Context
As I was heading to Texarkana for Friends meeting today, I saw a dog running along the side of the road. After some internal debate, I pulled a u-turn and went to go look for it. I found the dog, but he ran away from me and seemed to be heading for a house a little ways off the road, so I gave up the chase.
Commentary
It was important to me to include the "internal debate" stuff in the Context, because I didn't want to go after this dog. Attending to stray dogs is a hassle. You often can't catch them, and when you do manage to get them in your car, you then have to decide what to do with them. Even if they have a collar with a current tag on, reaching the owners is sometimes a matter of several phone calls, and where does the dog stay in the interim?
No collar, no tag is even worse. Take the dog to the shelter? OK if it's open, but it often isn't, and even if it is, sometimes the people there suspect that you're dropping off your dog, not a stray, and give you a hard time. I used to work at the SPCA; I understand the instinct.
So why did I do something I didn't want to do? I think I know, but first I want to talk about some arguments I don't find compelling. You could say that I really did want to go after the dog, and that may be true, but as an explanation it's completely useless. If I can't even consciously access my own motivations and desires, there is little point in trying to analyze my actions. There's just this shadow self of mine that apparently does whatever it feels like.
Similarly, I find deterministic explanations of behavior problematic. By "deterministic" I mean both the religious idea of predestination and the scientific theory that brain chemistry controls everything. Despite their disparate backgrounds, these two ideas are remarkably similar in effect: they remove personal responsibility and self-actualization from the equation.
Also, it seems like determinism is both overly simple and overly complex. Simple in that it would answer every behavioral question the same way, either "God made me do it," or "My neurons made me do it." The complexity comes in when you look at that internal debate I mentioned earlier. It seems remarkably inefficient for either God or my brain to decide I should do go after a stray dog, then let me spend several seconds mulling the decision over. Why not just send me off right away?
So maybe you're thinking the reason I went after the dog was because even though I didn't want to, I thought it was the right thing to do. This is certainly closer to the truth, in that I do think stray dogs present an ethical problem. My husband will tell you that I grieve and pray over dead animals in the road, but for me, domesticated animals are a special case. At some point in our history as human beings we made agreements with dogs and cats that we would take care of them in return for some service. A stray dog indicates that we've dropped our end of the leash, if you take my meaning.
However, the reality is that I don't always go after every stray dog I see and even today, I didn't move heaven and earth to capture this one. So why did I perform this particular set of somewhat unusual actions today? Because I received a very specific call from God and (eventually) answered it. It's not predestination; it's a conversation with God about what I'm going to do. People look at me funny when I say that the reason I don't drink caffeine is because I had an argument with God about it and lost, but it's the truth!
In this case, the call was to go see if I could help the dog. Once it starting running away, I was released from the call. If you're not religious, you may prefer to think that my conscience smote me on this particular occasion, and that's fine. From my perspective, doing something I don't want to do seems so unlike me that it feels like an external presence. Ergo God.
"C'mon Lynn," you may be saying, "why would an omniscient God ask you to do something so pointless? Stop your trip, turn around, and not even catch the dog? What's up with that?"
I don't know, which is another reason I point the finger at an external God rather than my own internal mechanisms. This whole blog post has illustrated that I like to have good explanations for the things I do. Sometimes, it seems like God just says, "Nah, let's do this instead."
Which doesn't mean I can't impose an explanation after the fact, so here are are two possibilities:
1) Obedience is more important than results.
2) It made me blog about God, right?
What did you see today?
Showing posts with label God. Show all posts
Showing posts with label God. Show all posts
12/22/2012
10/14/2012
I saw a description of negotiations
Context
I'm reading The Social Life of Information by John Seely Brown and Paul Duguid. This book contends that the belief that more information, especially in the form of the internet, will somehow solve all our problems is at least premature, if not hopelessly naive. I've just finished a section where the authors talk about the intricacies of negotiation, pointing out that human beings makes thousands of implicit negotiations every day, and that we only resort to rule-based decision making, the kind computers are really good at, when those fail. As an example, they point out that committees often have to make rules about how to communicate, like who can talk for how long, but groups of friends usually do not.
Commentary
The idea of rule-based decision making and negotiation got me to thinking about the rule of law. Patriotism is a challenging concept for me. I like being an American because I think we have a kick-ass constitution, not because of any loyalty to a geographic or cultural entity. Does the U.S. even have a culture? Our embrace of multiculturalism maybe, but I digress. Anyway, I like the rule of law in this country.
On the other hand, I'm a Quaker, and as a matter of practice, we abjure some of the things the Constitution prescribes. For example, Quakers don't vote when doing church business. In my experience, Quakers vote like mad in the national elections, but that's a separate issue. Anyway, in our meetings for worship with attention to business (We're a simple people, but we like the names of things to be painfully precise.), we make decisions by "sense of the meeting." This means we work together until we find an answer that resonates with everyone participating in the process, rather than voting, which produces winners and losers.
If you ask a dozen Quakers why we do things this way, there's a good chance you'll get at least ten different answers. Christian Quakers often believe that a collective answer is more likely to reflect the will of God. In my case, I specifically hark back to the wrong turn the children of Israel made when they told God they no longer wanted their disputes settled and armies led by the itinerant judges He raised up among them. They wanted a permanent hereditary king, like all the other cool nations had. The extra level of remove from the Lord did not work out well for them.
Quakers who are not explicitly Christian sometimes still invoke the mystical aspect of collective decision-making, even if the mystery is not attributed to a particular deity. Even non-Quakers sometimes adopt the "sense of the meeting" language to their secular business dealings, in the belief that consensus (or in the case of the International Monetary Fund pretending to have consensus) serves better than conflict when expecting people to work together.
So I like the rule of law, but I avoid using it whenever I can. Brown and Duguid point out computers can't manage the slight change-of-course negotiations people navigate with ease because these depend on shared values and trust, which machines can neither create nor maintain. And there's the rub: the moment we turn to the rule of law, which is the set "If you cross this line, these consequences will happen," way of looking at the world, we give up human connection in order to take a chance on "being right." Which one is really more valuable?
What did you see today?
I'm reading The Social Life of Information by John Seely Brown and Paul Duguid. This book contends that the belief that more information, especially in the form of the internet, will somehow solve all our problems is at least premature, if not hopelessly naive. I've just finished a section where the authors talk about the intricacies of negotiation, pointing out that human beings makes thousands of implicit negotiations every day, and that we only resort to rule-based decision making, the kind computers are really good at, when those fail. As an example, they point out that committees often have to make rules about how to communicate, like who can talk for how long, but groups of friends usually do not.
Commentary
The idea of rule-based decision making and negotiation got me to thinking about the rule of law. Patriotism is a challenging concept for me. I like being an American because I think we have a kick-ass constitution, not because of any loyalty to a geographic or cultural entity. Does the U.S. even have a culture? Our embrace of multiculturalism maybe, but I digress. Anyway, I like the rule of law in this country.
On the other hand, I'm a Quaker, and as a matter of practice, we abjure some of the things the Constitution prescribes. For example, Quakers don't vote when doing church business. In my experience, Quakers vote like mad in the national elections, but that's a separate issue. Anyway, in our meetings for worship with attention to business (We're a simple people, but we like the names of things to be painfully precise.), we make decisions by "sense of the meeting." This means we work together until we find an answer that resonates with everyone participating in the process, rather than voting, which produces winners and losers.
If you ask a dozen Quakers why we do things this way, there's a good chance you'll get at least ten different answers. Christian Quakers often believe that a collective answer is more likely to reflect the will of God. In my case, I specifically hark back to the wrong turn the children of Israel made when they told God they no longer wanted their disputes settled and armies led by the itinerant judges He raised up among them. They wanted a permanent hereditary king, like all the other cool nations had. The extra level of remove from the Lord did not work out well for them.
Quakers who are not explicitly Christian sometimes still invoke the mystical aspect of collective decision-making, even if the mystery is not attributed to a particular deity. Even non-Quakers sometimes adopt the "sense of the meeting" language to their secular business dealings, in the belief that consensus (or in the case of the International Monetary Fund pretending to have consensus) serves better than conflict when expecting people to work together.
So I like the rule of law, but I avoid using it whenever I can. Brown and Duguid point out computers can't manage the slight change-of-course negotiations people navigate with ease because these depend on shared values and trust, which machines can neither create nor maintain. And there's the rub: the moment we turn to the rule of law, which is the set "If you cross this line, these consequences will happen," way of looking at the world, we give up human connection in order to take a chance on "being right." Which one is really more valuable?
What did you see today?
8/29/2012
I saw a book description
Context
I was looking over the new children's nonfiction books at my library when I found Moonbird: a year on the wind with the great survivor B95 by Phillip Hoose. If you go to this link and click on A Look Inside, you'll see that the book describes the survival of an individual migrating shorebird in the face of myriad threats to his existence, including environmental changes wrought by human beings.
Commentary
Yes, once again I'm blogging about a book description, rather than the book itself. I'm a librarian; I read a lot of book descriptions. And movie descriptions. And CD descriptions. I also seem to be on an environmental kick as well, so forgive me if I grow repetitive.
I've been reading little bits of Charles Darwin's The Origin of Species and feeling dismayed that some people hold it in such contempt. Far from being a dry scientific treatise tasked with disproving God's existence, it's actually page after page of Darwin describing the wonders he sees in nature and offering his best explanation as to why they happen. Perhaps I'm perverse, but to me it reads much more like a celebration of creation than a debunking of it.
Anyway, one of the things Darwin is particularly taken with is adaptation, and he devotes most of a chapter to talking about how human beings create (if I can use that word) adaptations in domesticated plants and animals. I agree that it's an amazing process, but not really a surprising one. As people, we're all about making things fit what we want and/or need.
Think about it. Most species reside in places that are suited to their physical makeup: tropical plants in Brazil, penguins in Antarctica. People move to places that are not suited to their physiology at all and then change their physiology! Well, they either put on some clothes or some sunscreen. Or they just change the place itself, by building air-conditioned condos in the middle of the desert.
I'm starting to think this is why we are so hard on the ecology of our planet. We figure we'll always be able to adapt to whatever nature throws at us. And we may be right about that, but we fail to take into account that other species do not adapt that quickly. When we change the environment to suit ourselves, we frequently make it lethally inhospitable to the other inhabitants of the planet. You might say we do this unintentionally, but that doesn't really excuse us. We're supposed to be the ones with the big brains, not to mention the caretakers of all creation. We ought to be able to both adapt and accommodate, not just carelessly wreck everything in our path.
What did you see today?
I was looking over the new children's nonfiction books at my library when I found Moonbird: a year on the wind with the great survivor B95 by Phillip Hoose. If you go to this link and click on A Look Inside, you'll see that the book describes the survival of an individual migrating shorebird in the face of myriad threats to his existence, including environmental changes wrought by human beings.
