Corruption, Corruption ...

In his new book Guilt about the Past, Bernhard Schlink speaks a little about corruption. He is not referring to the bribery variety of corruption, but the corruption that occurs when we work within systems that are unjust, turning a blind eye here, asking for favours there, re-interpreting the rules, keeping the 'authorities' from seeing what is really going on. He gives the example of some of the German universities before Hitler gained complete power. As the bureaucracy around them took on the Nationalist Socialist ideology, so the university professors and lecturers tried to work within the new, unjust rules that discriminated against Jewish staff. And for a few years they were able to work within this new system, asking favours, turning a blind eye, in public agreeing while within the faculties ignoring directives. Working within a system as best they could. But then Hitler arrived at the pinnacle of his power and all that maneuvering counted for nothing. Everything that had been built up by the professors to try and protect the Jewish staff was swept away, and the Jewish staff with it. They discovered that despite their early successes in manipulating the rules, they were vulnerable to their strict application. And once strictly enforced, the professors couldn't claim the rules were unjust. After all, they had been working within the rules for years. By agreeing to work within the rules in the first place and not oppose them the professors were compromised, and eventually failed in their aim of protecting Jewish staff.

The recent attempts across the Anglican Communion (including here in Australia) to bring a monochromatic and legalistic interpretation to sexual mores feels a little like the corruption Schlink is talking about. We agree to work within the new legalisms, but we know these rules are unworkable. Who is going to exclude from parish council a man in a stable, sexual, live-in relationship of 45 years duration, a relationship that has produced grandchildren, on the grounds that he is sexually immoral or a bad example of Christian faithfulness because he is not formally married. So we fudge it, turn a blind eye. We keep it a secret. The bishops and synods are complicit in this corruption by agreeing to this kind of system in the first place. We can't make human communities look like the legalists think it should without damaging it irreparably and unjustly. We, in the middle of Anglicanism, who know that life is not as regimented as the legalists would have us believe, have allowed the conversation and the legislation of our church be hijacked by the right. And we only have ourselves to blame.

Jesus was against legalism not just because of 'salvation by works'. ("I have done my bit God, now it is your turn to do your bit and save me.") He was against it because it corrupts whole communities. There are those who think they are holy, those who enforce the holiness code, those who administer it either in a legalistic way or in an arbitrary way, those who try to work in it as best they can, and those victimised by it. Oh, and I forgot to mention those who sit on their hands.

"Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites ... " (See Mark 7)

God With Us!

Here is a great quote from Karl Barth. I have cut this from an extended quote here.

"God with us! That is too strong a contradiction, not only over against our sins and sufferings but also against the nature of our existence down to the very deepest depths of its roots. God with us! That conflicts too much, not only with our unrighteousness, but more yet, with our righteousness; not only with the atrocities of history, but more yet with history's supposed progress and achievements; not only with the misery on earth, butmore yet, with the supposed happiness and saisfaction on earth. God with us! That subjects our total human nature to a judgment, to a No, that will leave nothing left of us, and will bow us under a grace, a Yes, that we cannot comprehend. God with us!

Sex

Some basic affirmations that need to be said explicitly.

1. The Christian faith is holistic, therefore it makes no sense to separate permanently body and soul. Without the body, soul makes no sense, and vice-versa. Our relationship with God makes no sense without our body, and this applies to salvation.

2. Thus the body is both the locale of experiencing God's love now and reflecting God's glory now and in the future. (Discipleship and resurrection) Sexuality, as a facet of our bodiliness, are to reflect the glory of God.

3. Sex is body and soul. When we reduce sex to only body or soul we are escaping from the closeness of reality and the depths and complexity of being human.

4. Heterosexual sex can lead to pregnancy and children. This is to be carefully considered when having sex.

5. Sex can help intimacy and the self-giving and receiving of intimate relationship. It is legalistic to think that sex is only permissible once a couple have been formally married.

