Fringe Faith

Schools -- too focused on the academic?

2012-02-01T12:16:00.002+11:00

Recently, Mama Mia published an article saying that parentsexpect teachers to be substitute parents. The article said that teachers shouldbe responsible for things like grammar and mathematics, while parents should'mould the manner of the child.' You can find the original article here: http://www.mamamia.com.au/parenting/teachers-to-parents-raise-your-own-damned-kids/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=%24%7Bemail%7D&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+typepad%2FKsWc+%28%24%7BMamamia+-+rss%7D%29.

To a certain extent, I agree. Parents do need to takeresponsibility for their own children. It is inappropriate and unfair to expectteachers to raise their kids. And any parent who leaves the raising of theirchild to a school cannot complain if they don't turn out the way they want them to.

However, I do think the focus schools place on the academicis not doing our children any favours. No matter how well you know yourreading, writing and arithmetic, if you don't know how to get along withothers, behave in certain situations and deal with your emotions, you're notgoing to go far. In fact, it is these life skills that actually the moreimportant than academic results. They help people to succeed in a career and contributeto society. It also affects how people treat our planet, the people in it - andthemselves. Ultimately, a person's test results will not bring themselves orothers much joy. How they live in the world will.

So why not just leave that part of life to the parents andlet the schools focus on the academic part?

First, children spend six hours in school, more when you addin travelling time and homework. Very few parents would have the time to spendsix hours teaching their children values and life skills, once this time forschool is taken out. Admittedly, these kinds of life skills are often woventhroughout other activities. But even then, children will always receive moreacademic training than they do values or life skills training.

Also, the compulsory nature of school and the focus on testslike NAPLAN tells kids that academic performance is important. They areunlikely to feel the same about what their parents are trying to teach them.The weight given to academic results actually changes children's values,because they have been taught from a very early age that it's how well you readand write that really matters in life. Children need to be taught that theirbehaviours, values and attitudes matter too. No matter how much a parent triesto instil this in their children, if they're hearing opposite messages fromelsewhere, then children will have difficulty fully accepting this.

Perhaps most importantly, teachers have far more opportunityto see how a child behaves with other people than the parents do. They arebetter placed to notice a problem and guide them through a situation. One of mysons is very shy and has trouble making friends. While I am constantly workingwith him on this, I am limited by the fact that, when he's around people of hisown age, I'm not usually around. As there are children with learningdifficulties, there are also children with social difficulties. It would begood to see them get the same assistance and guidance as those who don't dowell on tests.

I don't want to suggest that schools are only focused on theacademic. Schools do care about values. They do deal with behaviour problems.At least the schools my kids go to do. I'm sure other schools are the same. Butin a world where schools are judged on their NAPLAN results, obviously they'regoing to pay more attention to academic learning than life learning. And in myopinion, life learning is more important.

Ultimately, it is the parent's responsibility to raise theirchildren. And I for one don't want to leave all that important training to aschool. However, the saying goes that it takes a village to raise a child.Shouldn't then both parents and schools be involved in ensuring that we raisechildren who have all the necessary skills to help them succeed in life? Aschool must be judged by more than how well their students do in tests.

You better be good or Santa won't come: what we are teaching our children about possessions and worth

2011-12-02T09:20:00.001+11:00

For the next four weeks, children all over the world will behearing those words, "If you're not good, Santa won't come." I doubtit makes any difference to behaviour. The problem with threats like these isthey're rarely (if ever) carried out. But it might just be making a differenceto how people think about possessions and worth.

Imagine a child called Trudy. At the ripe old age of 7,Trudy has learnt that, no matter how badly behaved she is, those presents fromSanta still arrive on Christmas Day. Furthermore, she knows that Jenny fromnext-door (also aged 7) usually gets less presents even though Jenny is a verywell-behaved child and Trudy can be quite naughty at times. What is Trudy tomake of this?

Or let's look at it from Jenny's perspective. She is toldthat the same Santa Claus brings presents to everyone. Furthermore, she is toldthat he only gives presents to the good girls or boys. So why is it that Trudygets more presents than her? I doubt she would say it to herself in theseterms, but on some subconscious level, might she not be wondering whether sheis less worthy than Trudy in some unknown way? If she believes the Santarhetoric, what else is she to think?

Let's fast-forward six years. Trudy and Jenny are now 13.Their belief in Santa has gone, but the messages they heard about Santa arestill there. As any psychologist or counsellor knows, the messages we hear inchildhood can affect us long after we have grown up - even if we recognise thatthose messages were false to begin with.

If you haven't already guessed, Trudy comes from a wealthierfamily than Jenny. So while they may not be coming from Santa, Trudy still hasmore and better possessions than Jenny does. Jenny knows it's not because Santahas placed Trudy on the "good list". But maybe, deep down, she stillconnects possessions to worth. Maybe she still feels like Trudy owns morethings because she is more deserving.

Jump another 10 years. Trudy and Jenny have moved out ofhome and are sharing a flat together. Trudy finished uni and got a well-paidjob. Jenny also has a job, but it's not nearly as well-paid as Trudy's is. Bynow, they've not only internalised the Santa message, but the many advertisingmessages they have heard through their lives that tell them, either implicitlyor explicitly, that they should buy something because they deserve it.

Despite the fact that Trudy earns enough to save a littlemoney and use her money to help others and give to charities, she spends it allon herself. Many of the things she buys, she will never even use. But that'sokay (in Trudy's mind). It makes her feel good. She's become her own Santa,rewarding herself with possessions. The more things she owns, the moredeserving she feels.

Jenny also buys lots of things. But because she doesn't earnas much money as Trudy, she puts it on credit. She is sliding further andfurther into debt. But she considers it a small price to pay for the sense ofself-worth it gives her. She has finally made it onto Santa's "goodlist".

Jenny was never any less worthy than Trudy. She only feltthat way because of what society told her. As adults we know that the amount ofpresents Santa brings says nothing about how "good" that child is. Sohow about we stop telling our children that. And how about we recognise theSanta messages we ourselves have internalised - and do our very best to get ridof them.

Our thinking about possessions and worth is damaging notjust to ourselves, but to the earth. In order for this to change (and it doesneed to be changed) we first need to recognise how the messages we hear haveinfluenced the way we think about possessions and worth. It's only then that wecan get rid of them and replace them with something else. We need to come upwith a new message, one where Santa doesn't reward the "good" kids,where we don't own things because we "deserve" them, but where a lifewell-lived is its own reward.

Threats and Theodicy

2011-09-03T15:14:00.000+10:00

A knock on the door isn't usually threatening. Sometimes it can be rather nice. But it is threatening when it's at 2.30 in the morning. It's threatening when you don't know the person at the door. It's threatening when it's obvious you won't answer the door but he still won't go away. It's threatening when you talk to him through the door and find no good reason for him being there - and you don't feel any less threatened when he says that he's okay. And it's threatening when he still won't leave even after you tell him you're going to call the police.

I still didn't feel safe, even after the police came and told him to go. And I remember thinking, somewhere between 2.30 and 6.30 in the morning, Lord, why aren't you protecting me?

It was a silly thought for two reasons. One, I pretty much was safe. He never came inside. He left when the police came. As far as I know, he didn't even try to enter the house. I wasn't physically harmed. The only thing I suffered was a feeling of not being safe.

We seem to have such high expectations in the western world today. We expect to be healthy. We expect to live a long life. We expect to look gorgeous. We expect to be happy and we expect to see good reasons for our happiness. We not only expect to be safe, but we expect to feel safe. Why else would we spend so much money on security systems?

But is it really reasonable to say, being safe isn't enough, I want to feel safe as well?

And, if so, what do we then say to all the people who live with very real threats? I was a lot safer last night than many other people in the world. Is me feeling safe more important than their actual safety? If so, does this really reflect a God of love and justice and compassion on all human beings? If not, why should I expect to feel safe when other people aren't safe?

So then that brings me to the second point. Do we actually have any reason to expect God to protect us?

If we take a good long look at Christian history, we find many examples of people who loved God, but who still suffered or were even killed. How many missionaries have been killed? How many Christian martyrs have there been through the years? And some people might say, well, martyrs and missionaries are different. Although I've never quite figured out why God won't protect people when they're dying for Him, but He will when they're just driving home from a holiday.

And even if we ignore suffering for Christ, Christians have still suffered. The Middle Ages were a time when many people had a very strong Christian faith. Yet this was also a time when the plague took the lives of many. And it wasn't an easy death either. I'm quite sure that there were many Christians praying for God's protection during that time who still died. Or the children they were praying for even more fervently died. And I'm sure there were quite a few towns where the good people died and the evil and wicked people seemed to escape the plague altogether.

We may not have the plague, but things are really no different for us today. Christians suffer and Christians die. I remember reading recently about an old lady who had been killed in the church car-park on her way home from bible study. It's not the first time someone's been killed on their way to or back from church or a church-related event. Can we really expect God to protect us when church car-parks aren't even fatality free?

Questions of theodicy have been around for a very long time. And I'm not even going to attempt to answer the question of why a loving God allows evil to happen to good people. What I am interested in is what it means for how we approach God.

Every night I pray that God keep us free from fear, free from harm and free from evil. And last night, I had fear. But I'm still going to pray that prayer every night. Because, despite everything I've said above, I believe prayer does something.

Maybe it doesn't protect you in all circumstances. Maybe it doesn't always prevent someone knocking on your door in the early hours of the morning. Maybe it doesn't always stop some car driving into you as you're coming home from bible study. Maybe it doesn't prevent your home being flooded. Maybe it doesn't even protect you from turning up to work as normal, to have two airplanes fly into your building.

But maybe sometimes it does. And I do believe that when we pray, God can work with us. There are some things God can't prevent (or he could, but he doesn't because everyone has free will). Then there are things God does prevent. And then there are things he tries to get us to prevent.

He may not be able to stop the drunk getting into his car. Because that drunk has free will. But he can try and get us to avoid going to the shops at that particular moment in time. Maybe he protects us best by whispering something in our ear. Get out of that car. Lock the front door. Don't go into work today. Wait for the next bus instead of running for this one. And often we don't hear that voice. But I believe that when we pray for God's protection, we are more tuned into it. That doesn't mean we're going to hear it all the time. But it is more likely that we will hear it.

But then I also think that some suffering is unavoidable. In a world where everybody has free will, some people (a lot of people) are going to get hurt. And nothing God could say or do (save taking away free will) could stop it happening.

But then we live with that uncertainty all the time. We take vitamin C tablets even though there's no guarantee it will stop us getting the flu. We wear seatbelts in our cars, even though there's no guarantee it will prevent us from being killed in an automobile accident. We lock our houses, even though that's no guarantee that someone won't find another way to break in.

So I believe that praying for God's protection is not, and was never meant to be, a guarantee. But it does invite the Holy Spirit into a situation. It gives God more freedom to work in that situation. And when I'm in a dangerous situation (or even one where I just feel unsafe) I want God and the Holy Spirit working in that situation as much as possible.

Red Letter Christians » Find Your Own Calcutta

2011-07-07T12:57:00.000+10:00

I usually don't share other articles on Fringe Faith too much, but this is an excellent article on Mother Teresa from Red Letter Christians:

Red Letter Christians » Find Your Own Calcutta:

Extract:

"Mother Teresa was all too aware that we have a tendency to look for exotic places to do service for the kingdom of God when, in reality, there are needs all around us that are waiting to be met with Christ’s love. She made us aware that until we are faithful in loving those around us, we ought not to think we will be able to love those who live in some far-off place.

- Sent using Google Toolbar"

A Man Is a Rape-Supporter If…. | Eve Bit First

2011-07-04T16:18:00.000+10:00

A Man Is a Rape-Supporter If…. | Eve Bit First: "- Sent using Google Toolbar"

I came across this list through another blog earlier today and I haven't been able to get it out of my mind. So I thought I would blog about it to get it out my system, so to speak.

What it is is a list of things that show a man is a rape supporter. The list includes quite a lot of things that seem to have nothing to do with rape such as being pro-life, watching movies or musicals that sexually demean women, or subordinating the interests of women. It's a long list and I'm not going to reproduce it all here. But I think it's worth having a look at.

First up, though, let me say I don't agree with this list. Just because someone has decided that these activities support rape doesn't mean that they actually do. And not only would many men fit one of the categories listed here, but so would quite a few women I know. I'm pro-life. That does not make me pro-rape. And I fail to see how wanting to reduce the killing of babies (and the psychological harm to mothers) translates to supporting rape. Also, I love musicals. And let's face it, some of them are quite demeaning to women. But just because I enjoy musicals doesn't mean I agree with the way they portray women anymore than liking Judy Garland means that I agree with the drugs she took or the suicide attempts she made.

But the reason I have been thinking about it so much is because I think it's a wasted opportunity. The list is obviously meant to be one where all men have participated in at least one activity. It is deliberately broad. But all that does is mean the die-hard feminists are agreeing, saying, yeah, all men are rape supporters. And everybody else is shaking their head, going this person doesn't know what they're on about. Because that was my first reaction. There was no 'Wow, she has some really interesting things to say.' It was all, 'She's got to be kidding, right.'

And that's all well and good if all she wants to do is get people who already agree with her to agree with her some more. But I believe that rape and the sexual demeaning of women are things that we should try and do something about. And this post isn't going to do it.

Firstly, I think the list would have been better if there had been less on it. Let's look at those things that really do contribute to women's rape and try to address them. Secondly, I think we should differentiate between those actions that actually support rape and those that are just demeaning to women. Because there's a lot on this list that, while I don't agree support rape, I believe are wrong and that men need to start thinking about. Women are not just sexual objects. And we do need to change men's thinking where they think of us as only sexual objects. And I do believe that often women are objectified by men who don't really understand what they are doing. I need we need to think about a lot of the stuff that's on this list - without suggesting that men who do these things are supporting rape.

But I don't think this list is going to change anyone's thinking. In the comments, she points out that the list is meant to include all men. Well I understand that. But I believe most men will read this and go, this is ridiculous and I have nothing to learn from it. They know they're never going to avoid everything on the list, so why even try to avoid anything. Much better to have a shorter list that people can go, you know something, I'm actually going to try and change this in my life.

But I fear her aim in writing this list was not to effect change at all. It was to get a whole heap of women agreeing with her that, yes, all men are rape supporters. I'm not sure what good that does. At the most, it might get some women hating men more than they already do. It certainly isn't going to stop men from raping women - and I for one believe stopping rape is more important than making men feel bad for 'supporting' it.

A Franciscan Benediction

2011-07-03T16:13:00.005+10:00

A Franciscan Benediction

May God bless you with discomfit

At easy answers, half-truths, and superficial relationships

So that you may live deep within your heart.

May God bless you with anger

At injustice, oppression, and exploitation of people

So that you may work for justice, freedom and peace.

May God bless you with tears

To shed for those who suffer pain, rejection, hunger and war

So that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and

To turn their pain into joy.

And may God bless you with enough foolishness

To believe that you can make a difference in the world,

So that you can do what others claim cannot be done

To bring justice and kindness to all our children and the poor.

(Taken from Prayer, by Philip Yancey.)

Of the world, but not in it - and no, that's not a typo

2011-07-02T16:45:00.002+10:00

One oft-repeated Christian phrase says we are to be in the world, not of it. It’s a good phrase. Christians are meant to live in this world while still having Christian values. But dare I suggest that sometimes we seem more like people who are ‘of the world, but not in it’.

I think western society in general tends to separate itself from the world. We drive to work in cars, never having to look in the eyes of or rub shoulders with our fellow commuters and where the only communication involves a horn or a finger. We separate ourselves from the weather and the seasons, with air-conditioned houses and then complain how cold (or how hot) it is. Our food comes to us pre-packaged on supermarket shelves, where we never have to see (much less worry about) the weather, the ground, the killing of animals and everything else that helped produce that food.

The impact of suffering is diluted through television screens and minimised into five-minute segments that fail to adequately convey the grief and suffering that people out there beyond TV land are feeling. Their tears don’t stop and their hunger doesn’t end when the anchorman switches to the sport.

Christians can separate themselves from the world in any of the ways listed above. But we can also separate ourselves from non-Christians. We go to church, attend bible studies and hang out with Christian friends, all (or most) of whom have roughly the same values and ideas as we do. We hear the same advice, speak the same language and hang out in Christian world together. Often, churches have a “come to us” mentality, where people who aren’t Christians are always welcome to hang out in Christian world too, but where we fail to go out to them.

Sometimes churches send people to other countries for missionary work - which is a great thing. But do those of us who don’t go end up looking at the photos, patting ourselves on the back for supporting such a worthwhile cause and meanwhile ignoring the suffering in our midst?

There's this song I love called Not Too Far From Here. It’s basically talking about how somewhere near here there is someone crying or someone who needs help. I don’t have any statistics, but I think it would be fair to say that most of us walk by at least 10 people in any given week who desperately need someone to reach out to them. And sure, we don’t help because we don’t know. And we don’t know because they haven’t told us. And we can’t exactly go around stopping every person we see and asking if they need help. But maybe if we were a bit more ‘in the world’, if we rubbed shoulders and met eyes and communicated on a real level, we would know. Maybe they do want to tell someone they need help, but they just haven’t had an opportunity.

One of the things I love about the internet is it lets me see what is going on in the world. I know when there’s been an earthquake or Christians are being persecuted or schoolkids are being bullied or whatever. And because I know, I can care. And because I care, I can pray. And because I pray, I can be one tiny part of seeing God’s will done in that situation.

But I do wonder whether, as our knowledge of hurts and injustices on a global scale increases, our ability to recognise it on a local scale decreases. Are we too busy staring at the horror on our TV screens that we do not hear the person knocking on our door?

So that’s the not in the world part. Here’s the of the world part.

We live in a consumer culture. We live in a society that places a high value on what can be bought or sold. We measure the importance of things by the dollar value attached. We also seek to solve our problems by buying things. Feel too cold? Buy a heater. Got grey hair? Buy a hair dye. Got acne? Buy this skin product. Not feeling sexy enough? Buy this body spray. Feeling depressed? Buy this vitamin.

Not getting the spiritual results you want? Buy this Christian DVD.

Now I’m not suggesting that Christian books or DVDs are bad. I love Christian books. But I do get annoyed when people say, if you just get this book or DVD, your life will be changed (or blessed). Because it’s the same message we hear from TV every day. Got a problem? Fix it with this product.

And from the church I want something different. I want to see people who place more value on spiritual riches and relationships than they do on material wealth. And I actually want to see a church that doesn’t want to solve every problem, but that seeks God and sees him working in the midst of our problems. And I also don’t think that churches should be about selling themselves (or God) to unbelievers, where God is made to sound that the best new product on the market and the quick-fix that will instantly give us everything we want.

Yes, God is good. But we must remember that suffering and persecution receive a lot of space in the bible. And we shouldn’t leave them out of our churches just because their brand value is low.

This isn’t a dig at any specific church. I don't know of any individual church that really does live completely of the world, but not in it. But I think with all churches the temptation is there, the temptation to isolate ourselves from nature, suffering and the wider world and to embrace a Christianity that involves just buying the right products and reflecting the market-mentality of wider society.

Rejection and Acceptance

2011-06-24T22:34:00.000+10:00

I seem to have a problem with rejection. No matter how many times I kick it out of my life, it seems to find its way back in again. It’s partly my fault, I suppose. Not only do I leave my doors unlocked, but I open them widely whenever rejection walks past. I thought about locking them. But if you lock your doors against rejection, you also lock your door from ever getting close to anyone. It’s very hard to love those outside your life, when your door is locked against them. And the minute you unlock your door, rejection is likely to sneak right in.

It’s a struggle I deal with constantly. Because I suppose I seem to have to deal with rejection a lot more than other people. While occasionally rejection might sneak into the life of another person, with me, it’s always there, ready to come in the minute I open the door to anybody. And that’s tough. Do I leave the door open and constantly have to deal with rejection? Or do I leave it closed and shut everybody out of my life for good?

I’ve decided to keep opening the door. And yes, that means rejection comes in - constantly. And not only does rejection come in, but it hurts me. It seems to know exactly what to say and what to do that will cause me the most pain. I think it’s probably because it’s hitting scars that have never fully healed over and possibly never will. It’s hard to be healed of something when you keep getting injuries in the same place.

But anyway, this is sounding a bit like a pity party and it’s certainly not meant to be one. I have to bore myself with my own pity parties, I don’t really feel like boring my readers. What it is meant to be is my thoughts on remaining hopeful in spite of rejection.

And firstly, opening my door has meant that I have opened my life to some very wonderful people, people that I would never have known if I kept my doors locked shut. I know people used to tell me that it was like I had an invisible wall when I was talking to people. I hope that that wall isn’t there anymore. I don’t think it is. And my life has been truly blessed because I managed to take that wall down.

And of course, the big issue here is that God doesn’t reject me. And I would much rather be rejected by every single person in the world (which definitely has not happened - I haven’t even been rejected by everyone I know) than be rejected by God. Because the rejection we face down here on earth is nothing compared to what it would be like if God rejected us.

And He has every reason to reject us. We’ve disobeyed him. We’ve turned our backs on him. We’re sinful and prideful.

But instead, what does he do? He sends his Son to die so that He could accept us. Jesus faced the rejection of men Himself, so that God could accept me. That’s pretty amazing. It’s not just that God doesn’t reject us when we deserve to be rejected. He makes a way for us to become acceptable to Him.

No matter what I say in my pity parties, I am not a reject. Jesus died so I didn’t have to be one. And no matter how upset I get when I am rejected - or how undeserved I think it might be - the truth is that no-one was rejected more unfairly than Christ. Furthermore, He died so that I could receive acceptance from God that I don’t deserve at all. Maybe I have received undeserved rejection. But I have also received undeserved acceptance from God. And that’s far more important.

Misconceptions

2011-04-29T17:57:00.000+10:00

Recently, I read Misconceptions, a book by Naomi Wolf about pregnancy, labour and having babies. It was an excellent book and I recommend it to anyone who plans on getting pregnant in the future - though possibly not if you’re pregnant now. It’s not your typical feel-good, self-help type pregnancy book. In fact, you might say it’s that type of book’s evil twin sister. Rather than being a book about what to expect when you’re expecting, it’s more about how our expectations are wrong and how society fails women in this crucial time.

It’s been nine years since I was pregnant. So I was reading it more from the point of view of reflecting on the past, rather than imagining the future. I did feel complete sympathy for Wolf when she said she threw up constantly throughout her pregnancy. And when she said the last day she was physically ill from morning sickness was on the day of her labour, I felt like yelling out ‘Me too!’. It’s the first person I’ve heard of who was also sick every day (often a few times a day) for the entire nine months. But that said, it’s not that common. And although I would have liked to have known that was a possibility, I imagine if they put it in all the pregnancy books a whole heap of women would be worried about something that probably wouldn’t happen to them.

One of the sections that I believe deserves a lot of consideration is where Wolf talks about the lack of support available to women after they have a new baby. Unfortunately it’s not a problem that is easy to fix. In the past, when a woman had a baby, there was lots of family support around. Most likely she would be living in the same area as her parents, sisters, aunts, cousins and family friends. Furthermore, many of these women were not working. Nowadays, a woman’s family can be all around the globe. It is not unusual for women to have no relatives at all in the same area. And even her mother (usually a key support person) is quite often working and unable to help in the way mothers could in the past. We can also add to the problems the fact that many women nowadays are single mothers from the beginning of their child’s life. So these people do not even have the support of a husband or partner.

I don’t think there’s an easy fix for this. We can’t make people go back to living in the same town or tell grandmothers that they can’t work. But I think at the very least society must recognise that women are not getting the support they need. We must see that new mothers now are far more isolated and alone than they ever had in the past. Something needs to be done to address this issue. What? I don’t know. But at least if we admit there is a problem there, that’s a start.

But the part that I found most heart-wrenching was actually the part that I couldn’t relate to at all. It was about labour. I never realised how lucky I was, before reading this. Maybe it’s because I’m in Australia and things are better here than in America. I suspect it probably also has something to do with the fact that I gave birth in a small hospital. Although I went in on Medicare, and theoretically did not have a choice of doctor, the doctor who delivered both my children was the same doctor I saw through the pregnancy. All the midwives were extremely supportive.

The only thing that went wrong with my ‘labour plan’ was probably due to the midwives actually trying to give me what I wanted. I had a tape that I had put relaxing music on. The only problem was I didn’t reach the end of the tape. As it was taped over an old Choirboys tape, my labour took place to the sounds of lovely, relaxing music, followed by Choirboys. It was really annoying me, but I didn’t have the energy to say anything. And I guess the midwives just supposed that that was what I wanted.

The story Wolf tells in Misconception is very different. Although she is describing the situation in the US, I suspect that some of it at least is true for Australia. And if not, there’s a chance it may follow US lines soon. But in the US at least, women’s labour receives way too much medical intervention. Wolf claims that doctors are more likely to say medical intervention is needed to justify their big pay-checks. But the biggest problem seems to be that doctors and hospitals operate on a timeframe. A woman is expected to give birth within a certain period of time. If this doesn’t happen, then all kinds of medical intervention takes place - including Caesareans when they’re not really necessary.

And some people might say, well does it really matter? For a start, labour will always be painful - and modern medicine has come up with some very good ways of alleviating that pain. Furthermore, there are very good reasons why we need medical intervention. I’m sure no-one wants to go back to the days when there was a good chance a woman might die every time they gave birth.

But at the same time, I believe we are ruining a beautiful, spiritual, natural event. It is the time in a woman’s life when she gets to feel something of the joy the Creator must have felt when he looked over all He made. We get to not only see, but be part of new life coming into this world. And at the risk of offending the feminists, we also get to appreciate one of the great joys of being a woman. We are part of the ongoing story of generation after generation of women giving birth, and generation after generation of life coming into this world. So yes, I want medical intervention - sometimes. But I don’t want that medical intervention to completely take over this experience.

And I think it’s part of a wider story too. It’s a story where we fail to value what is spiritual and natural and beautiful. We replace God’s intended plan with profit-maximising practices. Instead of waiting for nature, we impose our will on it so that it meets our deadlines. We presume that our way of doing things is better than God’s way. We’re too busy and too egotistical to recognise the spiritual dimension of what is happening in our world. Quite simply, we fail to see.

In order for this world to truly reflect God’s plan, we need to uncover the spiritual dimensions that hide behind so many things. And just because human beings can come in with their machines and their technology and their ‘expertise’ doesn’t actually mean they are actually the experts. To truly be an expert, we need to not just look at the ‘facts’ or the ‘science’ or the ‘data’, but the whole. And the whole does not just consist of what we can study or what we can see, but includes those spiritual aspects as well.

