Back to Narnia

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Aside from the Bible, The Chronicles
of Narnia have been the most formative books in my life. My parents hung a
Narnia map in my nursery, and my dad started reading the books to me at age
three. Soon I was reading the books a couple of times a year.

Wheaton College houses C.S. Lewis’s papers (and has the wardrobe),
and we students lovingly referred to him as St. Jack. My husband and I got to
know each other at the Wheaton Children’s Literary Interpretation Society,
where we’d read children’s books out loud during study breaks. The first
semester we read The Lion, the Witch and the
Wardrobe. My husband was Aslan; I was the White Witch.

So regardless of the reviews, I am excited to go see the movie
version of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. The story
is an integral part of my faith journey and I love it. But it’s strange to
encounter Lewis apart from the evangelical lens I’ve always seen him
interpreted through in the past.

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My Daughter the Santa Believer

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as posted at The Christian Century blog –

We tried to be those parents. We tried to tell our daughter that Santa Claus isn’t real.

We knew that this could get her in trouble at some point, that chaos would ensue if she destroyed the innocent faith of her kindergarten classmates with a declaration of Santa-atheism. Yet we did it anyway, perhaps to always tell her the truth about the world, perhaps to preserve the religious focus of the holiday. Whatever our reasons, the project didn’t work.

Early on she went along with our attempts. She even laughed at the silliness of Grandpa suggesting we put out milk and cookies on Christmas Eve. But as she matured to the more social age of four, everything changed. Her assertions to her Sunday school class and preschool that Santa isn’t real were met with uniform disagreement; she was outnumbered. Every single other child she knew believed in Santa, so the logical conclusion must be that her parents were wrong. She informed us without hesitation.

But around the same time, my daughter decided that the Christmas story–as in the whole Mary, Joseph, angels and baby Jesus tale–is just too far-fetched to be real. So I was stuck with a preschooler who believed in Santa but not in the Bible.

Strangely enough, I was okay with that. I didn’t care that the preschool constituency was against me; my daughter’s conversion woke me up to what it means to convey truth to her. I realized that our understandings of truth are communally created–the truths I want my daughter to understand have to make sense within the communal narrative of her world. The truth of the Christmas story is about more than historical veracity. And the Santa story provides space for meaning as well.

There will be time to explore the complexities of the historical Christmas story, but for now I am content to work within my daughter’s understanding of the world to kindle faith and encourage a love of meaningful truths.

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Third Sunday of Advent 2010

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As I explore the unexpected places God showed up in our story of Christmas, I think the most unsettling to our modern sensibilities how God was revealed to the Magi. It is one of those stories that we often try to explain away. We ignore the text that names these visitors to the Christ child as Magi and translate them as the more acceptable “wise men.” It makes for cute evangelistic cards that proclaim “wise men still seek him,” but it ignores the unexpected way God showed up.

Scholars aren’t certain, but tradition holds that the Magi were the actual historical Magi from Persia. Followers of the teachings of Zoroaster, they looked to the stars for wisdom. If they were official Persian Magi, then their tradition would have had access to the religious writing of the Israelites. For after the exile when the Persian emperor Cyrus permitted the rich and elite Jews who had been exiled by the Babylonians to return to rebuild Jerusalem, many of them chose not to go. They were the elites of the land – the royal families and the scholars; the comforts of an established society that valued their wisdom was far more enticing that roughing it in a backwater province that had been left in ruin. So it is a near certainty that these scholars of Judaism interacted with and shared their knowledge with the educated elite among the Persians. Even if the Matthew gospel included the story only to convey the idea that all nations will worship Jesus, it still suggests the same meaning – God shows up in other cultures and religious groups.

That is the part that freaks people out a bit and why the revelation is so unexpected. In our modern attempts to domesticate the story, we either ignore who the Magi were or we explain them away as converts to Judaism. We have allowed our expectations of how we assume God to work to remove the power from this story. God showed up unexpectedly not just to those who were told that an anointed one was coming, but also to those truth-seekers following a different path. Truth was revealed through their culture and their religious practices – and this is part of our Christmas story.

