Musings

Why I'm an Agnatheist

A particularly useful book crossed my desk recently:  BRIDGING THE GOD GAP: Finding Common Ground Among Believers, Atheists, and Agnostics (Living Arts Publications, 2011) by Roger Schriner, a retired Unitarian minister and psychotherapist from Northern California.  In it, he describes the wide continuum of nuanced positions between "theism" and "atheism", blurring the meaning of both terms.   "The difference between belief and disbelief is often merely wordplay, a matter of semantics rather than substance." (p 80) 

There are many ways that God is understood in the Bible, that book so strongly associated with traditional theism.  Just which theism is displayed in which book, much less which chapter of which book, in the Bible?  There's the ineffable, mystical, unnameable I AM THAT I AM in the burning bush that confronted Moses in Genesis.  But also in Genesis are the three men who showed up for dinner at the tent of Sarah and Abraham.  The story indicates that these earthy, humanoid beings collectively were God.  In the second book of Kings, in the story of Naaman, God is described "henotheistically".  God was the god only of the land of Israel.  So Naaman, after being divinely healed in Israel, brought with him a cartload of dirt from Israel when he returned to his native Syria.  The God of Israel only had power over what happened on top of Israeli dirt, and he wanted to continue to have access to that power when he went home.  In the New Testament, in the book of Acts, Paul went to the Areopagus in Athens where stood statues of the Greek gods.  One empty spot was dedicated to "The Unknown God", which Paul said was the real God.  If the real God was unknown, did that make Paul an agnostic?  Early Christians were considered atheists because they did not worship the gods of Rome.  Such lack of reverence was as unthinkable for Romans as it would be for Americans to vote for an atheist candidate for president today!  

And on that subject, the current political contest leads a lot of Americans to puzzle if Mormons believe in God.  The Latter Day Saints church teaches that God began as a man who went through a process of spiritual improvement until he became divine, and that humans are intended to do the same.  It's a view that's foreign to a lot of Christians.  But there are many differing concepts of God among Christians, much as their pastors and priests might want to deny that this is so.  Those views reflect the variety of understandings that appear in the Bible and outside of it as well.  The God of the Mormons is just one of many that exist side by side, named by the same generic word.  And we can be sure that different Mormons have different understandings of God.  The realm of Christian theism has no clear boundary.

I think that many atheists are really awetheists.  They are people who experience the same kind of reverential wonder and respect for life and the highest human values that we associate with religion at its best.  Awe is their God, though they don't use that terminology.  I use Christian language to describe the deep humility I feel when I mindfully encounter the miraculous natural world around and within me.  For me, God isn't supernatural; God is the essential creative nature of the universe.   Some Christians say that this makes me an atheist.  Some atheists get upset when I tell them what I mean by the word God, and they say that I'm not a Christian!  They don't want to be associated with the supernatural God they associate with Christianity, and don't want to be confused by the possibility that non-supernatural theists like myself can be Christian.   Such conversations lead me to wonder if I am an agnatheist: someone who is agnostic about whether or not there is really such a thing as an atheist.  

BRIDGING THE GOD GAP offers a breathtaking array of places to stay, or at least visit, along the road between theism and atheism.  But Schriner's breakdown of the choices is hardly exhaustive.  The human experience of God, or the Ultimate Reality Formerly Known As God (URFKAG), defies definition by its very nature.  Pondering that is enough to make an awetheist out of me!

 (An understanding of God which I've found to be helpful is elucidated in process theology, a school of thought founded by the mathematician and philosopher of the early 20th century, Alfred North Whitehead.  For a brief introduction to it, check out this interview with Phil Clayton, process theologian at Claremont School of Theology.)

_______________

Mark your progressive Christian calendars!

February 12, Sunday:  Evolution Weekend
April 15, Sunday:  Blessing of the Taxes

May 6, Sunday:  Pluralism Sunday - sign up your church to participate, now!

How I Make Meaning of Life

(This "musing" appears in The Interfaith Observer online magazine this month.)

My wife and I drive out of the city.  On the way, we share stories with each other.

We laugh about how complicated and intertwined the tales of our lives have become with each other, and with and among the people we know.

We are amazed at how disparate events and people come together over time, in surprising combinations.

We get out in the country and see a lonesome hill and we get out of the car and climb it. 
At the top we hold hands and take deep breaths.

