The Constitution and Christmas

Posted on November 19, 2009 by Ron Byrnes

Last Sunday the wife’s Sunday school class on making Christmas less stressful and more meaningful went really well. At least for the first fifty minutes. During the last ten it devolved into a gripe session about public school and state government political correctness. Then on Monday a grad student of mine sent me an email conveying the same things. Here’s an excerpt. “At the top of the Senate, there arose such a clatter to eliminate Jesus, in all public matter. And we spoke not a word, as they took away our faith. Forbidden to speak of salvation and grace. The true Gift of Christmas was exchanged and discarded. The reason for the season , stopped before it started.”

At the end of the Sunday school class I sat in silence because I knew there was nothing I could say in a few minutes that would change anyone’s mind. Good thing probably because the teach may not have appreciated my stirring the pot. But that pot needs to be stirred.

Here’s what my conservative evangelical Christian friends would have me believe. The “founding fathers” were Christians and we are a Christian nation, a shining city upon a hill. As a result, public schools and other public places should allow the public expression of Christian faith whatever the form: the posting of the Ten Commandments, group prayer, the singing of Christian songs at Christmas, or the display of nativities or crosses. For the majority, Christianity is our common heritage, the national default if you will. People of other faiths should go ahead and celebrate in whatever ways they want in private, but as a distinct minority, they shouldn’t expect public schools and public places to accommodate their preferences.

In contrast, I believe the following.

1) We are a religiously pluralistic nation made up of many Christians mixed together with Jews, Moslems, Buddhists, atheists, and on and on.

2) Our greatest strength is our Constitution which protects minority rights against majority rule and creates a level playing field with respect to citizens’ diverse religious beliefs. Mutual respect undergirds that neutrality and enables us to peacefully co-exist.

3) Selflessness is a central tenet of Christianity; as a result, Christians should take some time to think about what it would be like if public schools and places were primarily Jewish, Islamic, Buddhist, or anti-religious. The alternative is for Christians to forgo selflessness, devalue Christianity, and continue to insist on a “majority wins” approach to governing public places.

4) The “wall of separation between church and state” principle is misunderstood by Christians who instinctively view it as problematic. Christianity can be taught in public schools as long as it’s done in a comparative, non-evangelical way. Many Christians conflate religious neutrality and anti-religiousness.

5) One Sunday schooler took a swipe at Kwanza and “other minor religious celebrations.” Christians who complain about religious neutrality in public schools and public spaces are struggling to come to grips with the fact that demographics have changed in the United States and they resent that they have to change any aspect of how they grew up experiencing Christmas. It’s difficult to exaggerate the deep symbolic meaning Christmas-oriented language and music in public schools from yesteryear has on many middle-aged and elderly Christians.

6) It’s utterly and completely ludicrous for Christians to suggest anyone is “forbidden to speak of salvation and grace”. It compromises their credibility as thinking people. How much of an adult Christian’s life is spent in public schools and spaces, five percent? Ninety-five percent of the time there’s absolute freedom to speak of one’s religious beliefs and convictions in whatever way one chooses. The “forbidden” argument couldn’t be more disingenuous and it makes a mockery of believers of different faiths who are truly persecuted by their governments.

7) The historical Jesus lived in a religiously diverse world. Instead of complaining that the first century world in which he lived wasn’t explicitly Christian enough, he focused on spreading his message through example, and in essence, competing on a level playing field. Christians today should do the same.

Afghanistan-Pakistan

Posted on October 22, 2009 by Ron Byrnes

Post title most likely to drive away traffic?

Despite following global politics closely, a bachelors degree in history, doctoral coursework in international studies, and extended experience in developing countries, I’m relatively uninformed about the “stans”. Lately though, I’ve begun to educate myself. I found the recent PBS Frontline documentary titled “Obama’s War” an interesting introduction that nicely outlined the complexities. Last night I finished David Rohde’s five-part series on being kidnapped by the Taliban and held hostage for seven months. I found his story utterly riveting and am completely baffled by the commenter on the Times website that wrote of his story, “I’ve learned nothing.”

Next, I’m turning to Jane Mayer’s New Yorker article on drones titled “The Predator War”.

I still don’t know nearly enough for you to justify continuing to read, but then again, every U.S. citizen should be thinking it through since it’s our military (and tax dollars) at work. So here are my initial thoughts.

First, like in Iraq, the military campaign is too much of an American enterprise and not enough of an international coalition. If the premise is that the West’s security could be threatened by a victorious Taliban that empowers Al Qaeda, then Western countries should work in concert to defeat the Taliban. Going it mostly alone guarantees that with each civilian death antipathy towards the U.S., instead of the West more generally, intensifies.

Second, we should make a commitment to additional troops dependent upon other western countries contributing more. If other western countries refuse to commit more troops, we should adjust our plans downward.

