Minor Job-Related News, Etc.

Nothing real major or profound to report today. It was Homecoming for Wyoming Park High School tonight, which normally means some extra musical responsibilities for the band, including a parade down Porter Street just a couple of blocks from my house. But the weather was rainy and dismal, so the parade was short and quick and the band's role at the football game was cut short since we also have a competition to attend tomorrow morning. The shorter-than-expected night was fine with me. Julie and I watched the beginning of the football game but the Vikings were pretty well pushed around by the Belding "Redskins" (I can't believe they still use that name for their mascot!) so we retreated into the comfy warmth of our home and watched the Detroit Tigers lose to the Kansas City Royals, ugh. But they are still looking good to win the Central Division due to their schedule and the opposition that the Minnesota Twins have to deal with this weekend from the Chicago White Sox. I also watched a portion of "The Fog of War" documentary by Errol Morris featuring some amazing interview footage by Robert McNamara. I hope Donald Rumsfeld lives long enough to come to his senses like McNamara did and can one day offer a similar testimony when he finally recognizes the error of his ways.

Anyway, I had my annual evaluation at work today and it was a pleasant and successful process. I feel very positive about my job and what I'm doing and how it's going and what we have in mind for staff training for the year ahead. My professional title has also changed - I'm now an Assistant Manager rather than an Assistant Coordinator. Yippee! More of a semantic thing than anything else - our department heads recently had their titles changed from Directors to Chiefs, and my supervisor went from Coordinator to Manager... we have a new CEO who started four months ago and the new direction is beginning to be felt. I'll be getting a raise to go along with the evaluation and it also looks like my level of responsibility will be increasing as we have some expansion of opportunities to offer trainings to people outside of our agency anticipated in the months ahead. I have to stay vague on details but it feels good to be recognized and trusted to take on new tasks and help out with creating new programs and curriculum for adult caregivers in the state of Michigan.

How Much Worse is it Going to Get?

It's late and I really don't have the time to fully articulate my thoughts but I just have to say it's a pretty sad day in American history. This Unlawful Combatant Detainee bill that the Senate just passed pushes our country that much closer to becoming a truly repressive and totalitarian state, especially the way the political end of it is being played out. Republican leaders like Hastert and Boehner are really outdoing themselves in stirring up the fear and paranoia in accusing those who have reservations or opposition to these bills of "coddling terrorists" and other such nonsense, which would be laughable if they weren't using such rhetoric to strongarm support for legislation that just cuts into the heart of what the Bill of Rights stands for.

But that's about all I have time for right now. Here's an article that goes into much more depth if you are looking for something to read on the subject. And here's another one.

Improvements to this blog are underway

My post today is simply informational. I am taking advantage of that big strip of white space on the right side of the screen by filling it in with some links to old posts. I began this project by listing some of the music reviews I've written up over the past year or so. I will get around to adding older concert write-ups as well when I get more time. From there, I will add sections for movie and book reviews, my "Incarnation Bits" series, historic occasions, etc. for anyone who has the good sense to dig deeper into this reservoir of worthwhile information from an otherwise anonymous regular guy living in middle American suburbia.

You deserve this convenience and quality, as a loyal and discerning reader of the PoMoXian blog. Thanks for your consideration... thanks for being you!

Heretic's Guide to Eternity: Introduction

OK, after several weeks of preoccupation with other books and topics, I'm going to follow through on the promise I made to Spencer Burke when he offered to send me a free copy of his book. I've mentioned it here already a few times, but I want to do something more in depth, and my plan is to give a brief summary and comments on each chapter. I figure that the process may take several weeks or even longer, since I will also be blogging about other things as interesting stuff comes up.

I'm going to skip over Brian McLaren's foreward, not that it's unworthy or anything, but I figure that it's just best to get into the substance of the book itself. You can read the foreword yourself standing in the aisle of the bookstore.

The book opens with a practically standardized rundown of how we're moving beyond the Enlightenment and modernity into some kind of new phase that is reckoning with the limits of science, the hollow promises of ever-increasing technological progress and strictly rationalistic thinking and so on, a theme that has been covered from a variety of angles but I suppose still has its place in setting this book (and others like it) in context for readers who are still in the process of "emerging."

Burke goes on to apply this sense of moving beyond to traditional and conventional views of how religion is observed and practiced in Western and especially American culture. I think it's fair to say that this book is written within that frame of reference, namely the technologically and cross-culturally literate and generally well-educated American culture. Burke is speaking to an audience that he assumes will follow him fairly effortlessly and has already shared significantly in his journey. Though anyone who pubishes a book, especially one that challenges popular religious maxims and orthodoxy, should expect to be read by people who will strongly disagree with his views, I get the impression that the book is particularly aimed at people who will find his idea of moving "beyond" conventional religiosity more appealing than threatening. So his tone is not all that defensive - I don't see him gearing up for a fight or itching for an argument. He's making his points in what I consider to be a casual and relaxed rhetorical style.

Here are a few of the points that I took the time to highlight in re-reading the section last night:

1. Though many people have lost confidence in the ability of religion to provide meaning and motivation in life, God is coming back into the picture in new and different ways. (I will italicize direct quotes from the book.) Much of the book will elaborate on this assertion, but it is something of an opening salvo in that it declares God's (and presumably humanity's) independence from organized religion.

2. He regards the issues of slavery and civil rights to be two "pivotal moments" for Christianity, a statement that again demonstrates his mostly-American frame of reference. Cultural forces compelled the church into new theological reflection, which in turn produced new theological positions. This is a crucial support for the arguments that follow, where he seeks to similarly legitimize more new theological positions, declaring an even greater independence of thought and imagination than is implied by mere detachment from institutional Christianity.

3. The future of religion is up for debate. Fundamentalism thrives on declaring what is not of God and particularly who is not of God. So Burke is really taking on not only fundamentalism, but also fundamentalistic ways of thinking and doing theology that have become common-place even in churches that don't regard themselves as fundamentalist per se.

4. Spirituality in the twenty-first century is not etched in stone but fashioned out of the fabric of our lives in new and ever-changing permutations. This is the focus and the hope of this book. A rather clear statement of purpose, obviously.

5. On his use and embrace of the concept of heresy, he says contemporary heresy is a means to a new end, a way out of what no longer works. We need heretics to push past and beyond the accepted conventional wisdom of the dominant group and pull us across sacred fences that hold us back and keep us tied to perceived orthodoxies... A heretic is a spiritual insurgent who rises up against the established order from the inside. Later on he says, if this is not explicit enough, I am not merely seeking to put a new spin on old beliefs; I am actually declaring that there are new ways of believing when it comes to the Christian story.

To me, this is a fairly provocative, exciting and potentially promising beginning. What I like about his approach is that he's not starting out with a fixed destination in mind. Though novelty and innovation are not in themselves any more to be esteemed than following the tested and familiar ways, I have often found in my reading of contemporary Christian literature an annoying tendency to wind up back at "square one" in predictable places that more or less serve to endorse the status quo and the existing power structures as they exist in both the church and the broader society. I can see the usefulness of such approaches to those who either think that all is basically well with the way things are, or who have a vested interest in preserving the existing order. But I see too many signs of injustice and breakdown all around me to find that approach acceptable any more, in American as well as our Christian subculture. We'll have to see just what Burke has in mind as we get deeper into the book but he has laid out the prospect of a free-ranging and unpredictable exploration, and I for one appreciate his willingness to loosen up and spread things out a bit.

Speak of the devil...

I don't really have much to blog about tonight but I hate letting a day slip by without adding something (my friend Juanito is my inspirational benchmark to keep the string of consecutive daily entries as continuous as possible, though I do lapse occasionally.) So I'm just going to compare and contrast a couple of news stories. One involves President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, who stirred up a lot of righteous indignation when he made the following comment about President Bush in front of the United Nations:

"The devil came here yesterday," Chavez said, referring to Bush, who addressed the world body during its annual meeting Tuesday. "And it smells of sulfur still today."

(Chavez also held up a copy of Noam Chomsky's Hegemony or Survival, a book that I happen to have owned for awhile since finding it for sale at a library clearance table. Since I have dozens of books on backlog right now, I hadn't gotten around to reading it but now I am, what with all the added notoriety and stuff. I will have some comments later once I get further into it.)

