The World According to Spong

Well, here’s what the guy believes: 

Twelve points

1.     Theism, as a way of defining God, is dead. So most theological God-talk is today meaningless. A new way to speak of God must be found.

2.     Since God can no longer be conceived in theistic terms, it becomes nonsensical to seek to understand Jesus as the incarnation of the theistic deity. So the Christology of the ages is bankrupt.

3.     The Biblical story of the perfect and finished creation from which human beings fell into sin is pre-Darwinian mythology and post-Darwinian nonsense.

4.     The virgin birth, understood as literal biology, makes Christ's divinity, as traditionally understood, impossible.

5.     The miracle stories of the New Testament can no longer be interpreted in a post-Newtonian world as supernatural events performed by an incarnate deity.

6.     The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.

7.     Resurrection is an action of God. Jesus was raised into the meaning of God. It therefore cannot be a physical resuscitation occurring inside human history.

8.     The story of the Ascension assumed a three-tiered universe and is therefore not capable of being translated into the concepts of a post-Copernican space age.

9.     There is no external, objective, revealed standard written in scripture or on tablets of stone that will govern our ethical behavior for all time.

10.   Prayer cannot be a request made to a theistic deity to act in human history in a particular way.

11.   The hope for life after death must be separated forever from the behavior control mentality of reward and punishment. The Church must abandon, therefore, its reliance on guilt as a motivator of behavior.

12.   All human beings bear God's image and must be respected for what each person is. Therefore, no external description of one's being, whether based on race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, can properly be used as the basis for either rejection or discrimination.

“The guy” is a former Episcopal bishop, John Shelby Spong, who has written a book called The Sins of Scripture, which argues that the Bible cannot and must not be taken literally. So how does one read the Bible, the interviewer asks in the clip below? Spong believes you should read it as a progression, from the tribal beliefs of the Old Testament through the teaching of the life of Christ.

Well, that was interesting enough for me to check out the Reverend Spong in Wikipedia, which is where I got the twelve theses above.

Well, I thought I knew the term “theism,” but did I? Is Spong using the term in some specialized way? Here’s the definition, also by way of Wikipedia:

Theism, in the broadest sense, is the belief that at least one deity exists.[1] In a more specific sense, theism is commonly a monotheistic doctrine concerning the nature of a deity, and that deity's relationship to the universe.[2][3][4][5] Theism, in this specific sense, conceives of God as personal, present and active in the governance and organization of the world and the universe. As such theism describes the classical conception of God that is found in Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Sikhism and some forms of Hinduism. 

Ummm—I’m a bear of very little brain, especially where religion is concerned, but I’d be curious to know: why is theism dead? And in what way are we to talk about God?

Could it be the ocean, the Goldberg Variations, the love of a mother holding her child moments after birth? Because if that’s God, I might have a shot, here.

Here’s what Spong has to say:

Right—so whatever God is (or are—which to me makes sense theologically, if not grammatically), Jesus is not the incarnation of her / him / it / them. Oh—and I looked up Christology, and yes, it means exactly what you think—the study of the nature and person of Christ. That said, how are we to look at Christ? As the most perfect representation of God?

All of the rest of the theses make perfect sense to me. But apparently, somebody with a better ear for theology didn’t think so; the Reverend Rowan Williams said they embodied “confusion and misinterpretation.”

Spong has various other contentions, some of which are contentious. He’s believed since before Dan Brown that Mary Magdalene was the wife of Christ. Why? Well, for one thing, Mary Magdalene in one gospel goes to claim the body of Christ—no woman of the time could have done that, were she not his wife.

Spong also decries the fact that “religion,” as it’s commonly seen, has become almost totally a negative thing—the priest abuse scandals, the exclusion of women in many faiths, the prohibition of homosexuality, the total focus on sex, about which he thinks the church knows nothing. Spong feels that two things are happening—the fundamentalist movement is hysterically reaching backward, and the mainstream churches have nothing to offer the rest of us. And so, we’re at a crucial moment when Christianity is going to have to change, to re-invent itself.

And about scripture? Well, first Spong points out that the first gospel of the New Testament was written 50 years after the death of Christ; in addition, it was written in Greek, whereas Christ spoke Aramaic. And he tears through a lot of stuff: nothing, he says, in the scripture paints Mary, the mother of Christ, as a particularly saintly, or even supportive mother, nor is she very prominent in the gospel. Oh, and by the way—the virgin birth stuff? Concocted in the ninth decade, by Matthew; none of the earlier writers ever made the claim. Oh, and he says that no respecting / respected theologian believes it. What’s the source of the confusion? Matthew didn’t know Hebrew, and had to read in Greek. So when he read in Isaiah 7:14 that a virgin shall conceive, he was reading a Greek translation of a Hebrew word that did not mean “virgin” but rather a young woman.

