Author Archives: Obie Holmen

Midweek miscellany

Bavarian Lutheran Church

Lutherans in the United States and Canada trace their lineage through immigrants from northern Europe. Of course, Luther was German, and the Lutheran Reformation centered in the regions around the Baltic Sea. As the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), easily the largest and most moderate of the American Lutheran denominations, moves toward full inclusion for gays and lesbians, similar processes are underway in the traditional Lutheran churches of northern Europe. Sweden has a lesbian bishop. A bishop in Finland has announced an openness to “gender neutral marriage”. Now, the Lutheran church in conservative Bavaria announces that gay clergy partners who have entered into a legal civil union may live together in church owned parsonages:

Gay and lesbian Lutheran ministers in the conservative German state of Bavaria may live with their partners in parish parsonages, but only if they enter into a state-sanctioned civil union … According to church officials, six Bavarian ministers already live in same-sex civil unions.

Gay student editorial banned at Catholic high School

Sean Simonson is a senior at Benilde-St. Margaret’s, a Catholic school in St. Louis Park, Minn. His editorial entitled “Life as a gay teenager” drew heated comments in the student newspaper, The Knight Errant, and the article was removed. Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) reprinted the article in full. Here is a portion:

I have considered suicide. Yes, I have considered taking my own life. Unlike six other boys recently in the news, I never took the steps to follow through on my dark thoughts, but, unfortunately, I can understand what drove them to. Because I know what it’s like to be a gay teenager.

Imagine going through adolescence: hormones raging, body changing, and relationships that go a little deeper than friendship developing. Now, add on being gay.

Don’t believe being different is difficult? Try going through a day in the life of a gay teen.

Every day you hear someone use your sexuality — a part of you that, no matter how desperately you try, you cannot change — as a negative adjective. That hurts.

You fear looking the wrong way in the locker room and offending someone. Politicians are allowed to debate your right to marry the person you love or your right to be protected from hate crimes under the law. Your faith preaches your exclusion — or damnation. And no one does anything to stop it … Oh yeah, and the words “queer,” “homo,” and “faggot” that people throw around all the time? Yeah, those might as well be personal attacks.

As an aside, there is news today that Sarah Palin’s sixteen year old daughter Willow embarrassed herself with a Facebook homophobic rant, using the personal attack terms Simonson derides. What values is she learning from her mother?

Roman Catholic Council of Bishops signals move to the right

For progressive Catholics who thought that the solid swing to the right by the church hierarchy, away from Vatican II, couldn’t get worse, it just did. The conservative vice-president of the American Council of Bishops, in line for election to the presidency, was defeated by a right wing insurgency and an outspoken hard-liner, New York Archbishop Tim Dolan, was elected.

Conservatives [dislike the vice-president’s] reputation as a moderate who favors dialogue and persuasion over the more bully pulpit pronouncements of churchmen like … Dolan, a media-friendly but outspoken figure who became head of the New York archdiocese only last year.

[It was] conservatives’ main goal of thwarting the ascension of a progressive to the top spot; since the contemporary structure of the bishops conference was established in the 1960s, no sitting vice-president has ever been passed over for promotion to the presidency of the bishops — until now.

ELCA commits half a million dollars to cholera relief

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) announced Nov. 15 that it has committed $500,000 for the prevention and treatment of cholera in Haiti, as well as continued response to communities displaced by the January 2010 earthquake. The gift is in addition to the $25,000 the church committed last week for similar purposes in Haiti.

ELCA social statement on genetics

Critics of the ELCA can find the lamest of excuses to justify their stance. A small, rural, farm community congregation of the Red River Valley of North Dakota announced that part of their rationale for leaving the ELCA is a pending social statement on genetics.

Members of the Anselm Trinity Lutheran Church near Sheldon, N.D., interpreted the ELCA’s draft statement as saying farmers who use genetically modified seeds are “pretty much sinners,” said church council president Jill Bunn.

The church is located in the Red River Valley, where farmers often use enhanced seeds to help plants resist weed killers.

Turns out that the pending social statement, which is still in draft and discussion stage, says nothing of the sort.

“If anyone reads the statement for themselves they’ll see that it does not condemn genetically engineered seeds and it doesn’t make any recommendation on farm management practices,” said Roger Willer, the ELCA staff person working with the task force developing the statement.

Was Paul the apostle gay?