Having a baby is not just a medical procedure. It is the most beautiful, emotional and I would say spiritual time in a woman’s life. And a successful outcome is not just a healthy baby delivered within a set timeframe. Instead it is one where the entire woman (body, emotions and soul) is respected and valued. It is one where all dimensions of the labour are looked after, rather than just the physical. And to be completely successful, it needs to recognise that giving birth is a natural and spiritual event and should be treated as such.

In-groups

2011-04-18T02:48:00.002+10:00

I have tried three times tonight to go to sleep. And each time, I just end up sitting there, thinking and getting upset. So I eventually thought, stuff it. Let’s get up and write my thoughts out and do something productive. It’s probably going to be the kind of post I shouldn’t write. But that’s who I am. I’m honest about my feelings and I’m honest about my pain. And really, I don’t think there’s much point in writing about personal experiences unless you are honest. It’s honesty that makes a piece of writing worth reading - in my opinion anyway.

So anyway, what I have been thinking about is in-groups. Now people who are in the ‘in-group’ usually don’t even realise there is one. I’ve been in heaps of situations where I point out there is an ‘in-group’ and those who are in the ‘in-group’ go, ‘no, there isn’t’ and people who are out of the ‘in-group’ nod their heads in acknowledgment. It’s really hard to recognise the in-group when you’re inside of it. It’s hard to miss when you’re outside of it.

I’ve spent most of my life not in the in-group. I’ve looked at it from outside, wishing I was a part of it. It was like that at school. It’s quite often like that in church. Today, I felt a bit like that at my own birthday party.

And that’s okay. Because in-groups are rarely a deliberate decision to exclude people. Most people in an in-group don’t realise that anyone is being excluded at all. They’re more like the goldfish swimming in water analogy, used mainly to describe worldviews. When people are swimming in it, they don’t see it’s there. And to take the analogy further, they also don’t see that not some people might want to share their goldfish bowl.

And look, to be honest, I’m sure there’s been times when I’ve been part of an in-group and been oblivious to those out of it as well. I try to recognise it. Mainly because, as I said, I’ve spent most of my life out of the in-group. I know how much it hurts.

I think actually one of the most painful things about not being part of the in-group is other people’s inability to actually see it. Often people in an in-group will say things like, everybody is welcomed and included here. But so often, way more often than we realise, people don’t feel included for one reason or another. It may be because the people in the in-group are really good friends and it’s hard for them to accept another good friend into their midst. They could be so tightly bound together that it’s hard for other people to inch their way into the circle. Others are welcome at the outer edge, but there’s no room left in the centre. And when ties are strong, people will automatically turn to those already in the in-group first, rather than looking to outsiders. And it can also be because some people are shy and find it difficult to reach out to others - and those in the circle don’t need to reach out to anyone outside of it.

We all want to belong. I think it’s one of the prime needs of a human being. We want to belong. We want to feel accepted. Not all of us get that. Even in church.

I feel like I belong to my church. Even though I keep leaving and disagree with this, that and other, I still feel like I belong. I also feel accepted - exactly as I am, warts and all.

But although I feel like I belong to my church now, I didn’t for ages. And maybe that’s partly my fault. I am shy. I do lack confidence. I have had that much rejection in my life that it’s really hard to reach out to others - especially as so often, when I do, I simply get rejected again. That makes it hard to make friends at all. But at the same time, when you are shy, lacking confidence, fearing rejection, the last thing you need is to go to church and find that (just like high school) there’s an in-group and you’re not part of it. And sometimes the church itself seems like the inner circle, and when you’re not part of that, you don’t feel like part of the church at all.

We tend to think of in-groups as something that only teenagers worry about. I remember thinking when I was a teenager that I couldn’t wait until I was an adult and all the worry about in-groups was behind me. But it still hurts even when you’re 37. You can still feel like an outsider no matter how old you are. You can still feel like you’re just not quite good (pretty, friendly, outgoing, funny, smart) enough. You can also feel like everybody else has all these really good ties and friendships and they just don’t have room for you.

It’s so easy to think that our group of friends are just our group of friends. And we visit them, and we hang around them, and we talk to them on the phone and we go out for coffee together because they’re our friends. And of course everyone wants to hang out with their friends. But do we really think about the people who need our friendship? Do we think about the people who might be looking in, wishing they were part of our circle of friendship? Those who might be hurting because they just want to be accepted and loved by somebody? Those who feel like everybody belongs except them?

And one thing that often gets said is people who need acceptance and friendship from church just need to reach out for it. But the analogy I often use is, even if a person with two broken legs can get instant healing if they go to the altar, they can’t get there by themselves. Somebody needs to be prepared to help them. And sometimes, I’m afraid to say, people do reach out - and feel rejected. And then it makes it all the more harder to reach out the next time.

If I had one wish for the church it would be this - that every church, in every place could be a place where EVERYONE felt like they belonged. I don’t think it’s ever going to happen. Partly because people feel like they can’t fit the mould. Partly it’s because people’s own fears, insecurities, shyness keeps them from belonging. But partly I think it’s because we often don’t do enough to help people through those fears and insecurities. We’re so focused on what’s happening inside the group that we don’t see who’s struggling outside of it.

Why I love the Catholic Church - but why I decided to leave

2011-03-29T16:05:00.000+11:00

Some people’s faith journey is like a very straight road. Mine seems to have a lot of bends, twists, roundabouts and u-turns. Some might see that as a failing. Personally, I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad thing. When you drive straight to a place, you might get there quicker. But when you take the scenic route, you have a better understanding of where you are when you get there.

I’ve been neglecting this blog for a while. The main reason for that is I have decided to leave the Catholic Church. I know that many of my readers are Catholics and I didn’t want to disappoint them. Also, this has come to feel like a very Catholic blog and I guess I just didn’t feel like writing it.

I’ve also started a new blog, devoted solely to the connections between nature and spirituality. It’s a topic I’ve been interested in for quite some time. But my interest in it has grown since studying theology. So I suppose I was more inclined to write in that blog rather than this one.

But lately I’ve been thinking that I don’t want to confine myself to ecotheology. I have lots I want to say on many topics - and even if no-one reads my posts, it helps me to write them. I thought about starting a new blog. But that seemed silly when I already had this one here. Plus, I couldn’t think of a name I liked better than Fringe Faith - and that one was already taken - by me.

I’m sure that if I looked hard enough, I could probably find some things here that either I don’t agree with anymore, have changed my perspective on slightly or just wouldn’t have written if I had been going to a Pentecostal church at the time. But that’s okay. It’s all part of my faith journey. And whenever I do change directions and read what I have read in the past, what surprises me is not how much I disagree with what I have written, but how much I still agree with. It’s a bit like looking at photos of a road-trip and discovering that no matter where someone travelled, they always took pictures of the same thing.

But to start with, I thought I might return to this blog by writing about why I love the Catholic Church - but why I decided to leave.

I thought long and hard before making the decision to go the Catholic Church. So when I eventually came to that decision, I thought I would be there for life. And from the very moment I stepped into the Catholic Church, I was positive that it was the right decision to make. I guess in a way I fell in love with the Church. So many times as I sat in the pew, I was really thankful to be there. After a while, I stopped going every week. But when I did go, I was always pleased that I did.

I can understand why people from other Christian denominations might not like the Catholic Church. It can seem boring, old-fashioned and ritualistic. Let’s face it, the Catholic Church is not always a fun place to be. But that was okay by me. I’ve never - and still don’t - want a church that will entertain me. And I’ve always thought - and still do think - that we need to focus more on the suffering of Christ and the cross, rather than just the blessings God brings.

As for the rituals and tradition, it’s hard to explain how I feel about this to someone who hasn’t experienced it themselves. I don’t believe we need the rituals and tradition, but I do believe they benefit us spiritually. There’s probably 50 reasons for this, but let me list just two. Firstly, they have the ability to draw our focus away from ourselves and onto God. (Not always. I’m sure there are many people who go through those rituals without giving God a second thought. But they can.) Secondly and perhaps most importantly, they remind us of God’s Holiness. Even just a little thing like doing the sign of a cross can be an important reminder that we are not just chatting to ourselves, but to God, who deserves our reverence and awe.

There are many other reasons why I do still love the Catholic Church. But here are perhaps the three most important. Firstly, I find that the Catholic Church (with all its rituals, traditions and lack of entertainment value) gives me a sense of peace that I find missing from other churches. There is plenty of time for contemplation and mediation in the Catholic Church. And even just following the ritual of the liturgy can be peaceful. In our daily lives, we are constantly entertained and bombarded with audio clips, images and advertisements. It is nice to have a place where all of that ‘entertainment’ disappears.

The other reason why I still love the Catholic Church is its beauty. I know churches nowadays seem to be designed to be places where people feel comfortable. And that’s all well and good. But I do really appreciate the beauty not just of Catholic Churches, but of the Mass itself. And that goes for the music too. I’ve heard a few people (including my children) say that the hymns in the Catholic Church are boring. But to me, Catholic hymns are far more beautiful than Hillsong praise and worship. Not as entertaining perhaps. But then, as mentioned above, we’re constantly entertained. If we want to be entertained, there’s a lot of places we can go. But a lot of that entertainment is stripped of beauty. It’s fun, but not too deep. Not that there's necessarily anything wrong with that. I would call Bon Jovi entertaining, but not beautiful. I still like Bon Jovi. But beautiful music can nourish your soul in a way entertaining music can't. It’s also nice to see beauty and experience beauty. And in my mind at least, the Catholic Church is very beautiful, in many different ways.

Another reason why I like the Catholic Church is it’s not so individualistic. The Pentecostal Church, at least in my mind, seems to focus on the individual a lot. The songs we sing often contain the words ‘I’ and ‘me’. I’m ashamed to say I once counted all the Is and Mes in worship and stopped when I reached 20. The sermons tend to focus on ‘how you can be a Christian’ or ‘how God wants to bless you’. Whereas Catholic sermons seems more focused on theology generally (without as much reference to the individual), the worldwide Church or the global community and global problems as a whole.

That’s not to say that the Catholic Church only focuses on the global or the Pentecostal church only focuses on the individual. It’s just they seem to prefer one over the other. And it’s also not to say that the Catholic Church’s approach is better than the Pentecostal approach. We need to focus on individuals sometimes. People need to be healed and transformed as individuals before they can make a difference in the world. But I will say that one of the things I liked about the Catholic Church is that it didn’t make me think about ‘me’ so much.

But then, I do still need healing. Maybe we all continuously need healing. We all need people to pray for us sometimes. (And I don’t think I ever had one person pray for me in the Catholic Church.) When I did have a problem, even when I was going to the Catholic Church, I would ring up my Pentecostal friends and ask them to pray for me. That’s one of the reasons why I decided to return to the Pentecostal Church. They are very good at praying for people.

Another reason is fellowship. And it was this that had the most bearing on my decision to leave the Catholic Church. For a start, all of my friends were in another church. That felt really lonely at times, unbearably lonely. Secondly (and this is partly to do with me and no doubt other people would find it very different) but I found it very difficult to make any friends at all in the Catholic Church. I would go to morning teas and hardly anybody would speak to me. I felt like a stranger. When we greeted each other in church I was usually greeting a whole heap of people I didn’t know.

Some people might say that the fellowship aspect to church is not important. But it’s important to me. I think it’s particularly important because I am a single mum, who works and studies from home. I would go the whole week without talking to another adult, then on Sunday be surrounded by people who didn’t talk to me. I may be very introverted, but I still need to talk to people. I also need see people who care about me. I particularly need to have conversations with people who share my faith. I love having theological discussions - even when I’m disagreeing with people. I didn’t have a single discussion about God with anyone from the Catholic Church. I could have those discussions with my Pentecostal friends. But I wasn’t seeing those Pentecostal friends nearly as much as I used to.

It’s also important for me to have support. As a single mum, I occasionally need people to help me do things. So when I needed help, who did I turn to? My Pentecostal friends, of course. This is generalising, but I find Pentecostals are usually very good at helping people when they need it. And I think that’s partly because they do really try hard to ‘live their faith’. I didn’t even know anyone in the Catholic Church that I could ask. Again, this could be just me. I am sure that many people find a lot of support within the Catholic Church. But I just didn’t know where to look. Even if I had a problem, I had no-one to discuss it with within the Catholic Church. I suppose I could have rung up the priest. But I always felt uncomfortable doing that. When I was trying to decide whether to leave the Catholic Church or not, I discussed it with perhaps three Pentecostal friends. I didn’t discuss it with anyone within the Catholic Church because I had no-one to discuss it with.

So that’s basically it. The reason why I love the Catholic Church is because I love beauty, peace, tradition and ritual. But the reason why I had to leave is because I need people. And for me at least the only place where I could find those people was in my old Pentecostal church.

Queensland floods - Uncontrollable nature, uncontrollable God

2011-01-12T09:11:00.001+11:00

Before I start this blog post, I would like to extend my sympathies to everyone who has been affected by the Queensland floods, especially those who are missing family members. My prayers are with you.

I was not sure whether I should write this post. Although it was a post I really wanted to write, I think it is too easy to turn tragedies into an opportunity to espouse political or religious views, without any real consideration for the people directly impacted. I know that for many people this is not a news story or a speech or a blog post, but a tragic reality in their lives. If this post comes across as insensitive at all, I am truly sorry.

When watching the news stories, it was the personal tragedies that struck me most. I don’t often cry during the news, but I find myself crying a lot lately. I think we see so much death, devastation and destruction on the news that we become a little immune to it. Perhaps it shouldn’t be the case, but it is much easier to find empathy for people ‘like us’. As I watched the news, I could so easily imagine myself in the position of those whose homes had been lost or whose family members were missing.

But another item that struck me was the information that the Wivenhoe Dam was meant to prevent a flood like that experienced in 1974, but that dam was not coping.

I think we have become a bit complacent about nature, especially those living in urbanised areas in the western world, where we seem so removed from nature. For a couple of hundred years, man has sought to control nature. They wanted to bend it to their purposes, mould it to their will. It was not man at the mercy of nature, but nature at the mercy of man. And to a certain extent, they succeeded - even if our control is undoubtedly more limited than we realised.

Undoubtedly humans have a huge impact on nature. And we can control nature in a way no other species can. But if we think we’re the one’s controlling this big huge system we call earth, we are much mistaken. Humans aren’t the ones in charge.

God is the one in charge. But leaving the theological discussion for a moment, let’s stick with nature.

Nature is more powerful, more forceful, more in control than we are. No matter what we do to try and bend nature to our will, nature will often do what we don’t expect - and don’t want. Natural disasters remind us that our influence over this world is very limited. And it must also remind us to respect and even fear nature. Nature is not something that bows down to human’s will. Nor is it something cute and cuddly that only wants to keep us safe. It is wonderful and awesome, fearsome and dangerous. It can bring us much joy and bring us much sorrow.

Humans don’t like to be at the mercy of anything. We think that the decisions we make and the actions we take can direct our own lives. We feel control of our own destiny. Nature reminds us that this is not always the case. Not only is nature uncontrollable, but it has the ability to sometimes control us.

This desire to be in control of our own destiny also affects how we sometimes view God. Like nature, we think we can control God, rather than realising it is God who controls us. Instead of seeing ourselves at the mercy of God, we try to bend God to our will and our purposes. Read many books on prayers and you will see what I mean. Many of them devote a lot of space on how to get our prayers answered. As I heard in a YouTube video recently, we have our own greedy desires and we presume they are God’s will for us. But maybe the purpose of prayer should not be to try and get God to do what we want, but to realise that He is ultimately the one in control.

Of course, especially in the light of the Queensland floods, this raises all kinds of questions about why God would cause this or even allow it. That’s a big question and one I don’t have the space to do even the tiniest bit of justice to here. The short answer is, I don’t know. But then, I’m not the one in charge. And I know God is loving and I know he is just. But I also know he is fearsome and powerful. Maybe God is just letting the laws of nature taking their course. If He stepped in and prevented this natural disaster, he would have to step in and prevent every natural disaster. And maybe the whole laws of nature would then be changed. I certainly don’t think it is any kind of act of righteous anger or judgment. I believe God is just as sorrowed by this as we are.

I also believe that God doesn’t only feel empathy for the people who are ‘like us’, but for all humans everywhere in this world. He cries with the people affected by the Queensland floods, just as he cried with the people affected by Hurricane Katrina or the Victorian bushfires or the Asian tsunami or wars and natural disasters everywhere. It is easy to focus on what happens in Australia, either because we are directly impacted, we know people who are or we can relate to those who are impacted. But there are people hurting every day in this world. And I believe God cares for them all.

The danger of ordering Christmas presents online

2010-12-10T23:04:00.000+11:00

I just wanted to alert everyone to the danger of ordering Christmas presents online, to be delivered.

I have ordered all of my Christmas presents for my sons online. One son had a bag from one place and a whole heap of Dr Who stuff from another place. Those two parcels consisted the majority of his Christmas presents this year, besides some minor ones and a big one for the family.

Well according to Australia Post, those two parcels were delivered to me at 5:30 on Thursday. I was home at 5:30 on Thursday and no parcels were delivered at that time. Not only was I home, but I was in the loungeroom, with a direct view out of the window. Plus my dog barks like crazy when someone pulls up, so he would have soon told me if the postal contractor was there. When I'm in my study, I know a parcel is being delivered because my dog lets me know. And at that time, I was actually looking out for the parcels as well. According to Australia Post, I signed for these parcels. I did not sign for these parcels.

I’m not sure what happened. Maybe they were delivered to the wrong address and the person there decided to sign for parcels that were not theirs. If so, they stole a child’s Christmas presents. Or maybe it was delivered at another time and decided to give it to some random person who just happened to be in my yard. Again, if so, that person stole a child’s Christmas presents.

I’ve rang up one of the merchants I bought from. And they are very nicely sending me a replacement. The parcel containing all the main presents for my son was bought from PopCultcha. I only just discovered that that parcel was also apparently delivered on Thursday. I've just sent them an email and am waiting to hear back from them.

But Australia Post refuses to do anything because they say they were delivered. When I know full well they were not. At least not to me.

Now I’m facing the possibility that my son may have no Christmas presents this year. I can’t afford to get new ones. It was hard enough affording the ones I bought.

And I am really upset about this. Not to mention worried about the presents I ordered for my other son. I’m also worried that perhaps that were other parcels that may have been delivered at the same time that were not tracked. I won't know they're missing until they never turn up, I suppose.

My son’s are 11 and 9 years old. One still believes in Santa. I really don’t want to have to tell them that there’s no Christmas Presents this year because Australia Post failed to deliver them to the right person.

My son asked me the other day if Santa was real. I told him that if he believes in Santa, then Santa exists.

Well at least he did. But I have a terrible feeling that Australia Post just killed him.

God said it was good

2010-11-05T12:49:00.000+11:00

God said it was good.

He did not say:

…it was unimportant

…it was meaningless

…it was irrelevant.

He said it was good.

God did not say:

It will be good

…once it has been modified, processed, developed

…once it has been exploited, consumed, destroyed

…once it has been value-added, sold and made profitable.

He said it was good.

God did not say:

It is good

…only for the rich

…only for the powerful

…only for those living in the 21^st century.

He said it was good.

God did not say:

It is all there is

And humans can discover

Everything there is to know

Just by studying it.

He said it was good.

God did not say:

It is divine,

It is to be worshipped,

It replaces religion,

It replaces Church,

It is God.

But He did say it was good.

Thankful to Be Here

2010-10-28T17:43:00.000+11:00

1991 State of Origin

Perhaps it is the spring weather and the fact that all the flowers are blooming, but the other day I was struck by how glad I am to be here. I did not choose this earth for my home. Yet God has placed me here and for that I should be thankful.

Even though life cannot exist on any other planets that we know of, imagine for a moment that one of those other planets was our home. Imagine living in a world with no grass, no trees, no flowers, no birds - a world without the abundance of plant and animal life, with little diversity and even less beauty.

Yes, I know this world is not all good. There is pain, sorrow, grief, disasters, devastation, flood, famines, droughts, injustice, oppression and terrible cruelty. Yet I believe the one of the reasons why we are appalled by such things is because we have seen their absence.

Here on earth, they are not absent for long. But there have been moments when the world really does seem beautiful, when all is right (or at least seems right) in our little corner of the world and there is more joy than sorrow. Even in a sinful world, we do catch glimpses of heaven. If this earth occasionally seems ugly, perhaps it is because we have occasionally seen how beautiful it can be.

There are other species that are also fortunate to be living here on earth. I also believe that all the other species, indeed the whole world, praises God.

Yet humans are unique. We have a special relationship to God. We have souls.

We also have a unique ability to be able to appreciate and be thankful for this world. We can never completely understand God, but we are closer in understanding God than the birds or the grass or the trees or the flowers are. We are the only species in this world that can join with God at looking at his Creation and saying ‘It is good.’

And yet so often we don’t. Instead of thanking God for the world he has made, we complain about our lives. We look at what we don’t have, instead of what we do. We ask why God doesn’t step in and change things, and forget to be amazed at what He has already done.

And honestly, if God did step in and change every thing in this world that seems wrong or unfair or we don’t like, most of us probably wouldn’t thank him. We’d be too busy searching for further things that are wrong with this world. We’re like proofreaders, too busy circling punctuation errors to be swept away by the whole narrative.

Most of us at some stage have found ourselves somewhere where we really wanted to be. And in that moment, everything seems right with the world. Of course there are problems. Things go wrong, as they always will. But when you’re so happy to be somewhere, those problems are only minor irritations. We are so thankful for where we are that we sweep them aside and refused to be bothered by them.

When I was 17, I won tickets to a State of Origin rugby league game. I took my sister, who is two years younger than me. Neither one of us had been to a State of Origin game before. To say we were excited is a huge understatement. Anyway, in the middle of game, when my sister and I had huge smiles plastered across our faces, it started to rain. And I don’t mean just a sprinkling. It poured - absolutely poured. Everyone around us went running for cover. My sister and I just looked at each other and didn’t even say anything. We knew it would take more than a little bit of rain (okay, make that a lot of rain) to budge us. After the game, we had to sit for five hours in soaking wet clothes on a bus. Yet still those smiles never left our faces. Why would they? We had just had the time of our lives.

Imagine if we treated this earth like that. Imagine if we thought of it as a place where we were really thankful to be. That doesn’t mean that we’re not going to face problems. It doesn’t even mean that we wouldn’t be bothered by things, sometimes even overcome by grief and sorrow. But perhaps it would give us a different perspective. Perhaps we might even learn to smile, and be thankful, through the rain.

Overgrown lawns

2010-10-24T18:30:00.000+11:00


A small barn on a low hill (picture taken from the road below), partially hidden behind long grass. Picture from Wikimedia Commons

There are days when the whole street seems to be painted green. These days are first preceded by rainy days, followed by sunny days when you constantly hear the sound of someone’s lawnmower. The result is a street where all the lawns seem to be the standard height, cut close to the ground. Everybody has done their bit to make the street look beautiful.

When I say everybody, I don’t quite mean everybody. There’s always one person who leaves their lawn long, who fails to get the lawnmower out at the unwritten, but universally agreed upon, time.

This nonconformist is the lawn that everybody frowns at as they walk past. After so many short, and neatly trimmed lawns, it’s impossible not to notice that this lawn is different - and therefore wrong.

This non-conformist lawn is usually my lawn.

There are a number of reasons why I fail to mown my lawn as often as my neighbours would perhaps like me to. One, I am a terrible mower of lawns. Half the time when I go to mow my lawn, I can’t even start it. So then I have to wait until some friendly neighbour or friend comes around to start it for me. Also, it’s very hard to get motivated to do something that I’m so bad at. One day after I had mowed my lawn, my aunt told my grandmother that it was the worst mown lawn she had ever seen. Sometimes I prefer to look lazy rather than incompetent.

The other reason why I am slack in the mowing of lawns is that I really do not like shortly-clipped lawns. People may think badly of my knee-height grass. Well I really don’t like their ants’ knee-height grass. Give me an overgrown garden over a manicured lawn any day.

When everybody mows their lawn, all you can see is green. It does look painted - and I don’t think that’s necessarily a good thing. This may sound strange to the Lawn Nazis, but I do get pleasure when my lawn hasn’t been mowed for a while, and you can see all the different varieties of grass. (Yes, I know most of them are probably weeds. But weeds can still be beautiful if you look at them in the right way.) I think my lawn is so much more interesting that the standard, boring, painted green that you get everywhere else in the street.

What does all this have to do with faith? Absolutely nothing. There’s no spiritual lesson, moral or even point to this blog post. I don’t even know why I’m writing it. Maybe I just felt that it was about time that somebody said something nice about overgrown lawns.

Aussie Saint?

2010-10-17T21:33:00.000+11:00

In Eureka Street recently, they had a cartoon, showing someone sitting in a departure lounge with a group of people going to Rome for the canonisation of Mary MacKillop. He had an Australian hat on and was waving a flag with ‘Oi, oi, oi’ on it. He was saying ‘Something tells me I’m missing the point.’ Go to http://www.eurekastreet.com.au and scroll halfway down the page to see the cartoon.

I was telling my son and his nanna about the cartoon today, saying I found it quite funny.

As I watched the live coverage of the canonisation ceremony, and they showed all the people with Australian flags, my son said to me, ‘Do you still think that cartoon was funny?’ And later on, we found out that people were saying ‘Aussie, aussie, aussie, oi, oi, oi’ as they arrived. No, I don’t think the cartoon’s so funny now - not when it depicts reality.

Now I am a very patriotic person. I have a tattoo of the Eureka Stockade on my upper arm. When I was pregnant with my first child, my sister said, knowing me, I’d probably call the baby Clancy or Matilda. And when it comes to Australia Day, I wave my Australian flag just as proudly as anybody else, usually wearing an Australia Day t-shirt, with green and gold zinc on my face.

But the making of a saint - even an Australian one - is not the time for overt displays of Aussie patriotism.

During the ABC News 24 coverage, Scott Stevens said that we may water down Mary MacKillop’s traits by focusing on things like her egalitarianism and anti-authoritarianism, traits that Australians admire and respect.

By focusing on these traits, maybe we do turn her into a saint ‘for all Australians’. But the fact is Mary MacKillop is not a saint because she was egalitarian or anti-authoritarian. She is a saint because she loved God and wanted only to do his will. And that’s the most important thing we need to focus on.

And in watching the media coverage of Mary MacKillop’s canonisation, I sometimes get the feeling that they see her nationality as more important than her religion. It often felt like I was watching an Australian get a gold medal at the Olympic Games. As though they want to portray St Mary of the Cross as a saint for all Australians, so that all Australians can feel proud of its country’s achievement.

But this isn’t a prize for Australia. And it’s not Australia’s achievement. If anything, it is God’s. And we shouldn’t ignore or even downplay God’s part in what Mary MacKillop did. Because if it wasn’t for God, and if it wasn’t for Mary’s faith, it wouldn’t have been done at all.

I am glad Australia finally has a saint. But not so that we can consider her some kind of winner in the Vatican’s saint-naming ceremony. But so that she may serve as an inspiration to all Australians. That is, after all, what saints are meant to do.

