Continuing with some thoughts and reflections on the lecture I attended just a week ago tomorrow.  In his essay “Science and the sense of the holy,” Dr Eiseley mentions that science has two basic practitioners: one the educated man who still has a controlled sense of wonder before the universal mystery and the second practitioner is the extreme reductionist who is busy stripping things apart- where the tremendous mystery is reduced to a trifle. He then points out a serious difference between the two in ethical situations. I will quote from two passages:

The reductionist too frequently claims that the end justifies the means…asserting reason as his defense and the mysterium which guards man’s moral nature falls away- a phantom without reality…

If you have the feeling that all animals – all living things have a common ancestor- that we are all “netted together” then you come to your scientific work with a much different sensibility than the person who blithely wields the scalpel- you will be less inclined to “murder to dissect” because you will feel a sense of kinship with what you are murdering…

Remember, Dr Eiseley is not talking about sensing a person God- but a sense of oneness with all creation- an essential oneness to life, a sense of awe and wonder. And that “sense of holy” has a ethical barrier to it.

Blaise Pascal, the 16th century mathematician wrote this ”

There are to equally dangerous extremes:  one, to shut reason out and two- to let nothing else in.

That is something to think about.

Dr Loren Eiseley also reminds us that it was not the logical inductionists who solved the problem of evolution, it was what Darwin choose to call “speculative men” – men with a touch of the numinous in their eyes, a sense or marvel.”

I like his thoughts. I think a person who has this “sense of holy” or sense of wonder – sense of being one with animals is more in tune with what it means to be a human being and more in tune with every other living creature.

There is an ethical sense here that having a “sense of oneness with creation” should make me more responsible for the environment.

What do you think?

Recently, I was introduced to the writings of an anthropologist from Nebraska- Dr Loren Eiseley. He was actually from Lincoln, Nebraska-not to far from where I live in Red Oak, Iowa. His writings were very infuential. Then just this Thursday evening I went to a lecture in Omaha where the speaker, a Rev Ron Knapp gave a talk on Loren Eiseley. I must tell you I fell in love with this writer. The lecture was on Science and the sense of the holy…a chapter in Eiseley’s book- The Star Thrower.

Before I talk about the lecture, allow me a few comments about Eiseley and the way he writes. You can tell what kind of man he is by the way he writes. He is a man that loved nature. His writings, I would say, are an expression of American Spirituality at home with Emerson and Thoreau. Dr Eiseley is an example of what I call a spiritual naturalist or a mystical humanist.

In Science and the Sense of the Holy, Dr Eiseley borrows a phrase well known in theological circles- the holy. It is from the writings of one Rudolf Otto who in 1917, wrote a major work entitled The Idea of the Holy in which he investigates the center or focal point of all religions- that being the experience of the moment- the holy being. Matter of fact, Rudolf Otto went so far as to say- “the experience of the holy being is a fundamental component a religion, and if it does not have it, it is not a religion.” There is one other term that Rudolf Otto uses – the numinious, a term he uses to try and capture the specific sacred- mysterious quality of this experience.

There is a problem for Dr Eiseley when he uses this term- the Holy and the numinous. The problem is in the modern Western Church, theologians have used Rudolf Otto’s terms to an effort to prove that the religious experience is a transcendant experience- relationship-an intentional contact with a holy other- in other words- GOD. That is not Dr Eiseley’s intention in his writings. He uses the terms- “holy” and the mysterium tremendum” to describe the feelings of something that is so beyond our understanding- something wonderful- a sense of awe.

May I just say- one does not have to believe in God or a higher power to experience a sense of awe – a “sense of the holy” that moment in time when you look over the horizon and you see a flock of geese soaring across the sunset and you feel the fresh cool breeze and smell a hint of moisture in the air ….awe.

Dr Eiseley uses the term the term- “a sense of the holy” as experiencing a sense of awe before the universe.

The lecture that I attended concentrated on what Dr Eiseley calls the two extreme approaches to the interpretation of the living world . These two approaches are typified in two characters from science: Charles Darwin and Sigmund Freud. Charles Darwin was 28 years old when he began to recognize the connection between nature and man; that animals are our fellow brothers. The reason we are connected is because we share a common ancestry. “We are all netted together. Darwin was an agnostic- yet he had a sense of the awe of the holy playing upon nature. In a mystical sense, we are one single diffuse animal.  On the other hand, Sigmund Freud shows the sense of being cold, clinical and reserved. Freud explains away this sense of awe believing it to be childhood ghosts. He discared any type of “religious ” feeling (even the illuminative quality of the universe) as an illusion. In other words, feelings of awe before natural phenomena were basically remnants of childhood and dismissed.

I will continue to write on this in the next few days- I want to reflect on this lecture and some thoughts and ideas about ethical issues that arise from these two approaches. I hope you will comment and give some thought to this.

