Church Shopping: Welcoming the Other

Walking into a new church can be intimidating. Here in Tacoma, most of the church buildings are very old. They have high, all-seeing steeples and huge wooden doors. It's even more intimidating if you show up late. Eyes turn toward you as you creep into the sanctuary during an unexpectedly quiet moment.

But this is the crucial moment that separates radically hospitable churches from punctual Christians only clubs. Extending hospitality starts when the stranger enters, unannounced, at the most inopportune time. When the other intrudes, late and frazzled, do you roll your eyes or do you give them your seat and hand them a bulletin?

In our three months of church shopping, my girlfriend and I have been to many uncomfortable churches. Some were stiff hard it was hard to follow the order of worship, making us feel like outsiders. Some were completely blind to our existence, keeping to the people they knew and making us feel excluded. Some were giant, impersonal megachurches where we felt attacked by preachers who sought to save us, whether we wanted to be saved or not.

It's hard to attract and keep young people like me and my girlfriend. Most churches don't have programs for 20-somethings. But with congregations aging and families disappearing, my generation is the only hope the church has of surviving to the next generation.

The first step is hospitality. In those churches that welcomed us, even when we were unknown and five minutes late to the service, we felt the love and acceptance of Jesus. Those are the congregations we want to return to and eventually, that's the kind of place we want to make our new church home.

"Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it." - Hebrews 13:2

Church Shopping: The Same But Different

Over the past month, I've been a Methobaptiluthertarian.

My girlfriend and I are church shopping. We're in a new town and we don't know many people; we're a blank slate. So, we're experimenting with different faith traditions.

A few weeks ago, we went to the local ELCA church and found it a little cold. Then, we went to the Presbyterian church and found it overly traditional, but very welcoming (the usher even gave us a hug). The third was a post-denominational church growing out of the rich musical tradition of the Baptists, but little structured liturgy. The fourth was a Methodist church with a strong social justice bent.

I've never considered myself to be conservative in my religious life. But these last few weeks, I seriously had to think about how my upbringing influences what I expect in church. Deep down, the tradition I was raised in shaped me. So, when the Eucharist isn't part of worship, I miss it. When the sermon isn't grounded in a specific reading, I miss it.

I don't know if all of this yearning for my roots will find me back in the pews of the church I grew up in. I don't know where it will lead me. But I know I the Spirit will take me there.

Why Church Shopping is So Uncomfortable

It's hard enough finding a faith community that you feel you can belong to once, let alone doing it again in a brand new place. What could be more terrifying? For me, church shopping isn't as simple as Googling the nearest compatible denomination. A place has to have the right feel, you know? That intangible quality — acceptance of heretical ideas, safety to explore theologic questions, a sense of the Spirit moving through a place. It all has to be there, and for me it's more an important than seeing "ELCA" on the church website.

I was raised Lutheran, but I don't always feel Lutheran. I want to explore my relationship to the Divine in new ways; I want to be challenged. Also, for the first time, I don't just have my own needs to consider. My girlfriend and I want to find a community that honors and incorporates both of our faith traditions (Lutheran and Presbyterian), but also challenges us to rethink our beliefs.

The final problem is the age thing. When you look at most congregations, you see a lot of families with young children and a lot of retirees. It's hard to find a church with a sizable number of twentysomethings to make friends with and talk about the issues that we're dealing with. By and large, young people are absent from the church — except for in nondenominational, rah-rah Jesus churches, where I've never felt comfortable.

So, how do we find a place that welcomes us, feeds us and sends us out into the world to do God's work, but also incorporates the liturgy we grew up with, has people we can relate to and encourages us to explore our ever-changing beliefs? Does such a place exist? How do we find it?

Let the church shopping begin.

Time and Chance

"Again I saw that under the sun the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to the intelligent, nor favor to the skillful; but time and chance happen to them all. For no one can anticipate the time of disaster. Like fish taken in a cruel net, and like birds caught in a snare, so mortals are snared at a time of calamity, when it suddenly falls upon them." - Ecclesiastes 9:11-12

I often try to rationalize the world in black and white terms. Good and bad; yes or no; love or hate; us and them. I do it and I'm not proud of it. I know the world is far more complex.

