Post 88—Den Tandt’s Ecumenical Remedy (continued)

This is a continuation of yesterday's discussion of Michael Den Tandt's remedy for religious fundamentalism.

Den Tandt’s remedy, you may recall, is to recognize and act upon “the commonality of the religious experience,” something that is acknowledged by a wide range of scholars. He regards this “remarkable.” I similarly recognize certain commonalities all religions share in some way.  Den Tandt attributes this commonality or ecumenicity to “something in the human condition that gravitates to spiritual experience.” I agree with that assertion. We Christians attribute this to creation: We were created with a wired-in predisposition towards religious experience, in fact, towards God Himself. That, in fact, is the very reason for our creation or existence. In spite of my love for philosophical speculation, I am not much of a philosopher. Nevertheless, I kind of like Den Tandt’s reference to Dean Hamer, an American geneticist, who theorizes that this human gravitation towards the spiritual has a “biological source” residing in our DNA that he calls the “God gene.” I have not read Hamer’s writings and so do not know the details of his theory. If I had read his stuff and knew the details, I might reject his all of his assertions. However, without knowing those details, I am favourably inclined towards this alleged “God gene.”  Why not? 

Now to many people, giving spirituality a biological or physical base may seem unorthodox and even highly heretical. Spirituality with a physical base?  Most of us Westerners especially walk around with a dualism between spirituality and the physical. We place a distance between them and never the twain shall meet. That is of the essence of Secularism. It is part of our Western world view that we simply assume without ever examining it. But if God has created us for the specific purpose of serving and worshiping Him, if that’s what we were made to do, then why dismiss a physical side to our spirituality deep down in our psyche or our mind?  Spirituality and the physical are simply two sides of the one coin of reality. They always go together. North American Aboriginals, Traditional Africans and all other Animists reject this Western secular bifurcation or separation. So does the Bible. The Bible is more on the side of Aboriginals, Traditionalists and Animists in this regard than on the side of Secularists and the majority of Christians who are influenced by Secularism. So, yes, there may well be such a thing as a physical “God gene.”  The notion of creation seems to allow it not only but may even demand it. However, I stand to be corrected, especially by Christian thinkers who have not bought into this Western secular bifurcation.

So, we affirm with Den Tandt a level of commonality among the various religions and world views. Many of them, including “explicitly non-religious traditions,” hold to a “cluster of beliefs that insists on exclusivity.”  They will argue that Jesus or Muhammad or Buddah is the only way to salvation.  Even the (in)famous atheist biologist Richard Dawkins insists that “every way of understanding reality but his own is wrong.” In other words, such exclusivity is, in Den Tandt’s own words, part of that commonality, is embedded in it. On what basis then does Den Tandt separate them, accept the positive but reject the negative that is just as much part of the equation?  Why grudgingly “respect cultural differences but celebrate commonality” when they both together constitute that commonality?  This stance seems similar to many African governments that, in their quest for national unity, want to excise tribal consciousness by pretending that tribes do not exist. You try to create unity by disregarding or even denying one of the most important components in the equation. Den Tandt seems to want to create an ecumenical culture of commonality by simply excising, denying or negating the part of it he dislikes, without giving a reason.

He clinches his argument by proposing we “accept that religious systems exist and evolve,” but without claiming to “owning exclusive rights to the truth, which is to say none.”  But how does this apply to Den Tandt’s own position? If no one has “exclusive rights,” on what basis does he?  I am reminded of one of his colleagues at the Vancouver Sun who some years ago declared pompously that there is no absolute truth. I sent her a quick note challenging the inconsistency of this statement. Denial of absolute truth is itself an absolute declaration! She responded with a mere “Oops,” as if she merely had made a logical slip. I responded to her that hers was no mere logical slip; it was a  total inconsistency inherent in her world view. Since she did not continue the discussion, it stopped right there. Well, it seems to me that Den Tandt is doing something similar. By denying everyone the exclusive right to the truth, he is denying his own as well!