ED

Since migrating out of Evangelical (Fundamentalism) Christianity in 2009, I have been wrestling with the issue of prayer and I have finally accepted the idea that prayer – that is talking to myself or talking to a force of universal love is okay. You see, I no longer believe in a personal God. I am a humanist or to be more specific, I am a mystical non-theistic naturalist or a spiritual naturalist. 

If you read my book, Journey into Love, then you realize that I no longer believe in a personal. I hold to some type of non-theistic presence of love in the universe. It is interesting to note that all the major religions have a concept of this presence. In Hinduism and Buddhism, the presence of God is referred to as AUM or OM. It is a song or a mantra that is vocalized and is very ancient. Among the Jews, it is called the Shekinah. In Islam, it is called al-hadra. Among the Native American Sioux, the term is Wakan Tanka or Great Mystery,

I still pray as a Spiritual Naturalist but my prayer as changed. I no longer cry out to a higher person, the old man with the white beard sitting on the throne wait out there.  I no longer beg for help from some angry God who must be appeased with my continual works of supplication.

But I do often in quiet stillness affirm the presence of love in the world and in my life.

Still I no longer believe is a personal deity, does this mean when I “pray” -am I talking to myself?

The answer is yes. And I must admit, when I stop praying to a personal deity, I stopped praying altogether. But recently it was at the dinner table that I realized that I can pray even though I no longer believe in a personal God. I discovered the power of oral affirmations. I was sitting there thinking how my wife was such a good cook and I just said, “I thank my wife for such a delicious healthy dinner.”

That is not the only time I find myself “praying.” When I need wisdom or guidance, I ask the “Spirit of Love” to give me wisdom. Often, as I quiet my mind I discover the wisdom or the answer to my needs.

When I “pray” for someone who has a need or is sick, I open my eyes and ears for a way that I can be helping someone. In order words, my “prayers” are followed up with action. My “prayers” are now more about looking for ways to be the answer.

What I am trying to say is that for prayer no powerful conscious entity or person is needed.

Someone might ask: Isn’t that kind of prayer an illusion? Good question- you are right! It was Ludwig Feuerbach, an 18^th Century philosopher who introduced the Western world to the notion that religion is a dream; that objects of religious faith are human projections in which we unconsciously create God in our own image. Never heard of Ludwig Feuerbach? I am not surprised. Most people have not heard of him. You’ve probably heard of Sigmund Freud…right? Freud was a student of Feuerbach at the University of Berlin. It was Freud who got all the publicity for his ideas about “religion being an illusion.”

So -I admit the possibility of this being illusion but psychologically, I am better off. I find myself more gratuitous. I am more thankful.

I am more philanthropic. I find myself more open to helping other people. In other words when people say to me “pray for me”; I look for ways to meet their needs. I don’t just say, “of course, I’ll pray for you.”

I have also developed an easier practice of prayer. It is far easier for me now-to sit in silence and be thankful than to “rant and rave” in a constant oral rumination of worries. My old way of prayer was very unhealthy!

So yes, I pray but it is based a different belief system and a far different practice.

The following is a Letter to the Editor that I published 8/25/2017 in the Des Moines Register (Iowa).

As a US Army veteran that served during the Vietnam era, I am shocked and ashamed at President Trump’s decision to ban transgender people from the military.  His reasons for the dictatorial decree: “the burden of the tremendous medical costs and disruption to military readiness.”  Those arguments are a smokescreen and untrue. Extensive studies have shown that there is only a 0.04-0.13 percent increase in total defense health care spending and there is no cost to military readiness associated with allowing trans people to serve. What’s really going on? It was Vice President Pence influenced by the anti-LGBTQ groups such as the Family Research Council who lobbied the House of Representative to pass an amendment to the 2018 Defense Spending Bill that would have ended care for transgender people in the military who are transitioning. I am proud of 24 Republicans who joined Democrats to vote it down. That was democracy in action- voting down a discriminatory and unjust amendment. Now the President who promised in his campaign to protect lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans from violence and oppression is trying to score cheap political points on the backs of the American soldiers. I am hoping that Americans will stand up- and speak up for these brave soldiers who put their lives on the line for this country

The following is a lecture I gave at the First Unitarian Church Omaha Nebraska (8/13).

Since I migrated out of the Fundamentalist camp of Evangelical Christianity in 2009, I have been asked numerous time “yes, Ed, but what about Jesus?”  “Where does Jesus fit into your new universalist faith?”

It is a good question

The question is important because for over 40 years of my life, Jesus played a central role in my very existence. I prayed to Jesus…I worshipped Jesus.  I leaned on Jesus…When I find myself in times of trouble- Jesus was who I sought and begged for help. So… this journey out of Fundamentalism has not been easy for I have had to examine not only Jesus -that is his identity but my relationship with Jesus.

