This week's Pieta

I carried in my newspaper this morning to find the photo of Christopher Stevens, either dead or dying, on the front page.


I thought newspapers had more respect for the dead, especially a US ambassador. Was JFK shown like this? Would the LA Times display a similar photo of Hilary Clinton or President Obama?

The news is bad enough without having to face this distressing photo: the UC Berkeley student who joined the Peace Corps and led the US effort in Libya now come to this bloody end. 

For a while the US kept the public from seeing even the coffins of soliders returned from Iraq and Afghanistan, but this photo invades my house?

I feel incited to riot by this photo--it invites revenge.

It's also a modern Pieta--his body being held and dragged calls to mind those sculptures of Mary holding Jesus' body.

Please, give me a little more distance before I have to view this.

Holy, holy, holy.    In my Book of Common Prayer there's no rite for the blessing of a newly-made martyr.

#     #     #     #

Note on Sept. 15: Link to LA Times report of readers complaining about this photo.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/letters/la-le-0915-postscript-stevens-photo-20120915,0,5870567.story

Lies, Sex, & Violence

I'm feeling very discouraged by news that the clumsy film causing protests in Egypt, Yemen, Iran, and other nations was invented by crack-pot Christians who produced it, lied to the actors about its content, dubbed in extremist lines, and claimed it was done by an Israeli.

 http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-libya-filmmaker-20120913,0,3754075.story

Steve Klein, the "script consultant," said they hoped it would "somehow open up the eyes" of Muslim extremists (interviewed on CNN today).   

What a way to win converts--insult their prophet, Mohammad. 

"The Southern Poverty Law Center has an extensive file on Klein that goes back decades," reports the LA Times. 

Apparently the central character, Mohammad, was only named "George" in the script.  Reports say he is portrayed as a womanizer and pedophile.  No wonder Muslims are protesting. 

Four people died in protests in Yemen today.  http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2012/09/gunshots-fired-as-protesters-storm-yemen-embassy.html

I care about Coptic Christians, just 10% of the population in Egypt and often under attack, but they are only more imperiled by the making of a film like this.

The BBC interviewed someone whose name I didn't catch, who said the extremists on both sides "have a symbiotic relationship."  Each fires the other up and provides publicity.

As a person who spends hours in the classroom trying to help students understand religious issues in the news, I am dismayed by the mountain of ignorance and hatred in the hearts of these filmmakers. 

Lines from "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?" echo in my mind: When will they ever learn? When will they ever learn? 

You'd think the filmmakers might have wondered if they were obeying God's will when they started having to use deceit to get the film made.   Now it turns out the main guy behind the film is an ex-con, Nakoula Basseley Nakoula (aka "Sam Basile"). 

http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/09/13/13842406-man-behind-anti-islam-film-reportedly-is-egyptian-born-ex-con?lite

Jesus said, "By their fruits you will know them."  

"Strange fruit" in Yemen, like Billie Holliday's song recorded in 1939 about lynching.

Elizabeth Warren & the Bible

So what do we make of Elizabeth Warren quoting Jesus in her speech at the Democratic convention last Wednesday night?


http://swampland.time.com/2012/09/06/democrats-favorite-biblical-passage-matthew-25/

It was a stirring moment in a great speech.  I didn't hear anyone else in either convention quoting the Bible, but I missed quite a few speeches. 

"Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me," she said (Matthew 25:40).

"The passage teaches about God in each of us, that we are bound to each other and we are called to act, not to sit, not to wait, but to act all of us together," she explained, contrasting Democratic support for programs like the Affordable Care Act vs. Republican opposition.

"The Republican vision is clear -- ``I got mine. The rest of you are on your own."' she had said earlier.  See the full transcript:   http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/09/05/transcript-elizabeth-warren-speech-at-dnc/


Her views at greater length were presented by Washington Post columnist E. J. Dionne in his blog after he interviewed her in August.  http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/post/elizabeth-warren-on-health-care-and-religion/2012/08/23/5c509058-ed6c-11e1-9ddc-340d5efb1e9c_blog.html


My only question: why was she quoting the King James translation, published in 1611?

She identified as a Methodist and a Sunday school teacher in the speech,  Most Methodists I know are not wedded to the KJV, and most Sunday school teachers use a version kids can understand. 

Did she choose the KJV because the most conservative Christians think the Bible was handed to us by King James and carved on stone tablets? 

In other words, the Bible doesn't sound like the Bible to most people unless it's in Shakespearean English?

Or is she just not familiar enough with the Bible in all of its modern translations to quote one of them?

"Brethren?"  I mean, really!  What Bible has she been reading for the last twenty years?