Apparently, there have been many visitors to places connected with Mary MacKillop. Many people travelled to Rome for the ceremony. Many people watched the ceremony in places around the country. I believe that many people may have felt an increased interest in religion because of this canonisation. And that is a very good thing.

My son asked me tonight how he could become a saint. I said to him that he can try and be a saint now. How he does that is to try and always do what God wants. And although I don’t expect it to last, he really did try - tonight at least. I could see him be more considerate. I could see him trying to think of others before himself. At one point, I went outside. When I came back, he said that they had said a prayer and he stood up for it, because he thought that was what God would have wanted him to do.

That’s what saints are about. They’re not about patriotism or cheering or feeling like Australia has won something. They’re about providing an example for people to follow. Already St Mary of the Cross has revived an interest in spirituality and faith. I pray that she continues to do so. I also pray that people everywhere try to live like her, not just cheer for her.

October Scrooge

2010-10-11T11:08:00.000+11:00

As soon as October rolls around, I start to get that old Scrooge feeling again.

Now I love Christmas - In December. Or the first seven days of January. Or even in July, because the whole seasonal thing of Christmas in July when you’re living in Australia is kind of nice.

But as for Christmas in October - bah, Humbug!

The Christmas items seem to make their way to the stores earlier and earlier each year. We’re not exactly flooded with Christmas products at the moment, but they’re coming out. Warning us that we better buy up quick because Christmas is only - over two months ago. I would add up the days to get a precise figure, but I’m too anti-Christmas in October to even do that.

Of course, it makes sense for businesses to put out their Christmas products as soon as possible. The sooner they’re out, the sooner people will start thinking about all the Christmas buying they have to do. They sooner they start buying things for Christmas, the more they’re going to buy. People who wait until the last minute to do their Christmas shopping rarely go overboard.

But it’s so annoying.

For one, Christmas is not meant to be about buying stuff. And we get so caught up in the whole Christmas buying thing that it makes us stressed and time poor. Instead of spending time with the people we love, we’re out buying them gifts.

But there’s another reason why I hate Christmas in October. We get sick of Christmas before it’s even here. And it ruins the excitement of seeing those Christmas products at Christmas.

I remember when seeing Christmas decoration and products really brought a thrill. Because when they arrived in the stores, you knew that Christmas was just around the corner. Now, by the time Christmas is just around the corner, we’ve been looking at Christmas products for two months. And it’s just not that exciting anymore.

Plus, we’re so over Christmas by the time it gets here, that we have that one day and forget all about it. Christmas should be celebrated after the actual day, not just before it. It’s not meant to be about - got my gifts, great, now let’s start planning for Easter.

Christmas is a very special time of year. It should be about Jesus, about tradition, about family, about love. Instead, we’ve turned it into a three-month shop-a-thon. And the earlier those Christmas products go out onto the shelf, the less Christmas is about like Christ.

The Story of Stuff

2010-10-07T11:54:00.000+11:00

'The Story of Stuff' is my favourite video on YouTube. It shows the problems along our current model of consumption. It's 20 minutes, but it's well worth watching.

At first, it may seem like this has nothing to do with Christianity. But I think it does. Because if you do watch the video, you'll see that the current model of consumption hurts many people along the way. As Christians are called to 'love our neighbour', which doesn't just mean the people living next door to us but all of our neighbours in the whole world, we should be concerned about any system that isn't beneficial for human beings.

It's also clear from the video that this current model of consumption hurts the environment. Whether Christians should be concerned about it is a bit more debatable. But I believe the earth is God's gift to us and we should be taking care of it. If someone gave me a gift and I just destroyed it, it wouldn't be showing much love to the person who gave me the gift. The more we love people, the more we value what they give us. I think it should be the same for what God gives us. That isn't limited to the environment. God gives us lots of things we should value. But I believe the environment should be part of that.

Anyway, here's the video. I hope you watch it.

Book of Eli - Two Approaches to the Bible

2010-10-03T11:36:00.000+11:00

The Book of Eli is set in a post-apocalyptic world. Eli is in possession of the last remaining bible on earth. (It’s interesting that many descriptions of this film say it’s a sacred book without mentioning that it’s a bible.)

Carnegie wants that bible for his own purposes, and will do anything to get it - even kill people. It’s hard to understand why a man like Carnegie would want the bible so badly, until we realise that he wants to use it to control people.

Most Christians, if not all, would find Carnegie’s approach to the bible abhorrent. Yet I’m sure some people have used the bible to try and control people, and probably still do. I think such people probably do not have genuine faith. But I could be wrong. Faith comes in many different forms. And often people who start out with a genuine faith may end up with a very warped faith.

And although we may not use the bible to try and control societies, I think people do often use the bible for their own purposes. Instead of really trying to discover what the bible has to say, they want to use it to show why they are right. The bible becomes just a tool for them, rather than the living word of God.

But this isn’t a movie about one person who has a bad approach to the bible and another who has a good approach. Because Eli also has a faulty approach to the bible. Eli is so focused on trying to protect the bible that he’s forgotten to live by it.

Near the beginning, there is a somewhat anti-Good Samaritan moment. Eli sees some travellers being attacked. Instead of helping them he says words along the lines of ‘Not my concern. Stay on the path.’

And I do think that many Christians, Christians of genuine faith, have the Eli approach to the bible. They’re too busy protecting it, they’ve forgotten to live by it. They concentrate on doctrine and forget about practice. They memorise bible verses but never do any of them.

The bible is not just meant to be used or protected, but lived.

Why I love Queanbeyan

2010-09-27T08:56:00.000+10:00

As I walk along the streets of Queanbeyan, I sometimes get an overwhelming feeling of thankfulness for my town.

I belong here. I am part of the community. And that’s something to be thankful for.

I haven’t lived here my whole life, but I was born here. My grandmother has lived here my whole life and, as a child, we used to visit her every week. As I grew older, I still visited her, though not as often. Plus, I have lived here for the past 14 years.

I love walking down the street and saying hello to the people that pass me. I love going for a quick dash to the shops and ending up in a long conversation with someone. And every time I go to the local shopping centre, I see at least one person I know. On a busy day, I might be saying hello to someone every five minutes. (There are times I have spent more time talking to people than I have in actually doing the shopping.)

I’m upset about the disappearance of the corner stores. (Originally, there were three corner stores within eight blocks of my house. Now there are none.) I think they fostered a sense of community which isn’t there with the big franchises. That said, I have also gotten to know people at my local Coles or BP. I can talk to the people serving me with more than just the standard polite conversation you reserve for strangers.

I like knowing that, if anything ever happened and I needed help, there are many people around that I know would help me. When my youngest son was only two, I lost him. I had many people on the street looking for him. (It turns out, he had hidden under a lounge-room chair and fallen asleep!) When my grandmother couldn’t walk earlier this year, one of my neighbours told me she needed help and then went to get my youngest son from tennis. Later on, someone else asked me whether my grandmother was okay. It’s good to know I have neighbours who care.

But it’s not just the people - although they certainly are a big factor in making me feel like I belong. It’s the town itself. For all its faults, it is still a part of me. Or maybe I am a part of it. I know its streets, its stores, its river, its parks, its houses. They form the background of my life. Walking across the bridge to go to church in pink, frilly dresses. My cousins and I sneaking into the showground to play cricket or football. Taking my children for their first day of preschool and then school, the preschool I went to and the school my father went to. Sitting in the park, watching my sons climb trees. Even saying hello to the statue of John Gale every time I pass it with my children. And the unbearable sense of loss every time something changes, closes down, gets demolished or, in the case of Spotlight, moves.

It’s hard to convey this sense of belonging to people who don’t have it. People move around so much nowadays. There was a time when you lived in one town your whole life and all your family surrounded you. My grandmother is the only member of my family who still lives in Queanbeyan. Everyone else has moved. It’s become normal for people to live in a variety of different places. And that’s kind of exciting. Sometimes I wish I could do it too. But at the same time, I am thankful that I am still here. Because I think I get a sense of community that other people fail to even realise they are missing.

But even if I moved, I would still belong somewhere. I would still belong to the Church. And like a home town, the Church has its faults. It is made up of imperfect people. But it is still a part of me and I am a part of it. And it’s nice to know that. And it’s nice to able to recognise how important that really is.

Good or Bad, Left-wing or Right-wing Christian

2010-09-20T09:13:00.000+10:00

I was watching a talk by Tony Abbott for a theology@thepub event on YouTube. And during that talk, Tony Abbott said that people tend to think of Good Christians as those who were more socialist, while bad Christians were those who were more conservative. And in that light, he was considered a bad Christian.

It probably depends which church (or denomination) you belong to. When I was in the Pentecostal Church, I always felt like I was a bad Christian for caring more about injustice and poverty than I did about moral issues.

But the purpose of this blog is not to discuss which Christian is good or bad, but the assumption that one is either a ‘Socialist Christian’ or a ‘Conservative Christian.’ I think it’s because we like to put people somewhere on the political spectrum. Are they left, right or somewhere in between? Then once placed, we expect their views to line up with their place on that political spectrum, rather than with Christ.

I’ve had people speak to me who are convinced that Jesus would vote for the Liberal National Party in Australia (the conservative party). Yet I’ve had people equally adamant that he would vote for Labor. As many people have pointed out, Jesus is not a card-carrying member of either political party. In reality, he would probably agree and disagree with both or either side of politics, depending on the issue being discussed.

And in reality we can agree with different policies from different political parties. And there isn’t necessarily a contradiction between caring about certain left-wing issues and certain right-wing issues. One can care about providing welfare and still want to cut down abortions. One can care about the environment and still want the Lord’s Prayer kept in parliament. One can care about funding for public education and still want school chaplains. One can even agree with giving homosexuals the right to marry without necessarily agreeing that Catholic/Christian adoption agencies should be forced to give them children for adoption.

It is possible to care about social inequalities and recognition of God. It is possible to care about injustice and morals.

Indeed, the bible gives a lot of attention to both.

Hope for a Fallen World

2010-09-19T17:21:00.000+10:00

There are a few things that people aren’t comfortable with nowadays in terms of Christian doctrine. One of them is the Fall or original sin.

I guess there are a few reasons why people don’t like the thought of original sin. One of them is that people like to think they’re good. Another reason is that it seems to offer no hope. We have no chance of doing the right thing if we are fallen human beings. Or perhaps another reason is that we like to tell everyone they’re okay nowadays. Self-help books of full of the kind of pep talk that is designed to make people feel good about themselves. Even Bon Jovi has a line saying ‘Remember that you’re perfect, God makes no mistakes.’ We love to feel good about ourselves nowadays. The only time guilt is allowed is when it’s going to make you go out and buy something. Guilt about germs, yes! Guilt about moral choices, definitely not.

Yet removing the doctrine of original sin may make us feel better about ourselves, but I think it leads to a far more despairing view of the world. If there is no original sin, if there was no fall, then that means this world is exactly the way God intended it to be. We’re all just acting according to God’s plans.

I don’t know about you, but if this world is exactly the way God intended it to be, then something is seriously wrong. We hurt people. We think way too much of ourselves. We look after our own self-interests. We either cause or allow injustice and oppression. We destroy the earth that God has given us. We have turned our back on God, each other and the world we live in.

And I sincerely hope that this is not the way God planned it!

Sometimes when I see something particularly depressing on the news or someone tells me a story about the hurt they have gone through, I think this isn’t the way life is meant to be. And of course, this isn’t the way life was meant to be. God planned a better world. But because he loves us, he gave us free will and we have used that free will to reject God’s plans. We have gone our own way, and the mess we see in the world is a result.

Yet the Fall also offers hope. But although it says human beings are born sinful, the bible always tells us that Christ has died to redeem us. Furthermore, even in the mess we see, the mess we have created, God is present. And He is continuously at work, bringing about his purposes. We may have gone against God’s plans, but God has a new plan - and therefore, a new hope.

If there was no Fall, then it would appear that this world is as good as it gets. If we’re not sinful, then what hope do we really have? But because there was a Fall and there is sin, there is also redemption. And Christ offers hope to a sinful, fallen world.

Original Sin by Michiel Coxie, ca. 1550

Good Search

2010-09-17T22:23:00.000+10:00

I recently came across this site called Good Search. You can nominate a charity of your choice and everytime you do a search, they donate money to your specified cause.

I do a lot of searching for things on the internet in my work. So it was great to find something where I could feel that all of that searching would benefit a good cause. It may not be as good as actually giving to a charity myself, but at least it's something.

For certain stores, they also donate a percentage of the purchase amount to a charity.

Oh, and you can add a charity of your choice - which includes schools. I think that may just be for American charities though.

The drawbacks are it doesn't have the Australian option, like Google does. And also you can't search for news, blogs or scholarly articles, like you can with Google. But for everyone else, it seems to be working well.

Fundamentalist Christians and Atheists

2010-09-16T10:59:00.000+10:00

The Punch recently had this excellent article by David Penberthy, where he discusses his annoyance at 'born-again atheists'.

http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/please-god-spare-us-the-born-again-atheists/

I have often thought that fundamentalist atheists seem to have a lot in common with fundamentalist Christians. They're both convinced they're right and they both are determined to convince other people that they're right.

Not that there's anything wrong in believing you're right. Why believe something if you're not sure whether it's the truth or not? And I don't think there's anything wrong in trying to convince other people that you're right either. Most people who are trying to 'convert' others are convinced that people will be better off if they do convert. And this also applies to atheists who believe Christians or other faith adherents will be better off if they lose their beliefs.

However, what annoys me is how angry, annoyed and patronising some people get. Or this idea that not only are their beliefs the only true ones, but that anyone who doesn't share those beliefs can be ridiculed or insulted. Or that one has to keep arguing their beliefs until people agree.

People are not stupid just because they believe something different. People are not evil just because they believe something different. We're all just people and we all have different ways of seeing the world. And maybe that's okay.

Now obviously as some of our beliefs conflict with others, some people have got to be wrong. That just makes sense. There isn't a world where everybody can be completely right. If two plus two equals four, then two plus two can't also equal seven. But arguing and mocking and looking down on people does not necessarily mean that you're the one with the truth. As I tell my youngest son all the time, shouting does not make you right.

The other day I was talking to an atheist. I hadn't really talked to her much before, but as walked home together we ended up having an interesting discussion about how she doesn't believe in God but I do. When we reached my house, we kept talking for a while afterwards - and this despite the freezing night-time. And not because we were arguing, but because we were enjoying the conversation. One of us is wrong. We both know that. Either God exists or he doesn't. He can't be real and not real at the same time. But just because one of us is wrong doesn't mean we can't talk about it civilly and respect the other person's beliefs.

Awesome

2010-09-15T08:52:00.000+10:00

‘Awesome’ has to be the most overused word of the 21^st century. Everything is awesome nowadays: music, movies, actors, haircuts, parties, mobile phones, friends, outfits. My youngest son uses it all the time. He comes home from school - ‘Awesome’. He plays soccer out in the back yard - ‘Awesome’. The next-door neighbour invites him to come and play - ‘Awesome’. We have dessert after dinner - ‘Awesome’.

Of course, none of these are really awesome. They’re good or maybe very good, but they’re not awesome.

It’s hard to even say what awesome means nowadays because even our similes for it have been overused. Incredible, wonderful, amazing, brilliant. We’re so prone to over-exaggeration that we now have no words for when something really is incredible, wonderful, amazing, brilliant - or awesome.

I think when we’re confronted with true awesomeness, we don’t even say awesome. We don’t speak. We don’t even think. We are lost in the wonder of something beyond ourselves.

A newborn baby - awesome. This world - awesome. Sacrificial love - awesome. An all-powerful, all-loving God - awesome. A fully divine, fully human Christ - awesome.

We may use the word a lot, but I don’t think we’re that great at recognising true awesomeness. Maybe we need to stop saying it and start seeing it.

Funerals are not a celebration

2010-09-14T16:30:00.000+10:00

There's been a bit of coverage in the media lately about secular songs being played at funerals.

The guidelines for Catholic funerals state they should not include secular songs, as they are not meant to be a celebraton of a person's life, but a reflection on our Lord Jesus Christ.

I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this. On one hand, I agree that funerals should focus on Christ. And if people don't get reminded of eternal life at funerals, some people may never have to think of eternal life at all. Plus, the Mass is probably not the best place to play your favourite footy song. Much as I would love to hear Bon Jovi songs at my funeral, I don't know that it would really suit a funeral Mass. (Actually, I just realised I wouldn't actually be hearing the songs as I'd be dead.) Okay, much as I would like to torture people by making them listening to Bon Jovi songs even after I'm dead...

Yet at the same time, even though the Catholic Church says funerals should not be a celebration of a person's life, people do usually go to a funeral usually to remember a person. And one way of doing that is by playing certain songs. It seems a bit sad that people may hear songs at a funeral that mean nothing in term of the deceased's life. As Bishop Tomlinson says, a wake or family gathering outside the church may be a good place to have these types of things.However, a lot of people may only attend the funeral and not any informal gathering afterwards. It would be nice to think that there is something there to help them remember the person.

Anyway, I'm still not decided whether it's a good thing or a bad thing. What does everyone else think?

Here are some of the recent articles on the Catholic Church's stance on funerals:

Funerals Should Not be Celebrations - 3AW
Chrch Drops Ball of Funerals - Geelong Advertiser
Funerals No Longer a Celebration of Life in Catholic Church - PM
Funeral March: the day the music died - ABC

Factory Farming

2010-09-14T16:01:00.000+10:00

Today, I came across an interesting article The Christian Post by Jonathan Merritt on faith and factory farming.

Faith and Factory Farming

I agree with Jonathan that being a Christian does not mean we should not eating meat, but it should make us think about our treatment of the animals we do eat. We should also think about the impact of factory farming on the local people and environment.

It's probably impossible to avoid factory farmed meat altogether. Yet we should think about where our meat comes from and how the animals are treated beforehand. We also need to think about what is happening to our meat before we eat it. Nowadays, the drive for increased profits, along with genetic engineering, means that factory farms can modify animals so that the profits they receive are even greater. Some animals bear little resemblance to their original forms.

For the producers of meat, profit often matters more than what is good for the animals or what even is good for humans.And that's one of the reasons why I think Christians need to care about factory farming. Because Christians know that there are more important things to worry about than profits.

I also believe there is a spiritual dimension to the food we eat. It comes from God and has a touch of the divine. Yet the more we modify our food, and the more we raise livestock in conditions that are far from natural, the more we lose that trace of the divine.

I don't think we can avoid factory farming altogether. We need to feed people and sometimes factory farming is the most efficient way. Yet I certainly think we should think about how our meat is produced and try to go for the better, more humane, more natural options as much as possible.

Body Corporate

2010-09-10T17:15:00.000+10:00

Body Corporate is a recent Four Corners program that describes the impact of patented genes by corporations.

When companies patent isolated genes, medical tests are much more expensive than they otherwise would be. Furthermore, scientific research is often held back, due to the huge sums involved in working with patented genes.

This is just ridiculous. The drive for profit impacts so many areas of our life. But when it stops people getting the best healthcare they can, or makes medical tests extremely expensive or stops people from doing medical research, then something is horribly wrong.

In the documentary, it was pointed out by some people that, unless people knew they could make a profit out of it, medical research wouldn’t continue at all. Now I can be quite cynical at times. But I do have enough faith left in humanity to believe that some of the people conducting medical research out there aren’t actually doing it solely to make a profit. They’re doing it because they want to make a difference. They want to help people.

And if medical research is going down the way of ‘making profits’ maybe that’s because we’ve let profit-making invade every area of our life. And making if we stopped allowing corporations to make a profit off anything and everything, people would be a lot freer just to get out there and help people.

The documentary is still available on ABC iView and can be found here:

http://www.abc.net.au/iview/#/program/633654

Catch the Fire Ministry Disappointed with Election Result

2010-09-09T19:40:00.001+10:00

A recent post on the Catch The Fire Ministries website, by Pastor Daniel, shows his deep disappointment at the re-election of the Labor government. His main reason for disappointment seems to be that we now have two atheists running the country ( Julia Gillard and Bob Brown). I suppose it is this which makes him say it is a ‘very, very sad day’ for

Australia

and that we have put in place a ‘wicked government’.

Just because a leader is an atheist does not mean they are wicked. Or that they will run the country in a way that would be displeasing to God. The bible often talks about helping the poor and the needy. And unfortunately, sometimes it is the people who are not Christians who care more about the poor and the needy than the Christians do. I’m not saying this is the case with Julia Gillard and Bob Brown as opposed to Tony Abbott. But it is sometimes the case. It is also unfortunately the case that the Liberal Party often seems to care more for business and the economy than they do for people. And as Pastor Daniel points out, people on both sides of politics have a belief in God. So I’m definitely not convinced that a Labor government is necessarily ‘wicked’ or a ‘sad day’ at all.

It appears that Pastor Daniel had a dream, which he believed came from the Lord. In the dream, Julia Gillard conceded defeat. He apologises for the dream and says he must have been mistaken. No doubt if Julia Gillard had conceded defeat, he would have been certain that God was speaking to him. One problem with prophecies and prayers is it’s so easy for people to say they are mistaken when they get it wrong. But if they get it right, there’s no doubt in their mind that God was talking to them. How many times has Pastor Daniel told his readers that he has proof that God speaks to him, because what he prophesied has come true?

And speaking of prayers, apparently the many prayers of people helped keep Labor as a minority government rather than a majority government. I wonder what part prayers played in the big swing towards the Greens.

But what I found most interesting about this post was that ALL of the comments were in agreement with Pastor Daniel. I find it hard to believe that no-one has disagreed with him. So I’m guessing they only allow comments they like onto the website.

I realise that this is a very critical post. And I don’t like being so critical. But articles like this really annoy me. Atheists can do good things. Christians can vote Labour - or even Greens. And not all prophecies or visions or dreams actually come from God. And just because we think that a certain thing can happen in an election doesn’t mean that God is going to agree with us and answer our prayers.

Here’s a bit of shocking news for them. Some people were praying for Liberal to be defeated! Some were even praying for a swing to the Greens! Maybe God was answering those prayers instead.

The original article can be found here: http://catchthefire.com.au/blog/2010/09/08/australian-election-2010-we-might-have-lost-this-battle-but-we-will-definitely-win-the-war-in-jesus-name-by-pr-daniel/

Mad Monks

2010-09-08T18:01:00.000+10:00

At the beginning of this year, I wrote an assignment about the early monks. I hadn’t really learnt too much about the early monks before. And I have to tell you, my first impression was that they were all completely mad!

These are not just people who left some of the pleasures of life for a while. Not only did many of them live alone for years, but they chose extreme self-deprivation. Going without food and sleep. Sometimes doing seemingly inexplicable things like standing on top of columns or spending months in a mosquito-infested swamp. Their aim was to forego all fleshly desires. The more they suffered, the more they believed they pleased God.

I think the reason why those monks seem so mad is because they have a completely opposite worldview to people who live today. Nowadays, everyone seems to be telling us that we should be comfortable and happy. Sadly, it’s sometimes even the churches are spreading this messages. Instead of seeing sacrifice as something we do for God, many churches tell us that God wants to make all of our prayers/dreams/wishes come true. I’ve even heard it said that, if we are suffering, it may be because we have sin in our life or we’re not praying enough or we don’t have enough faith.

You would almost think that the religion of the early monks was an entirely different religion from the Christianity practised in the 21st century.

But maybe we’re the ones that are mad. Maybe we’re mad for thinking that our one aim in life should be for comfort and happiness. Maybe we’re mad for thinking that we can get (and should strive to get) everything we want. Maybe we’re mad for believing that Christianity is a religion where we receive, rather than one where we give up.

I got a letter from my bank today. It very nicely informed me that I don’t need to wait for anything I want. All I need to do is apply for a loan. It didn’t really explain to me what exactly is wrong with waiting until I have the money. I guess that’s a question we’re not supposed to ask. If you want something, you get it. Now. End of story. Who would wait when you don’t have to? In fact, trying to convince someone that waiting for something is actually good can sometimes feel like a losing battle.

I still think those early monks were mad. But I think they have something valuable to teach us. Trying to live like they did would be almost impossible for most normal human beings. But maybe if we learnt to live a little bit more like them, learnt not to be so concerned about our own happiness and comfort, look to deprive ourselves just a little bit, learned that Christianity is about sacrifice and not just blessings, we and the world would be a much better place.

Maybe the monks were mad. But maybe we could all do with a little bit of that same madness.

Let's try again

2010-09-08T17:52:00.000+10:00

I keep leaving this blog and then returning it. Although I always have good intentions, life gets in the way. I get busy and my blog suffers.

I have decided to try posting more frequently again. Part of this will be posting shorter posts, sometimes that may only have one or two paragraphs or a link to something else, instead of writing longer posts all the time. Although hopefully writing the shorter posts will motivate me to write more longer ones as well.

Anyway, this is my hope. Whether it actually happens remains to be seen. I know this is generally the first thing to slide when I start getting busy.

Anyway, we'll see how I go.

Stranded on a desert island

2010-06-28T21:37:00.000+10:00

Tonight at dinner, I asked my two boys what they would take with them if they were stranded on a desert island. I expected them to say something like playstations or TVs or chocolates or footballs or books. But when they replied, I discovered that I have the two most wonderful boys in the world (although I may be slightly biased).

My youngest son said that he would take me. I was really touched by this, not only because I was his first choice, but also because despite all the material things he could have chosen, he wanted love instead.

Our family doesn’t have a lot of money. And there are times when I look at the catalogues and think of all the things I wish I could buy my children. And I know there are times when they wish we could afford a lot more than we can. It can be hard living in a world that constantly tells you that you need this toy and that game and this food and those clothes, when you can’t really afford to get any of it. But in the end, I wonder how much it really matters. Because when given a choice of anything, most people would prefer to have love. It is so much more important than material items. And I am so glad my son recognised that.

As for my eldest son, he chose the smart answer. He told me he would take a ship so that he could get off the island. Love is wonderful and important. But I have to give credit to my son for thinking about the future!

As for my answer? I’m almost ashamed to say it now. What I wanted to take on my desert island, the very first thing I thought of -- it was my iPod. It didn’t even exist 10 years ago. Now I can’t bear the thought of any length of time without it. Okay, if I had really thought about it, instead of just saying the first thing that popped into my head, I would have chosen my children. I’d much rather have them than my iPod any day. But it’s pretty sad that I wanted my iPod on a desert island. In fact, I’m still having trouble thinking of how exactly I would survive on a desert island without my iPod - or diet coke for that moment.

In a way, we are all stranded on an island. It’s an island floating in space. As much smarter people than me have pointed out, this earth is all we have. We don’t have anywhere else to go.

