Addressing An Issue That Jesus Never Did

[The following is a column which appeared in the Holland Sentinel.]

During Holland’s Tulip Time Festival, while enjoying dinner from one of the food vendors (something healthy, like a bratwurst sandwich), a man asked me, “Are you Bill Freeman?” I hesitated answering because, as a chaplain, I sometimes take controversial stands on issues. For example, I support the rights of two adults to marry (even though, in every other way, they seem to be of sound mind), whether the two adults are named Adam and Eve or Adam and Steve.

After seeing that the man was not carrying a knife or a gun, I replied, “Yes, I am Bill Freeman.” Turns out that, years ago, in a previous life as a TV news reporter, I’d done a story about the man. (And, miracle of miracles, he’d liked it!)

Because of my stands on issues, I sometimes receive items in the mail (and frequently they’re not even ticking). Recently a letter arrived from a woman we’ll call Gertrude Van Smith. She begins, “It is hard for me to understand anyone who claims to be a pastor that doesn’t understand the Scriptures and God’s clear cut ruling that homosexuality is sin.” She quotes from the New Life Version of the Christian New Testament, 1 Corinthians 6:9, “…people who do sex sins with their own sex, will have no place in the holy nation of God.” She continues, “I would hate to be in your shoes when you stand before God.” She then informs me where I will end up after I die. (Care to guess?)

Here’s my reply.

Dear Ms. Van Smith,

While we might disagree on some things, we can both agree that Jesus was a great teacher. Matthew 12:10-12 says, “A man was there with a withered hand, and they asked Jesus, ‘Is it lawful to cure on the Sabbath?’ so that they might accuse him. He said to them, ‘Suppose one of you has only one sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath; will you not lay hold of it and lift it out? How much more valuable is a human being than a sheep! So it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.’” What Jesus is saying goes against one of the Ten Commandments - not to do anything on the Sabbath.

Like Jesus, Christians don’t always take the Scriptures literally. For example, Paul says in 1 Corinthians 14:34, “Women should be silent in the churches.” And yet many churches today joyfully call women to be preachers.

Christians also don’t take the Bible literally when it supports slavery, as Paul seems to in Ephesians 6:5, “Slaves, obey your earthly masters.” Christians stopped owning slaves because of the Civil War, of course, but also perhaps because they heard Jesus’ words echoing across the centuries, “How much more valuable is a human being than a sheep!”

Today, since Jesus did not say one word about homosexuals or homosexuality, Christians face a dilemma: 1) take seven Bible passages literally that condemn homosexuals and/or homosexuality, or 2) support human beings who happen to be practicing homosexuals. That dilemma will be solved, as it was with women in ministry and owning slaves, when Christians increasingly hear Jesus’ still-echoing words: “How much more valuable is a human being!”

I hope my reply convinces Ms. Van Smith that, if I do end up where she thinks I will (and, God knows, there are many reasons why I should), it at least shouldn’t be because of an issue that Jesus never addressed.

Have You Hugged Your (Inner) Child Today?

I heard a standup comic once commenting on those “Baby On Board” signs. (I just saw one of those signs the other day.) The comic said, “What’s the purpose of those signs? If my car’s careening out of control and I see one of those signs on the car I’m about to crash into, am I supposed to say, “Oh, I can’t hit that car. I better smash into this van full of nuns!”

I always look upon those “Baby On Board” signs as something like a birth announcement: Hey everybody! I’ve just had a baby! And I’m so happy! I want you to share in my joy!

There used to be a bumper sticker that was very popular years ago: Have you hugged your child today?

My question is: Have you hugged your (inner) child today? Psychologists tell us that your inner child can mean one of two things. On the one hand, your inner child is your playful side. So hugging your inner child is embracing your child-like qualities. On the other hand, hugging your inner child is when you look back on the child you were many years ago and you hug that child, particularly if you had a traumatic childhood and that child needs to be hugged and healed.

