Ralph Milton's Rumors

R U M O R S #445
Ralph Milton's E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2007-04-08

April 8th, 2007

CONFLICTING TRUTHS

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Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
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Who'd a thunk it? There are now 6,547½ fine, intelligent, good looking, morally upright, spiritually motivated people reading Rumors each week.
Well, maybe you don't all read it. Some of the less intellectually endowed among you print it out and use it to line your gerbil cages. And there's at least one of you who forwards it every week to someone said person particularly dislikes. Tut! Tut!
There are also a few of you (one or two at most - I hope) who don't understand the computer lingo at the bottom of this electronic rag and so don't know how to get your names off the list. And you're too embarrassed to ask me to do it for you.
But all the rest of you, every last one of you, is a fine, intelligent, good looking morally upright and spiritually motivated person. (When none of the evidence is on your side, flattery usually works!)
If by some chance you know someone who is your intellectual and spiritual equal, why not introduce them to Rumors? If none of your friends are like that, introduce them anyway. We are prepared to make exceptions.

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Rib Tickler - Four-year-old Derek was asked to give thanks before a big family dinner.
He began his prayer, thanking God for all his friends, naming them one by one. Then he thanked God for Mommy, Daddy, brother, sister, Grandma, Grandpa, and all his aunts and uncles.
Then Derek began to thank God for the food. He gave thanks for the turkey, the dressing, the fruit salad, the cranberry sauce, the pies, and the cakes, even the Cool Whip.
Then he paused, and everyone waited - and waited. After a long silence, Derek looked up at his mother and asked, "If I say thanks for the broccoli, won't God know that I'm lying?"
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Next Week's Readings - These are the readings you will probably hear in church this coming Sunday, April 15th, which is the Second Sunday of Easter. It is also the observance of Yom Hashoah (Holocaust Remembrance).

Acts 5:27-32 - So what does it mean - to "obey God rather than any human authority"? (v.29) That verse was a powerful and dangerous mandate for many early reformers, but does it now have any currency in the ecumenical church community? I can't think of any time in my life when that's been a serious problem for me, and I am neither bragging nor complaining when I say that. It has been there recently for a number of ecological activists who have put their bodies on the line and done time in jail in defense of their convictions.
In the congregation where I worship, obedience to God or to human authority would be a mostly hypothetical issue. But before we wallow in too much guilt, it should be noted that many of the social issue battles the last generation fought have been won - especially in the fields of race relations, gender issues, medical care and education.
Yes, I know. There's much, much more to be done. And there's significant evidence that we are slipping backwards. But it's good to acknowledge our accomplishments, not as a source of pride but as a source of hope.
Then it's back to the question. Has the ecumenical church community lost its nerve - its backbone?

Psalm 118:14-29 paraphrased by Jim Taylor
(alternate reading - Psalm 150)
Perhaps it was in a movie, many years ago. I see a child advance fearlessly to huge oak doors set into solid rock walls. With supreme confidence, the child kicks the doors - and wonder of wonders, they open.
The miracle, of course, is not the opening but the confidence. The people who knew Easter similarly had the confidence to kick doors open all over the world; they feared nothing and no one any more.

14 Our God is great, God is mighty;
Even the powers of death yield to God.
God is invincible!
God is my strong arm, my protector;
God has freed me from fear.
15 Let ancient trees tremble, let governments hang their heads
As we shake up the skies with our shout of victory;
God is invincible!
17 Once I was a groveling coward;
I cowered from the shadows of the powerful.
But now I know that I shall survive;
I shall live to honor my hero.
18 I was oppressed; I was humiliated;
I suffered; how I suffered!
But God did not abandon me;
God did not leave me to grovel in the ground.
19 So fling open the doors! Throw open the barriers!
Boardrooms and corridors of power, make room!
God is with us;
we're invincible!
21 Thank you, thank you, God!
Thank you for recognizing my plight;
Thank you for picking me up out of the mud.
22 You rescued me.
Now the one the world has ridiculed has become someone to watch out for.
23 No one but you could have done it;
I can hardly believe it myself.
24 Good God, what a day! What a day!
Let me revel in it!
You are invincible!
25 Thank you, God. Thank you.
26 Thank you for those who serve in your name.
My tears overflow with gratitude.
27 God lives in the hearts and hands of healers.
Wherever there are people of goodwill,
wherever kindness and compassion exist,
God finds a home.
28 You are my God; I will thank you with every thought.
You are my God; I will honor you with all I do.
29 I will never feel alone again;
even in the halls of death, your love will hold me up.
From: Everyday Psalms
Wood Lake Books.
For details, go to www.woodlakebooks.com

