Christ Church Blog

My recent (8/16/10) Letter to the Editor of the Dayton Daily News provoked a number of responses, supportive, antagonistic, and patronizing. In my letter, I criticized the display of fighter jets in downtown Dayton. I said we should not glorify weapons of destruction, teach children to decorate them and make them art, and then display them in our public places.

The reactions of those who agree with me come from three kinds of people: 1, those who are “peaceniks,” who believe in the struggle for human kindness and peace and who cannot comprehend the need for conflict and war that our society seems to want. They, like me, do not accept the militaristic world in which we find ourselves and they don’t want their children growing up thinking that war is a daily event; 2, those who believe that military strength and power are realities in our world and that we should find a way to harness that power; and 3, those who want our power and might to remain supreme , unquestioned and without sanction in our world.

The reactions of those who disagree are both interesting and comical. Some are ad hominem: the writer is a crazy left-over hippie in a long peasant skirt smoking dope outside the tent of her commune, or she is a befuddled remnant romantic who cannot understand the importance of conquering the enemy lest he destroy us. Others argue that we must defeat the enemies of our country.

The reactions of those who agree quickly expand the argument to its sub-text: war is evil, insidious and a basis for human society and we must not promote it, but eliminate it from our world cultures.

What quickly got lost in the argument is the children. Teaching children that fighter jets are objects of veneration and asking them to prettify them demystifies the truth of the purpose and function of fighter jets and makes them another form of decoration. Soon they will be bookmarks, Christmas ornaments, T shirt logos, key ring bobbles, cute attachments to the paraphernalia toted around by kids and youth.  Cute is in; even fighter jets can be cute. The commodification of the fighter jet has limitless possibilities, both totemic and commercial. But art is truth and truth is not always pop art. We falsify the purpose of fighter jets by making them cute; rather the art of portraying fighter jets should get to the meaning and purpose of what a fighter jet is and show it in its raw essence.

The objection to the fighter jet as decoration and art is really a symbol of a larger argument as both sides recognize. That the jets are displayed as art on the streets of a large city is deplorable, but inevitable. They are, in fact, icons of our cultural values: conquest, war, and what Henry A. Giroux calls “economic Darwinism.  As a theater of cruelty and a mode of public pedagogy, economic Darwinism undermines all forms of solidarity while simultaneously promoting the logic of unrestricted individual responsibility.”

In other words, we as a society have ingested and incorporated into our body and soul the idea that we are entitled to survive, and we must do whatever is necessary to do so. Unfortunately, survival in our world means that one group conquer another group and continue on until that one group is superior to all. I am sorry that I was born into time and place of my country’s dominance in the world. That dominance has only increased in my lifetime and is now threatened. Being born into the time of history when our country is the richest and most powerful in the world, I and we take this as our due, rest secure in our prosperity and comfort, and feel that we are intrinsically superior to the rest of the globe and that we must preserve our superiority at any cost. The reactions to the threats of change are producing unprecedented combative, angry, fearful responses. We think we are entitled to be dominant and that we must protect and defend our way of life at any cost. This is often called patriotism. To many, patriotism means military might and war. After all, our whole economy is built on war. I too have friends and relatives in the military and/or its cohorts. I do not want them to lose their jobs; I do not want to be taken over by another country or by rabid terrorists.  But the conclusion that many reach is that we have to get our fighter jets in the air and wave our flag and kill the enemy and preserve our marvelous country and way of life. I get it. I get it, but I don’t want it. It’s phony, immoral, sentimental, hypocritical and mad.

Carole Ganim Nelson is a writer, professor, and member of Christ Church, Dayton

Glenn Beck’s August 28 “Restoring Honor” rally, in Washington, D.C., is over, but I’m not entirely over it.

That Beck would gather his disciples in front of the Lincoln Memorial on the 47th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.‘s “I Have a Dream” speech struck me as audacious, grandiose, and insensitive.  In other words, about what I’d expect.

But when he took his medicine show, cameras rolling, into the Washington National Cathedral, Beck outed himself as a poseur who ought to be called out for impersonating a theologian.

Here’s my issue, the short version. By neglecting to instruct his flock that the National Cathedral belongs to the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, D.C., and wrapping the God he claimed to find there in the American flag, Glenn Beck inched dangerously close to implying that the cathedral is some official house of worship of the United States of America.  I’m sure many who heard him went away with precisely that mistaken notion.

Furthermore, what makes Beck’s selection of the National Cathedral as a stage for unfurling his hybrid theology so over-the-top ironic is that the Episcopal Church is a mainline liberal Protestant denomination committed to social justice, a Beck heresy.

Maybe I’m not giving Beck’s audience enough credit for being able to catch onto Glenn’s tricks themselves, because It wouldn’t take much Googling for them to discover that Episcopalians have gay and lesbian priests and bishops, and that we have approved the blessing of same sex unions in several dioceses, including the Diocese of Southern Ohio.

How does Glenn Beck reconcile using the stained glass and statuary of apostates (that’s probably the nicest thing he’d call liberal Episcopalians) to convert the masses to his new, purer religion?  Not that I care, but his followers should.

They also might ponder the unvarnished hypocrisy of Beck taking liberties with the National Cathedral’s doors-wide-open hospitality, when the temples of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons), to which Beck belongs, are off-limits to non-members.

A lay theologian I know speculates that Beck is having a crisis of faith, evidenced by his taking on the mantle of God-promoter, passing harsh judgement on mainstream moderate and progressive Christian beliefs and practices, while altogether avoiding public discussion of Mormon theology.

Or maybe Beck’s just doing what snake oil salesmen have always done, making a killing on the gullible and vulnerable. Trouble is, you can’t fool all the people all the time, hence the need to hawk new and improved concoctions.