Michael, I appreciate the courage you display in proposing a remedy for religious fundamentalism. We need it badly and any attempt at it should be taken seriously and with appreciation--but also weighed seriously.  You need to rethink your commonality. Thanks for trying and for challenging me. You readers, this is an important issue. I invite, nay urge, you to weigh in with your comments.

Post 87 –Remedy for Religious Fundamentalism?

Remedy for religious fundamentalism?  Who would have the nerve to make such a proposal? Seeking a remedy for such a wild societal phenomenon?  You’re in for a bit of lay philosophizing. Hope you’re up to it?

Some behind-the-scene stuff here. Originally I made a typographical error in the above paragraph. Instead of “seeking,” I wrote “seeding”  so that the sentence read “Seeding a remedy….”  Now wouldn’t that be wonderful? We just go out, buy a bag of seed, put it in the spreader and there it goes throughout the society, slowly germinating and sprouting the “remedy” flower till it has taken over the entire field.  Wouldn’t that be nice? Alas, only a typo!  Not even a dream, though it almost germinated one in me!

One of my favourite columnists in the Vancouver Sun, Michael Den Tandt, had the courage—or should I say “nerve?”-- to suggest a remedy, using the title of this post I borrowed from him, but without the extension “…is clear.”  His full title: “The remedy for religious fundamentalism is clear” (Boxing Day, Dec. 26, 2015).  Wow!  This is something we’ve all been waiting for: a clear remedy for this scourge of fundamentalism. I could hardly think of a more appropriate Christmas gift, even now that we are into January 2016 with Christmas long behind us.

For those of us who are writers, there is enough in Den Tandt’s column to fill a good-sized volume with comments, reactions and alternatives. I will have to be very selective to keep this down to an acceptable blog post length. It’s possible that I will have to use two posts even to say the minimum, but that would not be the end of the world, at least, not of my world. So, Michael, I’m going to think along with you a little and make some suggestions as well as ask some questions. I do this in the framework of appreciation for your courage to even dream of a remedy of so intractable a global scourge.

Den Tandt’s remedy? In his words, “It is, simply, ecumenism.” That term means, again in his own words, “the notion that people of faith, and indeed agnostics and atheists, have far more in common than they sometimes wish to believe.”  My association with Humanist Atheists has taught me that this is a typical perspective of that group of people. In fact, based on my association with them, I consider that part of the core of Humanism and Atheism. Taking that away from them would be similar to taking Jesus away from Christians or Muhammad from Muslims. You end up with an empty shell. 

Jesus observed that a tree shall by known by its fruit. We know that there are many kinds of trees, each with its own fruit. Now trees have certain basic things in common that mark them as trees. They have roots, stems, branches and, often, leaves and, usually, fruit, though not necessarily edible. Without those they are not considered trees. Though they share certain structural features, their root structures vary, bark is different so that we can identify them as this or that kind of tree. Their leaves look and behave differently as does their fruit. Trees, yes, all of them, but still they are very different from each other, used for different purposes ranging from shade, decoration,  construction, canoes, nesting, food all the way to burning. All trees, yes, but how different from each other.  By their fruit, including their various uses, you will know that it is this tree or that tree. Anyone who can’t tell the difference between a Western apple tree and an African baobab would be looked at askance.                           

Every society is undergirded by a worldview that gives it shape and values. Most members of a given society are hardly aware of that worldview; they just assume it as their “common sense,” but it affects both their thought patterns as well as behavior.  In fact, it creates their culture. Part of that worldview is the dominant religion of the culture. Yes, behind every culture lies a religion of some sort. That is to say, a more or less coherent set of values and ideas by which the  people guide their lives and form their social structures and to which the people have given their hearts. All of this means that you can learn something about a people’s religion by analyzing their culture.

It may be that the above was more true in the past when most cultures tended to be cohesive mono-cultures and mono-religions.  This situation may be breaking down into groupings within a given culture so that today one finds more worldviews next to each other in any society. Nevertheless, the dominant cultures of the world have religions behind them, religions that have taken on a large variety of shapes, values and beliefs that undergird the societies.