To even talk about this is unexpected. The exclusivity of Christianity has become a totalizing thing for most Christians. Insisting that Jesus is the reason for the season often has less to do with a commitment to Jesus as it does a rejection of other cultural practices. Hearing how God shows up in other cultures is unexpected because it is the last thing people often want to hear. But God does not play by our rules (thankfully). God shows up where God desires to show up. We have the testimony of the Nativity story to affirm that truth, perhaps we should stop letting it unsettle us so.

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God Even in Christmas

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as posted at The Christian Century blog –

I’m a sucker for Christmas songs. I’m not so far gone that I’m okay with department stores playing some pop princess’s version of “Baby It’s Cold Outside” on an 85-degree early November day here in central Texas. But let me join in on a round of “O Holy Night” or “White Christmas” and I’ll get choked up every time.

They might be overdone and cheesy, but there is something visceral about the collective emotion that Christmas songs tap into. Something is stirring even in all the schmaltz and sentimentality, something that goes beyond the consumeristic trappings. God shows up in the midst of all that cheese.

This week I finally allowed myself to click on the “Christmas Songs” playlist on my iPod (yes, I waited until Thanksgiving week). The songs shuffled between Willie Nelson and Enya and Harry Connick Jr. and The Wiggles. Then the player landed on U2’s version of “I Believe in Father Christmas.” Released two years ago to raise awareness for World AIDS Day, this quickly became my favorite Christmas song–mostly because of a one-word change Bono makes to the lyrics.

The original lyrics question any deeper meaning of Christmas and encourage people to simply enjoy the chance to be with family. The song writes off the reasons for the season as a mere bill of goods:

They sold me a dream of Christmas
They sold me a silent night
They told me a fairy story
Till I believed in the Israelite.
And I believed in Father Christmas
And I looked at the sky with excited eyes
Till I woke with a yawn in the first light of dawn
And I saw him and through his disguise

We were apparently sold to and told until we believed. But Bono changes the fourth line to “But I believe in the Israelite.” This present-tense affirmation changes everything:

—

We still have the trappings of Christmas and the competing narratives. But God shows up–there is room for belief. Yes, our eyes are full of cheap tinsel; yes, we can see through Father Christmas’s disguise. We may not get the snow at Christmas or peace on earth–but that isn’t all there is. We can say, “But I believe in the Israelite,” and this affirmation provides a meaning that the season otherwise lacks–and even infuses the season’s trappings with meaning. The sparkly lights, the trees, the tinsel and the songs (even the cheesy ones) can connect us with a surprisingly weighty soul language.

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A Princess Story I Can Get Behind

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as posted at The Christian Century blog –

I am not a fan of Disney princesses. I can deal with the tiaras and the pink, but I’m disturbed by the sexualized visions of thinness, the suggestion that to be ugly is to be evil and the promotion of extreme body modification in order to get the guy.

But my five-year-old daughter lives in the real world. Escaping the princess culture isn’t even an option. So when I heard that Disney’s latest princess flick, Tangled, has a female lead who is strong, adventurous and in possession of a personality, I allowed myself to hope for a non-cringe-worthy princess.

I took my daughter to see Tangled on opening day, and I wasn’t disappointed. The story focuses on Rapunzel’s journey to break free from the woman (Gothel) who kidnapped her as a baby and has held her captive in a tower. But it isn’t just a simple tale of rescue and escape; it is the story of Rapunzel discovering her passions. Her captivity convinced her that she was weak, good for nothing but domestic chores, and in need of protection from the evil world. Yet as she enters that world she discovers that it is a beautiful place where dreams can be fulfilled. The true evil was captivity, which kept her from being whole.

