with them, as larger companies conducted widespread layoffs, and small businesses dissolved.

Another outcome of the shelter in place policies was that people found they had more time for leisure activities. Our neighborhoods were filled with people jogging, walking, cycling, playing with their dogs, or exploring with their children. It felt like Sabbath observance. True Sabbath: not the go-through-the-motions Sabbath of spending an hour at church on a Sunday morning and then reengaging with the hyperactive busyness of our everyday lives. True Sabbath: when the wheels of commerce and commodification are forced to slow down, even come to a halt.

But it was a Sabbath of forced compliance. We engaged because we had to, not because we wanted to. We weren’t observing Sabbath in the spirit with which it was intended. Before long we began to push back. We needed to get our hair cut. We needed to shop and spend money, so we needed to go back to work to make money. We needed to “reopen the economy.” We needed to “get things back to normal.” We rejected the idea that true Sabbath stands in resistance to the production, acquisition, and consumption cycles that we consider normal. We rejected the idea that true Sabbath offers God’s normal as an alternative to Pharaoh’s normal.

We enjoy many freedoms in America, but we don’t have the freedom to resist the wheels of commerce. Either we engage or we suffer. We aren’t an enslaved people, as the Israelites were in Egypt, but we are wage slaves to the overlords of business and commerce. And, as such, we are slaves to a life of busyness, seeing any form of inactivity as unproductive. As Rob Bell so eloquently said, “Sabbath reminds us that we are human beings, not human doings.” But we choose doing over being.

The gears of greed must be greased, so life itself has become a commodity to be traded for the good of the economy. Many of our leaders were more than willing to make this trade. Dan Patrick, Lt. Governor of my home state of Texas, went so far as to suggest the elderly population would be willing to sacrifice their lives “in exchange for keeping the America that all America loves for your children and grandchildren.” Restrictions were lifted, people began going about business as usual, and now we are seeing new spikes in diagnosed cases, hospitalizations, and deaths.

Because we fail to recognize Sabbath as resistance, we are resistant to Sabbath. We are like the Israelites who grumbled in the wilderness, preferring to have remained as slaves in Egypt where they at least had meat, fish, and cucumbers to eat instead of perfectly good and abundant manna. They were willing to choose enslavement over freedom for a morsel of lamb.

And we are willing to choose sickness and loss of life for the good of the economy. We are willing to sacrifice sacred human life at the altar of commerce in the Church of the Free Market.

We worship a God who loves unconditionally. We follow a teacher who said the greatest commandment is to love God and the second is to love our neighbor. A teacher who instructed us to care for the sick. But sadly, we resonate with the adage, “Time is money” while rejecting the truth that “God is love.”

An Inheritance of Suffering: A Review of ‘This Too Shall Last’

Tue, 28 Jul 2020 18:00:34 GMT

“We’ve so fused our American Dream with the risen Christ that when suffering enters our lives and does not leave quickly, all we know how to do is hide, judge, or despair. We’ve reduced the gospel to rescue, power to privilege, and hope to swift healing, reducing ourselves in the process. Western Christendom has long treated suffering like a problem to fix and a blight to hide… When our storylines do not match the arc of triumph we’ve come to expect and revere, we can feel stuck on the outside of both our communities and God’s grace.”- KJ Ramsey

News of how the American Dream is largely a mirage has shown up on our televisions and smart phones for months now. We see the dream crumbling like an old abandoned building, as we read story upon story of inequities, and inhumane treatment suffered by many who call this nation home. Along with the decaying dream, we also see the hope of the Evangelical church in America fizzling out like Fourth of July sparklers.

Into this climate comes this timely call to re-examine our theology of suffering, and even of our God. It explores the question of whether we have emphasized the power and dominion of God and forgotten the God who comes near and suffers with? And who calls followers of Christ to do the same.

In this, her first, book author KJ Ramsey discusses her personal story of physical pain from a debilitating auto immune disease, but the content is surprisingly universal. The writing is a unique mix of personal story, brain science, theology, and counseling, with just the right amount of butt-kicking. It is smart and personal, scientific and soulful.