I overheard a young teenage girl the other day at JP’s coffee house. She told her friends that her mom used to call her a brat, but now her mom refers to her as a different B-word, a B-word that rhymes with witch. My jaw dropped. Yikes!

Now, maybe her mom was just “kidding around” – we can only hope. But who says that about their own teenage daughter, even in jest? In 10 years, when that girl is walking on South Division in Grand Rapids, looking for “customers,” I wonder if mom will have “absolutely no idea” what made her daughter do that. (Hopefully, that’s not where that girl will end up.)

I read a book a few months ago called, “Severe Attachment Disorder in Childhood,” by Niels Peter Rygaard. According to the book, Severe Attachment Disorder, or SAD, affects perhaps 1 in 20 children. It’s seen in Russian children raised in orphanages, who aren’t touched much at all, but it’s also seen in children in America who lack a loving touch, appropriate affection and encouraging words from their parents. SAD can result in personality disorder, addiction, depression, suicide and other problems.

Hopefully, one day all parents will understand the importance of hugging their children. And all children will be hugged. Failing that, or in addition to that, perhaps we all have to take it upon ourselves to hug our own inner child, our own hurt side, but also our own playful side. Jesus seemed to understand something like that.

“At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, ‘Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?’ Jesus called a child, whom he put among them, and said, ‘Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.’”
In that passage, Matthew 18:1-3, I don’t think Jesus is talking just about heaven in the hereafter; I think Jesus is talking about heaven in the here-and-now. Jesus seems to be encouraging people to be more child-like: innocent, playful perhaps, full of wonder maybe. Jesus appears to be telling us not to take ourselves too seriously; to enjoy life; to have a little fun. That’s the way to reach heaven on earth. Now compare Jesus’ words with those of the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 13:11.

“When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways.”

What a contrast! Jesus is saying, “Become like children.” Paul is saying, “Put an end to childish ways.” (I think that, in a nutshell, is why I like Jesus a little more than I like Paul: Jesus is more playful; Paul is too serious.) Now, don’t get me wrong; many of Paul’s writings are profound. 1 Corinthians 13:1 is simply amazing. “If I speak in the tongues of humans and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.” Paul understands love, but I’m not sure he understands children as much as Jesus did; or that Paul understands our own need or necessity to be playful, to be childlike, to not completely grow up. In a similar way, Jim Trelease understands that, too.

Jim Trelease wrote several books about the importance of reading aloud to children. Jim Trelease says, “The prime purpose of being four is to enjoy being four - of secondary importance is to prepare for being five.”

I would amend what Jim Trelease is saying just a little bit. I would say that the prime purpose of being any age is to enjoy being that age – whether you’re 4, 24, 44, 64, 84 or 104. What Jim Trelease is saying, though, is let children be children. Don’t look upon children as little adults. Let them enjoy childhood. Help them enjoy childhood. Who knows, maybe it will even help us to enjoy our (hopefully) never-ending childhood.

The other day I saw live TV coverage of Barack Obama giving the commencement address at the graduation ceremony of Kalamazoo Central High School students. It was an historic event. It’s the first time a president has ever given a commencement address at a high school. President Obama told the students, “Together as a community, you’ve embraced the motto of this school district: ‘Every child, every opportunity, every time,’ because you believe, like I do, that every child – regardless of what they look like, where they come from, or how much money their parents have – every child who walks through your schoolhouse doors deserves a quality education.“ I liked his speech, but I liked what happened after his speech even more.

I noticed that several students, after they received their diploma, when they got the opportunity to shake hands with the president, that many of them did, but some of them did not. Instead they gave him a hug. It was interesting to see how much closer a hug seemed to bring the president and the students than just a handshake. Touching someone is more meaningful to them. At least with most people.