Now this lecture is intended to make you think…it is intended to make you begin to ask questions…Do not be afraid of asking questions…for too long the Church in the Western world has been afraid to ask questions

Also this lecture is not a pronouncement of absolute truth for I am not so certain we can have absolute truth about someone name Jesus who lived in Palestine some 20 centuries ago.

My study began in 2010 when I started asking questions- and at the time, I did not realize how dangerous some questions can be? I keep reminding myself of Socrates and what happened to him. Socrates was a teacher in Greece four hundred years before Jesus. He had a humanist mindset…He proposed a way of learning through questioning. It is called the Socratic method. The Socratic method is a form of critical thinking that takes place in a dialogue between people by continuing to ask questions, obtaining answers and then asking questions about those  answers. If you have ever had a dialogue with a 5 years old grandson, then you know about the Socratic method, because the 5 year old boy will continue to ask, ”well, why is that grandpa?” The questions I asked were dealing with many of the traditions that have accumulated for 2000 years about Jesus and the Early Church. I began looking at historical and religious sociological environment of the 1^st Century specifically the early Jerusalem Jesus believers from 33-70CE,

And what I discovered surprised me.     History has a way of doing that.

We have a lot of baggage as “Christians” especially here in America. What I mean by that is      ….As Christians – We have for over 20 centuries  accumulated a vast baggage of dogma and doctrine, creeds and beliefs, about Jesus.

Interesting the word dogma originally from the Greek language meant- an opinion or thought. In time -our opinions and thoughts became carved in stone. What the late Professor Paul Tillich called an A codified expression of reality-  In other words, it became canon law…the Church law- and if you wanted to be a member of the Church- you had to accept it as the rule of life.  And God help you if you questioned those stone beliefs because your fate would likely be that of Socrates or for that matter Jesus

And the reason I mention this accumulated baggage… is because we as Christians have a built a massive tower of images of Jesus – because with each century another image has been placed on top of it and another  and another until the image of Jesus that we have today is not the image of Jesus of the first century.

Let me put it this way… Orthodox Evangelical Christianity of the 21^st Century is radically different than the Jesus believers in Jerusalem in the early 33- 50CE. And it is radically different because of many paradigms shifts in thinking that have occurred since then…  Shifts in how people thought about God, and Jesus.

You know as a Fundamentalist Evangelical I was always preaching from the pulpit…WE NEED TO RETURN TO THE SIMPEL GOSPEL OF THE EARLY CHURCH… and imagine my surprise when I did return to the historical religious sociological period of the Early Jerusalem Jesus believers and discovered it was nothing like the Church of today.

Now, before I explain that statement there is one more thing I want to talk about…As I migrated out of fundamentalism, and I began to study –my view of Jesus was cast in rather a negative fashion. And what I mean by that is…I began with a series of ideas that were cast in the form of a negative…,

“I no longer believe that Jesus was God who became man…

I no longer believe that Jesus is the eternal son of God….

I no longer believe that Jesus died on the cross for the express purpose of being an atonement for my sins…

Do you see what I mean…it is stating what I don’t believe… a kind of negative faith? And I began to see that about myself and I did not like it…I do not like the idea of a faith that is expressed in negatives…To me it was a kind of faithless faith

Another way of saying this is- the heart of a faith whether it is pagan, humanism, deism, Judaism or Christianity should not be what we reject but we affirm.  Does that make sense?  I understand that was part of the journey…a discovery of what I did not believe in order to discover what I do affirm about Jesus.

So, What do I affirm about Jesus?

I affirm that Jesus was one of the last great prophets of Judaism and  Jesus was a good committed practicing 1^st Century temple centered Jew. (repeat)

Jesus was a Jew. Jesus was not a Christian.

 And that means these four elements:

1. Jesus was a strict exclusive monotheist.
2. Jesus believed that the Jews were God’s covenant people. There is a element of cultural blindness there.
3. Jesus kept Torah
4. Jesus was temple centered.

Let’s look at those four elements real quick…

First, Jesus was a strict exclusive monotheist.

Every morning and every night he prayed as instructed in the Deuteronomic Mosaic law- was is known as the Shema Israel. Deuteronomy 6: 4-6 “Hear, O Israel: the LORD is our God, the LORD is one.” Shema means hear…or listen…the Lord is our God and the Lord is one.

Jesus was a strict monotheist. There was no thought or speculation at this early point of a trinity…Matter of fact, the Jews at this time did not spend their time speculating  about God…that would be a later trait of the Greek and Roman Christians…

by the way ….slight digression here….

