My Clinton Problem

I've discussed Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign quite a bit with friends via social media. I'm not a Clinton supporter. I believe that Bernie Sanders more closely represents the views I hold and I plan to support him in the Democratic primary. I'm undecided what I may do in the general election if Clinton wins the nomination.

Several of my friends have told me that Sanders cannot possibly win the nomination, so I am just wasting my vote. "It's time," some have told me, for a woman to become president. She has "paid her dues" and "deserves" the presidency, others have said.

While I do agree that a female president is long overdue, my heart wishes Elizabeth Warren were leading the pack of nominees rather than Clinton. The other arguments are simply unconvincing to me.

Setting aside Sanders' electability for just a moment, I'd like to discuss in greater detail the larger issues with which I disagree with Clinton.

1. Citizens' United. Clinton has recently said she would make the overturning of the Citizens' United  decision a litmus test for a Supreme Court nominee. I will first say that I actually think this is in direct response to Sanders' continued calls for substantial campaign finance reform. Clinton has a troubled history of campaign finance and while I believe she has not broken the law, it is unclear that her public policy positions have not been influenced by substantial private money that has come her way. Apart from this is the fact that Clinton has arguably gotten the biggest financial windfall from the Citizens' United decision. The super-PACs contributing to her campaign are the very reason that some view Sanders' candidacy as unviable: how could he win against Clinton's money?

2. Support of the Keystone XL Pipeline. Clinton has received over $3 million in speaking fees from banks who are investors in the controversial Keystone Pipeline, which environmentalists have universally decried. Her husband has told everyone it is time to "embrace" the pipeline that risks major environmental damage from oil spills and increased CO2 emissions. Given Clinton's identification as an environmental supporter, this is unconscionable.

3. Failure to call for serious Wall Street Reform. The 2008 financial bailout brought the specter of banks that were "too big to fail." It is a frightening proposition and an expensive one. The initial cost was $700 billion but some have estimated the true cost to be upward of $12.8 trillion in taxpayer money. Sanders continues to call for the break up and regulation of these financial institutions, but Clinton has been silent on this front. Why? Perhaps it is because the major contributors to Clinton's campaigns have been from that sector: Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, Ernst and Young, J.P. Morgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, Lehman Brothers, et al. There is no evidence that Clinton supports serious reform or regulation of the financial sector, which leaves the American taxpayer vulnerable to big banks.

4. Failure to support an increase in the minimum wage. This week Clinton called for an increase in the minimum wage to $15, but only for workers in New York City by 2021. The income disparity in this country is alarming and while CEO salaries continue to skyrocket as our economy grows (and even when it doesn't), the minimum wage has become anything but a living wage. If adjusted for worker productivity and inflation since 1968, the wage would be $26. It is a myth that our economy couldn't handle the increase. (I won't address all the ins and outs of this issue here, except to say that our public subsidy of the Walton family alone would be enough for me to support the increase.)

5. Hawkish foreign policy. Clinton has indicated time and time again that she favors the military option in places where it is almost certain to fail, including Iran and Syria. The support of the Syrian forces opposed to Assad reads like a chapter from Reagan's foreign policy book, the one that gave us arms to Iran, Manuel Noriega, Saddam Hussein, and the Taliban. Our failure to learn from our continued mistakes is troubling, especially from someone who served as Secretary of State. While it is understood that the U.S. will have a continued role in world affairs, our interventionist policies ("the enemy of my enemy is my friend") have cost us thousands of lives, trillions of dollars, and have not made us safer.

6. Her lukewarm civil liberties record. Clinton has been a supporter of the Patriot Act, and roundly condemned Edward Snowden for his exposure of the NSA. Wikileaks documents reveal that she supported the wiretapping of U.N. officials. She sponsored an amendment punishing the burning of the American flag and until very recently, was opposed to gay marriage. She has supported the suspension of habeas corpus, our extensive drone program that occasionally targets U.S. citizens, and anti-terrorism measures that have led to a curtailing of American civil liberties.

7. Support of the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Clinton called TPP the "gold standard" in trade agreements, even though it will almost certainly lead to the loss of American jobs and potentially compromise the sovereignty of U.S. courts. The trade agreement was negotiated in secret, without the review of the U.S. Congress. In addition, it provides no significant human rights or labor protections in signatory countries.

8. Opposition to single-payer healthcare. While I believe the Affordable Care Act is an important first step in providing reasonable healthcare for all American citizens, the U.S. needs a single-payer system, most likely run through Medicare. We already pay more in tax dollars for the healthcare system than most western countries, but without the benefit of universal coverage. Considering healthcare was Clinton's signature cause as first lady, it is troubling that she does not support a universal, single-payer system. I would opine that it is due to many of those contributors to Clinton's campaign, many of whom are major investors in the that industry. Amid cries that "It won't work!" we see single-payer systems working all around the globe.

I do not dislike Clinton. I think many of the attacks on her personally have been unfair. But she is not a "progressive," whatever that means. And she does not represent my interests on the issues that are most important to me and to my family.

Why the Christian Right is Going to Lose the Culture War

It's been a busy couple of weeks for culture warriors.

The figurative war became a literal one when a white supremacist terrorist shot and killed nine black churchgoers in Charleston, SC. We've seen Confederate flags coming down and rainbow flags going up. And we've seen a lot of grandstanding by local politicians.

I think Pat Buchanan was the first person I heard use the term "culture war," though certainly Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority thought of themselves in much the same way. These are people who believe it is a divine mandate to seize the culture from humanists, atheists, and other non-Christians so as to enact laws based upon the morality of the Bible, as interpreted by their leaders.

But they're going to lose.

They are going to lose and they already have. Many times.

As Neil Carter pointed out in a brilliant post last week, modern evangelicals like to pretend that they were on the cutting edge of the Civil Rights Movement. But a careful examination of source materials of the era does not bear this out. The most conservative evangelical denominations were those that defended the practice of slavery and it is no surprise that most of these fought against desegregation. Bob Jones University did not admit black students until 1970 and then continued a policy of prohibiting interracial dating.

The movement gained much steam in the years following Roe v. Wade, although many evangelical leaders were initially rather lukewarm on the issue of abortion. There was rock and rap music, women's rights, evolution v. intelligent design, marijuana, and gay rights . . . And there's something interesting about that list.

In every single case, it is clear that the culture has moved progressively toward secular values. Yes, we have Tipper Gore stickers on our CDs, but it's pretty rare to hear of anyone trying to ban a record. Women still make just 78 cents on every dollar a man makes, but very few Americans think this state of affairs is preferable. We are woefully behind other industrialized nations in accepting evolution as a fact, but more Americans do now than ever before. Marijuana is being legalized in more and more states and we will probably see a change in federal policy in the next few years. And now there is last week's SCOTUS ruling legalizing gay marriage in every state of the union.

The extreme right sees nefarious forces at work. There is a vast communist conspiracy, it is the liberal media, or Satan is at work. Given the energy and money spent to defeat these causes, it seems only reasonable to imagine that your enemies have dark and unimaginable tools to work with.

I think the truth is more mundane.

The Christian Right is going to lose because most of them actually like the world they live in. And who could blame them? One article floating around social media this week listed companies that were celebrating gay marriage, including Visa and Mastercard, Coke and Pepsi, Facebook and Twitter. Jesus may have told his followers to take up their crosses, but most evangelicals I know would have a hard time giving up Coca-Cola.

Witness the Texas pastor who announced that he was "ready to burn" to protest gay marriage, only to clarify after the court's decision that it was, of course, meant figuratively. And can you blame him? I mean, I'm sure living in Texas is no picnic, but he probably hasn't even had a chance to see Jurassic World and he still hasn't gotten the iPhone 6 yet.

Contrast this with civil rights leaders who endured beatings, dogs, and lynchings to secure liberties for people of every color. Can you really imagine hundreds of thousands of evangelicals ready to die just to keep two guys from registering at Macy's?