Oh, and another news flash—there weren’t twelve apostles but fifteen. Why? Because there are 15 guys in the New Testament who seem to be apostles, and so we have to assume that Thaddeus was Judas, and they got the names wrong. Poppycock, says Spong. And speaking of disciples—Jesus had both male and female disciples.

Spong says that he started out as a fundamentalist, and only changed when he discovered, at age fourteen, that his fundamentalism was impeding his growth and development. And what does he say now? “God is beyond my human capacity to ever know fully.”

Right—I can get that. In fact, I can buy into all of what Spong says. But I think he’s articulated all of what we shouldn’t be thinking or doing. That’s great, but…

…what is he proposing instead?

An Atheist Confronts Christmas

Mostly I ignore it. Or laugh at it, which isn’t hard to do. For years I sang all the gringo Christmas carols with the worst possible Puerto Rican accent. “Jingle bells” became “jinger bears;” the “one-horse open sleigh” became the “one-whore open sleigh.”

A few things helped. I didn’t have kids, so I was spared having to do the whole thing—the shopping, the putting up the tree, the pretense about Santa. And in Puerto Rico, Christmas is an entirely different affair.

“Why are all the Christmas carols so sad,” asked a student. I knew what he meant, and tried to explain. “Imagine a time of year so dark, so cold. You’re outside, trudging home, the wind is slapping snow in your face. At last you can see the house. It’s totally dark, but you can smell the wood smoke from the chimney. Your legs are tired from the effort of pulling through the snow. Finally, finally you can see—there’s a single candle burning in the window. You’re home.”

“I don’t get it,” he said.

“It’s all about a light, a single light, that you see in the darkest time of the year. And there’s no reason for that light—in fact, it’s miraculous. You stare at it, this one tiny flame that at any moment can sputter out. It’s infinitely small. Yet it may become larger, grow, warm you and your family and your neighbors. You can cook. You can see. It’s this small, miraculous, filled-with-potential flame that has no reason, no reason whatsoever, to be in your life. You stare and stare, full of wonder.”

“Silent night, Holy night,” he sang. Or rather, parodied. You could have gone out for a cigarette, come back, and still not have gotten to the third line….

“Look, it’s just something in the culture.”

“But it’s a birth, it should be happy, joyous….”

I never convinced him, of course. He left thinking that we celebrated the birth of his Savior with increased and renewed fits of melancholy.

“Christmas is just the time of year when happy people make the rest of us feel more miserable,” said a depressed patient to me, years ago.

I knew what she meant. We were hanging out by the TV, trying not to watch anything about Christmas. We were ignoring it as hard as the rest of the world was shrieking it at us. Oh, except for that afternoon, when family and friends weren’t visiting.

Who wants to go to a nut house on Christmas day?

So occupational therapy had thrown the “Christmas dinner” two days before. We were on marginal staffing. Anybody who had less than a fifty-fifty chance of harming himself or anyone else was discharged.

I worked a lot of those Christmases, operating under the theory that I wasn’t going to celebrate it any way—why shouldn’t I let someone for whom it meant something have the day off? Let some woman be with her kids.

That seemed reasonable up until a couple days ago. When I looked at a guy whom I had first seen as a kid holding his own kid.

And realized for the first time—I didn’t have that.

And I wish I had.

It’s about how you define it. Kids didn’t come into the equation—they were rigorously excluded. So of course I was working those Christmases. Why sit at home and listen to the sounds of joy and delight—presents under the tree!—that weren’t there? Better to go hang with the depressives in the madhouse.

In just the way that generations of Blacks accepted Jim Crow for years, we accepted that we’d never have kids. We squared our shoulders, lifted our chins, got on with our lives. Some of us got kids into our lives as teachers or pediatricians or uncles and aunts. Some of us pretended we didn’t want parenthood. We had better—or at least more expensive—vacations.

That same exclusion worked for God. For most of two millennia, the Christian churches had some news for us gay people, and most of the time it wasn’t stuff you wanted to hear. So now, in the last 20 years, I can find a church that accepts me, embraces me.

So?

Well, yesterday was Christmas Eve, the big holiday here. All of the family was gathering. I got sick.

Was it psychosomatic? Can you really bring on severe diarrhea just by wishing to be anywhere else?

My doctor might say yes. My stomach says no.