Commentary
Yes, once again I'm blogging about a book description, rather than the book itself. I'm a librarian; I read a lot of book descriptions. And movie descriptions. And CD descriptions. I also seem to be on an environmental kick as well, so forgive me if I grow repetitive.
I've been reading little bits of Charles Darwin's The Origin of Species and feeling dismayed that some people hold it in such contempt. Far from being a dry scientific treatise tasked with disproving God's existence, it's actually page after page of Darwin describing the wonders he sees in nature and offering his best explanation as to why they happen. Perhaps I'm perverse, but to me it reads much more like a celebration of creation than a debunking of it.
Anyway, one of the things Darwin is particularly taken with is adaptation, and he devotes most of a chapter to talking about how human beings create (if I can use that word) adaptations in domesticated plants and animals. I agree that it's an amazing process, but not really a surprising one. As people, we're all about making things fit what we want and/or need.
Think about it. Most species reside in places that are suited to their physical makeup: tropical plants in Brazil, penguins in Antarctica. People move to places that are not suited to their physiology at all and then change their physiology! Well, they either put on some clothes or some sunscreen. Or they just change the place itself, by building air-conditioned condos in the middle of the desert.
I'm starting to think this is why we are so hard on the ecology of our planet. We figure we'll always be able to adapt to whatever nature throws at us. And we may be right about that, but we fail to take into account that other species do not adapt that quickly. When we change the environment to suit ourselves, we frequently make it lethally inhospitable to the other inhabitants of the planet. You might say we do this unintentionally, but that doesn't really excuse us. We're supposed to be the ones with the big brains, not to mention the caretakers of all creation. We ought to be able to both adapt and accommodate, not just carelessly wreck everything in our path.
What did you see today?
8/11/2012
I saw a description of the Divine
Context
My Quaker meeting is reading excerpts from Patricia Loring's Listening Spirituality. One person was particularly struck by this sentence, found in the chapter entitled "Discernment: the Heart of Listening Spirituality: "Both interpretation reflect Friends' felt sense of the Divine as a dynamism rather than as an entity." After some discussion, I added "some" before "Friends'" to my copy of the reading.
Commentary
Quakers are non-dogmatic, which means that although we may spend time talking about what we believe as individuals, we never say that someone else's belief is incorrect. At my meeting, at least, that means that people come to the table with many different conceptions of God. The person who most tends toward the atheistic side of the spectrum like to tease me by asking if I believe God is an old white man in long robes. The completely honest answer to this question is, "Sometimes."
Realistically, I think it's quite a stretch to expect that any human being's understanding of the divine would be entirely accurate. We end up using different language to describe the various aspects we do understand, but those aspects change over time, if only because we choose to emphasize different ones. Even if we decided to remove a great deal of cultural vagaries by talking only about Roman Catholics, a child's idea of her God would vary from a Jesuit's about to graduate from seminary, and his would likely be different from the one held by an elderly woman who's recently been widowed.
So I don't object to people seeing the divine as a dynamism rather than an entity. I even kind of understand where the idea comes from. I think many people prefer this conception because being a discrete entity, or a person, as some of us would have it, would seem to establish inappropriate limits of time and space on the divine nature. On the other hand, I think non-personal language like "flow" or "energy" or, say, "dynamism" is inappropriately limiting as well, in that it takes away the idea the God has a will.
Loring has an answer for this. In the very next paragraph of our reading she discusses a recording of Thomas Merton (referenced in this list) in which he jokes with students about wasting time looking for the map God has planned out for history so they'll know exactly what to do. In Merton's mind, there is no pre-designed map; the road is constantly changing according to the decisions we make and the actions we take.
From my perspective, Merton and Loring are batting .500 as a team. I do agree it's not a good use of our time to try to figure out what God's entire plan is, but that's because the "trying to fit divine-sized stuff into a human brain" problem occurs again, not because the plan doesn't exist. In the final analysis, I feel much more confident living my little Lynn-sized life if I know that God has everything around me in hand (Eeek! A personification!), and everything will work to the good.
What did you see today?
My Quaker meeting is reading excerpts from Patricia Loring's Listening Spirituality. One person was particularly struck by this sentence, found in the chapter entitled "Discernment: the Heart of Listening Spirituality: "Both interpretation reflect Friends' felt sense of the Divine as a dynamism rather than as an entity." After some discussion, I added "some" before "Friends'" to my copy of the reading.
Commentary
Quakers are non-dogmatic, which means that although we may spend time talking about what we believe as individuals, we never say that someone else's belief is incorrect. At my meeting, at least, that means that people come to the table with many different conceptions of God. The person who most tends toward the atheistic side of the spectrum like to tease me by asking if I believe God is an old white man in long robes. The completely honest answer to this question is, "Sometimes."
Realistically, I think it's quite a stretch to expect that any human being's understanding of the divine would be entirely accurate. We end up using different language to describe the various aspects we do understand, but those aspects change over time, if only because we choose to emphasize different ones. Even if we decided to remove a great deal of cultural vagaries by talking only about Roman Catholics, a child's idea of her God would vary from a Jesuit's about to graduate from seminary, and his would likely be different from the one held by an elderly woman who's recently been widowed.
So I don't object to people seeing the divine as a dynamism rather than an entity. I even kind of understand where the idea comes from. I think many people prefer this conception because being a discrete entity, or a person, as some of us would have it, would seem to establish inappropriate limits of time and space on the divine nature. On the other hand, I think non-personal language like "flow" or "energy" or, say, "dynamism" is inappropriately limiting as well, in that it takes away the idea the God has a will.
Loring has an answer for this. In the very next paragraph of our reading she discusses a recording of Thomas Merton (referenced in this list) in which he jokes with students about wasting time looking for the map God has planned out for history so they'll know exactly what to do. In Merton's mind, there is no pre-designed map; the road is constantly changing according to the decisions we make and the actions we take.
From my perspective, Merton and Loring are batting .500 as a team. I do agree it's not a good use of our time to try to figure out what God's entire plan is, but that's because the "trying to fit divine-sized stuff into a human brain" problem occurs again, not because the plan doesn't exist. In the final analysis, I feel much more confident living my little Lynn-sized life if I know that God has everything around me in hand (Eeek! A personification!), and everything will work to the good.
What did you see today?
7/24/2011
I heard the Apostles' Creed
Context
I'm in Houston today, so per my usual custom, I went to worship at Christ the King Lutheran church. I used to be a Lutheran and this is the church I got married in. Lutherans always say a creed at some point during any communion service; today it was the Apostles' Creed. Quakers, on the other hand, are very non-creedal.
Commentary
I think the main reason Quakers are non-creedal is because of the feeling that creeds create an exclusive atmosphere. We're concerned that we would be saying, in essence, "If you don't believe this, you don't belong here."
Lately, when we talk about beliefs at my Quaker meeting, I feel like Friends are saying something beyond just: "We shouldn't have a set creed as a group." We seem to have moved on to: "We shouldn't have any strongly held religious beliefs as individuals, either." This perspective says our beliefs are so often proved spirit-killing and wrong that it is a bad idea to hold them at all. Better to just have faith in God in general and not be married to specific theological ideas.
As I was speaking the Apostles' Creed today, I realized I don't agree. For one thing, I actually believe everything in the Apostles' Creed. I don't think that gives me exclusive access to God, but I'm not going to pretend I don't believe those words just to make others feel comfortable.
Moreover, I don't think I can have faith in God without believing certain things. Here are four that seem pretty bedrock to me:
1) I believe that God is powerful.
2) I believe that the things I see constitute the work of God.
3) I believe that God has suffered.
4) I believe that God will ultimately bring justice to our exceedingly evil world.
Without these beliefs, having faith in God seems pointless to me. At its most primitive level, my trust is predicated on an expected outcome: the redemption of the world. If I believed that the march of history was just going to continue on its current path, I would commit ritual suicide. If I didn't care one way or the other, I wouldn't bother trying to learn about God and serve Him.
What's funny about the current discussion of beliefs in our meeting is that one of the ways we encourage people to discern whether Quakerism would be a good fit for them is to take this quiz at beliefnet.com. Unsurprisingly, most of the questions are about one's beliefs.
What did you hear today?
I'm in Houston today, so per my usual custom, I went to worship at Christ the King Lutheran church. I used to be a Lutheran and this is the church I got married in. Lutherans always say a creed at some point during any communion service; today it was the Apostles' Creed. Quakers, on the other hand, are very non-creedal.
Commentary
I think the main reason Quakers are non-creedal is because of the feeling that creeds create an exclusive atmosphere. We're concerned that we would be saying, in essence, "If you don't believe this, you don't belong here."
Lately, when we talk about beliefs at my Quaker meeting, I feel like Friends are saying something beyond just: "We shouldn't have a set creed as a group." We seem to have moved on to: "We shouldn't have any strongly held religious beliefs as individuals, either." This perspective says our beliefs are so often proved spirit-killing and wrong that it is a bad idea to hold them at all. Better to just have faith in God in general and not be married to specific theological ideas.
As I was speaking the Apostles' Creed today, I realized I don't agree. For one thing, I actually believe everything in the Apostles' Creed. I don't think that gives me exclusive access to God, but I'm not going to pretend I don't believe those words just to make others feel comfortable.
Moreover, I don't think I can have faith in God without believing certain things. Here are four that seem pretty bedrock to me:
1) I believe that God is powerful.
2) I believe that the things I see constitute the work of God.
3) I believe that God has suffered.
4) I believe that God will ultimately bring justice to our exceedingly evil world.
Without these beliefs, having faith in God seems pointless to me. At its most primitive level, my trust is predicated on an expected outcome: the redemption of the world. If I believed that the march of history was just going to continue on its current path, I would commit ritual suicide. If I didn't care one way or the other, I wouldn't bother trying to learn about God and serve Him.
What's funny about the current discussion of beliefs in our meeting is that one of the ways we encourage people to discern whether Quakerism would be a good fit for them is to take this quiz at beliefnet.com. Unsurprisingly, most of the questions are about one's beliefs.
What did you hear today?
6/04/2011
I saw a driver slow down
Context
When I drive to Texarkana on Saturdays to attend my Quaker meeting, I usually obey the posted speed limit. Since a great deal of my trip takes place on a two-lane highway, this means when people pass me, they then pull in front of me.
A gentleman driving an older sedan with cracks in the windshield did this today. Shortly thereafter we came upon three vehicles on the opposite shoulder, one of which belonged to the Caddo Parish Sheriff's office and had its lights flashing. Louisiana law requires us to move over or slow down for vehicles with flashing lights on our own shoulder, but there are no obligations pertaining to vehicles on the opposite side. Nevertheless, the guy who had just passed me slowed down considerably, even going a few MPH under the speed limit. I was tempted to pass him, but restrained myself.
Commentary
My first reaction to the driver slowing down ahead of me was, "My driving decisions make my life easier." Consider: except for the "move over or slow down" rule mentioned above, I never have to change how I'm driving when I see a member of law enforcement. Other people have to make numerous adjustments.