I eschew the term "liberal" (a topic for another time) but I like the word "progressive," for this very reason. "Progressive" values are the ones that lead to real progress in our culture. They are the values that lead us from superstition to the scientific method, from feudalism to equity, from oppression to liberty. They are the values that gave us vaccination and the moon landing. But they are also the values that gave us rock and roll and cable television.

Because conservative evangelicals are first and foremost human beings, they still value progress. They may not believe in evolution, but they certainly enjoy the benefits that evolutionary biology has given us. They may not value gay marriage, but they do not want a return to marriage as it was in the first century, no matter how much they protest otherwise. 

100 years ago the foremost social cause among evangelicals was the temperance movement. Today, a large number of them are social drinkers and it is unthinkable that they would support prohibition. The Coors family, one of the largest beer producers in the U.S., supports organizations like the Heritage Foundation. As important as that cause was to a large part of the American population, it was no competition with the great taste of beer. It tastes good even to fundamentalists. 

100 years from now there will probably still be those who identify as conservative evangelicals. But many of them will claim that evangelicals have always supported gay marriage. Others will privately oppose it, but will agree that the rule of law is what is best for living in a pluralistic culture. They will alter their understanding of what the Bible says about it, without so much as a nod to their critics of yesteryear.

Progress is too great a temptation to resist.

Leaving the Garden (Religious Thoughts, Part Three)

The book of Genesis in the Bible is something of a touchstone in the culture wars that continue to rage in this country. There are 66 books in the Protestant Bible, but this one contains many of the stories that have become emblematic of particular values. This one book has Noah and his ark, Abraham and Isaac, and Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. But if you say, "Genesis," most people are going to think of Adam and Eve.

In our day, the story is connected to what people think about the origins of life. To the conservative evangelical who takes the passage literally, the Genesis creation story tells us that everything there is was created in a span of six days, and that each form of life was created separately. To many, the story represents all that is wrong with religion, especially a denial of science and what we have come to learn about our own world.

For me, there is a third way to read this story.

But first, a brief re-telling:

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

And the earth was formless and void, but God's spirit moved about the water.

Then God said, "Let there be light!" and there was light. And God saw that it was good.

So He called the light day and the darkness night, and that was the first day.

On the second day, God separated the heavens from the watery earth. Then He called forth dry land and separated the seas, and made all sorts of plants and trees to grow. This was the third day, and He saw it was good. On the fourth and fifth day, God called forth creatures of all sorts in the water and on the land, and made them to fill the earth. And He saw that this was good, too.

Then on the sixth day, God said, "Let us make man in our own image." So he formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed His own breath into him, giving him life. So God made man after His own likeness and gave him the abundance of the earth and made him above the other creatures, and gave all the plants for his food. And He told him to be fruitful and multiply. God named the man Adam.

On the seventh day, God rested from all His labors. And He saw that all He had created was good.

Then God made a garden in a place called Eden and put Adam there. A river ran through the garden and became the head of four rivers: Pishon, Gihon, Hiddekel, and the Euphrates. 

God filled the garden with trees that were beautiful and full of fruit for the man. In the midst of these were the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. "Do not eat of the Tree of Knowledge," God told Adam, "or you will surely die."

God saw that though the garden was filled with creatures the man had named, Adam was still alone. So He put him into a deep sleep and took a rib from his side and made the first woman. Then Adam said: "This is now bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. She will be called 'woman.'"

The woman, who was named Eve, went walking one day in the garden, when she came across a serpent, the most cunning of all of God's creatures. The serpent said, "Why has God not let you eat of every tree of the garden?"

And Eve answered, "He has, only we are not to eat of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, or we will surely die."

Then the serpent said, "You will not die, but God knows that if you eat of the Tree of Knowledge, you will become like a god, knowing good from evil."

So Eve took the fruit, which was very pleasing, and ate it. Then she gave it to Adam. After eating it, they looked and saw that they were naked, so they took leaves from a fig tree and sewed them and made clothes.

Then God went walking in the garden, in the cool of the day, and the two hid themselves. So God called out, "Where are you?"

Adam answered, "We hid ourselves when we heard you coming, because we were naked."

God said, "Who told you you were naked? Did you eat of the Tree of Knowledge?"

So Adam answered, "The woman you gave me gave me the fruit and I ate it."

"What have you done?" God asked Eve.

Eve answered, "The serpent deceived me, and I ate."

Then God said, "Because you've done this thing, Eve, you will labor greatly when the time comes to give birth. And you, Adam, will only have food by the sweat of your brow."

Then God killed an animal and covered the pair in animal skins.

Then God said to Himself, "They have eaten of the Tree and become like Us, knowing good from evil. Now, lest they take of the Tree of Life and live forever . . ." So God drove them from the garden to a place east of Eden, putting a cherubim as guard at the garden gate with a flaming sword that turned every direction.

Reading it again (and if you have not read the entire story from the Bible, I would encourage you to do so) it seems strange that anyone living in 2015 would obsess about the portions of the story having to do with the literal creation. The ancient culture whose story this was simply had no way of ascertaining how all things came into being. And they are spoken of in the most poetic and ambiguous terms. There is light and dark before there is a sun. The animals all reproduce in a single day, filling the oceans and land. It seems impossible to imagine that this was meant literally.

Even so, such an emphasis would seem to miss the point.

As I read this narrative, two ideas seem to come off the page.

The first is that there is something of the divine in us.

The narrative is very specific that these first parents of ours were made to resemble God (Or is it "the gods"? Who is He talking to anyway?), that God breathed life into them, and that knowledge made them more like God. I'd like to unpack that a bit.

The idea that man (i.e., humanity) is made in the image of God is central to Hebrew and Christian faith. Medieval theologians called this the imago Dei (the "image of God") that is stamped upon every man, woman, and child. The implications of this are rather obvious, though one might not guess so based upon the actions of the church throughout the ages. Everyone you meet, this passage is saying, carries divinity within them.

Breath is associated directly with life in this scripture and again, the message seems rather clear: life is sacred. While anti-abortion groups might rally around that motto, that would seem to muddy the waters. Life is sacred, it is like the breath of the gods, and we should live every moment as if that were true. For those of us who have seen that breath leave someone we love, that understanding is even clearer.

When one comes to the passage where God admits that he lied (Oh — did you miss that?), it is startling. Adam and Eve will not die after eating from the Tree of Knowledge. No, sir. The serpent was right. They will become like gods. God says so Himself. How is it that I heard dozens of sermons on this passage but no one ever pointed that out?!  When God acknowledges this, He does something particularly cruel: he drives them from their garden home, condemning them to mortality. They will now die — not because the fruit has killed them, but because God keeps them from eating of the Tree of Life.

Which brings me to the second big thing that jumps off the page: all of us are fallen and mortal.

This awareness, one that we slowly come to realize as children, can be overwhelming at times. I'm not sure which was worse for me — learning of my parents' fallibility or learning of their mortality. I remember crying bitterly about both.

Closely tied to this idea is that this knowledge leads to a loss of innocence. It certainly did for me. There is a price to be paid for wisdom. "If ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise," someone said, but a later Biblical author answered, "Wisdom excels folly as light excels darkness."

We might all imagine living in a garden, blissfully, eternally, without a care in the world. But we have lost our innocence. "When I became a man, I put away childish things," the Apostle Paul wrote, and we must all come to terms with our own mortality in this sometimes very dark world.

Yet knowledge is not to be shunned. To learn and to grow is to become more divine — whatever the cost. We now know more than we once did. We know our world and our universe are much older than imagined and that it took much more than six days for them to come into being. We know that we are all headed to a dark oblivion trillions of years from now. We cannot return to the garden of innocence and ignorance. But we should live here, east of Eden, with our fellow mortals, cherishing every sacred breath we take.