I use the term…the Jerusalem Jesus believers…let me explain that-The first community of Jesus believers in 33 CE formed after the death of Jesus was the Community of Jerusalem.  I hesitate to call this community a “Christian Church” because that term would not be used until later at Antioch. (Acts 11:26) (40-45CE). And those “Christians” centered in Antioch were far different in beliefs and practices than the Early Jerusalem Jesus believers. Here is the difference: The Jerusalem Jesus believers were Hebraic-led by James brother of Jesus, they spoke Hebrew and Aramaic- followed Torah and the corresponding food laws and sabbath,,,They used the Hebrew Bible the Tankhn…and they continued to sacrifice animals in temple and they believed Jesus was the Messiah. They believed he was a man..period and they believed he was martyred for his faith on a Roman cross like so many other Jewish believers. There’s was a narrow exclusive -faith…

In comparison, The Christians in Antioch were Hellenized led by Paul  -spoke Greek, used the Septuragint- the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, and here is the Hellenized paradigm shift. This was the new image of Jesus- replacing the first Jewish image of Jesus… They believed Jesus was born of a virgin, died on the cross for the sins of the world, and no longer kept torah, they considered themselves free from Torah, they consider the law to be the enemy of grace and they believed that the Church now replaced Israel as the valued possession of God. The Hellenized Christian’s message was now open to all people.

There was one other major difference between these two contending Gospels. The Jerusalem Jesus believers were a gospel of deed…Paul and John changed the gospel and made it a gospel of belief…

 

2ndly….Jesus believed that Israel had been chosen to be God’s covenant people. This was known as election

There is the story of a canaanite woman (Mt 15)- a gentile- a non-Jewish woman who kept crying out to Jesus for Jesus to come and heal her daughter…and the disciples get a little tired of this woman ranting after Jesus and ask Jesus to send her away and listen to what Jesus said…

I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. …

Jesus specifically says he was sent…interesting word..it is literally the word ap-os-tel’-lo root of apostolos or apostle

Jesus was saying…I am an Apostle to the House of Israel…

Jesus saw his identity as an apostle to the Jews

And the woman keeps bugging him and he gets even blunter with her

It is not meet ..not right to take the children’s bread, and to cast it to dogs…dogs was slur for a Gentile…

Now the image of Jesus here is not very flattering- he reveals his humanity- his cultural blindness- although the author of Matthew does have him reach out and heal her daughter ,,,

The point is Jesus had no plan to take the Gospel to the Gentiles- he even commanded his disciples not to go to the Gentiles. That was Paul’s idea ….Paul was the one who called himself an apostle to the Gentiles. Paul was one influenced by Hellenism for better or worse- who made his gospel universal- divorced from Judaism.

Jesus never intended to found a new religion.

So Jesus’s view contrary to popular opinion was that The Jewish people were the chosen people of God.

3rdly…Contrary to popular opinion, Jesus kept Torah…and  the Jewish practices of circumcision, sabbath observances and the food and purity laws.

Jesus was an observing Jew, Torah was central to his life… so were his followers. He was circumcised and his followers-the Jerusalem Jesus believers continued the practiced as required by the Abrahamic covenant. He observed sabbath (Mark 2:27-28, Luke 4:16) and never taught that the Sabbath day would be changed or eliminated. His followers also observed Sabbath. (Matthew 24:20) As Jesus observed the purity and food laws, so did his followers. (Gal. 2:12; Acts 21:20-26).

4thly, Jesus was a Temple Centered Jewish believer…meaning he worshipped in the Temple… There is a perception today – a perception that has been compounded like interest- that Jesus hated the Temple…That is a terrible idea…for the Gospels tell us that Jesus called the Temple his father’s house…He saw his mission as one who would purify the temple- to rid it of its corruption…he was picture as having so much zeal for that house that it consumed him…The Temple in Jerusalem was the center of his life.

The Jews believed at that time, that “the presence of God was specifically located in the Temple.

And The entire temple sacrificial system was for the purpose of preparing people to commune with God.

Let me give you one example…from the preaching of Jesus about this:

Found in the sermon of the Mount”

Therefore, if you bring thy gift to the altar, and there remember that thy brother hath ought against thee; Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift.

He is not talking about an 21^st century offering of money. He is talking about a gift or offering- a sacrifice at the altar of the temple. E. P. Sanders, a New Testament scholar in his book the Historical Figure of Jesus explains:

“Ány Jewish teacher would agree. The ‘gift’ here is probably a guilt offering, brought in order to complete the process of atonement for harming another person, The sacrifice did not count if the wrong was not put right first, This is clear in the Biblical legislation (Lev. 6:1-7) and later generations go the point.”

The point I am trying to make was Jesus was a Jew and for too long our Orthodox Christian theology has divorced Jesus from his true Jewish roots.

Now do n0t misunderstand the point of this lecture, I am not trying to persuade you to become a 1^st Century temple believer. But I am encouraging you to rethink some of the assumptions about who Jesus was and what he did- for there are consequences to our thoughts-perceptions and ideas.

