Monday Morning Music Ministry

5-1-23

I am enamored of the hilarious BBC mockumentary series Philomena Cunk that has found its way onto American cable outlets and the internet. Comedian Diane Morgan plays a determined blockhead who conducts educational tours and interviews actual experts and professors about history, the arts, and culture.

She is relentlessly clueless, and manages to surprise and confuse her stuffy guests. Normal hosts begin their interviews with respectful introductions or a detailed resume of the person’s credentials, but Philomena routinely demands, “So, who are you?”

Don’t get whiplash, but I will pivot from her silliness to a legitimate thought: When we think about it – which we often should – life is always asking us, in effect, “Who are you?” To take stock, and to know where we’re going. We should ask it of ourselves, too. “The unexamined life,” Socrates said, possibly going overboard, “is not worth living.”

And then, of course, we must be aware that God is forever asking us, “Who are you?” – not waiting for Judgment Day. Who are you?

We evolve; and we should. It is the essence, after all, of the requirement to be “born again.”

Who are we? People different than we were yesterday. People whose tomorrows will be different than today. “Better”? That depends on the definition of “better,” and certainly it depends on choices we make, and our determination to draw closer to God.

The act of “drawing closer” was given a name in the early church and in church history: to be “Imitators of Christ.” It clearly means to walk in the footsteps of Jesus; to apply His teachings and His examples of love, forgiveness, humility, mercy, charity. To be Jesus to those who hurt or are lost. A few decades ago it was manifested in the WWJD wristbands – “What would Jesus do?”

The books of the Gospels and Epistles have numerous adjurations to be like Christ. St Augustine made a brilliant recommendation: Why art thou proud, O man? God for thee became low. Thou wouldst perhaps be ashamed to imitate a lowly man; then at least imitate the lowly God. St Francis; St Bernard of Clairvaux; St Thomas Aquinas, all sought ways to be Christ-followers best by “imitating” His ways, not only believing in Him.

The Imitation of Christ is a book by Thomas à Kempis written in 1418. It can be seen as Christendom’s first devotional manual. With Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress it probably is the most-printed book in the Western world, after the Bible itself. It still is a worthwhile “user’s manual,” so to speak, for being a Christian. It is not a 12-Step program or substitute for Salvation. It helps us be like Christ, subsequent to Salvation. Find it! Many translations and versions exist.

You will discover, when you ask “Who am I?” and determine to “imitate” Christ in every way, that you have great company! Imitation, that is, as a theological practice. We could do worse. The Bible overflows with examples of people who examined their lives… asked “Who am I, really?”… and then were changed. Discover “Before and After” examples of people who can inspire us.

David slew a giant (anthropologists, by the way, have discovered that there were races of giants) but was also the “sweet singer of Israel.” He could be such a rotten schemer that he arranged to have his lover’s husband killed… yet he ultimately was, after forgiveness, the king “anointed of God.”

Was there ever a better example of “Before and After” than Peter? An impulsive fool, sometimes, and one who denied Jesus three times… but after Pentecost he matured and became what Jesus promised, the leader of the Church.

Saul persecuted believers, even having some put to death. After his own “Who am I?” experience, he became Paul, the first and greatest evangelist; writer of half of the New Testament.

The examples are many. We think of Luther, we think of C S Lewis, we think of Billy Graham. We think of so many saints of history who found new lives by examining their old lives… and were transformed from the Old Selves to New Creations in Christ. Imitation may be the best form of theology!

Who are you?

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Click: Who Am I?

1-22-18

There is a verse in James that admonished us to be “doers of the Word, and not hearers only.” The Bible reminds us often that God sees all we do; and so do the “Heavenly cloud of witness” of Hebrews 11. Often we might be tempted to wear two hats – the secular (when we argue about politics) and the sacred (when we forgive all, forget all).

That is shameful. We all live at the intersection of Sacred and Secular. There is no forwarding address.

I offer this on Celebration of Life week, Sanctity of Life Sunday.

