Doing some reading and listening these next couple weeks around the ideas of "Faith, Doubt and Delusion".  There are so many angles and nuances wrapped up in these topics that I can't hardly keep to a blog, so I will attempt a series of blogs to help make sense with the thoughts that are banging around in my noggin'. 

How do we know what we know?  That is the work of Epistemology.  Being an educator and a teacher, I'm deeply empassioned about this topic.  Are beliefs the same as knowledge?  Can beliefs be informed by knowledge?  Or perhaps a more dangerous question, do our beliefs contribute to our knowledge?  Is knowledge only rational thinking, or are there other parts of our self that come into play? 

I will agree with every philosopher who has come before me, the answers to these questions matter.  They largely dictate and influence behavior, the things you actually do.  There is what we say we believe, then there are the things we actually believe.  Core beliefs, or perceived knowledge, inform our behavior.  Don't tell me what you believe, just let me watch you for a week and then I can tell you what you actually believe.  What we 'want' to believe but are still growing in?  That's a whole other matter; we are all moving from one place to another cognitively.  It's either deeper in the same direction, or we are diverging paths altogether.  (Those complete changes in direction can be expensive by the way, but that's another topic)

It is a search for truth, for what we can actually know that makes sense of our existence.  These are deep questions.  Our behaviors reveal what we perceive to be meaningful, typically what gets the majority of our attention.  These are the things we organize our lives around: family, sport, recreation, reading, disciplines, entertainment, adventures, escapes, medications, worship, groups, games, pseudo-communities, travel, vacations etc.  We are largely a consumer culture and we organize our lives around leisure, 'the good life' that we are striving for and feel entitled to with enough hard work. 

We want to make life meaningful and experience it as such.  We want our beliefs to match up with what we want.  But what if our 'beliefs' don't work?  (That is the pragmatic question)  What if our beliefs are not based on good evidence?  (That is the reasonability question)  What if our beliefs are in fact not objectively true?  (That is the epistemological question)  These are dangerous questions, they may upset the apple cart.  As Morpheus says in the Matrix, waking up to these realities may lead you like Alice in Wonderland  to "see how deep the rabbit hole really goes". 

The first step in response to asking some of these questions may be to venture to the other side of some fences to see what the grass feels like there and how the world looks from another's perspective.  It can be unsettling to listen to the opposite claims of your own.  That raises a deeper question in me, if listening to another's views that is opposite of my truth claims is not possible, what does that say about my claims?  It says that they are not on sure ground, that I have a hidden insecurity, that I'm not willing to be wrong.  I want to be sure about my beliefs, particularly if they are informing my behavior choices, this is how I live.  I want to know if there are blind spots that I'm not seeing, I want to use the reason I was born with and have grown in for deeper understanding.  I want things to make sense as much as anyone else, so why not at least listen and consider the voice of another?  In the world of Philosophy, that is called "confirmation bias", that we only listen to or expose ourselves to those who share our conclusions.  If you claim truth, you ought to climb other fences to guard against only confirmation bias. 

This week, that contrasting voice is Dr. Peter Boghossian, Philosophy professor at Portland State University.  Peter is a passionate voice out of the world of reasoning and free thinking.  He considers Faith to be a "Cognitive Sickness"; an utterly unreliable process to bring us to the truth.  The result of faith beliefs without reliable processes of rationality, Bhoghossian would say are results that are based in delusion, not truth.  Here is a taste of his passionate assertions:

If you want to go deeper into Peter's epistemology and general candor, I suggest searching out his lecture on "Jesus, the Easter Bunny and other Delusions" from January 27, 2012.   Peter is marvelously consistent, he is not against Christianity solely, he can't make sense of any faith claims that are not grounded in reliable processes of the rules of rationality.  He seeks to debunk Judaism, Taoism, Islam, Hinduism, New Age, relativists, postmodernists etc.  Any conclusions that are not based on the reliable processes of clear evidence is to be discounted as delusional.  He is equally hostile to all faiths and I actually find that kind of intellectual honesty to be refreshing, it is somewhat rare in my experience. 

What I appreciate about the thoughts that Dr. Boghossian puts out there:

• He is not a postmodernist, he does not believe that all truth is relative to the individual.  His assertion is consistent, truth is the result of reliable epistemic processes based on evidence.  He is a staunch claimer of absolute truth that can be known and finds fallacy that opposing truths can both be evident in reality. 
• He is a learner, he is 'open' to being wrong and challenges all his hearers to be willing to have the humility to do the same.  (Those of us in the Faith category don't have a strong history in this kind of openness)  He is genuinely interested in what he calls the Twin Goals:  "maximizing" true beliefs and "minimizing" false beliefs.  This requires an honest committment to ongoing learning
• His central thesis is clear, truth is the result of reliable processes.  If a claim is not based on actual evidence or perceived evidence, it is bad belief and unreliable; thus delusional.  Faith cannot be pointing to truth because is a claim without rational evidence.
• Just because someone feels strongly about a certain truth claim or position, doesn't make it true.  They may even have the kind of conviction that they would die for it, but that doesn't make it true.  He states that conviction is only evidence of the presence of conviction; I found that to be a reasonable argument. 
• He seeks to align his rational beliefs with reality.  He works within his local prison community trying to empower prisoners and their faulty rational choices through the training of the Socratic method of reasoning for better choices.  I truly admire someone who puts their strong beliefs or truth claims into action, we need more practitioners out there.  His beliefs inform his behavior, that is  epistemologically consistent.
• He avoids labels.  Doesnt' find it helpful to claim to be an atheist or some other pre-determined category to have to explain or argue out of with attached baggage. He simply just wants to be perceived as a rational thinker who is honest about the inquiry and processes towards truth. 