When we picture Jesus in the exclusive garb of 21^st Century Evangelical view of a God-man we cut ourselves off from our Jewish roots and from our Jewish brothers and sisters. We are also being unfaithful in telling the true story of Jesus- the jew..

As I was thinking about this…I have to the conclusion that Moslems today have more in common with the Jerusalem Jesus believers of the 1^st Century that Evangelical Christians do. What does that say?

I also feel that Jesus would be very uncomfortable in our evangelical Christian Churches…not to say some of our potlucks with the favorite Midwest ham balls.

I believe; There is an opportunity here for us as Christians to begin to dialogue with Jews and Moslems- by reminding ourselves of our own Jewish roots and avoiding the narrowness and exclusive baggage of declaring that Jesus is God- the only sole mediator- the only Messiah…instead shall we with a new enthusiasm declare that Jesus was one of the last great prophets of the Jewish people who had a message about the spiritual nature of God and that spiritual presence being love.

May I suggest that you example your perceptions of Jesus and try reading the- the New Testament with the mindset of a 1^st Century Jew…you might just discover a new kind of Jesus- one that has been hidden – clouded by the evangelical fog of 20 centuries of misperceptions and misunderstandings.

Who is Jesus to me?

I believe he was one of the last great prophets of Israel and a good committed practicing first century temple centered Jew and we can learn a great many good moral principles from his teachings,

 

 

 

 

 

(This is the final part of the lecture I gave at First Unitarian Church Omaha back in April 2017)The very first matrix plug… the first illusion that I discovered and dealt with…..which was the source of most of my anxiety and fear in my life at that time was the teaching of the Rapture. It is not a simple teaching but a very complex system –a schematic timetable of last days events. It not only generates a conspiracy mindset but it generates fear especially when you center on the Tribulation and rise of the antichrist….

 

But it was in my own personal life, that the effects of the “rapture belief” were clearly evident. I had decided that there was no time for furthering my education. No time for looking at my career; only getting souls into the Kingdom. Everything took a back seat to the ministry, sad to say, even to family.

 

I do not remember why I began to study the “rapture” but in 1993 as a Pastor, I started to look at the Biblical references ..and not even realizing it I was beginning to use the principles of Biblical Criticism ..and those Bible verses contextually just did not match the doctrine. And then I looked at the history of the doctrine of the rapture and I came to realize I had been sold a bill of goods…this Rapture was not as old as Christianity as I had been led to believe- it only appeared in 1830 by John Nelson Darby. I slowly and quietly without fanfare remove references to “rapture” from my sermons and altar calls/ I also began to breathe a little easier realizing this wrathful God was not due yet and that the promised 7 year period of “hell on earth”  was a myth. My life became easier…I began to think about returning to school. I had discovered one of my perceptions- was wrong and I removed it. Or to use the term from the movie The Matrix One of the matrix’s plugs was detached. My theological box was beginning to unravel.

 

 

 

          In 2000, I started back to school and obtained a BA in Business Management from Buena Vista University. In 2005 I started a Masters in Theology program at Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio…how I got there is another story…it is the most conservative Catholic College in America…But The first class I took was Introduction to the Bible It was revolutionary- it introduced me to Biblical Criticism.  In a strange ironic way, I am thankful of that Catholic institution for introducing me to a way of studying the Bible that delivered me from reading the Bible literally…

 

The basic underlying principle of Biblical Criticism is that although God is an absolute being, the Bible does not have an absolute value but is conditioned on the historical and cultural setting in which it was written.

 

Then I made a terrible mistake as a Catholic theology student…I began reading other scholars…James Barr –Princeton and Oxford Bible Scholar, Hans Kung, the dissident catholic scholar and Paul Tillich

 

And I came away with a new perspective of the Bible. The Bible was never meant to be a historical, economic, legal or scientific textbook. But most importantly it was not meant to be the defining theological textbook, the final word or the only word about God. In less than two three months, I lost my fundamentalist “lenses” through which I had viewed the world.  Another matrix plug removed…

 

After this class..The year was 2006, and I began to think…

 

 Had I in the past, in my zeal as a Fundamentalist preacher, misinterpreting the scriptures about the fundamental moral issues of our time?.

 

I will limit my comments to one issue that dominated the majority of my preaching: homosexuality. Almost every Fundamentalist preacher focuses on this issue. You cannot tune into a Christian radio station and not hear how this “sin is destroying foundation of our country…”

 

The question I asked …is it a sin?

 

My study covered the 7 key Bible verses that I had used to condemn homosexuality. I was surprised- shocked by my findings. It revealed my ignorance of homosexuality. Some of it was just simple basic grammar. I discovered that no ancient text- Hebrew, Greek or Aramaic contained the English word homosexuality. The fact is the word “homosexuality” did not appear in any language until the 19th century.. 