And we need to ask what it is we really want while we’re here? Are we going to use up the earth’s resources making things like diet coke and iPods? Treat them as our main priority. Or are we going to recognise that love (including love for others and love for the planet) is far more important than material things? We don’t have a ship that can take us to another place. But maybe we should start realising that we need things that can guarantee our future.

I sometimes get pretty depressed about where the world is heading. But as the boys and I gave our answers around the dinner table tonight, I felt a glimmer of hope. It was obvious that the younger generation has a far better idea of what’s important than I do.

Beauty Queen

2010-06-06T11:39:00.003+10:00

I learnt when I was 17 that love was meant for beauty queens. And when I was 37, I learnt that I wasn’t a beauty queen because I didn’t have silky, shiny hair and pearly white teeth and full pouty lips and curly defined lashes and flawless skin. The good news was I could become a beauty queen if only I bought the right products. I guess if I couldn’t afford to buy the right products, I would just have to continue being ugly - and not as worthy.

I’m about to get quite personal here and share some thoughts that I’ve only recently admitted to myself. I feel less worthy because I’m not beautiful. When I talk to people (men and women) I sometimes get the feeling that they won’t want to know me because I’m not that beautiful or I don’t put enough effort into my appearance. When I compare myself to people who are more beautiful than me, I feel like I am worth less than they are and not nearly as interesting.

I shared this because I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one. And I don’t think it’s any surprise that I feel this way. Advertising agencies spend a lot of money trying to make me feel this way. Every time I turn on the TV, I’m bombarded with ads telling me that I can have silky, shiny hair and pearly white teeth, et cetera, et cetera. And the advertising agencies don’t just want to make you feel like you can have all these things. They want you to feel like you need to have all these things. No ad is going to come out and say you’re worth more if you’re beautiful. But the message is there nonetheless. Anyone who feels completely fine and worthy the way they are, and the way they look, is not going to spend a large amount on beauty products.

However, my feelings of worthlessness because of my looks got a lot worse when I joined the Pentecostal Church. On the face of it, this doesn’t appear to make much sense. Christian books, DVD, study groups, sermons and TV programs spend a lot of time telling woman that they are beautiful -- and that God thinks they are beautiful. So Christian women should think they’re beautiful, right? Well no. Because it’s still reinforcing the message that woman want to be beautiful. So if you’re not beautiful (even if God thinks you are) you feel sub-standard.

Christian marriage books (of which I read many before my divorce -- obviously they didn’t work) spend a lot of time telling women that men care about looks and they should put effort into their appearance. I was listening to a radio program where James Dobson was interviewing someone (sorry, I’ve forgotten his name) about how women should make the effort to look beautiful for their husbands. And ‘making the effort’ meant putting on make-up. James Dobson asked him whether women should wear make-up when they go to bed at night. I was relieved to hear the interviewee say no, but horrified at what came afterwards. James Dobson said that that really surprised him. The interviewee said that wearing make-up at night wasn’t good for the skin. In other words, the only reason why women shouldn’t be made up 24/7 is because it might make them look uglier in the long run.

Now I have nothing against women wanting to look nice for their husbands. And I think women like to make an effort sometimes, which often means putting on make-up. But I have a real problem with a world where women are expected to wear make-up. Because what make-up really is is a mask. It’s hiding the way we really look under a new improved version. And from a Christian perspective, it’s basically saying well the way God made me isn’t good enough. I need to look better.

One thing that makes this worse is that we are constantly seeing images of beautiful women. One hundred years ago, women were thought beautiful who wouldn’t even get a second glance now. I went to high school with a girl that everyone thought was beautiful. I think she’d be overlooked in a high school now. And I don’t think it’s because of fashions changing. I think it’s because our standards are so much higher. When just about every single woman we see in the media is made up to look their very best, we start to think that’s what beautiful is. And anything less than that isn’t good enough.

Not only that but we’re losing our appreciation of natural beauty. The type of beauty that can be found in very ordinary faces. We don’t see it because we’re too busy comparing the faces we see in real life with the made-up, altered faces we see on our TV screen. And we’re too busy hiding our natural beauty beneath a fortune of beauty products that the ads tell us we need to be beauty queens.

We’re also busy hiding imperfections. Beauty products are only part of it. There’s also cosmetic surgery. And if there is any imperfection on your body anywhere at all, there’s something you can do to get rid of it. If we continue to simply hide or remove imperfections, will we eventually reach the stage where any imperfection at all is automatically seen as devaluing? Will a woman’s worth be automatically rejected because she has a big nose?

About three years ago, my sons were talking about beautiful women. I can’t remember how they got onto the subject. At this stage, they were five and seven, which seems a strange age to be talking about beauty. But anyway, one of them (I think it was my youngest) said that the most beautiful woman at our church was the pastor’s wife. I don’t want to go into all the ways the pastor’s wife fails to live up to the ‘magazine ideal’ because that would be contributing to the problem. But let’s just say she’s not conventionally beautiful. But yet to my son, she was the most beautiful woman in church.

Last year, we were watching TV and some ad came on for a skin moisturiser. My son said to me “You should get that.” I felt like crying. Not because there was the insinuation there that I need a beauty product to be beautiful, but because his idea of beauty had changed. The media and the advertisements had finally influenced him.

I wonder what he’ll think of as beautiful in another ten years time. Will he have so many images of beautiful woman in his head that no-one in real life can compare? Will he fail to appreciate natural, ordinary beauty? Will he only look at women whose imperfections are hidden or corrected? Will he think his girlfriend isn’t making an effort if she doesn’t wear make-up? Will he think a woman’s worth is dependent on her beauty?

I hope not. And I like to think that I may influence the way both my sons see beauty. I hope that they can learn that someone doesn’t have to be perfect to be beautiful. And that a woman’s appearance is not the only thing that’s important. I hope they can appreciate and recognise the beauty in a person’s soul.

But then I can’t expect the media not to affect them at all. I know how much it has affected me.

The Trinity

2010-04-11T10:37:00.003+10:00

To be honest, the Trinity is not something I’ve thought a lot about. Making the sign of the cross is about as Trinitarian as my thinking gets. It’s not that I had a problem with the Trinity. I think I just put it in the too hard basket. The Trinity is a hard concept to get your head around. It’s easy to say I believe in the Father, Son and Holy Spirit in the one Godhead. It’s a bit harder to understand how that actually works or what it means.

And I think, honestly, how it ‘works’ may almost be a bit beyond us. We’re too likely to think of it in human terms. In ‘The Shack’, the members of the Trinity were presented as three different characters, in human form. It was one of the reasons why I didn’t like ‘The Shack’. Although we can think of Jesus as a human, the Father and the Holy Spirit are not. We can’t imagine three different human people sitting up in Heaven and having tea together. Somehow one, but somehow different. And yet if we do not think of them in human terms, how do we think of them?

I like to visualise things. I also like to use metaphors. But when it comes to God, our imagery and metaphors will never be completely adequate. We are using earthly concepts to describe Heavenly realities. That’s a bit like trying to describe colours to someone who has been blind from birth. Nothing on earth, nothing in our understanding, can fully explain God.

But when it comes to the Trinity, I can’t even think of a metaphor. I know that people in the past have used things from earth to try and describe the Trinity. St Patrick’s three-leaf clover for example or Augustine’s idea of the human mind as the Trinity, divided into memory, intellect and will. However, these metaphors don’t really get me any closer to understanding it. They can point towards the reality, but they don’t really explain it in any meaningful way.

One approach that does help me get a little bit closer to appreciating the Trinity is to split it up into three distinct persons and imagine what they would be like in isolation, separated from the Trinity. God the Father may be seen as a very distant God, unconcerned with the world. Jesus may be seen simply as a prophet, providing us with a good moral example. The Holy Spirit may be seen as a warm, fuzzy spirituality and that’s about it.

But it is when we see all three as part of the one Godhead that we can better appreciate who God is. Father, Son and Holy Spirit do not stand alone, even though we might think of them occasionally as if they did. God the Father is not just an absent God, but he sent his Son to reconcile us to Him and he sends the Holy Spirit to work in the world today. Jesus was not just a prophet, but God, sent by the Father to redeem us. The Holy Spirit is not just a disconnected spirituality, but a real person, sent by the Father and the Son to accomplish their purposes.

I still cannot visualise it. I still can’t point to anything in the world and say the Trinity is like that. But to think about how the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are all part of the one Godhead, relating to each other and connected to each other, helps me better appreciate each one. It is also by reflecting on all three persons of the Trinity that I better appreciate who God is, what He has done and what He is doing.

(Image details: Holy Trinity. The Icon from the Church of Laying Our Lady’s Holy Robe from the village of Borodava near Ferapontov Monastery. 16th century. From Wikimedia Commons.)

2010-04-08T08:15:00.002+10:00

I’m back again. It seems my big break may not be such of a big break after all.

I have just spent the last two days at a residential school for my Introduction to Theology unit. During that residential, we were asked to spend 20 minutes reflecting on a passage in Migliore’s Faith Seeking Understanding. Then we had to share our reflections with the group. People seemed to like what I shared, so my first reason for returning to this blog is to post that reflection on here.

Afterwards, the lecturer mentioned that doing reflections like this can be very beneficial. It helps us to see what we react against and question why we react in that way. I reacted against a few things during the residential. So I thought it would be good for me to spend some time writing and reflecting about those things. It would also be useful to use my blog more to write about my learning, the readings and any essays. One of the reasons I decided to stop writing the blog was because I decided I didn’t have the time with all the uni work I have to do. But my blog can help me in my university studies.

Anyway, here is the reflection. I only had 20 minutes, and that was writing by hand. So it’s not particularly well structured or written. But I have kept it exactly as I originally wrote it, rather than changing it.

Sometimes Christianity can be a bit like sitting in a cupboard saying God make me brighter. It is better to be a flickering flame out in the world, sharing my light, than a very bright torch, sitting in a cupboard where no-one benefits from the light.

To live an individualistic faith, where we are only concerned about what God is doing for me and what God means to me is to never really change. We are by nature selfish people. Yet we are also unfulfilled people. There is a yearning inside us that tells us there should be something more.

But it is in losing ourselves that we truly do find ourselves. When we help others, we often forget about our own worries. To join with people for a greater cause not only reminds us of how insignificant our own problems may actually be, but it takes us beyond them. We see them from a different perspective.

Today’s world often tells us that we find happiness by concentrating on our needs, our desires, our wants. Maybe it can give us a shallow temporary happiness, but never true joy. Because true joy comes not from focusing on ourselves, but on taking the focus off ourselves.

The most wonderful moments in life are not those when we were thinking about ourselves, but those when we forget about ourselves.

Although it’s not related to service, we may forget about ourselves in a piece of beautiful music, for example. Maybe Christianity, at its best, is when we lose ourselves in the beautiful music of God’s purposes.

Good Friday

2010-04-02T17:36:00.002+11:00

Looks like I'm not waiting until June to do a post after all. I couldn't let Good Friday go past without doing at least something.

Taking a Break

2010-03-27T22:08:00.003+11:00

I will be taking a break from this blog for a couple of months. I'm very busy with uni and there's a few other things going on. Hopefully I will return to posting in late May, early June, after things have settled down a bit.

When Will It Stop Bleeding?

2010-03-23T17:33:00.002+11:00

I don’t usually write much poetry. But very occasionally, I feel inspired to write some. This is what I wrote today. And I am going to be extremely brave and share it with you.

When will it stop bleeding?

A pain-filled room
littered with tears
and guilt-filled tissues
huddled in groups below each chair.
Misery loves company.

The women speak
with choking sobs
and folded arms
and hands that clench and fidget
and cover their faces,
to hide their shame.

Their words are not words
but poison-tipped daggers
piercing all who listen
to the womb.

Their right, they said.
A simple procedure.
No need to ruin your life.

Tell that to the women
who cry,
not silently, softly,
like a lady in mourning,
but loudly, angrily,
violently, uncontrollably.
The cries of a woman
who not only lost her child,
but could have saved it.

A tissue seems so inadequate.
Somebody pass her an exorcist.

When the stories are told
and the tears are shed
and the shame uncovered,
they will go home,
Empty.

But their wounds will remain.
Not scars
for they never really heal,
but bleed afresh
with each new knock to their motherhood.

This is no fresh, bright red blood
But dark, clotted, almost brown blood.
(Is that a blood clot or my baby?)

These are the cries of woman with a choice,
unable to change their decision
once they made it.
(You live with it forever, you know.)

These are the cries of women with dead children,
of graves with no gravestones,
of grief with no sympathy,
of guilt with no understanding.

These are the cries of empowered women,
feeling helpless.

(Nurse, something is wrong.
I had a procedure.
I can’t stop bleeding.
There are so many blood clots.
And I think I saw my baby.)

(Nothing is wrong.
The baby is gone.
The bleeding is normal.
The blood clots are normal.
It will stop in about three weeks.)

(But Nurse, when will it stop bleeding.
When will it really stop bleeding?)

Beautiful Letdown - Switchfoot

2010-03-22T09:18:00.003+11:00

Time for me to share another song. This one isn't because I heard it and loved it, or because it ties into a special day, or because it's sung by Bon Jovi. I am sharing this song just because I wanted to listen to it. And so you get to listen to it as well.

Here are the lyrics:

"Beautiful Letdown"

It was a beautiful let down
When I crashed and burned
When I found myself alone unknown and hurt
It was a beautiful let down
The day I knew
That all the riches this world had to offer me
Would never do

In a world full of bitter pain and bitter doubt
I was trying so hard to fit in, fit in,
Until I found out
I don't belong here
I don't belong here
I will carry a cross and a song where I don't belong
But I don't belong

It was a beautiful let down
When you found me here
Yeah for once in a rare blue moon I see everything clear
I'll be a beautiful let down
That's what I'll forever be
And though it may cost my soul
I'll sing for free
We're still chasin our tails and the rising sun
And our dark water planet's
Still spinning in a race
Where no one wins and no one's one

I don't belong here
I don't belong here
I'm gonna set sight and set sail for the kingdom come
I will carry a cross and a song where I don't belong
But i don't belong
I don't belong here
I don't belong here
Kingdom come
Your kingdom come

Won't you let me down yeah
Let my foolish pride
Forever let me down

Easy living, not much like your name
Easy dying, you look just about the same
Won't you please take me off your list
Easy living please come on and let me down

We are a beautiful let down,
Painfully uncool,
The church of the dropouts
The losers, the sinners, the failures and the fools
Oh what a beautiful let down
Are we salt in the wound
Let us sing one true tune

I don't belong here
I don't belong here
I don't belong here
Feels like I don't belong here
Let me down
Let me down
Feels like I'm let down
Let me down.
Cuz I don't belong here
Please
Won't you let me down?

Looking in a Mirror

2010-03-21T19:39:00.003+11:00

The Gospel reading from today was John 7:53-8:11:

The Woman Caught in Adultery

They went each to his own house,but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. Early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him, and he sat down and taught them. The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst they said to him, "Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?" This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, "Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her." And once more he bent down and wrote on the ground. But when they heard it, they went away one by one, beginning with the older ones, and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus stood up and said to her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?" She said, "No one, Lord." And Jesus said, "Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more."

To start off his sermon today, the priest told the story about a parish, where people kept telling the priest of that parish that the church was dead. So he decided to send invitations to everyone in the parish, inviting them to a funeral Mass for the church. At the front of the church was a casket. And after the Mass, the priest invited people to walk past the casket and pay their last respects. As everybody looked into the casket, they saw a mirror.

Last year, someone from a blogging community said that I needed to look into a mirror. I presume that the reason she thought I should look in a mirror was because I didn’t see myself the way she saw me. But neither did she see me the way many other people saw me. At around the same time, I was receiving many supportive messages - some from unexpected people - that showed that not everybody shared her perception of me.

So if I looked in a mirror, what would I see? Me, the way she saw me? Or me, the way many other people saw me?

Personally, I’d rather see me the way Christ sees me.

I’d also like to see other people the way Christ sees them.

I didn’t point out to this person the messages of support I had received. Nor did I point out everything that she had done wrong. I’d prefer to concentrate on my own faults than those of other people.

I say I’d prefer to concentrate on my own faults, but that’s not always so easy to do. Other people’s faults are so much easier to find. They’re right there in front of you. But you actually need to look to find your own faults.

Once when I admitted to a friend that I was finding it hard to forgive someone, she said she was actually quite pleased I said that, because she was under the impression I was never critical and always forgiving. I don’t know how she got that impression, because I can be very critical and slow to forgive. Maybe it’s because I try to keep a lot of it inside my head. Although, I seem to be failing even at that lately.

I think very critical thoughts about people sometimes. And I get very annoyed with myself when I do. But I get even more annoyed when I do say something.

I wonder how many of the Pharisees walked away from the woman caught in adultery, imagining how much they would like to stone her.

Actually, the most surprising thing about this story, I find, is that they didn’t throw stones after what Jesus said. Jesus must have written some very powerful stuff in that dirt. Because when you think about it, if somebody is being critical, and you say ‘Let him who is without sin throw the first stone’, most people will just go on saying what they were saying. Only now they’ll add a whole load of reasons as to why they’re justified in their criticisms.

Not to mention the fact that a lot of people seem to think that they are without sin. It’s always other people that have the problem. Have you ever had a conversation with someone about bible passages, and every time you mention the kind of things Christians should be doing, they point out someone else who isn’t doing it? They never seem to be able to apply it to themselves.

I’m doing it now, you know. As I’m writing this, I’m thinking of other people. Not me. It’s the other people that are doing the wrong thing. And wouldn’t it be good if so and so read this? They would really be forced to look at themselves then.

To criticise someone for being critical is to commit the same sin. To judge someone for being judgmental is to be just as guilty.

Another reason why we’re so quick to criticise is it makes us feel better about our own faults. It’s this whole ‘Well, I may be doing this, but that person is doing that.’ Or ‘If I’m a sinner, she’s a bigger one.’ Or ‘I am doing such a better job of following Christ than they are.’

Wrong attitude.

I don’t think I should be looking at a mirror. Not because I have nothing that needs fixing. I have a lot that needs fixing. But because it’s easy to look in a mirror and decide that ‘It’ll do’. I judge myself by my own standards

Instead of looking into a mirror, I need to look at Christ. And by Christ’s standards, I have a lot I need to work on. And compared to Christ, the difference between this sin and that sin and this fault and that fault is negligible.

The truth is we all fall short. It doesn’t matter who is the biggest sinner. What matters is that we are all sinners. And the more time we spend looking at other people’s sins, the less time we have for getting rid of our own.

(Image details: The woman taken in adultery, Rembrandt.)

St Patrick's Breastplate

2010-03-17T12:55:00.003+11:00

I don't have the time to write a post this week. So instead, and because it's St Patrick's Day, I'm going to share with you the song and the prayer, St Patrick's Breastplate. The song is very beautiful. I hadn't heard it until I went looking for something to share on my blog today.

"The Deer's Cry" or St. Patrick's Breastplate - Rita Connolly

Prayer - St Patrick's Breastplate

I arise today
Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity,
Through the belief in the threeness,
Through confession of the oneness
Of the Creator of Creation.

I arise today
Through the strength of Christ's birth with his baptism,
Through the strength of his crucifixion with his burial,
Through the strength of his resurrection with his ascension,
Through the strength of his descent for the judgment of Doom.

I arise today
Through the strength of the love of Cherubim,
In obedience of angels,
In the service of archangels,
In hope of resurrection to meet with reward,
In prayers of patriarchs,
In predictions of prophets,
In preaching of apostles,
In faith of confessors,
In innocence of holy virgins,
In deeds of righteous men.

I arise today
Through the strength of heaven:
Light of sun,
Radiance of moon,
Splendor of fire,
Speed of lightning,
Swiftness of wind,
Depth of sea,
Stability of earth,
Firmness of rock.

I arise today
Through God's strength to pilot me:
God's might to uphold me,
God's wisdom to guide me,
God's eye to look before me,
God's ear to hear me,
God's word to speak for me,
God's hand to guard me,
God's way to lie before me,
God's shield to protect me,
God's host to save me
From snares of devils,
From temptations of vices,
From everyone who shall wish me ill,
Afar and anear,
Alone and in multitude.

I summon today all these powers between me and those evils,
Against every cruel merciless power that may oppose my body and soul,
Against incantations of false prophets,
Against black laws of pagandom
Against false laws of heretics,
Against craft of idolatry,
Against spells of witches and smiths and wizards,
Against every knowledge that corrupts man's body and soul.

Christ to shield me today
Against poison, against burning,
Against drowning, against wounding,
So that there may come to me abundance of reward.

Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me,
Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me,
Christ on my right, Christ on my left,
Christ when I lie down, Christ when I sit down, Christ when I arise,
Christ in the heart of every man who thinks of me,
Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me,
Christ in every eye that sees me,
Christ in every ear that hears me.

I arise today

Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity,
Through belief in the threeness,
Through confession of the oneness,
Of the Creator of Creation.

Doing Big Things for God (or maybe not)

2010-03-13T00:18:00.002+11:00

How many times do you hear a child say, ‘When I grow up, I want to be the leader of a band that plays in the local pub’ or ‘I want to play cricket for the local cricket team’ or ‘I want to have a lead role in a local production’.

It doesn’t happen very often. Usually it’s ‘I want to have a number one album on the charts’ or ‘I want to play cricket for Australia’ or ‘I want to win an Oscar’.

Children dream big. Which may be a good thing. My son is convinced he’s going to win Wimbledon one day. Who knows? Maybe he will. But maybe he won’t. And does it really matter if he doesn’t?

My friend who just died, at the age of 82, used to play tennis. And that ‘used to’ was pretty recently. She played on a regular basis right up to last year. When they took her casket out at the funeral, the ladies from her tennis club did a salute with tennis rackets.

And to me, that’s a very successful tennis player. Not one who wins the major tournaments and gets interviewed for sports magazines. But one who plays tennis and enjoys tennis for her entire life.

A lot of people talk about God’s purpose for their life as if they just presume it’s going to be something big. They become a Christian and tell God they’re willing to do whatever He wants them to do. But what they’re thinking is ‘I’m willing to become a famous missionary or lead thousands of people to God or write a best-selling Christian book’.

A saying that is used a lot in the Pentecostal Church is ‘God has big things planned for your life.’ Maybe he does. But what if he just has little things? Are we still so eager to follow God’s plan for our lives if it involves nothing more than reading the bible, praying and living a very ordinary life?

I was listening to a podcast where somebody asked what she could do to reconcile the things God wants her to do with the things that she has to do (such as take the children to school and keep the house clean). The person answered her by saying ‘Maybe those things you have to do are the things God wants you to do’.

If God wants us to do big things for Him, that that would be difficult. Big things usually involve a lot of sacrifice. And it can be hard to be willing to make those sacrifices. Or to step out of comfort zone. Or to place ourselves in challenging situations.

But sometimes the biggest sacrifice we can make is to give up our dreams of being somebody important.

Comfort zones aren’t always such comfortable places to live in. They’re not the stuff that dreams are made of. Sometimes when we tell God we’re willing to step out of our comfort zone, it’s because that’s where we want to go.

And it’s where the world tells us we have to go. We are told to dream big, to reach for the stars, to fulfil our potential. Try telling someone that your only goal is just to stay at home and follow God in your own simple, ordinary way, and you get some very strange looks.

I was having this conversation with a friend once. And he was telling me that God has a plan for my life and that God has big things in store for me and that, whatever I’m hoping for, God can make it happen. So he asked me what I wanted. I said nothing really. I honestly couldn’t think of anything at the time. And he kept pushing and pushing, until eventually I thought of something. And then he said something along the lines of, ‘God will make that happen for you. Because God wants to give you your heart’s desire.’

The problem with the whole ‘God will give you your hearts desire’ approach is that most people want to be someone important. Someone who does big things for God. Someone who is recognised.

But we can’t all have that. The people who do stand out as doing great things for God stand out because they were different. If everyone did it, there wouldn’t be anything to recognise.

If every single child who wanted to record a number one song on the charts actually did it, there’d be a lot of number one songs. You’d be watching the top 30, and when they got to number one, they’d have to say and here are our 6,000 songs that are in equal position for the number one place. There’s only so many places in the Australian cricket team. If all the young boys who want to play for Australia actually got in, we’d need about 100 cricket teams. And then being in one wouldn’t be that big a deal.

And although I think dreaming big can be good, sometimes it can let us down. We dream so big that we’re disappointed when we receive anything less than the very best. Boys who wanted to play for the Australian cricket team no longer even play cricket. Girls who wanted to record a number one song don’t even sing in the shower. We give up completely because we didn’t get exactly what we wanted.

When I was younger, I wanted to write a novel that would win the Miles Franklin award. That was my lifelong goal. I know now that that is never going to happen. I’m not good enough. And I’ll be honest and say that sometimes that hurts. Sometimes I even feel like giving up writing altogether. Why bother, as I’m not going to do anything ‘big’ with it?

Sometimes (not quite so often thankfully) I feel the same about my faith. I’m never going to do anything ‘big’ for God. I’m never going to be an important person in his plans. I’m never even going to do an exceptional job of following Christ.

When I was in year nine at school, I got a B for English. And it really crushed me. And after that, I gave up a little bit. Who wants to get a B? I had been a straight A student until then. It almost felt like there was no point in trying if I couldn’t get all As.

Well if God was giving out grades for how well people followed Christ, I think I’d be getting mostly Ds, sometimes Cs and sometimes Es. And I’m never going to get an A, no matter how hard I try.

But that shouldn’t be a reason to just give up. Maybe I won’t ever do something ‘big’ for God. Maybe I’ll never be a straight A Christian. But maybe that was never God’s plan for me anyway. Maybe God’s plan for me is for me to just keeping on doing the little things. And to keep on trying my best.

But most of all, to just keep on. Like my friend with her tennis, to still be playing the game at the end of my life.

This didn’t start off as a post about perseverance. It just kind of ended up that way. But as it seems to have drifted off into that direction, I will end with these words that somebody else wrote to me just recently.

Maybe my goal in life should simply be to:

Keep the Faith.

And that sounds like as good an excuse as any for a Bon Jovi song:

Public Notification

2010-03-11T16:58:00.003+11:00

Under the policy of openness and transparency, I wish to notify the public of the following:

1. I am not perfect.

2. My imperfections may result in one or more of the following:
(a) doing the wrong thing;
(b) saying the wrong thing;
(c) thinking the wrong thing;
(d) annoying people;
(e) getting annoyed without good reason.

3. If you have good reason to believe that any of the items listed under Point 2 apply, you have the following options available to you:
(a) See Point 1;
(b) Make a complaint to the irrelevant authorities (known colloquially as a 'bitchfest');
(c) Make a complaint to me.

4. Please note that complaints made under subsection 3(c) may result in a full or partial disclosure of your own imperfections.

5. If you wish to make a complaint about the content of this declaration, please see Points 1 and 3 above.

Lord, when I am hungry

2010-03-09T18:38:00.000+11:00

This is from Liturgy of Life, an anthology compiled by Donald Hilton based on patterns of Christian worship (1992).