Not that my method is entirely stress-free. When people pass me on the two-lane, they sometimes express annoyance, and I'm not completely immune to that. Nonetheless, I'd have to say my method of driving is the one that brings me the most peace.
Making all our decisions according to which ones will bring us the most peace is not a bad way to go, although it is complicated by the need to predict how we'll feel in the future on a regular basis. If nothing else, we can evaluate our current path to see if it's bringing us peace and make adjustments accordingly. Who knows? Doing this often enough might improve our powers of prediction.
So what do we define as peace? I'll admit that for me it has the air of "I know it when I feel it," but I'll try to be more definite. I think we can all agree that peace is not worry or stress or guilt, but I would venture to say it's not necessarily happiness or satisfaction, either. As mentioned previously, I often get a great deal of visceral satisfaction when I do the wrong thing. There's always psychic damage to clean up afterwards, though.
Absence of conflict is a reasonably good definition of peace, but it depends on how you define conflict (wheels within wheels!). I often find that making a good decision for me causes opposition from other people. What really tears me up is when I make the right choice for myself and someone else makes the right choice for her/himself and we still end up in conflict! These disputes can usually be resolved by recognizing our differing needs and perspectives, but still!
I also can't really say that making good decisions means I won't be conflicted about them. Change, even good change, is often very stressful. However, I usually find that once I've made my initial commitment and taken the first few steps, most of the strain falls away. Peace manifests in the feeling that a way is opening up for me.
If peace is the revelation of a path we can follow, then I have to say that neither complacency nor resignation fits the bill. Complacency does its level best to never move at all, and resignation implies that one is not deciding where to go. I do, however, have to leave room for the radical resignation that says, "I'm giving up everything to follow God's will."
There, I did it. Stuck God into the middle of a perfectly good (psychological? philosophical?) treatise. I can't help it, though. For me, even seeking peace is related to my religious beliefs that there is a God, that He cares about me, and that He has a plan. When I say "a way is opening up," I mean God's way. Realistically, I don't believe it's actually possible for us to thwart God's will. On the other hand, I think we can cause ourselves a lot of stress and worry by trying to.
What did you see today?
When I drive to Texarkana on Saturdays to attend my Quaker meeting, I usually obey the posted speed limit. Since a great deal of my trip takes place on a two-lane highway, this means when people pass me, they then pull in front of me.
A gentleman driving an older sedan with cracks in the windshield did this today. Shortly thereafter we came upon three vehicles on the opposite shoulder, one of which belonged to the Caddo Parish Sheriff's office and had its lights flashing. Louisiana law requires us to move over or slow down for vehicles with flashing lights on our own shoulder, but there are no obligations pertaining to vehicles on the opposite side. Nevertheless, the guy who had just passed me slowed down considerably, even going a few MPH under the speed limit. I was tempted to pass him, but restrained myself.
Commentary
My first reaction to the driver slowing down ahead of me was, "My driving decisions make my life easier." Consider: except for the "move over or slow down" rule mentioned above, I never have to change how I'm driving when I see a member of law enforcement. Other people have to make numerous adjustments.
Not that my method is entirely stress-free. When people pass me on the two-lane, they sometimes express annoyance, and I'm not completely immune to that. Nonetheless, I'd have to say my method of driving is the one that brings me the most peace.
Making all our decisions according to which ones will bring us the most peace is not a bad way to go, although it is complicated by the need to predict how we'll feel in the future on a regular basis. If nothing else, we can evaluate our current path to see if it's bringing us peace and make adjustments accordingly. Who knows? Doing this often enough might improve our powers of prediction.
So what do we define as peace? I'll admit that for me it has the air of "I know it when I feel it," but I'll try to be more definite. I think we can all agree that peace is not worry or stress or guilt, but I would venture to say it's not necessarily happiness or satisfaction, either. As mentioned previously, I often get a great deal of visceral satisfaction when I do the wrong thing. There's always psychic damage to clean up afterwards, though.
Absence of conflict is a reasonably good definition of peace, but it depends on how you define conflict (wheels within wheels!). I often find that making a good decision for me causes opposition from other people. What really tears me up is when I make the right choice for myself and someone else makes the right choice for her/himself and we still end up in conflict! These disputes can usually be resolved by recognizing our differing needs and perspectives, but still!
I also can't really say that making good decisions means I won't be conflicted about them. Change, even good change, is often very stressful. However, I usually find that once I've made my initial commitment and taken the first few steps, most of the strain falls away. Peace manifests in the feeling that a way is opening up for me.
If peace is the revelation of a path we can follow, then I have to say that neither complacency nor resignation fits the bill. Complacency does its level best to never move at all, and resignation implies that one is not deciding where to go. I do, however, have to leave room for the radical resignation that says, "I'm giving up everything to follow God's will."
There, I did it. Stuck God into the middle of a perfectly good (psychological? philosophical?) treatise. I can't help it, though. For me, even seeking peace is related to my religious beliefs that there is a God, that He cares about me, and that He has a plan. When I say "a way is opening up," I mean God's way. Realistically, I don't believe it's actually possible for us to thwart God's will. On the other hand, I think we can cause ourselves a lot of stress and worry by trying to.
What did you see today?
3/06/2010
I heard a disparaging remark
Context
One of my flights back from the COSUGI conference lasted a little under three hours. During it, a baby on board screamed bloody murder at varying intervals. Once, he or she probably kept it up for a good ten minutes. At the end of the flight, a man in my row said, "Horrible flight!"
Commentary
I hate to fly. This may come as a surprise to members of my family because I used to love it, and I still do fly on a regular basis, but I hate it. Usually this hatred takes the form of mild anxiety, often for weeks before an anticipated trip, but it sometimes turns into full-blown panic while on the plane. All told, I prefer the train. So for me, "horrible flight" would either mean I cowered in terror all the way or the plane crashed at some point. I guess most people would agree that the latter would count as a horrible flight.
But I don't want to talk about how brave my seatmate was about flying or how tolerant I am of fussy children. I want to talk about what I think upsets both of us, which is the lack of control. Once I get on that plane, I can't control how it moves or whether it lands safely or not, and that makes me crazy. Under non-flying circumstances, one can usually deal with a screaming baby that's not your own by either walking away or trying to convince the parents to do so. On a plane, not so much.
So for both of us, perhaps the feeling of helplessness is upsetting. What's interesting is the difference in what makes us feel helpless. I've already spent too much time speculating about my seatmate's feelings, so I won't try and figure out why flying doesn't appear to bother him. I will say that generally, crying babies who aren't being abused by their parents don't bother me. In the situation on the plane, I wasn't helpless. I could have tuned the baby out or listened to iTunes on my laptop. What I actually did was feel sorry for the baby and the parents. It's just about impossible to explain to an infant what ear-popping is and how to handle it.
Which leads me to faith in general. I am a firm believer that God controls everything; that it's His world and we're just living in it. This does not, however, make me behave fatalistically. I believe every moment is an opportunity to decide whether we're going to try to participate in God's will, oppose it, or ignore it. I find I always do better when I try to participate. As I mentioned in an earlier post on patience, I find I do better when I spend less time on, "Why is God doing this?" and more on "Why does He want me around while He is?"
It's a good theory; I certainly don't always put it into practice. I often say, as Mother Teresa did, "I know God will not give me anything I can't handle. I just wish that He didn't trust me so much." On the other hand, as I was reminded when I read on this blog, I think sometimes God likes to remind us that it's not all about how well we handle things for ourselves. So I try to remember that too when I fly.
What did you hear today?
One of my flights back from the COSUGI conference lasted a little under three hours. During it, a baby on board screamed bloody murder at varying intervals. Once, he or she probably kept it up for a good ten minutes. At the end of the flight, a man in my row said, "Horrible flight!"
Commentary
I hate to fly. This may come as a surprise to members of my family because I used to love it, and I still do fly on a regular basis, but I hate it. Usually this hatred takes the form of mild anxiety, often for weeks before an anticipated trip, but it sometimes turns into full-blown panic while on the plane. All told, I prefer the train. So for me, "horrible flight" would either mean I cowered in terror all the way or the plane crashed at some point. I guess most people would agree that the latter would count as a horrible flight.
But I don't want to talk about how brave my seatmate was about flying or how tolerant I am of fussy children. I want to talk about what I think upsets both of us, which is the lack of control. Once I get on that plane, I can't control how it moves or whether it lands safely or not, and that makes me crazy. Under non-flying circumstances, one can usually deal with a screaming baby that's not your own by either walking away or trying to convince the parents to do so. On a plane, not so much.
So for both of us, perhaps the feeling of helplessness is upsetting. What's interesting is the difference in what makes us feel helpless. I've already spent too much time speculating about my seatmate's feelings, so I won't try and figure out why flying doesn't appear to bother him. I will say that generally, crying babies who aren't being abused by their parents don't bother me. In the situation on the plane, I wasn't helpless. I could have tuned the baby out or listened to iTunes on my laptop. What I actually did was feel sorry for the baby and the parents. It's just about impossible to explain to an infant what ear-popping is and how to handle it.
Which leads me to faith in general. I am a firm believer that God controls everything; that it's His world and we're just living in it. This does not, however, make me behave fatalistically. I believe every moment is an opportunity to decide whether we're going to try to participate in God's will, oppose it, or ignore it. I find I always do better when I try to participate. As I mentioned in an earlier post on patience, I find I do better when I spend less time on, "Why is God doing this?" and more on "Why does He want me around while He is?"
It's a good theory; I certainly don't always put it into practice. I often say, as Mother Teresa did, "I know God will not give me anything I can't handle. I just wish that He didn't trust me so much." On the other hand, as I was reminded when I read on this blog, I think sometimes God likes to remind us that it's not all about how well we handle things for ourselves. So I try to remember that too when I fly.
What did you hear today?
10/13/2009
I saw a passage in The Grapes of Wrath
Context
John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath is the Big Read for Shreveport this year. The book intersperses chapters about the Joad family and their journey west in the wake of the Dust Bowl with those containing background and commentary about the wave of history.
One of the latter types of chapters contains Steinbeck's theories about how oppression creates fertile ground for the rise of collectivism. As for the oppressor, Steinbeck encapsulates his state thusly: "For the quality of owning freezes you forever into 'I,' and cuts you off forever from the 'we.'"
Commentary
The Grapes of Wrath is an interesting book. It's a polemic, but that doesn't make it any less interesting. And I agree with Steinbeck that there are things in this world that inhibit the creation of community and that ownership can be one of those things. I don't believe it's the only thing though, and I don't believe that people who own stuff are doomed to self-absorption.