I do not believe there was a literal Adam and Eve and I would be lying if I told you I believed in God either. I do believe in the timeless truths of this story though. And I believe you and I are both made in a divine image. I can live with that.

A Memorial for Dora Leigh Bassham Deskins

Good morning. My name is Jack Deskins and I am Dora Leigh’s youngest son.

I want to thank my brother Mark and my sisters for coordinating the events today. And I want to thank all of you for being here to share in the memories of my mother. She was important to all of us in so many ways.

My mom called me one Thursday last November to tell me she had decided, at age 75, to quit teaching. I was driving to Point Pleasant for my work and we talked for about an hour on the phone. She was tired and she really hadn’t felt well since my father’s death the previous January. She was going to see her doctor, take a short medical leave while she got things settled with the retirement board, then figure out what was next. She had talked about moving away from the home we grew up in. It was big and she didn’t want to be left with its upkeep.

She called me again at work on Monday to apologize that she wouldn’t be able to come to my son’s 1st birthday party. Her doctor insisted that she come to the emergency room. They’d discovered irregularities in some tests.

Later that day she told me the x-ray revealed a mass on her liver. “And a spot on the pancreas,” she said. I remember the sinking feeling in my chest at those last words. I’d known others with pancreatic cancer. I’d never heard of survivors.

She was dead within a month.

I think we all took it very, very hard. For reasons that I need not go into right now, my siblings and I all developed a pretty dark sense of humor growing up. It was never so much on display as it was when my father died last year. But it was different with my mother. When we gathered at their house after she died, it was grim. There were lots of tears and few laughs.

There were few laughs, but there were some.

Mark and I drove to the funeral home to make arrangements for her body. Her wish was to be cremated and there was some confusion about this initially. Finally a form was brought to us and we were asked to read it carefully. Across the top we read in bold print, “Cremation is final and irreversible.” Cremation is final and irreversible. Anyone who knows us will understand why this sentence led to fits of laughter, as we imagined the circumstances that had led to the inclusion of this important caveat on the document we were reading.

I think my mom would have appreciated that. I know my dad would have.

I took a great deal of pride in telling others that my mom was still working at 75. She was a teacher, a career she didn’t begin until she was almost 50.

She taught me a great number of things.

She taught me to love books. She took me to the library constantly as a child and once, when the librarian refused to check out more than three books to me, she argued with her that I should be allowed as many as I wanted. Whenever we talked, she would always ask, “What are you reading?”

She taught me that things that have value usually require a great deal of work. I can remember sitting on the piano bench with the kitchen timer ticking away the minutes until I’d finished my practice time.

She taught me to defend the things I believed. This meant arguing with her sometimes and we had lots of heated discussions about religion, politics, and education. It also meant arguing with teachers and Sunday School teachers and anyone else who made unsupported assertions.

She taught me that you can have a successful second chapter in your life, something I’m thankful to have learned in the last few years.

She taught me about love and how fierce love can be. Although I think I was a reasonably well-behaved child, I got my very first disciplinary referral in this very room for calling a teacher stupid. Because it was so hard for her to see any wrong in me, she argued with the principal that I shouldn’t be disciplined because the teacher was, in fact, stupid.

If she had a weakness, this was it. She believed her own children, and later her grandchildren, set the moon. I sensed this, even from a young age. We had a book at the house called Best Loved Poems of the American People and when I was seven-years-old, I memorized poem in it for my mother. It goes like this:

While walking down a crowded
City street the other day,
I heard a little urchin
To a comrade turn and say,
‘Say, Chimmey, lemme tell youse,
I’d be happy as a clam
If only I was de feller dat
Me mudder t’inks I am.’ 

‘She t’inks I am a wonder,
An’ she knows her little lad
Could never mix wit’ nuttin’
Dat was ugly, mean or bad.
Oh, lot o’ times I sit and t’ink
How nice, ’twould be, gee whiz!
If a feller was de feller
Dat his mudder t’inks he is.’ 

My friends, be yours a life of toil
Or undiluted joy,
You can learn a wholesome lesson
From that small, untutored boy.
Don’t aim to be an earthly saint
With eyes fixed on a star:
Just try to be the fellow that
Your mother thinks you are.

It’s sentimental and saccharine, but it still captures so much how I feel. In her mind I was the smartest, most handsome, most well-behaved, most talented young man there was. For anyone to suggest otherwise was to question the reality that she knew.

For some time, I really did just wish I was the fellow that my mother thought I was. But I wasn’t and I’m not. No one ever could be.

This week I’ve been wondering if she aspired to the same, that is, did she wish she was the person her mother thought she was? I don’t think that was how she thought at all.

What I think she aspired to more was to be someone her children would admire.

My mother came from a time and place that would lead others to narrow-mindedness and bigotry. But she read, all the time, and the things she read led her to become someone else entirely. I don’t mean to suggest that she was particularly progressive or liberal in her opinions; she wasn’t. But she wasn’t close-minded either and I watched her change her opinion on several occasions because of things she had learned.

She wasn’t the type of person who wished the world would have stopped turning when she was young. She looked into the faces of her children and grandchildren and wanted a world that was better for them. Even as she was dying she made plans and bought books for her grandchildren -- even one who hadn’t been born.

I’ve stopped wishing I was the fellow that my mother thinks I am. She is not here and though we may all disagree about what that means exactly, I think it is a fair thing to say that whatever obligations we felt toward her are no longer. Instead, I look into four young faces at my dinner table every night and try to be person they will one day admire.

What that means exactly, I’m still figuring out, but it does mean that I continue to learn, to destroy my own bigotry wherever I find it, and to fight for a better world for them. A lot of you have children, a lot of you will have children, and certainly all of you know children. If you would honor my mother -- and if you would honor your own mother -- then try to be the person those children will one day admire, even as I admire her today.

Journey from Faith

I've hinted at it a lot, but I've never really talked about why I finally lost my faith. I don't know that it's a particularly interesting story, but I've been talking more to people who were like me and have gone through similar things. I've also been reading over at Godless in Dixie, which you should definitely check out. Then yesterday morning, I received a very troubling message from a close friend. It wasn't about my faith, exactly, but it was about the type of person I am. It makes me want to write about this part of my life. If you've read my writing before, you may notice that what follows will lack a little bit of my normal snark and "cleverness." I can't seem to muster it when re-telling this story.

I guess I should start at the beginning.

I grew up in a typical southern West Virginia home in a lot of ways. My mother was deeply religious. She'd grown up Methodist but began going to an independent Baptist church when they moved to our little town. My father was irreligious, though I wouldn't call him an atheist. He was "godless" in the traditional sense — he had grown up in church but liked drinking and smoking and cursing too much to be a regular churchgoer.

The rest of us attended an independent Baptist church of the more fundamentalist variety. There were sermons against drinking and smoking and rock-and-roll music. We attended the weekly Awana meetings and memorized scripture. My mom took a lot of it with a grain of salt, but there was one thing we did not take casually: the Bible. The Bible was the literal word of God — inspired (literally, "God-breathed") and "profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness" we were told. There were no errors in the Bible and it was the final authority on all matters. We didn't believe in evolution: the Bible told us the world was created in six days. We didn't believe in homosexuality, because the Bible called it "an abomination."

Like most small independent churches, ours was riddled with in-fighting. We eventually left and bounced around a couple more, but they all had common characteristics. They all believed that the Bible was the inerrant word of God and the final word on anything. They all believed that Jesus Christ represented the sole hope for fallen man to escape eternal punishment in hell and enjoy a blessed eternity in the presence of God. And they all taught that Christians were in the minority and were under constant assault from the prevailing culture. They were also all very heavily influenced by the local Bible college, whose students attended each of these churches.