A week ago, I spent the weekend in Milwaukee promoting my novel to the 2,000 participants of the Roman Catholic Call to Action Conference. One of the keynote speakers was retired Episcopal Bishop John Shelby Spong. The Bishop is an outspoken proponent of progressive Christian causes, and he has published a dozen or so books in the last several decades that have attracted a huge liberal readership.

I was greatly pleased to have the opportunity to visit with the Bishop for a short time. For those unfamiliar with my novel, A Wretched Man, a novel of Paul the apostle, the characterization of the man from Tarsus suggests he struggled with homosexual urges, which he characterized as his “thorn in his flesh”. Bishop Spong shares this view, and we briefly discussed our common impression. Bishop Spong said he first read of this idea in a 1930’s treatise by the British theologian Arthur Darby Nock. I offered the bishop a copy of my book as a gift, which he graciously accepted and asked me to sign it for him.

A video of the bishop explaining his rationale has appeared on You Tube. Watch and enjoy:

Call to Action: progressive Catholics hold a convention

Along with a couple thousand others, I spent the weekend in Milwaukee attending the annual convention of Call to Action (CTA), a beleaguered group of progressive Roman Catholics. The conservative retrenchment of the Vatican and the American bishops marches on, and one wonders what the future holds for Catholic progressives. I met hundreds of interesting persons with fascinating stories: former priests and nuns who are now married, many gays or parents of gays, and numerous women who have recently been ordained to the priesthood or who are anticipating ordination in the near future.

“What,” you ask, “women ordained as Catholic priests?”

Roman Catholic Womenpriests is a movement less than a decade old that began with the 2002 ordination of seven women (six Europeans and one American). Since then, the movement is growing rapidly (despite excommunications), and I can attest to a sense of vibrancy at the Womenpriests’ booth that attracted an earnest crowd. One of the priests at the exhibit told me that their booth at the 2008 CTA Convention attracted a few curiosity seekers, but overall the mood was “don’t get too close to these excommunicated dissidents”. Last year, at the 2009 CTA convention, she reported that the fear of contagion had dissipated and the curiosity level had increased dramatically. This year, the Womenpriests booth was filled with visitors who had moved beyond curiosity to genuine interest. Their US map with red and green dots signifying locations of ordained womenpriests and pending ordinations was a hit with many asking for more specifics so they could attend a nearby Eucharist celebrated by female clergy.

Are progressive Catholics coming to the realization that their future lies outside the patriarchal hierarchy and beyond the control of the Vatican? If so, where? If not, how can progressive Catholics effect reform within the existing conservative power structures?

Enter the American Catholic Council. The Council also had an energetic presence at the CTA conference, passing out brochures inviting all to a Pentecost gathering next June. CTA is one of the member organizations of the Council, which also includes other Catholic reform organizations.

American Catholic Council is a movement bringing together a network of individuals, organizations, and communities to consider the state and future of our Church. We believe our Church is at a turning point in its history. We recall the promise of the Second Vatican Council for a renaissance of the roles and responsibilities of all the Baptized through a radically inclusive and engaged relationship between the Church and the World. We respond to the Spirit of Vatican II by summoning the Baptized together to demonstrate our re-commitment. We seek personal conversion to renew our Church to conform to the authentic Gospel message, the teachings of our Church, and our lived context in the United States. Our reading of the “signs of the times”, as we experience them in the US, our plan and our agenda are set out in our Declaration. We educate; we listen; we facilitate discussions and encounters; and, we build toward an American Catholic Council that will convene in Detroit over Pentecost weekend in June of 2011. At this Council we hope to proclaim our belief in the Rights and Responsibilities of US Catholics.

June 10, 2011. Mark the date.

On a personal note, I had the opportunity to visit with keynote speaker, retired Episcopal Bishop and noted author John Shelby Spong, and we discussed our mutual suspicion that the Apostle Paul may have been a conflicted gay man (which is developed in my novel, A Wretched Man). Bishop Spong said he first encountered that theory in a 1930’s book by theologian Arthur Darby Nock. We also discussed our mutual admiration for recently deceased British theologian Michael Goulder, who rekindled interest in the theory of Christian origins that posits a fundamental opposition between Paul the Apostle on one side and the Jerusalem Christians Peter and James, Jesus’ brother, on the other. This dispute provides the main plot line of A Wretched Man.

I also visited with Linda Pinto of CORPUS who favored me with an early report on her reading of the novel:

It was indeed a delight to meet you at CTA. I am, however, a little annoyed. I packed your book (a present to my husband) and at the last moment thought….you might browse through it at the airport. As the hotel forgot to change their clocks, they woke me up at 3:45 am rather than 4:45 am. So, with that much time to kill, I started to read A Wretched Man. WOW!!!! I am addicted. My annoyance comes from the fact that I had to return to work today and my husband insisted that I keep the book at home for his consumption!