Perhaps it is the human condition to oversimplify. After all, it's so much easier to blindly hate someone than it is to understand them; it's so much tidier to be ignorant than to risk shaking my assumptions.

And so, perhaps it's no surprise that we start to believe that the universe turns around us. God loves me, so I'm entitled to certain benefits, right? It makes sense, but reality isn't so transactional.

Sometimes, things don't work out. I struggle financially despite my hard work and cleverness. The cancer patient succumbs despite prayers for healing. We tend to think that God is to blame. The Divine is micromanaging existence down to the slightest detail. So, when things go badly, we wonder if our faith wasn't strong enough. We suspect we're being punished.

But I suspect that sometimes, bad things happen to good people, not because God is playing puppeteer, but because the world is an imperfect place. That's just how things go.

Yes, God loves you and yes, terrible things still happen. I don't know why. The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to the intelligent, nor favor to the skillful; but time and chance happen to us all. And that uncertainty is okay.

Our Refuge

Today, I took a walk through the Superdome and I felt the pain. You see, I'm in New Orleans, Louisiana as part of the team that will put on the ELCA National Youth Gathering — an event for more than 33,000 Lutheran high school students and their chaperones that occurs once every four years. And this year, as in 2009, it is being held in the Mercedes-Benz Superdome.

So, today, during the course of my duties (I was writing something to accompany a performance piece), I left our busy, noisy little office to breathe and collect my thoughts. I headed up to the second bowl, which was largely deserted. Just me and the empty seats. Rows and rows.

The phrase "what if these walls could talk" popped into my head. If I was very still, I could almost hear the walls weep. Their story was one of desperation; of dehydration; of starvation. It was a place where thousands of people waited for rescue or death.

During Hurricane Katrina, over 20,000 people took refuge inside the stadium. They waited out the storm here, on these cement floors and in these folding chairs. For six days, they waited, while babies ran fevers, trash and toilets backed up, lights went dark and the only running water poured through holes in the ceiling and trickled up through elevator shafts. It was hell at its most tangible.

When the last bus of refugees rolled out, the concourse where I stood was overflowing with more than a foot of garbage and human waste. Imagine the horror of it all. These walls are still crying, still bleeding for the poor of New Orleans.

In several Psalms, God is likened to a shelter. "The Lord is a refuge for the oppressed, a stronghold in times of trouble," the psalmist says in one. In another, the people of Israel call out to God, "Turn your ear to me, come quickly to my rescue; be my rock of refuge, a strong fortress to save me." In the storm, God is the shelter. Isaiah proclaims that the Lord has "been a refuge for the poor, a refuge for the needy in their distress, a shelter from the storm, and a shade from the heat." God does not abandon those in need. He was there, in the Superdome, wiping sweat off his brow with the people of New Orleans; he suffered through their nightmare.


It is easy to forget the story behind the flashy exterior, but if you stop to feel the divine presence in the Dome, it is undeniable. If those walls could talk... We are called to hear the story — to feel the pain and love the scars.


I hope my brothers and sisters who come to this event understand that the Spirit is at work in this place. Jesus was crucified in the Superdome just as surely as he was at Calvary. And God provided a refuge from the storm.


If this is not a sacred place, then I don't know what is.

- Jonny Eberle, Dome Creative Team Member. I live in Flagstaff, AZ and blog here and at www.jweberle.com/blog.

Holy Saturday: Life from Death

There was nothing especially uncommon about that week in Jerusalem. Jesus was not the first messiah to appear and gather followers. Jesus was not the first man to threaten the establishment of the Temple. Jesus was not the first rabble-rouser to be arrested by the Roman occupying force. Jesus was not the first man to be crucified, nor was he the last. Jesus was not the first person to die.

But sometime Saturday night, something extraordinary occurs.

Behind the heavy stone sealing the tomb, the Spirit is at work. When morning comes, the body of Jesus will be gone and his burial shroud neatly folded. What exactly occurs in the dark of the borrowed tomb we may never know or comprehend, but the result changes everything.

Death — once the end of everything — is no longer a barrier.
Death is vanquished.
Death is meaningless.