What I would push back on with Dr. Boghossian:

• The hard rationalist approach to me paints Dr. Boghossian into a corner.  It starts with the assumption that the only thing that can be trusted or reliable to lead towards truth, is the result of a rational process only with displayed evidence.  This would discount much of what is being pursued in the Social sciences, the Neurological sciences and Mathematical sciences.  There are research pursuits of learning that are aimed at the micro and macro level of the univers that in fact cause and effect relationships are being quantified but on completely different plains.  The evidence of effect is showing up far from the cause and we know little about why or how this is happening.  It's interesting, but leaves many of the facts in the world to mystery so we certainly can't make truth claims off of it except that it reveals how much we still really don't know about this world and how it works.  So if you narrow down the only things you can know and base life on to the limitations of human rationality, it appears to be a very narrow path for living.  (I suppose Peter would say that narrow path is preferable to wide road of possible delusion)
• Dr. Boghossian doesn't need me to care, but I fear this hard-rationalist project will get slaughtered as the global community seeps deeper and deeper into both cultural and epistemological postmodernism.  The hope of the Modernism project that rational thinking, reason and progress will win the day to help with the world's problems didn't work for WWI, WWII or any other atrocity we've seen over the past 100 years or more.  My hunch is that postmodernism isn't going anywhere, rather it will define our future projects.  It will be a harsh deconstruction of reason-only explanations for reality, it will be open to mystery, it will be skeptical of truth-claims and it will be unrelenting in its chaos of embracing relative truth.  I don't embrace postmodernism, I think it's only evidential end is a kind of chaos, but I do believe that hard-line rationalism will get creamed in the ongoing transition.  I can't prove that, it's just a hunch.  ;-)
• There is a growing number of people of faith who love science, love math and think it is time to be reasonable about our rhetoric with people of oppostive views.  We don't believe in a young earth, we are willing to learn and change our minds on some nuances, we are willing to admitt that there are other apects of self that influence our behavior than simply reason and aren't unglued about the fact that we may not make sense to the entire populace, particularly hard rationalists.  That doesn't mean we can't discuss, share coffee/meal over topics, listen to one another, challenge each other, tell each other they are wrong.  This is all reasonable discussion without the rhetoric that ought to be banished to the popular political culture only; it's a poison to truth-seeking.  As Peter doesn't want to be labeled, he may be surprised that there is a growing population of people of faith that don't want to be tied to labels either. This may be a futile goal, but it seems to me that it's required if we are going to have real conversation about our claims.
• Based on the conditions of delusion: 1) Certainty 2) Incorrgibility and 3) Implausibility.  This 3rd category appears to be completely subjective.  By looking at the behavior or truth claim of another, if it appears "implausible", isn't that only based on the knowledge and experience of the individual posting judgment?  This appears to be a kind of cultural or educational nepotism, if it's seemingly 'weird' or outside your experience, does that make it truly 'implausible'?  Do we expect 4.3 billion people on earth to share a common view of all experiences so that there is an agreed upon plausibility?  If we close ourselves off of possible learnings, could we be keeping ourselves from new discoveries of evidential truths based on new evidence?  I'm sure I'm being too simplistic here, he didn't have a chance to unpack this but it's one of the concepts that didn't connect with me.
• Peter admitted to not being able to fully explain the origins of the universe and it possibly being something you can't know or would never know.  I would suspect behind closed doors he would have at least a semi-formed opinion on it but it wasn't anything that could fit the narrow processes of reasoned reliability based on evidence.  One cannot re-invent the universe to measure how or why it happened.  To build our only construct of knowing anything or making truth claims based on the limited chapters of the larger story is hard for me to swallow.  It's like trying to expalin a story while completely leaving out chapters 1-3 and expecting the middle chapters to be enough to fill in the blind spots. 

Mathematically, the universe is infinite.  Humans are not, our minds, our portions of reason are severely limited.  I'm comfortable, would even say it's reasonable to look outside of only our faculties of rational thinking in search for truth.  But I would strongly consider all truth claims base on good reason and processes of reliable evidences.  Dr. Boghossian's teaching is a helpful trip across the fence for me to continue to challenge my own truth seeking. 

Disclaimer: I am not a scientist, nor a physicist, nor an ecological expert.  At best, I'm a decent teacher/thinker, but what I am most assuredly is a Dad who cares deeply about my kids and their future in this world. 

Having just read "Global Waming: A Very Short Introduction" by Mark Maslin, I'm left with so many questions, but I'm choosing to focus on just one:  What to tell my kids about Climate Change?

This is such a heated debate within the political, social and religious culture of modern America.  If you acknowledge any hint of conviction in a kind of Climate Change that is happening through the measurements of Science, you are labeled an immediate political and religious liberal.  There appears to be no category for economically conservative, evangelically traditioned and an ascent to at least a kind of Climate Change. 

Well, here it goes:  I do believe in at least a kind of Climate Change that appears, according to the science of certain measurements, to be the result of human agency.  The scientific community is in no way in agreement on every point on this matter to be sure, but there is relative aggreement that with the increase of carbon dioxide at the hands of human development is having environmental effects.  "One of the few claims of the global warming debate that seems to be universally accepted is that there is clear proof that levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide have been rising ever since the beginning of the industrial revolution." (p. 7)   Clearly our expansive development through the Industrial, Space and Information age have created a quality of living, comfort and modernization as never before seen on this blue planet, but at what cost to our environment? 

There are so many issues to muddy the water in this debate:

• Global Warming has become big business, and the point of big business is to protect and sustain big business which means profits.  This is a dangerous slippery slope to Science as it has been to Religion through the centuries.  There is no such thing as being 'unbiased', particularly when so much money and professional reputations are on the line.  The Scientific community is at odds a bit on this issue, see this article. 
• The politicization of this issue particulary in the fractured American world of politics.  To be for 'climate change' means you are a democrat, and to be against it is to be Republican.  It would be professional and political suicide to differ from the ranks on this issue.  How did we come to this point?  It seems to have peaked with Al Gore's participation with "An Inconvenient Truth" and now it is purely a political issue/stance instead of a human reflection. 
• A postmodern distrust in media, institutions and organizations of power such as the UN and others from the scientific community.  Consumers are used to the over-statements of daily marketing messages and the dire warnings of climate change seem to fall into the same white noise. 
• A fractured relationship between the Chrisitan Church and the Science community.  You can trace the origin of this fault line most likely all the way back to the Scopes Trial of 1925.  As a result, the evangelical Christian community within America has launched a culture war to "win back" America from the secular age.  The culture war created a bubble of it's own music, books, movies, t-shirts, camps, concerts, video games, breath mints, schools, nightclubs, dating services, campus groups and a myriad of other versions of Christian industry.  At the very top of the list of this crusade to take back America is a severe distrust of the Scientific community for it's lack of space for any kind of rational creationism.  Science is met with fear and reactive statements.  This fracture grieves me and perhaps one of the reasons why I have no home within the fuzzy middle of this culture war, it makes no sense to me as a person of faith. 