The characters are all living others’ dreams instead of their own. Gothel believes she must remain forever young and beautiful. Flynn Rider is convinced that if he had enough money he could find happiness. The brigands live a life of crime while their true dreams–one wants to be a concert pianist, another a mime–are left unfulfilled. Even Rapunzel’s sidekick is a chameleon, changing to fit into its surroundings. Those who find redemption in the film turn away from the pressure to be what others tell them they should be and embrace who they were born to be.

Disney is finally telling a story that delivers a life-affirming message. As a Christian who constantly prays that my children will be able to live into who God created them to be and not be swayed by the siren calls of our culture, I found the message faith-affirming as well.

Other Christians don’t agree. Todd Hertz’s review misses the point of the redemption story, reducing the film to a story of a girl finding her parents. He suggests that the manipulative words Gothel uses to keep Rapunzel captive (the world is evil, so good must be kept protected) have biblical roots and would be a good discussion starter for family reflection. Armond White condemns the film, asserting that it is “strained through a sieve of political correctness that includes condescending to fashionable notions about girlhood, patriarchy, romance, and what is now the most suspicious of cultural tenets, faith.” He derides the Rapunzel character as “a girl of contemporary spunk, daring, and godlessness,” all apparently evil traits.

It’s hard to raise a daughter. While the culture feeds her lies about how being a pretty princess is all that matters, the church too holds her back from living life fully. Its message is that she cannot be who she was created to be if that involves questioning authority, exposing herself to danger or showing a little spunk from time to time. Women have been held captive by these messages for too long, and I’m grateful that Tangled offers something more affirming–even if it’s in the guise of a princess.

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God Showed Up

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Our Advent service at Journey today was all about the unexpected ways God shows up in our lives. We decorated the room in cheezy Christmas decor and played the video to Stephen Colbert’s Another Christmas Song juxtaposed against traditional seating in rows (really odd for my church) and somber hymns. For even in those everyday extremes God shows up in unexpected ways. We told the story of Elizabeth and how God unexpectedly turned her world upside down. The following are some readings and a monologue for Elizabeth that I wrote for the service.

God Showed Up
(to be read by two readers, like slam poetry)

A: Unexpectedly
B: Intrusively
A: Undeniably
B: God showed up
A: In the least likely of places
B: Where no one thought God would ever go
A:God appeared
B: Fear not, I am with you, Be not dismayed
A: For unto you this day is born, a savior
B: A baby
A: A child for the woman who thought she could bear none
B: A child for the girl who was not yet wed
A: A child to change their lives
B: A child to change the world

Elizabeth’s Story

I was, how do I put this nicely, well advanced in years when God showed up. You would think with a priest for a husband that I would be ready for God to appear in my life, but I think God likes to show up where we least expect him.

You see, my husband served in the temple, we were good folk, but that doesn’t mean that I never heard the rumors. The whispered questions wondering how Zechariah could be approved to serve as a priest when God was so obviously withholding his blessing from us. The questions that echoed the cries I had uttered to God for years. Why God can we not have children? Why are we not granted this joy? Eventually my cries had turned to reluctant acceptance. At the age when other women were getting a rest from their labors as daughters and daughter-in-laws assumed the brunt of the day to day chores, I finally had to accept that I would never have what I had spent so many years longing for. That doesn’t mean that my heart didn’t break everyday knowing that the dream was lost to me forever, but I had no choice but to accept that my body had long since passed the point where children were a possibility.

So the last thing I expected was for God to send an angelic messenger to my husband to tell him that we would soon have a child. Thankfully I didn’t laugh out loud like my foremother Sarah did when she heard similar news. But I do admit to a moment, okay, maybe a few moments of incredulity. Me, have a child? At my age? It seemed impossible. But I soon learned that the words “God” and “impossible” don’t go together well. God showed up and turned my world upside down.

