King David, Pretty-boys, Homophobia, and Liminality -- Part I

For some time now I’ve been fascinated with pretty boys. Okay, I guess that sounds strange when I put it that way. What I mean is that I’m interested in understanding the phenomenon where our culture considers certain men to be attractive, not in a rugged, “masculine” sort of way, but in a finer, almost feminine way (which is why the generally feminine term “pretty” is used to describe them). What’s particularly interesting is the way that many men (and women!) despise and reject pretty boys (try to find a “manly” man who has anything nice to say about Orlando Bloom). Why is that?

The thing that initially piqued my curiosity about this phenomenon was when I was reading the story of David and Goliath a few years ago and realized that Goliath belittles David because he is a pretty boy. The text says “When the Philistine looked and saw David, he disdained him; for he was but a youth, and ruddy, with a handsome appearance.” (1 Sam 17:42) Now part of Goliath’s scoffing is because David is young (male youths are often considered to be feminine; this is part of the reason young boys were sexually exploited in the Greco-Roman world, and why in the American colonial period boys wore dresses for the first few years of their life), but his “handsome” appearance is also a factor. I still need to do a more careful analysis of the passage, but from my understanding the term translated “handsome” (yph for you Hebrew folks) is generally a term used for feminine beauty – like “pretty” in English.
I was again reminded of the pretty-boy phenomenon recently when reading Euripides’ ancient Greek tragedy the Bacchae, in which the God-in-disguise Dionysus is ridiculed for his feminine appearance (from the description he sounds like Goldilocks).

It’s beginning to seem to me that the pretty-boy phenomenon (not surprisingly) is cross-cultural, and as such may offer us some interesting insights into issues of human gender and sexuality. There are a variety of ways we could interpret this phenomenon (and I’d love to hear some of your suggestions), but I’m interested in exploring its relationship to homophobia. My theory is that the source of the pretty-boy phenomenon and homophobia is the same – a fear of the subversive nature of that which is liminal. But I also believe that the relationship between these two social phenomena goes beyond mere analogy, and that homophobia is actually the driving force behind hatred for the pretty-boy, making the pretty-boy phenomenon a form of homophobia. (forgive any misuse of terms or hazy conceptual distinctions, I’m a bit new to these kinds of analysis).

1) Disdain and hatred for the pretty-boy is ultimately caused, like homophobia, by the basic human fear of liminality. As human beings we constantly construct categories which allow us to organize and interpret our experiences, and which give us a sense of identity and order. Black, white, liberal, conservative, man, woman, child, adult, slave, free, etc (the fact that some might object that things such as male or black are not social constructions but are ‘natural’ is evidence of how effective society is at convincing us that the things it has created have always been) Each category we construct comes with a behavioural script, telling people who they are and how they are expected to act, providing us with order and meaning (note that these ‘categories’ are often designed to serve the power interests of certain segments of society – the caste system and patriarchy are clear examples of this). Because these socially constructed categories/identities have an ordering effect and preserve power interests, violation of their behavioural scripts is seen as a threat to society – improvisation is not allowed. We respond to this threat by labeling the offender as a deviant. I think we are particularly threatened by any violation of binary categories/identities – such as male/female.

We often fear the liminal – those people and things which straddle the fence between social categories and identities. We fear them because they threaten our constructed boundaries, and because they force us to see these boundaries for what they are – creations of human culture. In my opinion, when some/many things ‘feel wrong' to us it is not because of some divinely implanted, universal moral sensibility – it is because our neatly ordered, human-made social universe is being threatened. This is why so many Christians in the previous century (and sadly even today) opposed interracial marriage as an immoral abomination against God (it threatened our racial categories, and therefore threatened white supremacy). It is also why so many feel such a strong disgust towards homosexuality in our own day (interestingly, some of the rhetoric used against homosexuality is identical to that which was used against interracial marriage in a previous generation – ‘It will lead to polygamy and sex with animals’). Homosexuals threaten our yin-yang gender/sexual categories and identities, creating a messy spot of gray that obscures that crisp, curvy, line which separates white and black. What is the gay ‘man’? Is it man? Is it woman? Which locker-room should it use? Social conservatives are right – homosexuality is a threat to society, because it challenges some of our most fundamental social constructions. But this isn’t necessarily a bad thing – the civil rights movement was also a threat to society, and forced us to rethink oppressive racial scripts that had become deeply embedded in American culture (a comparison between functionalist and Marxist approaches to social theory is illuminating here).