Sisters, we need to send her a copy of The Inclusive Bible--or at least the "New" RSV, done in 1989. 

In any case, she's a courageous and intelligent woman running for senator in Massachusetts.

Warren has an impressive record in setting up the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, passed by Congress and signed into law in 2010.

Her possible nomination as the agency's permanent director "was strongly opposed by financial institutions which had criticized Warren as overly aggressive in pursuing regulations, and by the Republican members of Congress," reports Wikipedia. 

Republicans later blocked the appointment of Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray, crippling the agency's functioning for a while.

As she summarized it in her speech, "I had an idea for the consumer protection agency to stop the rip offs.  Now the big banks did not like this, and they marshalled one of the biggest lobbying forces on earth to destroy the agency before it ever saw the light of day." 

"By the way, just a few weeks ago that little agency caught one of the biggest credit card companies cheating its customers," she continued. 

What a committed fighter!  We need Elizabeth Warren in the Senate--let's do all we can to support her.

Here's her website for donations:
  http://my.elizabethwarren.com/page/s/join-elizabeth-warren?source=BPI_GS_BrandedUS-S_EW-Exact_Elizabeth%20Warren

In Memoriam

In memoriam:

Jaime's little sister

Paul's daughter

Mary's sister

Benita's daughter

Chris's son

my grandfather

and now one more

Requiem eternam donat eis.

Friend

Comfort of silky ears

soft fur over a beating heart

warm body to hug

canine kisses

fierce protection

how many suicides

has a dog prevented?

What can you do?

What can you do?

Hug her every night

and say something?

Please wait for dawn.

I love you.

Please accept

another dealing of cards

another hand to play.

Assignment

Our assignment:

thirty thousand dawns
more or less
but some of us go AWOL























The moon
this morning
half a degree
away from Jupiter

The ancient cry:

Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have life

And thou no life at all? 
     --King Lear, V.3.354-55.

O my darling,

you could not wait for one more dawn?

You could not give the Creator

one more chance

to paint the sky

to make the day

less painful?

The news came last night: their 14-year-old daughter took her own life at home early Thursday morning while the family was sleeping.

The child's mother and aunt both elders at my church.

The child under treatment for depression and suicidal thoughts.

In September, the time of return to school and pressure and peer groups.

Fourteen years and she cuts the slender shoot of her life.  I who am greedy for years cannot fathom it.

How do you argue with suicide?

How do you not?

Beach Therapy

At 7:30 pm when Ann Romney’s speech was over, I herded the dogs into the car and drove off seeking open space, sunset sky, transcendence.


I found myself driving into the beach parking lot, planning to walk Stormy and Mocha and recover from the upsetting bits and pieces of the Republican convention I’d heard on radio and television.

We immediately encountered two chihuahuas, Bodhi and Shiva, and their owner, Susan.

Someone was performing on the sidewalk with a guitar and microphone; the sun had just set, turning the western sky pink and orange.

“It’s so peaceful here,” she sighed.

“Really—after watching the Republican convention,” I answered.

“I was watching it too ,” she said. “Ann Romney—‘I love women!’”

“I love women too,” I said. “But it sounded so weird coming from her.”

We took the dogs’ leashes off, and they chased in huge circles on the lawn. Politics faded as daylight dimmed and the almost-full moon moved through translucent clouds. Our recovery was complete.

Here is a sampling of the upsetting remarks we needed to recover from:

Rick Santorum after describing his severely handicapped newborn, Bella: “All men—all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with life and liberty.” His repetition of “all men” was such a nonsequitur. I think he meant that the newborn was created equal, but it sounded like men were really equal. Women were absent.

Ted Cruse, running for the Senate seat from which Kay Hutchinson has resigned: “Our rights come not from government but from God.” Not mentioned: “To secure these rights, governments are instituted.”

Nikki Haley, governor of South Carolina: “Ann Romney is a strong woman of faith, a wife, a mother, a patriot.” Period. That sounded to me like a message to women: be those four things.

Ann Romney: “Women sigh a little bit harder than men.” (She hasn’t heard my husband sigh.)

“It’s the moms who really hold this country together. You know it’s true, don’t you!” Oh really? What an essentialist statement—one gender holds this country together; the other doesn’t?

“I love you women!” Awkward moment—Miss America proclaiming her love for other women. As in, “Men may put women down—some women too—but I don’t?” Definitely not as in “I’m attracted to women.”

“No one will work harder, care more, or move heaven & earth more to make this country a better place like Mitt Romney.” I don’t know about that—in a contest for working hard, caring and moving heaven & earth, Barack Obama has to score pretty high.