Many years ago, I worked for Channel 8 news in Grand Rapids, the NBC affiliate. At that time, “St. Elsewhere” was a popular drama on NBC. One of the stars of that show was Howie Mandel. One day, Howie Mandel visited our station. One of our news producers shouted, “Howie Mandel is in our newsroom!” More recently, Howie Mandel was the host of “Deal or No Deal” and a judge on “America’s Got Talent.” I saw him a month ago being a judge on “Marriage Ref.” A couple of his fellow judges touched him, as a joke, because apparently he hates being touched.

Howie Mandel is what’s called a germaphobe. He doesn’t want to be touched for fear of coming into contact with germs. He hates it when people touch him. I had a seminary classmate like that.

She wasn’t a germaphobe, she just didn’t like being touched. In seminary, during chapel, she didn’t want to take part in the passing of the peace. She didn’t want to shake hands; she certainly didn’t want to be hugged. At least not back then.

At our recent 5-year reunion, she was there. I said “Hi” to her, but hesitated even shaking hands with her, because I knew she didn’t like to be touched. She chuckled and told me she’s been a pastor for 5 years (where shaking hands, hugging and being hugged is almost a job requirement), so now she said hugging is okay with her. So I joyfully hugged her.

I interned at a church once where the pastor told me that they don’t do a passing of the peace, because many of the people there didn’t want to even acknowledge the existence of the person sitting next to them, let alone shake hands with them or – God forbid – hug them.

I call churches like that Elliott Ness churches, because they’re filled with: The Untouchables. I never want Interfaith Congregation to become like that; that’s why we do a passing of the peace. I never thought of this before, but maybe we also do it because in these days of Facebook “friends,” where you communicate with many people, but rarely if ever come in contact with them, we’re in need of human touch. Maybe we don’t need to just hug our own inner child, maybe we need to hug the inner child of the people sitting next to us.

During this past school year, I read to my wife’s grandsons’ Kindergarten and 2nd Grade classes, or they read to me. I’m called Opa, which I think means grandpa in Dutch. A month or so ago, after school, we picked up her grandsons. As we were walking up to the school, all the students were outside. I kept hearing, “It’s Opa!” “There’s Opa!” “Hi Opa!” That was neat. On the last day that I visited their classes a couple weeks ago, I had all the kids give me a group hug, which turned into individual hugs. That was neat too.

I got to thinking. It seems to me that the job of parents, grandparents and great-grandparents, the job of schools, the job of churches and the job of each one of us is surprisingly similar. The job of parents, grandparents and great-grandparents is to nurture their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren in body, mind and spirit. (If body, mind and spirit sounds a little too new-agey for you, then how about: physically, mentally and emotionally.) The job of schools is to nurture students in body, mind and spirit. The job of churches is to nurture people – inside and outside their walls, as much as possible - in body, mind and spirit. The job of each one of us is to nurture others (to the extent that we can) and to nurture ourselves in body, mind and spirit. Perhaps the easiest way to begin doing that (respecting people’s boundaries, of course) is by giving them - and ourselves – a hug. Have you hugged somebody today? Have you hugged your (inner) child today? If so, will you do it again tomorrow and the next day and the next?

Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, Etc., Are Verbs

A couple of weeks ago I was at Skiles downtown, enjoying pizza with a friend and I noticed over his shoulder a TV screen. The sound was off, but the picture was there. They were showing a “sporting event.” I use that term loosely. I think it was called extreme fighting or ultimate fighting, something like that. It was basically just two guys kicking and hitting each other. They were whaling on each other. Until they ran out of energy and then they were just sort of flailing their arms and eventually one of them was declared the winner. When he was declared the winner, he pointed up to heaven and did a little dance, I’m assuming to thank God for his wonderful victory. Now I’m not sure what that guy’s concept of God is, heck I’m not even sure what my concept of God is, but at that moment my idea of God was: As that guy was pointing up to heaven, apparently giving God credit, God was looking down and saying, “Ummm, no thanks, buddy; I don’t want the credit for that.”