Lord, when I am hungry, give me someone in need of food;
When I am thirsty, send me someone needing a drink;
When I am cold, send me someone to warm;
When I am grieved, offer me someone to console;
When my cross grows heavy, let me share another’s cross;
When I am poor, lead me to someone in need;
When I have no time, give me someone I can help a little while;
When I am humiliated, let me have someone to praise;
When I am disheartened, send me someone to cheer;
When I need understanding, give me someone who needs mine;
When I need to be looked after, send me someone to care for;
When I think only of myself, draw my thoughts to another …

Co-workers of Mother Teresa in Japan

Sexy girl

2010-03-08T21:45:00.002+11:00

Everything has to be sexy nowadays. Movies, video clips, advertisements, clothes, magazine covers. And women. Especially women.

Women nowadays see many more images of attractive woman than they used to. They are on our TV screens, our computer screens, our movie screens, our iPods and our phones. Wherever we look, there is an image of a attractive and definitely sexy woman, reminding us of how far short we fall of the ideal. And when I say attractive, it usually means sexy. The pure and innocent look may be appealing to some. But it doesn’t tend to sell a lot of magazines, deodorants or clothes. Women don’t want to look pure and innocent anymore. They want to look sexy.

So what came first? The images of the sexy women or the women who want to look sexy. They seem to be tied in together.

Sex sells, as the saying goes. But we are heavily influenced by the images we see. And a lot of the images we see relate to people selling something. Even if it’s not a specific product, the sexy, gyrating video clips are using sex to sell their music. The movies use images of sexy women to get people to come to their movie. And all these images influence how we see the world and our place in it. If sex sells, images influence. The more images of sexy women we see, the more women will want to be sexy.

Now this may not be such a huge problem when it comes to grown adult women. Possibly it is. Possibly it isn’t. But my main concern here is with young girls and young women, particularly teenagers.

But let’s go backwards a little bit. Because even children now are getting sexier. Instead of pink frilly dresses, they’re wearing midriff tops and hipsters. Because image does not just influence, it matters. Even for children or the parents of children. Who wants to see their child wearing a pink frilly dress, when everybody knows that pink frilly dresses aren’t fashionable? What is fashionable is sexy. And so children are wearing sexy clothes. Not to look sexy exactly. But to look trendy. Pink frilly dresses are not trendy. Midriff tops and hipsters are.

And so by the time they’re 12, children already have a good idea of what’s fashionable, what’s in, what’s trendy. They probably don’t even think of it as sexy. But the fact is they’re being influenced by the culture of today and the culture of today is all about sexy.

Not only do they know what’s hot, but the message is constantly reinforced. The magazines they buy, the TV shows they watch, the video clips for their favourite singers, all continue to give the message that sexy is trendy.

And teenagers want to be trendy. Not only that, they want to be accepted. They want to be popular. They want guys to like them.

And so they look to the world around them (which increasingly means their friends and popular culture) to tell them how to be trendy, accepted, popular and attractive to boys. And what does the culture say? It says be sexy. In fact, it doesn’t just say be sexy. It practically screams it at them. Continuously.

And of course, the more teenagers dress and act in a sexy way, the more they do get noticed. But that’s not always a good thing. Okay, in a minute, I’m going to say something that may not go down too well. So before I get there, I’ll change tracks a little bit.

Twice in the last week, in very different programs (neither of them religious, by the way), I have heard someone say that fathers are more afraid now to tell their daughters that what they are wearing is unacceptable. Because a father knows what a young boy will think when he sees his daughter dressed that way. But the problem is he feels it’s politically incorrect to say anything.

The message we’re told nowadays is that no matter what a woman wears or how a woman acts, she doesn’t ask for sex. Which is fair enough. A man should never force a woman into sex just because of what she’s wearing or how she’s acting. And it’s a very good message and one that our young men need to hear.

But the problem is that now it’s difficult for people to tell young women that what they are wearing may draw unwanted sexual attention. Because the message is they can wear what they want, act how they want and boys just have to keep their hands off.

I stepped backwards before. So now let’s step forward.

When an adult woman wears a sexy outfit, she knows she looks sexy. And unless she’s completely naïve, she knows exactly what men are thinking when they look at her. And maybe she likes that. She feels sexy, desirable, attractive - and often in control. She knows she has the ability to reject any unwanted sexual advances.

But a young woman does not always realise the effect she is having on men. She wears an outfit because it’s trendy. She is flattered by the attention she receives from boys. She hasn’t necessarily learnt how to tell the difference between a boy who is interested in her as a person and one who is not so much concerned with admiring her new outfit as he is with taking it off.

Rape is wrong. Obviously. But sometimes a young girl will find herself in a sexual situation that she isn’t really ready for, but isn’t really sure how to say no. She’s not yet sure herself how far she wants to go. I don’t want to get explicit here, but things can slide from enjoyable to regrettable pretty quickly. And it is my belief that many teenage girls will let things go a lot further than they actually want them to.

The solution here for many people will be to just give girls coping skills on how to say no. I don’t think that’s enough. Because I think sexy behaviour and appearance puts young girls in situations that they’re just not ready for. Not only are they not ready for sex, they’re not ready to learn how to cope with unwanted sexual advances. And not only that, sometimes they don’t want to say no. Because when a guy wants to have sex with a girl, quite often that girl feels wanted. It’s hard to say no to that. It’s hard sometimes for adults to say no to that. Let alone young girls who want above all else to be wanted - and popular and accepted and attractive.

Well give them condoms, I can hear someone say. Sure. And make it even easier for them to have sex before they’re ready for it. And make it even harder for them to say no. When a young girl walks around with a condom in her purse, it’s like she’s admitted to herself she may have sex. And admitting you may do something is always the first step towards doing it. Whether it’s something you should do or not. Whether you’re ready for it or not. Whether it’s good for you or not.

I don’t know what sex education is like these days. But I hope at least some of it involves telling young people how to avoid sex. I don’t mean the whole abstinence only approach. I like abstinence - as in abstinence education. And honestly, I think it would be good if that kind of sex education actually worked. But I really don’t think it is ever going to be fully successful in the highly sexualised culture that we live in.

But at least giving kids (for that’s what they are) some knowledge on how to deal with or avoid unwanted sexual advances. And teaching them the kind of situations that may lead to sex. Perhaps even letting teenage girls know some of the thoughts that are running through teenage boys head. And even though this may be politically incorrect, telling girls what affect their sexy clothes and behaviour has on the males around them.

I’ve never been a boy, so I don’t know what it’s like to be one. But I imagine it’s not easy. Right when their hormones are going wild, they have all these teenage girls wearing the skimpiest outfits possible, acting in the sexiest ways, often giving them the idea that they want to go further than they actually do. And many of the girls don’t actually know what they’re doing. They’re just trying to be trendy and attractive.

Feminists complain about the objectifying of women. I wouldn’t call myself a feminist, but I also get very annoyed at the objectifying of women. I don’t think it’s all men’s fault though. When women or young girls go around trying to look as sexy as possible, can we honestly blame the men for looking at them and thinking ‘sex’? And that was probably politically incorrect statement number two.

Now I don’t want to enforce rules where modest dress is compulsory. And I don’t think there’s anything wrong with mature women (and I say mature, because the exact age can vary from person to person) wearing sexy clothes. Women like looking sexy sometimes. But I do think we should be educating young girls about the types of clothes they wear - and the types of behaviours that go with them.

And I suppose I better leave this post here, before I get to politically incorrect statement number three.

I will pray for you

2010-03-07T22:08:00.005+11:00

I heard this song for the first time this week. And I loved it so much that I decided to share it here. Sorry for the non-English subtitles. But it was the best video on YouTube. And it does mean that the English lyrics are there as well. Here is I will pray for you, sung by Katherine Jenkins.

Seriousness of sin

2010-03-07T02:03:00.002+11:00

Before I start this post on the seriousness of sin, I want to say three things.

1. We are all sinners.
2. Sinners need love and compassion.
3. We are all sinners.

So this post is not going to be about pointing fingers and judging people. That’s never been my approach and I’m not about to start now. It is, however, about recognising that sin is serious. And we do nobody any favours when we pretend that it isn’t.

Many Christians lean towards the love and compassion approach to Christianity. I have nothing against this. I’m all for love and compassion. I believe if everyone had more love and compassion in their lives, the world would be a better place.

When people sin, they do one of two things. They either feel sorrow for it or they don’t. If they don’t feel sorrow, generally nothing anyone says is going to make them feel sorrow. If they do, they feel bad enough on their own, without having other people make them feel worse.

But the love and compassion we extend to others should not involve saying that what they have done is quite okay.

Well, not always. Sometimes people feel bad about something when they really have no need to. Sometimes they exaggerate what they have done wrong and have an unhealthy sense of guilt. And so the best thing is often to say, ‘You know something, what you did wasn’t really that bad.’

When someone feels upset about something, it’s normal to want to make them feel better. It’s the loving and compassionate thing to do. But sometimes what we say to ‘make someone feel better’ doesn’t line up with God’s view of sin. The whole, ‘Well maybe you did have an affair with your husband’s best friend. But lots of people have affairs nowadays’ kind of approach.

And sometimes people don’t need to feel better. Their sorrow for sin is a good thing. It’s what leads to repentance and submission to God’s will. Sometimes making someone feel better is the worst thing you could do for them.

In the beginning I listed three points. Okay, it was more like two. The first and third point was that we are all sinners. Remembering this should help prevent us becoming too judgemental. But it should never lead to a downplaying of sin.

Sometimes the truth that we are all sinners morphs into a ‘We are all sinners, so sin doesn’t really matter’ kind of attitude. ‘After all, what is one sin amongst so many?’ I’ve had someone say to me, ‘Do you honestly think God is going to care if you do this, when there are so many people doing much worse things?’

Short answer, yes. Because sin does matter.

Sin is not like littering. You know how sometimes you’re in a public place, and there’s rubbish everywhere. You kind of look at your empty chip packet or soft drink can and go, ‘I should just toss it on the ground. It’s not going to make any difference. There’s so much rubbish here already.’

Well sin is not like that. Sin is not just one tiny spec in a sin-filled world, hardly noticeable from God’s perspective. Each sin is important. Each sin is an offence against God.

I was praying in Church the other day, looking at the wooden carving of Jesus’ crucifixion, thinking about how He died for our sins. And I thought I can never fully grasp that. My mind can never capture the entirety of what that means. I know Jesus died for the sins of the whole world. And it’s been repeated so often it almost sounds like a cliché. Which is sad in itself, really. But Jesus dying for the sins of the whole world is such a staggering idea. I can’t even begin to appreciate how truly astounding it is.

So I stopped thinking about how Jesus died for our sins and started thinking about how he died for my sins. Not from the point of view that He died just for me. But from the point of view that my sins put him there. My sins nailed God to the cross. If I was the only person in the world, or if I was the only sinner in the world and everyone else was perfect, Jesus would have still been crucified. He would still have undergone unimaginable agony. The suffering that my sins alone would have caused him are immense.

I can’t even grasp that. I will never fully understand just how much he suffered for my sins. And I will never be as thankful for it as I should be.

Perhaps it’s better that way. Perhaps if I did understand and appreciate it properly, I would never get off my knees.

Jesus Christ had love and compassion. Jesus Christ who died on a cross, in agony, suffering for what we have done, paying the price for our sins.

(Image details: Basilique Saint-Quentin, France - Crucifixion)

Understanding Jesus' Love

2010-03-05T20:24:00.003+11:00

For my theology unit, one of the readings, Divine Teaching and Christian Beliefs (McIntosh, 2008), discusses the idea that theological beliefs could be tested by their effect upon the person with those beliefs. In other words, good practice equals right beliefs. McIntosh also discussed John Henry Newman’s idea that you can tell whether someone has healthy faith by whether they have love and compassion.

I disagreed with this view. Firstly, because Christians with good beliefs often do bad things. This doesn’t necessary mean their beliefs are wrong.

Secondly, it is not always easy to see what good practice - or even loving others - actually means. There are many Christians who all believe that they are modelling a Christian life of love, who are actually behaving in very different ways to one another.

How can we decide who is right? And if we start deciding that someone has an unhealthy faith because they are not loving, is it really that they are acting without love or is it simply that our idea of love is different to theirs?

Most people would agree that Jesus is our best example of how to love others. But still there is disagreement as to how we should love others, even when following his example.

To some, Jesus’ example is clear. He showed compassion and love on all occasions. Therefore, there should be no disagreement as to what our love should look like.

But Jesus’ example was not clear. Although he showed compassion, he also said things like:

‘You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell?’ (Matthew 23:33)

And:

‘And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You will be brought down to Hades. For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. (Matthew 11:23).

Many Christians would suggest that mentioning hell to people is not a loving act. And yet if we are to hold Jesus up as the perfect example of love, we have to face the fact that Jesus mentioned hell.

The problem is that although Jesus modelled love perfectly, it is not always so easy to understand. It can’t be summed up in six easy to understand dot-points. It is not a one-sided view of love, that only seeks to love people in one way. It loves people in very different ways. And quite frankly, Jesus’ love is mind-boggling at times. Just when we think we understand Jesus’ love, He seems to approach it from a completely different direction.

I think the greatest mistake we can make is starting to believe we understand Jesus’ love. The first point is that we are not God. We cannot understand God’s love, because our minds our limited. God’s love is so much bigger than what we can comprehend.

Secondly, I think when we start believing we understand Jesus’ love, there’s a danger we may be seeing it from only one perspective. There is also the danger here that we may take that one perspective as the rule by which all our loving actions should be measured against. We must remember to consider the whole of Jesus’ actions and words, not just those that fit into our idea of what love is like.

It’s interesting to think about the Gospels from the point of view of the Apostles. I’m sure there would have been many times when they thought they were starting to understand where Jesus was coming from. But then Jesus goes and does something completely unexpected. Surely there were moments when they thought, ‘That doesn’t fit into my own ideas about who Jesus is. I’m going to have to rethink it all now.’

We like to put people in boxes. We like to figure out where they’re coming from and try and match all their actions up with that. But Jesus was far bigger than our little boxes. We can’t even imagine a box big enough to contain him. Whenever we think his example of love is easy to understand, what we’re really doing is reducing Jesus to a box that doesn’t extend beyond our own mind.

Jesus did not just have one approach to love. He didn’t come at love from the one angle. But we do. We tend to stress one aspect of love and ignore the others. We see love through very limited eyes. We cannot ever fully grasp how big love can be. Because we only ever see a tiny part of it.

Yes, we must always look to Jesus as an example of how to love. But we must never make the mistake of believing that we completely understand that example. We never will. Our minds (and our hearts) are too limited. His love is far bigger than our own ideas. And just when we think we finally get it, that we know how to love and what love means, Jesus is likely to do something completely unexpected. And we may have to rethink it all.

(Image details: Holy Trinity by Botticelli.)

What's the point of fasting?

2010-02-28T13:33:00.002+11:00

I fasted for the first time last Friday.

I don’t say that to boast. If I thought I had any reason to boast at all, I wouldn’t mention it. I say it only because I know how slack I am and I want anyone reading this to know how slack I am (and how little experience I have) when it comes to fasting.

I might just repeat that first sentence again, with the relevant bit in bold in case you missed it.

I fasted for the first time last Friday.

If I was serious at all about fasting, I would have fasted long before now. I would fast for the whole 40 days of Lent (excluding Sundays) and give up diet coke. Although I did drink Pepsi Max for most of last Friday and that was penance enough. At the very least, I would have fasted at least one other day during this Lent season, before now.

I don’t know why I have never fasted before. It is true that fasting doesn’t get much mention from Pentecostal pulpits. And I was in the Pentecostal church for about three years before I even knew that some Pentecostals fasted. But above and beyond that, I didn’t see the point.

I knew that Catholics fasted. But even when Lent started, my thoughts were more geared towards giving up something, than abstinence and fasting. Until I saw a message printed in the parish bulletin. Which made me think I should probably consider doing it.

So now I have fasted. And with my grand one experience of one whole day, making me an expert in my own blog, I would like to tell you exactly what the point of fasting is.

Well, not exactly. More like I would like to think about what the point of fasting might be - or might not be. And because I’m a blogger and I think better when I write, I’m writing a blog post about it.

First of all, to the non-points of fasting. The point of fasting is not to lose weight or save money. They’re earthly benefits. And if we’re fasting to gain earthly benefits, then I think we might miss out on the spiritual ones. And as this seems to be quite a honest post, I will tell you that the thought of both did cross my mind. I thought maybe I’ll lose weight. And I’ll definitely save money. Yay! But if that’s my reason for fasting, I’d be better off calling it dieting and frugality.

Another reason for fasting, that I have heard from some people, is to have their prayers answered. Now the people who I have heard this from have fasted more than I have. So I don’t really want to say their reasons are invalid. But it does seem to be sliding into that area of wanting earthly benefit rather than spiritual benefit again. Although I suppose it depends what you’re praying for. If you’re praying for a new car, I don’t think fasting is going to help too much. If you’re fasting to try and have a prayer answered to overcome sin, then that’s probably a good thing. I think. Maybe.

I may as well face it. I’m not even an expert on my own blog. I can’t even say anything without wondering whether what I am saying makes any kind of sense at all.

But one thing I do know about is me. So maybe I should talk about that. Me and my reasons for fasting.

I decided to fast first of all because I saw that message in the parish bulletin. But also because I want to continually try and get just a little bit closer to where I want to be. And I thought fasting might help me do that. Some people diet to improve their bodies. I wanted to fast to improve my soul.

And I still don’t think my reasons are that fantastic. There’s probably much better reasons for fasting that I haven’t even thought of. But that was my main reason.

But it’s still about ‘getting’ in a way. And to go back to what I said about not seeing the point of fasting. When people say ‘I don’t see the point’, what they are often (not always, but often) saying is ‘I don’t see what I am going to get out of it.’ Of course, the point to a lot of things is not actually to get something out of it.

But still, it’s interesting that I only tried to fast when I saw something I might get out of it. Although these are spiritual goals, not earthly ones, the principle is the same as the reasons why people do many things. I have a goal. I thought fasting might help get - there’s that get word again - me closer to that goal.

But then, all getting isn’t necessary bad and all giving up isn’t necessary good. If I was to get closer to God, that’s a good thing, right? If I want to give up church, that’s a bad thing.

And so maybe I shouldn’t be thinking of fasting as needing to avoid ‘getting something’. I just need to make sure that what I am trying to get is a good thing.

The other point to fasting is penance. I can’t say this crossed my mind nearly as much as it should have. (In fact, I probably thought of it about the same number of times as I thought of losing weight and saving money.) It’s a very important reason for fasting. I know that. And that’s about all I do know. So something that should be discussed in detail is only going to get a couple of sentences. And you’ve just read them.

One other thing that crosses my mind about fasting (although I’m not sure whether it’s considered a reason for fasting at all) is that suffering brings you closer to God. That’s not a popular opinion nowadays. But I do believe it’s true. And I think maybe one of the reasons we don’t accept that as readily nowadays is because many people (in the western world) no longer know what it really is to suffer.

My idea of suffering is drinking Pepsi Max instead of Diet Coke. And I have to say that drinking Pepsi Max does not bring me any closer to God. But then it’s not really suffering. Nor is going without food for a day. If I was actually starving, that would be different.

So I don’t know what it is to really suffer. But one thing I do know is that, in my darkest moments, at the times when life seems really difficult, I am far closer to God than I am when everything is going well. And I don’t know whether everyone else is completely different to me and won’t understand this next sentence at all. But for myself, if I was to never suffer anything in life, I think there is a very good chance I may forget God completely.

And that almost sounds like the saying we hear so often that ‘Religion is only a crutch.’ But I don’t mean it in that way. It’s not like I turn to God only because I want him to help me. I turn to God because when I suffer, I think of God more.

In Luke 22:44, it says that Jesus, being in anguish (some translations have agony), prayed more earnestly. I saw that verse in something else I was reading recently. And it was one of those verses that I have read many times, but that suddenly seemed to jump out at me. And I thought of all the times I have prayed, when I was deeply distressed or troubled. The more anguish I feel over something, the more earnestly do I pray. The prayers said when I am happy and everything is fine are never prayed as fervently.

I seem to have gone slightly off track. Back to fasting.

Jesus not only mentioned fasting, he fasted himself. He didn’t do it to get any earthly benefit. The devil tempted him afterwards, and he resisted temptation. Nor did he do it to ‘improve his soul’. His soul was already perfect. And that is what makes me think that my reasons for fasting may not be that good.

In the Cantena aurea, I found a commentary from St John Chrysostom, saying that Christ fasted, ‘not Himself needing it, but teaching us by His example’.

I have to say I was a bit disappointed in reading this. Because I thought if I could understand Jesus’ reasons for fasting, maybe I would be a bit closer to understanding the point myself.

I’ve just been reading different things on the internet, trying to find some good point to end this post on. But the more I read, the more I realise that any attempt to summarise it and put it into my blog is not going to do justice to it. I didn’t become an expert on fasting through my one day’s experience. And I’m certainly not going to become an expert by spending one to two hours on the internet, trying to skim through things that I don’t really understand anyway.

So I think I’ll just leave it here.

Grace

2010-02-27T20:22:00.002+11:00

I feel like I should do a post, because I haven't done one for a few days. But I don't really feel like writing much at the moment. So I'll leave you with one of my favourite U2 songs instead, Grace.

Birth, Death and In Between

2010-02-23T19:41:00.001+11:00

I am going to a funeral tomorrow. I am going to a baby shower on Saturday. And on Sunday, I have been invited to a wedding. I’m not going to the wedding. But still, having a funeral, a baby shower and a wedding all in the same week makes you think about life, death and in between.

When I was researching an essay on the sacraments last year, I came across something that said that in the Catholic Church, the sacraments (of which there are seven) cover all the important life milestones. There is baptism for birth. Anointing of the Sick (or Last Rites or Extreme Unction) for Death. And marriage itself in a sacrament.

I couldn’t explore this idea in my essay, because it would have been off-topic, but I remember being quite struck by this idea that the Church was there at the beginning of life and at the end of it, and at the important moments in between.

On one level it was reassuring. There was this continuity, a thread between birth and death, linking those important moments. Not just our own birth, death and marriage. But the birth and marriage of your children and grandchildren. During all those times, the Church was there.

It was also reassuring because there was at least one constant. So many things happen in a life, so many things change. People you thought would be there forever suddenly aren’t there. The ones who were there at your birth will often have died before you die. Some faces will be gone. And new ones will be in their place. And yet the Church is still there. It’s the one face that hasn’t changed.

Yet the Church doesn’t simply show its face when it administers the sacraments. In a way, it is the face of God to the world. I don’t want to get into too much discussion about the sacraments. Not least, because I’m likely to say something wrong. But it is worth noting that the sacraments are a visible means of conveying visible grace. When the sacraments are administered, we see a visible sign of God’s presence in the world. God is there at the beginning. And God is there at the end, whether we receive the sacraments or not. But the sacraments remind us of God’s presence. Though of course, they do so much more than that. Because they actually confer the grace which they signify. And that is reassuring. To know that God’s grace is there at the beginning and there at the end, and there for many occasions in between.

But I think what most struck me is not that the Church was there at the beginning of life and at the end of life, but it was there before the beginning of life and after the end of life. One lifetime is really only a tiny blip in the history of the Church. And the Church is not just a thread, connecting the start of one’s life to the end of it, it is a thread that connects the baptism of the first Christians to the Last Rites of the last Christians. That’s quite mind-blowing, when you think about it.

In the end, this post has seemed to be more about the longevity of the church than about life and death. But maybe that’s what life and death boils down to, in the end. It is so short, compared to everything else. My friend who just died had a fairly long life. I’m not sure exactly how old she was, but she had her 80th one or two years ago. But there were many lifetimes lived before she was born and many lifetimes to be lived afterwards.

And now there’s a new little life, just getting ready to be born. Who knows what things he or she will see and do? Who knows how the world will have changed by the time he or she dies? But the Church will be there at the beginning and the Church will be there at the end. Maybe not in the form of the sacraments to this particular person. It’s impossible to know for sure what will happen there. But the Church will at least exist and be available to administer the sacraments. And God will be there. He’s there now, forming this baby in the womb. He will be there at its birth. He will be there at its death. And He will be there after death as well.

People and Walls

2010-02-22T11:36:00.001+11:00

Every now and then, I decide that I’ve had enough of people. They only hurt you or let you down. I’m better off without them. And living life without having anything to do with people would avoid a lot of pain.

I decide I might lock myself up in my house and avoid everyone. Only it doesn’t quite work because I have children. I can’t exactly say to them can you please live somewhere else? I’ve decided to become a hermit.

These feelings never last for long anyway. A day, maybe two. On very rare occasions, maybe a week. I get disappointed with the whole human race fairly easily. But then someone will do something or I begin to think a bit more clearly and I realise they’re not such a bad lot after all. Besides which, I’m part of them. And if I wanted to avoid all people that did the wrong thing occasionally, I’d have to avoid myself. That’s pretty difficult.

But there was a time when I did avoid just about everyone. When I was married to my husband, I basically locked myself in the house and saw no-one, besides the people I had to see. There were a few reasons for that. Some of which I could discuss, but as some of them I certainly don’t want to discuss, it’s probably best not to discuss my reasons at all.

And even when I did have to see people, I put a big, sturdy, Jericho-type wall around myself before I talked to them. I might be in the same room as them. But there was no way I was getting close to them. There was a barrier between them and me.

Things have changed since then. In fact, writing this post has proved to me how much they have changed. Because I write about that time without feeling any pain whatsoever. I actually feel happier now than I did when I started writing.

And I wonder why that is? Maybe it’s because remembering that time shows me how much I have gained.

When I first started to come out of that ‘Married hermit with kids’ stage, someone was talking to me about how I needed to open up and remove that wall. And I said to her that I didn’t want to remove that wall. Because if I did, I would get hurt. She told me that at the moment (that is, at that moment), I was just a big bundle of hurt.

Reliving the past may not be painful, but it’s certainly not something I want to go back to. Because even though people occasionally let me down and disappoint me, they also bring much joy. There are also the times they surprise me with their generosity or friendship.

But just because I said that thinking about that ‘hermit’ phase doesn’t hurt anymore, doesn’t mean the hurt is completely gone. The pain I felt then is still there. Sometimes I feel like if you cut a deep gash in me, what would come up would not be blood, but tears, disappointments, hurts and fears.

I think (at least I hope) that I deal with it a lot better than I used to. But the reason I locked myself away from everyone was not only that I was worried they would hurt me. It was the fear that they would see the hurt already inside me. That they would catch a glimpse of those ‘tears, disappointments, hurts and fears’ and then they would run away. Or they would pity me or think less of me. Something. It’s like when you have a room in your house that you never want anyone to see because it’s such a mess. And if they see that, what would they think? Well I have rooms like that inside me. Rooms that are messy and ugly and pretty depressing places to be in.

