Our Love Affair with Victimhood

One of my good friends lamented recently that he felt like the atheists were being persecuted by the larger society. This is interesting because when one talks to liberal Christians or conservative Christians one hears the same thing. I would wager that if we were to talk to any number of people we would hear the same complaint. I confess that I feel the same way too. Recently, I lamented to my girlfriend that I felt like Lutheranism just didn’t have a voice in the larger society. Fortunately, she called me to the carpet and asked what it really meant to be Lutheran. Of course I gave her some answers, but when I thought about it, I really couldn’t offer too much.
Everyone likes to be the victim. The rich are the victims of “levelers” and the “99 percent.” Meanwhile, the “99 percent” are victims of the rich. Depending on your Christian persuasion, you are being persecuted by someone else. Diana Butler Bass finds herself having to fight against evangelicals while David Jeremiah laments that “he never thought he’d see the day.” Israel feels itself threatened by Arabs and the Arab states feel themselves threatened by … well … everyone. And obviously, they all have their cases, which is probably the problem.
Nothing loses friends and wins enemies quite like telling someone not to be a victim. Yet, if there is one thing I learned from my parents, it is not to be one. My parents came down pretty tough on me when I tried to play it and I find that life tends to do the exact same thing. This isn’t a blog telling people that they haven’t gotten bad hands dealt them or to just suck it up (much less to capitulate and roll over), but rather to think about what kind of life they are choosing.
We live in a culture that feeds on hatred. I am not talking about the kind of hatred that we think about as our pinnacle of hatred, but the subtle hatreds as well: The angry words about the person who cut you off in traffic, the poor service you received at the coffee shop (hint, hint), and even the nabob on the sports call in show. Subtly we have begun to turn away from people. We see them as nothing more than the sum of opinions. In a culture where opinion is king (or queen), did we expect anything less? And so we protect our opinions as if they were our very nature. God help any politician who comes to the bargaining table. God help the friend who speaks up for “the other political party” at a soiree we are having. God help the Christian who has a different belief than our own.
Yet again, it is important to have your opinions. It is important to understand that your opinions might be dead wrong too. However, more important than all of this, it is important for you to know that you are not the victim. There are going to be intolerant people out there, and rather than looking at it as an issue of you being persecuted by all the intolerant people, perhaps we should really look at it as “some days you are victim and some days you are victimizer.”

We are going to hurt people, but we don’t like to think about that. Whatever happened, they had it coming. We couldn’t help it. We were just being honest. Yet when the same thing happens to us, we are immediately at the Alamo. However, pride is an interesting thing. It is amazing how lonely it makes us. We don’t stop to ask ourselves, “could I be wrong here if everyone else is so sure.”

I remember the thoughts that went through my head when I decided to leave my church body. I think a lot of people (on both sides) thought I had made the decision in haste because of a knee-jerk reaction to a single issue. I worried about that myself. Later when I decided to leave my seminary it was less because of being angry and more because I wanted to find a place that would teach me to focus on my strengths. Do I think I am victim? Of course. I am human. Its what we do. But the fortunate thing is that I know that I am very proud person and very proud people succumb to victimization much more whole-heartedly. I am thankful that I know I am proud because its like an alcoholic who has made peace with that particular vice.

My point here is that we should never be defined by what we are not, but who we wish to become. I am not saying that if your goal is to become a thief or a murderer, than you have my blessing; but I am saying that human beings were created to be more than just victims. Augustine said God is forever changing and changeless. If we are made in the image of God, doesn’t a little of that rub off on us.

When I was in Haiti, I saw poverty that would put any American to shame. I found a people that indulged in the same virtues and vices as we in the first world enjoy. However, what marked the truly amazing Haitians is the same thing that marks any truly amazing human being. They allowed their circumstances to mold them, without allowing them to control them. They felt pain and pleasure, happiness and sadness, love and loss; but they felt it as a human being and not as a victim. And if the noblest of the poor can weather the cruel storms of life, perhaps there is hope for us “wealthier victims.”

I am not going to lie to any of you out there. I still feel it. There is that nudge of pride that tells me to say that I am a victim and worthy of your sympathy. Yet I realize that if I indulge in that, I will lose a great deal. I will lose friends and loved ones. I will lose the ability to share my hope, faith, and love with people that I care about. We must always take a stand, but that doesn’t mean we should unnecessarily make ourselves pariahs. Jesus exemplified this best. He was willing to be with anyone and humble with everyone. The people who were victims in Jesus’ day never heard Jesus reinforce their victim-hood, but rather fight against their injustice. The ultimate victim took on the ultimate injustice and showed us all how to fight it properly. We must be willing to sacrifice our dignity, our reputations, and our very lives for what we believe is right.

Losing My Faith in American Civil Religion.