“Give and it shall be given unto you.” A Bible quote, good. (How did it fit in? Who is giving what? I missed the connection between the Romneys and Jesus’ words, except that Mitt helps the poor in his church.

“I make you this solemn commitment: this man will not fail.” When you make solemn promises, don’t you do them on your own behalf? How do you make them for someone else? And how do you promise not failing? No one can promise that because so many factors are outside our control—especially as President of the US.

Repeated four times: “this man I met at a high school dance….”

And in closing: “It’s been forty years since that tall, kind of charming man asked me to dance…. You can trust Mitt, just as he took me home safely from that dance…” Kind of charming? What does that mean? And was it a blizzard that night? Or was it Al Qaeda, or just his own hormones?

The camera switches to Connie Rice, looking very sober at this point, as if to say “Really, Ann? This is why he should become President?” A few seconds later after the speech ends, she is smiling and clapping.

Bill Plante: “There is Governor Romney joining his wife on the stage.” Looking as plastic as ever—(sorry).

Bob Schieffer: “Wow—that was a speech! A fine speech.”

Another guy: “One heck of a speech.”

Really, guys? It was a strange speech.

Governor Chris Christie began his keynote: “Tonight we’re going to choose respect over love, as my mother taught me.” Huh? What does that mean? We’re going to respect Romney, even if we don’t love him?

I turned off the television and rushed out of the house, seeking peace and quiet.

Thank you, Todd Akin!

On my birthday, August 19, all I did was go to church and climb up the slopes of one of my favorite Colorado fourteeners, Mt. Sneffels. 

But in St. Louis, Congressman Todd Akin was being interviewed by a Fox affiliate and handing me a memorable birthday present: anti-abortion remarks so offensive that he is no longer a serious challenge to the Democratic Senator from Missouri, Claire McCaskill.

Woo-hoo!  Thank you, Todd. You may have tipped the balance to keep the Senate's Democratic majority in the elections this fall.  You may even have affected the presidential race.

You also gave me the opportunity to tout my evangelical Christian pro-choice book:  Abortion--My Choice, God's Grace: Christian Women Tell Their Stories (Pasadena, CA: New Paradigm, 1994).  It's available on Amazon, everybody.

I take the Bible seriously as the Word of God and point out in the book that nothing in the Bible opposes abortion.  Fifteen Christian women who have chosen abortion in difficult circumstances share their prayerful decision-making process in the face of rape, incest, health issues, and other crises.

I want to shout another thank-you to reporter John Eligon of the New York Times who researched Akin's religious connections and quotes a friend of Akin's as saying they both are "'far to the right' of people like Rush Limbaugh."

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/22/us/politics/todd-akins-faith-is-central-to-his-politics.html?_r=1&ref=johneligon

The phrase "Christian conservatives" has become so widely used in the last twenty years that the public now thinks that all Christians are conservative--or that all evangelicals are politically conservative as well as conservative in their approach to the Bible.

Not so.  There are Christian liberals and evangelical progressives, both of whom support legal access to abortion for women who feel they cannot continue an unexpected, unplanned pregnancy. 

The Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice is the most prominent organization trying to counter the myth that all Christians are anti-abortion.

In addition, check out my book, the website of Sojourners Magazine, and the pages of The Other Side, a distinguished evangelical publication that ceased publication about ten years ago. 

Visit the website of Evangelical & Ecumenical Women's Caucus--Christian Feminism Today, www.eewc.com, and its quarterly publication.  These media are all produced by evangelical Christians whose politics are progressive to left.  EEWC-CFT is an inclusive organization (i.e. gay friendly).  There are many churches that advertize themselves as "inclusive" or "welcoming." 

Eligon points out that Todd Akin holds an M.Div. from Covenant Theological Seminary in Missouri, affiliated with the Presbyterian Church of America, a group that split off from the southern Presbyterians in 1973 when they merged with the northern Presbyterians.  The PCA has about 350,000 members, compared to 1,952,000 in the PCUSA. 

Christians make up about 77% of the population in the US, and evangelicals are estimated at 30-35%.  But Todd Aiken's variety of "Christian conservatives" is a minority among the evangelicals--those who do home-schooling only, who oppose contraception and abortion, who think wives should be "in submission" to their husbands, and who oppose the increasing acceptance of gays and lesbians, claiming that all this is biblical.  

Do we want someone from this very small sub-group to be one of two senators representing Missouri?  Do we want his vote among the 100 senators making decisions for the 314 million citizens of the USA?

Thank you, Todd Akin, for exposing yourself and your views in time for the people of Missouri to make an informed choice.  You're also giving all Americans a chance to know what they're voting for this coming November 6.