In college, I attended a broadly evangelical church that was of the Christian and Missionary Alliance denomination. They were more charitable to non-Christians, to be sure, and supported a more nuanced understanding of scriptural authority, probably because most of the parishioners were involved in university life. They held that the scripture was infallible in matters of faith and inerrant where it was meant literally. This meant that there were some instances of scripture that were to be understood metaphorically, though we might disagree about which these were. Yet we still clung tightly to the concept of supernaturalism. Jesus was born of a virgin. Moses parted the Red Sea. Jonah was swallowed by a big fish.

I returned to my home town after school and began attending an American Baptist church, the big church in the center of town and the one where I was married. American Baptist churches are typically more liberal than their Southern Baptist brethren, but through a fluke of history (i.e., the American Civil War), Southern Baptists have had relatively little inroads in the state and American Baptists have remained a very conservative denomination. Our church was one of those that a lot of the "important" people in my small town attended. That church had a sort of "convenient evangelicalism," that is, they believed the Bible completely, unless it interfered with their social or political aspirations. There was the sort of anti-intellectualism that accompanies life in most evangelical churches, too, and I was put off by that.

Sometime shortly after I began attending there, I began reading Reformed and Calvinist theology. I was troubled by passages in the Bible that seemed to clearly say that God predestined all that happened, and most contemporary evangelical authors shied away from the subject. I dove headfirst into it and was soon a closet Calvinist. I say "closet Calvinist," but I wasn't really able to disguise that for very long. I was a deacon and a Sunday School teacher in the church. I would frequently bring up the topic of historical Baptists who were well-known Calvinists.

I should mention here that there was a lot more going on my life. I was married, working, playing music sometimes, and I had a lot of other interests. But theology was a special passion and it took up a lot of my time. I read the Bible, prayed, went to church two or three times a week, and even hosted Bible studies in my home.

Like a lot of Christians, I worried if I was really saved. I worried that my professions of faith — there were many — were sincere. And then there was sin. Sin was a big problem in my life. The Bible said that if any man is in Christ he is a new creature, but in many ways I felt like I had the same problems with sin that non-Christians did.

Another aspect of my experience was being in a semi-leadership position. As I said, I was active. I was a Sunday School teacher, a deacon, I sang in the choir and played other "special music" occasionally. There is an aspect of this that is a bit of "seeing the sausage made," if you take my meaning. I will relate one story in particular.

There was a couple my age attending the church that I knew pretty well; I had gone to high school with both of them. The woman's family had been active in the church for years. The man had grown up Roman Catholic.

Now, to many Baptists, Roman Catholics may as well be Sikhs or Shintoists. They are not Christians. (I'm not going to go into the why of it. I get bored even thinking about it now.) So while we all hoped that this man believed in his heart and had gotten saved, he had made no public profession of his faith. He had not been baptized as an adult.

The pastor came to me, as a deacon and this man's Sunday School teacher, and made a special request. "Jack," he said, "I believe the Lord is leading **** to be baptized. I want you to pray that he will come forward this Sunday morning for baptism."

My heart was very heavy with this request. I prayed diligently for it all week. "Lord, if it be Your will and if Your name would be glorified, I pray that **** will come forward for baptism. Give comfort to his friends and family that You have saved him, and raise up Your name among our community. I ask these things in the name of Jesus and for His glory, Amen."

That Sunday morning came and as is customary in most evangelical churches, a time of "invitation" was given at the close of service. Imagine my joy when this man stepped forward immediately, walked to the front of the sanctuary, and requested that he be baptized. My heart was so full of love and faith at that moment. I remember the tears in his family's eyes and the pastor looking at me. "Prayer really does work!" he said.

There was a baptismal service sometime later and I continued to interact with the couple. After a few months, I believe, I was having a conversation with the man and we began discussing his decision to be baptized. "What made you decide that morning to come forward for baptism?"

"Well, I'd discussed it with the pastor a couple of weeks before that and he said I should come down on that particular morning."

I was stunned. The pastor had orchestrated the whole thing, and for reasons I cannot imagine, gave me this behind-the-scenes role. But it was a ruse.

Incidents like these strangely did not shake my faith. I mean, I lost a great deal of respect for the pastor, but not for God. Man was totally depraved, I was learning in my Calvinist studies, and we should never be shocked at wickedness in human beings. But God is good and faithful and just.

By the summer of 2002, I had grown cold toward that particular church. Besides that, I wanted to go somewhere that taught the things I was coming to believe.

After an internet search, I discovered a Reformed Baptist church an hour away from where we lived. Just on a lark one Sunday, I suggested to my wife that we drive down and see what it was like. We made the trek, but due to a misunderstanding about the address, we didn't make it in time for the service. The group met in a community building. We arrived just as they were dismissing.

The pastor met us and invited us to come to his house for dinner. We accepted and spent the afternoon with he and his wife, learning about the church and sharing our Christian experiences. This was the beginning of a seven-year tenure at the church.

We drove an hour every week for seven years. We usually stayed the afternoon, sometimes having a monthly church dinner, other times going home with families who graciously fed us and got to know us.

For those of you unfamiliar with the Reformed faith (including the various Reformed, Reformed Presbyterian, and Reformed Baptist denominations), it is an "all in" sort of theology. We believed in an austere worship, with only the elements prescribed by the Bible. This meant a preeminence of preaching God's word, and a typical sermon would last between an hour and hour-and-a-half. There was no choir, no "special music," no elaborate holiday programs. We were sabbatarian, so no one worked on Sundays. We believed in the ten commandments. Everyone read theology. Men were expected to lead their families in daily family worship times. Most of the families home-schooled their children, though that was not mandated. There were conferences — for men, for women, for teens, for entire families even — where one could spend your vacation and listen to preaching all day long.

I would add that there was real love. As far as I am from that life now, I can say that I have never known a more sincere and loving group of Christians. They were human, to be sure, but they truly believed the Bible was God's word, that He had chosen them for salvation for which they were in no way worthy, and that the world was a sad place where millions perished without the saving knowledge of Christ.

Reformed theology is tight, too. If you want to meet a Christian who has an answer for everything, talk to a Reformed pastor. All the conundrums of scripture have been meticulously worked out for generations: the unpardonable sin, Jepthah's daughter, how many times the cock crowed when Peter denounced Jesus, multiple marriages, are all dealt with systematically and thoroughly. They do not blink at the more difficult parts of scripture that the broad evangelical church shied away from, and that is to their credit.

But it may also be why I am no longer a Christian today.

It was expected that all church members read the entire Bible. We believed in the unity of scripture and came to it with a sense of wonder and awe. I've written about it before, but it is a really wonderful thing to believe the world works the way it is described in the Bible. We believed in a God who could speak galaxies into being; who delivered his people with plagues of locusts and flies; who fed His prophet for years during a famine (together with a widow and her son) from a small jug of oil and a jar of flour; and who commanded the crippled to walk.

But the most wondrous thing of all was that the Lord of glory condescended to save His people from their sins, giving them eternity and freedom from sin. It was a small wonder that He could raise the dead; it was a very great wonder that He could bring life to spiritually dead men and women. I was deeply grateful that He saved a wretch like me.

And I knew I was a wretch. I had the witness of my own heart against me — a heart that was depraved as any, but which still spoke judgment in my spirit. I was a sinner, saved solely by the grace of God. As a Christian, I also had the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, who witnessed to my spirit that I was saved, but still convicted me.

Yet, I still had remaining sin.

Reformed theologians — especially the Puritans — had written a great deal about this subject. They even had a term — "besetting sin," as in, "the sin that so easily besets us." I had my besetting sin and it was a problem. For both the sake of brevity and discretion and I won't go into detail here, but it's something many (most?) Christians struggle with to a greater or lesser degree.

Then there was the fact that we worshiped an omniscient God. Where could I hide from God? If I ascended to heaven, He was there. If I made my bed in Sheol, He was there. When He comes in judgment, men will cry out for the rocks to hide from the Almighty, but He knows the wickedness of our hearts. Our thoughts, which Jesus taught were as wicked as deeds, were not hidden from the Creator of man.