Revelation 1:4-8 - In a study group at church, Bill Medland, a mathematician, pointed out that there are two numbers which are indivisible - zero and infinity. His comment came in the context of a discussion on the unimaginable vastness of creation. God was there at the zero point of the Big Bang, and God is there in the infinitude of creation. "The Alpha and the Omega." The God "who is and who was and who is to come." (v.8)
Author Madeline L'Engle once told me she found almost as much inspiration from her reading in quantum mechanics as she did from scripture. I can't follow her there. My story-teller mind simply doesn't make those kinds of synapses. I tried to read Brian Greene's "The Elegant Universe" and got bogged down in the first chapter.
But I stand in open-mouthed awe when Mark, my astronomer son in Tucson, describes what is known and also the great "cloud of unknowing" in what science is discovering.
It's important to know that God's self revealing didn't stop when John of Patmos wrote his "Amen" at the end of his "Revelation."

John 20:19-31 - As a writer, I dislike footnotes and post-scripts almost as much as I dislike side-bars. I like stories that begin somewhere, go somewhere and come to an end. As quickly as possible. If it doesn't fit into the flow of the story, leave it out. (Even us wishy-washy liberals need something to be dogmatic about.)
In this story, Thomas wants to believe. He is of the scientific, logical bent, like Bill Medland and Jim Taylor and Madeline L'Engle. There is a deep and profound yearning in their souls for the transcendent experience of a living God, but it so often comes to them loosely packaged in stories and songs and legends.
There are many kinds of people and many ways of thinking. Among the infinitude of God's gift is the creation of so many different kinds of people who think on different planes. Such as the Thomas'."
I celebrate the Thomas' of the world, even though I can not be one of them.

There's a bundle of great resources on the Wood Lake Books website, including "Seasons of the Spirit" curriculum - which has material for all ages in the church. A few moments poking around on that site could be very fruitful.

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Rumors - Some years ago, reading a now mostly forgotten book about Israel, I remember only one juicy quote. "There are many, many sects of Judaism in Israel. All of them have one thing in common. All of them are totally convinced that all the others are doing it wrong."
The same could be said of Christianity, of Islam, of Buddhism. We compare our best with their worst (whoever "their" might) and come to the conclusion that they are wrong. Because if they are right, then I must be wrong, and that is a possibility I don't want to even think about.
Perhaps the greatest heresy of all faiths of whatever description is the assumption that truth is one. And that the human journey is about finding that one true faith. Some will insist that unless you have the one correct theology, you will not get to heaven. And they will tell you exactly what the one correct belief structure is.
I'm well aware that most ecumenical churches, in their corporate theology, are moving away from that idea. That's fine. But the real theology of a denomination is not in its official statements but in the way that theology is lived and expressed in the lives of the people who make up that denomination.
Whenever we get into a discussion, especially with someone whose ideas are similar but a little more liberal or evangelical, we will argue for the rightness of our own point of view. We seem to have little trouble being inclusive with people of other faith communities with whom we have little contact. But we find it hard to be genuinely open and accepting to those to our right and our left in our own denominations. Or at least that is my experience in my own denomination, The United Church of Canada.
It's probably a reflection of our own insecurity. We have such a need to be right that our anxiety buttons are pushed by anyone who thinks differently - who reads the resurrection stories differently.
In my denomination, we have clergy and laypeople who read the story of Thomas and his encounter with Christ as literally true. And we have those who see it as pure mythology. And of course, there are people - most people actually - all along that continuum.
Does someone along that long line of viewpoints have the truth? Or is it possible that all the viewpoints along that continuum are true? And, at the same time, that all of them are false?
There's a delightful scene in "Fiddler on the Roof" where the men of the village are having a discussion. One opinion is expressed, and old Tevya says, "You know, you're right." Some body expresses and opposite opinion, and Tevya says, "You know, you're right."
Then one of the young men challenges Tevya. "You say one is right, and then the other is right. They can't both be right!"
To which Tevya responds, "You know, you're right."
The whole thing is enough to send us screaming naked into the streets. Unless we have nurtured one of God's greatest gifts - a sense of humor about ourselves and our prized opinions.

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