We walk down the other side, and at the bottom is a pile of rusty junk.

I collect some of it and put it in the car.
I'm not sure why I pick it up, but I sense there are reasons.

At home I put the junk in a cardboard box in the garage.

On a Saturday morning, I drive alone to the desert mountains and hike along walls of pale stone.
I pluck a stem of sagebrush and crush it under my nose with my fingers.

I wonder how that scent floods my mind with memories of other hikes in other landscapes.

I ask:  Do those moments, stored and now released, belong to me or to those times and places?

Am I but a wind blowing through wilderness, making pine needles moan and cottonwood leaves flutter?

Need I be anything more than these questions I ask as I pause on the trail?

At work, I listen to a student tell me that she doesn't know why she is alive, and can't find other students who will listen to her predicament.

I listen to a university staff person tell me about having an affair and how it made a mess of her life.

I make vegetarian pizzas and serve them to students in our Interfaith Council as they discuss what they and their religions have to say about life after death.

I lift chairs off stacks to arrange them in a patio where I will be leading a memorial service for a student who committed suicide.
I fuss with image files to fit them in an e-newsletter.

At home, I read a story to our five-year-old granddaughter, and then we chase each other around our apartment and yell.
I edit an academic paper for my daughter, who is in graduate school at the university where I work.

At church I feel the tears welling behind my eyes as we stand in line to receive communion.
A mystery is being completed in us as we eat bread dipped in wine.

I get a call telling me it's time to drive 400 miles north to my home town because a friend of mine is dying.

I sit next to the hospital bed and stroke his forehead and chant peace and love into his ear as he dies. 
We were friends for 44 years.

On a Saturday afternoon, rummaging through the garage, I find the rusty junk in the box and take it out. 

Without a plan, I assemble it in different ways, to see what could be made of it all.

A steel spring, a metal strap, a corroded piece of a toy Tonka truck, and a rusty little tube.

Finally I'm pleased with a construction of the pieces.  With tin-snips and epoxy glue I put it together.

I call it my self-portrait.

I take it inside our apartment and put it on a shelf and stare at it.

It gives my life a meaning
That makes me laugh.

Mormon Reckoning

America is entering a Mormon moment as a former bishop of the Latter-Day Saints, Mitt Romney, takes front-runner place in the race for the Republican nomination for the presidency.  I welcome the religious reckoning that is bound to result.  Mormonism shines an ultraviolet light on Christianity in America, revealing features that are unseen under the rest of the spectrum. 

In the last few years, I have become acquainted with the progressive theological and social movement within the Mormon world.  It's much bigger than the public perceives, if it is perceived at all.  There is a wide range of thought within the membership of the LDS on matters religious and political.  There is a loyal opposition to its leadership's positions on same-sex marriage, homosexuality, women's limited roles, and other issues.  The online Mormon "bloggernacle" on these topics includes dropout (or "Jack") Mormons, temple-ready, tithe-paying Mormons, Mormons who take the Book of Mormon literally, Mormons who don't, Mormon Democrats, and Mormon Republicans.  Journals like Dialogue and Sunstone make space for respectful but critical viewpoints about the church.

This lively contrarian community within the LDS world results in part from the fact that the Mormon church has a theology, but few theologians.  The top leaders of the church, some of whom I had the occasion to meet a few months ago in Salt Lake City, are chosen primarily for their gifts as managers, not as scholars.  There is no LDS seminary, and there is little scholarship within the church to compare to what is found in the Catholic or mainline Protestant traditions.  An integral part of Mormon theology is the principle of personal revelation.  Each Mormon is expected to come up with his or her own "testimony" that the Church is "true".  And while there are clear Mormon doctrines, the LDS Church is not preoccupied with interpreting them.  That task is largely left to the personal relationship between the individual Mormon and God.

As a result, a substantial number of Mormons have quietly consulted with their Maker and concluded that the Book of Mormon is mythical.  And they have found a way to hold that view while staying loyal to their church.  Their church is "true" for them in ways that might not be "true" for other Latter-Day Saints. 