During the night, a spiritual calculus is performed. A single sacrifice pays for the accumulated sin of all humanity for all time and the slate is wiped clean. As Paul would later write to the Romans, "...We have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life."

Jesus overcomes the grave and death itself to free us from sin. I don't know how that math works. I don't know how the sacrifice of one man can liberate an entire species, but I am humbled to think that my soul is worth dying for. The mystery of that depth of love will forever captivate me with its beauty.

Good Friday: Forsaken

"Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani? My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" - Mark 15:34

Humans are strange creatures. We are petty, we are cowardly and we are untrustworthy. We lie, cheat, steal and kill our brothers and sisters. But the thing that truly defines us is our mortality. No matter who you are or how much money or power you might have, you cannot escape the inevitable. Our whole lives are spent outrunning death...until we grow weary or are caught off guard.

I don't know about you, but I'm terrified of death. I don't understand it. I don't understand why we lose the people we care about, one by one. I don't know if anything lies beyond the final breath or the last flicker of electricity in the brain. I don't even like to think about it.

Tonight, I have to think about it. Tonight, Jesus died. He was tortured and nailed to a cross where he hung for hours, bleeding his life out from the wounds in his hands and his side. He was sent here for this; to die. I know this story, but it is still painful to be reminded of it.

Over the past week, death has hung over every aspect of my life. One of my professors, a man I considered a friend and mentor, died suddenly in his sleep eight days ago. The anniversary of another friend's death is next week and I know other friends have suffered similar losses. It feels like the whole world is dying.

And I'm supposed to believe in a resurrection?

I don't know if I can.

Like the disciples at dusk on Friday evening, I'm lost. I'm forsaken. I'm not sure how to function anymore. The idea that all this death could have some purpose seems trite. This night, I must wrestle with the grave; struggle with its meaning. Tonight, my savior lies in a tomb, betrayed by his friends and savagely cut down by the same people who praised his entrance Sunday morning.

"Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?"

Lent: Church and State

Every Lent, I wrestle. I wrestle with myself and my own shortcomings and I wrestle with the world. By the time my 40 days in the wilderness are over, I usually have more bruises than answers, but I struggle anyway. This year, with the political world in chaos (as always), I've been asking myself some tough questions about the relationship between faith and governance.

As a Christian-in-progress and a political animal, I have a lot of trouble with the concept of the separation of church and state. Contrary to popular belief, the United States was not founded as a Christian state. Most of the Founding Fathers were deists and the only mention of religion in our highest documents is one clause of the First Amendment, which reads: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." It seems simple enough on its face, but everyone draws a different interpretation from those 16 words.

On the one hand, my beliefs guide my decisions, so I don't have a problem with applying that to my actions in the public sphere. On the other hand, religion can be a tool of oppression and my understanding of Constitutional law tells me it needs to remain far removed from government. How do I reconcile that?

Some of the current presidential contenders have made remarks about tearing down the wall between the Church and the Capitol. They believe strong Christian values can turn this nation around, but I'm not so sure that's how it works.

For one, I worry about religious oppression. In the last decade, we have proven ourselves to be extraordinarily intolerant of other faiths. Christians think they're superior to everyone else and it's easy to see why other traditions are marginalized — Christians dominate the political stage, especially on a national level. A survey conducted by the Pew Research Center found that of the 535 members of Congress, 304 are Protestant. An additional 156 are Catholic. There are just 3 Buddhists and 2 Muslims in the 112th Congress (and none of them are senators). What results is nothing less than mob rule, where the 86% who self-identify as Christian believe they have a monopoly on morality.

I just don't know what to think. Christians don't have a terribly good track record when it comes to governance (ie. the Crusades, the Inquisition, and Nazi Germany), but I can't shake the feeling that I could be on the wrong side of the argument. And so, I am left right back where I started, pondering the question: What role should faith play in the affairs of state?

Risky Business

"Cheap grace is the grace we bestow upon ourselves. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession...Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate...When Christ calls someone, he bids them come and die." - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

We like things to be easy. We don't want to have to think or commit too much to anything. We want to get the most reward for the least amount of effort. We expect it from our technology, our education, and from our God.