Chavez went on to excoriate the American president, as is probably common knowledge to my well-informed and globally aware readers. This earned him no shortage of rebukes and reprimands from all quarters of American punditry and politiciandom. At this point, Chavez is an easy, low-risk target that just about anyone in the USA can criticize or ridicule with impunity.

However, it appears that our old friend Jerry Falwell has also equated one of his political rivals with the Evil One, when he said this:

Falwell said during a breakfast session in Washington Friday, "I certainly hope that Hillary is the candidate. I hope she's the candidate, because nothing will energize my (constituency) like Hillary Clinton. If Lucifer ran, he wouldn't."

When asked to explain the analogy the next day, he replied that his comments were "totally tongue-in-cheek." I suppose that to some people, that excuse won't suffice, though there are others who will give him a free pass because they either agree with him or feel some kind of solidarity with him as a fellow Christian.

Was President Chavez speaking with his tongue in cheek at the U.N.? Has anyone bothered to ask him? I'm not sure how "tongue-in-cheek" translates into Spanish. Even if he was, would it earn him any benefit of the doubt?

It's kind of amazing to me that political figures are still able to get mileage out of likening their adversaries to Satan, but I suppose it's a time-tested formula. A little red meat for the masses...

Incarnation Bits 23: John Hersey on Revelation

The text is enigmatic; it seems to be ciphered in a code of some sort. One way of cracking the code may be with historical keys - seeing the book as a message to the Jews (including Christian Jews) of the 60s A.D., when the writing of the book was apparently completed, and when warfare was heating up in Palestine between Romans and Jews, telling the latter that if they mended their behavior, God would take a hand in delivering their homeland from the oppression of the former. In this case the number of the beast would, in the counting of Hebrew letters, stand for Nero: Neron Caesar. The ten horns of the scarlet-colored beast bearing the whore of Babylon (meaning Jerusalem) would be ten emperors of Rome. The woman clothed with the sun who is given refuge in the desert would be the faithful band who fled from the Romans into the Judaean desert. And so on.

If this interpretation works, what is wrong with applying the metaphor of its promise to our times? Revelation is intensely pessimistic, and we have reason to be. The book suggests that things will get much worse before they get better, and we can think so too. Hasn't this century poured its vial of plague on us? Sores: AIDS. Seas of blood: slaughter of whales and seals and dolphins. Rivers and fountains of blood: the "conventional bombings" of World War II, Vietnam, wars of the Middle East. Fire: Hiroshima. Darkness: smog. Drought: drought, the greenhouse effect. Unclean spirits: you name them. And we can list other plagues not even dreamed of in the first century: overpopulation, mass starvation, mountains of garbage, epidemics of drugs, a glut of violent crimes... Things do seem bound to get worse before they get better.

But Revelation offers what seems to me an obviously false hope: that after the worst of the coming misfortune (Armageddon), God will intervene to bring to the chosen - and who is so modest as to exclude himself definitely from the band of the elect? - first a millennial, then an everlasting, paradise. We tend to picture Armageddon nowadays - "a great hail out of heaven" - as a nuclear holocaust. If that were to come about, would paradise ensue? Are we expected to accept the inevitability of this Armageddon? Even to welcome it, as the prerequisite to eternal peace?

Revelation puts mankind in an accepting, passive mode. The book allows - almost commands - doing nothing about social ills and dangers; God will take care of those things. We must suffer plagues in order to reach heaven. In Blessed Assurance: At Home with the Bomb in Amarillo, Texas (the home of the final assembly plant for all American nuclear weapons), A.G. Motjabai quotes Reverend Charles G. Jones, pastor of the Second Baptist Church there, as saying, "The Lord does not need nuclear war to help Him do what he chooses to do. If He chooses to use nuclear war, then who am I to argue with that?"

For literal-minded believers with temperaments too active merely to sit and wait for Armageddon and paradise, there is a grave temptation: to appoint themselves on God's side, as soldiers of his agency. The dualism of Revelation has its political attractions. We are the good guys; they are the bad. This makes it easy to speak of an Evil Empire, which is bound to be defeated, which we have a foreordained duty to fight and defeat. "I have read the book of Revelation," Caspar Weinberger, then Secretary of Defense, was quoted in the New York Times of August 23, 1985, as having said. "And yes, I believe the world is going to end - by an Act of God, I hope - but every day I think that time is running out." The speaker's phrase "I hope" implies the possibility of fateful Acts of Man, presumably to help God along.

(Note from Dave: This is my final excerpt from the anthology titled Incarnation: Contemporary Writers on the New Testament, edited by Alfred Corn and published in 1990. I will soon start a series of posts interacting with a new book, The Heretics Guide to Eternity, which I've read and would like to consider in more depth over the next several weeks.)

Tornado Survivors

Last night the Wyoming Park High School Marching Band participated in a regional band competition in Hastings, a town about an hour's drive to the southeast of here. It's our biggest road trip of the season - the other shows we do are in the immediate Grand Rapids suburban area. To get there, we arranged a caravan of three buses and a truck to tow our trailer full of instruments. I and a few other band parents made the trip in a minivan.

Due to a short pit-stop for fast food, our van took a different route to Hastings than did everyone else. The weather had been gray and rainy all day, but when we got about halfway through the trip, past the little town of Caledonia, the rain and wind really kicked up. Greg, the driver, plowed through it carefully enough, but it was fairly dramatic, especially with his wife scolding him for not having the windshield wipers on fast enough.

After we passed through Caledonia, a few miles down to the next spot on the map, Middleville (yes, isn't that a charming name for an American town?) we heard the weather-emergency buzzer come over the radio. At first I thought it was just a test, but then the announcer got serious as he issued a Tornado Warning, and it got even more dramatic than that. He informed his listeners that a tornado had touched down near Caledonia on M-37, the very section of road we had just passed through when the rain was at it's heaviest! It occurred to us that the buses and truck would probably be behind us and we wondered just what may have happened to them.

We got to the high school and waited for their arrival, and eventually learned, when they showed up about fifteen minutes after us, that they had actually witnessed the tornado itself, and had to pull over briefly to wait out the storm!

The tornado wound up being the front page story in this morning's Grand Rapids Press. There was some property damage - roofs torn off, some golf carts and other large objects overturned, trees crashing into a house - but no personal injuries. Even the cows in the nearby dairy farm appeared to escape unscathed. So we were thankful that "elevated excitement" was about as serious as the storm got for us and our kids.

A few of the girls on the bus got pretty emotional, so I hear, and I saw one girl who needed a lot of consolation and reassurance before she was ready to pick up her instrument and get back into the program. But it was all just part of a wierd night. The band had to perform inside a gym, so they couldn't do any of their marching, and since the bleachers were full, we had no opportunity to see any of the other bands who played before or after us. So it was basically get into the school, do a little practicing in their cafeteria, lineup, march into the gym, play the program, then march directly out from there to the parking lot, load up our instruments and go home.

That suited me fine. I've been fighting a cold all weekend and was glad to get an early bedtime than I was expecting out of the deal. But back to the tornado thing for a minute. Since no one was hurt, and I'll assume that insurance will cover the relatively minor property damage, I suppose the worst thing about the incident for me was that after we got the details on what had happened, my adult traveling companions in the minivan just would not stop talking about it. It's not like we were the ones who narrowly escaped the tornado's wrath, but man, every time I thought we had exhausted the subject, a few minutes later somebody would say something that would get someone else going on about that tornado and what a close call it was, etc. etc. ad nauseum. I mean, here in Michigan we talk about the weather a lot but to me, this seemed just kind of extreme...

Religious Irritability

This morning, the New York Times reached out through cyberspace and touched me with this story, comparing NBC's plans to broadcast a video from Madonna's current tour where she performs a part of the show while mounted on a crucifix and their decision to cut some of the scripture references from the Veggie Tales programs aimed at young children on Saturday mornings.

http://tinyurl.com/gm89w

The idea that a religious double-standard may be at work here was raised, i.e. the network is OK with "mocking Christianity" but won't let a more sincere Christian message get through to the kids. I can see it from that angle to some extent, and understand the dismay that some Veggie Tale proponents would feel at seeing the program "sliced and diced" that way. I can also see some validity to NBC's apparent decisions given the differences in audience, time frame and cultural expectations surrounding both Madonna and Veggie Tales.