In the same way in which the liminal nature of homosexuality threatens our tidy, binary, gender/sexuality scripts, so the ‘pretty-boy’ is seen as a threat to socially constructed borders. Is it a man? Is it a woman? No, it’s Super Queer! (Sorry . . . ) The pretty-boy, like the tom-boy, throws itself against that border fence separating masculinity from femininity, earning the disdain of those who stand firmly on either side of the fence. Fortunately these border monkeys are not alone -- they can find a sense of community and comraderie with the many other sorts of folks who hang out at societies borders.

(The name ‘pretty-boy’ is itself quite interesting. It highlights the liminal nature of this ‘category’ of people by combining a traditionally feminine term with a masculine term, and in the process reinforces the very boundaries which the ‘pretty-boy’ threatens. The use of ‘boy’ instead of ‘man’ is also noteworthy, and points us to the relationship between boyhood and femininity mentioned earlier. In addition to some biological reasons for this relationship (the pre-pubscent male has not yet acquired the physical characteristics such as facial hair, muscle mass, and deepened voice which we use to distinguish man from woman), I think that patriarchy might also be a key source. The young male and the female are both groups who are subjugated by the adult male. Portraying someone as feminine or as childish have traditionally been a way of subjugating them. In the past African-Americans and other colonized peoples were often portrayed by their white oppressors/exploiters as innocent and childish).

Christians and the Environment

Good news! There's a growing movement of "green-evangelicals" in the U.S. and abroad – evangelical Christians who are recognizing that their faith, and the Bible, call them to be active in environmental issues. These evangelicals are seriously challenging our culture's stereotypes that Christians don't give a rip about the earth. The Green evangelical movement is picking up speed, and includes evangelical leaders such as Tony Campolo, Rick Warren, Joel Hunter, Bill Hybels, and the heads of various Christian colleges, denominations, and organizations (Salvation Army, Christian Reformed Church, Judson College, Northpark, Wheaton, etc.)

Still, unfortunately, there are evangelicals who are not only apathetic towards environmental issues – they actually oppose environmental activism. It's been well publicized, for example, that Dr. James Dobson (head of Focus on the Family) has publicly opposed Richard Cizik (of the National Association of Evangelicals) for his focus on "creation care." According to Dobson, this takes the focus off of the "real" issues of abortion and family values. In my experience if you want to find someone who has a bad attitude towards global warming and other environmental issues the best places to look are a church, or the board room of a big corporation. In my experience, some evangelical Christians tend to be drawn more towards anti-global warming science (the vocal minority opinion within the scientific community which argues that human beings are not responsible for the warming of the globe, but that this is just part of some natural cycle) than others. Many of them WANT to believe that global warming is a joke, and are therefore drawn to these alternative scientific theories.

Why do many Christians have such a bad attitude towards environmental issues?

-I think a major reason is that environmentalism has long been associated with paganism and New Age movements, and evangelicals have been afraid of being associated with these movements, or of being "seduced" by the ideologies that underlie their environmental activism. They are afraid of "earth worship," etc. (Tony Campolo titled his book something along the lines of "How to Rescue the Earth without Worshipping Nature" for a reason). When Christians do talk about the environment they often throw out a disclaimer, "Now I'm not a treehugger."

-Another reason is that American evangelicals are in bed with political conservatism. For example, to be evangelical, unfortunately, often means you are also Republican. So, naturally, evangelicals have bought into the political conservatives' opposition to environmental issues. Amercian evangelicals don't realize it, but they have been seduced by "the world" by attaching themselves to conservative politics.

-An anthropocentric understanding of creation. Many Christians believe that human beings are the center and pinnacle of God's creation. Human beings, not the earth, are what really matter. This is wrong-headed and unbiblical.


