So on the morning of September 11, I arrived at the country club where the retreat was being held and situated myself at the conference table in a room with a panoramic view of the far west Chicago suburbs. We dove right into discussing the submitted articles, but about an hour later when the waitress came in with more coffee and danishes she mentioned that a plane had just flown into the World Trade Center. We all assumed it was another personal plane incident like the one that had flown into the Empire State Building a few years before and continued working. When we broke for lunch the head editors called the office and then quickly left. The rest of us stayed on and even watched a Bibleman episode for possible review, fairly oblivious to the events of the day.

It wasn’t until I left the country club in the late afternoon and turned on the car radio that I began to have an inkling of the magnitude of the day. I rushed home to my tiny basement apartment which had no TV reception and tried futilely to get online but the dial-up lines were all busy for hours. I recall going out to get the special evening edition of the newspaper and crashing the Wheaton College student lounge (with their TV and cable hookup) just to get some idea of what was happening. The next day I was scheduled to host my church’s table at the Wheaton College ministry fair, which meant I spent the day surrounded by not only college students but also representatives of every church and parachurch ministry in the Wheaton area. It was a surreal day as people attempted to process the shock and openly shared the subsequent anger and hatred that had started to develop. That evening my church held a prayer meeting, and I recall praying that this act of terror would not lead to people lashing out against the innocent as a form of revenge. I was informed afterwards that my prayer was inappropriate. Three weeks later I heard back from Christianity Today informing me that they had a hiring freeze and the position I was applying for was eliminated in favor of restructuring the department.

It’s strange to reflect back on the day the world changed. And a bit eerie to recall that I spent the afternoon of September 11 watching the Bibleman episode about how good Christian students need to stop hanging out with their non-Christian peers because they can be a bad influence on their faith and then spent the next day listening to Evangelical leaders responding to their enemy in hate. I couldn’t have know it at the time, but within those first two days after the attack I caught a glimpse of how the events of Sept. 11th would shape the church over the next ten years. The world has irrevocably changed – despite the ongoing attempts to pretend that that the false security and pride of American exceptionalism is still a viable option in a globalized world. Over this past decade this new world has forced me to abandon a naïve faith that cared only for the state of my own soul, and embrace the fact that I am connected to others as a child of God. Who I am is as much dependant on how I honor the image of God in them as it is on any acts of ritual or piety I engage in.

Perhaps it took 9/11 and the response of fear and hatred I found in the church to push me to finally realize that my faith had to be more about God than myself. I don’t know if I will ever know for sure, but it has assuredly been a decade of change from which there is no going back. And sadly, constantly living in a culture of fear has prevented many in the church from wondering what sort of people we are being changed into. But the questions need to be asked. Are we more Christ-like now? Is God’s Kingdom more visible ten years later? Maybe simply asking those questions this Sept. 11th can help us turn a day that could easily kindle new waves of hatred into one that pushes us outside of our all-consuming selves and back to the sort of people Jesus calls us to be.

The concept of freedom is of course an emotional issue in the U.S. We are fond of the phrase "freedom isn't free" and are told to honor the soldiers in Iraq for "ensuring our freedom." Neither of those phrases in the way they are typically used have anything to do with freedom and usually have more to do with justifying the restriction of freedoms. So needless to say, discussions regarding freedom these days are a bit skewed. In my understanding of the concept, freedom means being free from oppression. That oppression can of course take many forms – including control, enslavement, or even fear. The thing is, no one is ever truly free from all forms of oppression. There is always something controlling us – using fear to keep us where they want us to be. So in light of that, the only people who are truly free are those who just don't care about what will happen to them if they resist the oppression. In short, the people who have true freedom are those with nothing left to lose.

A few different things have me thinking about this. First, as I've been rereading and rewatching Harry Potter, I am amazed yet again at Rowling's nuanced presentation of evil and oppression. Evil insinuates itself in that world slowly. It starts with minor restrictions of freedom – a teacher punishing students for telling the truth or the government not letting the newspaper report the real news. Lies are spread, loyalties questioned, and little by little the freedoms disappear, until non-pureblood wizards are being round-up and others are going into hiding. Those who speak out against the oppression face dire consequences – like the kidnapping and torture of their children. In the end it is only Harry Potter, the orphan who has lost nearly everyone he loves, – who truly has nothing left to lose – who has the freedom to stand up to the oppression.

Then this past week I read of the start of trials of protesters in Iran. The New York Times reported, "The Iranian authorities opened an extraordinary mass trial against more than 100 opposition figures on Saturday, accusing them of conspiring with foreign powers to stage a revolution through terrorism, subversion, and a media campaign to discredit last month’s presidential election." Those that raised their voices for freedom are now bearing the brunt of oppression. Similar thing with the journalists who are now (thankfully) free from their captivity in North Korea. While they were trying to bring truth to the world, they both had a lot to lose in the process. Hearing the story of Euna Lee's 4 year old daughter who was told during her mother's captivity that "mommy was at work" broke my heart. I don't know if I could be willing to risk never seeing my children again in order to fight oppression.