So I went to the American Family Association website to see what their take was and sure enough, the Madonna broadcast is the TOP ITEM on their list!

http://www.afa.net/

http://www.afa.net/Petitions/IssueDetail.asp?id=215

They also discuss the Veggie Tales controversy here but I didn't detect an explicit link between the two stories on the AFA site. Maybe that is still developing?

So you combine this emerging furor with the furor sparked by the Pope's remarks and the predictably outraged response from Muslims and it just seems to me that there's a common link here of high sensitivity and a desire to control the limits of expression and speech. NBC is doing that as well, but I think they have more at risk in crossing over some of the lines that have been established regarding religious proselytizing and excessive vulgarity over the air (especially the way that the FCC has been doling out fines in recent months.) Notice that the AFA isn't asking for a million petitioners to expand the limits by asking for unedited Veggie Tales. Instead, they
want to eliminate the broadcast of Madonna's show.

Likewise, with the Muslims, I have heard a lot of outrage over the Pope's comments but very few seem willing to accept his explanation of wanting to have a respectful and serious dialogue on the issue of religiously-motivated violence. The interviews with Muslim spokesmen I have seen will acknowledge that dialogue is good and important and of course they condemn violence but they want to keep going on about how mean-spirited and offensive the Pope was by saying what he did. It's like they want to keep the relationships at a point of high tension and instability rather than find something they can agree on and build bridges of understanding that will lead to a more constructive and mutually respectful relationship.

God, I'm waiting for some wise and thoughtful grown-up leaders to emerge on the world stage. I know they are out there, but they don't seem to be connecting with the would-be followers very effectively.

Eric Clapton

I got a chance to work at the Eric Clapton concert here in Grand Rapids last night. I always enjoy the chance to see a legendary guitar god in person when he, his band and road crew pull up to the arena conveniently located just a few miles away from my house.

My assignment last night was to work a portable beer stand near the back of the arena, so the task at hand was pretty straightforward - take cash, pour beer, banter with customers. The nice thing about it was that we were able to shut down a little earlier than if we had worked the full-service concession stand with all the food and fixin's. But what wasn't so nice was that there's a new management system in place and we had to deal with numerous aggravations that seemed more about asserting the authority of the new sherriff in town than in actually providing good service or being sensible. But I know you don't want to read about all that...

Owing to the tightness of the oversight, I was only able to check out Clapton's show for three-and-a-half songs, but they were some of his best. The first tune that I observed (I could hear plenty of the opening portion of the set, but you don't really get the full flavor of what's going on until you can actually lay eyes on the band and hear the music at the intended volume) was a blistering version of Robert Johnson's "Little Queen of Spades." If you don't know the legend of Robert Johnson, you really ought to get caught up to speed on this seminal figure of American music. Check out the link when you get time. Also, one must listen to his music carefully to get what all the buzz is about, because it could sound a bit underwhelming at first due to the lo-fi quality of the recordings and the simplicity of the arrangements.

Clapton has expressed his indebtedness to Robert Johnson many times over the years, and in the last few has crystalized his dedication by recording not one, but two albums of cover versions. One is titled "Me and Mr. Johnson," and the other, "Sessions for Robert J." The latter is a nice DVD/CD set, featuring studio performances of the recording sessions with a live band. The results are significantly different than Johnson's originals in that they are fully expanded with a range of instruments and high quality production, but they are worthy interpretations. Still, they don't have that same gritty, mysterious aura that Johnson captured on wax and I'm sure must have projected even more dramatically in person.

I've been listening to this more recent work by Clapton over the past week or two, in anticipation of the show. My longtime appraisal of Eric Clapton over the years was one of respect but not necessarily enthusiastic appreciation. When I was a teenager back in the 70's, Clapton's reputation was sky-high among rock aficionados. He was part of the holy trinity of "world's greatest guitar players ever," the other two members being Jimi Hendrix and Jimmy Page. But whereas I could easily engage with the wilder and freakier sounds put forth by Page and Hendrix, Clapton never really seemed to measure up to all the hype, in my ears. His old band Cream had some good numbers, I could admit that. "Tales of Brave Ulysses" was one that I really liked because of the flamboyant use of the wah-wah pedal, and "White Room" had a pretty epic break to it as well. But in the mid-70's, Clapton was producing songs like "Lay Down Sally" and "Wonderful Tonight" which were actually quite offensive to my punk-rock sensibilities at the time. Hendrix was dead and Page was still in Led Zeppelin, but even with their so-so "In Through the Out Door" album, they hadn't gone nearly as extreme in the M.O.R. direction as Clapton had. So I personally ranked Clapton a lot farther down the list of guitarists and never bothered buying a single one of his records.

His mid-90's acoustic version of "Layla" that became something of a re-entry hit for him only confirmed my impression that he was kind of soft when it came right down to it. Why mess up a perfectly good song by slowing it down to a plodding shuffle that drained all the emotion and tension out of it? I felt bad for him when his son died in a tragic fall and he recorded "Tears in Heaven," but that wasn't enough to make me a fan.

So it wasn't until I became more directly interested in the legacy of American blues music several years ago that I began to better get what Eric Clapton is really all about. It started by me purchasing a 2-CD set titled "The Chess Blues-Rock Songbook," which featured the original versions of many songs later popularized by rockers like the Rolling Stones, CCR, the Beatles, Foghat, Janis Joplin, Van Halen and, yes, Led Zeppelin and Cream. I was pretty impressed and came to the conclusion that the originals were often much better than their more famous cover versions. That got me searching for more from artists like Muddy Waters, Howling Wolf, John Lee Hooker and Robert Johnson. As I became more familiar with craft and legacy of the great 20th century bluesmen, I realized that Eric Clapton is basically fashioning a lifelong tribute and preservation of that tradition, transmuted into the life and culture of a white Anglo-Saxon and thereby making it more accessible to other white Anglo-Saxons like myself. And I think that this is a fairly cool thing.

So last night, when he finished the soul-wrenching fretboard workout of "Little Queen of Spades," and moved right into the no-longer-so-sappy-to-me "Wonderful Tonight" (because now I understood the lyrics told a story of a man who got too drunk or wasted at a party and was taken care of by his wife) and from there, into a faithful-to-the-original performance of "Layla," complete with the elegiac piano-based outro, and then transitioned into his megahit rendition of J.J. Cale's "Cocaine," (at which point I had to leave because they were escorting us workers downstairs to turn in our jerseys, boo hoo)... Last night, I got a pretty inspiring and thrilling dose of the blues, on a big-time, arena level, mass consumption scale. That was also a cool thing. So yay for Eric Clapton!

He and J.J. Cale have a new album of original compositions coming out in November, I believe, titled "The Road to Escondido." I'm looking forward to it, probably the first time I've ever been interested in an upcoming Clapton release. I suppose that's a testament to the power of live musical performance.

My Computer is Reborn!

I'm very happy at the moment because after too many months of enduring a slightly-crippled version of Windows XP (that Microsoft messed up when they snuck their authentification software into my PC and mistakenly determined that I was running a counterfeit copy of their OS,) I was able to commit an afternoon and evening to meticulously backing up everything of value onto a different hard drive and running a fresh installation of Windows. It kept me busy and I have more work to do in order to get all my applications reloaded, but the important stuff is back - namely, my iTunes library! And it's better than ever. What a thrill to import over 15,338 songs all at once, as well as 3,517 individual images of album art. Of course all my playlists were wiped out but they are more fun to make than listen to so I won't mind doing that again in the weeks to come.(If you are curious, "1969" by Iggy Pop and the Stooges was the first track I played after we installed the sound drivers and got everything up and running... now the shuffle is kicking in and all is right with my world.)

But oh, what a relief it is to be able to enjoy the features of iTunes 7 and DirectX 9 and have fast boot-ups and no aggravating warnings that I do not and never did deserve about running "not genuine" Windows ware... All the things we take for granted with our computers, I have a new appreciation for and I hope that reading this little testimonial fills you with similar feelings of gratitude to live in an era of fast infotech and steadily available electricity!

Fantasy Sports Nightmare

My computer time today has been gobbled up by a catastrophe of my own making. Last night, in my haste to get my commishing business out of the way and avoid lengthy interruption of a video I was watching with my wife, I mistakenly clicked on the wrong button on my fantasy baseball league website and inadvertently WIPED OUT ALL OF THE STATISTICS AND ROSTERS THAT HAD ACCUMULATED UP UNTIL THIS POINT IN THE SEASON!