I turned to the Bible for help with this and I learned that I was not alone in this struggle. The Apostle Paul, in fact, the first great Christian theologian, had struggled with this. In his letter to the church at Rome, he writes about it.

For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do. If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good. But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me.

That is some truly tortured prose, but clearly the apostle was tortured in his heart and mind as well. And this captured how I felt. I wanted to do good, but I could not. The evil I did not want to do was right there with me.

I kept returning to this passage. I read the words over and over: "If I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me." Hmmm. "It is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me." So, Paul wasn't committing the sin? It was sin itself? But how could that be? Sin has no will. It is just a thing. And he told the Corinthians that they were new creatures in Christ and old things had passed away. And what about John writing that we know that we love Jesus if we keep His commandments? What does that mean if we don't keep them?

"If I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me."

At some point, my head kind of exploded at this logic. "Bullshit, Paul. It's not 'sin in you.' It's you." And it was me, not "sin living in me." I wished it weren't me, but it was.

I came to the conclusion then that only a Calvinist could. I decided that the words of the Bible were indeed true, that God was loving and gracious, that all I had known and believed were still true, only I was not among the elect. I was a goat, not a sheep. I was condemned and would one day bow the knee and confess that Jesus was Lord before being cast into a lake that burns with eternal fire.

It's really difficult to explain how this feels to someone who has never believed any of it. I woke up every morning believing the God of the universe had His face and His strong arm set against me. Any foul providence that crossed me was evidence of His judgment. Any good thing that happened to me was simply common grace (the rain that falls on the just and the unjust) and not to be taken as a good sign. Any Calvinist will tell you it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of an angry God.

Yet it did not drive me to Christ. Instead, I was in a very dark place for awhile. I drank a lot. I even planned on killing myself a couple of times and suppose I might have, except that it would have hastened my eternal punishment.

Somewhere along the way, I decided that if I were reprobate, I might as well not concern myself too much with Christianity. I decided to indulge in things I would not as a Christian.

Now by that, I don't mean sin. I had indulged in sin as a Christian and continued to do so. No, I meant something much more dangerous: critical thinking.

I started looking more closely at everything I believed, both in regards to religion and everything else. I freed myself to read more about science, a subject I steered clear of for most of my life. I tried to think about more diverse viewpoints without jumping to conclusions about those who held them.

Then a funny thing happened along the way: I started not believing everything I once did. Once I started looking critically at the Bible, evaluating it the way I would another book, certain things became obvious. The first was that it didn't always agree with itself. The unity of scripture was critical. We believed that all of scripture was about the revelation of Jesus Christ as the savior of the human race. But when I read it with a more critical mind, it seemed obvious that this was not true. In fact, there was very little in the Old Testament about a messiah, and it was obvious that the messiah was to come to the nation of Israel. All the tortured readings of Jewish custom (which begin with the writers of the New Testament) seemed an incredible stretch.

There was also the fact that we really had no idea who wrote the Bible. While certain books claimed particular authorship, there was no corroborating evidence that this was valid. And some (such as the letter to the Hebrews) we simply had no idea at all. And who decided all of these books were the ones included in the first place? James and Paul seem to disagree about key matters of regarding faith, Paul almost never quotes Jesus or refers to anything he did while on earth, and even by its own testimony, the early church did not take all apostolic authority as seriously as we did.

Finally, I started thinking about the science behind what I was reading. Obviously, if you accept supernaturalism, then anything is possible. But some of it didn't make any sense. There are stars in the sky that are millions of light years away. How has their light already reached us if the universe is just a few thousand years old? And why doesn't the Bible talk about dinosaurs? I mean, some theologians say that there are a few mentions, but these things were huge and we find their bones everywhere. How is it that no one wrote, "Also, there are these ginormous lizards running all over the place!" I mean, not just in the Bible, but in any other ancient literature from the same time. Don't get me started on Noah's ark.

When I finally had worked up the nerve to question foundational assumptions, I could see the outcome ahead of time. If there is a God, then why don't we hear from him now, the way the prophets did? If what the Bible said was true, then why did he create a world that didn't seem to support that? Why did everyone assume that the version of God they worshiped in their tradition was the one, true God? How could you tell without being inside each particular tradition?

I mean, if God, who is the very ground of being for everything that has ever existed and whose name means "I am" is really there, then why is he the most difficult thing in the world to prove? Shouldn't his existence be something easily proved without having to resort to faith? I understood that faith was the "evidence of things not seen," but what sort of sense does it make to command belief and then hide from humanity for thousands of years?

Finally one day, I realized that I didn't believe in God anymore.

It was some time before I ever called myself an agnostic, and I've only recently begun referring to myself as an atheist. I still prefer telling people I am "post-Christian," meaning that I am still firmly rooted in habits of mind and the stories of the Christian Bible.

A lot of other stuff happened to me during this same time, and it would be fair to say I had what was called a "mid-life crisis." It would not be fair to then assume that my loss of faith was simply a product of that process. In fact, I think that losing my faith drove that train rather than the other way around.

I could write a lot about how my life and thinking have changed because of my loss of faith, but that's best for another time perhaps. I will say that I occasionally have a type of nostalgia for Christianity, though I do not wish to return to the life I had.

The 2nd and 3rd chapters of Genesis tell us about the fall of man. They tell us that Adam ate the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. After he does, God says, "Behold, the man has become like one of Us, to know good and evil." Right there, at the very start of the book, is a hint that "god" is not so very different from us, if we eat fully of the tree of knowledge. It is a tacit admission by the author that knowledge is the true path to transcendence and that our gods will be humbled as we grow in understanding. Jesus told his disciples that they would know the truth and it would set them free, though they could not even imagine what it was that enslaved their minds.

My path has been very different than most and I have been a late learner. I hope my own children's minds will not be enslaved to ideas that have outlived their usefulness. That is my hope for all of us.

Queers, Whores, and the Kingdom of God (Religious Thoughts, Part Two)

As I mentioned in my previous post on my post-Christian experience, a lot of the Bible is about the way that looks can deceive. "Man looks on outward appearances, but God looks on the heart," we are told.

In my mind, this seems an improvement on pagan religion, at least for myself. The Norse adore Thor for his strength and courage. The Hindu Shiva is venerated as a destroyer and the standard of invincibility. Zeus sits and casts thunderbolts from Olympus. By contrast, the Hebrew and Christian Bible is full of heroes who glory in their weakness.

My favorite story when I was a kid was of David and Goliath. I had a picture book with a 7-inch, 33-rpm record that recounted the story. It mixed the actual words of scripture with some fanciful re-telling, but it was largely faithful. David was depicted as a young boy, sent by his father, Jesse, to take food to his brothers who were camped against the Philistines. I can still hear the sound of footsteps on gravel as David walked to meet them.

All of the Hebrews were terrified of the Philistine giant and David, full of piss and vinegar, is outraged that no one has gone up against him. He goes to King Saul and tells him that he is a shepherd, that he has fought lions and bears, and that he will kill the giant. Saul puts his armor on David and gives him his sword, but they are too heavy. David takes them off and opts instead for his trusty slingshot and five smooth stones from the brook. (Can you hear that trickling water?)

Their hero story is noteworthy, because the Jews, a Bronze Age people, tell us that leather and stone went up against the finest weaponry of the day. That shouldn't be lost in the telling.

Goliath predictably mocks the young man and tells him he will feed him to the birds of the air. David's response still sends chills up my spine:

Thou comest to me with a sword, and with a spear, and with a shield: but I come to thee in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied. This day will the Lord deliver thee into mine hand.

You know what happens next, right?

David is remembered as Israel's greatest king, and this story plays a large part in that legacy.  It's a variation on the theme I mentioned in my first post on the subject, but an important one. Tradition says that David's son later wrote: "The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong . . ." In an ancient world where battles had heretofore always gone to the strong, this was news.