I love your attention to detail and description. I love the interplay between the story of Paul and Jesus. And I love your description of Jesus’ family.

That is to say, get me a book review and I will publish it in CORPUS REPORTS.

Anyone interested in writing a book review for CORPUS? Contact me.

November figures of ELCA departing congregations

The figures are out for November. The latest figures follow the August convocation of the North American Lutheran Church (NALC), the Lutheran CORE spawned denomination that promises a “realignment of North American Lutheranism”. One regular commenter here (an ELCA critic) predicted that the months following the NALC startup would see a short term surge in ELCA congregational votes followed by a gradual withering down of congregational defections.

The actual figures don’t suggest any significant surge and it is too early to discern whether the process will slow:

as of 11/3/10, congregations have taken a total of 629 first votes [representing 596 congregations since some congregations have taken multiple first votes]. Of the first votes taken, 431 passed and 198 failed. 308 congregations have taken second votes (and one congregation has taken two second votes!) Of the total of 309 second votes; 291 passed and 18 failed.

For purposes of quantifying any recent surge, I think the “first vote” figure is most illustrative. As of Sept 2, 529 first votes had been recorded, so exactly 100 new first votes occurred in the last two months. This is slightly higher but similar to the monthly pace of first votes during the first year following the ELCA churchwide assembly of 2009 (CWA09). On the other hand, these figures do not suggest any slowing of the pace, either.

According to the NALC website, the dissident denomination lists forty-four member congregations at this time.

What the Lutheran Magazine printed and didn’t print

The Lutheran Magazine is the award-winning official publication of the ELCA. In the latest issue, Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson proclaims “Days of Timidity are over”. The Bishop does not mention the present controversy with Lutheran CORE/NALC (North American Lutheran Church) and LCMC (Lutheran Congregations in Mission for Christ), but undoubtedly that was on his mind. He writes,

In these uncertain and challenging times, I have pondered Paul’s words to Timothy: “God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline” (2 Timothy 1:7; New International Version).

Timidity is not one of God’s gifts to us, but we must assess it if we run the risk of becoming a timid church body.

A timid church focuses on what is lost or lacking: members, financial assets, numbers of congregations, or the number of students in programs and schools. A timid church battens down the hatches and tries to hold on to what and who remains.

A timid church defines itself (or lets others do so) on the basis of controversies or partisan divisions. Yearning for a life without tension, a timid church faces the future with fear and foreboding.

Most of all, a timid church has lost confidence — faith — in the gospel and the power of the Spirit to work through the gospel. A timid church has lost its trust in God’s promise to be faithful to God’s promise, and each part becomes preoccupied with its own survival. A timid church does not entrust its whole life to the power and promise of Christ’s death and resurrection.

As I said to synod bishops, synod vice presidents and seminary presidents in early October, I believe it is time for us to declare together: “In the name of Jesus Christ, our days of timidity are over!”

It is time for us to say with confidence: “By the power of the Spirit, we are a church confident that we have all we need. We have the treasure God has entrusted to us: the treasure of the gospel, incarnate in Jesus Christ.”

So, in response to the title of this post, this is what the Lutheran has printed. What is it that it did not print? Daniel Lehmann is the editor of the Lutheran, and he wrote a statement of policy in the September issue in which he said that NALC would receive no special treatment:

Page 8 of this issue contains a 203-word article (“Another Lutheran body formed”) on the founding of another Lutheran denomination. No more, no less.

The North American Lutheran Church came about in response to the 2009 ELCA Churchwide Assembly decisions on sexuality. Its leadership hails from the ELCA roster. Many of the 18 churches that signed on before the actual creation of the NALC were once ELCA congregations.

What we have here is a classic case of schism — a formal division or separation in the Christian church. That cleaving causes pain as your editor knows, having left the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod decades ago in another schism.

So now the NALC becomes, in the eyes of this magazine, one more Lutheran denomination. Just as the staff follows major events in the life of the LCMS, the same will be true with the NALC. The Lutheran won’t give it any special coverage just because of its heritage. This group, like Elvis, has left the building.

