More Dangerous Than What They Believe

What happens when we can no longer declare that it is the other's politics, religion, opinions, and daily whimsical notions of how things should be, that are more dangerous than our own fundamental opposition to them? Because truly, which is more dangerous? The point of view, or how its held, carried, decried, nurtured, and beheld? Can a fundamentalist ever be right? No matter the brand, style, fashion, or degree of that fundamentalism? What happens when our own favorite flavor of fundamentalism builds a wall with our hands, while purportedly tearing it down with our voices? Fundamentalism, regardless of how loud we yell, will blindly leave us still divided, on our own side, allowing neither them a way in or, most ironically, us a way out.

With so many bodies filling roles in the burgeoning competitive industries of Wall Construction and Wall Demolition, perhaps we notice the vacancies in the vocation of path-building. Of course, if a path is intended to go through a place where a wall currently stands, some contracting work will be needed, for at least some part of the wall will have to come down. What shifts when the primary focus is not the barrier, but the path that follows?

We cannot go around throwing up walls and lines and barriers everywhere we look, claiming that our worldview is The Correct or even "ordained" worldview, and pretend that those on the other side of the wall are there because they've chosen to be, and should celebrate, rather than despise us. When we are in the wall construction business, it should not bring surprise when some want to escape to the other side of the wall to be with "them." Nor, can we go around claiming that our worldview is loaded with wall-breaking dynamite, and pretend as though the collateral damage was caused by someone on the other side of the wall, or on the same side crying that the wall should remain, when the "explosives detected" came from our hands. How often do we exchange not ideas, but only our fundamentalisms that care neither for the progress or safety we claim to seek?

Fundamentalism is inherently dualistic, and therefore closes doors. The content of one's worldview is undeniably important. But the content can be subsumed by believing that a particular worldview is universally fundamental to reality. Is there space in your system of ideas, opinions, or beliefs for someone other than yourself and "your people" (whomever they are and why-ever you claim them)? What happens when the virtue of your politics, religion, opinions, and daily whimsical notions of how things should be, is whether or not there is room enough in them for someone other than yourself to breathe?

Toys That Are Real and Technology

This Saturday, I’m officiating a wedding for a friend I’ve known since high school. She and her fiancee have chosen to have a section from the Velveteen Rabbit read during the ceremony. It became the spark for my wedding meditation and I want to share just a bit of the reflection I’ve had around this beloved children’s story.

The section begins as the Velveteen Rabbit asks the Skin Horse, “What is real?” The Rabbit is curious about what makes a toy real. The Skin Horse responds with, “It isn’t how you are made, it’s a thing that happens to you. When someone loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.”

As I’ve read this passage, I was reminded of a story I heard about MIT Professor Sherry Turkle taking her young daughter to a natural history museum. As she and her daughter observed 150 year-old, Galapagos turtles, her daughter remarked, “For what those turtles are doing, they could have just had a robot.” Professor Turkle noted that what surprised her most was how the fact that the turtle was alive, mattered to her daughter not at all. For her daughter, it was what the turtle was accomplishing, its function that mattered most. The fact it fell into the category of the living was not part of the equation.

Smart phones are the tip of the iceberg of Artificial Intelligence (AI). Today, there are robots who can follow your eye movements and gesture in your direction in response to your advances. Sherry Turkle says that neurologically, once robots can do these things we’re hooked. These movements are emotive triggers for us humans. Robots will continue to become more and more a regular part of our lives and existence. Prototypes of robots designed to meet basic needs for children and the elderly already exist.

So, what makes something real? Of course, it depends on what we mean by real. Is it how we are made? Is it based upon something’s function? Is it how well it meets our needs? Must something be loved, as the Skin Horse suggests, for it to be real? Being real, at least as the Velveteen Rabbit inquires, seems to involve more than mere existence. Existence and “realness” are separate. As AI continues to advance to meet not only our needs, but our eyes as well, how we answer the question, what is real, and a second, what is alive, could have particular consequences.

We have gained much from our technology. Great things that humans on our own cannot offer one another. So great in fact, perhaps we should ask, is technology more valuable than life itself? Do these benefits trump the value of what humans can innately offer one another? It might be easy for some to say, of course life is more valuable than technology. Particularly easy for adults. Adults can quickly dismiss that it was a child that suggested replacing an animal with a robot. She doesn’t know better. It’s also easy to forget that this child did not create any of the technology she knows as normal. It’s easy to take for granted that today we give birth to children who will never live in a pre-technological world. And for so many reasons, thank God. While we give thanks, we might also pause to consider the question posed by a simple children’s story, “what is real?” If we don’t, we may risk losing track of which, humanity or technology, is the chicken and which is the egg.

That's Divine

We us the phrase "I'm only human," as a way of saying, "give me a break, I'm not perfect."

What if saying, "I'm human," instead of using our nature as an excuse, became a symbol of excellence?

When we look at a magnificent piece of art or hear an awe-inspiring concert, we might say, something to the effect of, "That was divine!"

What if in the face of excellence, magnificence, and awe, we began to say, "Now that was human!"

This isn't one more attempt to make ourselves divine. In fact, I believe we have come to use our humanness as an excuse because we so often pressure ourselves and others towards some futile notion of perfection which is neither human, nor divine. This wouldn't erase our shortcomings, inabilities, and anxious tendencies towards cold-heartedness at all.

But perhaps if our language began to change, perhaps our humanity could begin to become a source of motivation, rather than an excuse for mediocrity.

Most of Us Don't Want Spiritual Growth

We live in a wants-based economy. There was a time when we used to purchase and invest our time, money, and attention into things we needed...because we needed them. We have become want-focused to a point that most of us struggle to know the difference between our wants and our needs. A needs-based economy has limited growth potential. A wants-based economy has an insatiable growth potential. That's why the market wants us to want things.