I know that making sacrifices is a basic part of fighting for freedom. If no one was willing to take risks – sacrificing their families and even their own lives, then oppression would simply continue. But those sacrifices are chosen. People have to be willing to pay the price to seek freedom. When oppression can't demand a price of us, it has no power over us. So either society grants us that freedom or we decide that we don't care what others may do to us – but either way we are only free when we've got nothing left to lose.

Try as some might to make certain sorts of people illegal, what most people seem to want is hide the very existence of the other. I'm not talking about wishing child molesters or rapists didn't exist (and working to make it so), but the mentality that gets upset that they (or especially their children) must breathe the same air as say a LGBT person, or a Muslim, or an Atheist, or a Christian. These are the people who would rather ban all extracurricular activities in a school than allow a group of THEM to gather together. Or the parents who launch campaigns against libraries to remove books that talk about someone having two mommies from the shelves. Or the Atheists who freak out if a Christian social worker is profiled in a "secular" magazine. I understand engaging in disagreement, but am appalled at this desire to pretend reality just doesn't exist.

I've seen this pattern occur all too often within the Christian world especially. A few years ago I was working on a screening committee for a magazine to decide which submitted articles to publish. One very well written article told the story of a girl's date rape and subsequent silencing at a Christian college. While the committee thought it was a good article, it wasn't published because "our readers don't want to hear about stuff like that." Or the public safety officer at Wheaton College who had been told not to look for drugs on campus because it was better to pretend they don't exist than taint the college's reputation. Then there are the bans on religious symbols (headscarves, jewelry) in schools and workplaces. And the numerous people I encounter who just don't want to hear about justice issues because it might upset them too much.

Reality check please. Pretending that reality doesn't exist just because you don't want it too is unhealthy. Perhaps it's time to engage a slightly less unbalanced tactic in how you deal with the world.

Please.

What I'm thinking about here is the tension between the desire to accomplish something great with one's life and the call to serve God wherever one finds oneself. I know that following God means being willing to serve where one is at. One cannot wait for the ideal circumstances to arise in order to serve and a certain level of being content where God has placed you is needed in order to serve well. But I also see the danger of settling for whatever is easy and never stepping out in faith to serve. That stepping out, while focused on God, requires a basic level of self-pride. A sense that one is "important" enough to do great things for the Kingdom. While it might not be self-centered pride, it is a measure of confidence that pushes one beyond where one is at onto greater things.

I've always understood the line from Lord of the Rings that Eowyn answers to Aragon's question of 'What do you fear my lady?' She replies, 'A cage. To stay behind bars until use and old age accept them and all chance of valor has gone beyond beyond recall or desire.' To me that isn't about my need to accomplish great things in my life, but the awareness that I shouldn't be afraid to actually try. I think I fear complacency masquerading as contentment or "accepting my place in life" more than I fear excessive pride. But sometimes finding the right balance is hard.

I can get too caught up in desiring to "do great things" that I miss out on the opportunities I have right before me. It is this tension of accepting and grasping hold of such opportunities while not ignoring the whispers of the call pushing me out in faith that is the ongoing struggle. It isn't a bad struggle necessarily, but one that keeps me aware who I am and what I am being called towards.

The etymology of "discipline" takes us to the Latin terms referring to the instruction given to a disciple. Instruction/discipline was necessary in order to shape a disciple. So Jesus instructing his disciples is discipline. Yet over time the emphasis shifted from shaping a follower to dictating the manner or rules by which the disciple should live. Later the term evolved to refer to punishments inflicted if said rules were not followed.

The two areas I most commonly hear the term used are in reference to child rearing and spiritual disciplines. In both areas, I think we often focus so much on the later meanings of the term that we fail to remember its roots. Instead of shaping disciples (ourselves spiritually or our children) we dwell on legalism and rules. We have checklists for how to be a good Christian and are often punished personally by guilt or corporately through ridicule and ostracism if those rules aren't followed. We don't go to church, do our quiet time, appear engaged in worship and we suffer the consequences. And of course we all know the arbitrary rules and punishments we inflict upon our kids all the time. But I wonder if we are effectively making disciples? Are we instructing them and helping shape them (and ourselves) into disciples who choose to follow a certain path? Or have we just created good systems of rules and punishments that keep some people in bounds some of the time?

I'm not saying get rid of rules, just wondering if we limit our understanding of discipline to our detriment.