I barely knew what to do with myself. How I ached and the confinement nearly drove me crazy, but I rejoiced in every moment of it. This blessing was so unexpected and wonderful at the same time. I think I started even seeing the world differently. When God shows up in such a dramatic way in one area, it was hard to expect God not to show up in similar ways in everyone’s lives. So I think it was this impact of the unexpected blessing of my pregnancy that prompted my exclamation of joy when my cousin Mary showed up for a visit. I took one look at her and felt my babe leap inside me. Out of nowhere I exclaimed, “You’re so blessed among women, and the babe in your womb, also blessed! And why am I so blessed that the mother of my Lord visits me? The moment the sound of your greeting entered my ears, The babe in my womb skipped like a lamb for sheer joy. Blessed woman, who believed what God said, believed every word would come true!”

I think I scared the poor child. She heard me say those words and immediately burst into tears. It took a while to work it out but apparently God had shown up a bit unexpectedly in her life as well. Young and not yet wed she too was with child. And she was beside herself with fear. She knew she carried the hope of our people inside her, but who in the world would ever believe that the child was of the Lord?

We needed that time together, helping each other see the joy in the unexpected. Sharing in those few months our special bond, a secret that shouldn’t be so secret, but somehow always is – that God can show up in the most unlikely of places. That God can shatter every preconceived notion of how this world should work. That God uses even ordinary folks like us to turn the world upside-down.

Sending Blessing
May God enter your life in unexpected ways. May you see God at work in even the busyness and commercialism of the season. May you always be discovering that your box for God is too small. May you be impregnated with possibilities you never dreamed were possible. May God turn your world upside down. Go in peace and expect the unexpected.

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Second Sunday of Advent 2010

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My reflections for Advent this year are focusing on the unexpected ways that God shows up in our lives and in the Christmas story. For this second week I want to explore the idea of how unexpected it was that God showed up in a womb.

Obviously kings and messiahs have to be born of women, but that fact is generally overlooked. It is the great men they become that is focus of the narrative, not their humble origins as children. Perhaps if the hero of the story performed some miracle as a child or possessed great wisdom tales would grow around the events of their younger years, but usually the humble story of a woman carrying a child in her womb has no part in the stories of great men. Kings win battles, they are anointed by prophets, they inspire the people – their stories don’t start with God appearing and announcing that one woman’s world will be turned upside down.

Mary was no Bathsheba or Jezebel – women only included in the narrative for their role in destroying the great men in their lives. Mary was ordinary and yet God showed up unexpectedly in her life – and her tale ended up being told. On one hand I can lament the fact that telling the story of a woman’s pregnancy is unexpected. But I can also rejoice that surprisingly the narrative of God scorning not the virgin’s womb is part of the story of redemption.

Often in our theologizing about the role of Mary we forget the unexpected physicality of this part of the story. We want to jump ahead to the story of the child she carried or debate her role as mediator. But God does not just show up in the safe boxes of our sanitized theologies. God was in the womb. Mary’s reality – from suffering bouts of morning sickness to feeling the savior of the world kicking her lungs with an intensity that took her breath away – matters. God showed up and grew in her. It is an easy thing to overlook or skip over in the telling of the tale, but God showed up there nevertheless.

In a church that often despises the offerings of women or sees our contributions as inferior, it is important that God showing up in a womb is remembered. The ability of women to gestate and birth the divine is just as possible today as it was with Mary. Perhaps recalling that God elevated this often overlooked contribution of women can help us not be so surprised when God chooses to speak through women these days. God shows up where the culture least expects just to remind us that perhaps we should have been expecting God there all along.

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The Entitlement Trap

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As posted at The Christian Century Blog

I can’t stand the word “entitlement.” I use it sometimes, when people annoy me with their belief that the world owes them something or that their needs are more important than those of others. But when I do this, I’m guilty of the same thing they are: dismissing the importance of someone else’s desires and asserting the importance of my own. I get caught in an entitlement trap.

Looking at the story of the prodigal son in church, I found myself focusing on the theme of entitlement. The story is one of those passages that reveals something different each time I encounter it. What struck me this time was how each brother thinks the world owes him something.

The younger brother’s sense of entitlement is obvious: he demands his inheritance so he can live as he pleases. But the older brother displays a similar sense of entitlement in his condemnation and rejection of his brother. He believes that his hard work and good behavior entitle him to the economic benefits and stability of his father’s love. Each brother is deeply flawed, yet the father graciously extends mercy to both.