Like when Beck fazed out Beatitudes-Busters (he actually instructed people to leave their churches if the term “social gospel” so much as passed their minister’s lips) and introduced his miracle Glenn Beck Will Tell You Who God Is and What God Wants antidote to liberation theology, a spiritual poison smuggled here from Latin America and slipped into Jell-O salads at liberal congregations like the one President Obama once belonged to.

I made that up about the Jell-O salads, but Beck’s done far worse, making up a Jesus who had nothing to say about walking in the paths of justice, mercy and peace.

Beck needs to get honest.  He wouldn’t know liberation theology if it stowed away on a stalk of bananas and wound up on his morning corn flakes.  How could he?  He detests the poor and is contemptuous of anybody who would serve them.

To understand the socio-political context for liberation theology, rent “Romero,” a Paulist Production film about Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero, who championed the oppressed and was shot to death, while he said Mass, by a paid assassin.

I have one more gripe about Beck. It may seem petty, but, remember, he’s the one who set himself up as the arbiter of what’s honorable.

Beck is not only theologically illiterate. Pre-rally photos posted on Beck’s own Web site suggest he might be literally illiterate, as well.  Next to a photo of an Arlington National Cemetery sign reading “Silence and Respect” is a shot taken at President Kennedy’s grave.  Beck, who hasn’t removed his ball cap, is talking to his daughter.

“Something that is beyond imagination is happening,” Glenn Beck has proclaimed.

Oh, Glenn, you got an amen on that.

Mary Thomas Watts is a Wilmington writer and a member of Christ Episcopal Church, in Dayton.

I doubt that many people living in this country in our time will ever be able to think about September without reference to September 11—both to the actual events of September 11, 2001, and to the symbolic and emotional reactions and meanings whenever “9/11” is evoked. I suspect that many of us can remember exactly where we were and whom we were with on that September morning in 2001 when we heard the news. Beyond the news and verbal reports were the images of that day that we will carry with us to our graves.

I have long wanted to do a theological reflection on September 11. To some, this reflection may seem political. But I’m like Jim Wallis, editor of Sojourner’s Magazine, who wrote a book entitled God’s Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn’t Get it. My intention is not to engage in the Republican/Democratic Party debates and the coming electioneering season. My interest is in asking what God may want us Christians to wrestle with.

When I was in college, a wise political science professor advised us students to ask, “What do my opponents want out of me?” “The answer,” he suggested, “will give you significant insight.”

So I ask what is it that Osama bin Laden and his accomplices wanted to achieve? What did they want from us coming out of September 11? And the answer is pretty obvious. They wanted to create terror. After all, terrorism is the title that we’ve given to our response, The War on Terror.

Terror. I looked it up. It means fear. Synonyms are fear, horror, fright, dread, shock, panic, alarm. Antonym: security.

The follow-up question is this. What would we do if Osama bin Laden were successful in terrorizing Americans on 9/11?

Out of our fear, horror, fright, dread, shock, panic, and alarm, we might do one or more of the following:

• We might declare wars on predominately Islamic countries, which would have the twin effects of alienating millions of Moslems and helping to bankrupt America with military budgets so high that we could not properly educate, provide healthcare for, or support the common good.
• We might become so paranoid that strangers would not be welcome in our land . . . especially strangers who came here looking for a good deal just like our ancestors did.
• We would do away with freedom of religion guaranteed in the Bill of Rights . . . especially freedom for Moslems to build mosques and to worship not only in Manhattan but in many places across the country (like Sugarcreek, Oh
• We might do away with freedom from harm by arming citizens with concealed carry weapons, because they’d be so afraid . . . even to carry guns in bars and churches and public parks.
• We would pass laws that over-ride protections from government scrutiny of our communications without court orders.
• We would require people to carry papers at all times to prove our identity and citizenship—just like they used to do in the Soviet Union under the communism and in other repressive regimes.
• We might incarcerate people without trial and torture folk.

Osama’s goal would be to destroy us by creating enough fear that we would abandon our highest ideals: free exercise of religion, the rule of law, equality, generosity and hospitality.

To all of this fear, to all of the horror and terror, what does the Gospel of Jesus say?

“Fear Not!” To Mary the Angel Gabriel said, “Fear not, the Lord is with you.” The herald angels declared to the shepherds, “Fear not, for to you is born this day a savior.” And at the end of his life, the angel said to the women who had come to the tomb, “Be not afraid. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He is risen; He is not here.”

Throughout Christian history there have been many martyrs, saints, and holy women and men who have followed in Jesus’ footsteps. Even though they may have been very afraid and rightly so, they did not allow their fear to rule their lives or to disrespect the lives of others.

The answer to horror is not “security,” but trust in God. As we recite regularly from the 23^rd Psalm:

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil;for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me.

The purpose of terrorists is to terrorize. For people of faith, our purpose to refuse to be terrorized, “to fear no evil.,” but to trust in God.

–John Paddock

News today from Vatican City: “The Vatican issued revisions to its internal laws on Thursday making it easier to discipline sex-abuser priests, but caused confusion by also stating that ordaining women as priests was as grave an offense as pedophilia.” (From the New York Times)

Let’s see. Pedophilia causes lifelong damage to its victims and (when it is perpetrated by priests) often destroys the victim’s ability to relate to God. When God’s representative abuses you, faith in God is sometimes a problem.

Now to women. According to the tradition, a woman gave birth to the body of Christ. (Remember? Mary, Bethlehem, angels, shepherds, manger). Now it’s a problem when a woman stands before a gathering of God’s people and presides at a celebration of the Body of Christ. And this is associated with pedophilia?

We had a Reformation for a reason. If you are interested in a faith where women are celebrated and celebrate the Eucharist, and where it is an abomination to equate that with pedophilia, then we are here for you.

The Rev. John Paddock