Why should Christians care about the environment?

-We believe that God created the world and everything in it. To care for the earth is to honour the one who created it. To say that you love God but don't care about the environment is an impossibility – if you love God you WILL care about his creation. Can someone say they love da Vinci and then go and destroy the Mona Lisa? One of the deepest ironies is that the same people who yell the loudest about creationism are the ones who care the least about the environment. You can't really call yourself a creationist if you're apathetic towards environmental degradation. Atheists are doing a better job of practicing creationism than evangelical Christians – and that's just sad.

-The scriptures frequently speak of the trees, the rocks, and the animals worshipping God – I take these verses quite seriously. Nature, by its very existence, gives glory and worship to God. The world was NOT created for us (that's an unbiblical idea) – the world and everything in it was created for GOD. If Christians really care about worship they must work to care for the environment. As Tony Campolo has said, every animal that goes extinct means that God has lost another worshipper.

-To truly care for and value human beings requires caring for the environment. Environmental degradation poses real risks for human beings. Even if you believe that global warming is bad science (in which case you'd be disagreeing with the majority of reputable scientists, and taking a huge risk -- if the global warming folks are right, and you do nothing to stop it, then you're helping cause a lot of suffering), there are still other serious environmental risks. Pollution, even if it isn't warming the earth, causes serious health problems – including an increase in asthma and asthma related deaths, lung cancer, shortened lifespan, etc. (just check out the American Lung Association). Pollution also affects our drinking water. There's also a serious sustainability issue – there are only so many natural resources, and those in the West are consuming them at an unsustainable rate. The Earth cannot support a Western lifestyle.

-Evangelism. Evangelical Christians want to reach the world with the Gospel -- but anti-environmental attitudes (which are not demanded by the Gospel) threaten to needlessly alienate evangelicals from the broader culture, and in particular makes evangelicals ineffective in their attempts to share the Gospel with groups and individuals who define themselves by their environmental activism. How effective would some evangelicals be at reaching members of GreenPeace?

It's time for Christians to stop saying they believe God created the world, and start showing it. Join the growing movement of green evangelicals!

http://www.christiansandclimate.org/
Check out earthday.net to find out your ecological footprint

Thinking Critically about 'Wild at Heart' -- Chapter 1

“Wild at Heart” by John Eldredge has become an immensely popular book in the contemporary American church – and just like any other fad (the Prayer of Jabez and all the rest) it is important for Christians to carefully and critically examine it, lest they be led astray. Unfortunately, many Christians have dogmatically attached themselves to the theology of John Eldredge without first exploring alternative opinions.

There are many problems with chapter 1, but I’m going to just identify a few key ones.

First, there is a potential problem in theological method, which many critics have pointed out (some don’t realize that the Council of Biblical Manhood and Womanhood – an organization committed to preserving “traditional” gender roles has criticized Eldredge for his theology). Eldredge uses a bottom-up method, where he tries to understand something about God by looking at human beings. This is not necessarily bad, but it is dangerous. Christianity traditionally teaches that human beings are fallen and broken – we need to be careful about projecting that back onto God.