Now, can you possibly believe that with, say, Chinese or Indian cultures being so different from Western cultures, the roots of these greatly different cultures are one and the same? If the fruits of two or more trees are widely different, can you argue that the trees are one and the same?  If you did, people would not take you seriously. These cultures are different because the underlying religions are different from each other. The fruits from all these different cultures are different because the religions are different.

Dogmatic insistence that these religions are basically the same is just that: dogma, ideology, in this case modern Humanistic , Secular or Atheistic ideology or religion. Adherents of these movements will ward off any argumentation countering that dogma as much as any Christian will resist arguments against Christ or a Muslim against Mohammad. We all defend the values, philosophies and beliefs that constitute the core of our hearts and minds. Den Tandt is really expressing a major core value of one of these three close buddies, Humanism, Secularism or Atheism—or all three.

I am tired of having to mention all three of this triad all the time. I am going to refer to the whole gamut simply as “Humanism,” realizing full well not all adherents are Atheists. This will also hold for the next post.

Now, I’m all for the tolerance and peace Den Tandt is really after and I honour him for trying to help us solve a major problem of our time.  Absolutely. However, that should not be based on the faith of one of the many religions, in this case, Secular religion or worldview. He is really interpreting the entire range of religions from his particular secular dogmatic view point. And that's alright, as long as he recognizes the legitimacy of others as well. His remedy is undergirded by another core component of his worldview or religion, namely that his is the only rational or scientific one. And if I may be politically incorrect, most adherents of his Humanism, deep down, have contempt for all the other religions except their own and basically think of them as nonsense. I would hope this is not true of Den Tandt, but there is a sign in his column that would make us think that this might be the case, but that we’ll examine in the next post.

As a closing aside, there is one other religion that thinks of all religions as being the same, namely Baha’i. Baha’i members I know tend to be very sweet and amicable people; most of them have none of the hard pride that tends to mark Humanists—or condemnation. I suspect the reason for the difference between these two perspectives to be that the Baha’i come out of a non-Enlightenment context, a context they share with all non-Humanist religions, whereas Humanists have faith in reason which has harder edges and less room for emotion or affection.  

Post 86—The State of the United Church of Canada

           

I am not expert on the United Church of Canada (UCC), but I do know a few things about it. When we first immigrated to Canada in 1951, I was a boy of thirteen. We spent our first year in Pitt Meadows, BC, and then moved to Alberni on Vancouver Island. You will no longer find that name on the map, for the city has merged with and is now known as Port Alberni, its former twin city. That’s where I first became aware of UCC.  It was largely a negative awareness, for I, along with our local CRC congregation, considered it a totally liberal church that had long ago forsaken the Gospel. We did not feel the need to become more familiar with the denomination or its local congregation. It was liberal. Punkt. The end of the matter. We wanted nothing to do with it.

I carried that attitude with me to college and, later, into my seminary, Calvin Theological Seminary, in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where I graduated in 1965. During my years there, I wrote a research paper for a Church History course in which I traced the history of UCC from its beginning in 1925, when two and a half Canadian “mainstream” denominations, all of them known to be liberal, merged to form UCC. I “faithfully” described the church as fully liberal in a less than sympathetic spirit.  Though I still have some seminary research papers in my archives, this one unfortunately got lost—or is that perhaps fortunately? It might have ended up on my website and I bore you with its denunciations of that liberal church.  So, consider yourself lucky, if not fortunate. But, sorry, now you’re reading about it here! Sometimes you just can’t get away.