Maybe everyone has rooms like that. Maybe it’s just me. I don’t know.

The pain is still there. And so is the fear.

But I have realised that sometimes the best thing to do, when you have a messy room, is simply open the door. Let people see it. Yes, some people will be horrified and will want nothing to do with you. But some will stay. Some will see your mess and accept you anyway.

And those are the moments when I give up being disappointed with the whole human race, and think that some people really are beautiful beings. Those are the times when I realise that exposing myself to possible pain and hurt and disappointment is worth it. Because sometimes that’s not what I get. Instead, I receive joy and love and acceptance. When you leave yourself open, you put yourself in a position to receive both.

Caught Between Just Who You Are and Who You Want to Be

2010-02-20T08:55:00.001+11:00

Oh my Jesus, Thou knowest well that I love Thee, but I do not love Thee enough; O grant that I may love Thee more, O love that burnest ever and never failest, my God. Though Who art charity itself, enkindle in my heart that divine flame which consumes the saints and transforms them unto Thee. Amen.

I have started this post with this prayer, partly because I read it last night and it made an immediate impression upon me and partly because it was after reading this prayer that I began to think about the difference between where I am and where I want to be.

I know that I love Jesus. But I also know that I don’t love him enough. And last night, just before reading this prayer, I was getting a bit upset about the difference between who I am and who I should be.

The hardest thing about being a Christian, I believe, is not living a Christian life. It’s not doing the right things and making the right choices - that is when that’s what I am doing.

I think there are two common views of Christianity. The first is that Christianity is a crutch, something that helps you out when life is too tough. The second is that Christianity involves giving up everything you want to do and being miserable because of it.

It is true that some people use Christianity as a crutch. They’re interested in God when life gets tough and they think he’s going to wave a magic wand and make everything okay again. But as soon as life gets good again, it’s Goodbye God and hello world.

But to truly follow Christ involves some sacrifice. It does mean giving up some things we want to do. It means putting others and God before our own selfish desires.

But it doesn’t mean being miserable because of it.

I said before that the hardest thing about being a Christian is not living a Christian life. By which I meant that living a Christian life is not the hardest thing about being a Christian. But it can also apply the other way. The hardest thing about being a Christian is ‘not living a Christian life’. When you’re a Christian, but you’re not living life the way you want to, that’s the hardest thing.

And all Christians are in this situation. None of us are living life exactly the way we want to. We are caught between who we are and who we want to be. And it’s really hard wanting to live a certain way, but falling so far short of it.

And what makes it even harder is I know I will never get to that place. I know there is never going to come a day when I say ‘Oh good, made it. Now I can relax.’ It is always going to be some elusive goal ahead of me, that I keep walking towards (and sometimes away from), but that always seems to get further and further away.

If I did manage to reach a state of pure selflessness, where the only thing that mattered in my life was God, and where I lost every single one of my selfish desires, the world would look at me and say ‘what a miserable existence’. But it sounds wonderful to me. Misery is not being there yet.

And before I end this post, I just want to point out that the title did not come from me. It’s not exactly the words of any great theologian either. It’s a line from the Bon Jovi song, ‘Welcome to Wherever you Are’. That line kept running through my mind as I was writing this post and so it became my title.

My Own Opinions

2010-02-19T10:56:00.001+11:00

One of my faults is that I am very fond of my own opinions. I can imagine a few people being shocked by that statement. Not because I have admitted to such a terrible fault. But because I would call it a fault.

In the western world at least, we place a high value on the ability to think for ourselves and form our own opinions. We teach it to kids at school and ram it down their throats at university. What we think seems to matter less than whether we came by those opinions through our own reasoning. And one way to lose a person’s respect is to say that you believe something just because (fill in the blank) says so.

Although many different people with very different beliefs may be criticised for not being able to think for themselves, it is a criticism often directed towards Christians. Which makes sense. Christians do - or at least should - form some of their opinions based on what the bible says. If not, why bother having the bible? Why not simply lock it in a drawer and form our own opinions about how we think God should do things. And then teach those opinions as coming from God.

Also, Christians must simply accept some things. I am not going to get any further to the truth by doing some critical thinking about the Trinity. In fact, as my thinking may be wrong, if I do think about it and form my own opinions, I am far more likely to be led away from the truth than towards it.

There is nothing necessarily wrong with forming our own opinions. Sometimes it is not just an advantage to be able to think for ourselves, but almost necessary. Say there is a government election. What is better? To vote a certain way because that’s how someone told you to vote? Or to form your own opinion about the best party to vote for? Most people would agree the latter is preferable. Or take the messages we receive from society, culture, the media and advertising. I strongly believe that most people could do with a lot more critically thinking when it comes to those things.

So the problem is not being able (or being taught) to think for ourselves. The problem comes when we attach far too much importance on our own opinions. Or when we decide that an opinion is only valid if it relies on individual reasoning.

To get back to me. (After all, it’s my blog.) I said that one of my faults was that I was very fond of my own opinions. What this means is that I have to tendency to think that my opinion on something is more important that what anything else has to say about it. If my opinion contradicts something in the bible, well then maybe the bible is wrong or that centuries of interpretation have been wrong. If my opinion contradicts what the Church says, then I’m going to tell the Church exactly why it should listen to me instead.

And this isn’t simply a matter of wanting everything to match up to my own opinions. It extends to wanting to have my own opinion about everything. It’s the attitude that nothing must simply be accepted. But that all my beliefs must be based on my own reasoning. And that my reasoning is more important than anyone else’s reasoning.

I was thinking recently about the conversations I used to have with my Christian friends. But after a while, I realised that it wasn’t simply the discussions about faith that I missed. It was the disagreements about faith. I used to love challenging people and being challenged. The conversations where everyone agreed weren’t nearly as interesting.

Now I think being challenged is a good thing. I love it when someone says something that makes me either rethink something or realise that I fall far short of what God wants from me. And I believe the Christian life should be a challenging one. What the bible says does challenge us. What Jesus Christ said does challenge us. God doesn’t always tell us what we want to hear. And sometimes what he says seems to contradict our firmly held convictions and beliefs. If the bible doesn’t challenge you in some way, I suggest you’re not giving it enough thought.

We live in a world of critical thinkers, where people love to form their own opinions and voice them to whoever will listen. Nothing must be accepted. Everything must be challenged.

But maybe we’re so busy challenging the world that we won’t allow ourselves to be challenged. And maybe our ability (and desire) to form opinions on anything and everything sometimes prevents us from simply accepting the truth.

Going Without

2010-02-17T22:12:00.003+11:00

The people of today aren’t exactly known for their ability to go without things. Well why would they? Many of us have been told, by television advertisements, magazine articles and store salesmen, that we can have anything we want to. If we don’t have the money, no problem. Just put in on the credit card or get a loan or buy it on an interest free plan.

Instead of being told how to go without, we have a whole heap of people telling us how to get things. Which makes sense, from a sales perspective. You don’t sell too many products by telling people that don’t need or can’t afford what you’re selling. Or that they should save up and come back when they have the money. By the time that happens, they may have changed their mind or found a cheaper or better product.

It wasn’t always that way. The best conversations I ever had about money was with the lady who used to live next door to me. She was 90 and had lived through the depression. There have been many times when I thought I was ‘going without’. But compared to what she told me about her younger days, I was living in luxury.

Today’s idea of ‘going without’ is very different to way people thought of it in the past. Even when we think we’re cutting back to the necessities, we usually have quite a few luxuries that didn’t even exist in days gone by.

Just because something has been invented doesn’t actually mean we need to have it in our lives. (And I must remind myself of that next time my iPod breaks down.) And yet we act like we do. We must have a set-top box and a DVD player and an iPod and a television and a mobile phone, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

And because we see these things as necessities, we’re not going to let the fact that we don’t have the money stop us from buying them. Just put it on credit and pay it off later - or not.

There’s a very good reason why I’m saying all this today. Today is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent. It is a time to be spent in preparation for Easter. Part of this usually involves some form of self-denial. Traditionally, this meant fasting. But people may give up whatever they choose, from poker machines to television to chocolate.

It’s hard finding something to give up. It shouldn’t be. There are so many things in my life I don’t actually need. Little luxuries here, there and everywhere. I could probably write a list of at least 20 things I could give up. The problem is I don’t want to do without any of them.

But then, if I did want to do without them, it wouldn’t really be self-denial now, would it?

One fasting day that a lot of people do still keep to is Good Friday. I know someone who never went to church, didn’t like any talk of God at all, seemed to squirm when anyone mentioned Christianity, but faithfully abstained from meat on Good Friday. And I heard someone else who wasn’t a church-goer have a very big go at someone for eating a pie on Good Friday.

But then even that form of fasting often isn’t really self-denial. Last Good Friday, I was at my mother’s house. I cooked a fish dish that was probably the best meal I ate all year. Then we had dessert afterwards. I think we may have missed the point.

I have no idea how many Catholics give up something for Lent. Or how many Christians. I’m not even going to guess. But I suspect, of those that do, what they actually give up is not as much as what people used to give up for Lent. Little things, rather than big things. Small sacrifices, rather than an attitude of self-denial and penance.

Perhaps it is harder for us to go without things these days, because we are so used to getting what we want, when we want it. But maybe we need to practice self-denial because of that.

I don’t think any of us are meant to live in a world where we very rarely have to go without things. And I’m not just talking about the fact that we can’t buy a car or go on a holiday. Most people don’t get everything they want. However much money you have, there will always be something you can’t afford.

Instead, I’m talking about the things we are used to. The things that we see as necessities, even though they’re really luxuries. The things that are affordable and either make life easier for us or bring us some enjoyment. The world tells us that we need these things and that we will be happy once we have them.

Happy, maybe. But they won’t actually bring us true joy. Things are just things, when all is said and done. And allowing ourselves a whole heap of luxuries only increases our desire for new ones.

In the end, I decided to give up chocolate. I was telling my son about it and he said that he also wanted to give up chocolate for Lent. That’s a big sacrifice from him. My eldest son is a complete chocoholic. Whenever he gets any kind of treat, if there’s a chocolate version of it, he’ll go with the chocolate. I’ve never seen him choose any kind of milkshake except chocolate or any kind of muffin except chocolate. Anyway, you get the point. I didn’t ask him to give up something for Lent. He chose to do it. And I think, to be perfectly honest, he’s making a far bigger sacrifice than I am. Chocolate means far more to him than it does to me.

But anyway, his reasoning for this was interesting. He said that if he gave up chocolate, Easter would be even better than usual. Because he’d have all this chocolate and he’d really appreciate it because he’d gone without it for so long. It’s not exactly the kind of preparation for Easter that I think Lent is meant to be. Easter is about Jesus, not chocolate. But maybe he has a better understanding of Lent than I do.

I was searching for something to give up and, in the end, chose something that wouldn’t cause me too much pain - which I know is completely the wrong attitude. I wasn’t really thinking at all about how it was a preparation for Easter. There was not much thought given to what I might gain spiritually from self-denial. It was just - well it’s Lent. I should give up something.

I said earlier that I don’t think we’re meant to get everything we want. And I think that’s because it’s when we give up things that we’re more able to receive what God has to give us. And it’s when we go without that we actually gain the most.

(Image details: Detail of painting "The Battle between Carnival and Lent" by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, 1559.)

Scared Scripture

2010-02-15T22:37:00.001+11:00

Each night, I have to read for 10 minutes with my son. As a joke, I said to him you could read my university textbook. It was a joke. Honestly. I’m not that mean. But he thought it was a brilliant idea, which is how my son came to be reading my textbook out loud.

My son tends not to look at the words too carefully. So he’ll say what he thinks the word says or should say, rather than what it actually says. So when he came to the words ‘sacred scripture’ he said ‘scared scripture’ instead.

It was cute and it was funny. But it also made me think. In what way could scripture be scared?

Now obviously scripture cannot be scared at all, either as simply a book or as the Word of God.

But people can – and have been – scared that the authority of scripture is under threat.

I don’t have the time to go into everything with too much detail here. But as I have been thinking about the authority of scripture, I would like to briefly look at some of the possible reasons why people may believe that the bible is no longer authoritative.

The first and most obvious one is that some people do not believe that God is real or that Jesus was God’s son. For those that do not have faith in God or Jesus Christ, then it’s hard to find any reason why they should consider it authoritative.

However, another statement that comes up sometime is that no-one should consider it authoritative because some people do not believe it is the word of God. So for instance, say someone asks another person why they believe a certain thing is wrong. The person answers because the bible says this. The first person says well that’s not a good reason because I don’t believe in the bible.

But many people do base their beliefs on what is right and wrong on the bible. And if they are asked why they have certain beliefs, the answer is the bible – whether other people believe in it or not. This could almost be a post in itself. But I better leave it or I will run out of room.

Another threat to biblical authority is that people believe it doesn’t match up with scientific fact. Whether this be the creation story or Jesus’ resurrection or miracles or the flood. And some people think they can no longer believe any of it because they see certain parts of it as unscientific.

The first point to make here is just because something seems to go against our idea of science doesn’t mean it did not happen. If God is intervening, one would expect that the natural laws of science would be suspended. That’s what makes Jesus’ resurrection a miracle. If people rose from the dead all the time (under properly conducted experiments in science laboratories) then it wouldn’t be that much of a big deal. In fact, then you’d probably get people saying well I don’t believe Jesus was the Son of God because he never did anything that special.

The second point is that the bible is not a science book. And if someone were to ask me whether the bible was an authoritative text for learning about science, I would have to say no. But then if someone were to ask me whether a science text book was an authoritative text for learning theology, I would also say no. And yet many people do reject the bible because it fails to match what the scientists say.

I would also say that the knowledge of science is limited. Science tells us about what we can see and can know. But it can’t tell us of Heaven or God or spiritual intervention in our lives. And considering that science is limited to what is here on earth, it seems foolish to use it to reject a book that is not limited to what is here on earth. The bible is more concerned with heavenly matters. Science is only concerned with earthly ones – and can only examine earthly ones.

Another threat to biblical authority that is related to this is that the bible seems to contain errors or that certain passages in the bible do not line up with other passages. So for example, the Gospel of John sometimes seems to contradict Matthew, Mark and Luke. The idea is that, if the bible really were the Word of God, then it would not contain any errors or contradictions.

Again, I go back to the fact that the bible speaks of theological truths. I believe it was divinely inspired. And that God ensured that there were no errors in theological matters. However, it was written by humans, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. And humans have limited understanding. It is possible that God allowed them to make errors (due to their limited understanding), providing that they did not make errors that were of importance to any matters related to faith.

Here’s an example. One problem for the church is times gone past was the idea that the earth revolved around the sun. Because in Joshua, it says that the sun stood still. So that’s one error that people might point to and say that the bible is not divinely inspired, because if it did, it would not contain that type of error. However, we need to consider people’s limited understanding of astronomy at the time. If God was to ensure that this error was not in the bible, he would have had to sit the writers down and given them an astronomy lesson that they would not even have understood.

And if we go back to the Gospel of John. What was important for John was that he conveyed spiritual truths in an accurate way. Some of the contradictions may not really be contradictions at all. It is also possible that some of his gospel may not contain the type of strict, factual reporting that you may find in a court transcript, for example. And yet it may be truer because of that. A transcript may be accurate, but it does not always reflect the truth. The comparison has been made between a photograph and a portrait. The Gospel of John perhaps seeks to present a spiritual portrait of Jesus that may be a truer representation than a photograph would be.

The last threat I would like to discuss is one that often comes from Christians. And that is the belief that we don’t like what the bible says anymore, so we’ll change it to something we do like. In other words, they believe the bible is an authority, so long as it fits with their beliefs. But if it doesn’t fit with what they like, then it is no longer considered authoritative. And often this means changing the spiritual truths discussed in the bible to be more acceptable to today’s world.

It’s probably the scariest threat to scripture there is. This idea that the bible no longer fits with what we believe to be true. Therefore, it must be wrong. However, it might just be the case that what we believe not longer fits with the truth.

Anyway, I could probably go on for a few more pages at least, but this post is long enough.

What I am Thankful For

2010-02-15T10:16:00.003+11:00

This is a really daggy thing to do. And if there’s ever a post that you don’t want to read, this is probably it. But I feel like it’s needed at this time. More for my own benefit, than anything else.

Here is a list of all the things that I am thankful for:

• My faith
• My children
• My father, my grandmother, my sister and my mother.
• My house
• My dog
• The fact that I could manage to get a new computer when the old one died
• The box of veggies I just had delivered from www.vegiestoyourdoor.com (and no, they’re not paying me, but they deserve a plug).
• Trees, birds, grass and flowers.
• The fact that no-one has yet put a multi-storey complex in the showground near my house.
• iTunes
• My son fixing my iPod
• Bon Jovi songs
• Being able to study theology
• Learning about Catholicism
* The Catholic Church
• Books, books and even more books.
• The items I have on top of my TV cabinet.
• Sunshine
• Seasons
• Rain
• The delight on children’s faces as they go jumping in puddles
• The sound of my children praying.
• Finding friends in unlikely places
• Having people in my life that know me well, but still love and accept me.
• Getting help from people when I least expect it.
• Conversations about God.
• The bible.
• Watching Dr Who with my boys.
• Cuddles and kisses from my sons.
• Hearing my children sing.
• Laughter, silliness and absolute hilarity.
• The funny conversation I had with my son this morning about how the opposite of upset should be downset, but downset sounds more unhappy than upset.
• The humour in having to walk to the shops with a child’s umbrella that only covers three-quarters of me, has five holes in the top of it and keeps collapsing on my head.
• Podcasts.
• Curling up on the couch on a rainy day and reading.
• Aromatherapy oils.
• Long, hot baths.
• Having three different people give me clothes for the boys in the past week.
• The fact that I managed to cover at least one school book this year without putting creases in it.
• White chocolate.
• Being asked to make cheesecakes for my friends.
• Blogging
• Emails
• Writing
• Learning
• Music
• Beautiful art and architecture
• Old buildings
• Old churches
• Knowing that if I walk down the street, I will usually say hello to at least one person I know.
• Knowing that I don’t need to be wealthy to be happy.
• Knowing that I don’t need to be successful (as the world defines success) to be happy.

Love is not...

2010-02-13T18:11:00.003+11:00

At this time of year, you could almost be forgiven for thinking that love is about flowers, chocolates and very pink looking cards. It’s a pretty warped idea of love.

But then, watch any movie or television show and you’re likely to get as equally a warped view of love. Is it any surprise that many people’s idea of love is also warped?

Love is not flowers or chocolates or cards. Yes, these things may show someone’s love. But the absence of Valentine’s Day gifts does not mean love is missing anymore than their presence means that love is there.

Love is not wanting someone, in the way that someone wants to own or possess something. That’s lust.

Love is not trying to make someone fall in love with you or stay with you or come back to you. And it’s certainly not about trying to force them to do any of these things. That’s coercion.

Love is not about control or jealousy or always getting your own way or holding a grudge or winning an argument.

Love is definitely not about taking. And taking doesn’t just mean removing something from someone by force. It also means trying to make someone give you something they don’t actually want to give you. Trying to persuade someone to buy a gift or take you out for dinner is a form of taking. And love also isn’t about sulking or pouting when you don’t get what you want.

Love is not finding Mr or Mrs Right. It’s not about there being one special person out there who will finally make you happy or ‘complete you’. Or that there is one person for everybody and as soon as they find that one person, everything will be wonderful.

Love is less about happy endings and more about hard work.

And love is certainly not deciding that you have found that special person and that nothing else matters. That’s selfishness. Prior commitments, the pain of other people. The idea that these don’t matter once you find someone you ‘love’ is just nonsense. So is this idea that nothing else matters except being with the one you love.

Sometimes love means having to let go.

So what is love then?

As someone who didn’t exactly make a success of marriage, I feel more qualified to speak about what love is not than I do about what love actually is. So I’ll leave it to someone far wiser than me to describe it.

1 Corinthian 13:4-10.

[4] Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful;
[5] it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;
[6] it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right.
[7] Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
[8] Love never ends; as for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away.
[9] For our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is imperfect;
[10] but when the perfect comes, the imperfect will pass away.

Contextual Theology: Is the Bible speaking to us or are we speaking to the bible?

2010-02-12T09:25:00.003+11:00

I once thought that the only way to get an unbiased opinion of the message in the bible was to get a bunch of people who had never heard of the bible or Christianity or Jesus to read it and then tell me what they thought it meant. Obviously this was a foolish notion. In today’s world, it would be practically impossible to find anyone who has not heard of these things.

But it was foolish for another reason. I presumed that, if they hadn’t heard of these things, then their opinion would be unbiased. But in reality, they would still be reading the bible with ideas about spirituality, meaning, life and death and morals. They would also be influenced by their culture and background. Their worldview would determine how they read the bible, just as surely as if they were reading it with a set of preconceived ideas about what it actually meant.

Much theology today tries to give a voice to certain groups that may have felt excluded from theological discussion in the past. So we have feminist theology and black theology, to name the two most well known ones. There is also the broad category of liberation theology, which can refer specifically to groups of oppressed people, for example those in Latin America. Yet it can also refer to any group of people that have felt marginalised or oppressed in any way. Contextual theology can also be more narrowly defined to groups within groups. My readings for university include papers on Aboriginal theology and Samoan Women theology.

This type of contextual theology does have its benefits. The bible is for all people at all times. And what it says to me, as a white Australian woman, may not be the same as what it says (at least in part) to a Samoan woman. Also, the bible uses a variety of metaphors to describe spiritual truths. How those metaphors are understood may be different from culture to culture and individual to individual. To look at these metaphors in the context of specific peoples should not involve changing the metaphor to fit their understanding, but of ensuring that their understanding fits with the biblical truth.

Yet there are also dangers. The first of these is that the message of the bible may become segmented. Instead of being one universal message, it becomes a series of different messages for different peoples. Related to this is the danger that what the bible ‘says to me’ becomes more important than what it says ‘to people everywhere’. We raise the individual or group message over the universal one. Yet it is the universal message to mankind that is the most important.

Another danger is that we tell the bible how it should be read. In Faith Seeking Understanding (2004), Migliore says that the bible should be read as a liberating message. Yes, liberation and freedom is one strong message of the bible. But it is not the only one. The bible also speaks to us of judgment, for example. To approach the bible with our own ideas about what it should be saying may be to miss what else it has to say. Taken to an extreme, it may also involve correcting the bible when it does not fit in with our ideas.

Theology should involve letting the bible speak to us, rather than speaking to the bible. If contextual theology means seeing what the bible has to say to a specific group of people, bearing in mind that its universal message to mankind is more important, then I am all for it. If, however, it means paying attention only to certain parts of the bible or changing the bible to suit our own ideas, then theology and the bible become simply tools to achieve our own ends. We are closing our ears to what it really has to say and we are placing ourselves above God.

Something is Missing

2010-02-09T12:42:00.002+11:00

Two weeks after my old computer went into retirement, my iPod has now stopped working. Funny how the things that didn’t even exist 20 years ago now seem like necessities.

In a way, the loss of the iPod has hit me harder than the loss of my computer. Because I need my computer for work. And so when it broke down, I had no choice but to go and get a new one. But an iPod only seems necessary. It’s not actually that important. So considering that I don’t actually need one and I just bought a computer and I need to watch my money for a little while, buying a new iPod will have to wait.

And I feel like I’ve just lost a limb.

Last night, I had planned to do some reading for uni. Before I got to that, I was washing up, listening to a podcast, when my iPod just stopped. I tried reformatting it, but that didn’t work. So instead of going onto my uni reading, I started watching television programs on the internet. How that makes any kind of sense at all, I don’t know. It’s not like I use my iPod to read.

I guess it was just that sense that something was missing. Something in my life wasn’t quite right. And I couldn’t function properly without it there.

I don’t need to lose an iPod to feel like that. I often get the sense that something is missing. Or that my life is slightly off track and I need something to pull me back to where I’m meant to be. Or that I am searching for something, but I’m not quite sure what it is or how I will ever find it.

If I walked into a Pentecostal church and explained that feeling, they would tell me it was because I hadn’t found God. They would say that once I am born again and let Jesus into my heart and am filled with the Holy Spirit, that emptiness or sense that I have lost something will automatically disappear.

But I have found God, at least in one sense. And yet that feeling remains.

In another sense, I don’t think I’ve found God at all. And I wonder whether any of us really do find God. Maybe all we do is go searching for Him. And at times He allows us to catch brief glimpses of Him.

Another thing that the Pentecostals say quite a lot is ‘She needs to get God into her life.’ As if God were a thing that could be found and then owned. Put Him on a shelf next to the bible, and believe your search is ended. Kind of like an item in a treasure hunt. Crossed God off the list. Now I need to go searching for wealth and happiness.

God can never be owned. We can’t find him in the sense that we can pick him up and put him in our pocket. Put a label on Him that says ‘This belongs to Liz’. God doesn’t belong to me. God doesn’t belong to anyone. We belong to God.

Instead of getting God into our lives, we need to get our lives into God.

And maybe that’s what missing. It’s not just that something is absent from my life. It’s that my life is not completely where it needs to be. I am the one who’s missing. I’m not quite there yet. And I never will be.

I spend so much time searching for God. And that search will continue. But maybe it’s not just about finding God. Maybe it’s also about losing myself.

Authority for Determining Christian Belief and Practice

2010-02-07T13:36:00.003+11:00

Authority is not a word we like very much anymore. Unless it comes to questioning someone’s authority. The modern western world is very good at doing that. But when it comes to respecting the authority of others, or recognising someone’s authority to tell us what to do, forget it. Instead of respecting authority, we’re more likely to criticise or ridicule it. Instead of obeying authority, we tell them exactly where we they’ve got it wrong.

When it comes to Christianity, we need authority. Christians are called to believe the right things and do the right things. And although God may be in the world, he isn’t sending out media releases or doing interviews on The 7.30 Report. So how do we decide our right belief and right practice (orthodoxy and orthopraxy)? We need to recognise of the authority of other sources to speak on God’s behalf.

Not everybody would agree with this. In fact, one of the stumbling blocks for people coming to religion is that they do not want to recognise the authority of anything or anyone else, other than themselves. They want to make their own choices about what to do. They want to work it all out without any kind of guidance from anybody.

Related to this is the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Some people prefer to rely either solely or partially on what the Holy Spirit is saying to them. They recognise God’s authority, but not necessarily the authority of other sources. The problem with this approach is that what God is saying to me may be different from what God is saying to you. How do we decide who is right?

I heard a pastor once say that if everybody is being led by the Holy Spirit, then there will be no disagreements in church meetings. And if anyone does disagree, then they’re not truly being led by the Holy Spirit. (As a person who tended to disagree, I got a little annoyed at this.)