David's not the only one, of course. There are very few Bible heroes noteworthy for their physical strength. The notable exception is the judge, Samson, who slew a thousand men using only the jawbone of an ass. Yet even in that story, his real strength is not known until he is humbled, bound to a post with his hair shorn. Only then is he used by God. (Interestingly, God chooses to use him as a suicide killer, something we claim to abhor as a culture, though I remember hearing Samson's tale at least annually as a child.)

The interesting thing about Jesus Christ in the whole tale is not simply his humble birth, although the feeding trough and attendant barn animals add to the rustic charm of the story. But many heroes have humble origin stories and we are drawn to that. It seems to promise us that, no matter how low our beginnings, we may go on to do great things.

Those heroes are usually noted for vanquishing armies or dragons or legions of demons, perhaps rescuing damsels or returning treasure to their people. By contrast, Jesus has a fairly nondescript tale. He walks about healing the sick and preaching that the kingdom of God is at hand. It's true that some of his acts can truly be called miraculous, but they are forever in service to mercy. He makes the lame to walk, because he pities them. He feeds those who are hungry. He brings the dead back to life to be with their loved ones again. He even changes water into wine to save a friend embarrassment at his wedding.

"This is what God is like," he says. And by extension, we are much more like the gods when we are merciful.

"I and the Father are one," he tells the crowd, and they put him to death for this. The ancient world was not ready for a god of meekness and mercy. He is led to slaughter and his only words are those of forgiveness. There is no oath to seek vengeance on his enemies, no wise final pronouncement, no regretting he had but one life to give for his country.

Now, lest I be misunderstood, I want to be clear: the Bible is not all meekness and gentleness. There is bloodshed and misery and ample doses of bigotry of all sorts. But the stories that bounce around in my head and help make meaning of my own narrative are those with the unlikeliest of heroes.

It is strange that Jesus' followers in our own time glory so much in virtues he seemed to abhor. No one is as righteous in his own eyes as the modern American Christian, it would seem, and no one admires the wealthy more than they do. Jesus broke bread with poor people, adulterers, crooks, drunkards, and prostitutes. His followers won't sell pizza to a queer.

"Crooks and whores will enter the kingdom of God before the religious," Jesus preached. Is there anyone who believes that any more?

I'm not into Jesus like I once was, it is true, but I still see the truth in those stories that tell me that our strength is perfected in weakness, that the first will be last and the last will be first. You righteous people can keep your own company. I'll be pouring bloody marys for whores and drunkards.

Dear Ace

Dear Ace,

I spent a lot of time preparing for your brother's arrival just fifteen months ago. I wrote and recorded five original songs, composed a poem in honor of his birth, and began working on an extended fairy tale to explain to him his origins, which has now grown to over 50,000 words. I purchased clothes and toys, I cleaned the house and car, I bought baby seats and worked on making sure they were properly installed. I made playlists for him. I read books and listened to CDs about being a father.

And now here we are, on the eve of your birth. What, you may ask, have I done to prepare for you?

Hmmm.

Well, not to put too fine a point on it, but basically nothing.

Now I know what you're thinking: "Daddy loves Griffin more than me." That's not true. I promise you it isn't. It's just that things are different now.

How?

Well, for starters, before your brother was born, I was a recently-divorced bachelor living by myself. And let me tell you something, little man, my place was happening. I had musicians and girls crashing there, crazy parties, and the place all to myself any time I wanted. I also had a lot of free time, partly because I spent about three months unemployed during Griff's gestation. Your mom didn't live with me and I came and went as I pleased.

Now I come home to the Crackerbox Palace, and spend my nights with your mom, your two brothers, and your sister. I bought this old house right after your brother was born, and I love it here. I don't know if you'll ever have the chance to go from being a bachelor to a father of three in the space of a couple of weeks, but it's a trip. I got home from work tonight at about 5:45, then we ate dinner, I played with Jackson and Griffin while your mom took your sister out, then I cleaned the kitchen, emptied the litter box and diaper pail, took out the garbage, and helped your mom carry in groceries.

I don't mean to sound like I have a square life. I really don't. Several times a month I put on funny clothes and make-up and play songs about werewolves and zombies for people. I gig somewhat regularly with three bands. I've got a groovy little music studio set up in the basement and your mom doesn't mind if I spend a couple of hours down here every night. I'm even having a couple of short stories published in an anthology soon.

My life is pretty hip.

But it is a full life. There is never a moment that it stops. It's an interesting life, too.

Take this evening for instance. Your oldest brother began telling us about how he and a bunch of girls formed a Pickle Club at school. They learn facts about pickles every day. Yesterday, they learned about pickle juice. We dressed Griffin up in a Spider Man costume and had him dancing to the Spider Man theme from the 60s show. Your sister was going around singing, "I see butts! I see butts!"

I'm not making this shit up. It's like this every damn night. I really dig it.

Things are different in other ways, too.

Well, the past year has been kind of a roller coaster ride. Both your grandfather and your grandmother died this past year. Heavy, right? Your grandfather's death had been long coming in many ways and while it saddened us all, it came as no shock. Your grandmother's, just two months ago, hit us like a ton of bricks. The pain from it is still very real and I would be lying if I told you that I'm not glad my life is crazy busy so that I don't have time to stop and think about how much I miss her. Miss them both, really.

I really had hoped that your grandmother would make it to see you. She knew you were coming and my goodness would she have loved you. If anything could have made her live another two months it would have been seeing you, but life isn't fair and things don't work out like they do in the good stories.

Your grandfather would have loved you, too. He would have looked at you toddling around his house and said in his fake gruff voice, "Hey, Ace!" And he would've called you that, too, because he called all the boys "Ace," which is why we're calling you that.

Your other grandfather, your mom's dad, has been gone for a few years now. I never met him, but he sounds like a mighty fine fellow in my book — a musician and writer who loved New Orleans. (Yeah, I know. Your mom has lots to talk about with her therapist.)

You mom's mother is very much with us, however, and for this I am very thankful. Susie is as cool of a granny as anyone could hope for. She's an art teacher who once saw Muddy Waters in concert and made me a vampire hunting kit for Halloween. She makes costumes for all of us and has everyone over for visits where they play with chickens.

Maybe another reason that I haven't spent as much time planning for you is that we weren't expecting you so soon. I mean, you weren't an "accident" in the sense that we didn't want you. We just thought we might be seeing you six months from now instead. The Fates had other plans, however, and your mom is a buxom and healthy woman, so our evolutionary programming kicked in and I sought to further my line of DNA.

So what am I giving you, since I didn't have much time to plan?

Well, I'm giving you a name for starters. That may not seem like much. Everyone has a name, after all. But you have my name, which makes me proud. I told you about "Ace" already. As for your Christian names, those take a little explaining. "Harrison" is the name of one of your maternal ancestors. It's also the name of my current favorite Beatle and the guy who plays Han Solo (and there is a new Star Wars movie coming out this year with him in it and how unbelievably cool is that?). "Parker" is the name of one of my favorite saxophonists of all time: Bird. (Daddy has a tattoo tribute to him on his left arm.) He was as hip as they come and you could do a lot worse than to sit and listen to "Relaxin' at Camarillo" ten times in a row. You will also have the initials "H.P." to use if you should so choose, which are the same as Mr. Lovecraft, one of your dear pa's favorite horror writers.

I'm giving you a home, too. A year ago, I couldn't say that to your brother. He spent a few days in my bachelor apartment and then off with your mom and I didn't see him for days on end. Then after we bought the Crackerbox Palace, there was a period of adjustment while we all got used to how the other ones smelled and all that. I won't say we're completely through that period yet, but I will say that it feels like a family. It's not a "traditional" family, as they say, but I think we're okay with that.