So come lose your life for a carpenter's son
For a madman who died for a dream
And you'll have the faith His first followers had
And you'll feel the weight of the beam
So surrender the hunger to say you must know
Have the courage to say I believe
For the power of paradox opens your eyes
And blinds those who say they can see
So we follow God's own Fool
For only the foolish can tell
Believe the unbelievable,
And come be a fool as well

from Michael Card's God's Own Fool

I listened to that song a lot back in college when I was going through the whole postmodern crisis of faith thing. Before that I think I would have scoffed at the whole idea just like I've had people scoff at me when I have voiced similar ideas. Be a fool? Follow a fool? Choose to be stupid? Why would anyone do that?

The audacity of claiming the label "fool" when so many are quick to use it in derision confuses those that harp on truth and evidence. In a world where scientific certainty reigns and forensics has replaced mystery, to assert the power of paradox and affirm the foolishness of belief just doesn't make sense. It isn't the cultural norm, it doesn't fit the dominant paradigm, it leads to ridicule and dismissal. You know the list. It's what causes the atheists to point their fingers and laugh and the Christians to burn you at the stake as a heretic.

But all of that misses the point. I've been down this road of modern vs. postmodern epistemology before here on this blog and as fascinating as arguments about truth and certainty are they are often a red herring that distracts from the real issues. I've also admitted to not being afraid of postmodernism and do so for just this reason. I like the shift in postmodern philosophy (especially in Levinas) toward Ethics (as opposed to Epistemology) as first philosophy. So people can get their panties all in a bunch in their rush to call me postmodern relativist for not thinking that how we know things is of primary importance, but they are really missing the whole point – that of justice and how we interact with the Other as being more basic and central than any theory of knowledge. And it is that emphasis on interaction with the Other that has me proudly accepting the label of fool.

Faith is not about knowledge – what we know or how we know it, it is about following in the footsteps of a fool. Jesus was a fool in the eyes of the world. He has been accredited with ushering in an upside-down kingdom – where the first shall be last and the last shall be first. He cared for those whom society cast aside, he instructed us to love our enemies, he called the underdogs blessed. By anyone's standards he was a fool. And he called us to follow him. As many have stated recently, this isn't about affirming a secret set of knowledge but about entering into a way of life. It is about following the fool, being content in mystery, affirm the power of paradox, and turning the world upside-down.

Following the fool and choosing the foolish way isn't about stupidity vs. knowledge. Those things don't matter, or at least matter much less than the values of the Kingdom. Loving others and living subversively are foolish in the eyes of the world and so we follow God's own fool and choose to be fools as well.

Find more contributions to this month's Synchroblog on God's use of fools at -

Phil Wyman at Square No More
Fools Rush In by Sonja Andrews
That Darn Ego by Jonathan Brink
Won't Get Fooled Again by Alan Knox
Strength on the Margins by Igneous Quill
Foolish Heart by Erin Word
A Fool's Choice by Cindy Harvey
Quiet Now, God's Calling by Jenelle D'Alessandro
Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right… By Mike Bursell
Ship of Fools by David Fisher
Hut Burning for God by Father Gregory
God Used This Fool by Cobus van Wyngaard
Fool if you think its over by Paul Walker
Blessed are the foolish — foolish are the blessed by Steve Hayes
What A Fool I've Been by Reba Baskett
The foolishness of God and the foolishness of Christians. by KW
My Foolish Calling by Lisa Borden
What a Fool Believes by Sue at Discombobula
God Uses Foolish Things by Sally

Tags: Synchroblog, Fool, Michael Card, God's Own Fool, Epistemology, Ethics, postmodernism, Levinas, MissionalEmerging Church

We celebrated the Solstice with the alternative parents group I am a part of with a picnic and bubble extravaganza. (what better way to celebrate anything than to have laughing toddlers chase bubbles!) Here is Emma enjoying the occasion.

The suspected gunman in the Virginia Tech shooting rampage, Cho Seung-Hui, was a troubled 23-year-old senior from South Korea who investigators believe left an invective-filled note in his dorm room, sources say. …
A note believed to have been written by Cho was found in his dorm room that railed against "rich kids," "debauchery" and "deceitful charlatans" on campus….
Timothy Johnson, a student from Annandale, Va., said people would say hello to Cho in passing, but nobody knew him well.
"People are pretty upset," Johnson said. "He's a monster; he can't be normal. I can't believe I said 'hi' to him in the hall and then he killed all those people."

Two things struck me. How Cho's suppossed "reasons" for the attack parallel some of the reasons given for 9/11. And then the response of the fellow student. Just the assumption that to be nice to someone who is abnormal or even evil is so out of the question.

I in no way want to justify Cho's actions or blame the victim's for his choices. I know we don't know much about Cho and what other issues he was dealing with. But I have to wonder at how people like him are pushed to the edge. When normal people won't interact with the guy who's a bit off, when one sees valid concerns in the structure of society and feels powerless to have a voice against them – what then are constructive ways to work for change?