It's not hard to see how they arrive at that conclusion.  The text and Joseph Smith's account of its discovery are fantastic.  He claimed to have translated the text from the "Reformed Egyptian" - a language that never existed - into English, using "peep stones" called Urim and Thummim.  The book suggests that Jews settled in Meso-America and that Jesus visited this continent after his resurrection.  There is no sound archaeological or historical evidence for any of these claims.  The book was written in grammatically incorrect King James English, long after that version of the language had become antique.  While there are a few pearls of wisdom in it, and its vision of a Christianity indigenous to America is intriguing, a leap of faith as wide as the Grand Canyon is required to take it literally.  (Check out the LDS Church's own list of most cherished Book of Mormon passages, to get a sense of how many cups of non-Mormon beverages you'd need to finish the whole book.)  Consequently, many Mormons cherish the book as part of their cultural and religious heritage, while understanding that it cannot be taken as an historical record of the events it describes.

For evangelicals to argue that the Book of Mormon is a false gospel, they must give the same kinds of reasons that theologically progressive Christians present for not taking the Bible literally.  Smith's story of the appearance of the golden plates of the text of the Book of Mormon is no more fabulous than it is to take the miracle stories in the Bible as facts.  Non-Mormon Christians have been in the habit of taking the Bible literally a lot longer than Mormons have been doing it with their book.  But the duration of an obsolete belief system is no argument for maintaining it.

Many evangelicals are outraged that Mormons don't believe in the Trinity, and that they believe that God was a (married) man who became divine.  But what's any weirder about these doctrines than the arcane doctrine of the Trinity?  How do you explain the difference such theological disputes make in everyday life in 2012?  Plenty of loyal Mormons take their church's doctrine with a grain of salt. 

Richard Mouw, president of the evangelical Fuller Seminary in Pasadena, CA, recently wrote in the LA Times that "I do not believe Mormonism is a cult. However, I am not convinced that Mormon theology deserves to be classified as Christian in the historic sense of that word. I have serious disagreements with my Mormon friends about basic issues of faith that have eternal consequences. These include issues regarding the nature of God, the doctrine of the Trinity and the character of the afterlife. But I have also learned that in some matters we are not quite as far apart as I once thought. In any case, such theological differences don't preclude a Mormon from being a viable presidential candidate, in my view." 

I don't find the term "cult" useful in describing any religious groups.  But apparently Mouw does, and if Mormonism doesn't fit his definition, why?  Just because they've become "mainstream", as he says, in business and culture?  He fudges a bit about whether or not Mormons are really Christians, and he only hints at hellfire as a possible consequence of their beliefs.  Does he agree with the oft-cited phrase that a cult is just a religious group without political or financial clout?

In the interests of maintaining a conservative alliance, many evangelicals will be challenged to follow Mouw's example and downplay theological issues for the sake of promoting a common political agenda which has no biblical basis.  Already for many evangelicals, political purity trumps theological purity.  Notice the peace they have made with the Catholic Church, which they used to vilify.  Rick Santorum, an uber-Catholic, has become an honorary evangelical!  For the sake of teaming up with Mormons to fight abortion rights and same-sex marriage, topics about which Jesus said nothing, will evangelicals cut Mormons slack on matters theological?  They do so at their own doctrinal peril. 

If Romney becomes the nominee for the Republican Party, count on a national year-long teach-in about the Mormon faith.  Republicans will have to make Mormonism look good, and that's going to make Republicans look bad to the millions of fundamentalist Christians who are convinced that it is a terrible heresy.  Some fundamentalists will take a break from politics altogether, seeing how it co-opts and trumps religion.  Other conservative Christians will be nudged toward a more pluralistic, less dogmatic stance.  (See how it plays in the Seventh Day Adventist Church in this article by my friend and colleague Loren Seibold.)  Romney's Mormonism is going to result in a healthy confusion among conservative Americans.

So there's good news for progressive Christianity in America's imminent reckoning with Mormonism.  Romney's candidacy is going to make people ask questions.  Do political and social agendas matter more or less than theological doctrines?  If America is a Christian nation as defined by evangelicals, can it be governed by a Mormon?  Can any one religion or sect claim to be superior to all others?  More people will question whether the Bible should be taken literally, as they see how hard it is to take the Book of Mormon factually.  People will ponder whether their critiques of Mormonism might apply to their own religious beliefs.  And progressive Mormons will be connected with the larger progressive Christian community, leading to fruitful friendships.   