Third, we could gain the upper hand against the Taliban in the next few years (win the military battle), but still compromise our medium-long term security if collateral death and destruction leads to even greater anti-Americanism (lose the hearts and mind war). Sons will avenge their fathers’ deaths.

Fourth, if Pakistan’s top intelligence agency props up Taliban commanders and if Afghanistan’s national election was rigged, what are the odds that any of our efforts to stabilize the countries, let alone improve their “medieval” infrastructure will pay dividends?

Fifth, in our efforts to avert another 9/11 terrorist attack, we must not add to Afghan and Pakistani civilians’ suffering. On that note, here’s a particularly disturbing excerpt from Rohdes story:

A stalemate between the United States and the Taliban seemed to unfold before me. The drones killed many senior commanders and hindered their operations. Yet the Taliban were able to garner recruits in their aftermath by exaggerating the number of civilian casualties. The strikes also created a paranoia among the Taliban. They believed that a network of local informants guided the missiles. Innocent civilians were rounded up, accused of working as American spies and then executed. Several days after the drone strike near our house in Makeen, we heard that foreign militants had arrested a local man. He confessed to being a spy after they disemboweled him and chopped off his leg. Then they decapitated him and hung his body in the local bazaar as a warning.

At present, I can’t support committing more troops or money to the war effort because the military campaign is too much of an American enterprise, we risk even greater anti-Americanism in the medium-long term, we don’t have dependable political partners, and the plight of Afghan and Pakistani civilians will most likely worsen.

Ambition Reconsidered

Posted on October 12, 2009 by Ron Byrnes

Unfortunately, I seem to need a steady stream of reminders that life is fragile. I want to live fully conscious of my mortality to avoid taking my health, my wife, my daughters, my extended family, my friends, my work, and nature for granted. It’s a work in progress.

This week I received a postcard with information about my 30 year high school reunion (insert joke here). A few minutes later I had created a minimalist profile and was catching up with classmates via their profiles. Eight classmates have died, two that I knew. Had I been thinking like a mathematician, that wouldn’t have been too surprising, but I wasn’t, so it was.

Equally poignant, an older neighbor-friend died suddenly in his sleep a few weeks ago. Bill was a hardcore cyclist who rode year round no matter how shitty the Pacific Northwest weather. Tough as nails, he conquered RAMROD twice by himself. He wasn’t fast, but everything is relative. His memorial was Saturday at Olympia Country Club. I was the second or third person to sign a poster his widower had laid out on a table surrounded by touching family pictures. Not sure what to write, I peeked at what the elderly gentleman that went right before me wrote. “Bill, you don’t have to go at my pace anymore. You were a good friend that always understood me.”

I think that was and is moving.

In Sunday’s sermon, Pastor John touched upon what he referred to as our society’s three “A’s”, affluence, appearance, and ambition. Maybe ambition gets a bad rap. At the memorial I joked to L and J that when I go they’ll have the same RAMROD t-shirts hanging from my memorial table. My ambition is for some friends to be there and for them to say I was a good friend.

Religious Life and Leadership 2

Posted on January 24, 2009 by Ron Byrnes

After the too lengthy “Religious Life and Leadership 1” post, I feel like I can be relatively concise here.

I agree with my mother who says “variety is the spice of life,” but religious services are amazingly predictable. On some level, routines are comforting, but more than that, they probably contribute to a nostalgia for years gone by. But religious leaders and organizations don’t seem terribly reflective about how the exact same traditions that long-standing members find value in, may not resonate as much with younger, more diverse visitors.

I’m curious as to why there’s not more experimentation, especially with forms that promote interaction between religious leaders and members and between members themselves.

One of the most consistent routines is a mid-service sermon or homily by a religious leader or pastor. He or she typically speaks somewhere between 10-40 minutes depending on denominational traditions. Within my Lutheran denomination, you could go from church to church, and pastor to pastor, and find quite a few commonalities.

In contrast to Baptist or Pentecostal preachers, Lutheran pastors are much more subdued. More like a poet at a public reading than a union organizer at a large rally. I was reminded of this while visiting a Baptist church on MLK day. As the visiting Pentecostal pastor grew increasingly animated, I wondered why on earth he was using a microphone. Maybe Lutheran pastors would get more worked up if Lutherans threw a “call and response” switch which is about as likely as the Phoenix Cardinals making it to the Super Bowl.

Lutheran pastors tend to focus their sermons on the biblical excerpt for the day. Their exegesis is more historical than contemporary in nature. The classic Lutheran style is literary, my poetry reading reference was intentional. It’s rarely clear what the implications of the scripture might be for young people at school on Monday morning, middle-aged people in their respective families and workplaces, and the elderly in the various contexts in which they live. The pastor reveals relatively little about his or her spiritual struggles and probably to keep the political peace, pressing controversial issues are tip-toed around.