(I should mention here that you are a bastard. So is your brother. I bring it up now because some square ass-hat will probably try to make a big deal out of this some time in your life, but it's not. I love your mom and we're making our life together and we love you and your siblings and that's all that matters. Besides that, bastards are really sexy. We have a whole television program called Game of Thrones that is dedicated to this premise.)

We're giving you faery godparents. Your faery godmother is a burlesque dancer who is recently divorced from her wife. Your faery godfather is an Englishman who is an illegal alien and my former bartender, a relationship that is sacred among our people. They are both smart-asses and make-believe misanthropes, but they will give you love and you should talk to them a lot when you are older. They both like books and music and dance and all the things that make this old world bearable.

I also will give the advantage of being an older father. I'm happy that I'm having you in my middle age rather than my youth. It's not that I'm less rock-and-roll or anything like that, it's just that I think I know a little more about how things work. I know enough to know that the old gods are not as powerful as I once thought they were, but still wise enough to know that fairy tales are true — if you know how to read them.

I can also tell you what it's like to be the youngest in the family and the third boy. That's the spot your old man had in his family. It's kinda charmed, to be honest. I got all the advantages of my parents' experience with none of their overbearing concern. Everyone thought I set the moon and loved on me all the time. I hope that's your experience, too.

I can give you a love for music and the arts, for books, for learning, and for this world — because it is the only world we have, in spite of what the old stories say. We may dream of Paradise or Valhalla, but we better get busy sweeping our front step. A bunch of Englishmen in feathered hats used to go around saying, "Carpe diem!" I am told, and you could do worse than to follow their advice. Gather ye rosebuds, Ace.

I hope I can give you a sense of wonder about it all.

Here's something I know now that I didn't used to: you are made from the very same stuff that was present when the cosmos began in a giant explosion. Not only that, but all the atoms in you — the carbon and oxygen and whatever — were forged in stars in far-away galaxies. The atoms in your left hand may have been forged in Andromeda while those in your right may have formed in the Cartwheel Galaxy.

Our distant ancestors were single-celled organisms and fish and rodent-like creatures. There is no living thing on this planet that is not related to you.

In the span of a single lifetime, our species went from our first flight to landing on the moon.

We now carry around in our pockets more information than all of the libraries of ancient Babylon and Greece and Persia and Egypt combined.

We have billions — maybe trillions — of micro-organisms living in and on our bodies, living creatures too small to see with the naked eye.

There are untold billions of galaxies in our cosmos, filled with untold trillions of stars, surrounded by innumerable planets that may host life that we cannot begin to imagine.

My imagination is staggered when I think about these things and when I think about the role you (and your siblings) play in all of it, our star children. Life is the most incredible drama, and we each have our hour on stage. Make the most of yours.

I hope you will understand my negligence in preparation for your arrival. Speaking of which, I need to go now. We have a big day ahead of us tomorrow.

Welcome to your world, Ace. We love you and hope you have a good time.

Demand More Science

I've been on a bit of a mini-crusade recently.

It centers on the manufactured controversy around childhood vaccination and vaccines in general.

I say "centers on" because it encompasses a lot more: climate change, evolution, GMOs, the teaching of science in schools, fracking, mining, etc.

The crusade is for science literacy.

I'm not the poster boy for this topic. Let me tell you a true story.

When I was in 10th grade, I had a great biology teacher named Karen Emery. She was a very hands-on teacher and I had a great time. The thing was, I wasn't a "science kid." I was a "music kid," which, you know, is supposed to be the opposite. Anyway, I was dicking around in class one day and got called out to answer a question regarding eurkaryotes and prokaryotes. I hadn't really been paying attention, but instead of just admitting that, I did what any 15-year-old dickhead does to save face in class. I said, "Why do I need to learn this? I will never use this information for the rest of my life."

But I took it a step further.

That night, I found two poems — Walt Whitman's "When I Heard the Learned Astronomer" and Poe's "Ode to Science" — and typed them out. Both are Romantic reactions to reason and the Enlightenment, decrying the lack of poetry in science and the loss of wonder. Then the next morning, I placed the poems on Ms. Emery's desk. She came and found them. I watched with glee while she read them. Then I saw her eyes getting wet.

She regained her composure then and tacked the poems on her bulletin board. She carried on with class and said nothing more about them.

Yeah. I know. I was a major asshole.

Fast forward about ten years.

I'm teaching music at a middle school and this student asks me if she can go to the library. She has a report she must complete for science class. I allow her to go and am shocked when she returns in five minutes.

"You're finished?" I asked.

"Yeah."

"Let me see."

I looked to see that her "report" is simply copied and pasted web pages.

"There's no way you know what any of this means! You haven't even read it! Like this word here — what does that mean?"

She read. "Eukaryotic." Then, "I dunno. What's it mean?"

Boom.

I wrote a letter of apology to Ms. Emery that night.

But I grew up thinking that science wasn't important. At least, not to me. I was artsy, you know, not concerned about all those facts and rational thinking. That stuff was for other people.

Besides, I was an evangelical Christian in an evangelical Christian community in an evangelical Christian state. We knew that scientists were liars.

I remember the "Chick tracts" we got at church. There was one about evolution that I loved. It was like a little mini-comic featuring a college student who calls out his godless college professor on evolution and convinces everyone that the Bible is right — the heavens and the earth were created in seven days.

I memorized those talking points and had them ready any time evolution was discussed.

The thing was, it wasn't really discussed all that much. I had science teachers in junior high and high school that went to my church or other churches like it, and they didn't believe in evolution either. They certainly didn't think the universe was billions of years old. Well, maybe Ms. Emery did, but she was probably bullied into going light on the topic.

The only time I ever heard these things — the age of the universe, human evolution, all of these wondrous discoveries — was from my friend Rebecca. And she was a Unitarian, so I wasn't about to trust her.

And this is the way I grew up.

As I got older, I mostly just ignored science. It wasn't my field, so I wasn't interested. And I was still an evangelical Christian, so I knew that science was wrong on many, many things. I had the Bible and the Bible was God's word — inspired, infallible, and profitable for doctrine, reproof, correction, and instruction in righteousness.

And then I lost my faith.

That's a subject for another time, but I lost it hard. All of it. It was gone, leaving a big God-shaped hole in me.

I'm not sure when, but I decided to re-visit the whole "Science Isn't Important to Me" thing. Because, you know, I had a lot of free time on Sunday mornings.

I "discovered" Neil Degrasse Tyson. And Bill Nye. And Stephen Hawking. And Lawrence Krauss. And Brian Greene. And Richard Dawkins.

You know what else I discovered? I discovered that Whitman and Poe were wrong: science is full of wonder.

Consider this: all matter that exists in our universe was once contained within a dense ball about the size of a softball.

Or this: scientists may be on the verge of discovering why anything exists at all. It takes math. Lots of it.

Or this: all the elements in your body — the oxygen, the carbon, the nitrogen — were forged in stars. AND the elements in your right hand were probably forged in a different star than the ones in your left, perhaps separated by billions of light years. We are made of star dust.

How's that for inspiring wonder?

Beyond that though, I live in a world made possible by science.

We wouldn't have DVDs and CDs if it weren't for quantum mechanics. We would have no understanding of DNA — which has led to breakthroughs in medicine, criminal science, and history — without understanding human evolution. And my children and I enjoy a life relatively free from diseases that two generations ago crippled and killed thousands of people a year in this country.

Science matters. So does science literacy.

Here in this state and others like it, we are battling against regulation of the fossil fuel industry. This is because those interests own our state government. Luckily for them, they have a ready audience of climate-change deniers in people who are like I once was: scientifically illiterate or otherwise indifferent.

Our state and federal government actively fight against student learning standards that require critical thinking, partly, I am convinced, because students who are able to evaluate claims and evidence will begin to make better-informed decisions about global warming and other hot topics. Those decisions may result in a shift of power in this country.