"I went to church and I even put money in the offering, so we're cool, right, God?"We did the minimum and we think that should be good enough. Yes, you're still saved through grace; grace that is a free gift. But that grace is hollow, because you didn't put yourself on the line for it.

For years, our experience of church has been safe. Sit, stand, sing, bread, wine, Jesus loves you. Being a follower of Jesus is mainstream and acceptable. In most cases, we don't risk anything by being a Christian. We proclaim a cotton candy gospel (that is, mostly sugar and air) and nobody gets stoned to death, crucified, or drawn and quartered. Do you see what I'm getting at? I'm not saying you have to defy the Roman Empire to validate your faith, but if you're not willing to stand up for it, what is it really worth? What are we worth if we let intolerance and injustice rule over us without a fight?

Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a Lutheran pastor living in Germany in the 1930s and '40s. When many clergy stood by while Hitler spouted hate and killed millions in concentration camps, Bonhoeffer realized that he could not stand by and let this happen. He started an underground seminary, smuggled people out of areas under Nazi control, and eventually became involved in a plot to assassinate Hitler. When the attempt failed, Bonhoeffer was arrested and executed, joining a long line of martyrs.

Grace is not cheap. It is costly. Jesus paid for it with his life and many of those who followed him have paid the same price. I don't know how we face that risk today, but I know that we shouldn't take this precious gift for granted. You don't have to earn it, but I think that we have a responsibility to use it. What is point of forgiveness if we keep it all to ourselves? We have to care for the less fortunate, stand with the broken and oppressed, and fight tooth and nail for a better world. Only when we risk our reputation, our relationship, and maybe our lives can we truly call ourselves disciples of Christ. At least, that's how I see it.

Feel the Spirit

 

In the first chapter of the Gospel of Mark, Jesus is baptized by John the Baptist in the Jordan. As he is coming up out of the water, "he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him" (Mark 1:10). That's pretty powerful, but it gets better. A voice calls down from heaven, saying, "'You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased'" (Mark 1:11). Immediately after this awe-inspiring moment, the Spirit drives Jesus into the wilderness.

I can't even imagine what Jesus must've felt. I have never been filled up with the Spirit, or seen it descend on me like a dove. I have never seen the heavens open up or heard a voice call to me. But this is what we want, isn't it? We want real results when participate in church. We fully expect that at some point, we're going to hear the voice of the Lord as clearly as if whispered in our ear. We want to be claimed as part of the family. We want to have our existence affirmed and  have God's seal of approval stamped on our forehead. Perhaps most importantly, we want to be physically, mentally, emotionally, and of course, spiritually moved by the Spirit from apathy into action. We want purpose and direction.

However, most weeks, I walk out of the Sunday evening service at LCM feeling no different than when I walked in. I don't feel transformed. Sometimes, I feel like I'm trying too hard. I know I can't force myself to have an experience. All I can do is be open to the possibility that I will internalize a little of the Spirit.

Still, while I don't expect the sky to open for me anytime soon, I cannot shake the sensation that sometimes, I'm alone in the room; the Spirit didn't show up at all. I don't know how to feel about that or if it's even true. Like most mysteries in this world, I may never get an answer.

The 21st Century Church, Part Four: Re-Formation

Exactly 494 years ago today, an insolent monk in what we now call Germany nailed a notice to the door of a church. There were 95 things he was ticked off about and he listed off every one. One scathing indictment of the Roman Catholic Church after another. Martin Luther had guts (and he was probably a little stupid). At the time, the Church was the most powerful institution on Earth. Making it angry was likely to get you excommunicated or even executed. But Luther stood firm in his beliefs.

At the heart of his 95 theses about what was wrong about the Church were five key conclusions that Luther had gleaned from careful study of the Bible. The basis on which he challenged the Pope's monopoly on salvation now forms the foundation of modern Protestantism, something he never imagined or wanted.

Martin Luther believed that the road to being saved was very different from the path prescribed by the Church, encapsulated by his five core principles:

• The first was sola scriptura — by Scripture alone. The authority of God does not lie in any person, office, building, or institution, but only in the words of the Bible.