Second, his method is to look at the stories we tell and the movies we watch to get an idea of what is really at the “heart” of men and the “heart” of women. Eldredge is running the risk of taking cultural particulars and turning them into universal descriptions of what a human being “really” is. This underestimates the diversity of culture, both today and throughout history. We cannot look at the stories that resonate with us and assume that they resonate with all people. I’m not sure if Eldredge realizes this or not, but many of the story patterns that he keys in on do not go back to ancient times, and are not found in all cultures – many of them are particular to the West, particular to American culture, and had their origins in the medieval era or later periods (the cowboy image, which he seems to really like, is not appealing to all cultures). In the words of Hoggatt and Munn "Eldredge's characterization of true femininity appears to be influenced more by Middle English heroic sagas than by the teachings of the New Testament." Further, the stories we tell do not merely reflect “who we are” – they also make us who we are. Think about it – we intentionally tell children stories that model for them ideal behaviour. Why do parents not want their kids to watch a show like the Simpsons? Because they believe that Bart’s disrespect for his parents will teach their children to disrespect them. The stories we tell shape our values and our understanding of who we are in ways we don’t even realize (this is not a new idea -- Plato realized this millenia ago). The rescuing that Eldredge seizes on resonates with women not necessarily because it is programmed into them by God (if that were the case we would find it in EVERY culture), but because we are raised on these stories. They don’t reflect reality as much as they create it. If you analyze stories from throughout history you will see that they present very different pictures of ideal femininity and ideal masculinity. We must also keep in mind that stories have often been created and told by men. It was men who created the damsel in distress. Just as children’s stories represent attempts by adults to tell children how to behave, many stories throughout history have been attempts by men to tell women how to behave. Because women are raised on these stories they feel right and natural to them – the values and ideologies of the stories are internalized.
Christians recognize the dangers that movies pose to our values. Should we not also criticize the versions of masculinity and femininity that the movies feed us?

Third, he is making sweeping generalizations about EVERY boy and EVERY girl that just aren't true. He claims to be tapping into the core of a man’s heart and a woman’s heart (can the hearts of God’s creatures really be reduced to a list of three things?). More on this and the way Eldredge may be using psychological tools akin to psychics in later reviews.

This all raises a fourth problem: Eldredge is being incredibly influenced by his culture. It’s ironic that Eldredge argues that Christian feminists and others have sold out to our “culture’s” lies about manhood and womanhood, when Eldredge himself is highly influenced by his culture – he’s just influenced by different elements of it. If you notice, Eldredge often refers to the book “Iron John.” This tips us off the fact that Eldredge is influenced by the modern mythopoeic men’s movement – a secular movement which Eldredge is attempting to Christianize. Further, Eldredge is drawing heavily on movies and the like – doesn’t that indicate he is selling out to the culture? Christians need to engage in some more carefully nuanced thinking about the interaction between faith and culture. They often speak of “the world” or “the culture” as if it is monolithic – it’s not. Our culture is quite diverse. Sometimes Christians buy into one cultural movement (the modern men’s movement) and call it “biblical” and then identify those Christians who have identified with another cultural movement and label them as “sell-outs.” John Eldredge is just as influenced by “culture” as a hardcore feminist.

And finally, underlying much of his program is the idea that human beings were created in God’s image (amen!), and that men were created to reflect certain aspects of God, and women were created to reflect other aspects. This is a serious problem – and it is not suggested by the text. The text emphasized similarity and equality, rather than difference. This will be discussed more in the review of chapter 2.

I had a Gay Ole Time on my Vacation in Sodom

Hey, did you know that if you rearrange the letters in Sodom it spells "dooms" . . . creepy. And if you rearrange the letters of Gomorrah it spells . . . Hormogra . . . ok, I'm not sure what that means.
The Sodom and Gomorrah story (Gen. 19) is one of the main texts used by Christians (and I suppose Jews, and maybe even Muslims) to condemn homosexuality, and has proven to be a very strong rhetorical resource in fundamentalist political discourse. You may have heard something along the lines of: "If we legalize gay marriage and let gays adopt then we're inviting God's judgment on our nation, just like Sodom and Gomorrah." Some, such as the late Jerry Falwell, have interpreted national tragedies such as 9-11 as an example of this. In my opinion, this is a complete misuse of the text. In fact, the REAL crime of Sodom is something completely different . . . something that most people in our churches are guilty of. Here are a couple thoughts:

1. Some believe that the story of Sodom is non-sexual – that the men of Sodom didn't actually want to rape the angels, but wanted to interrogate them.

2. Even if the story is sexual, it is about RAPE. It's not like the angels came into Sodom and saw a bunch of friendly, committed gay couples strolling around holding hands in the town square and decided to call down judgment. The men of Sodom were trying to violently rape these visitors – an action which is certainly condemnable. To say that God condemning a city full of same-sex rapists is an indictment against homosexuality would be as wrong-headed as saying that a story which condemns heterosexual rape (such as the rape of Dinah in Genesis, or the similar story in Judges where a concubine is raped to death) shows that God is against heterosexuals.