 

Now I do not have time to spend on those 7 key verses this morning…allow me just to say this…I discovered that none of those 7 key verses have anything to do with today’s understanding of committed same sex relationships.

 

 I discovered that I was wrong in judging homosexuals. I was discovering that I was a bigot; that I had committed acts of prejudice in the name of God.

 

But in  2006, I had crossed over…and in my own personal way, I took personal responsibility and stopped what I called the core essence of Fundamentalism…I stopped being a judging meddler in people’s lives.

 

I discovered late in life that spirituality is not limited to one certain religious persuasion. I discovered that my arrogance, the kind of arrogance that I used to live and thrive in;  the arrogance of fundamentalism, of putting God in a box and saying “ HE ONLY WORKS IN MY BOX”- that limited God and my experience of God. My box, that is my system of ideas and perceptions about God and about Jesus had become a form of idolatry. The idolatry of the box limited my relationship with God and with others. It disconnected me from others/

 

Why do I call it idolatry? I will close with this thought…this set of ideas that learned from Paul Tillich. I call it idolatry because what was of ultimate concern to me was not God but my ideas about God.  I had put my ideas on the pedestal of life and God help you if you held to different ideas. I have also discovered that it is a very unhealthy way to live spiritually, mentally and physically.  I have discovered that in order to rightly relate to God and to others, I had to let go of absolute theological certainties and that realize God is not an angry old man sitting on a throne wait out- just waiting to punish me….but God  is bigger and better and lovelier then my mind can conceive or imagine.

 

Part two of a lecture given at the First Unitarian Church Omaha…April 23, 2017

Before we go any further let’s talk about the term fundamentalism…We here in America, talk about Fundamentalist Moslems; Extreme Fundamentalist Moslem and we use that term in a kind of flippant manner as if the only Fundamentalists were over there. We seem to forget that the most Fundamentalist Country in the world right now is America. Fundamentalism is a rich American term with a unique American history

Now I do not have enough time this morning to talk about that history but considering the current religious political situation in America today…I want to refresh your memory of something that should give you hope…because we have been through this kind of battle before…

From 1900 thru 1925 there was a battle for the soul of this country when Fundamentalists were attempting to rid this country of what they saw as the enemy of truth…that one common enemy was…science.

The science applied to the Bible – known as Biblical Criticism and the science applied to the origin of man known as Evolution.

Many of you know the history of the Scopes trial when a teacher was prosecuted for violating the anti-evolution laws in Tennessee, so I am not going to talk about that except to say this:   Remember the outcome…yes, Scopes was convicted and the ACLU paid the fine …. but in the end…The Fundamentalist movement may have won that battle but they lost the war. The movement was lampooned out of the public arena…they went quietly into the night at least until 1980’s

Remember the outcome…Maynard Shipley argued in his book WAR ON MODERN SCIENCE,   1927,  and I believe this was a very prophetic warning… if the fundamentalist managed to seize power in the denominations and impose their strictures on the people by law, Americans would lose the best part of their culture, and be dragged back to the Dark Ages…he said that in 1927 and it is something we are seeing today.

Allow me to give two definitions of a Fundamentalist…

A fundamentalist is one who believes everybody else is having too much fun… I believe that describes me twenty years ago. I honestly believed everybody was having too much fun.

On a more serious note:

A fundamentalist is one who believes and lives their lives as if their perceptions of God and the way God operates is the only valid absolute truth. Think about that for moment.

Here is an observation that I have recently come to acknowledge after spending 25 years of life wearing a narrow exclusive religious spectacles……Fundamentalists are a deeply anxious-fear dominated people. You might not know that…or you might not have perceived their fears-because they wear a mask of confident arrogance. I know.. I wore it. Now, I am not trying to draw sympathy for fundamentalist here…

But I am hoping to share just how important empathy is especially if you are desiring an honest compassionate dialogue with Fundamentalists…Then understanding- where they are coming from…how they are feeling…getting to know them individually because …no two Fundamentalist are alike. Do not lump into the same bag…do not commit the same mistake that many Fundamentalist do about us Liberals – that is to generalize about them all- because we are not all the same…right??? Just an observation that I think is important to understand…One more observation, it is very difficult to be a Fundamentalist Christian today because everything you encounter in our American culture rubs you the wrong way…

Oh….I should mention this…my goal and I hope it is your goal as well is not to change people – not to change fundamentalists…let me tell you I have a hard enough time changing myself…no…our goal should be to understand fundamentalists…dialogue begins there….

Part Three continues next week.