I hope that my typographical emphasis sufficiently underscores the calamity that we collectively endured.

I discovered this later on at night, as I was checking to see what the final scores were as we are wrapping up the regular season and on the verge of our four-team playoffs (I did not make the cut this year, after making it to the championship game last year, where I lost.) Needless to say, I was distraught... stoic and philosophical about it all, to be sure, but still, deeply disappointed about what happened. Fortunately, we have paper copies of the standings and point totals and all of the most significant results of the 2006 season, but it's a bummer to not have all the numbers at our disposal for those of us who like to analyze trends and simply keep track of the all-important stats that baseball generates in superior quantity and quality compared to all the other big-time sports games.

So this morning I got up real early and spent an hour re-entering the final week's stats so that we can get as close to an exact tally of the final points, wins, losses, etc. for the season. All the transactions and roster moves are recorded elsewhere on the website - we just don't have the box-scores any more and it is much too tedious a process to re-enter them all at this late point in the game. All in all, I suppose it could have been worse, but I have to admit feeling a bit of embarrassment and regret at being as careless as I was to click that wrong button when the large font warnings were right there but I just didn't take the time to read them carefully as I ought.

I'm sure my baseball buddies will forgive me but I know they are going to let me have it when I show up at the Friday lunch gathering!

Incarnation Bits 22: Grace Schulman on Jude

Although the Epistle of Jude is included in the canon of sacred Scriptures, it was from the first viewed with suspicion and still suffers some disfavor in the church. In the third century, Jerome questioned its canonicity because of the inclusion of apocryphal writings. In the sixteenth century, Martin Luther impugned its authorship. Those objections still cast shadows on the epistle. Pointedly, the Jude writer quotes Enoch as though that Genesis patriarch were the author of the Book of Enoch ("And Enoch also . . . prophesied" [14]). That reference to Enoch as author seems now a sad comment on the history of Jude. It suggests, too, his innocence of the stance taken by later biblical scholars: the textual authenticity resides in naming the author.

In the case of Jude, the writer's name is of less relevance to the epistle's strength that it is of interest historically. What matters more is the sense given of a writer who offers Christian followers a glimpse of an ideal world founded on the concept of a loving God.

I am moved by that vision, despite myself. I have always regarded literary religious systems as metaphorical. I can be stirred by the aesthetic function of, for example, Sophocles' notion of the cosmic order, or of Milton's reimagining of the Genesis story. However, reading Jude as mere fancy would be to slight its importance to the writer as a proclamation made in accordance with God's will.

It is the writer's personality that draws me to his exhortation. As a being, he is less appealing than he is intricate. He is given to self-denial and has an unsmiling distaste for physical intimacy. At the same time, his compassion for men and women is emphasized by repetitions of "beloved" and "love." He seems humorless in his amassment of rebels such as Cain and Core without regard for the vast differences in tone between those biblical accounts. On the other hand, his list of bad acts, making up a composite notion of evil, suggests a lively wit reminiscent of Juvenal or Swift.

Passion and restraint are the polarity that direct his thought, vary his tone, and rattle the beams of Jude's rhetorical scaffolding. Those opposites enliven his mind and his art. While he advocates containment of emotion, his images have that accuracy that strong feeling pressures into being. The imagery of "autumn trees without fruit uprooted and dying twice" has an actuality born of creating an equivalient in terms of earthly things. The imagery is so exact as to seem induced by some rage or grief.

The Jude writer is consistent in possessing the purity of heart essential to his vision of ideal love. Other than that, he fascinates for his contradictions. His language is heightened by paradox (the sinners insult what they do not understand and are destroyed by what they do [10]); contrasting acts (the Lord saved, the Lord destroyed [5]); and antithetical attributes ("sensual" persons who lack spirit [19]). True to his nature, he recommends obedience but is no passive servant of manmade law. I imagine him to have been an ambivalent follower of the reign, contemptuous of the anarchists who opposed the Roman emperor, and critical of senators who sided with the rebels. He was not, I think, devious, as one who speculates on the advantages to the church of honoring the monarch. Instead, he was loyal to the prevailing order as an extension of his loyalty to God, or perhaps he had in mind "Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's."

He is impressive, too, for his range of tone. In the concise epistle, he roars with anger against the unrighteous, bristles with logic, and utters a benediction. To listen to his voice, bold and original, is to know that he is a person of conviction whose commitment to the right deeds can move other to be ethical. He is a poet who has made art out of a difficult subject: a warning to be virtuous and scorn the tempter.

Yo La Tengo

Today was a pretty plain day. I actually worked and it was a pleasant day - we enjoyed some beautiful weather last night and all day, after a week full of rain, with more rain on the way starting tomorrow accdg. to weatherpeople on TV. But it wasn't really much to write about. So instead I will dedicate this blog entry to a new CD I got earlier this week by one of my favorite bands: Yo La Tengo.

The facts on the band are fairly simple (or I'll keep 'em that way.) They are a trio from Hoboken, New Jersey, two men and a woman, with one of the men and the woman a married couple. They are critical darlings and a long-time fixture in the indie rock scene - kind of the antithesis of what we expect to see from most musical entertainers (unglamorous, actually rather nerdy, seriously in love with the music for music's sake, not as a stepping stone for publicity and the fabulous lifestyle that comes with the deal.) Their first recording was released in 1986 but their music is hard to date according to popular stereotypes of 80's or 90's sounds. Their albums are thoughtful, warm, intelligent and fun, featuring an eclectic mix of styles that reference most of the interesting trends that have emerged in rock music over the past forty years or so. Of their past projects, I recommend I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One from 1997 as probably their best single disc, or Prisoners of Love, an excellent and affordable two-disc retrospective compilation that came out last year (I bought it to listen to on the bus when I traveled as a chaperone with my sons' high school marching band to New York City.)

However, it's the new one is what's got my attention now. Its title is spectacular: I Am Not Afraid of You and I Will Beat Your Ass. Yes, it's a bit vulgar and even violent - I have to admit cringing just a wee bit at endorsing it, given my identification as a Christian and a non-violent peace activist. But I'm sorry, the title just fits so perfectly the times we are living in (the mixture of aggression and defensiveness that characterize the prevailing attitudes all over the world) and I love the brashness and humor it conveys! And it all just gets better from there.

The opening track is simply one of the most enjoyable pieces of recorded music that I've encountered in awhile. The song is called "Pass the Hatchet, I Think I'm Goodkind." (I have no idea what if anything that is supposed to mean.) It's nearly 11 minutes of a steady, feedback-drenched jamming over a cool, catchy riff, with some mumbled lyrics that I haven't bothered to decipher yet. Just an amazingly nervy but joyous way to open a CD that breaks from the end of that cut into catchy pop tunes, slightly artsy experiments and consistently well-executed, thoughtfully-crafted musical gems.

I'm slightly bothered by the fact that the album has already been featured on NPR's "Fresh Air" with Terry Gross, but I can take some consolation that I had already purchased it before hearing rock critic Ken Tucker's review a couple days ago. I bought it on Wednesday, the day after it was released, just knowing it would be good before I had heard any of it. Yo La Tengo is one of just a few bands that I will buy with confident assurance that whatever sounds the CD produces will be both interesting and abundantly enjoyable to my ears. If my musical recommendations mean much to you, I encourage you to at least download the free mp3's from their website, or find some other place to listen to their stuff for yourself and if you are feeling kind of adventurous, just go ahead and buy it because what they do and say is pretty cool.

Keeping [Women's Shelter Home] Safe

I spent my workday at a church in the next-suburb-over (to the east) (namely, Kentwood) co-leading a training for staff who work at a home for women and children seeking shelter from domestic abuse. I won't name the agency or say anything too specific about what they do on the slim chance that any details I include would compromise confidentiality and safety, but I really appreciated the chance to get to know these women and learn more about the work they do, even as my supervisor and I taught them some of the principles that inform the work that we do in residential treatment.