Octogenarian Carl Braaten is an esteemed elder of Lutheran academia; in his later years, he has grown fond of bashing the ELCA. He is one of the coterie of theologians who attempt to provide academic cover for the CORE/NALC dissidents, but his hyperbole has too often drifted into name-calling and petulant whining. Recently, in response to Editor Lehmann’s statement above, Braaten has written an open letter:

he accuses Lehmann and the magazine of being lackeys of the ELCA leadership, taking “the side of the bureaucrats”
he suggests the policy announced by Lehmann is “petty”
he whines about the refusal of the magazine to accept advertising for CORE’s theological conference, protesting that the conference was coincidental to the formation of a new denomination a month later
he disagrees that CORE/NALC is schismatic [how many times have we heard “we did not leave the ELCA, the ELCA left us]
he again takes the opportunity to swipe at the ELCA quota system for voting members and “radical theological feminism” [is that a euphemism for ordaining women?]

There’s a very small country church near Northfield that had a part time pastor. Early on, it became obvious that the church would vote to leave the ELCA, and the pastor made it clear that she would remain an ELCA pastor and would not leave with the congregation. When the day came for the final vote, everyone knew that would be the pastor’s last day. After the vote to leave became official on a Sunday afternoon, the congregation called the ELCA synod office that week requesting assistance with pulpit supply for the following Sunday.

the Lutheran Magazine

Minnesota Public Radio and anti-gay bullying

With kudos to Locally Grown Northfield blog and its commenters, here is a link to yesterday’s program on Minnesota Public Radio (MPR), which continues the discussion regarding religion’s role in fostering anti-gay attitudes that are manifested in bullying and teen sexual angst.

Consider Justin Anderson, who graduated from Blaine High School outside Minneapolis last year. He says his teenage years were a living hell. From sixth grade on, he heard the same taunts.

“People say things like, ‘Fags should just disappear so we don’t have to deal with them anymore’; and, ‘Fags are disgusting and sinful,’ ” he told the Anoka-Hennepin School Board. “And still, there was no one intervening. I began to feel so worthless and ashamed and unloved that I began to think about taking my life.”

Anderson told his story at a public hearing last month — a hearing convened because in the past year, the district has seen a spate of student suicides. Four of those suicides have been linked to anti-gay bullying.

Justin Anderson survived. Justin Aaberg did not. Aaberg, 15, loved the cello, both playing and composing numbers like “Incinerate,” which he posted on YouTube. Justin was openly gay. He had plenty of friends, but he was repeatedly bullied in his school. In July, his mother, Tammy, found her teenage son hanging from his bed frame.

“They were calling him, ‘Faggot, you’re gay,’ ” she recalls. ” ‘The Bible says that you’re going to burn hell.’ ‘God doesn’t love you.’ Things like that.”

But a representative of the Minnesota Family Council (the same group behind the flyer that appeared in my mailbox directed to “serious Catholics”—see yesterday’s post), disagreed:

she wants to keep the neutrality policy because she says that controversial topics like sexual orientation should be taught in the home or church — not in school. And she believes that changing the policy to allow such discussions is a ploy to normalize homosexuality for kids.

“It becomes homosexual advocacy when you allow this curriculum to come in under the guise of anti-bullying,” she says.

I actually agree with her in part. Sexual orientation issues ought to be openly discussed in our churches; unfortunately, I sense that the message in conservative churches only reinforces the gay angst, and the silence of many moderate and progressive churches, borne of fear of giving offense, is a sin of omission. Listen again to the words of Cody Sanders quoted in an earlier post:

These messages come in many forms, degrees of virulence, and volumes of expression. The most insidious forms, however, are not those from groups like Westboro Baptist Church. Most people quickly dismiss this fanaticism as the red-faced ranting of a fringe religious leader and his small band of followers.

More difficult to address are the myriad ways in which everyday churches that do a lot of good in the world also perpetuate theologies that undergird and legitimate instrumental violence. The simplistic, black and white lines that are drawn between conceptions of good and evil make it all-too-easy to apply these dualisms to groups of people. When theologies leave no room for ambiguity, mystery and uncertainty, it becomes very easy to identify an “us” (good, heterosexual) versus a “them” (evil, gay).

If anti-gay bullying has, at any level, an embodied undercurrent of tacit theological legitimation, then we simply cannot circumvent our responsibility to provide a clear, decisive, theological response. Aside from its theological base, anti-gay bullying is a theological issue because it calls for acts of solidarity on behalf of the vulnerable and justice on behalf of the oppressed.

I’ll be voting for …

I’m ready to vote now in the Minnesota election for governor, aided by a helpful piece of campaign literature.