So, what to tell my kids about Climate Change?:

1. You live in a global community.  You are a uniquely gifted individual that lives within the context of a global community.  With that comes responsibility to use your personal freedoms with the common good in mind.  Think tribe, think community, think inter-connectivity.  Your individual actions affect the whole and vice-versa.  The American propaganda of hyper-individualism is a fool's gold, there's no life in it.  Think of others, act on behalf of others, use your gifts to serve others; you'l find youself in harmony with the intention of a life-giving Creation.
2. Re-use and recycle because it's just a good idea of being stewards of Creation.  Will it affect global change when China is expanding it's CO2 inducing industrial plants?  Probably not but it doesn't make it a bad idea.  Act in your freedom to do what is doable.  Healthy living and thinking has its own rewards.
3. Refuse more.  Learn to live on less.  Contentment is found in simplicity.  Don't buy into the myth of "away".  When we throw "away", it doesn't go to a magical land of nothingness.  It goes to a place on earth built for waste and it overwhelms our environment.  Be conscious of our contribution of waste in our communities.  Meaning is created, it isn't purchased. 
4. Embrace Science, it is a physical revelation of what we can know about the design of our Creator.  It is a lifelong wonder.  Read Science with awe as you do the Scriptures, they are describing the same God and His intent for humanity.  Learn to read and discuss important issues with people you disagree with.  Listen, think critically and then offer your measured response.  Learning sometimes happens in unexpected places. 
5. Humanism leads to fear, the wonders of our world are astronomically far beyond us.  Most of what can be known, we yet don't know.  Fear is not our story, our God is not nervous.  We act responsibly, we use our freedom to serve, we participate in a Kingdom that has come on earth as it is in heaven.  But it is not about us, salvation is beyond us.  Have a proper view of self in the scope of God's Creation and history.
6. Love this world, it's a part of our expected hope.  Resist the dualism of this world being "bad" and the far off place called 'heaven" being the good.  We believe in the restoration of all things, a coming of a new heaven and a new earth.  We will not be raptured away to a different land in the by and by, rather there will be an unveiling of the New Creation that will restore and resurrect the one we have.  The Scriptures are not linear, they are circular.  Revelation points back to Creation, our hope is that God is restoring the intentions of Creation itself.  As Howard Snyder put it recently, "Salvation Means Creation Healed".  Start with the end in mind, our hope in Christ is the salvation of all of Creation.  We are not in a culture war, we exist to love our neighbors. 

Tricky and complicated issues to be sure, but they deserve to be wrestled with and sifted through.  With complete disregard, it may be the end of the world as we know it, for good or bad. 

Mohamed and his family in Hebron, West Bank (1/12/99)

In January, 1999, I had the oppportunity to travel to Israel and Palestine to study the modern day political and religious conflict of this part of the Middle eastern region.  It was an incredible time of learning and being personally conflicted in how to get my mind around such complexity when it comes to the issues at hand.  They say that if you spend a week in the Middle East that you can write a book.  If you spend a month, you can write an article.  If you stay a year, you are rendered speechless due to the overwhelming complexities of a land steeped in religioius, geographical and political conflict.  On my return, I wrote an academic essay on the problematic nature of "dehumanization".  When we dehumanize the other, we can then justify any act done upon them for they are less than human. 

I was so thankful to have the honor of being hosted by a Muslim family in Hebron of the West Bank in Palestine and observe the fast of Rammadan with them.  Being a Christian, I found it a great cultural exchange to learn of the faith and life of another, a world so foreign to mine.  We stayed up until the late hours discussing history, faith, politics and the future.  They treated me with a great sense of warmth and care.  I had been very ill for several days prior to my stay with them and they made sure my time with them was comfortable and provided for.  They had very little materially, but what they had they shared.  They even went to lengths to provide Coca Cola to me and my friends from the West, knowing it would be a taste of home.  I am obliged to have been able to put a face and family to the political issues when I hear about the Muslim world on television and listen to the rhetoric.  They are not to be dehumanized as a foreign people, they were hospitable friends to me.  His name was Mohamed and the picture above is his family.  He has a face. 

We often outlet our dehumanizing in the language we choose to describe the other.  There is the derogatory use of the anti-semitic term "Jew", as well as the reference of all people of Arab descent as "terrorists".  Those are most common, but the lectionary of terms is certainly varied and lengthy.  We spent time in Jewish settlements listening to diplomats explain their case for the land and how they aim to make compromise with the native inhabitants.  As well we spent time in the mosques of the Palestinian refugee camps hearing quite a different side of the story.  At the conclusion of the trip, my head was spinning from all the nuanced viewpoints we heard.  It was rich in learning, but dizzying in drawing any conclusions.   My only conclusion is that when the relationships erode to the point of dehmanization, the conflict has no face and the potential for systemic evil is fertile.

In my doctorate cohort this week, we read several academic articles on the "Muslim World".  It confirmed much of what I already figured, that even after my trip and subsequent reading, there is still so little that I know and understand about Islam.  Much of it is embedded in a land, history and culture far from mine, but no doubt is a part of my global community.  To be in a doctorate program that claims to be titled: "Leadership and Global Perspectives", we scarce could claim that without at least a cursory view of the Muslim world.   It was particularly shameful to read of the western contributions to nation building that has led to so much political, ethnic and geographic strife in regions such as Kuwait, Yemen, Iran, Iraq, Israel and Palestine. 

The articles pointed out some of the internal strife amongst fellow Muslims in terms of fundamentalists, moderates and militants.  Argments can be made that the interpretation of Islam into Jihad conclusions is not new and actually is the result of poor scholarship by the extremists.  However it is obvious that the violence in the region and threatened around the world by these extremists is far more than their literary interpretation of fundamental jihad, it is deeply a struggle for power, voice and political strategy.  Amidst this storm, many Muslim scholars want to validate their conviction that Islam is a religion of love and peace, not strife and violence.  It is vitally important as world citizens of a global community that we read and listen to our Muslim neighbors to hear their perspective before we can begin to understand and interpret the events of our day and age.

These are tense issues, the realities of global terrorism often claimed by Islamic extremists is not uncommon.  However, it is civically naive to not be aware that US involvement in the Middle east is much of what has precipitated attacks on American soil.  See this debate below between Ron Paul and Rudy Guiliani in 2008.  Ron Paul is well schooled in the US involvement in the Middle east but Rudy G. suggests his opinions are proposterous.