We are now 50 years further down the pike. Many things have changed, including denominations and individuals, including my denomination, the CRC. Whereas previously it looked at the UCC askance from afar, the two churches now meet each other in the context of the Canadian Council of Churches and other ecumenical settings, including the newly formed World Communion of Reformed Churches (WCRC).  The CRC has become more sure of itself and feels free to reach out to churches with which it generally tends to disagree. It is also member of the Evangelical Fellowship of Churches. It eats from both sides, precisely because it rejects the one-sidedness of both traditions and embraces both, a natural consequence of the Reformational pattern of the Canadian section of the CRC.

But I as an individual have also changed and become more broadminded and ecumenical. When we went “church shopping” in Vancouver in 2001, the UCC was a serious contender for our loyalty. Rather than repeat this story, I refer you to Volume 4 of our memoir, Every Square Inch, pp. 64-67 (www.SocialTheology.com/Boeriana.htm).  You will learn there that I had become more nuanced and recognized good things in UCC as well as negatives. Nevertheless, we ended up across the street at First Baptist Church (FBC) of Vancouver, though I am still tempted by UCC for its broader cultural approach to the city. We are now associated with both the CRC and FBC.

The question is now: Have I been wrong, or, at least, partially wrong about the UCC all these years?  Is the situation more nuanced? Well, yes, it is and probably always has been. But please remember what I wrote in the previous post on this score and compare that sentiment with an article by Douglas Todd of the Vancouver Sun (VS) entitled “Atheist Clergy Should Remove Masks” (July 4, 2015, p. I-5), a controversial one, I might add (See letters to editor in VS July 11, 2015).  Among other things, Todd adduces the views of some scholars.  Mark Noll, a well-known scholar at Notre Dame University, holds that the church “has declined in part because it embraced secularism, pluralism and multiculturalism.”  That, of course, brings her right in line with the dominant Canadian culture, exactly as suggested in Post 85 above.  Then there is Ontario scholar Nancy Christie who thinks the church “faltered because it promoted personal freedom above public morality.” 

A feature related to the above is that the UCC tolerates atheist preachers on its pulpits. Well, yes, why not if you have embraced the three

“-isms” in the above paragraph?  Todd talks of “the strange case of Vosper,” a female UCC pastor who loudly proclaims atheism and has even published books on the subject. He considers her case “strange” not because of what she preaches, for her thoughts are very commonplace among humanists and other secularists, nothing new or unique about them. It is “strange” because the UCC tolerates this conviction on the pulpit. He writes, the UCC “has become so freedom-fixated and inclusive—often boasting ‘We Welcome Everyone’—that it has lost its boundaries.”              

Todd further suggests that it is time for UCC “to reform itself by becoming more honest.” It suffers from “a lack of authenticity” and concludes with the hard-hitting paragraph

Just as … Vosper should do the honourable thing and leave the United Church, so too should the more secretive clergy who won’t declare they really are atheist, mainly because they don’t want to lose their gig in a denomination in danger of becoming The Church of Niceness. 

He borrowed that term from Canadian psychologist Evelyn Sommers, the author of The Tyranny of Niceness: Unmasking the Need for Approval. According to Sommers, this need has “a dark side to needing to be liked.” That is precisely what Todd suspects to be the case with “open-minded church members who tolerate Vosper’s employment are guilty of”, which makes the Church seem “so Canadian.” And that brings us again back to Post 85, where it is suggested the UCC is losing out precisely because of its loss of Gospel punch and its appropriation of the Canadian liberal public spirit. It is one thing to support the marginalized and even promote all that emerges from public good will, but when this is at the cost of losing sight of the basic antithesis between the Spirit of God and the “powers and principalities” that have such powerful influence in the society, then the “tyranny of niceness” has taken over.

My wife and I attended the weekly jazz session at St. Andrews-Wesley UCC here in downtown Vancouver this past Sunday. It was a wonderful musical experience interspersed with a fine sermon  scattered throughout the programme by Gary Patterson, the senior pastor. The music was indeed superb. I sat there absolutely enthralled as I not only heard the music but also observed the musicians from close up with their facial expressions and bodily postures. Patterson utilized all his amazing gifts as an orator as he presented the UCC version of the Gospel. It was all about grace in our lives. 

