Six

Nine months before graduating from Brite Divinity School and a few years before ordination, this little blog began. What began as a series of random thoughts with an audience size of one a month now is a series of random thoughts with an audience size of about 700 a month. 

You readers are the largest congregation that I will ever have the privilege of engaging on a regular basis. Thank you for subscribing, reading, commenting and sharing with others. 

If this blog were a person, this is what the development would be. Which other than the math portion, this is just about right.

With this milestone, I will be taking a week sabbath from writing. 

How Where's Waldo exposes a problem with Christianity

Where's Waldo may not be the cultural icon it was when I was a kid of the 1990's but I still see this little guy around sometimes in the bookstore (also seemingly a dying icon of my childhood). In case you are not aware of what "Waldo" is all about, it is a book where you search different scenes and try to find the "Waldo" character. Frustratingly simple and boy did I love it.

I would race my brother to determine who was the best Waldo-finder in our house. To this day I secretly assess if the person I am looking at a Waldo scene with it smarter then me based on how quickly they find him. Most of the time, everyone finds him before I do and thus I feel less smart by the end of the book. 

Where's Waldo is a fun little thing to do and I marvel at the imagination of the artists to draw such crazy scenes. There is also a sense of excitement when you begin to look, a sense of challenge sets in after a few minutes. Frustration can set in when you begin to convince yourself that Waldo is not in this scene at all and then the moment you find Waldo there is a sense of satisfaction and affirmation that you are encouraged to go through the whole process again and turn the page. It is the search that makes Waldo fun. 

Which is why one of the worsts gifts you can give is a Where's Waldo book with Waldo circled on every page in thick black marker. Sure the other person will always be able to quickly "find" Waldo in every scene, but you also have removed the joy of the search. 

Large parts of Christianity have become fixated on sharing our faith with others but doing so with all the answers already given. Some Christian communities tell you what the answers are to every question. When people are searching for the "real Noah's arc" they believe that in finding it they will answer the question and thus bring more people to the faith. I contest that in "proving" all sorts of things in Christianity surmount to marking up the faith with a thick black marker. Sure, you can see the "answer" but then the joy of the search is removed. 

Give me a blank Where's Waldo book anytime.

What a Conversation Between Kermit & Fozzie Shows About Self Identity

In 1979, The Muppet Movie was being filmed. It is the only film that I know of with a product placement of both a Studebaker and pistachio ice cream.

The genius of Jim Henson Productions cannot be contained in one post, but the first two minutes of this video between Kermit and Fozzie is another example of their brilliance.

This is recording of a sound and camera check for the film and so the dialogue is improvised. Rather than going through the standard "check" or "Sibilance" there is an existential conversation about self identification.

Fozzie takes the position that he is able to self identify as a bear. Kermit plainly points out that in fact Fozzie is not a bear. He is made of foam rubber and fake fur. He does not hibernate. He is not a real life bear. Now you and I know this, but this comes as a huge shock to Fozzie who then, in a turn of tit-for-tat, informs Kermit that he has a wire attached to his arm. 

As silly as this conversation is, it is an example of how Christians think of ourselves. 

Christians in America tend to think of Christianity as an identity that we can claim all on our own. We are like Fozzie who thinks he is a bear because he says he is a bear. I am a Christian because I say that I am Christian. We live in a place where self-identification as Christian goes unchallenged. There are few Kermit-type people saying, "You cannot say you are a Christian and condemn people like you do." Or "You cannot say you are Christian and do not practice the spiritual disciplines that Jesus taught." 

Christianity is a religion that is practiced by the individual but confirmed by a community. It is like saying you can study medicine all you want but unless people agree to be treated by you, you are not a doctor. We are not Christians unless the community (and as a Methodist I affirm the community to be Bible, tradition, reason and collective experience ) confirms that your actions reflect what the community understands a Christian to be. 

We all know this in the extreme. When someone says they are Christian then murders and steals and lies and cheats, the community agrees that the person in question is not Christian - no matter how they self identify. It is the actions of the person that defines who they are, not their words.

This idea requires more space and time to unpack everything, but this is not a thesis paper. This is a blog post designed to kickstart a conversation. 

So let the conversation begin!

Cleanliness is next to Godliness? Science Suggests Maybe Not

Many religious rituals involve a washing or a bathing. This washing/bathing symbolically connects the physical cleanliness with a spiritual/moral purity. Washing is a powerful symbol for a number of reasons and Christianity uses this symbol in baptism, in telling the story of Jesus' last supper and even at his trial. When I was working for the Catholic Church I would help the priest symbolically wash his hands before celebrating communion and even as a minister today, I put hand sanitizer on my hands prior to communion. 

While the Church has long understood the validity of the sacrament does not depend upon the moral character of the minister (which is why I will not re-baptize you) we still hold onto the connection between physical and moral purity. 

Dr. Thalma Lobel writes in her Sensation: The New Science of Physical Intelligence about a study about bathing and honesty. Here is the set up:

People were given a test and when the time was up, the answer sheet was given to each person to "check their answers". The people were to use the answer sheet to mark on their own pages the number of incorrect answers they gave. They found that some people used the answer sheet and changed some of their original answers and gave themselves a better score.

Some in the group were asked to take a shower prior to the test and others were not. The assumption was that those who took the shower before the test would be physically clean and thus influenced to be morally clean when it came test time. However the study showed that those who were more likely to lie or cheat were those who took a shower prior to the test.

The reason? The researchers suggest that those who took the bath "felt clean" (both physically and morally) and thus felt they had a little more "room to get dirty". 

Clergy are constantly in a position of being physically clean. We go into hospitals and must wash a our hands. We perform rituals that require a physical washing as a part of the ritual. We are expected to have clean clothes and look "professional' and "put together", and if not then we question the if the man who looks disheveled is a very good clergy person. Clergy expectation/stereotypes involve descriptors like being "squeaky clean", using "clean" never "foul" language", and avoiding the "dirty side" of life (such as smoking and drinking and rated R movies that deal with the macabre). Could these expectations of clean clergy ironically, contribute to clergy feeling more like we have room to "get a little dirty"? 

Maybe this is in part why Jesus was not in favor of his disciples washing their hands before eating?

“Now when the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around him, they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them. (For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they thoroughly wash their hands, thus observing the tradition of the elders; and they do not eat anything from the market unless they wash it; and there are also many other traditions that they observe, the washing of cups, pots, and bronze kettles.) So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, ‘Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?’”

— Mark 7:1-5