Not many of us want to do the necessary work to grow spiritually. Well, at least we don't want it in a way that we have grown accustomed to wanting things.  I believe we do long for spiritual growth and deep meaning in our lives. Somewhere inside us, something desires this deep meaning even to the point of needing it. One step towards spiritual growth (and church growth) would be to gain clarity about this vital difference between want and need. The next step would be to nurture what is needed. The church is in the business of spiritual growth, feeding the poor, building community...things we need. Leave the wants to retail.

Come on Folks, It's Jesus...

I struck up a conversation the other day with a local pastor who belongs to a more conservative denomination than my own. I'd overheard him talking with another colleague about the other's successful new church start. We somehow came to the topic of missionaries he'd visited in India. He traveled there and worked with them for a couple weeks. The mission of these missionaries, a husband and wife team, was to literally pick up the handicapped of the under caste off the streets, bring them into their home and feed them. Once they established a relationship, they taught these "outcasted" computer skills. These once casted out human beings were eventually able to obtain employment and bring income to the very families that had left them in the streets. This rehabilitation was inconceivable, primarily because no one else would have risked investing the time, energy, compassion, and love into these folks for them to know their potential.

This other pastor and I paused after he finished his story. Both of us shook our heads when we compared this ministry to the institutional ministries we led. That missionary work is where Jesus would have been we agreed. That work in India was a place where Jesus' words, "well done, my good and faithful servants" would have been heard. 

We acknowledged that we each knew enough about the other's denomination that if we had gotten into a discussion over doctrine, church governance, stances on abortion or homosexuality, we would have disagreed bitterly. However, both of us agreed a successful, flourishing new church start was a good and beautiful thing. We both agreed that subverting India's caste system by welcoming the stranger, feeding the hungry, and caring for (dare I say healing) the sick were good and beautiful things.

Why does it seem ironic to me that we - both liberal and conservative - could agree about Jesus' teachings? Certainly this conversation would not play out the same in all situations. But surely both literalists and those who aren't, can agree on how Jesus asked us to treat the poor? It's right there in the text. Why do we spend so much time on everything else? Perhaps we have too much at stake? Perhaps we are not as willing to take risks as these missionaries?

However we answer these questions, it seems the key to this ecumenical interaction was Jesus. Particularly how Jesus asks us to live our lives in relation to the poor. My experience is that Jesus also gets the attention of the unchurched, de-churched, and secular humanists, folks of all generations (even the generations missing in our churches). Not the died for your sins Jesus, not just be nice and mind your manners Jesus, but the radical boundary crossing, counter-cultural, love and compassion at any cost Jesus.

Ecumenism, pluralism, church growth, and spiritual growth can all begin with this Jesus.

How long will we make these things about something else?

It's Time

Somewhere within the infinitesimal moments of time between this moment and what is now the past we made a choice. We have made and are making a series of infinite choices to do precisely what we are doing this moment. The choice may not have been deliberate, intentional, or precise, but it was a choice that eminated from within the almagamation of thought, experience, emotion, spirit, and instinct that we know as our self.

Knowing this does two things. First, it correctly places the responsibility for our self within our own capacity for choice. This by no means makes the element of choice simple as some in our culture would falsely make it out to be. Our choice is also always indelibly formed by the external forces that come from the people we know as lovers or call strangers, as well as the group of people we know as society. It is impossible to remove the external or internalized impact of these forces from our decision-making process. Nevertheless, we are responsible to claim the responsibility of decision-making - however convoluted that responsibility may be - as our own.

Secondly, this means that we can choose to do something different at any time. The trick is the discernment of making those decisions based upon deliberate personal values. We can make a different decision in the time it took to finish reading this last word. Or this one. Or. That. One. Some of you know the decision you need to make, but haven't yet and should not read another word of this and go do that thing you've been putting off. Stop wasting your time reading my blither blather. Go do something. Make the choice. It's yours. Others will will tell you it's not. They'll tell you it's theirs. They're wrong. Go do something that matters. Waste not another nanosecond...because it's already passed.

Unworthiness...Nurture, not Nature

None were born feeling unworthy, inadequate, insufficient, weak, or dumb. We each came into this world screaming, breathing, trying to take in every movement, touch, bodily sensation, color and sound ready to learn all this world has to teach. We did not know the meaning of inadequate. At some point though, we looked around and saw others afraid, shamed and shaming. We learned this fear and this shame and when we were old enough we began to practice it on others. We didn't know any better. None of us desires to feel unworthy. None would say that feeling unworthy is something they freely chose. We were taught it. We were shown it. We experienced it. So we learned it. And as much as we'd like to let others keep it, some of it always gets on us. It's impossible to shame someone else without knowing shame yourself. But it's ok, because baby, you were not born that way.

How often are we waiting for the next shaming, the next reminder of inadequacy and unworthiness? In my experience, always. All the time.

We want to connect, but when our only tool is shame, we use it and only get distance. We use it because we desire connection and often don't know what other tool to use. We've had the most practice and experience with shame. No wonder we're so confused about desperately wanting to connect, but rarely experience meaningful connection. Our primary tool for connection is a tool of unworthiness.

Use love.

It's ok. You can give up shame. It's not you. You learned it. You don't really feel that way about yourself. It's not really how you want others to feel either. You are worthy. It's ok. Show others they are worthy by connecting and loving them. Don't worry when they're surprised. They aren't used to others showering them with worthiness. Most of us aren't. We're more accustomed to shame. It's ok. Don't lose heart. Keep loving. Keep showing worthiness. Keep connecting. Others will catch on. They'll catch on when they feel worthy. One day they'll like it better and let go of their fear. And so will you. You are loved. Keep loving.