• The second was sola fide — by faith alone. You can't buy your way into Heaven (despite what Pope Leo X would've told you). God has no use for money and does not require good works. You get in on your faith, in a transaction that skips the middleman (Rome) entirely.

• The third was sola gratia — by grace alone. This one is my favorite. No one forgives sins but God himself (of course God is beyond gender, but that's another blog) and nothing we do can make us worthy of this forgiveness. The good news is we don't have to do anything. God is merciful and gives us his forgiveness as a free gift.

• The fourth was solus Christus — by Christ alone. This is gift of grace is given through God's son, who died so that we might live. That's how great his love is for us.

• The fifth was soli Deo gloria — glory to God alone. I imagine this one really angered Luther. In his day, the Church held all the power and influence in Europe and was in the process of violently converting the native peoples of Central and South America. The Pope lived opulently. The glory was to the Church...and if there was any left over, God could have that.

It has been 500 years since Martin Luther took his historic stand against the Church. A Protestant branch of Christianity swept the globe, inspired by his theology. A whole new church was named after him. The Catholic Church survived and thrived. It, too, was reformed by the Reformation. Martin Luther became a mythic figure, a champion of intellectual and philosophical rebellion and one of the first men in history to assert his individuality against the hegemonic ideology of his time.

In 1517, Luther saw that the Church was broken and he sought to give it form again. In 2011, our church is also broken. People are leaving in droves. Our stance on social justice issues is largely limited to words and resolutions, but lacks any real action. The stances themselves are deliberately vague to keep from alienating a diverse base of financial support that covers the entire political spectrum. We have trouble practicing what we preach and we get so caught up in the trappings of modern Christianity that we ignore or forget about the meat of our beliefs. We don't question. We don't debate. We don't grow in our faith through serious reflection and discussion. We are stagnant, without form.

We need to re-form our church. We need to give it life again, the same way Martin Luther did. We need the courage to say that the institution is wrong. We need to take a good, hard look at the scriptures and remind ourselves of what we believe. The time has come — time for a new Reformation.

Blessed...

Word cloud from the first part of the Sermon on the Mount. Interesting to see where the gospel writer places the emphasis. Lots of blessed brothers and sisters...

The Drum Major Instinct

“I know a man — and I just want to talk about him a minute, and maybe you will discover who I'm talking about as I go down the way because he was a great one. And he just went about serving. He was born in an obscure village, the child of a poor peasant woman. And then he grew up in still another obscure village, where he worked as a carpenter until he was thirty years old. Then for three years, he just got on his feet, and he was an itinerant preacher. And he went about doing somethings. He didn't have much. He never wrote a book. He never held an office. He never had a family. He never owned a house. He never went to college. He never visited a big city. He never went two hundred miles from where he was born. He did none of the usual things that the world would associate with greatness. He had no credentials but himself.

“He was only thirty-three when the tide of public opinion turned against him. They called him a rabble-rouser. They called him a troublemaker. They said he was an agitator. He practiced civil disobedience; he broke injunctions. And so he was turned over to his enemies and went through the mockery of a trial. And the irony of it all is that his friends turned him over to them. One of his closest friends denied him. Another of his friends turned him over to his enemies. And while he was dying, the people who killed him gambled for his clothing, the only possession that he had in the world. When he was dead he was buried in a borrowed tomb, through the pity of a friend.

“Nineteen centuries have come and gone and today he stands as the most influential figure that ever entered human history. All of the armies that ever marched, all the navies that ever sailed, all the parliaments that ever sat, and all the kings that ever reigned put together have not affected the life of man on this earth as much as that one solitary life. His name may be a familiar one. But today I can hear them talking about him. Every now and then somebody says, "He's King of Kings." And again I can hear somebody saying, "He's Lord of Lords." Somewhere else I can hear somebody saying, "In Christ there is no East nor West." And then they go on and talk about, "In Him there's no North and South, but one great Fellowship of Love throughout the whole wide world." He didn't have anything. He just went around serving and doing good.

“This morning, you can be on his right hand and his left hand if you serve. It's the only way in.

“Every now and then I guess we all think realistically about that day when we will be victimized with what is life's final common denominator — that something we call death. We all think about it. And every now and then I think about my own death, and I think about my own funeral. And I don't think of it in a morbid sense. Every now and then I ask myself, "What is it that I would want said?" And I leave the wordto you this morning.

