Pickles and Morons..

In June of 2007, supported by the United States Government, Palestinians held elections in Gaza to determine which group would govern them – Hamas, a globally famous organization, infamous among Western governments for it’s militant opposition to all things Israeli, or Fatah, the favorite of Western governments. In the name of freedom and democracy, elections were held, (celebrated by the American president!) elections were monitored, and votes were counted.

Then, to the great dismay of all governments Western, results determined that free people in Gaza had freely elected Hamas to be their governors.

Hamas! What shall the freedom-advocating global civilization do? We insured their ability to make the free choice we so prize! And they chose what we did not. Do we honor the process we created on their behalf and the choice they made within the process, or do we force an outcome we prefer? What a pickle!

Closer to home, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has made much news since August of 2009, when (among many things) it voted by significant margins to approve non-heterosexual humans who happen to also be committed into same-gender, lifelong, publicly accountable relationships to become clergy in parishes who wished to “call” such individuals. (Churchspeak translation: The ELCA let some practicing gays preach.)

What does the election of Hamas in 2007 and the National Assembly of the ELCA in August 2009 share? Three things: Freedom and voting, two prized American values. – and they share the same pickle.

What happens when you let people vote?
Well, you personally release control of the outcome into the hands of everyone else who joins you at the polls. To allow a vote is to occasionally allow an antithetical option to the one you prefer! We Americans allow the dangerous option because we believe that the society we share together is resilient due to our ability to grant disharmony voice and (if elected) authority. Freedom and elections enable the risk taking and dissonance necessary for long-term systemic adaptive change- and this capacity for change fuels our nation, our culture and our economy.

Of course, your fellow citizens may be morons who don’t deserve to vote. What then? Perhaps they should be prevented from frequenting the polls. We might do well to consider who ought to make the decisions for us! The ancient Greeks had a working system: only male landowners of significant financial means had a voice in politics. All others were disposable.

The Greek empire was overthrown.

Our system allows disposable morons like me and you to vote.

We should not vote, and should not call ourselves freedom-loving if we cannot release the outcomes of our votes. If the voting cannot go your way without jumping to conspiracy theories, you may not really have much interest in freedom and democracy at all. Mull that over.

Our American civilization is losing it’s freedom- but not due to the work of one or another political party- we’re losing our freedom to disenfranchised conspiracy theorists who will not allow voting to be voting. When we cannot trust freedom and voting any longer, and we won’t live peacefully with outcomes we dislike, we have violence as our future. Hamas is the Old-Testament word for violence- Look it up.

Back to the ELCA as I wind down:
A noisy minority within the ELCA are “disenchanted” now with the churchwide organization. As I listen closely, I hear conspiracy theory lurking underneath a significant body of the disenchantment. Rather than believing that the cumulative free votes of the church-wide assemblies over the last decades have led the Evangelical Lutheran Church into systemic adaptive change that differs from their personal preferences, many dissenters believe that the churchwide office in Chicago has manipulated votes to drive a liberal agenda; then they withhold funding to "punish" the institution.

Withheld funding cripples local mission-start congregations, disaster relief, seminary funding, mission-redevelopment internship sites, and many other vulnerable growing edges of the faith. Withheld funding "punishes" mission and misses the real target: voting.

Should the church allow regularly scheduled representative votes and elections, or should the Evangelical Lutheran Church realign with the Papacy? Should the ELCA become a separate Papacy? Is participatory, accountable, systemic adaptive change part of the resilient long term health and story of the Christian faith- and if so, should it continue? Is voting a church function?

Should the people in Gaza, Afghanistan, Iraq, Congo, Sudan, Pakistan, California, Oregon. Iowa, Delaware. . . be allowed regularly scheduled representative votes and elections, or . . mmmmmm. . . ???

Pickles!!

Children of God in jeopardy

“Listen closely, my children. Unless you are baptized, you are not counted one of the children of God, and you will not see the Kingdom of Heaven.”

The Pastor is very, very earnest, for his faith, his career, his theological foundations, his very existence are tied up in these words. “Unless.” He is ordained to hold and turn the keys to the Kingdom in water, word, and sacrament.

The earnest pastor preaches to a room full of children. They come from a variety of faiths, many of them “none”, and others from the churches that choose to baptize around the age of full maturity, near the Sophomore year in High School, when they get their driver’s licenses. . .

I wonder what enters the hearts of the children who know they are not baptized, when the very official and serious preacher tells them they are not children of God, and will not see the kingdom of Heaven? Do they meet a God of love and mercy at these moments? Do they long for a relationship with a God who knows the number of hairs on their heads? Or do they begin to fear, and fear deeply?

For it is their parents who make these choices for them. Their parents put them in “unless” jeopardy. And the kids sit, trapped before a preacher, knowing that they cannot become children of God. Oh dear!

At times like these I hope the children are daydreaming; and I begin wondering what became of the criminal on the cross next to Jesus, when he was told, “Today you will be with me in paradise.” This man was not baptized. Did Jesus lie to placate the poor condemned soul? The man made no formal confession of faith, attended no membership classes, tithed not, received no saving sacrament or baptism, yet to him who believed was salvation promised! And what of the household of Cornelius in the book of Acts – who believe and receive the fruits of the spirit prior to baptism? Goodness, and doesn’t the formal church hustle to cover this grievous procedural error on God’s part? Peter, aware that his formula for salvation has been divinely subverted, stammers:

“Can anyone withhold the water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?” So he ordered them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. (Acts 10:47)

"Children of God" is Romans 8:15 language. Paul writes that we did not receive a spirit of bondage but a spirit of adoption, wherein the Holy Spirit testifies that we are children of God; children, by faith. Those who believe are children, as Paul continues. “ . . it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are reckoned as descendants.” (Romans 9.8)

Hmmm. Believing faith saves, and belief ultimately desires baptism. But is it baptism that saves?

What, exactly determines whether or not one is a child of God? Is that our designation to make? And how, exactly, does one enter the Kingdom of Heaven? Is there a formula to follow and a gatekeeping scorekeeper?

Or is it up to Jesus?

We know Jesus’ heart. They crucified him for not keeping score, for welcoming thieves and dining with outcasts, for healing without copays and feeding without lunch tickets. And we know how he describes the Kingdom of Heaven – near, within us, and like Luke 15, shamelessly in love with the missing sheep and unworthy children. We know that it is children (unbaptized, certainly) that he holds in a his arms when he tells the disciples, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for it is to such as these the kingdom belongs.” (Luke 18, Matthew 19)

Are the children in Jeopardy? Certainly not, at least not those who believe and love and wonder; not those who want to come close, for theirs is the kingdom.

Yours is the kingdom, child.

Ours.