The reality is that what Ron Paul was referencing was the substantial 9/11 Commission Report that apparently the mayor of New York City never read, though he was running on that as his strength for his political platform.  The crowd's negative response to Ron Paul is indicative of the loyalties to a civic religion and blind patriotism.  We (collectively as a US culture) are incredibly unaware of unintended consequences of the resources needed to support our consumer lifestyles and national security.  In order to keep that narrative moving forward, the typical media line has been to dehumanize the Muslim world.  It is shameful how Islam as a world faith and the nationalities represented are portrayed with broad generalizations of dehumanizing language by the media outlets of the West that justify their existence by cultivating a culture of fear and suspicion.  For this very reason, I stopped watching the network news channels sometime around the return from my trip to Palestine in 1999. 

When I think of the Muslim world, I choose to think of it within the scope of the generous Islamic hospitality I received in Hebron.  It is a world with a face and a name, not a label to be feared.  They are a diverse people to be understood and a large part of our global community to learn.  I pray America wakes up to the opportunity for real change through hopeful dialogue and not fearful rhetoric. 

"Pain removes the veil; it plants the flag of truth within the fortress of a rebel soul." - C.S. Lewis in the Problem of Pain

Here's a dirty little secret:  we leaders need to be needed.  Within the context of spiritual leadership, this is particularly grueling as we have expectations that the lives, minds, hearts and words of these kinds of leaders are sacred just like the deity they represent.  Many leaders are infected with the false idea that we can 'fix' ourselves if we just get involved in the work of 'fixing' everyone else.  Sometimes, spiritual leadership at it's root, is a masked attempt to live out an addiction to a need to be needed.  You have a broken leader who is sent to lead a broken people with broken motives and broken expectations.  This is a recipe for disaster.  In the words of Charlie Brown: Good Grief!

This is not how we start out however.  At the beginnig there is the desire for glory, the lofty ideals of changing the world and standing up in a world gone awry.  We answer the call, we throw our stick in the fire at summer camp, we walk the aisle after an emotional plea from the stage.  At some point our heart-strings are tugged and we see the light.  It's difficult to exactly locate the timing, I think it is between the 3rd verse, the key change and the bridge, right before the crescendo of the 4th verse.  This is at least somewhat what it felt like for me, but when the song and service were completed, I was alone with my new lifeling commitment.  I missed the part where someone told me that answering this call to this kind of lifelong leadership would lead me down a horroring path of loneliness, alienation, ridicule, dissertion, hardship, loss, suffering and soul pain.  As a leader, there are many days and nights of mourning.  Grief is a killer. 

Leadership of most any kind can lead you to a place of utter isolation.  This is where Shelley Trebesch's book "Isolation: A place of transformation in the life of a leader" comes in.  Shelley describes these places of isolation in terms of desert or wilderness experiences.  They are unwanted, unplanned and avoided if at all possible.  Her thesis is that we don't try just to survive, endure or get past these times, but to begin to see them as the very transformational experiences that may be preparing us for another journey.  Within the crucible of pain, grief and isolation, we can learn and grow in powerful and transformational ways that only suffering can do.  We shouldn't try and 'avoid' these times, but we should embrace them as a kind of 'good grief'.  The crucible of pain reveals the shallowness of our previously held goals and expectations and God desires to deepen our life into more of what the truth really is about ourselves and our world.  In this way, the truth very much does hurt.  However, it is also only the truth that sets us free. 

Trebesch is speaking directly to the broken leader I found myself to be in my first semester at seminary as an outwardly successful rising star in evangelicalism, but internally a disallusioned, exhausted and lost wreck of a human being.  I'll never forget the chapel speaker Viv Grigg, a New Zealander, who was begging us American hotshots to come and walk amongst the poor with him in Calcutta.  I thought his plea was quite odd, but then he said it.  He said he had only one question for us aspiring young leaders in America, "Who told you to be successful?"  And then he sat down.  In one interogatory sentence, he undressed my entire worldview, personhood and personal identity.  I couldn't move, I found myself at 26 outwardly successful, but inwardly undone.  This ushered in a 5-10 year isolated desert experience of learning for me.  I had to go completely back to the drawing board and ask the fundamental questions of who I was, why I was here and what did I want to do. Some days were excruciating and painful, other days were more of a kind of "good grief", much like a sabbatical.  The wilderness was a complete transformation.

Trebesch describes this kind of isolation experience well this way:

"Instead of finding identity in the ministry or in what one does, transformed leaders find identity by looking at the Artist, by looking toward the Author.  Having experienced the stripping and wrestling that reveals who God has created them to be, broken leaders can now embrace their true identity wholeheartedly and enter ministry knowing their giftedness as well as ther weakness.  Thus, when the pressure comes to perform or be someone they are not, leaders can return to the roots of who God has created them to be." (50-51)

We need not seek to avoid these times, we can embrace them.  We don't like grief, it's painful, but in the hands of the One who made us, there is such a thing as 'good grief'.   We can find Hope even in the most grievous of times and circumstances.  In utter darkness, light can yet shine through.  I love these words from Henri Nouwen: 

"Hope is not dependent on peace in the land, justice in the world, and success in the business.  Hope is willing to leave unanswered questions unanswered and unknown futures unknown.  Hope makes you see God's guiding hand not only in the gentle and pleasant moments but also in the shadows of disappointment and darkness." (60)  Turn My Mourning To Dancing

Good grief is when a leader can embrace a time of mourning with the hope that transformation is good for their very soul and the souls of the ones they serve.  I'm still learning.   

The video that started it all (as of the writing of this post) has been viewed over 76 million times since being posted one week ago.  Friends, that is our new reality.  Images, awareness, causes, news, messages, agendas, movements etc. can be virally spread through communication devices without need for subscriptions or searching libray stacks.  It is all readily available at our fingertips or in our cargo shorts pockets. 

I do not want to focus on the validity of the idea of the "Stop Kony 2012" campaign, it's value or the counter-arguments.  I simply am interested in the meaning and form of the new media that made it all possible to have this 'open' and global conversation.  The day the video started exploding, without precedent, it was an immediate 'open source' conversation. 

A great example of this can be found in the Guardian. 