“If any of you are around when I have to meet my day, I don't want a long funeral. And if you get somebody to deliver the eulogy, tell them not to talk too long. Every now and then I wonder what I want them to say. Tell them not to mention that I have a Nobel Peace Prize, that isn't important. Tell them not to mention that I have three or four hundred other awards, that's not important. Tell him not to mention where I went to school.

“I'd like somebody to mention that day, that Martin Luther King, Jr., tried to give his life serving others. I'd like for somebody to say that day, that Martin Luther King, Jr.,tried to love somebody. I want you to say that day, that I tried to be right on the war question. I want you to be able to say that day that I did try to feed the hungry. I want you to be able to say that day that I did try in my life to clothe those who were naked. I want you to say, on that day, that I did try, in my life, to visit those who were in prison. I want you to say that I tried to love and serve humanity.

“Yes, if you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice; say that I was a drum major for peace; I was a drum major for righteousness. And all of the other shallow things will not matter. I won't have any money to leave behind. I won't have the fine and luxurious things of life to leave behind. But I just want to leave a committed life behind. And that's all I want to say.

If I can help somebody as I pass along,

If I can cheer somebody with a word or song,

If I can show somebody he's traveling wrong,

Then my living will not be in vain.

If I can do my duty as a Christian ought,

If I can bring salvation to a world once wrought,

If I can spread the message as the master taught,

Then my living will not be in vain.

Yes, Jesus, I want to be on your right or your left side, not for any selfish reason. I want to be on your right or your left side, not in terms of some political kingdom or ambition. But I just want to be there in love and in justice and in truth and in commitment to others, so that we can make of this old world a new world.

- Rev Martin Luther King, Jr.

1968

The Economy of Grace

"Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you that have no money, come, buy and eat! Come buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food." 

- Isaiah 55:1-2

Today, in the midst of a meeting of the Dome Creative Team for the ELCA's Youth Gathering, we happened across these verses from the prophet Isaiah and it got me to thinking. In our everyday lives, we are so caught up in the material — the market economy, the exchange of goods and services, the global systems of cash and credit — that we forget that God doesn't play by our rules.

In a nation hit hard by a recession and very possibly heading into another one, we are acutely aware of the difficulties of surviving in the secular modern world. According to the latest figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the national unemployment rate was 9.1% in September. Concerns about how to repay student loans, pay rent, and put food on the table dominate our thinking and guide our choices. In captalist society, someone usually has to lose for others to gain.

God's economy doesn't work like human economies. Through Isaiah, we are invited to enter the marketplace. Everyone is invited to buy, but God doesn't take cash, credit, or debit. You buy without money. There's never a bill or an invoice. To the western mind, this sounds like gibberish, but for God, it makes perfect sense, because God is far beyond the acquisition of wealth. Grace is a priceless gift — literally priceless.

We have difficulty fathoming this economy, but that is only because our worldview is so narrow. We can barely see beyond our own wallet. We are consumed with paychecks and car payments and in doing so, we have missed the point of our existence. Why do we spend our money on that which is not bread and our labor on that which does not satisfy? Is this not the perfect critique of modernity? We do we do all these things that ultimately do not fill the emptiness?

In the 16th century, Martin Luther rebelled against the Church's practice of selling indulgences, proclaiming that we are saved by grace, not any earthly institution. He saw that God expresses no interest in our money. God is selling something infinitely more real: this mysterious, intangible thing called grace. We have been invited to eat was is good and delight ourselves in rich food. Even if we are unworthy, God forgives us free of charge. If we are unable to pay, God picks up the check. That's good news.

Why this Christian-in-Progress Supports Gay Marriage

Photo by Jonny Eberle.

Arnold: "I don't know what to say to you. I really don't. I'm not trying to throw it in your face but it is what I am and it's not just a matter of who I sleep with. Ma, try to imagine the world the other way around. Imagine that every movie, book, magazine, T.V. show, newspaper, commercial, billboard told you that you should be homosexual. But you know you're not and you know that for you this is right..."