6. Sex is about pleasure not just popping out babies.

7. Both salvation and sin swirl around the human experience of sex. Because sex is tied up with desire, intimacy, pleasure, joy and 'nakedness', it can also have devastating results in our lives. However, for these same reasons it is a sacrament of God's love and salvation. Sex is also one of the most important images to think of our relationship with God and salvation. (E.g. union)


Commentary

The Song of Songs is an explicit love song, with symbolic sexual language within it. It has been spiritualized in the Christian tradition. It is easy to imagine this was done by some because of discomfort with the physicality of the content. The physicality of our existence, our relationship with God and our salvation has been, and continues to be, problematic for many Christians. Christian discomfort with the Incarnation has the same root as discomfort with sex: it is about real human life in all its reality, messiness, sweat, blood, tears and complexity. However, the intuition that has interpreted our relationship with God in terms of the physical relationship between two lovers is correct and utterly orthodox, traditional Christianity. Human bodiliness and God go together.

These days we rarely meet the obvious rejection of our physicality and bodiliness in the church. (An exception is the rejection of the resurrection of the body, but I have posted on this before, many times.) The rejection of our physicality and the ultimate union of creation and God in Christ is masked these days. One of the masks used is the rejection of promiscuity. Of course we are critical of promiscuity: Christianity takes our bodiliness seriously, a bodiliness that includes all our ways of relating faithfully. Promiscuity undoes faithful relationships and can lead to great hurt. And when it doesn't but retains a casual, meaningless character, we are critical of that meaninglessness in something so profoundly intimate. It just isn't right. But, our criticism of promiscuity is not an excuse to import any lingering discomfort about our physicality and sex. And that is what happens, and it happens a lot.

For example, the new orthodoxy required by all Australian Anglicans that says sex can only happen between those who are formally married. So I cannot have on parish council someone who is in a sexual relationship who is not formally married. So you can be in a defacto marriage, have grandchildren from the relationship, and sorry, don't bother applying for any ministry position. Ridiculous, but that's typical of those still uncomfortable with their physicality and its messiness and complexity.

If people are sharing their lives and growing in intimacy, with the intention of continuing in that growth in intimacy faithfully, sex should not be legalistically prohibited. The legalists just can't bear the idea that people are moral beings and that in the complexity of human growth in intimacy legalisms don't hold. As in all legalisms, people are driven 'underground', and those in authority (except for the maniacal and ideological legalists) turn a blind eye at some point. Corruption, corruption ... Better to be sensible in our acknowledgement of our bodiliness and in our regulation of sexual relations.

Finally, because soul and body go together sexual relations are one of the important metaphors for our relationship with God, the act of redemption and our eventual salvation in Christ. I mean the metaphor of union. It's sexual through and through.

By Faith

Following on from a previous post regarding our relationship to nature, it should be remembered that the biblical affirmation of the goodness (not perfection) of nature is a statement of faith. Without that faith perspective any objective view of nature should include its savagery, and sheer cyclical pointlessness. To do otherwise is to ignore (or interpret away) the reality of evolution through natural selection. This doesn't mean that nature is bad or worthless, but just that, without the eyes of faith, nature's imperfections should make us a little more circumspect in regards to the romantic claims we make of nature. This is why I am not one who subscribes to a 'back-to-nature' ideology as the universal panacea for our woes. On its own, nature cannot 'save us'.

The goodness of nature is not the only aspect of our lives that requires faith to be recognizable. Recognising our (and everything's) salvation in Christ is also an act of faith. It could hardly be otherwise. This explains why it often seems that life is anything but saved, and why we should be suspicious of pop gospel claims (and its secularized siblings in the self-help industry) that complete happiness and satisfaction is (or could be if you just did the latest self-help fad) the reality of our lives. Underneath our usual lives we can see the underpinning grace of God, and we can live this grace in the joy and pain we experience in life. But when it comes to salvation there will always be evidence to the contrary right in front of our faces. To see in this contrary, through this contrary and beyond this contrary evidence, God's activity requires faith, and a faith encompassing the realities of life, like crosses.