But even though I believe his attitude was wrong, I think he had a point. If the Holy Spirit is guiding all Christians, then why do they disagree? Now if I believe God is telling me one thing, but it seems to be telling everyone else another thing, what do I do? Do I decide that God says different things to different people? Do I take the view that what God is telling me is more important than what it is telling everyone else? And what if the Holy Spirit seems to be guiding me differently than the way it has guided millions of believers through the centuries? What if it’s different to what the bible says? Am I the only one who has it right?

So unless we want billions of Christians, all with very different ideas about what it means to be Christian, and all convinced that their idea is the right one, we need some other authority to appeal to.

The bible is easily the most widely accepted source of authority for Christian belief and practice. God did not just create us and leave us alone. He interacted with us. And the bible is a record of what He has said and what He has done in the past. It is God’s word and divinely inspired. For some, this means it should be the only authority. Yet as history – and the many Christian denominations that now exist – shows us, people may read the bible and get some very different ideas.

Another source of authority is tradition. We do not just read the bible for ourselves and make our own decisions. We consider how Christians through the ages have interpreted the bible. We look at the orthodoxy and orthopraxy of the past to help us decide on what we should believe and how we should act in the present.

I believe another source of authority should be the Church. Even with the bible and with tradition, there will still be many disagreements. The Church helps resolve those disagreements. And although I believe that the churches of different denominations can help guide the individuals within that denomination, I also believe that the Catholic Church is the only church that has the authority to speak to the body of believers as a whole. As with individuals, different denominations have different ideas about what it means to be Christian. The Catholic Church was the one church instituted by Jesus Christ and so would seem to be the church with the highest authority when it comes to determining matters of faith.

Authority is related to revelation. As we seek to determine what or who has the authority to speak for God today, we must look at how God has revealed himself in the past. The perfect revelation of God comes in Jesus Christ. Authority relates to power being invested in someone or something by another source. Jesus Christ was asked under what authority he performed his miracles. He did not answer, but we know that his authority came directly from God. In the context of Christianity, this investment of power should come from God or Jesus. Authoritative sources must not simply be made up out of thin air. We should consider where God or Jesus Christ have given authority to others.

Again, what immediately springs to mind is the bible. The bible is a written record of how God has revealed himself in the past. It is also a written record of Jesus Christ, what he said and did, what his purpose was and who He was. As most Christians agree that the bible is an authoritative source, I won’t spend too much time discussing this one. And yet the bible also helps us determine what else has authority.

It is worth noting that bible does not stop with the Gospel of John. It goes on. In the Acts of the Apostles, we see how the early church community developed and grew. And some of this involved working some things out. They could not simply turn to Jesus all the time and say well Jesus said this and so the way forward is plain. They needed to discuss things and come to certain decisions. And as we move past the Acts of the Apostles, we find many epistles, written to Christian communities. These epistles explain things and give advice. They talk about right beliefs and right practices. Those early churches often didn’t quite get it right. They needed to be pointed in the right direction.

When we use the letters in the New Testament as a guide for what to believe and how to act, we are essentially giving authority to the very beginning of Christian tradition. We recognise that people of the past have something valuable to say to people in the present. We learn from the theology of those that went before us. Now there is a difference between the epistles included in the bible and theology that was done afterwards. And I can see why some people would respect the first, but not the second. And yet it does seem to suggest that theology is an ongoing process.

This does not mean that theology needs to recreated for each new generation. Nor does it mean that we return solely to the bible to discover a theology for a new age. Instead, our theology must be built on the theology of others. Making decisions about right belief and right practice did not end after Jesus’ resurrection. Nor did it end after the last word Revelation was written. In fact, if it had, then we wouldn’t even have a bible to use an authoritative source. We also wouldn’t have the Church we have today. The first 500 years included a lot of differences and problems that needed to be worked through. And one of reasons why Christians believe the things they do today is because the people around then spent a lot of time resolving those issues.

I cannot finish this post on authority, without discussing where Jesus specifically gave authority to others. In Luke 9:1, Jesus called together the 12 apostles and gave them power and authority. It is very important that we think of this in deciding what or who has authority to act on God’s behalf today. Some people believe that the authority given here relates to all believers. Yet it seems important to me that he only gave authority to his apostles, not all his followers.

Before I go any further, I want to point out that I do not have a good understanding of this verse. And I tried looking for some kind of commentary on it, to get a better idea of what it actually meant. However, I couldn’t really find anything that was too helpful. But I am guessing that this relates to the authority given to the Church. Well in my opinion, it seems to. Maybe I might try and find out a bit more about that and do another one of my ‘I have no idea what I’m talking about posts’ a bit later.

But my ignorance here actually brings us to an interesting point. Because I have a verse in the bible and I’m not quite sure what it means. So what do I do now? Wait for the Holy Spirit to explain it to me? Search the rest of the bible in the hopes that I might find something that will shed light on it? Talk to people at my church – with the realisation that what the Catholic Church says about this verse is very different to what the Pentecostals would say about it? Check commentaries of other theologians to see what they have to say?

I can speak to other Christians, but in doing that, I may face differing opinions. What if one person says it means something, but another person says it means something else? How do I decide who is correct? I must then ask myself what basis they are using for their interpretation. If one person’s interpretation comes directly from the Holy Spirit, but another person’s interpretation comes from years of studying theology, do I treat both interpretations as equally valid?

So it seems that, although God speaks to us through the bible, we do need some form of further explanation to help us reach conclusions about what the bible is actually saying. And because there are many different explanations out there, we need to decide which explanations are correct. This can’t be simply a matter of choosing the one we like the best – tempting as this is to do. It must take into account the authority behind the explanations we receive? Do they link back to an authoritative source? Or are they simply one person’s opinions?

(Image details: Calling of the Apostles by Ghirlandaio Domenico (1481). Image is in the public domain.)

Prayer - Using the Words of Others

2010-02-05T16:13:00.004+11:00

When I was a child, I was told that prayer was personal. Something between me and God. An individual matter.

At first, this seems very different from the way I came to view prayer as a Pentecostal. The Pentecostals spend a lot of time praying together, either in prayer meetings, in fellowship groups or as a church. Then there are prayers said at the beginning or middle of every social event and a prayer said before each meal. When somebody needs prayer, everybody near gathers around and lays a hand on them. There are also prayer chains, where people are placed on a list and asked to pray when requested. When the bible studies close down for the holidays, the prayer meetings continue. Prayer is considered not just important, but vital.

In the Catholic Church, prayer is also seen as essential. In fact, I would hazard a guess that most denominations see the importance of prayer. Perhaps that is one reason why prayer meetings are often the way place where different denominations come together. Prayer is something that we all do.

And yet the way that we pray can be very different. I have certainly noticed a difference between how I saw prayer as a Pentecostal and how I am beginning to see it as a Catholic.

Pentecostals may not see prayer as a personal matter, but I think it would be fair to say that there is a strong focus on the individual. When prayers are said, they are usually said as the person thinks of them. No notes are used. No memorised prayers are used. In prayer meetings, people are encouraged to simply speak out as the Spirit leads them.

Despite attending many Sunday School lessons, my children were never taught any prayers. Nor were they given any prayers to read. The Sunday school teachers talked often about prayer. But it was prayer that focused very much on the relationship we have with Jesus and with God. Prayer was simply talking to them, not borrowing other people’s words to say.

In the Catholic Church, praying is done a bit differently. (And I’m leaving aside here, one obvious difference that Catholics pray to Mary and the Saints.) But in a Catholic Mass, prayers are usually ones that the congregation knows and recites together or they are read from a book. And outside the Church, Catholics are encouraged to pray the rosary and use other existing prayers, instead of always making up our own.

I would say one of the main differences between Pentecostal Prayer and Catholic Prayer is that Pentecostals place more emphasis on using their own words (or the words of the Holy Spirit, as they would have it) and Catholics place more emphasis on using the words of others. That is not to say that there is a firm divide between them. Pentecostals do not have a rule that you must not use the prayers of others. Nor do Catholics only use existing prayers.

To ask which one is better seems pointless. People usually pray in the way that seems best to them. I’m sure that God is more concerned with whether we are actually praying, rather than having a preference for the way in which we pray.
However, I do believe there are a number of things I have gained through starting to use the prayers of other people.

First, I believe praying together forms a spiritual connection between people. And although Pentecostals do pray together, they are not saying the same words at the same time. And quite honestly, there are quite a few prayer meetings I have been to where I have been more concerned about what prayer I would say, rather than listening to the prayers of other people. We say Amen together at the end of it. But for the rest of time, we could be thinking of completely different things.

When people say specific prayers as a group, they are brought together in that one thought. And yes, it is possible to be thinking of tonight’s dinner while you’re reciting memorised words. But even despite this, there is a group of people saying the same words together. I think there’s something powerful in that. One of my favourite times of the day is when I pray with my children. And it never used to be. There were times when we would pray and I would be struggling to think of something to say. It’s hard work trying to think of a new prayer every night. But now we recite prayers together. And it really is beautiful. To hear all three voices in unison – three voices that may have been in disagreement with each other that day. But when we pray, we are brought back together again. Not only does it connect us to God, but it connects us to each other.

The other benefit from using existing prayers goes back to what I said about it being hard work trying to think of a new prayer every night. For some people, praying is easy. As soon a prayer meeting starts, something beautiful and amazing comes out of their mouths. For others, it’s a bit more difficult. One reason why I have spent time in prayer meetings worrying about what I would say next is because I do find it a struggle. Not so much when I’m praying alone, but definitely in front of other people. Plus, I know there are some people who won’t pray in prayer meetings at all. Either they’re too shy or they can’t ever think of anything. When a group prays the same prayer together, that obstacle is removed. Everybody can pray, without trying to think of something to say or the right way to say it. And then we can focus on the words we do say, instead of worrying about what we should say next.

One book I read said that existing prayers can often be useful, because they say what we want to say, but better than we could ever say it. That is certainly true. Sometimes what we want to say to God comes in semi-formed thoughts. Existing prayers put those thoughts into sentences. And some prayers are so beautiful. To read them is like reading poetry. But I think it goes a bit deeper than that. Because many prayers do not just say what we want to say, they say what we never even dreamed of saying. If I pray, only using my own words, then I am limited to what I think and believe and already know. But when I use the words of others, I am influenced by their spirituality and their devotion. They take me to a place that I could never find by myself.

When the disciples asked Jesus how to pray, he did not say well it’s a personal matter. Nor did he say just pray as the Spirit leads you. He gave them a specific prayer to say. At the very least, we should pray the Lord’s prayer, as it was given to us by Jesus himself. But also, there have been so many wonderful prayers written throughout the centuries. It seems arrogant to believe that anything I can say would be better than anything they could say. And foolish to ignore those prayers have brought comfort, hope, joy and a deeper spirituality to many people, simply because they are not my own words.

Christianity is not solely a personal religion. We are not just a bunch of individuals who happen to believe in the same thing. We live our faith in fellowship with one another, as a community or believers. The prayers I make up myself belong to me and God alone. And yes, there is a place for that. Some prayers are meant to be personal. But prayer is also meant to be a communal activity. Something that the Church does together. And even when we are not physically located in the same room, when we pray the prayers of the Church, the prayers that people have written, the prayers that many people through the ages have said, we do pray in community. We pray alongside the many people who have said that same prayer in the past, all the people who are praying it now and all the people who will pray it in the future.

Think about the Lord’s prayer for a minute. In fact, why don’t you actually pray it now?

Our Father who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come.
Thy will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us,
and lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
and the power, and the glory,
for ever and ever.
Amen.

Did you pray it? I sure hope so. Because if you did, you just said a prayer that people have been praying for 2000 years. In fact, you just said a prayer that the Apostles prayed, the very people who were with Jesus when he was here in earthly form. You just said a prayer that was taught to those Apostles by Jesus himself. Two thousand years of people using that prayer, going all the way back to Jesus.

I don’t even have words to express how that makes me feel. But that’s okay. Because I’m sure that someone, somewhere, at some time, has done a very good job of explaining it.

(Image details: The Lord's Prayer (1886-1896) from the series The Life of Christ, Brooklyn Museum, by James Tissot. Image is in the public domain.)

Spiritual Meaning Behind Real Events

2010-02-03T09:13:00.002+11:00

In looking at the historicity of the Gospel of John, some writers have come to the conclusion that it is symbolic, rather than historical. They seek spiritual meaning behind many of the stories and thus conclude that those stories did not actually happen. For example, the raising of Lazarus can said to be symbolic of the way in which Jesus Christ gives new life. Therefore, it did not really happen. It was meant to convey a spiritual truth, rather than give a historic account.

However, in my experience and I’m sure in the experiences of many other Christians, everyday life is loaded with symbolism. Barely a day goes past when I cannot find a spiritual meaning behind events that actually happened. In writing this blog, there are many ideas I have that revolve around some event that occurred in my life. These events may remind me of a spiritual truth or convey a spiritual lesson. When I wish to describe these events, I focus on how they are symbolic of God or faith or being a Christian. But just because they are symbolic does not mean they did not occur.

I try not to write too many of these types of blogs. Firstly, because I don’t have the time to write them all down. Secondly, because I think they can be a bit boring. The type that start with ‘I was feeding my dog today and that made me think about how God…’ Don’t laugh. That was an actual idea at one point. My son had made the comment that the poor dog must be starving because he hadn’t been fed in five days. Don’t report me to the RSPCA just yet. I had been feeding my dog. It’s just my son hadn’t seen it and so he presumed that it hadn’t happened. Made me think about all the times that we think God isn’t doing something, just because we haven’t actually seen Him do it.

You may have noticed that there’s been a bit more time than usual between blog posts. That is because my old computer decided to die on me. It would frequently either freeze or shut down in the middle of what I was doing, with no warning and for no apparent reason. So I had to get a new one. And I have spent the last couple of days setting it up and adding all the programs that I need.

Anyway, to go back to that moment when I walked out of the computer store. There were a few different emotions happening for me at the time. But one thing I did feel was this sense that what I was holding was new and clean and incorrupt. I had a fresh start. My old computer had been with me for five years. During that time, I had added a lot of programs and files that I didn’t want and didn’t need. For example, I had five programs to tell me how fast I type. I know I’m a fast typist. I don’t need five programs to tell me that. They were clogging up the system, affecting my performance and holding me back. Now all those programs were gone. I had a clean slate to work with.

Of course, if you go back a couple of paragraphs, you’ll see that I’ve already added new programs. At the moment, most of these are ones that I need. But give it time. I’m sure that before too long, I’ll have a number of programs that aren’t really necessary. And if I have this computer for five years, it will probably be just as full of junk as the old one was.

Yesterday, I was listening to a Catholic Answers podcast. And someone rang up to ask why we continue to sin after baptism. I can’t remember the exact answer. But I know the person answering said that we do not lose our inclination to sin. And straightaway, I thought of my computer. I thought I may have lost all the old crappy programs I had on my old computer. But I haven’t lost the inclination to add new ones. And I believe his answer will stay in mind because I was able to immediately apply it to something I understood.

Jesus used parables a lot. He used parables to discuss heavenly realities in a form that his hearers would understand. Whether they really happened, in this case, is irrelevant. But in a way they did happen. They had happened to all the people who were listening to him. They were the symbolic meaning that occurred in their everyday lives.

I believe God often uses earthly things to describe heavenly realities. And so do people who talk about God. To say well this has a symbolic meaning, so it didn’t really happen is to miss the point entirely. My son really did say that about the dog food. I did really get a new computer. The fact that I attach a spiritual meaning to it doesn’t invalidate the truth of that.

And if everyday life is so full of spiritual meaning, how much more so when Jesus walked the earth. Jesus wasn’t just describing heavenly realities in earthly form, he was the heavenly reality in earth form. To try and separate Jesus into those events that had spiritual meaning and those that are historically true, is like trying to separate any other person into the part of them that breathes in and the part of them that breathes out. They are both intertwined.

Jesus really walked the earth. He did the things described in the gospels. But he also was a symbolic representation of God. More than that, he was God. He was a symbol that represented the very thing He was symbolising. And so it would be surprising if Jesus only did those things that had no spiritual meaning. Everything he did had spiritual meaning. It was part of who he was.

Tony Abbott, Virginity and Hypocrisy

2010-01-28T11:51:00.002+11:00

In an interview for Australian Women’s Weekly, when Australian Opposition Leader, Tony Abbott, was asked what advice he would give to his daughters, he said that women should treat their virginity as a gift and not give it away lightly.

He has received a lot of criticism for that comment. Julia Gillard said it would confirm Australian women’s worst fears about him. She also said that Australian women want to make their own choices and don’t want to be lectured to. He has also received criticism for being hypocritical, as he did have sex before marriage – and for many years thought he was the father of a son by a former girlfriend.

The first thing that should be noted here is it was advice given to his daughters. He was not preaching to the whole of Australia. And if Australian women don’t want Australian politicians telling them what to do, I don’t think Australian parents want politicians telling them what advice they should give their children either.

Why is not okay for Tony Abbott to give his daughters advice regarding virginity? But it’s quite okay for Julia Gillard to tell Tony Abbott that his parenting advice is wrong? It doesn’t make sense to me.

And I wonder what the reaction would have been if Tony Abbott’s advice had been to go on the pill and use contraceptives?

Furthermore, it seems to me that it is very good advice. I remember when I was in high school and all my friends were at that stage when they had either lost their virginity or considering losing it. Some gave it away lightly. Some waited for a while. And I can’t remember one single person saying to me, gee, I’m glad that I lost my virginity with the first bloke that came along. I heard a lot of my friends say that they wish they had waited. I wish I had waited.

Virginity is a precious gift. And I think when we treat it as something of no value, something that can simply be tossed away as soon as the opportunity presents itself, we do women a huge disservice. Because no matter how society tells us we should think about sex, most women – at least the ones I know – feel that their virginity is precious. And when they lose it, they feel as though they have lost something valuable.

To deny this is not to liberate women. It is to hold them captive. For instead of being urged to value that which is precious, they are told the ‘safe’ ways they can give it away for free. This promotes the view that what they have does not have value. And so the expectation becomes that they will have premarital sex, and have it young. And then when they give into that expectation, they realise that it was not really what they wanted to do.

If someone convinces you that the diamond necklace you were wearing was worthless and you gave it away for free, wouldn’t you feel a bit cheated? I think many women feel cheated too.

In all this talk about liberating female sexuality, we seem to have forgotten that sex is different for men and women. I have had many people disagree with me on this point. But I truly believe that is the case. Sex for women is usually more emotional. It is not just a physical act. And most women feel that when they have sex with someone, they are giving away something precious – whether it’s the first time or the 21^st time. And when there is sex, with no love, with no attachment whatsoever, it often leaves a woman feeling empty. Not all the time. I will say that. There are some women who have many one night stands and are perfectly happy with that. And there are some men who also need love and attachment for sex to be a meaningful act. But the emotional aspect of sex is far more likely in females than in males.

Is that so wrong? Why do we want to pretend that doesn’t exist? So that we can convince a whole new generation of females that having sex whenever and with whoever they want to is natural? And then we leave them wondering why they don’t feel liberated at all?

Anyway, back to Tony Abbott. And hypocrisy.

Because according to some commentators, Tony Abbott’s advice was also out of line because he had sex before marriage.

If being a hypocrite means giving advice that you didn’t actually follow yourself, I would suggest that most parents are hypocrites. At least the responsible ones.

I smoke. Am I then going to tell my children that they should start smoking because I do? Of course not. That would be incredibly irresponsible. Instead, I will urge them not to smoke and tell them of the dangers. I also wasted my year 12 through wagging practically everyday. Does that mean, when my boys reach year 12, that I can’t tell them to go to school? It’s because I know how much I regret wasting that final year of high school that I will give them advice to pay attention to their studies.

And that’s the thing about parenting. Most parents don’t tell the children to do the things they actually did. We want our children to make better choices than we did. Not the same ones. If my children do exactly the same things I did through my life, then they will be making exactly the same mistakes. And yes, children often do need to make mistakes and make their own choices. But you don’t just sit back and let them do something you know they will regret.

That applies for many types of advice, not just parenting advice. I really hope we never see the day when people can only give advice that they follow themselves. People need to be given advice that helps them make better choices. We don’t want to be a situation where each generation keeps repeating the same mistakes, over and over again, because nobody is telling them to do any better.

And this whole concept that everyone is free to do what they want to do and nobody should tell other people how to live is really, really stupid. Part of being human, living in society, in community, is learning from the experience of others. Yes, we may reject their advice. And each generation that comes up will reject at least some of the advice of their parents. But we should at least give it. They should at least have the chance to learn from our experience, if they choose to. Not to simply find their own way, because everyone is too afraid to tell them what to do.

As for Tony Abbott, I think his advice was very sensible. I’m not generally a Liberal voter, but I do like Tony Abbott. I don’t always agree with him. But I like the fact that he speaks his mind, instead of saying what he thinks the Australian public wants to hear. And I think his daughters are lucky to have him for their father.

Australian Courage and Conquering Fear

2010-01-26T10:22:00.002+11:00

As today is Australia Day, it seems appropriate to start this post with what I consider to be one of the most courageous moments in Australian history.

Caroline Chisholm had just persuaded the government to give her an empty barracks building as a house for female immigrants. On her first night there, a couple of rats landed on her shoulders. Instead of leaving, she put out some bread and butter for them and watched them. The next night, she added arsenic. The least she counted at any one time was seven. The most was thirteen.

Now that may not seem like much of a courageous moment. Surely, there are other people who have done way more courageous things than that. And it may not even seem like the most courageous moment in Caroline Chisholm’s life. What about coming to Australia or having nine children or persuading the government to let her have the barracks or taking in the homeless women or riding her horse, Captain, around the countryside searching for jobs for them?

Yet it is true that there are many moments that can be said to be more courageous.

But see, I’m scared of rats. Spiders don’t scare me in the least. I have a spider that has currently made his home in my kitchen window. He is right in front of me every time I wash up. He doesn’t bother me. I don’t bother him. So I’ve decided to let him stay.

But staying in a building filled with rats and having rats jump onto your shoulders. I am finding it hard to think of anything more terrifying. (To show you how deep my fear of rats actually goes, I was going to put a picture of a rat on this post. But I couldn’t do it. I started looking at the pictures of rats and gave up. It’s pretty silly when you’re scared of even pictures of rats. And I’m sorry, to anyone who is frightened of spiders.)

Sometimes the things that require the most courage are not necessarily dangerous. I’m a bit strange in that I seem to be more scared of creatures that can’t hurt me than the ones that actually can. I also have a problem with mice and moths. And I’m not too fussed about snakes. But often people are scared of something because it does have the ability to hurt them. Being frightened of spiders may be a very healthy fear to have. I have had people tell me that I should be a bit more scared of them. That’s possible true.

And it does require courage to face situations where we might be hurt. Other great courageous moments in Australian history include John Simpson Kirkpatrick rescuing wounded soldiers on his donkey or Thomas Curnow alerting the train that Ned Kelly was planning to derail. Courageous because it was dangerous.

And then there’s the fear of things like failure, loneliness, poverty and rejection. They may not cause physical harm, but they’re no less scary because of that.

I’ve heard it said that God will never ask you to do anything that you do not want to do. I think that’s a load of rubbish. I think God often asks us to do things we don’t want to do. Not as some divine punishment. But because it’s what we don’t want to do that we often need to do, for ourselves and for the Kingdom of God. And doing what we don’t want to do usually involves conquering some fears.

In the western world, Christians are not likely to face death because of their faith. But following Christ often does mean facing some other fears. There’s the fear of losing the admiration of others, looking foolish, giving up control, being rejected, suppressing our own desires, losing things that are precious to us, changing our lives and being ridiculed. And these are just some of them.

Some of these fears are unlikely to cause any real damage. Others may very likely happen and cause us some pain.

Following Christ is not about losing our fear for these things. And it’s certainly not about saying, well that looks a bit too scary, and God wouldn’t want me to be scared. It’s about having the courage to do it anyway. Truly courageous people are not those that have no fear. They are those who face their fears head on. They are those who might get scared when a few fears land on their shoulder, but instead of running and hiding, they stay and find a way to conquer them.

Confession

2010-01-25T15:18:00.002+11:00

Amongst my Protestant friends, the Catholic practice that is most often discussed is confession. Not that it came up a great deal. But I do remember at least a few conversations about it. I can’t really think of any other Catholic practice that has been discussed more than twice.

And the reason I think my Protestant friends are comfortable discussing confession is because they think they understand it. And that ‘think’ should probably be underlined, made bold and highlighted. But things like devotion to Mary and the Saints and transubstantiation are harder to discuss, because they seem so foreign. Whereas confession. That seems easier to get your head around. They think it’s simply telling a priest what you have done wrong. Kind of like pastoral counselling.

But it’s not like pastoral counselling. And I think perhaps that ‘think they understand it’ may be one thing that prevents them from understanding it. Because they don’t look too deeply into it. And as a result, they miss the whole sacramental nature of confession.

It’s hard for me using words like ‘sacramental’ because I always feel like I’m talking about something I don’t really understand. I know I don’t fully understand the nature of the sacraments. I know I don’t come anywhere near to properly understanding the nature and purpose of confession. When I was going to the Pentecostal Church, I thought I did understand it. Now I realise I really didn’t have a clue. So because I do not fully understand confession, I’m actually not going to talk too much about its sacramental nature or anything like that. I’ll leave that to people who know more than me. And in all honesty, I have a feeling this post may be more a Protestant view of confession than a Catholic one. So keep that in mind. (Sometimes I get the feeling that I should start every post with ‘This is written by someone who has no idea what they’re talking about.’) But I write anyway. It’s how I try and make sense of things, I suppose.

Anyway, I have been to confession twice now. And that probably left me feeling more confused than ever. Because it was the same church, but two completely different experiences. For the first one, it was just like having a chat with someone. We sat on chairs. I said what I wanted to say. And that was pretty much it. If I said a prayer, I don’t remember it. It was very casual. The next one was almost the complete opposite. The curtain was pulled over. I knelt down and there was a print out in front of me of what I needed to say and when I needed to say it. That was very helpful actually, because then I knew I things the correct way.

So – confession. My semi-Protestant, semi-Catholic view of it.

In the Pentecostal Church, we are taught that you only need to confess your sins to Jesus. There’s no need for a middle man. But at the same time, they emphasise the importance of fellowship groups and pastoral counselling. So it seems they recognise the value of saying things out loud. And I know, from past experience, that just confessing sins to Jesus alone can leave you feeling a bit unsure about whether your sins are really forgiven. It’s nice to say them out loud and hear that nobody thinks you have been permanently separated from God for what you have done.