Whatever. It was going to be very loud in a very small place. People were going to sing, play the typical percussion instruments, dance, tell jokes. It would be five or six hours of forced gaiety.

I am, by a definition that got redefined, childless and godless. I cannot see that little flame, that flicker that may die, or may grow and warm and transform and reform us.

I’m outside, looking in. But I leave the following, for those inside.

The Craziness Marches On

Well, it’s a day when religion seems to intrude itself.

Maybe it started yesterday, when I read the lovely and teaching story of Marriott's undergarments. Yes, there is a Marriott; yes, he’s chairman of the board of you-know-what; yes, he’s a Mormon.

And listen to what he said!

“I related to him how I’d been involved in a very serious boat accident, here  in New Hampshire,” Marriott said. “I caught fire; my polyester pants had burned off all the way to my waist. But my undergarments from my waist down to my knees had not even been singed. There wasn’t a mark on them. And I said, these holy  undergarments saved my life.”

¿Bíjte?! (as we’d say down here—“see”?!)

Of course, it could also have been yesterday, when I walked past the capitol with Raf. There’s a huge group of people, today, who are clamoring to God. And they’ve stuck up a huge “Christian” poster, completely obscuring half of the capitol’s northern face. Got the Jesus, got the sheep, got the cross! And they’ve got the quote from—I think—Ezekiel about the clamoring….

This, of course, used to set my Madison sensibilities howling. These crazy evangelicals who are anti EVERYTHING except personal-read-financial enrichment are being given the use of the preeminent public building on the island—I’ve paid for a block or two of the marble several times over, thanks!—and nobody whispers a word of disagreement?

Can we—gays and lesbians and women and just about everybody who isn’t insane—hold an alternative festival next week?

You know the answer.

Well, well. Mental hygiene. Breathe, Marc.

And then, it turned out the Reverend—wait, why did I type that!—Sun Myung Moon died at age 92 yesterday. Well—certainly had to check in on that!

And it is quite instructive, the life of our reverend. Born in 1920, he encountered—literally, he says—Jesus at age sixteen. (That’s Moon, age 16—sorry, writing about religion so often induces bad grammar, or maybe just thinking….)

Well, Jesus had a message, as he so often does. Moon was to go forth and complete the work that Jesus had left unfinished 2000 years ago. Sets up the Unification Church, and grows it by preaching family values.

The family often being the result of two strangers of different cultures being “blessed” in a mass ceremony.

Remember Madison Square Garden in 1982?

Well, Moon did what any sharp guy would do. Got rich, acquired money and power! The New Yorker Hotel, a ski resort—all manner of bangles on the guy’s bracelet.

Oh, and curious friendships—with Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon, and George H. W. Bush. As well, of course, as the dictator of North Korea.

I could tell you as well about the Church of Scientology (capitals by convention only) interviewing girlfriends for Tom Cruise.

But the brain tires.

Here’s the thing. 20 % of the followers of this blog—there are five—go to church faithfully (was about to say religiously, but thought not).

Her name is Susan.

And I respect Susan’s beliefs as she respects mine. I would also argue that she is the best sort of Christian, and that she, and her church, do good in the community. I cheerfully grant her and her church the right to be tax-free, and I shoulder a bit more of the burden April 15 for that dispensation.

But these crazies?

Needing a breath of fresh air, mentally, I turned to Mark Twain. And here he is, on the Book of Mormon:

All men have heard of the Mormon Bible, but few except the "elect" have seen it, or, at least, taken the trouble to read it.  I brought away a copy from Salt Lake.  The book is a curiosity to me, it is such a pretentious affair, and yet so "slow," so sleepy; such an insipid mess of inspiration.  It is chloroform in print.  If Joseph Smith composed this book, the act was a miracle--keeping awake while he did it was, at any rate.  If he, according to tradition, merely translated it from certain ancient and mysteriously-engraved plates of copper, which he declares he found under a stone, in an out-of-the-way locality, the work of translating was equally a miracle, for the same reason.

The book seems to be merely a prosy detail of imaginary history, with the Old Testament for a model; followed by a tedious plagiarism of the New Testament.  The author labored to give his words and phrases the quaint, old-fashioned sound and structure of our King James's translation of the Scriptures; and the result is a mongrel--half modern glibness, and half ancient simplicity and gravity.  The latter is awkward and constrained; the former natural, but grotesque by the contrast.  Whenever he found his speech growing too modern--which was about every sentence or two--he ladled in a few such Scriptural phrases as "exceeding sore," "and it came to pass," etc., and made things satisfactory again.  "And it came to pass" was his pet.  If he had left that out, his Bible would have been only a pamphlet.