I think anything we are trying to keep safe has the potential to poison our relationships with others, because it tends to create a "me vs. them" mentality. The desire to hold on to our possessions makes us believe that every person we meet wants to deprive us of them. On the other hand, the habit of evaluating people based strictly on how much of a potential threat they are to our children also erects unnecessary walls. Even the steps we take to protect our own hearts from hurt can separate us from interactions that could pay us back a thousandfold.
I'm not saying yearning for security is wrong. I'm saying that left to our own devices we tend to want the wrong kinds of safety and use inappropriate means to accomplish them. I believe we're better off commending our stuff, our children, our hearts and yes, even our community to God and trusting that He will both provide and protect, to His greater glory. So I'm not looking for the "I" or the "we." I'm going for the "Him."
What did you see today?
John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath is the Big Read for Shreveport this year. The book intersperses chapters about the Joad family and their journey west in the wake of the Dust Bowl with those containing background and commentary about the wave of history.
One of the latter types of chapters contains Steinbeck's theories about how oppression creates fertile ground for the rise of collectivism. As for the oppressor, Steinbeck encapsulates his state thusly: "For the quality of owning freezes you forever into 'I,' and cuts you off forever from the 'we.'"
Commentary
The Grapes of Wrath is an interesting book. It's a polemic, but that doesn't make it any less interesting. And I agree with Steinbeck that there are things in this world that inhibit the creation of community and that ownership can be one of those things. I don't believe it's the only thing though, and I don't believe that people who own stuff are doomed to self-absorption.
I think anything we are trying to keep safe has the potential to poison our relationships with others, because it tends to create a "me vs. them" mentality. The desire to hold on to our possessions makes us believe that every person we meet wants to deprive us of them. On the other hand, the habit of evaluating people based strictly on how much of a potential threat they are to our children also erects unnecessary walls. Even the steps we take to protect our own hearts from hurt can separate us from interactions that could pay us back a thousandfold.
I'm not saying yearning for security is wrong. I'm saying that left to our own devices we tend to want the wrong kinds of safety and use inappropriate means to accomplish them. I believe we're better off commending our stuff, our children, our hearts and yes, even our community to God and trusting that He will both provide and protect, to His greater glory. So I'm not looking for the "I" or the "we." I'm going for the "Him."
What did you see today?
7/09/2009
I saw a bumper sticker
Context
As I was driving to my volunteer job today I saw a bumper sticker on a pickup truck that said, "An armed man is a citizen. An unarmed man is a subject." A quick Google search reveals that "armed=citizen, unarmed=subject" is a common internet trope. I had never heard it before today.
Commentary
I am a religious pacifist. I am not, however, totally anti-gun. Biathlon is my favorite Winter Olympic sport and I actually gave a pro-Second Amendment speech at the American Legion's National Oratorical Contest (of course, I was younger then). However, I am completely flabbergasted by the idea that weapons are our most important, or if I'm to take the bumper sticker literally, only tool of citizenship.
Perhaps I'm overthinking this, but I'd rather be accused of overthinking something than underthinking it. I mean, if your gun is what makes you a citizen, why don't we have an armed coup d'etat every time a pro-gun control candidate is elected? Obviously the ballot box, the peaceful protest, the letter-writing campaign from hell and even the liberally-biased mainstream media (as an actual liberal, that last one gives me a giggle, but I digress) are insignificant props, so why use them?
If I were to be really mean (and I'm in that kind of mood, because this is the dumbest political slogan I've seen all week), I'd say the "must be armed to be a citizen" folks are rank cowards. Think about it. What they're saying is that if they don't have a gun available, they can be made to do anything. Or perhaps, since we know the government is unlikely to be unarmed, they're saying that if someone else holds a gun to their head, they'll do whatever they're told. I know the first one's not true of me and I'm hoping the second isn't either.
In the end, I guess that's the foundation of my pacifism: the belief that there are all kinds of things that are mightier than the sword, and the mightiest of all is the will of God. To which we're all subject.
What did you see today?
As I was driving to my volunteer job today I saw a bumper sticker on a pickup truck that said, "An armed man is a citizen. An unarmed man is a subject." A quick Google search reveals that "armed=citizen, unarmed=subject" is a common internet trope. I had never heard it before today.
Commentary
I am a religious pacifist. I am not, however, totally anti-gun. Biathlon is my favorite Winter Olympic sport and I actually gave a pro-Second Amendment speech at the American Legion's National Oratorical Contest (of course, I was younger then). However, I am completely flabbergasted by the idea that weapons are our most important, or if I'm to take the bumper sticker literally, only tool of citizenship.
Perhaps I'm overthinking this, but I'd rather be accused of overthinking something than underthinking it. I mean, if your gun is what makes you a citizen, why don't we have an armed coup d'etat every time a pro-gun control candidate is elected? Obviously the ballot box, the peaceful protest, the letter-writing campaign from hell and even the liberally-biased mainstream media (as an actual liberal, that last one gives me a giggle, but I digress) are insignificant props, so why use them?
If I were to be really mean (and I'm in that kind of mood, because this is the dumbest political slogan I've seen all week), I'd say the "must be armed to be a citizen" folks are rank cowards. Think about it. What they're saying is that if they don't have a gun available, they can be made to do anything. Or perhaps, since we know the government is unlikely to be unarmed, they're saying that if someone else holds a gun to their head, they'll do whatever they're told. I know the first one's not true of me and I'm hoping the second isn't either.
In the end, I guess that's the foundation of my pacifism: the belief that there are all kinds of things that are mightier than the sword, and the mightiest of all is the will of God. To which we're all subject.
What did you see today?
6/10/2009
I saw routing flags
Context
Because Shreve Memorial Library has 20 branches and uses a hub-and-spoke model to move materials around(similar to this one, but we try not to lose your luggage ;-)), we have pre-printed, color-coded routing flags that we stick in and sometimes on materials that say where they're going. The problem is, once the item arrives at its destination, the flag becomes temporarily useless. Nobody is trying to send things from the Main Library to the Main Library, after all. So each branch, when they've received a sizable number of these things with their name on them, bundles the flags up and sends them back to the Main Library hub. Our Interlibrary Loans Department is normally responsible for routing both the traveling material and the flags themselves.
I occasionally receive items (correspondence or pieces of hardware I need to look at) with Main Library flags attached to them. Since I receive so few I don't bother to give them to Interlibrary Loans; I just drop them off at the next branch I happen to visit. So I was looking at the three or four flags sitting on my desk awaiting redistribution today.
Commentary
I am not much of an environmentalist. I like to think this is not a character flaw on my part, but just a question of some other aspects of life taking higher priority. However, I do like the "reduce, reuse, recycle" mantra and try to apply it when I can. That's why I like the routing flags; they are single scraps of paper that can be reused over and over again.
So there's something that some of my coworkers do that drives me straight up a wall: they write my name and/or my floor on the flag, which renders it un-reusable. Oh sure, I'm going to be sent more mail at some point in the future, but no one's going to hold on to the routing flag with my name on it waiting for that eventuality. The floor designation's unnecessary anyway; it's Interlibrary Loans' job to know where everyone is in the Main Library. And if you want to attach my name, use a separate piece of paper; don't invalidate the routing flag! See, I told you I get up in arms about this.
So as I was looking at the unsullied, still-reusable flags on my desk, I was wondering why people don't just "do right" in this respect. It's something I frequently wonder about and I've come to the following conclusion: it's because they don't see the world the way I do. There is some quantity of people that don't look at an item that can easily be reused and say to themselves, "I should do everything I can to make that happen."
My first instinct in situations like this is to ponder what I can do to make people change. 45 years of life experience have actually taught me the answer: nothing. The good news is, recent religious exploration has convinced me that it's not only impossible to make everyone conform to my view of the world, it's not even desirable.
God is vast and vastly creative. No one person can perceive, appreciate and participate in all that He is doing. So our different ways of seeing the world are a gift we can offer to the Lord and to each other. For example, when I interact with a friend who thinks airline travel is immoral because of the ecological impact, I get to learn that just owning a Prius isn't enough to call myself an environmentalist, and she gets to see that people can hold other priorities in good faith, like wanting to build community through travel. Everybody gets to grow!
Share with me what you saw today!
Because Shreve Memorial Library has 20 branches and uses a hub-and-spoke model to move materials around(similar to this one, but we try not to lose your luggage ;-)), we have pre-printed, color-coded routing flags that we stick in and sometimes on materials that say where they're going. The problem is, once the item arrives at its destination, the flag becomes temporarily useless. Nobody is trying to send things from the Main Library to the Main Library, after all. So each branch, when they've received a sizable number of these things with their name on them, bundles the flags up and sends them back to the Main Library hub. Our Interlibrary Loans Department is normally responsible for routing both the traveling material and the flags themselves.
I occasionally receive items (correspondence or pieces of hardware I need to look at) with Main Library flags attached to them. Since I receive so few I don't bother to give them to Interlibrary Loans; I just drop them off at the next branch I happen to visit. So I was looking at the three or four flags sitting on my desk awaiting redistribution today.
Commentary
I am not much of an environmentalist. I like to think this is not a character flaw on my part, but just a question of some other aspects of life taking higher priority. However, I do like the "reduce, reuse, recycle" mantra and try to apply it when I can. That's why I like the routing flags; they are single scraps of paper that can be reused over and over again.
So there's something that some of my coworkers do that drives me straight up a wall: they write my name and/or my floor on the flag, which renders it un-reusable. Oh sure, I'm going to be sent more mail at some point in the future, but no one's going to hold on to the routing flag with my name on it waiting for that eventuality. The floor designation's unnecessary anyway; it's Interlibrary Loans' job to know where everyone is in the Main Library. And if you want to attach my name, use a separate piece of paper; don't invalidate the routing flag! See, I told you I get up in arms about this.
So as I was looking at the unsullied, still-reusable flags on my desk, I was wondering why people don't just "do right" in this respect. It's something I frequently wonder about and I've come to the following conclusion: it's because they don't see the world the way I do. There is some quantity of people that don't look at an item that can easily be reused and say to themselves, "I should do everything I can to make that happen."
My first instinct in situations like this is to ponder what I can do to make people change. 45 years of life experience have actually taught me the answer: nothing. The good news is, recent religious exploration has convinced me that it's not only impossible to make everyone conform to my view of the world, it's not even desirable.
God is vast and vastly creative. No one person can perceive, appreciate and participate in all that He is doing. So our different ways of seeing the world are a gift we can offer to the Lord and to each other. For example, when I interact with a friend who thinks airline travel is immoral because of the ecological impact, I get to learn that just owning a Prius isn't enough to call myself an environmentalist, and she gets to see that people can hold other priorities in good faith, like wanting to build community through travel. Everybody gets to grow!
Share with me what you saw today!
2/08/2009
I saw a group of unfaithful people
Context
I had a dream this morning. It started in a church. I was there with my husband and I had decided I wasn’t interested in the proceedings, so I went by myself to an area in the rear where the pews were turned backwards and I could hang out without really paying attention to what was going on.