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WikiLeaks and Government Responsibility

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Since WikiLeaks released the first of the leaked government cables for public viewing, the outcry regarding the act has been overwhelming. Government officials are condemning the release, Amazon dropped WikiLeaks from its servers after they received a visit from Homeland Security, and media groups are calling the release an act of terrorism.

While I understand the need for discussion whether the release of these cables might endanger some people, I am uneasy condemning them simply because they reveal the embarrassing sins of the United States. In our country we have forgotten that social sin does indeed exist. Governments are not above morality and justice, but sadly often have the power and wealth to hide their sins from the judging eyes of the world. When all the people see is the façade the government constructs for themselves (while being sold the message that unquestioning patriotism is the highest virtue), it is easy for governments to avoid responsibility and accountability for their actions.
I don’t believe innocence is bliss. If my government is committing injustices or betraying the ideals of our nation, then the people who they supposedly report to should know about it. We are the only ones who can hold governments responsible – if we abdicate that role or if it is denied to us then government sin can abound.

But no one likes being called out on their sins. When John the Baptist called out Herod on his sinful ways, he was beheaded to shut him up. Intimidation and fear are the governments’ tools for keeping truth suppressed so they can continue to avoid responsibility. Amazon already gave into the pressure to be silenced, Julian Assange (WikiLeak’s founder) is currently in hiding, and the public is being told that revealing the truth is an act of terrorism. We are made to feel guilty for knowing the truth instead of the government owning up to those truths and taking responsibility for them.

Government is complex, I get that. But that doesn’t mean that it is exempt from morality. Perhaps WikiLeaks is the martyr that will wake us up to the need to hold our government to those basic standards of morality.

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My Arm Doesn’t Need Healing

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a post I wrote for the Christian Century blog

I was born missing my left arm below the elbow. This technically means I have a disability, though I find it hard to identify with the label. Missing my arm is simply what I know, part of my basic everyday existence. I know the limits of my ability, but I see no need to define myself by them. Similarly, I don’t mind being asked about my arm, just as I don’t mind being asked about a new haircut–I feel no need to be ashamed or apologetic for my physical form.

So it is always a bit jarring when I encounter people who think I should feel ashamed about my appearance. These people, when meeting me, look at my arm and immediately say, “I’m sorry.” From their point of view my life must be so miserable that I deserve their pity.

I have church friends (and yes, family members) who let me know that they have been praying for years that God would grow my arm. According to their view, if I only had the faith of a mustard seed then some sort of miraculous arm sprouting would occur. I’ve learned to take such responses in stride, knowing that their rejection of who I am says more about their insecurities than it says about me. But I struggle more when I hear such things from church leaders.

For instance, Rowan Williams, writing about the eucharistic interdependence of the corporate body of Christ, says that abled people should not respond in fright to handicapped people but instead realize that abled people need the healing of the handicapped for their own good–just as the handicapped need abled people’s wholeness for theirs. He calls this the outworking of the sacramental vision.

I could barely read any farther, as his words forced me to realize that he views people with disabilities as “other.” Instead of being allowed to be ourselves, we are reduced to a category of people who must be healed before we can be accepted as equals.

Few people would deny that it is hurtful to tell a woman she must become a man or to tell a black man he must become white in order to be a full member of the body and experience wholeness. But some people still assume that people who are differently-abled need to become like someone else in order to be whole.

Our faith celebrates the idea of the word becoming flesh and dwelling among us, yet we reject physical bodies that seem different. It is one thing to say that our condition as human beings is broken. It’s another thing to assert that some people are more broken simply because they have only one arm, or use a wheelchair, or have different mental processes. We are all the broken body of Christ struggling to be in communion with God and each other.

God created me to be tall, to be a woman, to have brown hair and a left arm that ends at the elbow. I don’t need to be healed of any of that in order to be a member of the body of Christ.

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