Ma: "Arnold, stop already. You're talking crazy."


Arnold: "You want to know what's crazy? That after all these years, I'm still sitting here justifying my life. That's what's crazy."


Ma: " You call this a life? This is a sickness! But this is what you've chosen for yourself."


Arnold: "Ma, look: I'm gay. I don't know why. I don't think anyone does. But that's what I am. For as far back as I can remember. Back before I knew it was different or wrong..."

- Torch Song Trilogy by Harvey Fierstein

Last month, the New York State Legislature passed the Marriage Equality Act, making New York the largest state in the country to legalize same-sex marriage. When I heard the news, I remember feeling pride — pride in the fact that we were finally taking steps toward a more loving and accepting future.

Some people are surprised to hear that I support gay marriage and go to church. Personally, I don't see why the two have to be mutually exclusive. The God I believe in is a loving God, who loves everyone, not just straight people. The God I believe in makes no exceptions and any interpretation that casts him as a father who doesn't love all of his children and would condemn some of them because of how he created them just feels wrong.

In 1st Corinthians 13:13, Paul writes to the church in Corinth, "And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love."In the gospels, Jesus says the same thing, telling an expert in the law, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment. And the second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself'" (Matthew 22:37-39).

Love your neighbor as yourself. That's what it all comes down to. Loving our neighbors — all of our neighbors — and God makes no distinction between people like us and people who are different. In his day, Jesus was criticized because he associated with the unclean members of Jewish society. He ate with tax collectors and went around healing lepers.

I am convinced that if Jesus was here today, you would not find him in the pews of our churches. You would find him among the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer community. Why? Because Jesus does not side with public opinion or authority. He sides with the people society and the church condemn. Not to convert them. Not to "save" them, because there is nothing wrong with them. He goes there to show them that God loves them unconditionally, just as they are. If we want to call ourselves Christians — followers of Jesus Christ — we would do well to follow his example.

Yet, people still hate. Christians in particular often denounce homosexuality as a sin. When I hear this hateful rhetoric, I am ashamed to be connected to an organization that can be so blinded by dogma that it forgets its founding ideals. If we took a step back and saw the hurt anti-gay sentiment has on real people, we would be disgusted by ourselves.

Arnold: "Listen, Ma, you had it easy. You have thirty-five years to remember, I have five. You had your children and friends to comfort you, I had me! My friends didn't want to hear about it. They said, 'What're you gripin' about? At least you had a lover.' 'Cause everybody knows that queers don't love. How dare I? You had it easy, Ma. You lost your husband in a nice clean hospital, I lost mine out there. They killed him there on the street. Twenty-three years old laying dead on the street. Killed by a bunch of kids with baseball bats. Children. Children taught by people like you. 'Cause everybody knows that queers don't matter! Queers don't love! And those that do deserve what they get!"

I hope that one day, this won't even be an issue. I pray that my children will ask me about the gay marriage battle and ask, "Dad, what was that all about?" because they won't understand what the big deal was. Someone has to take a stand. As Christians-in-progress, I think we're called to stand with those who are told that everything they are is wrong and that they need to be "cured."

Jesus loved everyone. Why can't we?

The Power of Simple Things

There is beauty in simplicity. There is a poetry in small things; in the complimentary relationship between light and shadow, word and image, form and function.

I remember leaving a 3-D movie showing recently with my head pounding and my senses overwhelmed. I drove home, got to the front door and turned to look up at the sky, where I could clearly see the Milky Way snaking across the a black velvet sky. Unlike Harry Potter, it was not a manufactured effect costing millions of dollars, but the simple (yet powerful) fusion of hydrogen atoms, the simplest and most common element in the universe. Still, it captivated me with its singular normalcy.

I am currently part of a planning committee for a huge Lutheran student gathering in New Orleans. An unfathomable 36,000 high schoolers are coming. It is expected that they will leave with a sense of awe after participating. Headline artists will be contracted, a huge stage will be constructed, complete with a towering, 100-foot cross adorned with lights. This is big.

