Let me be clear: I love Harry Potter. Not in a dress-up-as-Dumbledore-for-the-finale-part-2-type thing, but I will admit that I have watched the entire series a number of times and gotten way more into it than a 30-year-old professional woman probably should. But still it is difficult for me to express in simple words the FURY I felt when I read the following interview with Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe in Parade Magazine.* In response to the question "Your dad is a Protestant from Ulser and your mom is English and Jewish. Were you raise in a particular religion?" Radcliffe responded with this RIDICULOUSNESS: "There was never [religious] faith in the house. I think of myself as
being Jewish and Irish, despite the fact that I’m English. My dad
believes in God, I think. I’m not sure if my mom does. I don’t. I have a
problem with religion or anything that says, 'We have all the answers,'
because there’s no such thing as 'the answers.' We’re complex. We
change our minds on issues all the time. Religion leaves no room for
human complexity."
I'm sorry you wizardly little jerk, but let's get real: At some point, even when you are famous and rich and young and talented, you're going to need to grow up and develop a more nuanced view of the world, one that can take into account that yes, we are all complex and we all have different ways of processing that complexity. To say religion leaves no room for human complexity betrays that you know as little about the religion of the world as you do about the religion of your parents.**
Religions are some of the most fascinating and ancient and intricate responses to human complexity that there have been. Traditions that seek to reconcile what it meant to be a human 5,000 years ago with what it means to be one today, traditions that try, with varying success, to make meaning of the sanctity of human life across geography and time and culture, and traditions that ask, amidst all that, what it is to be the best humans, to transcend all that makes us beasts and to try to enact compassion and wisdom and awe in meaningful ways; these traditions are, to me, respectable endeavors and should be treated as such.
Do you need to make use of these particular forms of addressing the complexity you so astutely observed in humanity? Of course not. Are there aspects of religion that detract from human joy and dignity that could benefit from articulate, reasoned critique? Certainly. But to get on the anti-religion PR band wagon*** just to seem cool for a magazine that most people will toss aside in favor of the Sunday funnies is flippant and thoughtless and makes me wish I never heard the word "Expeliarmus."
*Why was I reading Parade Magazine is an area which needs a bit of investigation?
**Maybe instead of processing this with Parade Magazine, you could start your learning with a candid conversation around the dinner table.
***Why is it SO cool just now to be anti-religion? I don't mean to sound like a paranoid fundamentalist here, but seriously, it seems every time I turn around some privileged, self-absorbed hipster is writing a content-light, cliche-heavy book or a blog post about how enlightened they have become in giving up religion and becoming spiritual in the wilderness. Does this really have to be such a thing? I stopped eating hot dogs, but I don't know enough to write a book about it, so I won't. I'll leave that to the experts.
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
What's Up Jesus on Steroids
One thing I would like to point out is that sometimes, good things do happen. Sometimes you are limping through life feeling like you've gotten the cold of the century, and then you find out what you actually have is bronchitis/pneumonia, for which they give you both antibiotics and steroids that allegedly will make you feel better, though what actually happens is that you don't feel better at all and now can't sleep at night and despite their reputations still don't make you feel like lifting weights or playing baseball. (Though perhaps I'll check back on that when I have oxygen actually flowing to my heart and brain again.)
And then just as you are dreading, dreading, dreading spending a super long day at work, leading a Lenten worship service which will involve massive amounts of singing (an activity which, it turns out, also requires regular oxygen flow.), and then moderating a meeting which is bound to last long into the night, you wake up and see this scene in the backyard of the home you just bought in the temperate climate of the NW:
And you think, even though you don't believe in divine intervention in exactly this cause-and-effect-way,
And you go back to bed. But not before feeding the dog, who apparently has not been fed in a while:
And then just as you are dreading, dreading, dreading spending a super long day at work, leading a Lenten worship service which will involve massive amounts of singing (an activity which, it turns out, also requires regular oxygen flow.), and then moderating a meeting which is bound to last long into the night, you wake up and see this scene in the backyard of the home you just bought in the temperate climate of the NW:
And you think, even though you don't believe in divine intervention in exactly this cause-and-effect-way,
THANK GOD.
And you go back to bed. But not before feeding the dog, who apparently has not been fed in a while:
Yes, but I'm not Your Pastor
Warning: If you are not a pastor, or somehow involved in thinking about religious vocational identity, this may be a meaningless rant and for that I am sorry. More about fun stuff later.