Go To Church and Be a Better Person (Going to Church Series)

Now I know we are a religion of grace and that we don't earn our salvation, and we are certainly not in the business of superficial moral perfection or liberal 'enlightenment'. However, I think it is true that going to church will make you a better person. Of course, I have to add caveats to this statement like, which church you go to will make a difference. (Go to the loony right and you'll end up a loon). But I stand by my previous sweeping generalization: church is one of the few places left we can go where we will have enacted for us in the liturgy, and hear in scripture and sermon, some of the greatest bits of wisdom ever struck in human culture. And despite the fact that the church can have some of the worst people attending, most of the best and most human people I know I have met through the church. Without the church I would never have had the resources to transcend the little bit of humanity I had when I became an adult. If I didn't go to church and put my puny little existence into a much bigger frame, I would slide into utter superficiality, and one that I consider rather bleak.

We Are Not Alone

We don't like the idea of being alone. But given the vicissitudes of human community people end up seeking solace in all sorts of strange places. UFOs are one of them. Some people love the idea that there is an intelligent 'other' separate from our flawed human history. We can't trust each other, but maybe we could trust ET! Well, yes, I have some sympathy with the desire to step outside of reality, but, obviously, we can't, and that is exactly what the doctrine of Original Sin is trying to communicate.

Some people do the same with nature. The unspoilt outdoors where we leave behind the corruption of human history and what we have done to nature. Or leaving the human community to find companionship with our near genetic neighbours of the animal kingdom. Pets don't betray you. (Although not all our genetic neighbours are that friendly and will eat us if given half a chance.)

I'm all for the unspoilt wilderness and the guileless relationship I have with Gromit our dog. But it is hardly an answer to human sin and the pressing problems of humankind. And I shouldn't finish this post without mentioning how people use God just like a UFO. An intelligent 'Other' removed from the blood and sweat of human history. But in this case we are clearly not thinking of the God of Jesus.

Follow Your Gifts

Following on from God's Call (Part 1), the second part to my preaching series on God's call asks how we can discover our call. For most of us it doesn't come in a Damascus Road experience as depicted in the picture. So where do we start? You won't be surprised if I say that the identification and use of our gifts is crucial. It is really pretty obvious that if God has given us certain gifts and passions this should be explored as an indication that God's call is to be discerned in and through the exercise of these gifts and passions. But what if you don't see how these gifts or passions could be used productively in your life? Or can't see how they could make a contribution, or not see how you could make a living from them? Then, at this point, concentrate on developing your gifts. You might be born with a talent, but that isn't enough. We have to use, grow, develop our gifts and passions and, as we do, a door will be there at some point to open. Needless to say things might not work out how you thought. But after all, it is God's call to us that we are talking about.

Evil is Close

It is commonplace to either understate the reality of evil or froth at the mouth about it. I doubt these two misrepresentations are exclusively Christian, but we do them well. Some Christians are still stuck in the Enlightenment's hope of progress, and think that with greater education, the curtailing of religious mania, and greater justice in the world evil would essentially evaporate. Such Christians are offended or embarrassed by the inclusion of 'evil' in the public life of the church, and edit out mention of it in, for example, the baptismal liturgy.

And then there are those Christians who seem to be obsessed with evil to the extent that human agency within it disappears, or certain people are identified entirely with evil. While I have some sympathy with that identification, those who do this seem to spread the just wide enough to catch those they don't like. (A tendency a bit evil in itself.) And the obsession with evil is then perverted still further by Hollywood which makes evil almost sexy (in a perverted way) or so 'other-worldly' that people are distracted from its actual locale. And I should also mention the teenage attraction to evil/demons which seems to derive from either self-hate or plain old teenager rebellion.

So what are we meant to think of evil? Well, first, it is real. Second, it isn't like Hollywood. It is to be found in the lives of real people, and manifests itself in individual perversion right up to whole societies. Third, it isn't sexy either, more banal than anything (but don't let this fool you, evil kills and destroys. Hannah Arendt attached the label of 'banal' to evil in her reporting of the Eichmann trial and the evil of Nazism.) And yes, I think sometimes people earn the appellation 'evil', although not necessarily for good. I looked into the eyes of a drug-crazed maniac yelling satanic abuse in my face from two inches away while he had a screwdriver poking in my belly. Two lives were lost after that night, and it doesn't feel like I was encountering 'merely' human failure that night. He was in the power of evil.