I'm sure I would faint if I knew the exact figure that's being dropped on this 5-day event.  It's probably better for me not to know. However, I can't help but wonder if we're missing something — a larger truth. It is hard for me to reconcile the poverty and devastation of New Orleans as a backdrop for a spiritual extravaganza where no expense will be spared. How do we justify that kind of extravagance when people just outside the Super Dome are going hungry. Is that an authentic experience?

Perhaps I'm being a buzz-kill. The organizers want students to get excited about their faith. They want them to be fired up and moved by the Spirit. I want that, too. In a church that has drifted away from the youth and into retirement communities, we need to hang on to these guys or there won't even be a church in 30 years. But, I have to ask, do we really need to fly the bishop in on a wire to do it? Do we need slick graphics? Do we need to be put up in hotels with attached water parks? Is that all that we are? Is that all that we stand for?

I want people to have fun. I want people to feel like they are a part of something big and to talk about it years after with fondness and wonder, but I don't want to manufacture awe with pyrotechnics and laser shows. My faith is about so much more than that.

My Teacher walked everywhere. He slept outside on the ground and ate with lepers and tax collectors, of all people. My Teacher lived a simple life. So, why do we feel the need to dress him up, shower him, shave him, gel his hair back and teach him a dance routine? All I need to feel fulfilled is the Word and the Meal.

I often don't know why I'm here and I feel stupid suggesting that maybe the stage should be bare, with just a small, wooden cross (or maybe just the shadow of a cross) instead of a production worthy of the Super Bowl Halftime Show or the Academy Awards. In the end, it won't matter how tall the flames were or if you could feel the bass in the back seats. In the end, there is a message that challenges us to go out and live as Christ lived and died.

Maybe we need to reassess why we're doing this. Maybe we need to take a few steps back and ask if the fireworks and choreography are all absolutely necessary to the impact of this gathering. I'm not qualified to answer that and I am open to the idea that I could be completely wrong about all of this, but the idea of simplicity and the power of a moment of silence is something I cannot shake.

All I can do is put it in God's hands and trust that he knows where he wants us to go. The rest is faith — simple as that.

Defining a New Christianity

Tonight, I went dancing with a few friends at a local bar. While the jazz band was taking a break, we sat at our table and sipped water. One of my friends, an atheist, asked me what I was doing this weekend, to which I replied that I was going to Wisconsin. I didn't immediately say why, so she probed. Finally, I admitted quietly that I was going to help plan a youth gathering. I said it quickly, almost under my breath. I wasn't ashamed of my involvement...or was I?

When you ask me what I am, I will often reply that I'm a writer or a filmmaker or a student or Albino Black Irish. I make it a point not to introduce myself as a Christian, though. In fact, most of my friends go years before they find out I go to church. But why all the subterfuge?

The moniker "Christian" once meant rebel. It identified you as a a committed follower of the teachings of Jesus Christ. Today, "Christian" means collaborator, bigot, or ignorant. So, what changed? Did Jesus' message change? Or did we change?

The church is broken. Centuries of brutality and bureaucracy has transformed a few pockets of zealous free-thinkers into a monstrous organization that, in many ways, ignores its founding principles. The public by and large sees Christians as backward, intolerant hypocrites and the reputation is well-earned. When I tell someone I am a Christian, I risk losing my credibility and their respect. That is a tragedy.

Today, there is no blood, but people in pews have fallen into a safe routine where they are called upon to do nothing more than sit, stand, sing, and put money in the offering plate. There has got to be more to it than that.

I shouldn't have to be ashamed because I believe. I dream of a new Christianity that gets back to the root of what it all means. Loving our neighbor (all of our neighbors). Caring for the sick and the needy.

There are needy people among us. Not just on the streets, but in the sanctuaries. There are people in need of a new, more spiritually-fulfilling Christianity — a Christianity that is not afraid to get its hands dirty to do what is right; a Christianity that doesn't fear questions or dissenting viewpoints. The church of the future should show the world that it practices what it preaches.

I am not a Christian. I am a Christian-in-progress — a flawed human being who wants to follow Jesus' example, who wants to be a good man, but struggles to get there. The church, while broken in many ways, is also a work-in-progress, but there is hope. We may have strayed, but our shepherd will guide us to greener pastures. We are saved by grace, even from ourselves.