3. Rape doesn't necessarily say anything about sexual orientation. Prison rapes and other acts of sexual violence are often committed by heterosexual men. In the ancient world the prisoners of war would sometimes be raped, as a way of humiliating them and robbing them of their masculinity. Rape is about power more than it is about sexuality.

4. The REAL crime in this story is a breech in ancient hospitality codes. In the ancient world and in many cultures today hospitality was very important – you had an obligation to care for and protect the stranger and the traveler. There are many stories in the scriptures and in ancient Greek literature where angels or gods come disguised as strangers in order to test the hospitality of an individual or a city, and then dish out reward or judgment accordingly. People like Abraham and Lot passed – the people of Sodom failed. The Sodomites are wicked not because they're gay, but because they try to commit an extreme act of violence and humiliation against the very people they are obligated to welcome and accept. If the Sodom and Gomorrah story speaks to ANY contemporary political issue, it is the issue of IMMIGRATION. The God who destroyed Sodom is much more worried about how we treat people crossing the border than he is about where two grown men who love each other are putting their penises.

5. Sodom comes up a few more times in scripture. Of particular interest is Ezekiel 16:49: "Behold, this was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had pride, surfeit of food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy". Interesting . . . I don't remember ever hearing this one preached on . . . I wonder why? Based on Gen. 19 and this passage it seems that the REAL CRIME in Sodom was that they were not caring for the marginalized, the poor, the oppressed. If American Christians really want to avoid God's judgment perhaps they should keep their nose out of people's bedrooms and focus on their pocketbooks. My advice: the next time you run into a Christian who is doing nothing to help the poor, call them a Sodomite. It's a good way to make friends at church.

My problems with the 10 commandments -- Feminism and Coveting

In my opinion, the commandment against coveting in Exodus 20:17 assumes and perpetuates a dangerous patriarchal ideology which continues to permeate western culture.

"You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his manservant, or his maidservant, or his ox, or his ass, or anything that is your neighbors."

Here we find the command that you are not to covet your neighbor's wife, a command which contemporary Christians often seem to read in light of and in connection with the prohibitions of lust in the Sermon on the Mount – i.e., coveting your neighbor's wife is equated with lusting after his wife.
There are several problems with this commandment from a feminist perspective, but the most important one is that it places a man's wife in a list of his other properties – she is listed right along with his livestock and his house. It is wrong to covet another man's wife not because it is in any way disrespectful to her, but because she is her husband's property, and his private ownership of her must be safeguarded in the same way that his private ownership of his house or car must be safeguarded.


While our society may consider itself to be free from such archaic understandings of marriage and gender, we still tend to view women as the property of their men. This manifests itself most clearly in the emotion of jealousy. Jealousy is a possessive emotion which is activated when one believes that their possessions and territory are being threatened. A husband is not jealous over his wife because he cares about her or wants to protect her from harm – he is jealous because she is "his" and he fears that he will lose her. Sometimes literature and film portray jealousy as a romantic quality – it's not, it's a vice that comes from men's desire to conquer, possess, and control. It is not coincidental that according to psychologists one of the biggest warning signs that a man is a potential or actual abuser is excessive jealousy. Men physically, verbally, and sexually abuse women as a way of asserting power and dominance over them (a form of marking their territory). Jealousy is a symptom of this need to own and control, and is itself a form of abuse.


Sadly, the commandment not to covet your neighbour's wife provides religious legitimation for an ideology that continues to result in the dehumanization, objectification, and physical, emotional, and sexual abuse of women. I don't know about you, but that's not the sort of commandment I want hanging on the wall of my nation's courtroom.