Epiphanies

 

An awakening. An opening into higher consciousness.  A discovery.  A parting of the fog of confusion, revealing a new kind of clarity.  Webster’s says that an epiphany is a sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature or meaning of something. What an enticing definition!  It makes me eager to get an epiphany right now.  How about you?

In the context of the Christian church calendar, Epiphany is January 6, the day celebrated as the time when the wise men visited the newborn Jesus in Bethlehem.  It’s the sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature or meaning of Christmas to three guys from somewhere in Iraq or Iran.  They were the first non-Jews to “get it” about Christmas.  Think of it! Jesus was barely born before his message was out of the Jewish box.  Hmmm – isn’t it about time that his message got out of the Christian box?

I love this story for a bunch of ephinaneous reasons.  Yes, I made up that word, epiphaneous.  That’s what happens when you have an epiphany: you expand your vocabulary.  For one thing, I love this story because the three wise men show up with really weird gifts.  Normal folks might think:  let’s get Jesus a rattle, or a rubber ducky, or get his parents a couple months of diaper service.  No, these supposedly wise men traveled many hundreds of miles on camelback to deliver gold, frankincense, and myrrh.  Gold – sure.  Valuable then, valuable now.  That’s not so strange: at least for Mary and Joseph, it was probably a welcome sight.  But frankincense and myrrh?  Used as burial spices, at the time.  Yes, valuable:  Mary and Joseph could have traded them for something useful.  The three wise men were like those relatives or friends who feel compelled to give you stuff for Christmas, except they are truly clueless about who you are, what you want, what you need. 

 

Another thing I love about the story is that the three wise men apparently didn't become Christians after meeting Jesus.  They already had a religion, and they didn't give it up.  They followed the star because their own religion suggested it.  Faithfully following their own religion got them outside of the box of their own religion, even while they continued practicing it.  Maybe that’s something we can emulate today. By following Jesus in a serious way, he’ll lead us out of the Christian box and inspire us to explore other religions and become better global citizens.  He'll lead us to be humble about our religion, even as we continue practicing it.

The recipe for epiphany is simple, but still challenging.  It is about showing up:  physically, emotionally, and spiritually.  That’s what the three wise men did.  They did not just send gold, frankincense, and myrrh by Fed Ex and then just email a Christmas letter from Baghdad.  When they discovered that the star was hovering above a rude and crude manger, and that the so-called king was a peasant child, they still showed up in person and presented themselves. 

Are we present?  Really here?  All here?  Did your body show up, but your mind is someplace else?  Did your mind show up, but your body get left behind?  Are you awake and aware of your whole self, here and now?

The way to have an epiphany starts with being all here, and being awake to your inner and outer worlds.  If you are awake to your feelings, your bodily and mental experiences in the moment - if you are aware of what is going on in your mind and body right now, then you will be awake enough to have a sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature or meaning of things.  What are we really thinking?  What are we really feeling?  To what are we really paying attention right here and now?  Facing the truth about ourselves, reflecting our emotional and physical reality back to ourselves, lovingly, without judgment: that enables us to be present, body and soul, at the manger.

When we take a good look at ourselves in the spiritual mirror, we begin to experience higher consciousness.  This is the kingdom of heaven Jesus was talking about: the heaven’s eye view of ourselves and the world around us.  When we take this God’s-eye view of ourselves, lovingly and without judgment, doing an inventory of our inner worlds, then we are able to perceive the meaning of what we observe.  

I do quite a bit of counseling for students at USC in the course of my job, even though I’m not officially a counselor.  I find myself asking students questions to nudge them to examine their inner lives – lovingly, and without judgment.  Just paying attention to their inner worlds, just describing their inner experience, is enough to trigger epiphanies.  Suddenly they make new connections among their experiences and feelings, and make fresh sense of their lives. 

It’s New Years, when we hear all that talk about resolutions.  I say, forget about who you ought to be, what you ought to look like, what you ought to weigh.  New Year’s resolutions are almost always about there and then.  This New Year’s, let’s look at here and now.  Who are you, really, now?  Look with clear spiritual eyes.  Pay full attention to your present reality, with love and acceptance of what is.  If you can do this, you’ll be empowered to make whatever changes you need and want to make.  You'll be epiphany-ready!  Be here now, and you’ll be ready to go there then... in 2012, and beyond.