A little while ago I had listened to some of my conservative friends opine that the march on Wall Street was awful and being infiltrated by Communists and Socialists. Many of you would have applauded when I said … nothing. That's right, nothing. I am a person who has a tendency to opine a lot myself, but as I have gotten older I have become aware of the uselessness of this. The crazy people who come into various jobs I have worked and complain about this thing and that thing have taught me something. I should re-evaluate the way I talk to people.

It has not been easy; not by a long shot. And yet, reading through the pooled ignorance of Facebook posts (some of them my own), I realize that there is something to be said for the old adage, "It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt." I can tell of numerous statements where I have spoken some opinion only to have someone refute it with the greatest of ease making me feel the intellectual equivalent of a paramecium or Hollywood celebrity.

Yet, I don't want to just roll over and play dead. I should explain what I believe and I should start off by stating what I did believe. I was blessed to have two very intellectually curious parents and to grow up in just the right places at just the right time. My formative years were in a rural Lutheran farming community. At this time in the 1980s, I cannot conceive of a better place to grow up. Lutherans are known for being advocates of simul justus et peccator, a phrase which means "both saint and sinner." Lutherans follow the laws and rules of their faith, but do not let that get in the way of grace. They were masters of common sense (since they were farmers) and of good theological sense (since they were Lutherans).

We then moved to the suburbs of Cincinnati, which was a bit of a wake up call because I thought everyone was Christian and everyone attended church on a regular basis. The desire for mission and sharing God's message of Jesus is Lord and Redeemer of a fallen world grows when one is surrounded by such a world.

However, Christianity was not the only religion that I was practicing. I had bought into American Civil Religion. As one of my great intellectual sparring partners, David Kamphuis (pronounced KAMP•vīs) has put it, "The Constitution and the government it produces are philosophical ideas, which means they are going to be in conflict with other philosophical ideas. That is why it is hard to be a Christian and an American." I would discover this later, but as a youth I flirted with being a Democrat (because I believed the poor should be looked after), a theocratic democrat (because I believed in a Christian state that was ruled by Christian Philosopher Kings), then a communitarian (read Amitai Etzioni), finally I became one of the most hated of all political parties in America. I became a moderate.

Moderates are hated because they take each issue and examine it. They cannot be counted on (read: trusted) to vote down the party line. Take a moderate position on anything and watch your friends disappear. Liberals think you are a conservative and vice-versa. It isn't that moderates aren't passionate about things. They can be unbelievably passionate about taxes, poverty, military spending, etc.; its just that they disagree with the pre-packaged answers. Here, then is the moment of decision and it is here where I lost my moderatism.

Moderates have a choice in the end. They can apathetically shrug life's requirements for belief in something greater then themselves, or they can find a new paradigm. This is when I lost my faith in American Civil Religion and I declare it to be a half-truth and therefore a dangerous lie. Lutherans talk of the two-kingdoms theory. Unlike Calvinists, Catholics, and Anglicans; Lutheranism began to define itself in theological terms and not in tribal terms. While Calvin was setting up Geneva, the Catholics consolidated their domains (and began exporting their religion), and Anglicans developed a theology of pseudo-Catholicism with anti-papism; the Lutherans took the moderate road and thus the more arduous. We declared, in the Spirit of Augustine, that there are two kingdoms: there is a kingdom of the left (the one of laws and civil governments) and the kingdom of the right (the kingdom of grace and the church).

In today's society is tempting to flatten the two kingdoms into one. The "conservative" camp (though by no means all of them) wishes to create a secular theodicy. They wish to have American society mirror 1950s Christianity. Their temptation is understandable due to the relative tranquility of that time period and the economic progress of America. On the other hand, the "liberals" (again a broad brush stroke is being used) wish to make a) to use the words of Milton Friedman, to make Christianity so small a part of people's everyday lives that it can be drown in a bath tub, or b) to mold Christianity into something more palatable to the countercultural movements.

One could argue that this shows there is no American Civil Religion to speak of, but rather two or more ACRs. Yet, a close examination of the two reveals that they are the same in one key aspect. Both believe that the state is the most important aspect of life and Christianity merely an appendage). The "conservatives" believe it is the state which will evangelize. It is the state that true redemption and "heaven" are found. It is the state that we are working towards. The liberals believe virtually the same things. I recall a conversation I had in one of my Church History classes where we got onto the subject of George W. Bush's Faith Based Initiative. I thought being in a class surrounded by staunch Liberal Christians, it would be a fore-gone conclusion that the Faith Based Initiative would be bad since it is an obvious violation of church and state and manifestly weakens both. I was shocked to find myself in the center of maelstrom as I argued every single person in class. What I found is that Liberal Christians are just as eager for government favor as Conservative Christians. Church and state is, like all human constructs, merely a useful tool to be discarded when it becomes an hinderance.