The current of anti-intellectualism in this country is profound and disturbing. The chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee said that global warming has to be a hoax, because the Bible promises seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, as long as the earth continues. Fox News host Bill O'Reilly has said repeatedly that no one knows what causes the tides. Georgia Republican Paul Broun, a member of the House Science Committee, said, "All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the Big Bang Theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell." California Congressman Dana Rohrabacher opined that dinosaur flatulence is what most likely contributed to past changes in global temperatures.

That's right: dinosaur farts.

The thing is, we need science desperately if we are to survive as a species. This world was not created for us and in fact, 99% of the species who have ever lived on this planet have gone extinct. We have an advantage, though. We have an advanced brain, one that has given us survival skills and tool-making abilities and the ability to reason. One that has given us science.

Those who have known me for a while know that my mantra for many years was "Demand More Art." I've not abandoned that cause, to be sure. I regularly advocate for the importance of the arts in the lives of people young and old, and I make my living in the arts. But we need to demand more science, too, and more scientific thinking among every day people.

If we do not, we may be beating the drum for a return to the dark forests of an age long past, back to the gloom of superstition and a time when we lived in ignorance and fear, praying and offering sacrifice to mute gods against the perils of the elements and disease. This is a future I do not wish for your children or mine.

Throw Out the Baby Jesus; Keep the Bath Water (Part One)

I am not a Christian.

I used to be. God-the-father-almighty-maker-of-heaven-and-earth and all the rest.

I wasn't casual about it either. I don't mean to imply that I was particularly moral or good. I wasn't. But I thought a lot about the things I believed. I read the Bible — several times. I went to church two or three times a week. I studied Christian writings, everything from the church fathers to the Puritans to contemporary authors.

I think I have a pretty decent grasp of Christian theology, too, especially the branch I most recently belonged to. (Reformed Baptist, if you are curious.) I can recite a bunch of scripture or the catechism to you, or distinguish for you the major differences between the 1644 London Baptist Confession of Faith, the Westminster Confession of Faith, and the 1689 2nd London Baptist Confession of Faith. I can even tell you why it's called the 1689 Confession when it was written in 1677.  I can talk to you about the distinguishing characteristics of the first and second "great awakenings" and why the second is not highly regarded among some.

Vanity of vanities, all is vanity and vexation of spirit. It's not much use to me now.

If people ask me "what I believe" now, my answer usually depends on who I am talking to. Sometimes I say, "I'm not a religious person." If I want to be cheeky, I tell them I believe in John Coltrane. I like the word "agnostic," I suppose, although that has to do with what you know rather than what you believe. The word atheist might fit, but it has so much baggage, I don't know if it's worth it.

Besides, it doesn't capture the way I process my life or the narrative I impose on it. 

I am a rationalist and a skeptic when it comes to the natural world. I believe that the universe is 13.8 billion years old, that the earth is 4.5 billion years old, and that we evolved from lower life forms. I believe in the scientific method, in secular government, and in a "wall of separation" between church and state.

Yet I have these words and stories bouncing around in my brain. And I don't mind them. Staves turning to snakes. Widows mites. Buried talents.

At some point I was introduced to Joseph Campbell. If you haven't been, I cannot recommend highly enough his Hero with a Thousand Faces. I don't agree with him categorically, but I do find that he understood our need for myth, much similar to (and related to) our need for art. Campbell sent me to Jung, and while I haven't figured anything out just yet, I'm more comfortable than I used to be with all that stuff I used to take literally.

It's a common thing among evangelicals of a certain stripe to say that "Christianity is not a religion, it is a relationship." I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm in need of a religion, but no thanks on the relationship. I need psalm and prayer and communion and celebration and the word (lower case "w" will do just fine). I need a pause at the end-beginning of my week to say, "Life is not merely matter, energy, and time." I need sacred moments and sacred spaces, made sacred not by the presence of the spirit of God, but the presence of my own spirit — me, fearfully and wonderfully made, the product of untold eons and made from the dust of stars. I need the mythology of the Bible without the disproven cosmology and barbaric ethics. 

I don't exactly think that there is anything special about Christian mythology, it's just that it happens to be the one I grew up with. As Campbell wrote, it is one of many examples of the monomyth found throughout mythology and art. But there are some things in the Christian story that seem unique, or at least emphasized more strongly that seem special to me.

These are the things I think about, the things that still color the way I see the world. I am deeply grateful (in whatever sense you can understand that in a non-theistic way) for that.

So, I thought I'd do a series of posts about this topic, namely, what about my religion is still meaningful and relevant to me in a post-supernaturalist context.

# # #

All of that was by way of preface, but I thought I'd go ahead and talk about the thing that still means the most to me in the Christian religion. And in a weird way, it's the thing that's central to what I do and don't believe any more.

I'll start with a story. It's one of my favorites and I've mentioned it in a prior post. Perhaps you already know it.

The king of Aram was at war with Israel. And God had given the prophet Elisha knowledge about the king's comings and going so that whenever he would encamp, Elisha would send message to the king of Israel and say, "Don't go to such-and-such a place. The king of Aram waits to attack you there."

So the king of Aram asked his courtiers, "How is it that the king of Israel always knows where I am about to attack?"

And they answered him, "The prophet Elisha knows and tells him."

So the king of Aram sent his army to Dothan, where the prophet Elisha had pitched his tent. And Elisha stayed there with only his servant.

So the servant rose up early in the morning and left the tent, and he saw hundreds and thousands of horses and chariots and soldiers of Aram. So he went to the prophet and said, "Alas! What shall we do, master?"

Elisha answered, "Do not be afraid, for we are greater than they are." Then he knelt and prayed, "Lord, open the eyes of my servant."

Then the servant looked again and saw the army of Aram, and encircled around them were the hosts of heaven riding horses and mounted on chariots of fire.

The story goes on from there. God makes the army blind and Elisha leads them to Samaria, where their sight is restored and they realize they are in an enemy city. Then the Israelites give them bread and send them back to Syria.

I love, love, love, love, love this story.

It comes to me when I am at my lowest. It renews my spirit. There is real power in this story.

If someone asked me what I take from the story, I would say it is this: things are not as they seem.

There is more than meets the eye. Like Harry Potter in a world full of muggles, we are surrounded by wonder and what passes as magic.

In many ways, it is one of the central themes of Judeo-Christian scripture. As I've written before, the Bible is filled with these unexpected twists. Boys slay giants with slingshots. A man kills a crowd with the jawbone of a donkey. And right there at the climax of the whole story, we see the most divine, powerful thing in the universe made weak. But the secret is this: we are made strong in weakness. The first will be last and the last will be first. And that man who is now naked and despised and bleeding on a cross before a pitiless crowd is winning the battle over death.

How can this possibly appeal to the rational mind?

Because it's true, in a sense.

We've learned that the smallest things in the universe — particles so small that we cannot see them — have unimaginable power, power to level cities and nations.

We look at a diamond and at plant life and imagine they are different, but they are not. Time does its thing and one transforms into the other.

All matter that ever was or will be in this universe began as a small ball — about the size of a softball, if Neil Degrasse-Tyson is to be believed — and has grown to an expanse past human calculation.

Each of us — kings and queens as well as washerwomen and chimney sweeps — are made of the same matter that makes up the furthest star.

We look up at the night sky and see ghosts — stars that have passed out of our universe ages ago, whose light is just now reaching us.

Each of us is covered by billions of micro-organisms who depend on us for survival and who, if scaled to our size, would seem like the stuff of nightmares.

And we can look at a single-cell organism and see something like our most distant ancestor.

Things are not as they seem.

It could pass for magic. But it is real.

How marvelous. What a wondrous world we live in.

A number of very virulent atheists like to refer to the Bible as a book of fairy tales. I would agree with that assessment, but I celebrate it. It is a book that has prepared me to look at the world in wonder and expect the unexpected.