Their task is to provide a safe place for up to four women and fifteen children at a time. Each family's stay can last up to 30 days while they work through the complications caused by violence or other out-of-control behavior in their homes. The staff who work there don't face as much risk of verbal or physical aggression as we do from our clients in residential youth treatment, but they still need the kind of verbal de-escalation skills and abilities to put oppositional behavior in perspective by understanding some of the underlying psychological issues and needs that drive people under duress. Our teaching focused on the effects of early childhood trauma, developmental anxieties, verbal de-escalation and conflict management.

What left the biggest impression on me was the clarity and purposeful focus that I felt from the group as a whole. I can easily imagine the gratifying feedback that their staff get in providing a home and safety to a battered woman and her children, but also know that there are a lot of difficulties and pressures that come with the job. This group of women I met with yesterday seemed to have their boundaries, ethics and ideals all very much intact. I enjoyed the opportunity to spend the day with this group of dedicated and empathetic women.

Keeping Calvin Interns Safe

I spoke for about an hour tonight at Calvin College, where my assignment was to discuss on-the-job safety to a group of social work interns. It was a fun evening, for the most part, even though I have to admit that I was drifting for a bit in the middle of my presentation for some reason. The material I shared was good but truthfully, I think I could have covered it more succinctly in forty five minutes but I had seventy five minutes to fill overall. I had not prepared anything real formal, figuring that I could banter with the students and tell some stories that would be more engaging than "just another lecture." However, it didn't go quite as well as I would have liked because the students were simply so new at their practicum sites (they were just starting this week) that they had a narrow frame of reference and not much to say about what they were doing, since they were just now (or not even quite yet) getting their assignments.

So I decided to shift gears a bit and demonstrate some of the physical management techniques that we use when clients get aggressive and lose control. That livened things up quite a bit, even though the interns themselves are almost certainly not going to be authorized to use those skills, which is a good thing. I demonstrated some escapes and a primary restraint technique (but not the take-down to the floor) on one student who was brave enough to mix it up with me a bit in front of the rest of the class.

My hunch is that the things that I most wanted to convey got across effectively - that the best thing we can do to promote our own (and everyone else's) safety is to build relationships with clients and co-workers based on the key attributes of "warmth, empathy and respect." (That's a motto I've adopted from a training on listening skills that I lead.) It doesn't guarantee safety but it puts us in a better place to prevent crises, manage them effectively and respond therapeutically when difficult behaviors put strain on both us and the clients we serve. I told the interns that this experience they are just starting is potentially a life-changing experience, that they will be challenged and stretched in ways that they don't fully anticipate and that they will most likely discover personal strengths and vulnerabilities that they hadn't encountered in themselves before. I said to them (and I mean it!) that Calvin BSW interns are some of my most favorite people in the world. I supervised eight of them when I was a programt supervisor, hired numerous grads and worked alongside quite a few others over the years. It was pretty cool to connect with these young people in a new way tonight.

Busy Week. Full of Training and Task Mgmt.

This is going to be a short blog entry tonight. I've been doing lots of training this week and have three more events that I'll be presenting at before Friday afternoon rolls around. Then I'm working at the Friday night football game helping the marching band set up for the halftime performance. So a lot is going on but I'm not feeling particularly imaginative or creative when it comes to internet stuff. All my productive energy is going in other directions for the time being. But that's OK. Keeps life balanced, right?

I'll have more to say later about the trainings I lead on Thursday night and Friday though. They are not the usual things I do and are worth mentioning here when I get to it. Checking out for now though, except to say that it's been rainy and a bit chilly here lately - the mood of summer is over, even if the calendar says we still over a week before autumn begins.

Today is September 11th

It was a grey, gloomy and rainy day here in Grand Rapids, which on top of all the commemorative reminders of what happened five years ago, was plenty enough to cast a somber mood across most everything that I saw happening around me. We worked today, we had our meetings and did the things we're paid to do, and we took care of business. We even laughed and had fun at various moments. But through all that, an air of heaviness lingered that was simply hard to escape. Not that "escape" seemed like the proper thing to do anyway. We just sat with the knowledge of what is on so many of our minds.

Tonight I tried watching some of the TV coverage of memorials, interviews with 9/11 survivors, video replays of disaster footage and the aftermath. I couldn't really bring myself to endure anything that had a political twist to it, and that included Bush's speech. I'm just not able to hear him very well these days and that's about as much commentary on the president as I'm going to offer here. Mainly I just felt a sense of deep disappointment when I think of the course of our nation's history over these past five years. I don't know that I will ever believe in the possibility that crucial, epoch-defining events like 9/11 can serve as the catalyst for something big and constructive and hopeful, the way I did back in the late 90's when I dared to wonder if the turn of the millennium might actually bode something positive for humanity. Even as bad as the Sept. 11 crisis was, as my email quotes from this morning indicate, I was still willing to consider that perhaps some kind of renewed purpose or collective coming-together might emerge from the horror. I suppose it did for a little while, but that's all been lost now and I think the brokenness is even worse than ever in our society.

So when we finally just turned off the TV, I grabbed a book, an illustrated volume of William Blake's illuminated manuscripts. That may seem like an odd choice of reading material, but there's a story behind it. I actually bought that book on 9/11/01. It was one of several volumes that I had seen at the Bargain Books store several days earlier. I had bought a couple of volumes when I first saw them, and when I left work after spending a lot of time watching the TV and talking with my stunned co-workers, I swung by the store and bought the three remaining volumes that I needed to complete the set. I can't really explain why, it was just one of the things I did that day. The clerk and I conducted the sale silently, but I remember feeling something strangely fitting about purchasing the mysterious apocalyptic verse of William Blake in such circumstances.

(I also spent the afternoon and early evening of 9/11 sitting in a hospital waiting room with my son Curt, who had taken a spill on his bike that afternoon while out doing his paper route, delivering the shocking newspaper reports to the kindly retirees and working class folks who I'm sure saved them to re-read later and pass on to future generations, just as I did. I also happened to be a home subscriber to the New York Times so I have original copies of their coverage stashed in a plastic tub here in my basement.)

So here's an excerpt from Blake's poem, "America: A Prophecy" that seem strangely fitting for the occasion, though I want to be clear that I don't think he was doing anything Nostradamus-like when he penned these lines. Even though I read it first silently, then aloud to Julie and Brandon (the others were already in bed,) I'm not even sure what he meant or what his overall message was, but the feel of these words is compelling... to me, anyway. I think I will let them finish speaking for me about the events that this date on the calendar will always draw to mind.

Washington spoke: `Friends of America! look over the Atlantic sea;
A bended bow is lifted in Heaven, and a heavy iron chain
Descends, link by link, from Albion's cliffs across the sea, to bind
Brothers and sons of America; till our faces pale and yellow,
Heads depress'd, voices weak, eyes downcast, hands work- bruis'd,
Feet bleeding on the sultry sands, and the furrows of the whip
Descend to generations, that in future times forget.'

The strong voice ceas'd; for a terrible blast swept over the heaving sea:
The eastern cloud rent: on his cliffs stood Albion's wrathful Prince,
A dragon form, clashing his scales: at midnight he arose,
And flam'd red meteors round the land of Albion beneath;
His voice, his locks, his awful shoulders, and his glowing eyes
Appear to the Americans upon the cloudy night.

Solemn heave the Atlantic waves between the gloomy nations,
Swelling, belching from its deeps red clouds and raging fires.
Albion is sick! America faints! Enrag'd the Zenith grew.
As human blood shooting its veins all round the orbèd heaven,
Red rose the clouds from the Atlantic in vast wheels of blood,
And in the red clouds rose a Wonder o'er the Atlantic sea --
Intense! naked! a Human fire, fierce glowing, as the wedge
Of iron heated in the furnace; his terrible limbs were fire,
With myriads of cloudy terrors, banners dark, and towers
Surrounded: heat but not light went thro' the murky atmosphere.

The King of England looking westward trembles at the vision.