St Paul is right when he says that we are in conflict with more than flesh and blood (Eph 6:10-17); but we don't meet it apart from flesh and blood. It is close to each one of us in the distortions that make up our psyches, and the compounding historical perversions and distortions embedded in our global human community (and in each one of us; just as the doctrine of Original Sin says, we are sinners even before we 'sin'). Evil is opposed (personally and communally, historically and spiritually) through the traditional spiritual disciplines (including good counselling) and in our opposition to social movements of oppression and terror. And if you are really serious about opposing evil in your own heart and in the world, then truth, justice, peace and faith are essential.

Ultimately, evil is defeated on the cross and in the resurrection. Jesus' self-surrender and desertion by the Father to the power of evil, in utter openness to its power, defeats it. This is the truly disturbing heart of Christianity. Some atonement theories, and some interpretations of them, make the cross and resurrection in some way an overpowering of evil, as though God's power is of the same kind as evil, just of a greater magnitude. God's power in Christ is of an entirely different order, the power of self-sacrificing love given over to the power of evil and death. And in the apparent defeat of the cross, when all seems lost in the 'slabby darkness' of the tomb, there we discover that evil was 'tricked' (as the Fathers said in a variety of ways). The powerlessness of love overcomes evil in its (love's) powerlessness. Luckily God did it for us on the cross and resurrection because I don't have the courage to do it in my own life. If that terrible night with the man with the screwdriver was replayed I wouldn't give myself over to the evil, or watch as someone else fell into its power.

The Importance of Worship Without Expectations (Going To Church Series)

One of the ways to misunderstand worship is to come to worship for a purpose. It is easy to say about worship: I'm coming to be re-filled for a new week; I'm coming because I love hymns (or whatever kind of song); I'm coming to receive the sacrament (celebrated in a certain form, whether traditional or not, catholic or protestant); etc. When we do this, no matter how laudable the reason, we are worshiping for a reason other than what worship is for. Worship is to give thanks, to be open to God, not coming with our agenda. When we do come with an agenda we run the risk of manipulating God and indulging in magic. This is hard because we have all had the experience of worship that is badly done, lacking content and style, or even if spoken in our native tongue, it still seems to be alien to us. So we are tempted to think that what we should do is seek out what we want in worship. I am, of course, sympathetic to this because it has, for one thing, made churches more responsive to people if they wish to survive and flourish. And this has been a blessing to traditional churches, even though some may die because they won't/can't move. But, and this is a very large caveat, the danger is merely magnified when we go to worship with a particular outcome in mind.

Why do I say this? Let's think a bit more about magic. Magic is the use of a formulaic set of words and actions to bring about a certain outcome; manipulation of whatever the 'magic' is being used on. If you come to worship with a certain outcome in mind (whether it be how you should feel, what you should receive/get out of it, the content, the spiritual nourishment) aren't you doing magic? The minister, musicians or preacher become the magicians for you to get what you want from God.

What's the alternative? A couple of places to start. First, let's not pre-decide what we should receive from worship or how we should feel. Maybe your expectations are wrong. Maybe the conversion the gospel asks of us is exactly directed at our expectations of God. Second, come to worship to give thanks for all the graces in life, especially the grace of Christ and the Spirit. What we receive that day, if we come to worship without expectation, can be received as gift, further grace in our lives. this means that, instead of preconceived expectations of what God/worship should do or be like, let us approach worship with the expectation that God will indeed be present (even, at times in an apparent absence or dryness), but not necessarily as we would like.

The Dragon of Grandiosity (Part 2)

Continuing on from yesterday's post, unregulated grandiosity is a disaster relationally. The real person you are relating to will intrude into your grandiosity. They might not worship you, or then again might not want you to be their slave, and our grandiosity won't like that at all. However, the best location to deal with grandiosity is to relate to others, so that where we can find healing for our grandiosity is exactly that place where we can be undone by it. There is nowhere else to go to be healed other than relating to real people (and a real God, but more on that later).