But at the same time, sin does cause a separation. And I think that could be a very important point. Because when people are just confessing their sins to Jesus alone, it could lead to them failing to see that separation. When it’s just a simple matter of saying I’m sorry God, good I’m forgiven, then it doesn’t really seem like that big a deal. And confessing to other people in the church may be beneficial psychologically, but spiritually I do not believe it does anything to heal that separation. It’s kind of nice to go, oh well, so and so doesn’t think what I did was too bad and so and so struggled with the same failing. And now I have a whole heap of bible verses to read – that generally (in the church I was at, at least) are more designed to make you feel better rather than anything else.

But speaking from a psychological viewpoint, it can be very hard when you have something on your mind and you can’t tell anyone.

Just forgetting about sin for a moment. There are many occasions when someone has something they would like to say, but they can’t or are afraid to. For instance, I have a friend who really hurt me a while back. We’re still good friends. And I have never told him how much I was hurt by what he did. Because I decided to forgive him instead. And the reason I decided to do that is because I knew nothing would be gained by me saying something. It wouldn’t benefit him. It wouldn’t benefit me. But at the same time, there’s this thought in the back of my head that kind of hurts a bit, because it is left unspoken.

The attitude nowadays seems to be speak whatever is on your mind. Because it is good psychologically to get whatever it is out into the open. But sometimes what you are thinking won’t do anybody any good. It may not even be because it would hurt them. Sometimes it won’t hurt them at all. But it’s not going to benefit them from a spiritual perspective.

I used to think that anytime I had anything nice to say about anybody I should just come right out and say it. I still probably lean towards that view a bit. But I have realised that just because something will make someone feel good doesn’t mean that it will necessarily be beneficial to their soul. And that can be hard sometimes. It can be downright difficult to want to say something but know it’s not the right thing to do.

Anyway, I’ve kind of gone off track a bit here. (Probably a case where the unspoken thoughts inside my head tried to make a dash for freedom.) But the point is that when people have things they want to say, but don’t or can’t, it can be difficult to deal with. It’s hard to live with unspoken thoughts. They’re not the most agreeable of mind-guests.

So emotionally, getting thoughts out into the open can be very good for you. But spiritually, it can be quite detrimental.

So one of the benefits of confession can be simply to get some of those outspoken thoughts out in a safe place. And fellowship groups and pastoral counselling aren’t covered by the seal of confession. I know people who have shared things in fellowship groups that were later shared with others. I myself told the pastor’s wife something, who later went and told her husband.

But it is a very minor benefit, considering what else confession does.

Because if unspoken thoughts are difficult to live with, sin takes it to a whole other level. Unconfessed thoughts affect your mind. Unconfessed sin affects your soul.

And in the grand scheme of things, feeling a bit of mental anguish or emotional turmoil isn’t really that big of a deal. It can be nice to get it all out in the open. But it’s not really that important. If I die with thoughts left unspoken, it’s not really going to matter. But if I die with unconfessed sin, it may very well make a huge difference.

I am going to leave this post here. I don’t feel like I’ve finished. But maybe it’s not a post that can be finished now. Because in order to finish it, I do need to understand more about the reason and purpose of confession and its sacramental nature. It seems like haven’t even touched on what’s important and as soon as I starting to get just a teensy little bit closer to it, I run out of things to say.

It’s the way I feel about a lot of things these days. As though I’m looking at faith through a pair of binoculars. And just as something starts to get into focus, the binoculars fall from my hands. And I realise how far away I am from what I was looking at.

Watering Friendships

2010-01-24T22:44:00.003+11:00

I am a plant killer. I have a row of pot plants on my verandah, all filled with very dead plants. The last plant I bought, I joked to the person I was with that if plants had thoughts, they might consider being bought by me similar to a death sentence. You can almost hear them saying, ‘Pick someone else. I have a wife and family.’ And then after the plant is gone, the other plants say in hushed whispers, ‘Poor Lavender. And so young.’

I’m not quite so bad with friendships, but I’ve been known to kill a few of them too. Over-watered this one and smothered it. Under-watered this one, so that it died of neglect. I am fortunate to have some very good friends. But I think the survival of those friendships has more to do with the fact that they are hardy plants that have learnt to survive in tough conditions, rather than any proper care of them on my part.

Even though I do tend to kill almost all the plants I buy, I have managed to plant and grow two. A rose bush and a wattle tree. They’ve been going for years and are unlikely to die any time soon. Strangely enough, I probably take better care of them than I do of the new plants I buy. I guess it’s because I know they’re going to stick around. Whereas with new plants, there’s always this semi-expectation that they won’t be here for long. I feel like I shouldn’t get too attached, just in case they’re dead by the end of the season.

Friends need just as much care as plants. Too much water and they drown. Too little water and they dehydrate. It can be a hard balancing act trying to get it right. Which can be scary when you’ve seen a few friendships die from improper care, like I have. I do tend to worry occasionally whether I’m saying the wrong thing or not saying the right thing. It’s not like I live like that all the time. But there is this fear sometimes that I will kill the friendship. Especially with people that mean a lot to me.

It would be good if friends came with instructions. (Then again, plants do and I still manage to kill them.) But something along the lines of ring up once a week, meet for coffee once a month, send birthday card once a year. Remember to ask about any new developments in their life. Listen to problems carefully. Offer advice only when needed. Sprinkle liberally with laughter and tears.

Jesus’ friends didn’t always treat him the right way. Peter denied him. James and John asked for a place at his side in the kingdom of Heaven. But Jesus’ friendship remained constant. That’s something to keep in mind. Even though I may sometimes worry about my friends disappearing, I know that Jesus is not going anywhere. His love is hardier than my rose bush and wattle tree. Neglect him or deny him and he will still be there. Ask for too much and he will still be there. He’s not going to suddenly leave just because I do the wrong thing. He will never leave.

And that is very reassuring. Because I’m human. And I know there’s a good chance I will do the wrong thing. If not this very minute, then possibly in the next hour or so. It’s nice to know that whatever I do won’t suddenly kill the friendship. And it’s also nice to know there will always be someone’s love and friendship I can count on, no matter what I do. Not just for a season. Not just for a year. But always.

Art that Makes You Feel Something

2010-01-24T15:53:00.003+11:00

What is the purpose of art? It’s a question that has been asked often, but is very hard to answer. For determining the purpose of art is like determining the purpose of furniture. It depends. Different art forms are created for different reasons. Art can be created to impress art critics. It can be created to entertain people. It’s purpose might be to spread a message or say something important.

There is one thing, though, that I believe a lot of art tries to do. It tries to make people feel something.

One way of doing this is by shocking people. There are those who say that it is getting more and more difficult to shock people these days. To a certain extent, this is true. A woman’s bare ankles used to shock people. Nowadays, we can be confronted with full frontal nudity without even blinking. But at the same time, shocking people is really very easy. Just ask the group that did the Jackson Five skit with blackened faces on Hey, Hey, It’s Saturday. Or the people in charge of KFC’s advertisement, where someone gives West Indian supporters fried chicken. They managed to shock a whole lot of people without even trying to.

Another way to make people feel something is to make them happy. Entertain them. Get them to enjoy themselves. Make ‘em laugh. Most of the art that tries to make people feel happy falls into the category of popular culture. It’s entertainment of the masses. It’s not really taken too seriously. As a side note, I find it quite strange that art that shocks is often considered more highly than art that makes people happy. Because I think it is easier to shock people than get them to smile. If I wanted to shock a room full of people, I could simply walk in there with bags full of rubbish and empty them on the floor. And to really increase the shock value, I could even mix the recycling rubbish with the general waste. But if I wanted to entertain them, if I wanted to make them smile, if I wanted them to enjoy themselves, I have to put a bit more effort in.

There are many different ways that art can make people feel something and these are just two examples. But they are also instances of where the feelings often are only skin-deep. Joy and anger can be something completely different. But shock and happiness tend to be surface feelings. Easily felt and easily forgotten.

And there’s nothing really wrong with this. Sometimes we just want to be entertained, without having to think or feel too much.

But in my opinion, good art makes you feel things a bit more deeply. It doesn’t just make you feel things on the surface. It seems to dig deep and touch your soul. It can make you feel alone or sad or uplifted or amazed or all of these things at once. And no matter what words you use to describe it, they never seem enough.

This is going to seem a strange story to tell. Because I am going to describe a situation that may have involved a movie, but isn’t really what I would consider great art. But even though it’s not great art, it’s the best way I can find to explain what art can do. One day, I was watching Bruce Almighty with my son – see I told you it wasn’t great art. But at the end of it, my son just started crying and crying. He couldn’t stop. The tears were just pouring down his face. So I’m kept asking him ‘What’s wrong? Why are you crying?’ And the only answer he could give me was, ‘I don’t know.’

And that’s what art can sometimes do to you. You can have such deep feelings and you don’t even know why. Not only is it difficult to describe what you are feeling, it can be difficult to even describe why you are feeling it.

I’m not sure what any of this has to do with faith or Christianity. Maybe it has nothing to do with faith. Maybe it’s just something interesting, but relatively unimportant, about human emotions.

A line came to me as I was writing that. ‘Our hearts are restless until they find their rest in thee.’ I didn’t know who wrote it or even why it would suddenly come to me. But I did a search on Google and found out that it was a quote by St Augustine. I’m still not entirely sure why that quote would suddenly come to my mind. But maybe, just maybe, it’s because art sometimes reminds us that we are restless. When we feel something deep inside, we are forced to confront the fact that, deep inside, we need God.

The idea for this post came when I was listening to an old podcast, from the Festival of Dangerous Ideas. A panel was discussing whether art should be dangerous. That wasn’t what got me writing though. Instead, it was the discussion about whether art should be shocking.

But in a way, it’s kind of appropriate. Because I think art should be dangerous. It should make us feel alone and frightened and uplifted and amazed. And those are all dangerous feelings. It should be dangerous because it reminds us that we are restless. It should be dangerous because it shows us how empty we are without God.

Art that is shocking is not dangerous. Art that makes you happy is not dangerous. Art like that is easily forgotten. But having to face your need for God. That can change your life. And what could be more dangerous than that?

(Image details: Michelangelo Buonarroti's The Creation of Adam. From the Sistine Chapel. Image is in the public domain.)

Miracles

2010-01-21T20:20:00.003+11:00

1. An event that appears inexplicable by the laws of nature and so is held to be supernatural in origin or an act of God.

That’s the definition of ‘miracle’ according to The Free Dictionary. But the definitions of miracles we have in our mind can be quite different. To some people, a miracle is ‘an impossible event’ or ‘something that always has a rational explanation’ or ‘a coincidence’ or ‘pure luck’. To others, it may be ‘any occurrence where God intervenes’ or ‘something that can only be explained by supernatural means’. Miracles might happen never, everyday or only occasionally, depending on who you talk to.

Ena Zizi believes she received a miracle. She is the 69-year-old woman who was rescued after being trapped under rubble in Haiti for a week. She says she spent the week praying to God. On a much lesser scale, my son believes he received a miracle. He was looking for a toy and could not find it anywhere. He prayed before going to sleep at night and the next morning it was on top of his toybox.

Now these may be miracles or they may not be. Ena Zizi may have just been lucky. My son might have moved his toy to the top of the toybox without noticing. If they are miracles, they are the sort of miracles where another possible explanation can be found.

For those who do not believe in miracles, the other explanation is the only possible explanation. If God does not supernaturally intervene, then there must be some other reason for what happened. But for those who do believe in miracles, sometimes the intervention of God is the most likely explanation.

To illustrate this, let’s imagine I have paid a visit to my neighbour and mentioned in passing that I like carrot cake. The next day, there is a carrot cake by my front door. Now the most likely explanation for this is that my neighbour left me the carrot cake. But then imagine a friend comes over and says, ‘Well I have never seen your neighbour. I’m not even sure that she exists. And there are any number of other explanations for how you came to receive that carrot cake. Some other friend may have put it there. Perhaps someone dropped it off at your house by mistake. Maybe someone was given a carrot cake that they didn’t like and instead of throwing it out, they put it at the front door of the nearest house they could find.’

Now all these are possibilities. They might have happened. But the best explanation is still that my neighbour gave me the carrot cake.

To simply point out that there are other possible explanations for something is not to prove that a miracle did not happen. And sometimes those other explanations seem a lot less likely than the possibility that God actually intervened.

And then there are the miracles where there is no other possible explanation. To those who do not believe in miracles, these are simply impossible and could not have happened. So you end up with a whole lot of books that promise to tell you about the real Jesus – which ends up being nothing but the Jesus of the Gospels, with all miracles removed. In other words, it ends up being a Jesus that is nothing like the Jesus of the Gospels at all.

Some of them try to take the ‘other explanation’ approach to Jesus’ miracles. I have seen it suggested that with the feeding of the 5000, Jesus did not really multiply the loaves and fishes. Instead, when people saw he was feeding the crowd with such a small amount, they felt guilty and brought out their own food. Some of these authors take a semi-miraculous view and suggest that maybe God could have prompted their sudden guilt-induced generosity.

They can accept things like the feeding of the 5000, because that has another possible explanation. But as for things like Jesus bringing Lazarus back to life, they come to conclusion that it did not happen because it could not have happened. People do not get brought back to life after they have died.

And so they claim to demythologise Jesus by stating that some of his miracles have rational explanations and the rest of his miracles did not really happen because they do not have rational explanations. And what we are left with is a man, who we can accept, because he did nothing out of the ordinary. He didn’t rise from the dead. He wasn’t born of a virgin. He performed no miracles. He only did the type of things that normally happen.

Sounds like a pretty ordinary man to me. But it doesn’t sound much like the Son of God. Why would God send his Son to earth, just to do the same kind of stuff that can be found at any shopping mall or suburban street?

I like how N. T. Wright puts it. He says that ‘what happened to Jesus is not what normally happens’.

And so, for those who accept that Jesus really was the Son of God, what seems more likely? That he came to earth and acted as an ordinary man? Or that he came to earth and performed miracles?

And if Jesus did perform miracles during his earthly life, doesn’t it also seem possible that God may still be performing miracles now?

I believe in miracles. I believe they happen all the time. Sometimes they’re so extraordinary that no other explanation can be found. Sometimes they’re little miracles, mini miracles as I like to call them, where God just intervenes a little bit to answer a prayer or help someone. There will always be people who seek to find other explanations for these miracles. And no doubt, they will find them. But there will also always be people who recognise that sometimes the supernatural intervention of God is the best possible explanation.

(Image details: Raising of Lazarus by Jesus by Carl Heinrich Bloch)

The Urge to Complain

2010-01-19T22:23:00.003+11:00

This week, someone did something I didn’t like. Plus, it involved my children, which is more annoying than if they had simply hurt me. My first temptation was to ring that certain person and tell them what I thought of them. But then I decided it wouldn’t really solve anything, and would only make things worse for my boys. My next temptation was to ring up a friend. I was pretty sure, if I searched around for, oh, about two seconds, I could easily find somebody else to agree that what she did was pretty awful. But I didn’t do that either. My sister sent me an email today. And at the end, I was about to add a footnote about this horrible thing this person had done. But I ended up deleting it.

The first temptation, when someone does something we don’t like, is always to criticise them. And if we don’t criticise the person to their face, we criticise them behind their backs. Ring up a friend. Send an email. I suppose the modern version is to send a text message or put it on Facebook.

Little children do it. I don’t know how many times a day, I have one son or the other coming to me and telling me what terrible things their brother has done. It’s a pretty common reaction for children to have. And I don’t know why they continue to do it. Because it never gets a good response from me. It may be normal for children to tell on their siblings, but it’s not something I want to encourage. I am hoping that as they mature, they will eventually grow out of it.

Then again, maybe not. Because I know my initial reaction to anything is still to tell someone. Just like a little primary school child – So and so did this today. Usually, I talk myself out of it. But that desire to dob is still there. And sometimes I may not tell anyone, but I end up doing a blog post about it. I pretend that it’s okay, because I am writing a blog and this is what I want to talk about. But maybe all I’m really doing is satisfying that urge to complain.

Maybe that’s all I’m doing now.

Someone did something wrong. Despite the initial temptation to ring her up and yell at her, I decided that wasn’t the Christian thing to do. I also decided that ringing her up and speaking calmly to her about it wasn’t in the best interests of my children – because it would mean saying that my son said that you said this. Also, it seemed quite petty. Save my phone calls for more important issues. Then I decided that even speaking to someone about it wasn’t the most mature way to handle it. Not only wasn’t it mature, but it would only fuel my anger. Because I knew that whoever I spoke to would agree with me and start complaining about it as well.

So instead I write a post. I might kid myself that this is a mature way to deal with my feelings. But it’s still giving into that temptation to complain. And very similar to the childish need to dob on someone. It’s just a different way of doing it.

It’s not the first time I have acted out of anger this week. I was in a shop and, without going into all the details, I waited as people who came after me were served first and I was treated as if I were not even there. I got so angry that I left the tops I was buying on the counter and stormed off. It didn’t make me feel any better. In fact, I felt so bad, that I went back later to apologise.

I think releasing our anger may sometimes help. But generally, it just leaves us feeling angrier. The problem is it’s often hard to deal with our anger by not saying anything. I wish I could. I wish that I could handle offence a lot better than what I currently do. It would be nice to hear that someone has said something or done something and simply put it out of my mind. Forgive and forget. I believe that the people who find it easiest to forgive and forget must be some of the happiest people around. For they have peace, where others have anger and bitterness.

I would like to experience that peace one day. In fact, one of the things that I would love to accomplish somewhere near the end of my life (for I know there’s no chance I’ll be getting there anytime soon) is the peace that comes through that type of forgiveness.

I may be far from that at the moment, but there is one thing I know. If I am ever going to get there, I will need to resist the constant temptation to complain about what other people have done. And I will also need to stop writing blog posts that are only fuel my anger.

Irrational Faith

2010-01-18T21:50:00.004+11:00

In Beyond Critical Thinking, published in The Chronicle of Higher Education, Michael S Roth discusses the universities’ emphasis on critical thinking and the limitations of such an approach. He points out that not only do universities encourage critical thinking in the context of higher education, but that they are producing graduates who believe that ‘being smart means being critical’. Roth also says:

The skill at unmasking error, or simple intellectual one-upmanship, is not completely without value, but we should be wary of creating a class of self-satisfied debunkers or, to use a currently fashionable word on campuses, people who like to "trouble" ideas.

‘Self-satisfied debunkers’ have not just popped up recently. They have been with us for quite some time.

In The Theological Orations, Gregory of Nazianzus (330-390 AD) says that God should not be talked about before people ‘who watch what we do with overgreat care and would take the spark of what is wrong in us to become a flame, and secretly kindle and fan it and raise it to Heaven with their breath and make it higher than the Babylonian flame which burned up everything around it. For since their strength lies not in their own dogmas, they hunt for it in our weak points. And therefore they apply themselves to our, shall I say, ‘misfortunes’ or ‘failings’ like flies to wounds.'

Gregory of Nazianzus’ main point was that philosophising about God should be kept within proper bounds. (And, I might add, advice that I find extremely difficult to heed. I would talk theology with my dog if he would let me.) But it does say something interesting about approaches to Christian beliefs.

For it does seem that there are a number of people who want only to point out the flaws in what Christians believe. Then we get a whole lot of Christians pointing out the flaws in the atheists’ arguments. Everybody is doing a great deal of critical thinking. But I’m not sure that any of it gets us any closer to understanding God.

God’s existence does not rely on our ability to put forward a good argument. If I do a terrible job of explaining why I believe in God, that does not mean my belief in God is misplaced. And if someone finds faults in what I am saying, that does not mean that what I am saying is untrue. In a university essay, a student will get good marks if they give good reasons for their thesis – regardless of whether they are right or wrong. Conversely, if I fail to state good reasons for my beliefs, it says more about my lack of ability to put forward a good argument than it does about the beliefs themselves.

And so it seems to me that people who want to point out the flaws in what Christians say or believe are proving nothing more than who is the best critical thinker. Which I suppose can be quite an interesting exercise for some people. And I guess it can be quite an ego boost to know you bested someone in an argument who has beliefs different to your own. But it doesn’t really seem like a very productive exercise to me. Maybe I’m missing something.

Second, Christian faith does not rely on reasoning alone. To some, this automatically discredits it. If critical thinking and good arguments are held up as the ultimate method by which all issues should be resolved, then anything that cannot be proven is seen as irrational. In such a world, I suppose it makes some kind of sense to point out why belief in God is not a rational belief to have.

The problem is that I don’t think belief in God is rational. I – like many other Christians, I’m sure - didn’t come to my beliefs through good arguments and critical thinking. I came to them through faith. And for some, faith is a very bad reason for believing anything. For others, it is the best possible reason.

When my sons were babies and they were hungry, like all babies, they cried. They could not tell me they needed food. They certainly could not explain their reasons for wanting food. If I had entered into a debate with them on whether they actually needed food or not, I would have easily won. But it wouldn’t have removed their hunger. And what is the best reason for feeding a baby? A good essay on the necessity of giving babies food or a baby who cries because he is hungry?

I have a hunger – a spiritual hunger. My soul cries out for God. And I cannot put those cries into words, for that hunger belongs to a place whose language I have not yet learnt. Yet still I know that hunger is real. And I know the God I cry for is real.

And if that knowledge rested on how well people debated the issue, that knowledge may easily be lost. But it rests on something far more important than that. For this knowledge is not the kind of knowledge that sits in the mind, pushed and squeezed by all the other notions that are competing for the same space. It is instead a certainty that lies deep in the soul. And it is far too deep and solid to be affected by anyone’s critical thinking.

I’m sure, if you try, you can find flaws in this post. I did not argue this very well. I did not show my reasoning here. This point seems to contradict another point. That sentence goes against what the evidence tells us.

So point out its flaws. Destroy my arguments with your critical thinking.

Just don’t expect me to care.

Story of a Heretic

2010-01-15T18:36:00.002+11:00

There was a time when I thought I should start every bible study a bit like an AA meeting. Except instead of saying, ‘Hi, I’m Liz and I’m an alcohol’ I should say, ‘Hi, I’m Liz and I’m a heretic.’

I do not have any great expertise when it comes to heresy. My only claim to knowledge is that I have a book titled ‘Medieval Heresy’, which has been sitting on my bookshelf for three years and I still haven’t found time to read. I do not really know what heresy is. When does something become heretical? Is there a difference between heresy and dissent? Are all Protestants automatically classed heretics? And do Protestants have people they think are heretics? (During that time I felt like a heretic, it was actually amongst Protestants.) Is there a boundary when an opinion crosses from ‘inaccurate’ to ‘heretical’? Or are any inaccurate opinions automatically deemed heresy?

So as you can see, I am not an expert. If you are looking for information on what heresy is and how it should be defined, press the back button on your browser. You’re not going to find it here.

But what I seem to have is a lot of thoughts about heresy and how heretics are treated. Recently, I was reading a blog post called Hildebrand on Schism, Heresy, Truth and Unity at Non Nobis. The post suggested that heretics would be better off leaving the Catholic Church. And there were some good points. But it also stirred up a lot of feelings about my own path. And how I have been treated and what I actually needed at the time.

Before I get to that, I should make one point clear. This post was talking about people within the Catholic Church. And I do realise, strictly speaking, that a heretic is someone who disagrees with the Catholic Church (not any of the multitude of other denominations around.) I guess if the way to define a heretic was as someone who disagreed with the church they were in, then you could simply find a church you didn’t disagree with and be a heretic no more.

However, my feelings about heresy and about being a heretic come from a time when I was not in the Catholic Church. And so I am going to talk about that time – even though it doesn’t really fit the proper definition of heresy. Well I did say I wasn’t an expert. Go back and read that part again and consider it my disclaimer.

Now I am not sure that I ever had any beliefs that would be considered heretical. (And this is where my lack of knowledge can be very limiting.) But I never denied Jesus’ resurrection of the dead. I always believed Jesus was fully God and fully human. Yet at the same time, I know I definitely considered some pretty heretical notions. And I did tend to say things that the people in my church did not like much at all.

And there were two ways that people generally dealt with this. They would either say, well if you believe that, you’re not a real Christian. End of conversation. Full-stop. It’s like they simply ticked me off their ‘people I want to talk to when I get to Heaven list’ and that was that. Not very helpful. In fact, often incredibly hurtful. To be honest, it still hurts. I wanted someone to help me, not simply dismiss me.

And the other response was just as unhelpful. Because that’s the whole ‘Well I disagree with you, but that’s okay’ approach. End of conversation. We just agree to disagree and everyone’s happy, right? But I wasn’t happy. I didn’t want someone to simply accept what I was saying. I wanted someone to show me why they disagreed with me. Have a discussion with me. Don’t just ignore the subject in case someone’s feelings get hurt. I’m a big girl. I can handle someone disagreeing with me.

That might sound contradictory. First I say that some people hurt me and their responses still hurts me. And then I say don’t spare my feelings. But see, there is a difference between having an honest conversation, where you actually talk to me and one where you simply shut the conversation down.

Maybe the whole problem comes from our approach to opinions or questions. If someone states an opinion, all we can do is either accept it, reject it or agree to disagree. If someone disagrees with us, we start focusing on how we can win the argument. If someone asks a question, we wonder how they’re trying to trick us. If I answer that the wrong way, will that mean that they’ve won the debate?

But sometimes people ask questions or state opinions from a sincere desire to open up the conversation. They don’t just want to tell other people what they think. They want to hear what others think. Especially if they’re searching. And the sad thing is that it’s often the searchers who are labelled heretics. But searchers realise they have not yet found the truth. That’s why they consider opinions that might be ‘funny’ or ‘strange’. That’s why they ask questions that make other people uncomfortable. They are looking, seeking desperately for something that makes sense.

And so often, they are opening doors – any door they can find – just hoping to find something, just trying desperately to get a little closer to the truth. But the problem is every time they open a door, someone wants to slam it back in their face. Either with a ‘You’re not a real Christian’ or ‘Don’t won’t to talk about this. It could become uncomfortable.’

Let’s be uncomfortable. Who says we have to be comfortable? I don’t recall Jesus saying pick up your comfy lounge chairs and follow me. We are to pick up a cross. And I believe, strongly, that any sincere search for the truth will involve quite a large degree of discomfort. People who are afraid of being uncomfortable should just give up the search altogether. Go back and lie in their ‘I’m okay, you’re okay’ feathered bed. And I know, from my own experience, I was never searching for a comfortable Christianity. If I was, it would not have taken nearly so long to find it.

I heard this quotation from Blaise Pascal on a podcast today:

There are only three types of people; those who have found God and serve him; those who have not found God and seek him, and those who live not seeking, or finding him. The first are rational and happy; the second unhappy and rational, and the third foolish and unhappy.

I don’t know how much of this post has been about heresy. Probably not too much. But maybe it was never really a post about heresy at all. Maybe it was just a post about my unhappy search for God. About conversations that never started and doors slammed in my face.

Sometimes I write because I have something I want to say. Sometimes I write because I hope my writing has something to say to me. And sometimes I write because I’m searching for answers and the computer screen is the only one who won't walk away