Albion's Angel stood beside the Stone of Night, and saw
The Terror like a comet, or more like the planet red,
That once enclos'd the terrible wandering comets in its sphere.
Then, Mars, thou wast our centre, and the planets three flew round
Thy crimson disk; so, ere the Sun was rent from thy red sphere,
The Spectre glow'd, his horrid length staining the temple long
With beams of blood; and thus a voice came forth, and shook the temple:--

`The morning comes, the night decays, the watchmen leave their stations;
The grave is burst, the spices shed, the linen wrappèd up;
The bones of death, the cov'ring clay, the sinews shrunk and dry'd
Reviving shake, inspiring move, breathing, awakening,
Spring like redeemèd captives, when their bonds and bars are burst
Let the slave grinding at the mill run out into the field,
Let him look up into the heavens and laugh in the bright air;
Let the enchainèd soul, shut up in darkness and in sighing,
Whose face has never seen a smile in thirty weary years,
Rise and look out; his chains are loose, his dungeon doors are open;
And let his wife and children return from the oppressor's scourge.
They look behind at every step, and believe it is a dream,
Singing: "The Sun has left his blackness, and has found a fresher morning,
And the fair Moon rejoices in the clear and cloudless night;
For Empire is no more, and now the Lion and Wolf shall cease." '

9/11 Remembrance

For my blog entry this morning, I am going to quote a couple of passages from emails I posted to the Faithmaps discussion list on Sept. 12, 2001 in the aftermath of the infamous attacks from the preceding day. I'll have some more reflections on what's happened since then later on tonight, but for now, these paragraphs captured some of my thoughts at that fateful time.

To all,

I've appreciated the tone of the comments I've read on the list since
the horrors of 9/11 came to our awareness. I'd like to share an excerpt
from my journal this morning that I think fits under the subject line
that Stephen initiated:

"It seems like we've entered a new era, against our wishes and in
violation of our hopes. Three hijacked aircraft hit their
terrorist-driven targets in New York City and Washington D.C.,
collapsing the twin towers of the World Trade Center in Manhattan and
one side of the Pentagon in our nation's capital. I spent the morning
at work, listening to the radio and watching TV in between occasional
tasks related to my job... When we got home, we watched TV late into the
night, letting it all sink in as we pondered, prayed and wept over what
happened and what was next. Then we went to bed, and I got up this
morning to a new day, realizing that so much had changed.

This may be, in a way that I'm not sure anyone ever quite envisioned,
the beginning of World War III. If it is, it won't be fought the same
way as the previous wars, with ground troops marching into foreign
territory, combatting large armies and driving toward capitals and
military bases. But it will indeed be a monumental campaign, one that
will need to bring people and nations of good will together in a common
cause. It will require our willingness to transcend many of the
differences and arguments that separate us, often surrounding
significant issues that carry great emotional weight. A new kind of
heroism is called for - all of us who love life and freedom, and look
with hope to the future, have no other choice but to involve ourselves,
in whatever way we can, in the task of uniting and healing our society,
toward the end of making such attacks as we have endured ever-more
unthinkable, in all corners of the earth."

At that point, I stopped writing because I was at work, but I do believe
that some kind of an historic threshold has been crossed. We've been
invaded by a force that would try to persuade us that life is cheap,
random and out of control. We have to respond to this assault on our
moral and spiritual sensibilites in a way that affirms the goodness of
what the suicidal aggressors would have us deny. I'm not a fan of
George W. Bush or most of his political policies, but at this point he
has my solid support, in terms of my prayers and my willingness to
acknowledge his superior understanding of what's really happening on the
international scene, and what he and his advisors say must be done. As
for our larger culture, I remain committed to the cause of promoting
non-violence and mutual respect & understanding of the Other in all of
our forms of discourse. When dealing with a menace such as those who
attacked our civilization, the challenge to find that spark of humanity
that we share is enormous and painful. I don't think we should give up
on that, but in the meantime, we have to protect the innocent. This
tragedy, I believe, will significantly change our understanding of what
it means to be an American and a member of the postmodern global
community. My prayer and hope is that Christians of all branches and
denominations can appeal to the noblest aspects of our shared humanity
and truly provide a light of hope and reconciliation throughout this
dark moment in history.

and from a message later that day...

Stephen (and Dan B and Ed and Lorna and Chris and Bilbo and all the
others who I would otherwise be responding to at length re: their
stimulating and well-written posts of the past week or so),

I want to say thanks for the thoughtful and penetrating questions that
you have directed toward me in regard to some of my specific theological
beliefs/opinions. Particularly yours, Stephen. I am about halfway
through in my keyed-in response to the many points you raise but I just
don't think I want to pursue that kind of a dialogue at this time.
Obviously, from the last two posts I submitted, the terrorist attacks
and their aftermath are foremost on my mind. I'm mainly writing this to
explain my temporary lack of engagement on some of the finer points of
theological and philosophical arguments at this time so that you don't
think I've dropped out or am oblivious to your queries. It's not that I
don't think they are important or worthwhile, but I feel it's better to
stand observant to what will be a defining moment in our young century.
I risk sounding grandiose when I say such a thing, but it just seems to
me that this is so big and culturally transforming that we still haven't
quite come to grips with the impact that it will have on our collective
future. Right now, the emphasis is rightly on the rescue efforts and
the mourning of those whose lives have been lost. There is also the
very significant matter of the political, military and economic fallout
from the catastrophe, and how this will affect America's relations with
our allies and the rest of the world. Beyond that, there is the
question of what course civilization itself will take as it responds to
the threat of a secretive terrorism that dares not even voice its
demands or offer some form of a truce to a world that wonders "why?"
And of course, there's an even larger question of how our spiritual
understanding will be shaped by these events and whatever comes out in
response to them. Though the numbers of lives lost are not as great, I
wonder if our theological constructs may not come under as radical of a
questioning as was prompted by the Shoah (Holocaust) when the full
extent of that atrocity was made apparent to the West. I realize that
I'm posing really big questions and to some it may even sound like I'm
overly-enlarging the implications of this event. But that's just how it
affects me, I guess. Time will tell if my intuitions are well-founded.

WMJPC Convention

The West Michigan Justice and Peace Coalition held its second annual convention yesterday on the campus of Aquinas College. We had a decent turnout, about 60 people were there when I did a headcount about halfway through the afternoon. The event lasted about four hours and gave all of the member groups a brief time-slot to update everyone in attendance on recent activities and upcoming plans.

I don't have exact numbers, but I got the impression that the vast majority of WMJPC member groups were represented, even though we had a few no-shows and there may have been a couple organizations who've affiliated with the coalition but were unable to put together a presentation. In addition to the talks, literature tables lined the room offering a lot of free reading material and easy sign-ups for email notifications and other ways to get involved.

Most of the groups were based close to Grand Rapids, but we did have a number of attendees from outside the county representing a few lakeshore communities and even a visitor from Illinois who is offering some significant help in setting up a state-wide computer application that greatly eases the ability of a coalition like ours to arrive at consensus when it comes to planning events, actions or even arranging boycotts. I'm still reading up on the details, but similar networks have been set up in several states and there is some exciting potential for us to put these new tools to creative use in the near future.

My contribution to the event (besides some help in setting up, hanging banners, etc.) was to speak on behalf of IGE. With a short eight-minute window to speak in, I had to stay focused on the most important aspects of what IGE has been up to. Our organization was one of the oldest represented there (some groups have only been together for a year or less, while IGE is entering its 27th year this fall) so it was familiar to many in attendance, but we had some interesting new things to share, I think. I began my remarks by talking about the perspective that I've received from the IGE members and its well-established grounding in a hopeful, non-violent philosophy of life. Given our proximity to the fifth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks and all the attention that this occasion has generated in the media, I mentioned that my formal involvement with IGE began just a few months before Sept. 11, 2001. I recognized that IGE played an important role in helping me to not get caught up in the waves of fear and nationalistic mania that swept across our society in the weeks and months following that terrible day, and I expressed my gratitude to those IGE members who I've learned so much from over the years.

After listing some of our more notable current projects (annual peace festivals, our IGE Talks TV show, some counter-recruitment efforts in local high schools, our library, newsletters, meeting space, and more) I made a pitch for membership aimed at everyone in the room! I can't imagine any reason why a concerned peacenik in West Michigan wouldn't be connected to IGE as a member, but I know that there are some out there. I intend to put more effort into recruiting members in the weeks ahead.

I heard about many interesting efforts that others have undertaken. The Women's Studies group on the Aquinas campus has arranged for bell hooks and Diane Rehm to speak there over the next couple of months! That's pretty cool. There are efforts underway to create a cabinet level U.S. Department of Peace aimed at seeking non-violent solutions to conflict both domestically and internationally. A number of church-affiliated groups spoke of a growing interest in social justice work that is stirring among their memberships. Promotion of fair-trade, environmentally-sustainable alternative energy sources, labor organizers and community educators were among the many commendable initiatives that we heard about over the course of the afternoon.