No one is ever fully healed of grandiosity. It must be confronted and worked with, intelligently. Relating to real people is essential, as are two other techniques. We need to keep in contact with our real humanity, which includes particularly what the Christian tradition calls our sin. We are not the centre of the universe. The other tool is prayer. Prayer enables us to direct our own spiritual energies, and those we receive from others, onto the one who is able to carry it, namely God. These two techniques of connection with our sin and prayer are important especially for those leadership professions where people transfer their individual grandiosity onto the leader. For example, teachers, priests, politicians,and counsellors are all susceptible to this transferred grandiosity, and it can be disastrous. Look how much ego there is in politics, secular or ecclesiastical, for example. It also goes part of the way to explain the moral failure in these professions. When a priest, politician or counsellor has an extra-marital affair, Moore is suggesting that it is, at least partly, an attempt to ameliorate excessive grandiosity by human failure. (There's a better way to do it, of course.)

Facing the Dragon is an important book, and while the Jungian language can get a bit too much at times, it is worth it for the deep insights into being human.

Some quotes:

When we consciously face our hidden superiority complex, our preening sense of entitlement, enlightenment, and self-righteousness, then we can escape our delusional claim to be helpless victims and our anxieties mysteriously begin to diminish. (p. 207)

Spiritually speaking, you don't ask, "Am I a sinner?" You ask, "How am I a sinner?" So psychologically speaking, you shouldn't ask, "Am I carrying any narcissistic pathology?" You should ask, "Where is my narcissistic pathology? How am I acting it out? Where is my continuing residual unconscious, unregulated grandiosity possessing me and destroying my relationships?" (p. 147)

I love to teach comparative psychotherapy , because all therapies are trying to help you do that same type of thing, to be more realistic, to be less totalistic in your claims, to do less exaggerating, to do fewer behaviors based on some sense of entitlement or special exemptions, and help the individual to face limitations. All therapies tend to address these issues in some form or another. (p. 144)

Sometimes people think if they just prayed enough, or went to enough masses, then their grandiosity would stop being seductive. Or if they became a cardinal, or a bishop, or a mother superior, it would not be seductive anymore. The truth, or course, is just the opposite, because the more successful you get, the more seductive grandiosity gets. The more traumas and tragedies you have in your life, the more grandiosity will attack you. It can tell you how impressive it is that you are still alive, or it can chide you into depression by suggesting you might as well go ahead and commit suicide. Many suicidal thoughts come from a grandiose perfectionism. (p. 136)

(On the need to pray if you are in a profession of archetypal transference of grandiosity from others onto you, e.g. priest, politician, teacher)
If you are in one of those helping professions where you get a lot of archetypal transferences, you do not pray because it is pious or sweet or nice ... You pray to stay alive, to get help in dealing with your grandiosity... You can take that energy that is coming toward you and, through your prayer, pass it on. "Here," you say, "this is really yours, Lord. Take it. It belongs to you." (p. 95. See also p. 93.)

The Dragon of Grandiosity (Part 1)

I have just read an excellent book by Robert Moore entitled Facing the Dragon. Confronting Personal and Spiritual Grandiosity. He comes out of a Jungian tradition so you have to be able to work with the archetype theory of the Jungians. I have to admit being a little sceptical about it, although given the utility of the archetypes in a book like this, I could be persuaded to give it a great deal more respect. Made in the image of God we have such energy for life, but universally, it is distorted into grandiosity, thinking we are the centre of everything and the universe needs to bow down to us. This grandiosity shows itself in pride, but it can also show itself in all sorts of ways, including vanity, jealousy, lack of self-esteem and depression. These last two are interesting because we would associate them with the opposite of grandiosity. But Moore says that behind every disintegration of a sense of self is a prior extolling of the self. It's just that some recognise they can't live up to the grandiosity, so end up hating themselves or depressed at their failure. I approach this kind of claim with caution given that the 'presenting problem' is a deflation of self, and the feminist critique of universalising male sin onto women as well. However, it does make a good deal of sense. another example he gives is our dislike of criticism. Most might see this a a lack of self, producing a fragility that is easily shattered. Possibly, but it might also indicate that we don't like people who won't worship us. (archetypally we want people to worship our little king or queen within us. Sounds corny, but there is something in the idea. See p. 146) The tradition is quite strong on this too, and although the feminist critique would say that the tradition is strong on pride because it is a male sin, it can't be that easily dismissed. Grandiosity is hardly restricted to me. so in the Christian tradition despair is a sin of self-centredness: what, you are so beyond help that even God can't help you? Yeah, right, and you're not stuck in grandiosity either.