The chronically ill, or physically challenged are oft forgotten in our society, overlooked or viewed as a project. During these times when many of us are forced to stay home because of the advancing virus, these warriors are already very familiar with how this is done. For years, many have restricted their movements and stayed home because their immune systems required it, or because of the barriers they faced. This has been their daily reality which some of us are only now beginning to understand. Our current situation has revealed ways we have marginalized those who suffer, those who were prevented from attending church or participating in ways we view as “normal.”

READ: Comfort in a Time of Communal Suffering

Every leader in churches in the Western world should be reading this book before they make plans to re-open and go back to business as usual, which will again alienate the vulnerable. The author shares how living with chronic illness has been challenging within a body of believers. She becomes a loving whistleblower uncovering the ways the church has failed to embrace suffering as part of its inheritance, and how the suffering ones have been left on the scrap heap of success-driven Christianity. It is a call for the church to live up to its high and holy calling. After all we have experienced, and with the words of this book in our head, the voices of the marginalized can be heard and we know we can begin to do better.

While there is much in this book for leaders of faith communities, where it truly shines is for those who live a life of pain and those who journey with them. The author’s stories of fighting to be heard by the medical world, or accepted and affirmed by her church all the while facing doubt and pain, read like wisdom from a kind guide on the hard road of suffering. Her words allow the suffering person to feel seen and understood; it is a balm for the soul. As pain is acknowledged and weakness embraced, the author asserts, we are opened up to the presence of Jesus who himself is well acquainted with grief and sorrow. In spite of what society tells us, God is not absent during our struggles, but fully present and suffering alongside us. Into this place of communion with God, comes joy. The words in these pages are both challenging and encouraging, woven into a hope and grace-filled testament to the goodness of God in the midst of all of our stories.

There is likely no person alive who has not had the experience of receiving ill thought-out words in the midst of their pain, or has been the one to say the wrong things at the wrong time. We have heard such things as, “everything happens for a reason”, or “God must think you are strong to give you this”, perhaps, “all things work together for good.” These pat answers may hold a nugget of truth, but they are less than helpful in the moments of our deepest pain. We know words are inadequate, but we are not sure what we can offer instead. This book is a primer on how to respond. Ramsey leads the reader into an exploration of what true solidarity with the suffering might look like, how we embody the presence of God as we honor stories of pain and grief.

This Too Shall Last is for everyone who desires to go beyond trite, cliched responses to pain and hardship into a deeper, more nuanced understanding; we begin to hold the tension that suffering and joy can coexist. It refutes the ways we have adopted the prosperity gospel’s “name it and claim it” assertions for divine healing, and how we place the burden of continued pain on the shoulders of the one who suffers, who clearly did not have the faith required for a miracle. Instead we move into an understanding of sharing in the sufferings of Jesus, joining our fellow believers around the world who expect hardship as an intrinsic part of faith. Our communities would be radically changed for the better if we could all read this book and learn to embrace the ones who suffer, while living into the balanced, whole-hearted, and biblical perspective it provides.

Should We Tear Down All the Statues?

Tue, 28 Jul 2020 12:00:04 GMT

From state capitols to NASCAR races, many conversations and protests about racial justice have become focused on Confederate flags and icons. For obvious reasons, people of color are not happy about imagery that memorializes and celebrates racist people and institutions. What does it communicate when a statue or flag asks us to look back fondly on people who continually dehumanized and subjugated Black Americans?

This conversation is an old hat by now, and it’s unbelievable that these points still need to be made. But perhaps it’s time to inspect the argument that is, without fail, leveled against these cries for statue removal: the slippery slope. “Sure,” the statue-lover concedes, “we can remove statues of people who explicitly served in the Confederate army. But what’s next? Thomas Jefferson?! George Washington?” At this point, I trust you can hear the gasp of dismay as it echoes among white conservatives.

