Changing the World with Lentil Stew

So, apparently there’s now this new…group..or organization…or something…of “Seminaries that Change the World.”   

“Seminaries that Change the World is an invitation to a generation of idealists, activists, volunteers and servant-leaders who have demonstrated a commitment to community service and social justice.”

According to this website (and I should note that mostly the reason I care is that my alma mater, Luther Seminary, is a part of this group), people should consider going to seminary as a route to changing the world.

Ugh.

The leading quote on the website is, “Give me a place to stand, and I will move the earth,” supposedly uttered by Archimedes (about, um, physics, not metaphysics, but whatevs, right?).  Anyway…no quotes from the Bible.  Nothing about the words of Jesus or the empowerment of the Holy Spirit.  Not even anything about a generic non-denominational, genderless “God.”  

All, 100%, totally in curvatus se.  So, definitely something Lutherans would want to be involved with.  (For those of you who are sarcasm-impaired, that last sentence includes a gigantic eye roll.)

Now look, if they wanted to throw some Jewish or Muslim seminaries (is that what they’re even called?) on this list, and then they’d need to back away from the Jesus stuff a little, okay.  I get that it is possible to be a trained leader in a non-Christian religion, and I don’t begrudge people that. (I think they’re wrong, but I don’t begrudge them, and I certainly don’t want to take away their religious freedom to believe and practice as they see fit.)  

But.  But.  All of the schools in the group are Christian.  

And Christians know – or at least, they used to – that the only person who has any real power to change the world is Jesus Christ.  Even if you’re operating from the perspective that “changing the world” is coterminous with “God’s mission in the world,” you still have to contend with verses like Phillippians 2:13, “…it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.”

It’s just not about you.  It’s just not about you.  Say it with me, Christians, it’s just not about you. 

Carl Braaten, in discussing the “Two Kingdoms Theory” says this: 

“Historical liberation and eternal salvation are not one and the same thing. They should not be equated. The gospel is not one of the truths we hold to be self-evident; it is not an inalienable right which the best government in the world can do anything about. There are many people fighting valiantly on the frontline of legitimate liberation movements who are not in the least animated by the gospel. The hope for liberation is burning in the hearts of millions of little people struggling to free themselves from the conditions of poverty and tyranny. When they win this freedom, should they be so fortunate, they have not automatically therewith gained the freedom for which Christ has set us free (Gal. 5:1).”

This is excellent.  It is utterly, and absolutely, perfectly stated.  Yay, Carl Braaten.  (Why, why, oh why are there no theologians like him left in “this church”?)  “Changing the world” is great, so far as it goes.  But if we learned anything last week from Jesus’ takedown of the Sadducees, it’s that “this world,” and all it has to offer, is not the last word, and it is certainly not the only thing we have to look forward to do.  

“Changing the world,” is, I suppose, a noble task.  But it is not, in and of itself, Christian ministry.  And Christian seminaries should know this.  If the best we can be about is “changing the world,” with a little sprinkle of Jesus on top, then what the hell are we doing????  

“If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied….If the dead are not raised, ‘let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.” (1 Corinthians 15:19, 32)

Should seminaries be encouraging their students to live and practice the faith, and not just hunker down inside their own heads full of knowledge?  Of course.  Go forth, “change the world,” if that’s your thing.  So much good has been done, so much love has been shown, and so much gospel has been proclaimed in the concrete acts of love and mercy done by the Church throughout the ages, and let us pray that these might continue!

But these acts of love and mercy, of “changing the world,” have been done by a Church that was, as Braaten puts it, “animated by the gospel.”  By people who know that the death and resurrection of Jesus has already changed the world, and that we live and move and have our being on the basis of that reality.  Any so-called seminary that can’t see clear to that (and by choosing to associate with this “Seminaries that Change the World” it seems that they can’t) really doesn’t deserve to call itself Christian.  

Not only that, but the mission will ultimately fail.  Because “changing the world” comes from God, at the end of the day.  Because the problem with the world is not just that people aren't nice enough.  The problem with the world is sin, death, and the devil.  And the only - only - fix for that is Christ crucified.  Christ, and only Christ.  “Then the one who is seated on the throne said, ‘See, I am making all things new.’”  Not – “Then the one who is a nice person said ‘go out and make all things new.’” 

A seminary that is teaching its students to paint a veneer of religion over the mission of the Peace Corps is trading its rich heritage for a bowl of lentils, Jacob-and-Esau style.  

May the Lord have mercy upon us, and may He come quickly, to at last, once and for all, “change the world.”   

Random, Middle 'o' the Night Thoughts

I came across this tonight, from Thomas Merton in Thoughts in Solitude:

"MY LORD GOD, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone."

It reminds me a lot of the Holden Prayer for Good Courage:

"Lord God, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown. Give us faith to go out in good courage, not knowing where we go, but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen." 