Extreme Something

“In our family, when we don’t know what to do, we have a cup of coffee. When we don’t know what to think, we write.” Words I once wrote in Iguanas.

Well, I’m doing both.

The coffee is next to my computer. But where is Anders Behring Breivik, the source of my confusion and need to write?

In Oslo, awaiting sentencing.

You remember the guy—the extremist who blew up a government building in Oslo, drove to Utoya, crossed by boat to the island, and shot up and killed 60 students involved in a political youth camp. It happened on a Friday in July, 2011. I was at “work”—quotation marks because I was really just waiting to be laid off, and hence doing nothing. So I devoted the day to reading the news of the atrocities as it came in.

Madness or evil, I wondered at the time.

And it’s a case where knowing more means understanding less. Two court-ordered psychiatric evaluations have been done—they disagree. The first stated he was psychotic—both at the time of the killings and at the time of the evaluation. The second report claims he’s sane. The trial has just ended, and it riveted Norway. Sentencing will be on or before August 24.

The prosecution claims he’s crazy—and with good reason. Norway’s jails focus on rehabilitation—but they really mean it, unlike the US. (One-third of black American males between 20 and 50 are in prison? Ouch!)* Oh, and maximum sentence length in Norway is “only” 21 years. Breivik is 33—that means he’d be in his mid-fifties when he got out. Still time to do some real damage. Some more real damage, I mean….

The other problem is the other prisoners. The concern is that Breivik could start spouting off his militant anti-Islamic rhetoric, and form right-wing cells (sorry, couldn’t help it) in prison. So the Norwegians—bless them—are seriously considering putting him is isolation. But there’s a problem—it denies him his basic human rights. So, with paradoxically the same logical-to-the-edge-of-craziness that characterizes Breivik, the authorities are proposing to hire “friends” who will come in several times a day to…

…play chess with him.

(It’s a digression but I can’t help it. Does anyone remember Laura Hernández who got stuck in a Dominican jail for a couple of years? And the jail, with the dirt floors and no food—the family had to bring that in….)

OK—prosecution says he’s crazy. Defense says he’s sane. Anders argues—among other things (apparently he wrote a 1500 page manifesto—remember Mein Kampf?—that lays it all out)—that this violence was a necessary wake-up call to Norway. Their culture, their very identity is under attack! No, not openly—but slowly, insidiously by you-know-who, the folks in the burkas and the head shawls.

Hey, sorry, but someone had to do it.

Well—Norwegian thoroughness. I spent some time—though admittedly as a kid—in Norway. Norwegian women—charmers! Norwegian men?

Well, guys, just a little…

…dull.

But organized. And Breivik was that—renting the farm, buying the six tons of fertilizer needed for his bomb, laying the groundwork for what he hoped would be his message to the world. He may have had a thinking disorder, but clearly not a planning disorder.

But sane?

There was an accepted standard in 19^th century British law for determining legal sanity: would the prisoner have committed the same actions if he had had a policeman standing next to him? (Think it was Burke’s Rule—damn, wish I had Internet!)

Well, Breivik called the Norwegian police twice from Utoya, attempting to surrender. The police, for whatever reason, blew him off. So he kept wandering around the island, killing kids.

OK—so he’s sane. 21 years of playing chess with paid friends and he’s out. What happens if he’s declared insane? 

Paradoxically, because in Norway some psychiatric disorders are considered incurable, Breivik could be held for the rest of his life in a psychiatric unit. So it’s 21 years in prison if sane, potentially life in a madhouse if he’s nuts.

Well, in Puerto Rico we might see it in another way. I once, in an unthinking moment, confessed that I was suicidal to a student.

“Ah,” she said. “That just means you’re not listening to God. And do you know why! You have a demonio! I know, my sister-in-law had one!”

It was therapeutic, actually. Made me so mad I stopped being depressed….

OK—maybe extreme. But one does get the feeling—since psychiatry seems to tell us so little here—that we should turn elsewhere.

Like where Breivik turned? Because he’s an arch-Christian (my apologies to Christians, who could rightly argue that he’s anything but!). But no matter, it could indeed be that there is malevolence, as there is madness. Seventy dead kids is a pretty strong argument for evil.

As well, there’s the real question—does it matter? Sane / insane—who cares? What does it matter why he did it? Stick him somewhere—anywhere!—and forget about him! Sure, Norway is a rich country—but the rich don’t stay rich by spending foolishly. Like hiring chess players for killers….

No good answers, here. So then the question becomes…

…have we asked the right questions?

*No, dammit, I haven’t checked this fact—no Internet. But it’s something outrageous….