After a time a woman rose up to speak to the church. She said that she and a group of others were going to leave the church, which was called Nassaret, because of its teachings. I was interested in this development, so I looked over the back of my pew to see the power point presentation she was doing.
She mentioned several offensive things that had been said at Nassaret, including that it was OK to look at nudity. None of the things she said were preachings that would bother me in a church, but even though I didn’t agree with her I remember admiring the zeal behind her words.
After a time I saw the separatist group again. They were readying a boat, so I guess they were planning a major geographic exodus, rather than just starting another church nearby. I met some of the other people involved in the movement, including a drummer who was playing some music for people to work by. Now that I’m awake and remembering this dream, I realize that the drummer was the administrator of a nursing home where I do some volunteer work.
Another period of time passed and as I was going down a street near my house I saw the drummer again, drumming between orange cones that had been set in the street to reserve the lane for her. I was dismayed because I realized this meant the group hadn’t separated themselves at all. Sure enough, following the cones I found that they were part of a fundraising effort and they led back to the boat the group had been preparing. There were tons of people on board, including all the separatists and all the people from Nassaret.
I found the woman who had started the movement and asked her what had happened. She said they had found out they didn’t really need to create a schism and everything was going to be all right. Suspicious, I asked who had told her so. She said, “He’s right here!” and took me into another room to meet him. “This is Senator [Something] Neutral.” As soon as I saw him my suspicions were concerned. He was a servant of the devil.
“Nice to see you again,” I said, putting out my hand to shake. He shook it and said, “likewise.” Then I said, “begone!” and he said a phrase I didn’t know, presumably “bite me” in some ancient language.
“Begone!” I said again, and he gave no response. “Do you really want me to say it a third time, with the puff of smoke and everything?” He shrugged.
“Begone!” I said and he did in fact disappear in a puff of smoke.
The former leader of the separatist group was appalled. “I’m going to have you put in jail!”
“Do it! For God’s sake!” I said this in anger, and then stopped because it seemed an inappropriate time to be using the Lord’s name in vain. Then I realized I really was speaking for God’s sake so it wasn’t in vain. I said it again, “For God’s sake!” A third time, and deadly serious. “For God’s sake, follow through on one thing you promise Him you’ll do!” Then I woke up.
Commentary
I believe this dream came from God so it doesn't require a lot of commentary, but I do have a couple of things to say.
It was a dream, so my conscious mind may have changed some aspects in order to make it work as a narrative. I do clearly remember the exchange with the Senator and the final thing I said to the woman is a verbatim transcription.
I don't know if this dream is for me or for someone else. I can't think of anything I've backslid on recently, but that doesn't mean it hasn't happened. If it is for you then I'm glad to have supplied it.
In Revelation 3:16 God says, "because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I am about to spit you out of my mouth."
What did you see today?
I had a dream this morning. It started in a church. I was there with my husband and I had decided I wasn’t interested in the proceedings, so I went by myself to an area in the rear where the pews were turned backwards and I could hang out without really paying attention to what was going on.
After a time a woman rose up to speak to the church. She said that she and a group of others were going to leave the church, which was called Nassaret, because of its teachings. I was interested in this development, so I looked over the back of my pew to see the power point presentation she was doing.
She mentioned several offensive things that had been said at Nassaret, including that it was OK to look at nudity. None of the things she said were preachings that would bother me in a church, but even though I didn’t agree with her I remember admiring the zeal behind her words.
After a time I saw the separatist group again. They were readying a boat, so I guess they were planning a major geographic exodus, rather than just starting another church nearby. I met some of the other people involved in the movement, including a drummer who was playing some music for people to work by. Now that I’m awake and remembering this dream, I realize that the drummer was the administrator of a nursing home where I do some volunteer work.
Another period of time passed and as I was going down a street near my house I saw the drummer again, drumming between orange cones that had been set in the street to reserve the lane for her. I was dismayed because I realized this meant the group hadn’t separated themselves at all. Sure enough, following the cones I found that they were part of a fundraising effort and they led back to the boat the group had been preparing. There were tons of people on board, including all the separatists and all the people from Nassaret.
I found the woman who had started the movement and asked her what had happened. She said they had found out they didn’t really need to create a schism and everything was going to be all right. Suspicious, I asked who had told her so. She said, “He’s right here!” and took me into another room to meet him. “This is Senator [Something] Neutral.” As soon as I saw him my suspicions were concerned. He was a servant of the devil.
“Nice to see you again,” I said, putting out my hand to shake. He shook it and said, “likewise.” Then I said, “begone!” and he said a phrase I didn’t know, presumably “bite me” in some ancient language.
“Begone!” I said again, and he gave no response. “Do you really want me to say it a third time, with the puff of smoke and everything?” He shrugged.
“Begone!” I said and he did in fact disappear in a puff of smoke.
The former leader of the separatist group was appalled. “I’m going to have you put in jail!”
“Do it! For God’s sake!” I said this in anger, and then stopped because it seemed an inappropriate time to be using the Lord’s name in vain. Then I realized I really was speaking for God’s sake so it wasn’t in vain. I said it again, “For God’s sake!” A third time, and deadly serious. “For God’s sake, follow through on one thing you promise Him you’ll do!” Then I woke up.
Commentary
I believe this dream came from God so it doesn't require a lot of commentary, but I do have a couple of things to say.
It was a dream, so my conscious mind may have changed some aspects in order to make it work as a narrative. I do clearly remember the exchange with the Senator and the final thing I said to the woman is a verbatim transcription.
I don't know if this dream is for me or for someone else. I can't think of anything I've backslid on recently, but that doesn't mean it hasn't happened. If it is for you then I'm glad to have supplied it.
In Revelation 3:16 God says, "because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I am about to spit you out of my mouth."
What did you see today?
6/21/2008
I heard Friends discussing God's nature
Context
In Friends' meeting today we revisited a traditional topic: does God care about/control everything that happens? I am on the "way yes" side of this argument, but several other attenders view God as taking a more hands-off approach. This discussion, possibly because we live in the South, often centers on whether or not God influences the results of football games.
Commentary
Yes, I think God is involved in football. I don't advocate the use of prayer to try to sway Him one way or the other, but in my opinion He does care. I guess this is because I believe, like Amy Grant, that "we're just here to learn to love Him," so anywhere I learn things, I see God at work.
And I get quite an education from football. How-to-live lessons like: "a good game plan has to have both commitment and flexibility built in," and "the best predictor of ultimate success is your response to failure." Also: "every member of a team contributes to the triumph of the whole."
I also learn about God's creativity. I am awestruck when I watch what football players can do with their bodies, minds and hearts. God created each of those things, so watching is an opportunity to give Him glory.
I think this belief of mine makes particular sense in the context of this blog. After all, the whole point of it is to see God everywhere. Right?
What did you hear today?
In Friends' meeting today we revisited a traditional topic: does God care about/control everything that happens? I am on the "way yes" side of this argument, but several other attenders view God as taking a more hands-off approach. This discussion, possibly because we live in the South, often centers on whether or not God influences the results of football games.
Commentary
Yes, I think God is involved in football. I don't advocate the use of prayer to try to sway Him one way or the other, but in my opinion He does care. I guess this is because I believe, like Amy Grant, that "we're just here to learn to love Him," so anywhere I learn things, I see God at work.
And I get quite an education from football. How-to-live lessons like: "a good game plan has to have both commitment and flexibility built in," and "the best predictor of ultimate success is your response to failure." Also: "every member of a team contributes to the triumph of the whole."
I also learn about God's creativity. I am awestruck when I watch what football players can do with their bodies, minds and hearts. God created each of those things, so watching is an opportunity to give Him glory.
I think this belief of mine makes particular sense in the context of this blog. After all, the whole point of it is to see God everywhere. Right?
What did you hear today?
6/04/2008
I saw an odd post on an e-mail list
Context
I belong to an e-mail list called PUBLIB, which is directed at public librarians. Threads on subscription e-mail lists like this one usually start with a question or an invitation to offer advice, information or opinions on a particular topic, which are then responded to.
Recently, a library school student named Ron Creswell made various postings to the list (example here). His postings appeared in the form of essays on various topics which had not been prompted by previous discussion. As written, they did not appear to invite further discourse.
Commentary
After receiving three or four of Mr. Creswell's missives, many participants on PUBLIB, including myself, came to the conclusion that he had been given an assignment at library school to participate in an e-mail list. This is a standard assignment, one that is calculated to introduce students to the various modes of communication used by working librarians. It seems unlikely that Ron's instructor intended for him to dump seemingly random ruminations on the profession at large.
Once this conclusion had been drawn, list members' stated opinions of these postings basically broke down into four categories:
1) This guy is an idiot who is posting inappropriate material to the list and wasting our time. He would make a bad librarian.
2) This guy's teachers at library school are idiots for not teaching him the appropriate professional communication skills. They are turning out bad librarians.
3) We should be nice to this guy. Everybody makes mistakes.
4) This is a teachable moment where we could let this guy know where he went astray and what e-mail lists are actually used for.
In a perfect world we would all have had the #4 response. But I didn't. In fact, I remember being in distinct solidarity with the #1 folks, although I didn't post to the list.
As a teacher and a Christian, I find my response appalling. What is it in me that made me see my brother stumbling and decide that screaming and shaking my fist was the appropriate response? Sin, of course, but what specifically was going on?
Well, first off, I wasn't looking at my brother at all. I was looking at how his actions affected me (wasting my time). Then I started thinking, "somebody needs to tell this guy he's making a fool of himself in front of a bunch of people he may be working with someday." Not me, mind you, but "somebody."
This response might fall under the category "diffusion of responsibility." You can find a good explanation of this and other similar sociological phenomena here. I think that given the number of people who participate in PUBLIB who are more eloquent and venerable than me, I just didn't think it was my job to intervene.
So is this humility, appeal to authority (an insane thought if you know me personally), or just a method of avoiding difficult situations? Realistically, it's probably a combination of the three, but I know the third is of no merit and I should do my best to eliminate it from my repertoire.
Well, humility and standing aside are good things, right? Maybe, but it's not like I had nothing to contribute. I was well aware that Mr. Creswell was doing something unwise and I could have said so, maybe privately to him, maybe on the list itself with the aim of building community.
As for the appeal to authority, that actually has a lot of merit if I'm appealing to the correct authority. Ultimately, the student's well-being is not in the hands of his teachers or the list moderators. It's in God's hands. And if you listen to Jewel, you know that our hands are God's hands (listen to the song "My Hands" off the 1998 Spirit album if you don't know what I mean).
What did you see today?
I belong to an e-mail list called PUBLIB, which is directed at public librarians. Threads on subscription e-mail lists like this one usually start with a question or an invitation to offer advice, information or opinions on a particular topic, which are then responded to.
Recently, a library school student named Ron Creswell made various postings to the list (example here). His postings appeared in the form of essays on various topics which had not been prompted by previous discussion. As written, they did not appear to invite further discourse.