My problems with the 10 Commandments -- Marxism and Coveting

Many, even some who are non-religious, champion the 10 commandments as the most basic and essential of moral/ethical codes. While I believe "Thou shalt not kill" and some of the others are pretty good, there are a few of the commandments that, in my opinion, are potentially problematic, particularly the commandments against coveting and worshipping other gods.
Exodus 20:17 says "You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his manservant, or his maidservant, or his ox, or his ass, or anything that is your neighbors."
The basic idea here is that it's wrong to look at the things your neighbour has and say "I want that." On the one hand, this is a good commandment because it can discourage materialism. On the other hand, from a Marxist perspective this commandment has two fundamental flaws: it 1) assumes and perpetuates the idea of private ownership (rather than communal ownership) – i.e., that I can take an item, an animal, a piece of land (or even a human being) and say "This is mine, not yours. I am master of it, and I reap its benefits"; and 2) it discourages righteous discontent over economic inequality, providing religious legitimation for the elite who wish to maintain the status quo.
If you're not some sort of Marxist then the first point might not be a big deal to you, but regardless of what your views on Marxism are the second point is important for anyone concerned with socio-economic justice. We live in a world of gross economic inequality, where a small percentage of the world's population owns and controls the majority of the world's resources, while large numbers of human beings live in extreme poverty. If taken to its final conclusion this commandment seems to say to the poor "Don't look at those who eat three meals a day, those who can afford vaccinations for the most basic of diseases, those who get to see most or all of their children live to adulthood and say 'I want what they have.'" When we're dealing with dramatic inequalities coveting, far from being a vice, is actually a virtue which is fueled by a biblical desire for justice.

Back

So I realized this morning that I've been neglecting this blog for some time now . . . and there's a good chance none of y'all check it anymore. But, regardless, I'm going to try to start posting some stuff here again. Shalom.

Holy Saturday Batman!

There are two "holidays" in the Christian calendar that I believe are particularly special, but often underrated.. The first is Ash Wednesday, and the second is today – Holy Saturday. Ash Wednesday and the liturgy that is used to celebrate it is beautiful and meaningful, in that it vividly captures human brokenness, the liberating admission of that human brokenness, and the certainty of death. Holy Saturday (or as I prefer to call it – The Black Sabbath) is that day between Good Friday which commemorates Jesus' execution and Easter Sunday, which commemorates his resurrection from the dead. Part of the reason for having religious holidays is so that we can replay and participate in those stories and myths that are foundational to our faith. In my mind we are called during the Easter season to lose ourselves in the unfolding story, temporarily forgetting that we know how it ends. It is helpful to try imagining what Jesus' disciples thought and felt each step along the way. What might they have felt on Holy Saturday? I think they may have felt a little like this (Keep in mind – they did not know that the story would turn itself around the next morning):

-Lost – what now?
-Frightened – might they be next?
-Cynical – they just wasted years of their lives.
-Alienated from the divine -- where is God in all this? (I can imagine them singing Psalm 22 again and again).
-Disappointed and hopeless – they had pinned their hopes and dreams on one man, who was then brutally executed by the state.

To me Holy Saturday is significant, because many people live their lives in a state of darkness, disappointment, and hopelessness that resonates with the experiences of the disciples on that Sabbath. Every human being knows what it feels like to be lost and confused, to pin your hopes on something or someone only to have them shattered, to have no hope that life will turn itself around, to be consumed with the reality of human mortality, to be aware of the atrocities one human being can commit against another, etc. etc. Everyone at one time or another is deeply aware of the often sadistic nature of the universe: we all hold dreams and desires, and on occasion the realization of those dreams seem to be at hand -- only to be brutally crushed. Holy Saturday is a day for folks like that, a day when their darkness is in some way sanctified.

(The Anglican church has a liturgy for Holy Saturday – there is no Eucharist – and this is part of the anthem that is often sung for it (it is noteworthy that this anthem comes from the burial liturgy):
"In the midst of life we are in death;
from whom can we seek help?
From you alone, O Lord,
Who by our sins are justly angered.