A live blog was set-up this past Thursday in the Guardian (as just one example) and throughout the day, informed and educated people on all sides of the perspective argument chimed in with stories, information, additional videos and opinions.  It was a live, real-time critical inquiry into the heavy themes and subject matter of human atrocities.  Personally, I was somewhat informed on the issue of capturing children in East/Central Africa to be put into the rebel military against their will from watching the original "Invisible Children" film back in 2003.  However, I spent most of the days last week becoming a learner of dozens of other perspectives on the issues and how they should be resolved in action.  New Media made it possible for me to immediately get the perspective of mulitple Ugandans and other aid workers in the region.  Education and awareness was happening at a feverish pitch.  For those of us with a bend towards ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder), it was like school the way it was meant to be. 

No matter how professional, artistic, powerful, polished, inspiring, emotional, informative your video post may be, it will no longer ever be a one-sided conversation.  New media has ushered in a culture and time of real dialogue, open source conversations and a dizzying volume of perspectives.  The 'Kony 2012' campaign could not stop with the viral video, daily it has had to update it's website with public statements and defense of its strategy.  The day of the monologue is over, new media has ushered in dialogue with all it's unfettered rhetoric. 

Recently, our cohort read "New Media: 1740-1915"  which was edited by Lisa Gitelman and Geoffrey B. Pingree by MIT press.  This was a fascinating read within the historical context of former 'new media' technologies like zograscopes, telegraphs, stereoscopes, telephones, phonographs and the emergence of cinema.  Each of these examples of new media did not have immediate definition or meaning of their significance, they were defined over transitionary times to serve the purposes of the cultural contexts placed upon them.  Meaning is found within its place of culture and time, it may often not be in the intention of its invention.  New Media finds power and form in these cultural meanings, defined by its use not it's inventors intentions. 

New Media is on full display in meta-phenomenas like the 'Kony 2012' campaign and it's subsequent backlash.   It was another coming of age moment for 'social media' and the expansive power of it's networkng roots.  Politics, social movements and civic duties are no longer monologues happening behind closed doors and then spin-doctored to the consuming masses.  The people have power to be educated and informed, new media is making it all possible.  As an educator by trade, briniging this kind of definition to these new technologies is something I get very excited about.  What about you?

Aesop, the Greek fable writer, famously reminds us that "slow and steady wins the race":

And smiling at the thought of the look on the tortoise’s face when it saw the hare speed by, he fell fast asleep and was soon snoring happily. The sun started to sink, below the horizon, and the tortoise, who had been plodding towards the winning post since morning, was scarcely a yard from the finish. At that very point, the hare woke with a jolt. He could see the tortoise a speck in the distance and away he dashed. He leapt and bounded at a great rate, his tongue lolling, and gasping for breath. Just a little more and he’d be first at the finish. But the hare’s last leap was just too late, for the tortoise had beaten him to the winning post. Poor hare! Tired and in disgrace, he slumped down beside the tortoise who was silently smiling at him.

“Slowly does it every time!” he said.

Our western culture is built on a pace for manic speed with an insatiable appetite for increased production.  'More' and 'faster' are buzzwords tethered like a millstone around the neck of the American worker.  Presently within the fearful context of an eroding global economy and threat of unemployment, the typical worker feels the pressure to immerse themselves in greater output vocationally to prove their indispensability.  We are a people driven towards innovation and efficiency and our best idea is faster, stronger and more.  When someone can output this kind of idealized effort, we say they are a 'machine'. 

I thought we created 'machines' so that we didn't have to work so hard all the time and everywhere.  The post World War II consumer marketing movement promised us the 'good life' of luxury, leisure and free time for our pleasure pursuits.  In the words of Dr. Phil:  "how's that workin' for ya?"  With more time, more convenience and more space for constant communication and data-sharing, we created a monster, not a machine. We falsely believe that we control the monster, but increasingly it is the monster of muchness and manyness that in fact controls us?   When does the carousel stop so we can get off?  Perhaps a bigger question is, would we get off if we believed we had the choice to do so?

What if what we want is not a machine, nor a monster, but rather simply just to be human again?  This is the milieu where Daniel Patrick Forrester enters with his book, "Consider: Harnessing the Power of Reflective Thinking In Your Organization".  This book was very timely for me to read at the onset of the season of Lent that I try to pay attention to each year to peal off the scales of inhumaness still stuck on me.  Forrester lays out a sound argument that for organizations and individuals, if you don't take the time to reflect, think and wonder; then you are a train wreck waiting to happen. 

We type A's, like the hare, believe that speed and busyness will always win.  This may finally be an idol that needs to die if we want to see a revolution of being human again.  One of the sacred cows that Forrester filets is the misnomer of the idea of 'multi-tasking'.  MRI's of the human brain through studies confirm for us "that our minds function best when pursuing only a single task". (15) The fallacy of trying to accomplish multiple crucial tasks at the same time is a recipe for doing none of them effectively nor thoughtfully.  If your endgame is merely pragmatic, then just get it done.  If your endgame is perpetual beauty/creativty/ingenuity/sustainable design/unique perspective or a thorough and nuanced plan; then turn your phone off and take time to think and reflect. 

Reflection and time for thought is a choice, you are not a victim.  Let me re-state that, I am not a victim.  I really do struggle with this idea of shutting down, unplugging and seeking my reflective cell.  A large part of me craves it more than the Americano in my right hand, but I falsely and consistently don't build in time for it until the urgency of matters are met.  I just hope that life will magically slow down, that my iCalendar will automatically block out my free times and that I will have nothing left to do but to pursue a genunine state of wonder.  The problem is that I'm not 20 anymore, life is far more complicated and in fact more crucial.  My mistakes cost more, they affect more people than just myself, others are relying on me, I walk with the burden of leadership upon me (and gladly), so how can I not take the time to think and gain perspective? Forrester says:

Reflection is the deliberate act of stepping back from daily habits and routines (without looming and immediate deadline pressures), either alone or within small and sequestered groups.  It's where meaning is derived through reconsideration of fundamental assumptions, the efficacy of past decisions and the consequences including the downside of future actions.  It's where space is given for the "totally unexpected" to emerge. (18)

This kind of planning happens on purpose and with real intentionality.  The culture of present reality will not feed you the time of solitude and reflection you need.  We have the choice to tell our calendar what to do, we have the power over the off button on our phone.  We can give the 'other' in front of us our full attention and not continue the fallacy of multi-tasking, this may be a gift to your family.  Meaning is found in slowing down and emptying ourselves into a state of self-reflection.  This may in fact be a gift to yourself.  If you want to smell the roses, you need to plan some time to walk in the garden, they aren't coming to you.  