I know I get frustrated by how the normal response to me by my friends is just to roll their eyes or make fun of me when I go off on one of my liberal hippie jesusy rants. And on the national scale when countries don't change the way we want them to, we go on killing sprees with bombs. I guess that's what my rambling is leading to – trying to figure out how to change the world effectively without resorting to violence or despair. That's what's running through my head as I reflect in shock on the recent events.

So we decorated the tree tonight. This was our first year ever to have a real tree (after our duct taped fake tree collapsed on Emma a couple of times last year, we decided to try the real thing). While Emma was a bit scared at the tree farm and clung to my pants the whole time, she hasn't really seemed to notice that there is a tree in the house yet (granted we put her to bed before we actually started decorating it…).

We used colored lights this year. I have no clue where those lights even came from. I like the white lights, but behold we had half a dozen new boxes of colored lights in with the Christmas stuff. Mike pulled the "Emma would like the colored lights better" tricks and out voted me (plus he called me a tree light racist since I don't like colored lights). So we have colored lights…

With Ella Fitzgerald, Harry Connick Jr., and Enya singing the sounds of the season in the background and fortified with spiced wine, we decorated the tree. Now some people have pretty trees – all decorative and coordinated. We have a memory tree. I have (almost) 29 years of ornaments (often multiple per year) as does Mike. So on the tree are "Baby's First Christmas" ornaments from 1977, 1978, and 2005. I have at least 4 Texas shaped ornaments (Merry Christmas Y'all), Hallmark series from the 80's and 90's, and ornaments we picked up from our honeymoon in Europe. Then there is my Cathedrals of the World set – I can only put up the ones I've actually visted (7 out of 12 isn't bad). And pop culture is fully represented as well. From our childhoods we have Snoopy, Strawberry Shortcake, the Muppets, and the Smurfs (that would be Mike's given that the Smurfs were banned as New Age in my family). Of course the whole Hallmark Star Wars and Lord of the Rings series are there as well as a few Harry Potter, Winnie-the-Pooh, and Veggie Tales ornaments. And Emma got an Elmo one this year. So it is a memory tree – a tree that is about us, our stories, our lives.

So for a cultural tradition, we go all the way. The tree, the ornaments, the music, the TV shows (the Sesame Street Gift of the Magi with Bert, Ernie, and Mr. Hooper was on today – I had the record of that – fun memories) … Are we a product of our culture, sure. Do I think it cheapen or takes the meaning out of Christmas? Not at all. I embrace Christmas with all its cultural, pagan, and religious roots. It just adds to the richness of the celebration. To celebrate the return of the light, to give gifts, to tell cultural folk tales, to get to decorate with my favorite colors, to listen to happy music, to see family, to remember the birth of Jesus – it is all meaningful in its own way.

So Merry Christmas all. Have fun decorating your trees.

Merry Christmas From the Family by Keen Robert Earl
Mom got drunk and Dad got drunk at our Christmas party
We were drinking champagne punch and homemade eggnog
Little sister brought her new boyfriend
He was a Mexican
We didn't know what to think of him until he sang
Felis Navidad, Felis Navidad

Brother Ken brought his kids with him
The three from his first wife Lynn
And the two identical twins from his second wife Mary Nell
Of course he brought his new wife Kay
Who talks all about AA
Chain smoking while the stereo plays Noel, Noel
The First Noel

Carve the Turkey
Turn the ball game on
Mix margaritas when the eggnog's gone
Send somebody to the Quickpak Store
We need some ice and an extension chord
A can of bean dip and some Diet Rites
A box of tampons, Marlboro Lights
Haleluja everybody say Cheese
Merry Christmas from the family

Fred and Rita drove from Harlingen
I can't remember how I'm kin to them
But when they tried to plug their motor home in
They blew our Christmas lights
Cousin David knew just what went wrong
So we all waited out on our front lawn
He threw a breaker and the lights came on
And we sang Silent Night, Oh Silent Night, Oh Holy Night

Carve the turkey turn the ball game on
Make Bloody Mary's
Cause We All Want One!
Send somebody to the Stop 'N Go
We need some celery and a can of fake snow
A bag of lemons and some Diet Sprites
A box of tampons, some Salem Lights
Haleluja, everybody say cheese
Merry Christmas from the Family

At first I was annoyed. That’s the kind of thing that spoils Christmas, I thought. Cheap, cheesy crap that has nothing to do with joy and peace and all that. That is the real war on Christmas. But then I thought that no, this song represents the real Christmas for most Americans. An odd family gathering that is awfully real and mundane but is special because it is meant to be special. It’s not about the tinsel and the tree or whether or not the greeters at Walmart say “happy holidays” or “merry Christmas” (or even this year’s silly “be bright”) – what does any of that matter next to real people, real families, real hurts, real needs, real life?