Holy God, Holy and Mighty,
Holy and merciful Savior,
Deliver us not into the bitterness of eternal death." (this is repeated throughout)

Suicide

There's that well-worn passage in Philippians where Paul says: "For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. If it is to be life in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me. Yet which I shall choose I cannot tell. I am hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better. But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account." (Phil. 1:21-24)
I've heard this quoted by people a million times, and for many this is their "life verse." But, to be honest, these verses always seemed a bit pedestrian to me – until I recently read an interesting interpretation of them.
In one of my textbooks, the author suggested that in this passage Paul might have been contemplating suicide . . . meaning that when he spoke about "which I shall choose" that one of his choices was taking his own life – which to me is understandable, considering the many hardships Paul went through (life is hard enough without being stoned, persecuted, shipwrecked, etc.). I don't know if this interpretation is legitimate historically/exegetically, but for me it really brings the passage to life. There are many people in our churches who struggle with suicidal thoughts . . . and some of them eventually transform those thoughts into reality. People who experience such thoughts often already feel alienated and alone, and the fact that they're thinking about taking their own life can cause them to feel even more alienated, as suicidal thoughts, depression, and other forms of emotional/spiritual suffering are implicitly or explicitly labeled "unspiritual" in many of our churches. But if the Apostle Paul, that hero of evangelicals whose name is attached to almost half of the writings of the NT really thought about taking his own life, then that changes things. Paul then becomes a fellow sufferer who can be related to and identified with. He becomes an example of the fact that those who suffer, those who live in darkness, are not "unspiritual." And, Paul's decision of life over death shows that, no matter what, life is worth living . . .
"Convinced of this, I know that I shall remain and continue with you all, for your progress and joy in the faith . . ." (Phil. 1:25)

Knocking Yourself Up in the Past

Many time travel movies seem to assume a western understanding of reality. What if someone made a time-travel movie that assumed the Hindu doctrine of reincarnation? The main character could travel into the past and meet up with one of his previous incarnations. Oh the time they'd have. To make the plot a little spicier his previous incarnation could be a lady, and they could, well . . . do the "time-travel tango." Of course there have been some time-travel stories where someone goes into the past and impregnates a great-grandmother (gross, I know) thereby becoming their own ancestor, but has anyone ever made a film about someone impregnating himself in the past?

Cloudy with a 60% chance of execution

You know what's wrong with our society? We show way too much mercy to meteorologists. Did you know that in any given week 40% of the predictions weather people make are wrong? (ok, that figure may not be super precise, but it's close). When they're wrong there are serious social effects. Many people plan their lives around the predictions of TV weather seers – I can't tell you how many picnics I've cancelled because a weatherperson predicted bad weather, only to end up having a perfectly sunny day (ok, so I don't go on picnics. But I should). Why are weather people so prone to error? It's because they have nothing to fear. Nobody's gonna punish them if they're wrong – they're just going to keep on forecasting and getting their grossly inflated paycheck. Bastards. That's why I'm writing all the major TV networks encouraging them to get tough with their weather personnel. My proposal is simple: when a weather person is wrong about their prediction the network will publicly execute them during the evening news (this sort of incentive program worked really well for Darth Vader). For the sake of the bleeding heart liberals out there you could enact a three-strike system – if they make three bad predictions they get whacked. It'd probably boost ratings, since everyone would be watching the weather reports to see whether their favorite weather personality gets to live (it's like Survivor). Water cooler conversations about the weather would no longer be a way to make pointless and somewhat awkward small talk – it'd actually be a topic worth talking about. "Hey, Bill on channel 5 predicted rain yesterday and was totally wrong. That brings him up to two strikes. You think he's gonna make it until the end of the month?" "I don't know, but channel 7 executed Sherry last night. They had a bunch of angry chimpanzees stone her to death. Me and the wife watched it with the kids." Nothing brings a family together like a weather woman getting executed by zoo animals.
Ok, so some Christians might have a problem with this idea. I agree, on the surface it sounds barbaric. But let's think about it. If you're the average North American evangelical you already support the death penalty – I mean let's face it, you support killing pretty much everybody except unborn babies. Just throw the corpses of the weather-people in mass graves with the Iraqi children, Palestinian children, and many others that you've helped murder through your votes (hmmm, I sound bitter, sorry). (okay, so I totally made up the 40% figure. I really have no idea how often they're wrong).