Forrester illustrates his point of the oppressive master of communication technology through the words of John Freeman in "The Tyranny of Email":

We need context in order to live, and if the environment of electronic communications has stopped providing it, we shouldn't search online for a solution but turn back to the real world and slow down.  To do this, we need to uncoouple our idea of progress from speed, separate the idea of speed from efficiency, pause and step back enough to realize that efficiency may be good for business and governments but does not always lead to mindfulness and sustainable, rewarding relationships. (101)

The problem with slowing down, with pulling back, with minimalizing, with taking time away is that it challenges our self-confidence and leadership identity.  Are we secure enough to believe that for an extended block of time, our organizations don't need us?  Are we okay with the idea that we aren't neccessary?  We complain about always having to be 'on call', but deep down leaders can be infected with the sickness of the "need to be needed."  Can we cut the apron-strings of co-dependency and seek new freedoms of thoughtfulness and true perspective?  Do we have the confidence to rest and it doesn't shame us into meaningless toils under the sun?  The leader who can slow down is the leader that has the capacity to lead in any culture, in any economy and in any crises.  They lead out of a steady center, one that has been fought for on purpose, not by accident.  Rest is a kind of humiliation, it requires actual confidence to thoroughly enjoy and benefit from it. 

In Forrester's final chapter he leaves the reader with some prophetic warnings for America:  "The only way that reflection winds up happening in the United States is for it to be forced.  A catastrophic event must happen in order to create reflection." (Kyle Bass, 204)  The old mantra is that people don't change unless they have to, that it is neccesity that is the birth of invention.  I scarcely cannot disagree with Forrester on this point, I don't see a tipping point on the horizon for our culture to slow down and consider being human again.  However, the signs are layered everywhere that what we are presently pacing is not only not working, it isn't sustainable.  Will we fight for our future with a thorough reflection, or will we enter into reactivity and lament revealing all the cracks in the foundation just below the surface? 

Forrester concludes his thoughts with this gem, "Time for reflection is an open invitation to discover what awaits us. . . " (217)  That kind of leadership requires a steady confidence and a centered being that yet believes in hope.  That does not come from the race of the hare, it comes from the tortoise who reminds us that "slowly does it every time!". 

 

Last night I had a vivid dream that I entered death through a dark car accident, the space between this world and the next began to morph.  I abruptly awoke, but it has me pondering today. 

Like a woman searching and finding love
Like an ocean buried and bursting forth

Where it comes, flowers grow
Lions sleep, gravestones roll
Where death dies, all things come alive
Where it comes, water’s clean
Children fed, all believe
When death dies, all things live
All things live -Gungor "When Death Dies"

So here we are in the Lenten season, we creep along the 40 days leading to death, we stroll the 40 days leading to life.  I know of no greater season for the contrast of death and life than that of Lent.  It is the narrative of Christianity that life comes after death, they are inexplicably bound.  It is the announcenment of life at the end of Lent that changes the rules, quite certainly changes everything. 

When death dies, how should we live?

We all get to choose somewhat how we live, at least the attitude we can give to this life of ours.  We can follow the blindness of consumer culture, believing that meaning can be bought or acquired, of course it's folly and expensive.  We can follow the idols of self-reliance and radical achievements, only to find in the end they were a kind of fool's gold.  All the shine to others, but lack the intrinsic value we hoped for.  We can pursue the circus of self-pleasure, seekng the excitement of life under the big-top, denying our eyes and bodies nothing we desire.  The circus turns to be the freak show that the colorful poster promised, a short night of chaos. 

When death dies, how should we live?  In the end, will we have lived any differently?

I'm pondering the end of the story of David Brook's "The Social Animal:  The Hidden Sources of Love, Character and Achievement".  In the last chapters of their life, Erica and Harold find meaning in not running the rat race, but finding a different story altogether.

"They had also achieved what is called success, but theirs was a different kind of success.  Without really thinking about it, they had created a counter-culture.  They didn't consciously reject the lifestyle of the affluent mainstream; they just sort of ignored it.  They lived and thought differently, and their lives had taken on a different and deeper shape.  They had a greater awareness of the wellsprings of the human heart, and when you met them you were impressed by their substance and depth." (p. 363)

How many people do you know that are the kind of social animals that can be described this way?  How rare is it to watch a person live within a kind of security of being, comfortable in their identity and have the swagger to walk in their own skin?  I can say at least within the rat-race of American culture, it's as scarce as hen's teeth. 

It is Nietzsche that said, "He who has a why to live for can bear with almost any how."   Brooks then goes on to give this gem from Viktor Frankl in Man's Search for Meaning to describe that meaning in life is only discernble within the specific conext of one's specific life.  In the war concentration camps:

"We had to learn ourselves and, furthermore, we had to teach the despairing men, that it did not really matter what we expected from life, but rather what life expected from us.  We needed to stop asking the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those where were being questioned by life - daily and hourly.  Our answer must consist, not in talk and meditation, but in right action and right contact." (p. 369)

How do we measure success in this so called life?  It has got to be more than collecting a paycheck long enough so you can collect shells on the beach in the end.  Excuse my language, but it better be a hell of lot more. 

Brooks describes Harold's passage from this world to the next with a kind of poetic brilliance that remarkably resembles the experience of my own dream.  It is such a mystery isn't it, the locative space between this world and the next?  If you have never sat at the bedside of someone in hospice care and watched this transition happen, you absolutely should.  It is soul-shuttering and beautiful.  Brooks pens the transition this way:

"Harold entered the hidden kingdom entirely and then lost consciousness forever.  In his last moments there were neither boundaries nor features.  He was unable to wield the power of self-consciousness but also freed from its shackles.  He had been blessed with consciousness so that he might helpf direct his own life and nurture his inner life, but the cost of that consciousness was an awareness that he would die.  Now he lost that awareness.  He was past noticing anything now, and had entered the realm of the unutterable. . . . Harold had achieved an important thing in his life.  He had constructed a viewpoint.  Other people see life primarily as a chess match played by reasoning machines.  Harold saw life as a neverending interpenetration of souls." (p. 376)

 When death dies, how should we live? 