As I have discussed, in the past, being a pastor is a challenging balancing act between vocation and identity. I am a pastor, and I work as a pastor. And those two truths are interlinked in myriad of ways. But I've faced a strange conundrum in reconciling these two realities recently, when I've been asked, in a variety of contexts, how I can possibly reconcile my pastoral identity with any of the following aspects of my personality: flippancy, criticism, humor, dismissal, bartering, sarcasm, extreme enthusiasm or ambivalence. Basically, how can you be a pastor and do/say/think that? And to those queries I say, "Yes, I am a Pastor. But I'm not Your Pastor."
This may sound cold. In fact, when I casually ran this idea by a number of my pastoral colleagues, several said as much, one even suggested--jokingly, I think, though now I am beginning to question it--that perhaps I should attend some training on how to "integrate my values." But it is not meant coldly at all. In fact, quite the opposite. I am a pastor. I have been trained as a pastor. I pastor a church, and the title in my email signature is "pastor." I have wisdom and privilege and trust that are granted to me because of my office as a pastor. And I have particular responsibilities for upholding that office with dignity and integrity. But though I may be a pastor in every way, I'm not everyone's pastor. Though I can bring to bear all the insight I have gained through my identity as a pastor to all my relationships, I can't relate as a pastor to everyone. I have to relate to my friends as friends, and my partner as my partner, and my family as my family. I can't apply active listening in every conversation I have with Mr. L about what to get at the grocery store. And I can't maintain relationships of caring with my friends if all I can say is "That sounds really overwhelming." and not "Something sucky happened to me today too....let's bitch about it." I cannot constantly be attentive to everyone else's well-being in the same way I am attuned to it at work (just as I imagine most doctors do not come home at the end of the day and take their children's blood pressure.) Does this mean that I don't appreciate it when people outside of my work life ask me for input or advice or insight or prayers? Of course not. Using my skills to help those I care for is an honor and a joy. But it still doesn't mean that I'm their pastor.
A lot of theological work has been done to determine how it is exactly that being a pastor sets one apart from those whom one pastors. And there are many different answers to that question. In my own tradition, the Reformed branch, we believe that a pastor is set aside for particular work, not because of elevated genius or holiness (I am a very holy genius, you should know, but it's just a coincidence and is not how I got this gig.) Anyway, we believe you are set aside for the office. And there is something about consent in there. We have to agree that I am your pastor. And I have to agree to be in that role, to set aside my personal agendas and prejudices and issues in order to be fully present with you and help you hear what God is saying to you. And that changes how we are and will be together. And I don't always want that.
Because one cannot be set aside all the time. One has to be set inside too, in a community of equals, in order to be real. And so yes, I will continue to periodically tease you and make sarcastic comments and barter to get things I want and listen only half-heartedly sometimes (Mr. L if you are reading this, of course I am actively listening to you most of the time). I don't know that that makes me a bad pastor (though perhaps some of my colleagues will still disagree).
Perhaps this makes no sense at all. But being pastor of the entire world sounds pretty tiring. Doesn't it?
Here is a handy test to take if you are concerned about the implications of this post:
If I look like this when we are interacting, I am probably your pastor:
Please note the difference in both dress and demeanor.
As I have discussed, in the past, being a pastor is a challenging balancing act between vocation and identity. I am a pastor, and I work as a pastor. And those two truths are interlinked in myriad of ways. But I've faced a strange conundrum in reconciling these two realities recently, when I've been asked, in a variety of contexts, how I can possibly reconcile my pastoral identity with any of the following aspects of my personality: flippancy, criticism, humor, dismissal, bartering, sarcasm, extreme enthusiasm or ambivalence. Basically, how can you be a pastor and do/say/think that? And to those queries I say, "Yes, I am a Pastor. But I'm not Your Pastor."
This may sound cold. In fact, when I casually ran this idea by a number of my pastoral colleagues, several said as much, one even suggested--jokingly, I think, though now I am beginning to question it--that perhaps I should attend some training on how to "integrate my values." But it is not meant coldly at all. In fact, quite the opposite. I am a pastor. I have been trained as a pastor. I pastor a church, and the title in my email signature is "pastor." I have wisdom and privilege and trust that are granted to me because of my office as a pastor. And I have particular responsibilities for upholding that office with dignity and integrity. But though I may be a pastor in every way, I'm not everyone's pastor. Though I can bring to bear all the insight I have gained through my identity as a pastor to all my relationships, I can't relate as a pastor to everyone. I have to relate to my friends as friends, and my partner as my partner, and my family as my family. I can't apply active listening in every conversation I have with Mr. L about what to get at the grocery store. And I can't maintain relationships of caring with my friends if all I can say is "That sounds really overwhelming." and not "Something sucky happened to me today too....let's bitch about it." I cannot constantly be attentive to everyone else's well-being in the same way I am attuned to it at work (just as I imagine most doctors do not come home at the end of the day and take their children's blood pressure.) Does this mean that I don't appreciate it when people outside of my work life ask me for input or advice or insight or prayers? Of course not. Using my skills to help those I care for is an honor and a joy. But it still doesn't mean that I'm their pastor.