Anyway, Moore's contention is that unless we are consciously aware of this spiritual energy to greatness, work with it, confront it and harness it (at times), we will be in the thrall of evil. Moore takes seriously the human propensity to evil, and he says that not to do so is to be blind to both history and what we do to each other in our daily lives. So "(w)e either identify with this inner complex of grandiose energies, or we repress it and project it onto others." (201) When we identify with the energy of grandiosity, we inflate the self; when we project our grandiosity we become slaves to others, or demonise them. (A nation can project their grandiosity onto a leader, and demonise another group at the same time. The Fuhrer and the Final Solution come to mind.) Tribal grandiosity displaced the grandiosity from the individual to the group, preventing the individual psychosis that extreme grandiosity can produce. This was fine for the individual while my tribe rarely met any other tribe. But as human 'tribes' (ethnic groups, religions, etc) were forced to live closer and closer together, so tribal grandiosity slipped into demonization of the other tribes. (This demonization is everywhere still. Think of the continuing history of intra-european demonization we saw in Bosnia, or the conflicts in sub-Saharan Africa.)

Using 'They' As A Singular Pronoun

Some criticize those of us who use 'they' as a singular pronoun because it is allegedly grammatically incorrect. I have to admit not really minding if it is grammatically incorrect because it is for a far greater cause (rather than using 'he' all the time when reading the Bible for example). It seems, however, that using 'they' as a singular pronoun isn't without its precedents.

Becoming a Decent Human Being

This is good on not forgetting to become a decent human being (and stop talking incessantly about working on your relationship with God.)

Why Do We Discriminate Against the Re-Marrying Divorced?

Why do we discriminate against the divorced when they wish to remarry? In this diocese divorced people wishing to be remarried in the church must fulfill a specific set of criteria. One relates to the divorced person fulfilling all responsibilities, and working through any outstanding issues, from the previous marriage. The other requirements are that the couple connect themselves to an Anglican faith community, and must be referred to Anglicare for counselling. The Archbishop must give his approval before the priest in question can participate in the wedding. The stated reason why these criteria are mandatory is because of the higher rate of breakdown in second and subsequent marriages. (I wouldn't mind seeing the latest statistics, but seemed unable to dig them up on the internet.)

The problem is that we make it compulsory and we do not do so for first marriages. The rate of breakdown of first marriages is alarming in itself, and if we add into it the breakdown of live-in relationships prior to first marriages I wonder if there is any real distinction to be made. For consistency we should make similar criteria for first marriages, or else make the criteria suggestions for the clergy to consider when doing their pastoral work.

So why discriminate? I suspect it has something to do with a lingering, visceral discomfort about the remarriage of divorced persons.

Love Your Neighbour

I know you think you should make a trip to Calcutta, but I strongly advise you to save your airfare and spend it on the poor in your own country. It's easy to love people far away. It's not always easy to love those who live right next to us. Mother Teresa

God's Call

I'm doing a preaching series on God's call to each of us. In the first installment my major point was that the tendency in humankind is to live a karaoke life, singing the tune of someone else. And why not? It is familiar, we know it works, to some extent at least. And whether the karaoke life be an explicit parroting of another song, or whether it merely be a reaction to someone else's song, it is still someone else's song. Contrary to this, God has given each of us a particular task or contribution for the world, corresponding to our unique personhood. To find this unique task will take all our passion and gifts, and bring with it joy and sorrow.