In other news, God works in mysterious ways (as though I didn't already know that).  I was listening to a sermon from my home church tonight, and realizing that what Pastor Mike was talking about was something I really needed to focus on - reclaiming the joy in my faith.  There was a time in my life when my faith was almost entirely about joy, and there are times when it's more intellectual (and I find that the joy actually comes when I get to be really intellectually engaged, but that's a different story...), but more recently it's been that "God is really messing with me, and that's a good thing, but a really hard thing, and it's not always the most joyful time, even though I can recognize that it's going to be good at the end" kind of faith.
 

Oops!

Oops!  It suddenly occurred to me today that this entry could be interpreted as referring to my home congregation, or any of the other specific congregatations that I attend on a frequent or infrequent basis. 

It's not.  I love my home congregation, despite my critique that it is too loud.  In many ways, it is kind of strange that I have such an affinity for the place.

It is nothing short of gigantic, and in many ways is the low-church, generic American Evangelicalism that I just don't resonate with.  Not really the place for the high-church, Evangelical Catholic introvert that is me.

But the thing is, Jesus is there.  And when I first moved to town and started looking for a church, there was just something that continued to draw me back.  Of course, I was always at the early morning "traditional" service, and rarely made it past the chapel.  But God really worked on my heart and my attitude while I was there, and I found myself getting acclimated eventually - making friends, becoming more comfortable with (or at least less judgmental of) the general atmosphere there, and finally becoming involved in some really cool things.

Like I said, Jesus is there.  He is present in the leadership, and in the thousands of members who worship there each week.  He is present in the vision and the mission and the values.  He is present in the transformed lives and the built and rebuilt relationships.  He is present in the bread and the wine, the water and the word. 

The Holy Spirit is hard at work in my home congregation, and I absolutely love it.  I myself had somewhat of a "conversion experience" there, and it was where I really learned to be excited about my faith - where it moved from my head to my heart. 

Is it everything I would do, if I ran the zoo?  Hmm...maybe - probably - not.  But praise God for his graciousness, and his love, and the incredible things he's doing at, in, and through my church!

Movie Review: Juno

This column over at First Thoughts, the apparent First Things staff blog, got my dander up last week, and it's not even about the main point of the column.  I pretty much think the author is right, in general, about the point he's making, but that's not what I'm talking about.  I found it interesting that "those people who think children are a choice" are the same people who "thought Juno was a pro-life film."

So...

I'm one of those apparently crazy people who did in fact think Juno was a pro-life film. I worked at a crisis pregnancy center for a few years in college (before the movie came out), and aside from the weird emotional-adultery thing with the adoptive father, the movie is one I think I would generally recommend to many of the girls who came into our office.

The main plot of the story is that Juno is a high school girl who has a one-night-stand with her best guy friend, and thereby becomes pregnant.  After telling one of her girlfriends, and contemplating an abortion (she changes her mind when the one lone protester outside the abortion clinic, a classmate of Juno's, informs Juno that the baby already has fingernails), she decides to continue the pregnancy and give the baby up for adoption.  Throughout the movie, we see Juno gain self-confidence in her role as mother (even just for the time while she is pregnant).  We see her family being shocked, and then generally supportive, and even a little challenging and confrontational when is appropriate.  We see her friends try to be supportive, but we also see the situation at school change a lot, and Juno not quite knowing where her place is anymore.  We see Paulie (the dad) trying to be helpful and supportive, but not quite knowing how.  And for Juno's part, she seems to not really be able to communicate what kind of help and support she wants or needs from him.  And we see the Juno-Paulie relationship grow and evolve. 

The reason I liked the movie so much is that I found it to be pretty realistic. Life is hard, especially when you make bad decisions, and the movie has no qualms about making that clear. But what was most needed by a lot of the girls I saw at the pregnancy center was hope, the idea of a "future story." Many of them couldn't see beyond the next 5 minutes, let alone imagine a scenario 9-12 months down the road where things would be "not perfect, but ok." That's what I liked about the film - for girls who are already pregnant, I think it sends the message, "You can do this. It's going to be hard, and it's not going to be perfect, but you can do this."

Granted, not every pregnant teenager has a great family or supportive friends or a boyfriend who tries to be helpful.  Some are all-but-forced into abortions, or carry the pregnancy to term and then are given little to no support from a family who either disowns them, or considers the situation to be so common that no one bats an eye.  Life is messy.  But Juno shows one plausible scenario of a way that this situation can work out to being "okay."  Because the reality is that having an abortion is no less emotionally messy than keeping a baby or placing it for adoption.  And by highlighting to its viewers the reality of the baby (it has fingernails) and then setting up a reasonable way life can play out over the next several months, this movie gives hope to teenagers who might not be able to imagine it otherwise. 

That's why it's a pro-life movie.