In 2000, still a Fundamentalist…I saw a movie called The Matrix which made me stop and think. It is not so much the action, although there was much action; but the story that fascinated me. The theme of the movie was that the material world is not reality but an illusion created by the dominating controlling AI- artificial intelligence machines. The real world was a ravaged wasteland and most of humanity has been captured by a race of machines and made to live out their lives in pods- that while it sapped the energy from the their bodies, it also continuous fed sensory stimuli to their brains which gave them the illusion of leading ‘ordinary’ lives. This computer driven dream world is called the Matrix..

There are two main characters- Morpheus- the leader of the resistance and Nemo- a young man who Morpheus was able to save- release from the Matrix, Nemo in one dialogue asks Morpheus a question “what is the matrix?”

By the way…all religions and philosophy are an attempt to answer that question…in one form or another ,,,what is the matrix…what is truth…

Pilate asked Jesus …what is truth….what is real?

Morpheus answers…The Matrix is…

It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you to the truth…Unfortunately no one can be told what the matrix is. You have to see it yourself…

In a certain sense, the world had been pulled over my eyes for the first fifty years of my life and twenty-five of those years as a minister. The matrix was my box, my set of beliefs.

You see part of the illusion, the matrix plugs that I have lived with since I was a child was that God was an angry old man sitting on a throne way out there, waiting to punish me when I did something wrong. Scott Peck called it the “monster God” in his book the Road Less Traveled. This angry God illusion was the root of my “fire-brimstone” preaching as a Fundamentalist preacher. This was my religious box…my matrix.

Now this idea of certain religious ideas being an illusion is not new…matter of fact, in my recent studies I discovered a 18^th century philosopher by the name of Ludwig Feuerbach who introduced the Western world to the notion that religion is a dream, that objects of religious faith are human projections in which we unconsciously create God in our own image. Never heard of Ludwig Feuerbach? I am not surprised. Most people have not heard of him. You’ve probably heard of Sigmund Freud…right? Freud was a student of Feuerbach at the University of Berlin. It was Freud who got all the publicity for his ideas about “religion being an illusion.” But it was the 20^th century Philosopher John Hick, that I found a kindred spirit as he also migrated out of fundamentalism later in his life. Building on Immanual Kant, he stated we cannot know noumena, that is things as they exist in themselves independent of our finite perception. What that means is- each one of us experience the divine differently based on our cultural and cognitive filter.

Now, using the movie-the Matrix is not exact analogy for my life for example- Nemo was pulled out of the matrix all at once…For myself the change was not abrupt- immediate…meaning- I did not wake up one morning and say- “well, today I think I am going to be a liberal …or today I think I am going to be kind and compassionate to gays….

No it was a slow process of removing the illusions that clouded my mind or to use the image from the movie…of pulling out one matrix plug at time…And that process began in 1996 after having experienced a depressive suicide crisis which revealed to me that I had a problem with my thinking and I begin a period of self-reflection…

My transformation began when I began to think for myself, that is when I began to look at my belief system – my box and question everything.

But…Understand for me …as for any fundamentalist to think outside the box and to question and doubt one’s beliefs is a frightening experience.

To be continued…Watch for Part Two next week at this time.

In this article I will address the issue of responding compassionately to survivors of trauma in the Church.  One account that I remember as a Pentecostal minister that first initiated me in how cold and ignorant Christians can sometimes be in regards to sexual abuse. A female member of this Pentecostal Church came down the aisle and requested prayer for continued healing from sexual abuse. The Pastor did not ask if he could place his hands on her head, but he did and began to pray for her deliverance from sexual sin. Then she fell forward. The Pastor caught her and placed her on the floor. Then, calling for several men to surround her… These men then placed their hands on her- holding her down- restraining her and prayed for her deliverance from the demon of lust.

This is not a rarity, sad to say. You might answer, “Well, this is a Pentecostal Church. Our Church does not do that.”

While most Evangelical-Fundamentalist Churches are not that overtly extreme; sad to say, they are “too touchy” and covertly unintentionally re-victimize these survivors of sexual abuse. Since leaving the Pentecostal-Fundamentalism, I have observed this.

Considering the fact, according to the National Sexual Violence Resource Center that

• One in five women & one in 71 men will be raped at some point in their lives.
• 4% lesbians, 74.9% bisexual women & 43.3% heterosexual women reported sexual violence other than rape during their lifetime.
• One in four girls and one in six boys will be sexually abused before they turn 18 years old.

I believe it is imperative that we consider what the Church can do———– to not re-victimize these survivors and what the Church can do to assist them in their recovery.

Responses.

1. It seems obvious to me that we must start with education. Churches would do well to learn from the Medical field. I was first introduced to this subject as a Nurse some 10-15 years ago. I am speaking about Trauma-Informed Care. This should be taught in every Bible College and Theological Seminary. It should be taught to every Church worker, Church elder, Church Youth leader and every Sunday school teacher. Some of you might ask

What is Trauma-Informed Care?