The purpose of a coalition like this is to help a lot of smaller grass-roots activists connect with each other and perhaps get some ideas of how we can work more effectively to promote our common goals. It's also a chance to enhance our sense of community and take some encouragement from knowing that even though "peace and social justice" seem like elusive, uphill pursuits, we are not alone in our efforts. Though I can acknowledge that I would like to have seen the meeting hall more packed out than it was, I think we had a successful event. Now we just have to stay engaged and alert, finding new and creative ways to connect with our neighbors and those in positions of social responsibility. Yesterday's events provided the kind of boost that I need every so often to help me keep my focus.

Presenting... "Velvet Elvis"

Last night I sat with a group of folks to discuss our impressions of the first three "movements" (not chapters, they are movements) of Rob Bell's Velvet Elvis. It was an interesting, eclectic mix of people. Roughly half of the group were people I have known for several years who attend the Grand Rapids Friends Meeting (i.e. they're Quakers.) The other half of the group were from a local interfaith group (the name of which partially escapes me at the moment so I won't write it here.) They were there at the invitation of my friend Walt who suggested Velvet Elvis and has been serving as an informal liason of sorts between the Quakers and other religious groups in the area. Some of his interests have drawn him toward the emergent church movement, which Rob Bell doesn't really want to consider his church a part of but I don't think they can easily escape that tag at least as far as perceptions are concerned.

So even though I could easily imagine that Velvet Elvis has been and maybe even was at that moment being discussed other places around here, I doubt that there have been many other discussions with the kind of participants that gathered last night. Though there were a few people there who identified with traditional Christian denominations (one I know is Roman Catholic, another woman sitting by me said she's Lutheran), the majority of people were coming at Bell's book from the theological "left."

And by and large, everyone liked it.

Specifically mentioned were his generosity of spirit, his gift for creating memorable metaphors and images that bring abstractions down to earth, and his encouragement to ask the tough questions and be real. People liked his writing style, the accessibility of the text and his candid, engaging way of addressing the reader without too much posturing or grandstanding.

One point that caught my interest in the discussion was how Bell raised the troublesome issue of God ordering the Israelites to annihilate their enemies, but never really resolved it by declaring his beliefs about whether that was "really" what God wanted them to do, or why that might have been OK then but not now, or if the events ever actually happened or described, and so on. The person who made that comment seemed dissatisfied by Bell's circumspection and asked if anyone knew what his thoughts on the topic might be.

My response to that was to point out the simple observation that he was content to bring up the subject and leave it there without having to push for a clear either/or resolution, and that this is what puts Bell somewhat in that "postmodern" category - modernity sought to arrive at a "final verdict" that either sufficiently explains the actual solution to the problem but postmodernity says "here is the text, here's how it can be regarded, here is where it disrupts our conventional and convenient narrative" and allows multiple, even conflicting interpretations to stand unresolved alongside each other simultaneously.

Of course, Rob Bell is too shrewd and conscious of the potentially negative implications to go full-fledged "pomo" and bring all of that to the surface, but I see these kinds of things happening.

These are a few of the highlights of the discussion. I have a few more impressions I can share if anyone has comments, but I have to go get ready to help with the WMJPC Convention later this afternoon. I'll have a report on all that later!

Jobs and Gender Bias

Today's interesting things that I did were: 1) come close to final draft status on the latest issue of "Diversity Digest," a quarterly newsletter that I edit and write for as a representative of my employer's Diversity Committee. The lead article is on the topic of Gender Bias, and consists largely of comments from women who have experienced some degree of discrimination or other hardships that they consider are related to being female. I'm very sympathetic to their cause, and as a white male, I feel privileged to be able to write this article on their behalf. I've received some very nice feedback on the article by those who've read it - I'm basically waiting for the go-ahead from our new Executive Director and Director of Professional Services (two different people) before we publish the next issue.

2) The second interesting thing I did was facilitate a discussion on "Jobs" at IGE, the video of which will soon be edited down to become a one-hour public access TV show. We had a full room, with representatives from groups who work with released prisoners, advocates for the disabled, employment referral websites and a couple of other local activists and organizers who have done their homework on the current unemployment problems facing the state of Michigan. Our conversation covered a lot of topics and some of our folks made strong connections between the lack of job opportunities, the shrinking middle class, government cuts in social services and eductional assistance and the ever-increasing costs of waging the "war on terror." (approx. $1,000,000,000 a week in Iraq, so I hear.) I heard some things that I hadn't known before, like how many disabled people are basically forced to live in institutional placements even though they have homes they'd like to stay in, because the state is unwilling to support personal attendant services.

I could say more if anyone wants to ask questions in the comment section, but now I'd like to go hang out with my wife for a bit (she was off at her monthly book discussion group where they talked about Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress.) Oh, and there's a football game on too...

A Swashbuckler's Guide to Ultimateness

I continue to do a quick read through A Heretic's Guide to Eternity, after which I have decided I will read it through again and mark it all up with hi-liters, something I haven't done in many years, so that I can write up a nice, thorough, multi-part review that really engages with the author's ideas. So I did a blog search just now to see what other bloggers are saying about this book and I found and I find this site called "Doable Evangelism" where it mentions "Heretic's Guide" along with another book that's soon to be released called A Renegade's Guide to God. So I clicked on the link to see what that's all about and I have to say, I got this slightly queasy feeling and I don't think it had anything to do with the Nacho Crunch Grilled Stufft Chicken Burrito and Negra Modelo that I had for dinner tonight...

The queasiness is just realizing that I'm part of a demographic that's been noticed and cultivated... let's call it "middle aged guys who are getting a bit jaded with conventional church and need something raucous and swaggering to feed their 'independent rebel' self-image." Take these two titles, add in Jesus, Mean and Wild and I'm sure that once I start digging, I'll find a few other titles in a similar vein. So I went ahead and coined the one that titles this entry. I don't know if I'll actually get around to writing that book, but in case anyone else beats me to it, I can claim that I thought of it in September 2006 and perhaps get a cut of the royalties.

Yeah, I like that title! It gets me in on the pirates fad, and is suitably open-ended and rambunctious enough for me to toss in all kinds of surly, mildly irreverent and status-quo upsetting observations. It's gonna be a bare-knuckle, take no prisoners assault on mushy piety, Sunday morning pablum and all other church-affiliated manifestations of creeping whimpiness. I'm gonna kick butt, just like Jesus did when he and his band of marauding disciples roamed the Judean wilderness. You know they would have worn leather vests and roared through the desert on Harley's if they'd had the option. And leave the women behind, cuz this is no ride for lightweights and pantiwaists.

I'm one bad swashbucklin' Jesus-followin' dude, so better step aside!

Emmanuel's Gift

I'm going to cheat for tonight's blog entry and re-post something that I wrote this morning for my email list: a quick review and plug for a remarkable video... Some of my regular readers already saw it, but it's worth enshrining here too. Plus I added a few more thoughts at the end...

Last night, my wife and I watched Emmanuel's Gift, a documentary about a courageous young man born in Ghana with a birth defect that withered his right leg. This problem led his father to abandon the family, as Emmanuel was the first born and according to traditional Ghanan (sp?) beliefs, his handicap indicated some kind of "curse" hovered over the family. His mother was also advised to quietly put her deformed son to death in order to spare the family addtional hardship. It also meant that Emmanuel was destined for a life of street begging, the expected recourse that disabled people are to take if their bodies prevent them from working. Problem is that approximately 10% of people in Ghana have some kind of physical disability. Really, the numbers are that high! I was amazed at the numbers of people reduced to crawling and propelling themselves on their hands and knees that I saw on the video. So sad, but what resilient souls!

Anyway, Emmanuel decided at an early age he would be different, and he got jobs shining shoes and pushed himself to be as included in regular school and childhood games as his society would accept. His life's work began to form when he wrote a grant application seeking assistance for his disability. He didn't just ask for money or something to help him cope - instead, he asked for a bicycle so that he could learn to ride it and travel by bike across Ghana to show that disabled people need not endure the limitations imposed on them.