The thing was that it was not defined; it was left vague so that one came away wondering what the core of all this was. I am afraid, we once again ran into the typical UCC liberalism that is so all-embracing that it has no borders left and is almost forced to leave core values vague. Vintage UCC: exhilarating combination of music and oratory laced with the finest humour; core values left indefinite. We were glad we went. Thanks, UCC. Thanks, Gary. But that core.....?

I encourage all my readers to practice niceness towards UCC, Holy Spirit niceness.  We should not regard that Church as a lost cause. The Spirit of Niceness is still around and can turn that Canadian polite niceness into the real thing and the UCC once again become  a revitalized spiritual powerhouse in our nation.  For that we all need to pray. What could be nicer than that?

United Church of Canada, we love and stand by you.  But, please, fill in            those blanks with genuine Gospel core.

Post 85—The State of the Vancouver Church

The main thrust of this post is a letter I wrote just a few days ago to the Editor of the online magazine Church in Vancouver (CiV) about the state of the church in Vancouver. A gentleman by the name of Jason Byassee recently moved into town to teach at the Vancouver School of Theology on the UBC campus. He has quite a distinguished career behind him already, including publications. We have every reason to welcome him into our community and to expect much from him in terms of creative Christian leadership.

He wrote an article in the January 7/2016 edition of CiV with the title “Vancouver’s Stony Soil: The Church in the Secular City” that I found very interesting, at least partially because he confirmed a long-standing opinion/suspicion I’ve held on the subject. He gave a partial explanation as to why Vancouver is such a secular non-Christian or, at best, a semi-Christian place. I agree with much of what he wrote and recommend his article to you.

I responded to welcome him to our city, to express my appreciation for his input, to enlarge a bit on that topic, while, at the end, I gave a soft critique of an issue peripheral to the main discussion. Here’s that letter, slightly edited for this context:

I welcome Byassee to Vancouver. I expect he will become a great asset to our community.

I agree with Byassee and have long realized that the losses Canada's mainline churches are suffering, especially the United Church, is due to their Christendom foundation. Such a foundation is similar to sand and is bound to fall apart in due time. Of course, they can be revived and get a fresh start. I never accept the term "post-Christian," for we do not know the plans of the Holy Spirit for the future shape of the society or the church. He has surprised us before.

It may be that, as Byassee writes, no one quite knows why the entire church in Canada lost members. I was abroad for many years, but as I observed the Canadian church from afar as it seemed to be falling apart at the seams, I had a strong feeling that while the "mainstream" churches with their Christendom foundation had little to offer the people, most of the "other side" of Protestantism was too fundamentalist and also had little to offer the nation. In recent decades, the Evangelical "side" has woken up to some degree and now participates more fully in national life with a distinctive voice, even having established Christian post-graduate institutions like Trinity Western and the Institute for Christian Studies in Toronto.

As to Vancouver being kind of a hick town before Expo 1986, I was not here, but I find it hard to believe. The powers that be would hardly have awarded the city the privilege of hosting Expo if it were such a minor player.

End of Letter

In other words, both sides of the Protestant movement were weak; people showed little interest in either. The one had bought into the secular culture too far and had little left that was distinctive. The other had largely withdrawn from the culture and retreated into the spiritual world.  Indeed, why should people join or pay attention?

There is another aspect to the development of some mainline churches, this time both the United Church and the Anglican Church especially, that also contributes to what could be their slow demise. It is that they allow their clergy deny the very core points of the Gospel. Some deny the resurrection or, for that matter, the divinity of Christ, not to speak of His miracles. I heard one lead a Christmas hymn sing during which he referred to traditional Christmas songs as “songs we used to believe in.” And this is not even to mention that some United Church ministers are atheists, according to Douglas Todd of the Vancouver Sun (July 4 and 11, 2015).  Todd wrote a hard-hitting column on that July 4 and courageous. In our Canada of today we don’t often hear such sharp critique, for it is offensive to the politically correct who seem to dominate our culture.  But that is the state of some of the mainline members of our Vancouver Church. Todd’s article deserves a good summary/review, even though it’s already half a year old.