Trauma-Informed Care (TIC) is services and supports that take into account both the prevalence and impact of trauma. A Compassionate Church that is trauma informed strives to reduce or eliminate any interventions that can re-traumatize people or cause first-time trauma. The universal principle here is to treat all people as if they have experienced trauma.

A Trauma Informed Compassionate Church practices Universal Precautions- they assume that all people have potentially been impacted by trauma.

In order to apply that universal principle in Churches, much has to change.

Now I am not going to spend a great deal of time writing about this TIC but let me say this…Churches need to:

• Educate on just how common Trauma is
• Educate on the impact of trauma especially in terms of development of coping strategies
• Finally change the way we do things to reduce or eliminate any practice that could create or re-create trauma experiences.

Further resources:  www.samhsa.gov (put in Trauma Informed care in search)

www.nasmhpd.org

University of Iowa Health Care…PDF Creating Cultures of Trauma Informed Care

Trauma Informed Care: A Gift of Healing: Connecting Voices-Southern California Nevada Conference of the United Church of Christ

In my next article, I will expand on this and discuss other responses.

 

We know from the ACE (Adverse Childhood Experience) Study of 1995-1997 proved the link between extreme childhood stress and adult health/disease and early death. But what about the effects of adverse childhood experience on spirituality?

In my book Journey into Love, I shared my own experience of how my upbringing created an environment of fear and how that influenced my first image of God.  Here is a short excerpt:

The two main sources of this fear were family and religion. Both were, in my case, dysfunctional “realities”. Both were dominating, authoritarian and abusive. Both fostered a deadly, destructive dark view of God. The first thought-seed (of fear) that was inserted into the programming of my mind was a persistent emotive belief that God was an old man sitting on a throne in heaven, constantly watching me, waiting to hurl down lightning bolts on me when I did something wrong. My first image of God was that of a condemning God. Dr. Scott Peck in his book, The Road Less Traveled, calls it the “monster God.”  The primary source of this image was my father.  Where else do children acquire their initial insight into the mystery of God?  Fathers have a tremendous influence on their children… My father was a raging alcoholic and that is not meant as a blaming accusation but a descriptive term of my father’s abusive behavior. I cannot remember him without a bottle in his hand. I cannot remember not being yelled at or threatened by him. I have forgiven my father but in reality, he was physically and verbally abusive and the abuse did influence the box. The abuse saturated my box- my programming with not only fear but a perfectionistic mindset that no matter what I did, it wasn’t enough. I was always questioning whether what I was doing it was good enough. Actually, I was thinking that “I was never good enough… The second source of fear dealing with my perception of God was that of religion. The religion of my youth, which should have comforted and protected me…meaning it should have been a source of hope, a source of deliverance from an abusive dysfunctional family; instead my religion fostered and nurtured the abuse with its doctrines and rituals…My religion fertilized the fear programming. I now pictured God as an all-present fire breathing spirit dragon that was willing and able to breathe fire and brimstone down upon me. This is the image of God, the illusion that dominated and terrified my life for the first 45 years of my life..

Now in my book I did not discuss the scientific evidence of the link between abuse and spiritual malformation. I will address here in this article.

From my readings, it is clear that therapists and researchers have neglected this aspect of spirituality. Volumes have been written on the psychological effects of abuse but there have been only a few studies on abuse and spirituality. But the studies that have been done are showing a clear link that survivor’s perception of God are formed by their trauma.

Manlowe’s 1995 study (“Seduced by Faith”) of women who were sexually abused as children revealed their varied responses to God:

• Anger at God
• Absence of God or abandonment by God
• Guilt over being a part of a “sinful” act
• And the overwhelming sense that God’s nature was the same as the women’s abusive parent’s nature.

Imber and Jonker Netherland 1992 study found similar feelings toward God from suvivors of incest:

• Confusion
• Anger
• Despair, doubt, guilt
• Fear
• Disappointment and loneliness

 

Ducharme 1988 found that incest victims tended to see God more punitively.

Kane, Cheston and Greer 1993 also found survivors indicated more anger at God and a perception of God’s distance from them. This idea that God is “way out there” is a common experience of survivors. In my own life, even as a Protestant Fundamentalist minister at age 40, I still had the idea that God was way out there waiting to punish me. Kane also observed that survivors feel both ashamed of themselves and believe that God is ashamed of them which is a very damaging internalization of their victimization.

Beth Crisp in her 2007 study Spirituality and Sexual Abuse explains that when individuals are abused by clergy and especially when God is portrayed in images associated with clergy, the survivors unconsciously associate the two in their minds and merge the image of God with their experience of the abusive authority.

In my next article I will pick up here and discuss this issue further and discuss some possible interventions.