I want to see what Harold saw.  I want to not just search for mening, but bathe in it's waters.  I want to throw off the scales of this faulty flesh and see with the soul of my inner life.  I want to know, experience and lavish in the love that created us all.  There is more, when death dies, there is so much more.

For these 40 days of Lent, this is my haunting question.  When death dies, how should we live?

peace.

"We're on a Mission from God"  (Jake and Elwood, the notorious Blues Brothers)

As the story goes, Jake (recently released from prison) and his brother, Elwood need to raise a lot of money in a short amount of time to save the Catholic school they grew up in.  They are in dire need and are looking for some hope.  It is out of a charismatic religious experience where they 'see the light' and find their mission from God.  For them, the revealed truth is to get the band back together. 

What about you?  What's it going to take for you to believe?  What does it take to move from the epistemological position of not-believing to the assuredness of belief?  What exactly is the discernable space and varied location between belief and not-belief? 

These seem to be just a few of the questions that Charles Taylor sets out to explain in his masterful and astonishingly complete volume of work in "A Secular Age".  I am not sure I have ever picked up a book with such a vast proposal as this one has, to explain the true macro shifts in ideas, beliefs and thinking within the secular and religious milieu.  In this way, as challenging as it is, Taylor's work deserves not only to be read, but increasingly re-read. 

Being a lover of history and its connection to our present day context, I found his treatment of the Protestant Reformation as a major influence in the evolution of belief and knowledge that eventually led to the age of secularism we have today to be profoundly interesting.  Notably the inherent privatization of faith within the new Protestantism as it dramatically changed the 'center of gravity of religious life', no longer needing the church magic from the hierarchy, the sacred now became a matter of more inward and personal faith.  It is at least in this way that the Reformation layed the very groundwork neccessary for the present Secular age.  Taylor calls this shift the "Great Disembedding", away from the transcendent commonwealth and to the immanence of the individual.  The pre-modern world previous to 1500 A.D. lived within the construct of the 'porous' self where there wasn't a clear boundary between the spiritual and physical worlds.  With a clear disenchantment of this pre-modern world, the modern secular age was birthed within the 'buffered' self, a distinct disengagement from everything outside of the physical world. 

However, one of the main theses of Taylor's work that captured my attention was his assertion that there is not an entirely opposite location between belief and not-belief, the religious and the secular.  He refers to the sides as 'brothers under the skin'. 

But it's not an accident that "Christians" fall into similar deviations to those of "secular humanists".  As I have tried to show throughout this book, we both emerge from the same long process of Reform in Latin Christendom.  We are brothers udner the skin. (p. 675)

These brothers form a kind of step-family that Taylor calls "Secularity 3"; a middle way where belief and unbelief co-exist somewhat uneasily.  Whether from a place of belief or unbelief, Taylor asserts that humans are self-interpreting animals looking for meaning through the interpretation of their world.  These interpretations are where we get our sense of self and we often find it in one another.  The ultimate experience of our interpretations is what Taylor calls 'fullness'.  Fullness is where our answers are found and truth is self-evident and experienced.  Whether it be belief or unbelief, both brothers are seeking fullness through the interpretation of their world.  In this way, belief and unbelief are not competing theories, but are rather different means of understanding and searching for meaning (eventually leading to fullness).  Belief seeks its ultimate interpretation in the Transcendent (the realm beyond human life) and unbelief seeks its interpretive meaning in the immanent (within human life). 

So do either of the brothers ultimately lead to the 'fullness' that they set out to achieve?  Do they see the light?  Does their mission from God or not God get revealed?  Is one brother clearly preferred over the other?  Taylor finds several dilemmas in asserting any sense of clear distinction here in his conclusions.  He establishes that either brother requires at least an 'anticipatory confidence' (leap of faith) regardless of how one proclaims truth within the Transcendent and the other from it's Immanent world.  He states:

We see from all this how life in a secular age (i.e. Secularity 3) is uneasy and cross-pressured, and doesn't lend itself easily to a comfortable resting place.  This is what we see in the polemic, but it emerges also if we look at a range of concerns that are endemic to this age, those which touch on the issue of meaning in life. (p. 676)

'Uneasy and cross-pressured', does this at times describe your belief or not-belief?  It does mine and that's coming from a guy who believes he's on a mission from God.  ;-)

 

 

What is certain is that 'emerging church' is not any one thing.  There are many streams, rivers and camps within it, but there are at least some amorphous groupings rooted in similar questions that can be categorized.  The new category is a 10 year old or so movement, particularly within western culture, called 'emerging church'.  Unlike the past denominational affiliations of modernism where the constructs were built much like battleships: strong, sturdy, well-defined and organized for clear purpose.  These emerging communal relationships are meta, not mega.  It is less like a strong, industrial machine, and more like a loose conection of smal vessels that are tied together for a broader view of the murky waters called the 'unknown misisonal future'.  It is admittedly, due to it's lack of clear definitions and structure, a real anomaly.  Very hard to categorize and define using modernism's metrics, it is far better suited for the postmodern waters.  Argue what you will, but it's presence and impact is real.  There really is not much denying that at this point.  However, it's purpose, sustainability, survivability and effectiveness are questions yet unanswered. 

I am a mutt.  I hardly belong to any categories.  I think I'd like to, but it just hasn't been a part of my story.  If there was a category for thoughtful/compassionate/activist/charismatic/evangelical/monastic/historic/orthodox/communal/missional church, I think I'd like to belong.  In the late 1990's, this was the pulling on my heart, this was how I wanted to missionally engage my world but I didn't know where to belong or who to ask.  So, my wife and I discerned a calling, set sail and planted Ordinary Community Church in May, 2001.  OCC is a loose network of house churches in the Cincinnati area, determined to explore our faith together over our lifetimes and ask God for his Kingdom to come.  We embrace the call to create community and the challenge to give it away.  We desire to be about the living out of an old faith in a new world.  We didn't know it at the time, there was no term for it, but we weren't alone.  Unbeknownst to us, we were a part of a larger movement eventually termed 'emerging church'.  So now, some 10 or more years later, do we still want to be affiliated with this loose collection of thinkers/leaders/doers/trouble makers? 