When I was in seminary a few years ago, I learned a new idea, well I learned several new ideas, but one in particular. It was the doctrine I’ll call “You don’t get the credit; you just get the blame.” It goes something like this: If you do something right, then that’s not really you doing that, that’s God working through you or the Spirit working through you or Jesus working through you or something; it’s not you. But, if you do something wrong, then that’s all you, buddy, that’s your fault. That didn’t make any sense to me. I can understand saying, “If you do something right, then that’s not really you, that’s God or the Spirit working through you.” I’ve had times, believe it or not, when I’ve done things, like write a sermon and I’d get to the end of it and read through it and think: my goodness, I didn’t have any idea that this was what this was going to end up as; it’s better than I could have imagined. It felt like it wasn’t me doing that, it was the Spirit or God, or the Source or whatever you want to call it, working through me. So I can go along with that. But why doesn’t it go the other way? If you do something wrong, why not say: that’s not your fault, that was the devil or the evil spirits or whatever working through you. But that’s not how the doctrine of “You get all the blame, but none of the credit” works. I just don’t think that’s right.

Also, when I first started going to Western Theological Seminary, apparently my reputation preceded me, because one of the professors that I met immediately called me the “high priest of heresy.” I think he meant it jokingly, but I thought, “I’m not that heretical, am I?” I’m in the mainstream of at least liberal theology. Come to think of it, that was probably why I was called the “high priest of heresy.” I wasn’t orthodox enough. Now “orthodoxy,” as you probably know, means “right belief,” believing the things the church or the religious tradition says to believe. “Orthopraxy” means “right action.” I think it means doing justice and loving kindness and acting compassionately.

I’m reading a book, “God Is Not One.” It’s by Stephen Prothero, who is a religion professor at Boston University. The basic premise of his book is that everybody says, “God is one” and “we’re all one big happy family” and all that, but how can that be if the major religions of the world are so different? How can you reconcile Buddhism, that doesn’t believe in a god and Hinduism that believes in many gods? In that book, he talks about orthodoxy and orthopraxy, but what he is talking about is “right belief,” the doctrine and dogma of religions and about the rituals and routines of religion, like lighting a candle during the service. He doesn’t talk much at all about what I consider orthopraxy, which is doing justice, loving kindness, acting compassionately. I think religion without justice is impotent.

Jesus goes to the temple, sits down and begins teaching, while the people gather around him. Up walk several men and they bring a woman with them. They tell Jesus that this woman has committed adultery. They caught her in the act of adultery. They say to Jesus. “What should we do? Because Moses says she should be stoned to death. What say you, Jesus?” They did this, according to the story in the Bible, to test him, to see if he would say, “Yes, Moses was correct, stone her.” But he writes on the ground, scribbling in the dirt, basically ignoring them. But they keep pestering him saying, “What should we do?” He looks up and says, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.” Then he goes back to writing in the dirt. He looks up again and they’ve all dispersed; all but the woman. He says to her, “What happened to them?” She says, “They left.” Jesus says, “Well they did not condemn you, neither do I; go and sin no more.”

Jesus, I think many Christians would assume, was the first Christian. Let’s go with that, probably all of us here know he was Jewish, but for this story let’s say Jesus was the first Christian. It seems to me that Jesus was a Christian who didn’t just believe things … he was not just a noun “Christian,” he was a verb “Christian.” He took action. He saved the life of this adulterous woman. He shamed the men who brought her to him.

Many of us probably know the story of Moses from the Hebrew scriptures or from Charlton Heston’s portrayal of him in the movie, “The Ten Commandments.” One of the stories of Moses is that he led the Jews out of Egypt. He went to Pharoah and said, “Let my people go!” And Pharoah eventually said, “Okay.” And so they went. Assuming that story is true, Moses was a Jew who believed things, but he also did things. He was a noun “Jew,” but he was also a verb “Jew.” He took action. He led the Jewish people out of slavery to freedom.