While slippery slope arguments are generally bad, and thus easy to dismiss out of hand, there is a real and practical challenge at the heart of this one. If we begin to remove plaques and statues, and rename schools once named after Confederate soldiers, what about other early Americans who were less explicitly enemy-of-America-and-all-Black-people bad? People who were slaveowners when it was more widely accepted among white people? What about someone who didn’t own slaves but who once published a racist remark in a newspaper? The practical challenge presented by this way of thinking is this: Who gets to decide how offensive is too offensive? Who adjudicates a complicated history and declares who is fit to be a public hero?

I do not have an answer to that question, because I do, in fact, reject the entire slippery slope. The slope itself—which is to say, all the statues of our heroic Founding Fathers—should be torn down and moved to museums. The primary reason for this approach is not to resolve the tricky questions posed above; those only matter if you value the statues to begin with. No, we should free ourselves from these statues because doing so may heal us from the poison of our own naïve reading of history.

Justo González hits this home in Mañana: Christian Theology from a Hispanic Perspective. While making the point that Latinx Christians have treasure troves of wisdom to offer white Christians, he reveals that one such treasure is “responsible remembrance.” Because of their brutal genesis (“our Spanish forefathers raped our Indian mothers”), González contends that Hispanic people live with a full view of the ugliness of history. White Americans, meanwhile, have the privilege to selectively remember or forget history in whatever ways suit them. We can choose to remember Thomas Jefferson’s Declaration but forget that he raped slaves.

READ: A World of Lies When the Truth Sets Us Free

Statues (along with history books) are one of the primary tools of this irresponsible remembrance, this selective forgetfulness. Statues are erected to immortalize heroes, to forever remember their best achievements and attributes. When we have moved someone into the mental category of “hero,” we must forget the dark parts of their story. We can’t have evil heroes.

And so we romantically remember an America forged for the sake of freedom, forgetting that white people summarily denied this freedom to Black people. We remember an America whose land we were manifestly destined to explore and settle, forgetting that white people violently stole it from Indigenous peoples.

This project, perfectly encapsulated in the building of a statue, has served to effectively shield white Americans from feelings of guilt or thoughts of reparation—but it has left us woefully unable or unwilling to fix systemically racist systems. The cure, of course, isn’t just the rote removal of statues—it’s the interrogation of our false, innocent view of history. But tearing down the statues is a start. This is not to say that, practically speaking, we must immediately remove every statue in our nation. However, when a group of people is hurt enough by any given monument to protest for its removal, rather than attempt to debate the merits of the historical figure, we should remove the damned statue.

All of this may be even more pressing for followers of Jesus and for communities of faith. We who view all of history as a gift and each person as an image-bearer of God cannot afford to pick and choose which parts of history we will acknowledge. We must work to understand and own every piece of what created our churches, cities, and country as we know them today.

Who knows what peace and freedom this difficult work might one day yield? As Peter Choi noted in his affirmation of a George Whitefield statue’s removal, each concrete act of removal “might serve as a moment of reckoning, for redress. If it sparks conversations where we interrogate tropes of white saviorism and nationalistic greatness, that would be… a sign of hope.”

A World of Lies When the Truth Sets Us Free

Mon, 27 Jul 2020 20:01:19 GMT

Some years ago a friend of mine who teaches ethics –among other things- in a Christian university told me of an exchange that took place in one of his classes. He was leading his students in a discussion of truth-telling. Unsurprisingly, the question was raised as to whether there were any occasions when we have no responsibility to be truthful. A serious young man was among the first to respond.

“It is always wrong to lie for your own benefit,” he insisted. “But lying to gain political advantage is not wrong. If it is necessary in order to win people over and to stop them from supporting a political party or position you believe is destructive, then lying is morally legitimate.” My friend said he expected that some of his students would provide examples of situations where lying to save someone’s life would be permissible. But politics?

That Christian young man is far from the exception.

As the cynical, misanthropic Dr. Gregory House, of the TV series often said, “Everybody lies.” Yes. None of us are guilt-free when it comes to lying. But everyone doesn’t lie abundantly, shamelessly, and often maliciously. The fact that most of us don’t lie blatantly or continually is because we recognize the importance of telling the truth, even when it is inconvenient. A society will crumble if lying is not looked down upon and if people can’t be counted on to tell the truth the vast majority of the time.