So where am I now? I have moved to the most radical position of all. I have become a Christian.¹ It is the worst thing that could have happened to me too. Conservatives and Liberals can at least dialogue with each other (read: yell at one another), because their language is similar and their telos, that is "philosophical goal," is the same. They are both working to "make America better." The Christian doesn't care about America, Europe, Africa, Asia, etc. The Christian is loyal to God and God's Kingdom. This is why Muslims treated Christians with wary unease during the wars with the Byzantines and why Buddhists in the Far East pushed out or executed Christians in their realms. It is also why Christians in Europe would persecute other denominations. It wasn't because they didn't like their beliefs. It was because their loyalty lay to something, Someone, some place other than the nation-state.

A little while ago I went to school at a place where it was bad to have conservative thoughts. It was bad to not just be against but to question the roots of poverty, homosexuality, universalism, or ecclesiology. They may deny it, but faculty and student actions would say otherwise. (I know I can be pigheaded too. I do not have the open-hearted spirit of N. T. Wright though in my defense he has nearly 63 years to cultivate it and he is English and not an Irish-American Lutheran.) When we open ourselves up to the Gospel and to the Spirit we find ourselves forced to listen more and opine less. We realize that there but for the indwelling of the Spirit go we. I am not saying this with pride (at least I hope I am not), because I did not choose to follow Jesus. The Holy Spirit came into me in the life of the church and showed me a bigger world that is full of people living out "simul justus et peccator." I found that I did not have all the answers. I found that our programs and secular reconditioning of people (be it through the "secular theodicy" of the "conservatives" or the "state church" of the "liberals") is completely different from what Christ taught and by proxy from what God wants. So, I have written a great deal about why I am trying to learn to say nothing. I think it is best to let 1 Peter 4:11 say it best:

Whoever speaks must do so as one speaking the very words of God; whoever serves must do so with the strength that God supplies, so that God may be glorified in all things through Jesus Christ. To him belong the glory and the power for ever and ever. Amen.

1 Notice I did not say I was "born again." I have always been a Christian. Christianity is not something that happens all of a sudden. It is something you are born into and grow into, so that talking about when you were saved becomes ludicrous. When are you never saved?

The Answer for Christians Might be Easier than We Think

(I did not edit this properly.)

I hail from a liberal mainline protestant church. Immediately this conjures up in the minds of some people a group of wishy-washy non-thinking liberals who put their own ideologies ahead of the gospel or at least substitute it with a gospel of their own creation. I can also talk to another group of people and immediately get pigeon-holed as some backwards thinking nabob with who also substitutes the gospel for a God that looks very much like the ideology personified (or perhaps deified) that I wish to serve. And I do this too. Baptists, Catholics, Lutheran Church Missouri-synod attendees, or people who go to the ELCA church automatically get pigeon-holed, labeled, and then placed on their proper shelf. If you are anything like me, you probably realize you do it as well. Its okay, there’s hope for you too as there is for me. And its called the Bible.
Now, I am not talking about the Bible that takes one verse and expands it to mean the entirity of the Bible. How would we like it if our entire lives could be summed up in one sentence or one word? How does Good Friday carry any weight without The Fall or Easter Sunday? How does love your neighbor mean anything if you don’t know what it means to be loved yourself?# To back up this point pick up a Bible (English or Greek) and you will find that many Bible verses are linked to other Bible verses. There is a theme here, but if we wish to boil the theme down to mere sentences, we risk turning it into rules and regulations and pulling it away from it being a relationship.
Who am I? Who are you? Do you want to know the answers or do you want to live your life and discover that? I am a barista, a brother, a seminarian, a son, an American, and on and on. Do any of these describe me fully? Would you want them to describe you fully? This is the gauntlet which the Christian religion not only throws down in front of the world, but in front of the church as well. To live together as individuals in community doesn’t mean that the rest of the community must follow what you believe or that you must acquiesce to the structure of the community. The question isn’t some sort of either/or because what the church demands of you is that you is to be in relationship with Jesus. And this requires us to really believe in Jesus, not just the Jesus of our imaginations. If we think about our friends and loved ones today we often get the impression of people to whom our own will is enacted. We see them as characters in sitcoms who are placed into a situation and react in set patterns. Yet if we truly were to think about how we want to be treated, we would realize this all wrong. We want to have the benefit of the doubt and for people to seriously think about what we say not just when it happens to agree with them.
Liberal Jesus, Conservative Jesus, American Jesus, Liberation Jesus, they aren’t the real Jesus. We hang them up on our walls, place them on our bookshelves, and even see their marks in our churches. But not one of them saves us. That Jesus was a real man and is the real God. That Jesus didn’t proclaim an arbitrary law but spoke of the Torah that had been written on our hearts. That Jesus didn’t give up on the people he loved, but died for all of them. It wasn’t because he wanted us to follow his teachings, but to be in relationship. There is a myth that the church is divided, but this is a myth fabricated by people who don’t understand relationships. The church is united in its love of Christ. God sees us not in our divisions or groups, but in our unity under the blood which is called simply “The Church.”