This simple request initiates a whole chain of events which I won't spoil here because the ripples this one young man creates grow ever larger, amazingly so. I went into the video thinking this would be a nice, inspiring docudrama but I was really surprised at how the story moved me and got me thinking about what I myself have done, am doing, to make a positive difference in the world. Emmanuel is a remarkable person and he provides a most impressive role model for anyone to learn from, not just those struggling with physical disabilities. (His bodily hardships in a way only externalize the crippledness that afflicts us all in our own individual personal circumstances.) The blend of modesty, clarity of purpose, gentle humor and refusal to wallow in self-pity have stuck with me as I've described the film to a few of my co-workers throughout the day. I know it's easy to just nod and say, "sure, sounds like a good flick," but I really do encourage you to find this movie - it's worth investing 80 minutes of your time for a very effective pick-me-up and perhaps a whole lot more.

Labor Day Parade

I marched in the Grand Rapids Labor Day Parade this morning. The procession takes place every year on the city's west side, a working class district where property values don't seem likely to be all that high and the citizens don't currently appear all that prosperous. I did this parade a couple of years ago and was similarly struck by the struggles etched into the faces of many of the people who sat along the route, clapping for us, sending their kids out to get their bags filled with candy. I haven't been in many other parades in my life but I wonder how this audience compares with others. Comparitavely speaking, the Grandville 4th of July parade, just a few miles south geographically from today's route, draws a more affluent, socially secure and homogenous (caucasian) crowd.

The group I marched with were fellow activists from the West Michigan Justice and Peace Coalition. We were very near to the end of the parade and for a few minutes during the initial rollout it looked like we might be the actual tail-enders. But the organizer changed his mind and put another union group behind us. (Unions made up the bulk of the marchers, it turned out.) My main task this year was banging a small drum in time with an "anarchist marching band" made up mostly of young people either affiliated with or sympathetic to the Industrial Workers of the World, who marched just in front of us. That was by design, since our groups share similar political perspectives and messages. Here are a few pics of the event.

I like this shot of the anarchist band marching past the Richard M. DeVos Center (part of Grand Valley State University's downtown campus.)

And me bangin' the drum...

Quick Takes

A few short comments on various topics...

I bought a just-released paperback copy of Rob Bell's Velvet Elvis (that all-white hardcover was just too easily smudged, I like the darker style and cheaper price) yesterday and read the first two "movements" laying on the shore of Lake Michigan this afternoon. Fuller review to come later, but my first impression is that this is a light, pleasant, modestly imaginative presentation of Christianity that is not very doctrinaire in its approach, is somewhat culturally eclectic in its frame of reference, and pretty much plays it very safe in comparison to recent books by Brian McLaren and Shane Claiborne. I've made the comparison between Bell and another West Michigan export who moved on to the national stage, Robert Schuller. The more I read of his stuff, the more apt the comparison becomes in my mind - not so much the "positive thinking" stuff, but their ability to pitch smoothly to their generational audiences.

I'm also digging into the Heretic's Guide to Eternity. Read first two chapters later in the afternoon. I'm drawn into Spencer Burke's presentation of a grace message that is presented as separate from "brand Christianity." I want to see where he takes this. I'm not against brand Christianity per se but I like the idea of a more generic, less institutionalized gospel message that is truly and radically open to all regardless of where they affiliate institutionally (or if they do.) Does the church have the guts to relinquish some or most of its proprietary rights? (Fuller review also to follow...)

We watched the "Inside the Twin Towers" documentary on the Discovery Channel tonight. Harrowing depiction of a nightmarish situation that was all too real. Five year anniversary comes up a week from tomorrow. Will reflect more on what it means, what's happened since, how that day changed the world, over this next week...

Read today that the faithmaps email list has been deactivated after 5+ years of operation. Moderator Stephen Shields is a gracious and level-headed guy who showed me a lot about how to keep a moveable feast discussing religion, politics and everything connected to those hot topics flowing cordially and constructively. I haven't participated in that group in a few years, ever since starting my own in 2002, but I really valued the discussions I had there and the inspiration it gave me to create my own internet persona and website. He's moving on to focus on other priorities... I don't see myself shutting down the PoMoXian list for a long time, but faithmaps had over 45,000 messages (my list is "only" up to around 14,500...) so I suppose he's been juggling a bigger load than I've had to. Still, I'm kind of sad to think about a venerable group that touched many lives dispersing like that. Several 'mappers have migrated over to PoMoXian which I think will add some welcome and stimulating constructive (not to mention more conservative) perspective to the discussion there.

The Tigers are starting to bug me with their lack of hitting. I am not fearful of them losing the division but I'm getting edgy about their ability to do much in the playoffs if they can't start knocking out at least 3 - 4 runs a game with some consistency.

Incarnation Bits 21: Robert Hass on the Epistles of John

The whole upsurge in antiworldliness and asceticism in the ancient world from which Christianity sprung led away from the world, from the empire and its cities, and into the desert, which was both an actual wilderness and a metaphor for some place in the self that did not belong to the world. The secessionists were Gnostics, or crypto-Gnostics. They did not believe that the divine Word trafficked with the human body. They were inclined to discount the importance of bodily action. And in this they seemed a natural development of Johannine Christianity. The Synoptic Gospels, after all, belong to the eternity of story. They are full of legends of the marvels of this world: the curing of lepers, the multiplication of loaves and fishes, the man who walked on water and died and rose from the dead. Though these same stories appear in John, it contains what the others do not - that astonishing leap to what is not figurable in human art, not tellable: the Word that was in the beginning and was with God and was God. This is not Jewish eschatology with its chairs in Paradise. It is someething else that pulls away from the earth, wants to leave it behind. And clearly it speaks to a very deep place in the human imagination.

Writers know a version of it, because all art drives toward either representation or abstraction, or tries to negotiate the tension between them; it wants to render the thing and to be its pure essence, and never quite succeeds at either, fails to render human experience entirely, fails to soar fre of its materials. Logos and kosmos. The first epistle is fascinating because it is the place, among the canonical Christian texts, where this issue reaches a kind of resolution. The Word that preexisted the world and will outlast it came, nevertheless, into this world, the teaching says, was born not of water only but also of blood. It not only saved souls; it made the physical world sacred by its presence. It planted eternity here in the moments of human existence. That this argument emerges so flickeringly in a somewhat wandering and repetitious letter with an air more of valediction than of apocalypse gives it an odd sweetness: "My children, we are living in the last days."

August is in the Archives...

I didn't get around to blogging yesterday even though I actually had the window open and was ready to late last night. I decided to close it when I realized that I had nothing substantial to say. The day had been full enough, with me leading a pretty good listening skills workshop in the afternoon, setting up the marching band at our opening night high school football game in the evening, and some thought-provoking exchanges on my email list (though not all of the thoughts provoked were very edifying) throughout the day. But nothing coalesced into a blog entry, so I'll leave all that at that.

Today is Sept. 1, a date which usually puts me into a different frame of mind than when the calendar reads June, July or August. True, we are just getting into a holiday weekend so it's not like life kicks into a new gear all at once. My sons have not even started school yet (my daughter has though, as she's already living on campus and in classes at GVSU.) But the shift is in process.

This year, I don't feel as prone to lamenting the passing of summertime as I have in the past. That's probably because I've had plenty of time off over the past few months and generally speaking I'm in this really content phase of my life where I'm enjoying just about everything that's going on around me. So I'm willing to let the weeks slide by and I'm not feeling all that much urgency to try and make things happen that are simply out of my reach. I don't know if that's a "turning 45" thing or just something that's going on internally with me because of various circumstances and mental coping mechanisms that I've mastered with on-going practice. But in any case, it feels pretty good!

I have a sense that things are going to get busier soon though. Looking ahead at my calendar I see a number of events and commitments that are going to require a little more focus and effort than I've had to exert lately. And these three and a half, four day work weeks I've been cruising through, while pleasant enough, are beginning to erode the stockpile of ETO that I acquired over the course of years as a hard-working, limited-time-off-taking home supervisor. I really don't want to get to the point where I have to "save up" in order to plan my time off. And on top of all that, I don't want to get too flabby, either physically or mentally, and I think that might happen if I continued at the occasionally lolly-gagging pace that I've been on over the past few months.

There are some other changes and possibilities that I also know are (maybe) in the works but I won't divulge them here until they become more concrete. That will save me something to write about when the time comes.