A lot of theological work has been done to determine how it is exactly that being a pastor sets one apart from those whom one pastors. And there are many different answers to that question. In my own tradition, the Reformed branch, we believe that a pastor is set aside for particular work, not because of elevated genius or holiness (I am a very holy genius, you should know, but it's just a coincidence and is not how I got this gig.) Anyway, we believe you are set aside for the office. And there is something about consent in there. We have to agree that I am your pastor. And I have to agree to be in that role, to set aside my personal agendas and prejudices and issues in order to be fully present with you and help you hear what God is saying to you. And that changes how we are and will be together. And I don't always want that.
Because one cannot be set aside all the time. One has to be set inside too, in a community of equals, in order to be real. And so yes, I will continue to periodically tease you and make sarcastic comments and barter to get things I want and listen only half-heartedly sometimes (Mr. L if you are reading this, of course I am actively listening to you most of the time). I don't know that that makes me a bad pastor (though perhaps some of my colleagues will still disagree).
Perhaps this makes no sense at all. But being pastor of the entire world sounds pretty tiring. Doesn't it?
Here is a handy test to take if you are concerned about the implications of this post:
If I look like this when we are interacting, I am probably your pastor:
If I look like this, I'm probably not:
Please note the difference in both dress and demeanor.
Friday, March 9, 2012
Pink Toilet
I haven't really had a lot of time to write lately, mostly because Mr.L and I just became the proud owners of an Ugly Pink Toilet.
Ugly Pink Toilet is from the 1960s. She came with a matching pink bathtub and a pink sink, the three musketeers of tackiness, also from the 1960s. All of these pink items are, happily, attached to a little blue house, from, you guessed it, the 1960s. The decor inside this house is also, surprise surprise, from the 1960s, as is the plumbing under the house, the roof on top of the house, the carpet inside the house, and the paint on the walls of the house.
So that's what we've been doing.
Luckily, we are adjusting quickly and allowing this house to instruct us in important virtues from the past such as PATIENCE (Multi-tasking water related actions, for instance, such as taking a shower while running the washing machine is NOT an acceptable time saving plan, unless you are willing to endure scald marks on your back.) and TOLERANCE (No, that cabinet in the laundry room will not shut, it will continue to swing open at strange intervals and bash you in the head. You must tolerate it.) and WONDER (I wonder why there is a light switch in the kitchen whose sole purpose is to render all other kitchen switches unusable.) and MEMORY KEEPING (One must remember not to open the screen door too quickly given the strangely inconvenient placement of a roof nail that prevents the door from opening more than 1/3 of the way.) All important virtues for owners of fixer-uppers and pink toilets.
*What's that you say? Is that BOTH pink-black-grey confetti lineleum AND pink-purple-flower wall paper? Yes. Yes it is. The 60s threw up in my bathroom and I'm the one that ended up with a headache....
Ugly Pink Toilet is from the 1960s. She came with a matching pink bathtub and a pink sink, the three musketeers of tackiness, also from the 1960s. All of these pink items are, happily, attached to a little blue house, from, you guessed it, the 1960s. The decor inside this house is also, surprise surprise, from the 1960s, as is the plumbing under the house, the roof on top of the house, the carpet inside the house, and the paint on the walls of the house.
So that's what we've been doing.
Luckily, we are adjusting quickly and allowing this house to instruct us in important virtues from the past such as PATIENCE (Multi-tasking water related actions, for instance, such as taking a shower while running the washing machine is NOT an acceptable time saving plan, unless you are willing to endure scald marks on your back.) and TOLERANCE (No, that cabinet in the laundry room will not shut, it will continue to swing open at strange intervals and bash you in the head. You must tolerate it.) and WONDER (I wonder why there is a light switch in the kitchen whose sole purpose is to render all other kitchen switches unusable.) and MEMORY KEEPING (One must remember not to open the screen door too quickly given the strangely inconvenient placement of a roof nail that prevents the door from opening more than 1/3 of the way.) All important virtues for owners of fixer-uppers and pink toilets.
*What's that you say? Is that BOTH pink-black-grey confetti lineleum AND pink-purple-flower wall paper? Yes. Yes it is. The 60s threw up in my bathroom and I'm the one that ended up with a headache....
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