But we have come to expect a certain amount of dissembling from politicians. Fudging the truth to make themselves look better has always been part of the game of electioneering. And not sharing all the relevant information about ramifications of policies they push is virtually expected. Flagrant, unapologetic lying is another matter.

Jesus said, “Let your yes be yes and your no be no” (Matthew 5:37). He called for the unvarnished truth. Jesus went so far as to say the truth would “set you free” (John 8:32). However, we live in a time when many people are convinced power sets us free and any truth that doesn’t lead to power is dispensable. Clearly, that is the case with President Trump who is on track to make 20,000 false or misleading claims by the end of this month.

Peter Wehner, a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, wrote of Trump, “His goal, even before he became president, was far more ambitious than to tell mere lies. It was to annihilate the distinction between truth and falsity, to make sure that we no longer share facts in common, to overwhelm people with misinformation and disinformation.” Yet the vast number of white Christians –evangelical and otherwise- have continued to stand with him, defend him, echo his lies and even lie for him.

Sadly, many Christians, both before and since his election, have proven to have a very casual relationship with the truth. But, Frederick Clarkson noted that “various expressions of conservative evangelicalism and Roman Catholicism are allied in a long-term war with everyone else. And in this war, lies are a feature, not a bug.” He points to the thinking of theologian, R.J. Rushdoony, the most important figure in the rightwing evangelical Dominionism movement who points to the biblical figure Rahab to justify lying.

Rahab (Joshua 2:1-21) lied on behalf of two Israelite spies she had taken into her home who had come prior to the attack on the city of Jericho by the army led by Joshua. She hid the two and lied to Canaanite soldiers who came in search of the spies. For her help the spies promised that when the city was attacked she and her family would be spared. Rushdoony, and those influenced by his ideas, contend that in war –and that includes culture war- there is nothing wrong with lying in order to win. Such lies are not hypocritical but a righteous necessity.

I’m not convinced Jesus would agree. Shortly before his crucifixion when Jesus was hauled before the Roman governor of Judea, Pontus Pilate, he said to him, “I came into the world, to testify to the truth.” Pilate responded, “What is truth?” (John 18:37-38). He wasn’t asking a serious question. He was being dismissive. For him power was more important than truth and that was made clear in the events that followed.

The quest for and preservation of power is evidently more important than truth for some well-known Christians in our time as well.

Sarah Sanders is a notable example. The daughter of Baptist minister and former governor of Arkansas Mike Huckabee, she served for two and a half years as White House press secretary. During that time, she developed a reputation for being anything but honest and forthright. No doubt representing the Trump administration while being anything remotely resembling truthful must have been a tremendous challenge.

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Vice documented a number of her most notable lies. She claimed FBI Director James Comey’s firing in May 2017 was partly because “the rank and file of the FBI had lost confidence in Comey.” Lie. She later admitted that claim “was not founded on anything.” She claimed 4000 terrorists or suspected terrorists had been stopped at the southern border. Lie. There were six. She claimed that employment for blacks had risen dramatically under Trump in comparison to what had happened under President Obama. Lie. Not even close. And the list goes on.

Evangelical Ralph Reed, founder of the Faith and Freedom Coalition, is a liar’s liar, saying, “If keeping one’s word is central to one’s character – and it clearly is – then Donald Trump has shown he has far more character than his critics.” Except for those nearly 20,000 documented falsehood? Against all evidence to the contrary, Reed maintains that Trump “freely acknowledges … flaws and mistakes of his past.” In fact Trump doesn’t ask for forgiveness from God or people. Reed insists, “President Trump has ushered in a new era of spiritual renewal and religious liberty.” That claim can be regarded as truth only if exclude Jesus in our understanding of spirituality.

Franklin Graham, president and CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and of Samaritan’s Purse, has shown himself to be ready and able to lie for political ends. He is deeply devoted to President Trump and refuses to acknowledge his most blatant faults and failings. When asked about the president’s propensity to lie, Graham flatly denies that to be the case. Instead he concedes that Trump may have “misspoken” or that he was “misrepresented.”