As to the “other” or Evangelical side of things, the residue of that earlier spiritual retreat and cultural withdrawal is still with us to varying degrees in different denominations. We’re not over the hump yet, as we used to say in my mountainous teen home town, Port Alberni on Vancouver Island, but when you pay attention to the involvement of the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada in various central aspects of Canadian culture, then you know Evangelicals are on the way. That’s why I have devoted some posts to their work in the past and plan to do so again occasionally. However, their main efforts are still focused too much on religious issues such as religious freedom. There is little systemic work in the realm of economics and politics. And that is precisely the point where the mainliners concentrate. 

I am grateful the Lord has placed me in the Reformed camp, where both the spiritual and the social receive attention, at least, ideally! That’s what this blog is all about. 

Post 84--—Time for Explanation and Further Introduction

I had hoped to complete this post and publish it between Christmas and New Year. In addition to all the things I write about in the rest of this post, we visited our youngest son and family in Atlanta, GA. While there, no time or opportunity to write!  Returned home yesterday and decided to post a piece I had written earlier for such a time as this, when it is high time to post but have nothing ready.

I don’t write as many posts as I would like. So many other things that keep me busy, like getting all my published books, articles, lectures and some correspondence—some trivial even or attempts at humour—onto my website at <  www.SocialTheology.com >.  The time you may have spent on Christmas shopping in December, I spent on writing and a host of other things like…. 

I am an active member of our local West End Seniors Network (WESN) here in Vancouver as well as a couple of churches. I am the co-ordinator for the WESN’s monthly Men’s Breakfast Club, while wife Fran does the calling the day before to remind people. We both love social life and often accept invitations to or organize coffee times and visits from or to various friends and relatives whom we have here in BC by the bushel! We visit especially older people who are alone.

Fran, my wife, and I love to entertain people for lunch at home over soup and salads. She enjoys making salads while I specialize in soups. We are both good at our individual specialties. Such invitations are of a “social revolutionary” type, since the people in our West End area of Vancouver almost live in restaurants and do very little entertainment in their homes. Sharing lunch with them at home seldom is reciprocated, except perhaps over a coffee in a coffee shop. Individualism and a sense of exaggerated privacy has gone amuck so that people don’t easily open their doors to each other and loneliness has become a serious malaise in the neighbourhood. 

This particular sentence was written during the early morning of Christmas Day 2015. We had invited four people to enjoy Christmas dinner with us, all of them people who have no family nearby.  In fact, all of us, including Fran and myself, are either immigrants or former refugees, except for one, an Asian born in Canada whose family lives far away in another Canadian city. I do have family near by, but the others don’t and needed a place to celebrate.

I also mentioned churches. Yes, we are full members of the Christian Reformed Church here in Vancouver, while we are “adherents” to First Baptist Church in downtown. Why two? Well, that’s for another post sometime in the future. But these take time as well. We love attending church services and participating in other stuff during the week. The why and how, well, that, too, is for another time.

In addition to all that good stuff we’re involved in, we are both from very large families. Fran is the youngest of seven while I am number five out of ten. She has three brothers, two of whom have already passed away, and after them came four sisters, one of whom passed on. I have four sisters older than me and five brothers younger than me, with one sister and one brother already with the Lord. All of these siblings have together produced an entire battalion of kids, grandkids, even some great grandkids. This battalion is scattered all over North America, with Fran’s concentrating on Michigan, where her family immigrated to back in 1942, while mine are concentrated in British Columbia (BC), where our family immigrated to in 1951. I was thirteen at that time. Being as family-conscious as we are, we serve sort of as the glue for the two different families, though more so for the Boers in BC, since that’s where we now live.  For example, we organize the annual Boer get-together on Boxing Day (December 26) in Surrey. Fran is the Boer family consultant, since she keeps track of addresses and birthdays down to at least the fourth generation.  