The Dalai Lama has written many books. I think my favorite book that the Dalai Lama has written is “The Four Noble Truths.” If you haven’t read that book and you get the chance, I would highly recommend it. It explains, I think very well, suffering, and talks about how it can be alleviated from others and ourselves by acting compassionately toward others and toward ourselves. The Dalai Lama is a Buddhist. He believes things, but he also does things. He’s not just a noun “Buddhist,” he’s a verb “Buddhist.” He takes action. He writes a book that some of us find helpful.

Varion Fry lived in France. He was a frail man, an intellectual, not religious. He was apparently a humanist. You might not expect that Varian Fry would have stood up to the Gestapo, but he did. He helped 1500 people escape from Nazi occupied France in 1940 and ‘41. Varian Fry was a humanist who did things, he didn’t just believe things (or not believe things). He was a noun “humanist,” but he was also a verb “humanist.” He took action. He helped 1500 people escape from Nazi occupied France.

At this point in the sermon, I was going to quote the beginning of the Hippocratic Oath, the oath that doctors take, that says, “First do no harm.” But I looked it up online and it’s a common misconception that the Hippocratic Oath begins, “First do no harm.” That’s not true. In spite of that, I would still say that religious people who want to be verb religious people and not just noun religious people, should first do no harm.

The first church I pastored was a small church in a small town. The first summer I was there, the only summer I was there, I put together a little flier, not unlike the flier we have on our back table. It was about what I saw that church as or what I wanted that church to be, I think. I knocked on a hundred doors in that little town, and handed out fliers to a hundred people, or stuck fliers between the door handle and the doorframe. A week or two later, no one had come to church as a result. Then one Sunday, I saw a new person sitting in church. She was about five rows back. So, about ten minutes into the service, during our passing of the peace, I walked up to her and I said, “I don’t think I’ve seen you here before.” She said, “No, this is the first time I’ve come here.” I said, “Oh, great.” She said, “I came because of the flier you left at my door.” I said, “Oh, wonderful,” She said, “But I won’t be back.” What? She said, “I don’t feel welcome here.” How could that be? She walked maybe 5 steps into the building, up some stairs and then ten more steps into the sanctuary and sat down. She was there for 10 minutes. Yet she didn’t feel welcome. Now I know why she didn’t feel welcome. She wasn’t one of the family or friends of the powers that be. They made her feel unwelcome. Immediately. I look back on that and I think: That wasn’t really a church; that was a social club. That was a place that just cared about the people inside the four walls. They didn’t care about opening the doors of the church and welcoming new people in. But I opened the doors and welcomed new people in (or at least one new person in) and they didn’t like that at all, because that’s not who they were. Anytime a church only cares about the people inside the four walls, and doesn’t care about welcoming people in or helping people who don’t go there, it isn’t a church, it’s a social club.

If Interfaith Congregation is only about going to Denny’s after the service, or having a potluck on Wednesday night, or going bowling or playing miniature golf, then we wouldn’t be a church or a house of worship, we’d be a social club. We become a church or a religious institution or a house of worship when we feed the poor on Saturday morning, when a couple of us walk for peace in downtown Holland on Thursday afternoon, when some of us go to the city council and ask the council to pass an anti-discrimination ordinance in Holland to protect gays and lesbians and bisexual and transgender people. That’s when this place becomes a religious institution or a house of worship and not just a social club. If it were just a social club, I wouldn’t want to be here.

My daughter graduated from high school the other day. They had a wonderful graduation ceremony, held at Fountain Street Church in downtown Grand Rapids. The commencement speaker was a guy from Africa, about 30 years old, who when he was 13 was forced into the military; he was forced to kill or be killed. Thankfully he escaped from that and fled to the United States and now works for the United Nations. He told the students that they could overcome any obstacle, if he could escape from that situation. He concluded his remarks by reading the poem “Invictus,” by William Ernest Henley. The poem concludes with these two lines. “I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul.” Each one of us, regardless of the faith tradition we come from, is responsible for our own actions, for doing justice and loving kindness and acting compassionately, because each and every one of us is the master of our fate, each and every one of us is the captain of our soul.