In today’s mail I received a flyer entitled, “Voter’s Guide for Serious Catholics”. “Serious” is an interesting choice of adjectives. I have some very good Catholic friends, organizers of the recent Synod of the Baptized, and they certainly are serious about their faith and their Catholic tradition; yet, I don’t think they are the folks this flyer has in mind. In fact, they’re probably too serious and thus not likely to be easily persuaded to vote according to marching orders. I suspect that “serious” in the flyer is a euphemism for “good”, “real”, or “true”. Or, to put a finer point on it, if you don’t vote for this flyer’s endorsed candidate then you’re “bad”, “not a real” Catholic, or a “false” Catholic.

In the midst of the Great Recession, certainly the flyer would offer some insight into the economic policies of the candidates. Or, the candidate views on health care. Or, education. Or, …? Certainly there are “serious” (there’s that word again) issues to be debated, and if this “real” Catholic organization truly wants to inform the electorate, perhaps just a word or two about “serious” issues, but no, nary a peep.

But, they’re expanding. The folks behind this flyer used to be called “single issue”, and that issue was abortion. It’s still abortion, but now they have added a second: “protection of marriage”. I guess they’re branching out, but on both issues they would seek to impose their will on the sexual behavior of others. Through government intrusion.

If you’re interested, the flyer was prepared and paid for by the National Organization for Marriage and the Minnesota Family Council. And their preferred candidate? Republican Tom Emmer.

I’ll be voting for Democrat Mark Dayton.

Conservative Christianity driving a generation away from religion

A week ago, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Minnesota announced a reorganization plan that will eliminate twenty-one congregations in the metro, merging them into fourteen existing parishes. Stated another way, thirty-five current congregations will be downsized into fourteen. Some have suggested that if it wasn’t for the influx of Hispanic immigrants, the Roman Catholic church nationally would be suffering even greater declines in membership.

Of course, the problem of declining religious participation is not confined to Catholicism. Indeed, statistics suggest the decline in Americans who identify with religion is startling.

That shift is the decline in participation by all Americans, but particularly young adults, in churches. In 1990 only 7 percent of Americans indicated “none” as religious affiliation. By 2008 that number had grown to 17 percent. But among young adults, in their twenties, the percent of “nones” is reaching nearly 30%. The new “nones” are heavily concentrated among those who have come of age since 1990.

But wait, aren’t many conservative Christian denominations growing? Many evangelical churches thrive but at the cost of theological depth—“a mile wide and an inch deep”. Some are thinly veiled entertainment ministries. Joel Osteen Ministries is merely the most blatant example of the appealing “prosperity gospel” that too often characterizes the mega-growth churches, and makes charismatic leaders such as Osteen very wealthy.

But it is the judgmental scapegoating that is turning off this generation of young adults according to an article out of Seattle last week. Blaming the public perception of Christianity, as espoused by the religious right, for the stark decline in those identifying with religion, the article discusses a poll and a book entitled American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us, which:

makes the case that the alliance of religion with conservative politics is driving young adults away from religion …. Among the conclusions [of a major survey] is this one: “The association between religion and politics (and especially religion’s intolerance of homosexuality) was the single strongest factor in this portentous shift.”

Twenty somethings are walking away from the church, the article concludes, because of a skewed “public perception of religion as largely socially conservative,” and the perception of religion as homophobic is especially responsible for the growing percentage of “nones.”

An unrelated poll out last week suggests similar conclusions, and correlates with this blog’s recent theme of suggesting that conservative Christian policies are part of the problem of gay bullying and critically low self esteem for many young gays.

Most Americans believe messages about homosexuality coming from religious institutions contribute to negative views of gays and lesbians, and higher rates of suicide among gay youths, a new poll reports … Americans are more than twice as likely to give houses of worship low marks on handling the issue of homosexuality, according to a PRRI/RNS Religion News Poll released Thursday (Oct. 21).

After a recent spate of teen suicides prompted by anti-gay harassment and bullying, the poll indicates a strong concern among Americans about how religious messages are impacting public discussions of homosexuality.

Once again, there is a significant gap between the attitudes of younger versus older adults which mirrors very closely the higher percentage of “nones” among young adults.

Nearly half of Americans age 18-34 say messages from places of worship are contributing “a lot” to negative views of gay and lesbian people, compared to just 30 percent of Americans age 65 and older.

I’ll close by repeating the words of a young woman spoken at the ELCA Church Wide Assembly in 2009 (CWA09),

“Give us honesty,” she said. “My generation is turned off by what they see as hypocrisy in the church. ‘Love your neighbor’ is on the lips of the church, but a cold shoulder is what my generation sees.”