Really? The payoff to Stormy Daniels is one of many things about which Trump clearly lied. But Graham has also actually repeated Trump’s self-serving lies, such as this: “The economy of our nation is the strongest it has been in 50 years.” At no point in Trump’s time in office has that been the case, no matter how many time he makes the boast.

Vice President Pence has a name for being a man of faith but that hasn’t stopped him from being a man of deceit. Heaping praise on Trump, he gushed, “You have restored American credibility on the world stage” when in fact there probably has never been a time when the U.S. has been more pitied and disrespected throughout the world. Several weeks ago he lied by saying, “I don’t believe the president has ever belittled the threat of the coronavirus.”

But Trump had said, “We have it very well under control. We have very little problem in this country at this moment — five. And those people are all recuperating successfully” (January 30). And, “I think the numbers are going to get progressively better as we go along” (February 19). And similar statements could be added. Trump has spewed an abundance of lies in reference to the coronavirus.

But not only “big name” Christians engage in political lying. Ordinary Christians do as well, as evidenced by numerous posts on social media, especially through spreading wild conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton, the “deep state,” antifa, or impending Christian persecution.

“The LORD detests lying lips, but he delights in people who are trustworthy” (Proverbs 12:22). In his recent book, theologian D. Stephen Long has written, “If speech does not serve truth, it serves only the interests of power….The only way for truth to be served, and thus for the possibility of a just political society, is for persons to be held accountable for their speaking and acting.”

We must not normalize political lying. We must not justify it, make excuses for it, or call it by less pointed names. If we believe Jesus when he said, “The truth shall set you free,” we must insist on nothing less than the truth from the White House to our own houses.

Healing America of its sickness through Truth and Conciliation

Mon, 27 Jul 2020 19:07:45 GMT

The world as we know it is shifting and that is a great thing. Though it comes, yet again, through the tragic loss of life of Black people, I believe we are on the precipice of great opportunity—if we take hold of it. Being quarantined away for two and a half months, with entire nations shutdown due to COVID-19, made it impossible not to see and pay attention to the excruciatingly painful murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Abrey all in the midst of a pandemic where the racial disparities in healthcare here in the United States are on full display. America has known that Black Lives have not mattered, but no more.

For the past two months, people across the country have made the conscious decision to face the possibility of death on multiple fronts in order to engage in the work of that has plagued our nation for centuries—dismantling racism. As an African American woman, I recognize that I am more susceptible to falling ill and dying from COVID-19. I also know that being vocal and visible in opposition to the militarization of law enforcement in Colorado Springs makes me a target for violence and murder as well. But, I, along with people across the nation, have chosen to lean into the national work of dismantling racism because there is no life worth living if such systems of violence and oppression continue to choke the lives out of people of color in this nation and across the globe.

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Beyond participating in daily protests, and advocating for local and state legislation, we are working to birth a grassroots movement for a Federal Truth and Conciliation Commission. A Truth Commission investigates, acknowledges and examines the past human rights violations of a government. Through fact finding and evidence based inquiry, root causes and impacts are laid bare for those who have benefitted from and suffered through physical, economic, psychic, cultural and other forms of violence in hopes to redress past and prevent future harms. Such commissions are often paired with Reconciliation. However, there is no possibility for reconciliation in the United States, for to reconcile presupposes a shared moment of covenantal agreement—grounded and rooted in mutual respect, accountability, equity, purpose and goals. We must build a covenant of being through conciliation. We must craft together sacred agreement if there will be any manifestations of racial justice and racial healing in our nation.

There is no question that America is sick. Filled with intractable divisions that are centuries old and never adequately addressed, we continue to live with the impacts of institutional and interpersonal racism everyday. Through direct and indirect violence, prejudicial and discriminatory practices, the insufferable effects of racism cut short the lives, health and well-beings of people in America daily. The Truth and Conciliation Commission seeks to identify, examine and dismantle racism to build a more equitable, inclusive and justice-oriented society. We invite you to think of your role in this growing movement and join us in the coming weeks at www.truthandconciliation.org as we work to dismantle racism once and for all in the United States.