Our own three children and seven grandchildren are scattered—near Seattle, in Silicon Valley and in Lagos, Nigeria, with regrettably none in Canada. Well, they did not grow up in Canada but in Nigeria, while they did their undergraduate work in Michigan in the shadow of my in-laws and our mission employer. This means travel and more travel for us to all three of them. Seattle is close by. So, there we can do weekend visits. But when we visit the Silicon or Lagos crowds, we spend a lot of time; Silicon often takes up to ten days a couple of times a year, while we recently spent almost a month in Lagos. 

All of the above personals have—or is it “has”?—two reasons. One is my own feeling that when I deal with people over any length of time, I need to know who they are, where they come from and how they spend their time. I think and live wholistically. I cannot divide my own life nor that of people I associate with into little boxes that would make me deal with them only at the specific point of contact and never mind the rest. I just cannot relate that way, nor do I want to. 

We are basically social creatures more than isolated individuals. Put in another way, we are individuals in community. When either one of these is emphasized over against the other, we get social distortions, sometimes with very serious consequences. I hope to do a post on this subject one of these days. So, if you are one of my regular readers, you may be curious who I am, where I come from and what I do. Well, here it is. I have tried to satisfy your curiosity. That’s one reason for this post:  to establish a stronger connection with you. I hope I am not just imposing a personal opinion or relationship on you guys but filling a need also on your part to firm up our relationship.

The other but related reason for this personal stuff is to explain the occasional time lag between posts. Work, travel, socializing often intervene and leave me little time for blogging, as much as I love this writing activity.  No matter how short of time, my heart constantly urges me to write

So I have made a decision, a policy decision of what I have already started practicing, namely to intersperse my own writings with “guest articles.” Such guest articles-- while perhaps expressing opinions I agree with at least partially, or that I take on to undermine, or that I simply enjoy and want to share with you--, take less time to produce than fresh stuff from me. Of course, many of my “fresh stuff” also frequently includes materials from and references to other writers, something I always faithfully indicate. 

This semi-new policy will not only prevent unpleasant gaps but also create variety. My Dutch language has an expression, “Verandering van spijs doet eten,” which is to say that a change of diet increases your appetite and your enjoyment of food. Though not part of the expression, change is also more pleasant for the cook, at least, for this writer-cook. The same is true of both reading and writing.  

I had really intended to feed you a guest article about Justin Bieber, the singer, today, to be preceded by a short explanation and introduction. Well, that “short explanation” turned into a complete post!  Justin will have to wait a few days. Sorry, buddy. I don’t think it will bother him, since he is not, to the best of my knowledge, one of my regular readers. 

In the meantime, you’ve learned a bit about me, while I snuck in a bit of social philosophy on the side—but that’s also me. I am not a professional philosopher, though I wish I were, but I do like to philosophize about social stuff, especially about the relationship of religions and worldviews to culture and society.

Time to wind up. I hope you had a good Christmas celebration in the midst of family and friends. I end this post with wishing you a very happy 2016. For me, such a wish always goes together with the unexpressed silent Biblical prayer, “Maranatha,”  “Lord Jesus, come back soon.”

Post 83—It’s Christmas Time

Post 83—It’s Christmas Time                                                     

Merry Christmas to you all! Yes, it’s that day and that season. The season that many of us dread because of the tremendous pressures we put upon ourselves with our frantic buying. When I see the crowds in the malls—I only see them on the screen!—and listen to the shoppers interviewed by reporters, I shake my head and thank God for the wise decision that we have made. Seeing that giving presents is often a matter of bringing coal to New Castle, that is to say, giving presents to people who already have more than they need, we do our gifting to charities who make sure the poor are taken care of.  So, instead of pressures, my wife and I are free to enjoy the season with its many instrumental and choral concerts, joyful church services, street events, etc., etc. We love this season, not the least because of the parties that come with it.