The bones of James the Just on trial

James, the brother of Jesus, sometimes known as James the Just, is in the news. A dealer in antiquities, Oded Golan, is on trial in Israel. It is alleged that he fabricated the evidence of the authenticity of an artifact possibly connected to James.

A bit of background is in order.

Many are surprised that Jesus had siblings, and some would deny it altogether, but the Bible contains several clear references. Here’s a partial list, which includes references in each of the four gospels, Acts, and Paul’s letter to the Galatians:

Is not this the carpenter’s son? Is not his mother called Mary? And are not his brothers James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? And are not all his sisters with us? Mt 13:55-56
Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us? Mk 6:3
Then his mother and his brothers came to him, but they could not reach him because of the crowd Lk 8:19
After this he went down to Capernaum with his mother, his brothers, and his disciples Jn 2:12
All these were constantly devoting themselves to prayer, together with certain women, including Mary the mother of Jesus, as well as his brothers Acts 1:14
but I did not see any other apostle except James the Lord’s brother. Gal 1:19

Acts and Paul’s letters make it quite clear that James became leader of the Jerusalem based, Jewish followers of Jesus after the crucifixion, and he remained in charge until his unlawful death over thirty years after the crucifixion, an event recorded by the contemporary historian, Josephus.

Finally, Acts and Paul’s letters also report the ongoing disagreement between James and the apostle Paul over the question of Gentile inclusion into the movement. James was reluctant to allow Gentiles unless they agreed to follow Torah, including circumcision, dietary rules, and calendar observances. This ongoing conflict between these two leaders forms the plotline of A Wretched Man novel.

Now to the current news of James.

It was the Jewish custom during the 1st century (among the Pharisees and others who believed in the resurrection of the dead) to rebury the bones of deceased family members a year or more after death. The bones would be carefully placed in a stone box, called an ossuary, and placed in the family tomb. Nearly a decade ago, an Israeli antiquities dealer claimed to possess an ossuary with the inscription, “James son of Joseph brother of Jesus”. No one questions that the ossuary and the bones date from the correct time period, and it also appears that the first part of the inscription is authentic. But, prosecutors claim that the defendant skillfully added the words, “brother of Jesus”.

It appears that the academic community is split over the authenticity issue. The judge in the case is now considering his verdict, but the scientific controversy will hardly be settled by his decision in the criminal trial of Oded Golan. In a later post, I will offer a book review of The Jesus Dynasty by James Tabor which considers the James ossuary controversy in depth.

The law is a ass

Mr. Bumble of Oliver Twist is one of Charles Dickens many quirky characters. Bumble is a meek little soul, dominated by an overbearing wife. But, when the magistrate informs him that he is legally responsible for her actions, that “the law supposes that your wife acts under your direction,” the brow-beaten Bumble replies,

If the law supposes that … the law is a ass—a idiot. If that’s the eye of the law, the law is a bachelor; and the worst I wish the law is that his eye may be opened by experience—by experience.

Dicken’s insight has lately been pricking at my thoughts regarding the recent spate of teen suicides, focusing our attention on bullying and teen angst over sexual identity. We have repeated former ELCA presiding Bishop Herb Chilstrom’s challenging question here several times already, but here it is again:

What will you say to your sons and daughters, sisters and brothers and others in your churches when they tell you they are homosexual?

“What would Jesus do?” is ‘90s speak for discerning God’s will. Torah, as broadly understood, is the divine will revealed for the benefit of humankind. More narrowly construed, Torah is law. Jesus repeatedly castigated the religious authorities for allowing the letter of the law to interfere with its spirit. To some, myself included, it is painfully obvious that many who would speak for Christendom offer the letter rather than the spirit, offer Torah as law rather than revelation, offer hurt instead of healing. My post earlier today contained such an example in the words of the president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary who pontificated that in spite of the evidence of teen struggles over sexuality … “The church cannot change its understanding of the sinfulness of homosexual acts unless it willfully disobeys the Scripture and rejects the authority of the Bible to reveal the truth about sin and sinfulness”.

Does this Christian leader really believe it is the will of God that our gay youth should be brutalized in body and spirit even to the point of suicide? For the sake of upholding the authority of Scripture? Here the voice of Dickens sounds like a clarion, “if the law supposes that … the law is a ass”. Is it time to step away just a bit, as Bumble implores, from high minded talk of word alone and allow the eye of the law to be “opened by experience—by experience.” The experience of our gay youth is begging to be seen.