I’m not even sure if “good” sermons are remembered from one Sunday to the next.

I’m not sure I’d like to see more passionate, applicable, authentic sermons as much as a complete rethinking of the model where the same person communicates a few insights each week with little to no participation from anyone else. Imagine a pastor finishing her sermon and instead of moving straight to the offertory music, saying, “So what do you think? Let’s take some time to hear a few reflections, questions, or even differing perspectives.” My guess is the 50+ set would say “What the heck, I don’t want to have to participate in the service. Isn’t it written somewhere in the bible that ‘Thou shall go from the sermon to the offertory music?!”

I’ve attended churches where a more informal, alternative, interactive, hippy service has been introduced only to be poorly attended and then given up on. So I suspect I’m in the minority.

I just wonder, if religious leaders were more reflective about the outline of their services and found ways to promote interactivity, if more people would engage.

Religious Life and Leadership 1

Posted on January 7, 2009 by Ron Byrnes

In the Torah it is written, “We see things not as they are, but as as we are.” What follows reveals more about me, my life experience, and my worldview than anything else. No one will agree with everything, but I hope something resonates with someone.

This will be a sporadic series and this post is all prelude.

SOME CONTEXT

• My family wasn’t particularly religious, but my mom often took us to church and it was important to her that my sibs and I get confirmed. In the Lutheran church, confirmation involves a middle school religious education program that culminates in adult church membership.

• In SoCal, in high school, I got involved with a very dynamic church youth group. We spent time in Tijuana orphanages, we took turns leading high school bible studies, and our choir toured every summer. A few of my best friends from this time period are pastors in SoCal and one heads up the largest homeless organization in L.A.

• I am a Christian, but as I age, I’m increasingly comfortable with questions and ambiguity. I’m more interested in spiritual vitality than religious orthodoxy.

• My education and international travel experiences have led me to conclude that Western Christianity doesn’t have a monopoly on religious truth.

• I identify more with Christians who emphasize social justice than ones who stress evangelism and one set of religious truths.

• Sometimes I feel alienated within the church as a result of literal interpretations of the bible, Republican politics, materialism, patriarchal language, and cultural sameness.

• Solitude, moving in nature (lake swimming, trail running, cycling), the arts, and close interpersonal relations are integral to my spiritual vitality.

CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY’S INFLUENCE

In 2003, I was living in Southwestern China for a few months. My family and I met some missionaries or “English teachers” including a Nigerian citizen. He was the most exuberant and zealous Christian I had ever met. I was intrigued by his story including his facility with the language. He explained to me that his Nigerian mother tongue was tonal and so Mandarin was a snap. Nigeria, like a lot of Central and Northern African countries, is divided by Muslims in the North and Christians in the South.

All I could think about was what would his life have been like if he had been born a few hundred kilometers farther north. My guess is he would have become an exuberant and zealous Muslim iman. That lead me to wonder how different my spiritual journey would have been if I had been born in a predominantly Hindu, Muslim, Jewish, or secular region of the world.

A FEW LIMITATIONS

My wide-angle lens view of teaching excellence informs the limits of my observations/thinking on religious life and leadership. If most people were asked where does excellent teaching take place, they’d said “the classroom, of course.” But I think of excellent teaching as consisting of at least five things most of which are not classroom-based: 1) creative and conscientious planning; 2) the classroom activities that most people focus on exclusively which we could flesh out but don’t need to for my purposes here; 3) thoughtful assessment of student work; 4) purposeful reflection and revision of the original plan; 5) caring and constructive outside of class interactions with students.

In my faith tradition, leaders are most commonly referred to as pastors. When it comes to my pastors, I typically only see the equivalent of number two, the Sunday morning activities. I suspect the best pastors work especially effectively out of view building leadership teams, visiting people in hospitals, counseling people, conducting weddings and funerals, and doing service in the community among others things of which I’m ignorant.

If my pastor friends were to come watch me teach, they’d only get a feel for a portion of my professional life. Similarly, on Sunday mornings, I’m only seeing a portion of pastoral life.

Also, I don’t know how religious leaders evaluate themselves. I’m sure there’s wide ranging differences from the easily measurable (e.g., increasing attendance figures, giving, etc.) to the more intangible (e.g., deepening faith and spiritual maturity, positive impact on the community, world, etc.)

RELEVANT EDUCATIONAL BELIEFS

• I believe the educative effect is greatest when students do something rather than when something is done to them. Sounds awfully basic, but is far more radical a notion than you might imagine. Far too often in K-12 schooling, things are done to students. Put differently, the best teachers promote active learning. I believe religious leaders should promote active learning/growth too.

• Teaching excellence takes many forms. Similarly, I suspect religious leadership excellence takes many forms.

To be continued.

Pressing Pause

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