“Merry Christmas” is the traditional if no longer the most popular greeting.  “Merry”—it sounds rather flippant and superficial.  “Let us eat, drink and be merry,” as the Biblical saying has it.     But “merry” became a tradition because in the past it had a much deeper meaning with a spiritual undertone. I insist on using it along with the term “Christmas.” For others who have no reason to celebrate Christmas, fine, let them make do with the superficial “Happy Holiday,” but holiday for what? What are they celebrating? Yes, for some, great family time and that is indeed important and worth celebrating. But today so many have no families or they are far away. In fact, for many it’s a sad and lonely season.

Of course, originally the time was marked by a pagan feast that Christians recast in order to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. The rest of this post is devoted to the Old Testament passage of Isaiah 9, where that birth was prophesied in the words of the people of Israel thousands of years ago. That means in words and concepts that we do not immediately understand, but I believe the basic thrust of the passage should make clear what the major concerns were that Jesus came to address.

There are many, many different Bible translations. Most of them are not created to compete with or correct other translations. Rather they all have different purposes and, especially, target audiences. A major purpose is to make the Bible more easily understood to today’s reader. The first translation is from the English Standard Version; the second, from The Message. But both are translations of the same passage.

`

                        A New Day Is Coming

             (From English Standard Version)

9 But there will be an end to the gloom those people suffered. In the past, people thought the land of Zebulun and Naphtali was not important. But later, that land will be honored—the land along the sea, the land east of the Jordan River, and Galilee where people from other nations live. ² Those people lived in darkness, but they will see a great light. They lived in a place as dark as death, but a great light will shine on them.

³ God, you will make the nation grow, and you will make the people happy. They will rejoice in your presence as they do at harvest time. It will be like the joy when people take their share of things they have won in war. ⁴ That will happen because you will lift the heavy yoke off their shoulders and take away their heavy burden. You will take away the rod that the enemy used to punish your people, as you did when you defeated Midian.^[a]

⁵ Every boot that marched in battle and every uniform stained with blood will be destroyed and thrown into the fire. ⁶ This will happen when the special child is born. God will give us a son who will be responsible for leading the people. His name will be “Wonderful Counselor, Powerful God, Father Who Lives Forever, Prince of Peace.” ⁷ His power will continue to grow, and there will be peace without end. This will establish him as the king sitting on David’s throne and ruling his kingdom. He will rule with goodness and justice forever and ever. The strong love^[b] that the Lord All-Powerful has for his people will make this happen!

               A Child Has Been Born—for Us!

              (From The Message)

9 But there’ll be no darkness for those who were in trouble.

Earlier he did bring the lands of Zebulun and Naphtali into disrepute,

but the time is coming when he’ll make that whole area glorious—

 the road along the Sea, the country past the Jordan, international Galilee.

^2-7 The people who walked in darkness
    have seen a great light.
For those who lived in a land of deep shadows—
    light! sunbursts of light!
You repopulated the nation,
    you expanded its joy.
Oh, they’re so glad in your presence!
    Festival joy!
The joy of a great celebration,
    sharing rich gifts and warm greetings.
The abuse of oppressors and cruelty of tyrants—
    all their whips and cudgels and curses—
Is gone, done away with, a deliverance
    as surprising and sudden as Gideon’s old victory over Midian.
The boots of all those invading troops,
    along with their shirts soaked with innocent blood,
Will be piled in a heap and burned,
    a fire that will burn for days!
For a child has been born—for us!
    the gift of a son—for us!
He’ll take over
    the running of the world.
His names will be: Amazing Counselor,
    Strong God,
Eternal Father,
    Prince of Wholeness.
His ruling authority will grow,
    and there’ll be no limits to the wholeness he brings.
He’ll rule from the historic David throne
    over that promised kingdom.
He’ll put that kingdom on a firm footing
    and keep it going
With fair dealing and right living,
    beginning now and lasting always.
The zeal of God-of-the-Angel-Armies
    will do all this.