To talk about this I used three readings taken from Francis Dewar, Invitations: God's Calling for Everyone (an excellent book):

Reading 1

God says to each one of us; “Come, I have a special task for you to do, something that you were born for, that will bring you untold fulfilment, through which others also may be freed or enriched or enlivened."

Reading 2

Jesus said, “Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road is wide and easy that leads to destruction, and there are many who take it. For the gate is narrow and the road is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it."

Reading 3

On his death bed Rabbi Zuscha was asked what he thought life beyond the grave would be like. The old man thought for a long time, then he replied: ’I don’t really know. But one thing I do know, when I get to there I am not going to be asked ‘Why weren’t you Moses?’ or “Why weren’t you King David?” I am going to be asked, “Why weren’t you Zuscha?"

Christianity Without The Baloney

A guest post from the Revd Ron Keynes.

I have become increasingly cynical about all the letters to editors from atheists and others who charge Christians with being superstitious. Whilst there may well be some who fit into that category, the ratio pf Christians must be similar or rather less than the ordinary population. Look at any popular magazine - even newspaper – to see how much information there is offered about horoscopes and suchlike silliness.

The real question comes down to the matter of what is the focus of Hebrew-Christian Faith? And the answer dissolves the antagonists’ challenge. The fascinating reality of the Faith is that it emerged over millennia from observations of life, experience and relationships. And the stories that are evident, especially in the Old Testament, are designed, not for people to believe in, but rather to understand what is being offered to see if it does not match their own experience. It is hardly even religion! It is certainly not superstition. It is contextual and experiential.

So what were the issues being questioned by those old Creation Stories. Stemming from the observation that life was meant to be creative and worthwhile, that there could only be one God, not mobs, was the reality that rather too often, the opposite is the case. Life can be brutal and hurtful. And the question is ‘from whence comes such hurt?’ The stunning answer that the old story-tellers/ prophets came up with is that humans are the ones responsible. Not for all the mess, but a pretty solid proportion of it. The Adam and Eve thing. Here is no history lesson, but a description of what tends to go on inside of me when I determine to be boss of the universe, or even a small part of it. ‘You shall be like gods’ is the challenge, and sin – if you can face that ‘religious’ word, - consists of my (and your!) capacity to determine to make you fit my pattern. That first generation of the story was followed up by the Cain and Abel saga – if I go far enough I will eliminate you from the scene and cover up my destruction of you.

So what does this ancient Hebrew-Christian Faith go on to develop? Do not get led astray by the old stories of mayhem and destruction said to have been ordered by God. Like scientific evolution, this understanding of life and its vicissitudes had – and still does have – numbers of ups and downs as the truth is searched for. (I have long wondered why so many Christians still seem to have difficulty with evolution, as each and every one of us has moved on from where they were as two little specks of nothing that met at the right time in the right place. Even physically and intellectually, I am not what I once was – and if, very sadly, - I happen to have remained at an undeveloped state, that is tragedy and not the way it should be.)

Search the Scriptures and see how much of the faith has nothing to do with ‘believing,’ – and certainly nothing to do with believing the incredible. It has everything to do with such ancient and invariable matters as justice and truth and integrity. Read those old prophets of the Jewish faith, and listen to their drum. In fact, both Old Testament and New Testament prophets – John’s Revelation in particular – have nothing to do with ‘end of the world’ scenarios, and everything to do with the challenge to live in service of others, fairness to others, compassion for others. And Guess Who was just as strong hot on the subject – and even more so. Not only did Jesus talk about such an approach to life, He lived it, at great cost to Himself. So when I put me before you, then I am denying the most significant faith in the world. And there is not a lot of religion in that! It has far more to do with being what we Aussies call ‘fair dinkum.’

The real irony for me is that in friendly debates with some strong atheists I have encountered over the years – and there have been quite a few – is that when we get down to the nitty-gritty and I point out the issues above, they have been rather surprised to find that we have been on somewhat the same side. The fact that there have been both past and recent incidents of Christian adherents failing in their loyalty and truth simply underlines the Biblical emphasis on the capacity of we humans to collapse under the strain of being faithful. On that, none of us are immune.