I have spent much of 2011 being an ardent critic of EC, and I don't think I would back down or recant anything I've said.  However, I think I still want in.  (if they'd have me)  There is probably enough room amongst the collection of boats for an evangelical who isn't afraid to think or ask questions, and give grace for conversation.  If there is a real advantage to postmodernism within the church walls, it's the ability to live in tension amongst seemingly opposing viewpoints.  Anyone who is asking big questions and desiring to live a big life of mission to their world, I think I want to continue to be affiliated, if that in fact is what the desired outcome is.  Every family has tension, the best stuff is the stuff that happens on the other side of tension.  That's the place where I'd like to go, I'll link arms with any who want to go there too.

Where this comes from for me is in reading Mark A. Noll's book, "Jesus Christ and the Life of the Mind" this past week in our doctorate cohort.  This is his sequel to "The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind".  I don't disagree with any of his premises and critiques of the Evangelical church, we simply have tended towards the immediate results within cultural relevance and given up the places of intellectualism that actually have the largest impact on culture, thought, trends and practices. 

"As a force in Christian history, evangelicalism has been a movement whose great strengths also define significant weaknesses.  Compassionate concern for the immediate needs of individuals and their families, addressed right now, has been the defining trademark. . . .Yet these commendable traits pose problems for intellectual life, since serious thinking takes a lot of time, must honor the contributions of past generations, and often relies on the special insights of intellectual elites.  (152)

The perception within evangelicalism appears to be (and Noll alludes to it) that with too much time spent pursuing intellectual capacity it will most certainly lead to a kind of left-leaning liberalism as opposed to a conclusion to a truer understanding of revealed truth.  This kind of embedded fear is folly for a church with so many challenges at its front door.  This is not a time to hunker down and wait for Jesus to come back, this is a time to awaken the roots that are underneath our feet and conspire a way forward.  Can we ever dare to have good teaching without good scholarship? (Noll, 155) 

This is partially what I like about the EC.  I believe and have personally experienced that it cares about theological conversation, cares about the deep questions of our day, invests itself in reading/writing and conflicted dialogues.  They appear to be on a quest for enlightenment and discerning a sense of holism with the Creation.  They intend to be active with their learnings, putting feet to their lofty ideals.  We need more feet, we need more Kingdom activism, but it starts with good thinking, the kind that is reflective of the mind of Creation and all things intelligibly known.  I believe in the beauty of intellectual pursuits because I think it can lead to the kind of redemptive activity that celebrates all that is good in our world and worth fighting for. 

"Active Christian life of the sort that defines evangelicalism is a prerequisite for responsible Christian learning.  But unless that activity is given shape, it will not be particularly effective. . . To embrace the energy of American evangelicalism, but also to move beyond the eccentricities of American evangelicalism into the spacious domains of self-critical, patient, rooted, and productive Chrstian reflection, remains the great challenge for evangelicals eager to serve Christ with the mind."  (166)

I want to move forward, I'm not done yet.  My spiritual fathers are buried within a history and tradition of orthodox Chrisitanity, not within the marketing materials of corporate America.  I am looking for a tribe of people/leaders/thinkers/doers who want to be about the same stuff, even if we don't altogether agree on some of the specifics.  Humility goes a long way towards overcoming differences, because apparently I don't have the market cornered on truth.  Learning starts with listening to one another.  I don't know of another tribe other than friends within the EC that could go to those intellectual pursuits.  I'd love to be proved wrong, but I haven't run into it yet. 

The future is not to be feared, the future is opportunity for expansive hope.   Whatever will emerge will require minds and hearts dedicated to the pursuits that are reflective of the Creator of it all.  I'm all in. 

This week our cohort is reading through and reflecting on Mark A. Noll's "The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind."   His thesis is pretty simple, yet provocative for the Evangelical.  "American evangelicals are not exemplary for their thinking, and they have not been so for generations." (3)  His critique is not one from an outsider casting stones from afar, rather he describes himself as a 'wounded lover'.  He is an evangelical protestant who simply wishes this was not the case, but the scandulous reality remains.  The American evangelical church is busy with action, but dangerously 'anti-intellectual' (26) in terms of grounded thought.  Noll points out that:  "For a Christian, the most important consideration is not pragmatic results, or even the weight of history, but the truth." (50) 

So what's the scandal?  Is it just a matter of focus?  Evangelicals are the 'doers' of the Church family, pragmatically focused on missional efforts and engaging the popular culture.  What's the problem?  Noll proclaims that this isn't 'Christian' thinking, rather it is more akin to "modern-day Manichaeans, gnostics, or docetists." (51)  The separation of 'this' world and it's thinking is of no consequence, that only efforts in relationship to eternal destiny is what is important.  This kind of dualism is not new, it's historically been around, but it isn't orthodox Christianity and Noll wants to call that out. 

Evangelicals are not interested in being involved in what is determined in the 'mind' of Western culture, they leave that to the activity of 'this world'.  This is the scandal.  Re: the mind of Western culture:

"They define what is important, they specify procedures to be respected, they set agendas for analyzing the practical problems of the world, they provide vocabulary for dealing with the perennial Great Issues, they produce the books that get read and that over decades continue to influence thinking around the world - and they do these tasks not only for the people who are aware of their existence but for us all.  (51)

I am convinced that a large reason for the Evangelical withdraw from influential modern thought is within it's chosen eschatology.  Largely influenced by the post-enlightenment, modern America dispensational idea of a pre-tribulation rapture, the end in mine is a world far from here where God dwells.  Thus what remains here has little value and is in essence, Godless.  I categorically reject this interpretation of the NT acknoledgements of the Second Coming and believe wholeheartedly that the the coming 'new heaven and new earth' will be a restoration of this one, not one in another cosmic galaxy beyond the clouds.  This is my home, but it is not yet Resurrected or completely restored.  However, it IS being restored, day by day, moment by moment, the Kingdom has come and IS coming. Therefore love this earth, love this culture, love these neighbors, love this future, love this place and time for thought.  I don't see it as something that is waiting to be discarded, I see it as the very hope of a Kingdom that is coming and is waiting in pregnant expectation.  My value is here, in this place, with these people, noticing the glory of a God who is not far away but crosses to and fro from this side of the veil to the other. 

Therefore, I see intellectual Christian thought as a partnership with a God who created this world and it's truths to be found.  Every new learning is a revelation of the Great Mind that put it all into being.  We are not in a culture war, the fact is that we abandoned culture.  That's the scandal of it all.