Commentary
After receiving three or four of Mr. Creswell's missives, many participants on PUBLIB, including myself, came to the conclusion that he had been given an assignment at library school to participate in an e-mail list. This is a standard assignment, one that is calculated to introduce students to the various modes of communication used by working librarians. It seems unlikely that Ron's instructor intended for him to dump seemingly random ruminations on the profession at large.
Once this conclusion had been drawn, list members' stated opinions of these postings basically broke down into four categories:
1) This guy is an idiot who is posting inappropriate material to the list and wasting our time. He would make a bad librarian.
2) This guy's teachers at library school are idiots for not teaching him the appropriate professional communication skills. They are turning out bad librarians.
3) We should be nice to this guy. Everybody makes mistakes.
4) This is a teachable moment where we could let this guy know where he went astray and what e-mail lists are actually used for.
In a perfect world we would all have had the #4 response. But I didn't. In fact, I remember being in distinct solidarity with the #1 folks, although I didn't post to the list.
As a teacher and a Christian, I find my response appalling. What is it in me that made me see my brother stumbling and decide that screaming and shaking my fist was the appropriate response? Sin, of course, but what specifically was going on?
Well, first off, I wasn't looking at my brother at all. I was looking at how his actions affected me (wasting my time). Then I started thinking, "somebody needs to tell this guy he's making a fool of himself in front of a bunch of people he may be working with someday." Not me, mind you, but "somebody."
This response might fall under the category "diffusion of responsibility." You can find a good explanation of this and other similar sociological phenomena here. I think that given the number of people who participate in PUBLIB who are more eloquent and venerable than me, I just didn't think it was my job to intervene.
So is this humility, appeal to authority (an insane thought if you know me personally), or just a method of avoiding difficult situations? Realistically, it's probably a combination of the three, but I know the third is of no merit and I should do my best to eliminate it from my repertoire.
Well, humility and standing aside are good things, right? Maybe, but it's not like I had nothing to contribute. I was well aware that Mr. Creswell was doing something unwise and I could have said so, maybe privately to him, maybe on the list itself with the aim of building community.
As for the appeal to authority, that actually has a lot of merit if I'm appealing to the correct authority. Ultimately, the student's well-being is not in the hands of his teachers or the list moderators. It's in God's hands. And if you listen to Jewel, you know that our hands are God's hands (listen to the song "My Hands" off the 1998 Spirit album if you don't know what I mean).
What did you see today?
3/16/2008
I heard a sermon on the prodigal son
Context
I'm in Dallas today, so I attended a worship service at King of Glory Lutheran Church. Pastor Jon Bustard preached on, among other things, the prodigal son story from Luke. The text and a recording of his sermon of the week usually get posted to the King of Glory website, but as of this writing, they're not up yet.
Commentary
I think Pastor Bustard preached a great sermon today. That's really saying something coming from me because I hate preaching. It's even more surprising because, being having been a Christian all my life, I've probably heard at least 25 prodigal son sermons. But this one actually made me think about a new aspect of the story, because Pastor Bustard was challenging us to be involved in God's recovery of the rest of His prodigal children, instead of just emphasizing how happy we are that God found us.
Rationalist that I am, if I'm going to be involved in solving a problem, I need to know what causes it. Pastor Bustard's sermon made clear to me that there are two reasons the prodigal son stays away from his father, and that both of those apply to people who stay away from church today:
1) Guilt. Late in the story, the prodigal son realizes what he's done wrong and is convinced his father will never want to take him back. Today, there are many people who think, "I can't go to church. Who I am and what I've done are too awful to be in the holy presence of God." This is not true, but I think as Christians we forget that. After all, how often do we seek out child molesters to join our congregation?
2) Lack of perceived need. This is the one that really stood out for me today. As I was saying to my husband, "you can't catch the prodigal son when he's received his inheritance and he's walking away." It's kind of like the first step in Alcoholics Anonymous: "we admitted we were powerless over alcohol — that our lives had become unmanageable." Only when one's life becomes unmanageable (like when one's out slopping pigs and starts wanting their food) does one really need Christ.
This second reason made me feel worried. If people I knew had that lack of perceived need for years and years and constantly told me how unnecessary religion was in their lives, would I get lulled into inaction and not be prepared or available when their need suddenly came up and punched them in the stomach? I hope not, and here are two ways I can think of to prevent it:
1) I can insulate them a little. When they lack a perceived need I can say things like, "I understand that this is not necessary in your life, but here's how grace works for me," kind of like programming 911 into their spiritual speed dial in case of emergency.
2) I can keep my eyes open. I can recognize that opportunities to bring back prodigals may be sudden and brief and be prepared for them at all times. In other words, I can stay awake and keep plenty of oil in my lamp.
What did you hear today?
I'm in Dallas today, so I attended a worship service at King of Glory Lutheran Church. Pastor Jon Bustard preached on, among other things, the prodigal son story from Luke. The text and a recording of his sermon of the week usually get posted to the King of Glory website, but as of this writing, they're not up yet.
Commentary
I think Pastor Bustard preached a great sermon today. That's really saying something coming from me because I hate preaching. It's even more surprising because, being having been a Christian all my life, I've probably heard at least 25 prodigal son sermons. But this one actually made me think about a new aspect of the story, because Pastor Bustard was challenging us to be involved in God's recovery of the rest of His prodigal children, instead of just emphasizing how happy we are that God found us.
Rationalist that I am, if I'm going to be involved in solving a problem, I need to know what causes it. Pastor Bustard's sermon made clear to me that there are two reasons the prodigal son stays away from his father, and that both of those apply to people who stay away from church today:
1) Guilt. Late in the story, the prodigal son realizes what he's done wrong and is convinced his father will never want to take him back. Today, there are many people who think, "I can't go to church. Who I am and what I've done are too awful to be in the holy presence of God." This is not true, but I think as Christians we forget that. After all, how often do we seek out child molesters to join our congregation?
2) Lack of perceived need. This is the one that really stood out for me today. As I was saying to my husband, "you can't catch the prodigal son when he's received his inheritance and he's walking away." It's kind of like the first step in Alcoholics Anonymous: "we admitted we were powerless over alcohol — that our lives had become unmanageable." Only when one's life becomes unmanageable (like when one's out slopping pigs and starts wanting their food) does one really need Christ.
This second reason made me feel worried. If people I knew had that lack of perceived need for years and years and constantly told me how unnecessary religion was in their lives, would I get lulled into inaction and not be prepared or available when their need suddenly came up and punched them in the stomach? I hope not, and here are two ways I can think of to prevent it:
1) I can insulate them a little. When they lack a perceived need I can say things like, "I understand that this is not necessary in your life, but here's how grace works for me," kind of like programming 911 into their spiritual speed dial in case of emergency.
2) I can keep my eyes open. I can recognize that opportunities to bring back prodigals may be sudden and brief and be prepared for them at all times. In other words, I can stay awake and keep plenty of oil in my lamp.
What did you hear today?
3/06/2008
I saw an editorial about Brett Favre
Context
Brett Favre, the starting quarterback for the Green Bay Packers for over 15 years, retired on Tuesday. Mike Lopresti wrote an editorial column on this event on Wednesday, but I only got around to reading it this morning.
Commentary
It must be hard to write a summing up column on Brett Favre's career. I think Lopresti did a good job, but it seems like a path fraught with possible missteps. I mean, you want to give appropriate tribute, but there's some things you just can't say.
1) You can't say Favre was the best quarterback in the NFL. At least, I don't think you can because there are guys like Peyton Manning who are both more technically proficient and strategize better.
2) You could say he started 275 consecutive games, but that seems like damning with faint praise. In the NFL, starting that many games takes some determination, sure, but it also takes a measure of good old-fashioned luck.
3) On the other hand, you can't say he was the luckiest quarterback in the NFL. The man had some bad things happen to him during his career. His father died. He fought an addiction to painkillers. His wife was diagnosed with breast cancer (she beat it, but still!).
4) He holds a bunch of passing records, but those are somewhat related to his longevity, so they might not be the appropriate legacy either.
5) Even with all those consecutive starts, you can't really label him as consistent. As Lopresti points out, Favre last career pass was intercepted by the New York Giants on their way to the Super Bowl. In 275 starts, it was not exactly his first interception. Or his first one that lost the game for his team.
Now, you may think I'm ragging on Brett. Far from it. I was seriously considering wearing a black armband to work on Wednesday because I was that broken up by the news of his retirement, and I'm a Detroit Lions fan! It's just that his career kind of defies description in traditional terms.
So I'm going to take a non-traditional approach: Brett Favre was the best Brett Favre to ever play in the NFL. There has never been another quarterback like him and probably never will be. The combination of "yay, yay, yay," and "omigod, omigod, omigod" in every game he played. The passes he threw that should have never been caught (but were). The passes he should have never thrown (but did). The goofy "I can't believe they pay me money to play this game" grin. And with all that, yes, the probably unbeatable number of consecutive starts. The off-the-field challenges. The whole Brett Favre experience that many of us feel like we lived through with him.
In the final analysis, isn't that the best tribute to be worthy of? He took the strengths and weaknesses God gave him and crafted an unforgettably unique career out of them. That's something we can all aspire to. Maybe for even longer than 275 consecutive Sundays.
What did you see today?
Brett Favre, the starting quarterback for the Green Bay Packers for over 15 years, retired on Tuesday. Mike Lopresti wrote an editorial column on this event on Wednesday, but I only got around to reading it this morning.
Commentary
It must be hard to write a summing up column on Brett Favre's career. I think Lopresti did a good job, but it seems like a path fraught with possible missteps. I mean, you want to give appropriate tribute, but there's some things you just can't say.
1) You can't say Favre was the best quarterback in the NFL. At least, I don't think you can because there are guys like Peyton Manning who are both more technically proficient and strategize better.
2) You could say he started 275 consecutive games, but that seems like damning with faint praise. In the NFL, starting that many games takes some determination, sure, but it also takes a measure of good old-fashioned luck.
3) On the other hand, you can't say he was the luckiest quarterback in the NFL. The man had some bad things happen to him during his career. His father died. He fought an addiction to painkillers. His wife was diagnosed with breast cancer (she beat it, but still!).
4) He holds a bunch of passing records, but those are somewhat related to his longevity, so they might not be the appropriate legacy either.
5) Even with all those consecutive starts, you can't really label him as consistent. As Lopresti points out, Favre last career pass was intercepted by the New York Giants on their way to the Super Bowl. In 275 starts, it was not exactly his first interception. Or his first one that lost the game for his team.
Now, you may think I'm ragging on Brett. Far from it. I was seriously considering wearing a black armband to work on Wednesday because I was that broken up by the news of his retirement, and I'm a Detroit Lions fan! It's just that his career kind of defies description in traditional terms.