Parenting Tip

One of the biggest risks faced by teenagers today is drugging. Not the "fun" kind, but the kind where you're at a party and somebody slips some vodka or ecstasy into your drink and you wake up the next morning next to something that looks a little too much like Gilbert Gottfried (sorry Gil, you know I love you). Drugging is a serious risk, but unfortunately many teenagers don't take it seriously enough. How can you, as a parent instill in your teenagers the street smart caution and almost paranoid distrust of others that they need to navigate the high school and college party scene without becoming another notch in Mr. Gottfried's belt? You could try talking to them, but let's be honest, that's not gonna do a whole lot. You could make them watch an after school special, but unless it has Johnny Knoxville making an ass of himself they probably aren't going to emulate any of the positive behaviours they see in the film. My suggestion is much simpler, and much more effective. You simply offer your son or daughter a purportedly non-alcoholic drink – Coca-Cola for example – which they will undoubtedly accept without question. Then, without them knowing you spike the drink with whatever hard liquor you happen to have on hand. After a couple of refills your child will hopefully be quite tipsy. This is the part where you drive them to a public place (I recommend the post office or a playground), drop them there, and drive away. On your way home make a quick phone call to the cops letting them know that you saw a drunk teenager playing on the slides at your local playground. The cops show up, arrest your kid for underage drinking AND public drunkenness, and haul them off. While the arrest may be unpleasant, it is a lesson that your child will not soon forget. Once they realize that they can't even trust their own parents not to drug them you can bet they'll be a lot more suspicious of strangers at a party. That's just good parenting.

In Search of God's Penis

In our scriptures, our churches, our personal prayer life, and most of our public discourse we speak of God in exclusively masculine language -- he, him, his, etc. HE is after all our heavenly FATHER. Now I certainly don't know much about women, and I probably missed a couple of important steps in the birds and the bees talk, but I'm pretty sure the main thing that sets us men apart from the fairer sex is that we have penises and they don't. So . . . if having a penis makes you a HE, and God is always spoken of as a HE, then it logically follows that God must in fact have a penis. This realization has led me to embark on the greatest adventure of my life, an adventure that has consumed nearly all of my Christmas break -- trying to find God's penis. Unfortunately, I've yet to find it (I'm beginning to think that he doesn't keep it in the Midwest), and so I'm left with many burnning and unanswered theological questions. For example, how big is God's penis? I've heard somewhere that there are nine dimensions . . . does this mean that God has a nine-dimensional penis? Us Christians believe in the Trinity -- God being three distinct persons yet one -- so what exactly would such a Trinitarian penis look like? Is God's penis omnipresent? So many questions.
I suppose some people would find my search for the Sacred Penis to be either blasphemous or foolish -- I mean, surely God does not have a penis, does he? Good question. When God became incarnate in Jesus he did (as far as we know) take on a penis (he even had it circumcised), and if we could find Jesus' mummified body in Israel then we might be able to take a gander. Unfortunately, we believe that Jesus' tomb is empty and that his whole body (penis included) has been resurrected. And while Jesus is still in a "physical," resurrected form (somewhere), there are hints in scripture (Mark 12:18-27) that resurrected bodies are asexual. So, alas, my search for the Holiest Phallus may be as futile as the search for a Ben Affleck movie that doesn't suck.
Why then, if God is truly penisless, do Christians (and Jews and Muslims) insist on speaking of God in exclusively masculine terms? I'm serious -- I really need someone to explain this to me, because frankly I don't get it. Why do I get such startled responses from people when I tell them I occasionally address God as "Heavenly Mother" (and I only tell that to my open minded friends . . . if I told some of my other friends I'd be afraid of the response). Some Christians have tried to demasculinze the Holy Trinity by replacing the terms Father, Son, and Holy Spirit with Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer (the priest at the church I attend in Canada occasionally uses these gender neutral terms in her closing benediction), but this move has met with ferocious resistance from conservatives, Catholic and Protestant alike. Why? If God is in no way literally male, and if both men and women are made in the image of God and therefore both reflect God's nature then why can't we use feminine language to refer to the divine?

P.S. If you have any information regarding the whereabouts of God's penis, PLEASE, let me know.