So I'm going to take a non-traditional approach: Brett Favre was the best Brett Favre to ever play in the NFL. There has never been another quarterback like him and probably never will be. The combination of "yay, yay, yay," and "omigod, omigod, omigod" in every game he played. The passes he threw that should have never been caught (but were). The passes he should have never thrown (but did). The goofy "I can't believe they pay me money to play this game" grin. And with all that, yes, the probably unbeatable number of consecutive starts. The off-the-field challenges. The whole Brett Favre experience that many of us feel like we lived through with him.
In the final analysis, isn't that the best tribute to be worthy of? He took the strengths and weaknesses God gave him and crafted an unforgettably unique career out of them. That's something we can all aspire to. Maybe for even longer than 275 consecutive Sundays.
What did you see today?
11/10/2007
I saw a column about safety
Context
Monica Carter Tagore is a columnist for The Shreveport Times. Today is Saturday. In Friday's column she discussed some "how to stay safe" responses to a couple of recent incidents in the area.
Commentary
Even though Monica is my favorite columnist in the Times, I don't read the paper religiously enough to catch everything she writes. In fact, I was only reading the Friday paper today because it's my husband's (and dog's) job to get the morning paper and he wasn't up yet. I'm glad to be able to show you the column on the Internet, because the newspaper version had a somewhat nonsensical title.
The reason I like Ms. Tagore's columns so much is not because I always agree with them, but because they're almost always thought provoking. I didn't agree with her definitions of "common sense" and "smarts" today, nor with her solution to the "kid in peril" situation (I never think fear-mongering is a good way to promote safety), but reading the column did set me to thinking about safety in general.
I'm often troubled by how we approach this issue, especially our inclination to look to "preventing bad things" as the solution to society's ills. Don't get me wrong; some forms of prevention are wonderful (life without smallpox vaccines, anyone? I didn't think so.). But I think there are at least three things we need to consider when assessing the value of preventative medicine for a given situation:
1) Nothing will make you 100% safe.
Law enforcement,, popular culture and urban legend tell us that if someone is really determined to steal from us, they will find a way. Even God is not particularly impressed with our efforts to protect ourselves from loss.
2) Sometimes our instinct to just prevent bad things from happening keeps us from better long-term solutions.
I live in Louisiana. I'm nowhere near New Orleans and Shreveport got only one really rainy day out of Rita, but the "how to prevent hurricane damage" debate has an impact statewide on politics and economics.
In middle school I learned that levees are a pretty dicey form of flood prevention, because a body of water that is not permitted to flood occasionally will continually build up silt on its bed. So the water level keeps getting higher and you have to keep building bigger levees. If you do that all around a city over several decades, you end up with a city that's essentially surrounded by levee-walls. When the water finally does wash over, which it will because nothing makes you 100% safe, it's almost impossible to remove. That, in case you were puzzled about it, is what happened to New Orleans.
3) Sometimes it's better go through a bad thing and come out on the other side than to prevent it.
In the Bible, two people avoid death completely: Enoch and Elijah (Tip 'o the hat to Shygost, my husband's Go teacher for reminding me of this fact.). And Enoch and Elijah are obviously two of God's favorite people. But God Himself, in the form of Jesus, did not avoid death. He died and rose again, all for the purpose of ending the sting of death forever.
As a beneficiary, I think this was by far the better result. Frankly, knowing I have a God like that makes me feel pretty darn safe under any circumstances.
What did you see today?
Monica Carter Tagore is a columnist for The Shreveport Times. Today is Saturday. In Friday's column she discussed some "how to stay safe" responses to a couple of recent incidents in the area.
Commentary
Even though Monica is my favorite columnist in the Times, I don't read the paper religiously enough to catch everything she writes. In fact, I was only reading the Friday paper today because it's my husband's (and dog's) job to get the morning paper and he wasn't up yet. I'm glad to be able to show you the column on the Internet, because the newspaper version had a somewhat nonsensical title.
The reason I like Ms. Tagore's columns so much is not because I always agree with them, but because they're almost always thought provoking. I didn't agree with her definitions of "common sense" and "smarts" today, nor with her solution to the "kid in peril" situation (I never think fear-mongering is a good way to promote safety), but reading the column did set me to thinking about safety in general.
I'm often troubled by how we approach this issue, especially our inclination to look to "preventing bad things" as the solution to society's ills. Don't get me wrong; some forms of prevention are wonderful (life without smallpox vaccines, anyone? I didn't think so.). But I think there are at least three things we need to consider when assessing the value of preventative medicine for a given situation:
1) Nothing will make you 100% safe.
Law enforcement,, popular culture and urban legend tell us that if someone is really determined to steal from us, they will find a way. Even God is not particularly impressed with our efforts to protect ourselves from loss.
2) Sometimes our instinct to just prevent bad things from happening keeps us from better long-term solutions.
I live in Louisiana. I'm nowhere near New Orleans and Shreveport got only one really rainy day out of Rita, but the "how to prevent hurricane damage" debate has an impact statewide on politics and economics.
In middle school I learned that levees are a pretty dicey form of flood prevention, because a body of water that is not permitted to flood occasionally will continually build up silt on its bed. So the water level keeps getting higher and you have to keep building bigger levees. If you do that all around a city over several decades, you end up with a city that's essentially surrounded by levee-walls. When the water finally does wash over, which it will because nothing makes you 100% safe, it's almost impossible to remove. That, in case you were puzzled about it, is what happened to New Orleans.
3) Sometimes it's better go through a bad thing and come out on the other side than to prevent it.
In the Bible, two people avoid death completely: Enoch and Elijah (Tip 'o the hat to Shygost, my husband's Go teacher for reminding me of this fact.). And Enoch and Elijah are obviously two of God's favorite people. But God Himself, in the form of Jesus, did not avoid death. He died and rose again, all for the purpose of ending the sting of death forever.
As a beneficiary, I think this was by far the better result. Frankly, knowing I have a God like that makes me feel pretty darn safe under any circumstances.
What did you see today?
8/21/2007
I saw people sitting on benches.
Context
I was passing the Caddo Parish Courthouse on the way to the library today. There's a nice picture of it here at the website for Louisiana Film and Television (look for photo #25) that shows the benches out front. Today, as is usually the case, there were people sitting on the benches who didn't look like the people one normally sees inside the courthouse (lawyers, uniformed employees of the parish, etc.). Most of them didn't seem to be doing anything.
Commentary
A note for those of you who have never lived in Louisiana: a "parish" around here is like a "county" everywhere else in the United States. Because of recent tax law changes, when you order stuff on the phone you might have noticed that the operator will ask you what county you live in. I get a perverse kick out of saying, "I don't live in a county; I live in a parish." Sadly, I don't think they usually have a separate field for that in their form.
I remember that when I was a small child I used to frequently tell my mother I was bored. I also remember precisely when I stopped telling her that: it was when I learned to read. Members of my family will testify that subsequently there were many days when I accomplished little else besides devouring books, but at least I always had something to do! And it is still the case that I occupy some of my time with stuff like reading, watching TV, and surfing the Internet. I call these "input activities," because like #5, I'm just gathering input.
I don't spend nearly as much time on input as I did when I was kid, because now I'm expected to produce "output," like by bringing home a paycheck, distributing that money to other people, washing dishes, walking the dog, writing my blog, etc. I find I have a love/hate relationship with these obligations (even the blog-writing!). Sometimes I don't like anyone depending on me, because I really hate to disappoint people (or cats or dogs or birds) by not fulfilling every expectation. On the other hand, being counted on to perform a particular task, even a mundane one, makes me feel like an important part of God's plan. So I'm motivated to produce some output.
This led me to think about why the people sitting by the courthouse might not have anything to do. It's possible they didn't want to be doing anything, but assuming they were, in fact, bored, I wonder how that happened. If I start from the assumption that they are somewhat finanacially disadvantaged, it's possible that they didn't have the resources for a lot of "input activities," although the library has free books and computers right across the street. What worries me more is the idea that people might not have any "output activities" that they're expected to perform. Love/hate relationship aside, I would really hate it if no one depended on me for anything! How would I justify my existence?
Digging deeper, what would lead to someone not being expected to do anything? Well, maybe it starts from a scenario I remember from my own childhood. I was the youngest in my family by quite a bit, so I often felt like there was nothing special for me to do because my siblings had already taken all the available roles (athlete, brain, and yes, even troublemaker). What was left for me? Maybe the people sitting on benches feel like everything's already been done and there's nothing left for them.
Or could it be worse than that? Could it be that they were depended upon at one time and fell short, so everyone in their lives has decided not to expect anything at all? How must that feel, carrying both people's disappointment and their expectation of more disappointment? Helplessness is the feeling that we can't do anything. What about the feeling that no one want us to try? Pointlessness? Irrelevance?
No way! God does not work like that. When everyone else has written us off, God still believes in us. You know how much? He put His mark of protection on the very first murderer. The most revered of His patriarchs had a speech impediment. Peter denied his savior three times in a matter of hours, and he still got to be the founder of the Christian church!
God expects great output from the most downtrodden and disappointing people and you don't want to get in the way of what God expects. So how can we get behind it instead? How can we help people who don't seem to have anything to do find their true calling? Can we start by looking through God's eyes instead of our own?
Who did you see today?
I was passing the Caddo Parish Courthouse on the way to the library today. There's a nice picture of it here at the website for Louisiana Film and Television (look for photo #25) that shows the benches out front. Today, as is usually the case, there were people sitting on the benches who didn't look like the people one normally sees inside the courthouse (lawyers, uniformed employees of the parish, etc.). Most of them didn't seem to be doing anything.
Commentary
A note for those of you who have never lived in Louisiana: a "parish" around here is like a "county" everywhere else in the United States. Because of recent tax law changes, when you order stuff on the phone you might have noticed that the operator will ask you what county you live in. I get a perverse kick out of saying, "I don't live in a county; I live in a parish." Sadly, I don't think they usually have a separate field for that in their form.
I remember that when I was a small child I used to frequently tell my mother I was bored. I also remember precisely when I stopped telling her that: it was when I learned to read. Members of my family will testify that subsequently there were many days when I accomplished little else besides devouring books, but at least I always had something to do! And it is still the case that I occupy some of my time with stuff like reading, watching TV, and surfing the Internet. I call these "input activities," because like #5, I'm just gathering input.
I don't spend nearly as much time on input as I did when I was kid, because now I'm expected to produce "output," like by bringing home a paycheck, distributing that money to other people, washing dishes, walking the dog, writing my blog, etc. I find I have a love/hate relationship with these obligations (even the blog-writing!). Sometimes I don't like anyone depending on me, because I really hate to disappoint people (or cats or dogs or birds) by not fulfilling every expectation. On the other hand, being counted on to perform a particular task, even a mundane one, makes me feel like an important part of God's plan. So I'm motivated to produce some output.
This led me to think about why the people sitting by the courthouse might not have anything to do. It's possible they didn't want to be doing anything, but assuming they were, in fact, bored, I wonder how that happened. If I start from the assumption that they are somewhat finanacially disadvantaged, it's possible that they didn't have the resources for a lot of "input activities," although the library has free books and computers right across the street. What worries me more is the idea that people might not have any "output activities" that they're expected to perform. Love/hate relationship aside, I would really hate it if no one depended on me for anything! How would I justify my existence?
Digging deeper, what would lead to someone not being expected to do anything? Well, maybe it starts from a scenario I remember from my own childhood. I was the youngest in my family by quite a bit, so I often felt like there was nothing special for me to do because my siblings had already taken all the available roles (athlete, brain, and yes, even troublemaker). What was left for me? Maybe the people sitting on benches feel like everything's already been done and there's nothing left for them.
Or could it be worse than that? Could it be that they were depended upon at one time and fell short, so everyone in their lives has decided not to expect anything at all? How must that feel, carrying both people's disappointment and their expectation of more disappointment? Helplessness is the feeling that we can't do anything. What about the feeling that no one want us to try? Pointlessness? Irrelevance?
No way! God does not work like that. When everyone else has written us off, God still believes in us. You know how much? He put His mark of protection on the very first murderer. The most revered of His patriarchs had a speech impediment. Peter denied his savior three times in a matter of hours, and he still got to be the founder of the Christian church!
God expects great output from the most downtrodden and disappointing people and you don't want to get in the way of what God expects. So how can we get behind it instead? How can we help people who don't seem to have anything to do find their true calling? Can we start by looking through God's eyes instead of our own?
Who did you see today?
7/18/2007
I heard a student compliment my patience
Context
I teach computer classes at the Shreve Memorial Library, both for staff and patrons. Most of my students in the patron classes are seniors. Today a student praised me for being patient even though they learn slowly.
Commentary
I get the "patient" comment a lot. I was taught that it's rude to reject a compliment, so I always say, "thank you," or "you're kind to say so," or whatever. However, what I was thinking today was, "it's not like I have something better to do."
Said in a certain tone of voice, the above sounds churlish, but I mean it sincerely. The library pays me to teach people to use computers, so at that moment I don't have anything else I'm supposed to be doing. I'm not actually being patient; I'm just doing my job.
In my mind, here's what impatience is: it's what happens anytime I believe my current situation (waiting in traffic, going to school, listening to an elderly aunt tell the same story for the umpteenth time) is keeping me from truly important business. Psychologically, it's a bizarre combination of helplessness and arrogance. I feel that I have no control over the circumstances, but if I did I would put my time to much better use. As a person who has a strong sense of time being a precious commodity, I can get very impatient indeed.
My religious beliefs make this a problem, though. A certain amount of helpless feeling reminds me that I'm in God's hands, so that's a good thing. However, the arrogance that asserts I can put my time to better use than God does is foolish indeed. It's forgetting what my real job on this earth is and who's the boss. I don't actually have better things to do than what He places before me.
What did you see today?
I teach computer classes at the Shreve Memorial Library, both for staff and patrons. Most of my students in the patron classes are seniors. Today a student praised me for being patient even though they learn slowly.
Commentary
I get the "patient" comment a lot. I was taught that it's rude to reject a compliment, so I always say, "thank you," or "you're kind to say so," or whatever. However, what I was thinking today was, "it's not like I have something better to do."
Said in a certain tone of voice, the above sounds churlish, but I mean it sincerely. The library pays me to teach people to use computers, so at that moment I don't have anything else I'm supposed to be doing. I'm not actually being patient; I'm just doing my job.
In my mind, here's what impatience is: it's what happens anytime I believe my current situation (waiting in traffic, going to school, listening to an elderly aunt tell the same story for the umpteenth time) is keeping me from truly important business. Psychologically, it's a bizarre combination of helplessness and arrogance. I feel that I have no control over the circumstances, but if I did I would put my time to much better use. As a person who has a strong sense of time being a precious commodity, I can get very impatient indeed.
My religious beliefs make this a problem, though. A certain amount of helpless feeling reminds me that I'm in God's hands, so that's a good thing. However, the arrogance that asserts I can put my time to better use than God does is foolish indeed. It's forgetting what my real job on this earth is and who's the boss. I don't actually have better things to do than what He places before me.
What did you see today?
10/07/2006
I saw a description of Bin Laden's fatwa
Context
I’m reading the 9/11 Commission Report. There's a link here, but I'm reading the hard copy Official Government Edition. Chapter 2 starts with a description of the “fatwa” (more about those quotation marks later) issued by Osama Bin Laden and four other men in 1998. In essence it said, “it is the duty of every Muslim to kill every American they can whenever they can.”
Commentary
First, the quotation marks. The 9/11 Commission Report states: “A fatwa is normally an interpretation of Islamic law by a respected Islamic authority.” So the Islamic equivalent of a Talmudic writing or a papal bull, I guess. Even his most ardent supporters would probably put Bin Laden in more of the “soldier” than “scholar” category, so the quotation marks represent my skepticism that he has much authority to offer interpretations of Islamic law. In fact, I imagine that the average Muslim, if she/he heard about this obligation to kill Americans before 9/11, probably said to her/himself, “yeah, ok, whatever you say, oh crazy person.”
There are people who fault Muslims for this, saying they need to be quicker to distance themselves from extremists. Why? I don’t feel a strong obligation to distance myself from the Phelps family. I just assume people understand the difference between being a traditional Christian and being, well, a member of the Phelps family.
I worry a little, though. Perhaps those of us with moderate viewpoints (now there’s a word I never thought I’d use to describe myself!) spend a little too much time gaping in astonishment at the Bin Ladens and Fred Phelps’ of this world, and not enough time saying, “there really is another viewpoint.” People who never tire of speaking out are a perfect match for the news media, who need a constant flow of stuff to report. So if one measures by sheer volume of coverage, inflammatory opinions might end up looking like the voice of the mainstream.
So for the record, God doesn’t hate anybody, Osama Bin Laden has no authority to interpret Islamic law, and my husband is empowered to make medical decisions for me if I’m unable to do so. Don’t say I didn’t tell you.
What did you see today?
I’m reading the 9/11 Commission Report. There's a link here, but I'm reading the hard copy Official Government Edition. Chapter 2 starts with a description of the “fatwa” (more about those quotation marks later) issued by Osama Bin Laden and four other men in 1998. In essence it said, “it is the duty of every Muslim to kill every American they can whenever they can.”
Commentary
First, the quotation marks. The 9/11 Commission Report states: “A fatwa is normally an interpretation of Islamic law by a respected Islamic authority.” So the Islamic equivalent of a Talmudic writing or a papal bull, I guess. Even his most ardent supporters would probably put Bin Laden in more of the “soldier” than “scholar” category, so the quotation marks represent my skepticism that he has much authority to offer interpretations of Islamic law. In fact, I imagine that the average Muslim, if she/he heard about this obligation to kill Americans before 9/11, probably said to her/himself, “yeah, ok, whatever you say, oh crazy person.”
There are people who fault Muslims for this, saying they need to be quicker to distance themselves from extremists. Why? I don’t feel a strong obligation to distance myself from the Phelps family. I just assume people understand the difference between being a traditional Christian and being, well, a member of the Phelps family.
I worry a little, though. Perhaps those of us with moderate viewpoints (now there’s a word I never thought I’d use to describe myself!) spend a little too much time gaping in astonishment at the Bin Ladens and Fred Phelps’ of this world, and not enough time saying, “there really is another viewpoint.” People who never tire of speaking out are a perfect match for the news media, who need a constant flow of stuff to report. So if one measures by sheer volume of coverage, inflammatory opinions might end up looking like the voice of the mainstream.
So for the record, God doesn’t hate anybody, Osama Bin Laden has no authority to interpret Islamic law, and my husband is empowered to make medical decisions for me if I’m unable to do so. Don’t say I didn’t tell you.
What did you see today?
2/15/2006
I saw two Bible passages close together.
Context
Continuing my reading in Luke, over the past two days I've read two accounts of Jesus performing miracles. The first is the healing of the centurion's slave (Luke 7:1-10 NRSV). The second is the raising of the son of the widow of Nain (Luke 7:11-17 NRSV).
Commentary
When I read the first of these passages, I thought, "man, I've got this Bible reading down!" The story completely supports an idea I've been exploring lately, that we get the God we expect. Like in the dear departed TV show Joan of Arcadia, where God says, "I come off snippy because you understand snippy." The centurion in the Bible story says, "I believe you can heal my slave because of my experience of how power works."
So Jesus heals the slave and praises the centurion for his faith. We get to see the trustworthy God, far more dependable in His dealings with us than vice versa.
But then we have the next story. The widow of Nain is expecting nothing from God. The story doesn't say whether she had any previous knowledge of Jesus' ministry, but I don't think it matters. Aside from the devastating reality of a woman losing her son, a widow without sons was completely without recourse in biblical times. She was, for all intents and purposes, as dead as her son. I doubt she spared a single thought for the man from Nazareth.
He thought about her, though. And raised her son from the dead. This is the God of surprising love. The Giver of unanticipated, sometimes even unwanted gifts.
It cannot be a coincidence (because I don't believe in them) that these stories are right next to each other in the Bible. I think it's important for us to realize that God will fulfill our worthy expectations and blow the others out of the water. He is the Rock that we can build on, but also Lord of all, and subject to no human whim or prediction.
What did you see today?
Continuing my reading in Luke, over the past two days I've read two accounts of Jesus performing miracles. The first is the healing of the centurion's slave (Luke 7:1-10 NRSV). The second is the raising of the son of the widow of Nain (Luke 7:11-17 NRSV).
Commentary
When I read the first of these passages, I thought, "man, I've got this Bible reading down!" The story completely supports an idea I've been exploring lately, that we get the God we expect. Like in the dear departed TV show Joan of Arcadia, where God says, "I come off snippy because you understand snippy." The centurion in the Bible story says, "I believe you can heal my slave because of my experience of how power works."
So Jesus heals the slave and praises the centurion for his faith. We get to see the trustworthy God, far more dependable in His dealings with us than vice versa.
But then we have the next story. The widow of Nain is expecting nothing from God. The story doesn't say whether she had any previous knowledge of Jesus' ministry, but I don't think it matters. Aside from the devastating reality of a woman losing her son, a widow without sons was completely without recourse in biblical times. She was, for all intents and purposes, as dead as her son. I doubt she spared a single thought for the man from Nazareth.
He thought about her, though. And raised her son from the dead. This is the God of surprising love. The Giver of unanticipated, sometimes even unwanted gifts.
It cannot be a coincidence (because I don't believe in them) that these stories are right next to each other in the Bible. I think it's important for us to realize that God will fulfill our worthy expectations and blow the others out of the water. He is the Rock that we can build on, but also Lord of all, and subject to no human whim or prediction.
What did you see today?
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