When the mists, or smoke, of current controversies are swept away, I believe the world will see abortion – the act, the arguments, the very concept – in a different light. Most likely the “old” light, history’s traditional attitude. I pray.

Of course, the attitudes of various societies have been mutable, little different than any stands on any controversy. Honestly, there has not been a straight line in manners and morals on monogamous marriage, infant sacrifice, slavery, the role of women, personal freedom and liberty, democracy, even monotheism until the Revealed God revealed Himself fully.

Despite infant sacrifice, with its essentially different set of foundations, abortion is an act that mostly has been regarded as anathema at all times and in all places. By whole societies and by single women. Its sanction, and its approval, have always been exceptions. Mostly it is regarded as something to be discouraged because of the implicit recognition that it is horrible, contrary to human impulses.

Until our generation.

The anguish and severe challenges presented by unplanned, unwanted pregnancies are significant. They represent dilemmas that are endemic to the human family, and – no matter how much abortion might be outlawed – they will take place. To recognize this fact is not to approve of it. But to accept it as the price of a community, a society, maintaining consistent standards and trying to codify a moral code, is, well, the price to pay.

A lot of the world preceded the US, or closely followed us, in the legalization of abortion. Today, we have been reminded this week, we “surpass” most of the world in providing free abortion services… and we are among the few human-rights garden spots like North Korea and China that allow late-term abortions, killing babies otherwise viable outside the womb.

We should not need numbers like almost 60-million American abortions since Roe vs Wade… nor photos of aborted babies… nor facts like the bigoted Margaret Sanger (Planned Parenthood founder) encouraging abortions in the black and brown communities especially… to come face-to-face with the horror of abortion.

Fifteen years ago I interviewed Norma McCorvey, the “Roe” of Roe vs Wade, who had regretted her manipulation, reversed her views, and became a Christian. Pro-Life. Her testimony confirmed my views, but did not change them. That happened earlier; for a long time I was indifferent to the issue, and saw it as more a matter of convenience than morality. I even took that point of view in public, and now am conscious of blood on my hands.

But one does not have to trade Pragmatism for Christianity to realize that abortion is murder.

Why is America so militant, now, about abortion? Why is it a litmus test in broad swaths of society – why does the Democrat Party, for instance, forbid convention speakers and candidate endorsements to “pro-life” people?

I return to looking forward to the mists parting. Whether we go deeper into self-indulgence, or return to traditional values, abortion WILL be the litmus test. One does not have to abandon feminism, or denigrate women, to oppose abortion. The Big Lie that women are pro-choice and men want disposable women and babies, is belied by the profile of marchers at Pro-Life rallies; by fervent advocates I have met; by counselors (like Pam Stenzel, a friend from Grand Rapids MI) who speaks to kids about pre-marital sex – herself a product of a rape, whose mother decided against aborting her at the last moment.

If you don’t like being a woman who is “wired” to bear babies, don’t conceive. You cannot reverse nature. A lot of times it stinks to be a man, but, whatever. People have intimidated the culture to an extent; but they cannot reverse nature. They can tinker with the plumbing, but we still are men and women. Period; no pun intended.

Therefore, abortion, as a litmus-test, is a symbol. It is the result, not a cause, of America having become a Culture of Death. Abortion, homosexuality, the decline of marriage, all are symptoms of impulses that resist life and the advancement of the species – which of course sounds clinical and impersonal. But the truth is VERY personal. We respect life, or we don’t.

And the debate continues, often distracted by questions of a once-in-a-decade death sentence, or war in faraway places. Those arguments are healthy; but in the meantime, many of us CAN do something about the Culture of Death in our midst.

When we have become desensitized to death, we have become desensitized to life.

There is a common impulse behind the totalitarian lockstep attitude some people have toward abortion. It is common to militant homosexuality, to gender-bending, to newfound “rights,” to sex-change operations. To the redefinition of “marriage,” not to welcome legal precision, but to make it socially meaningless. To the ubiquity of Political Correctness. The apparent anarchy of PC attitudes is really the New Religion – the replacement of God.

We are witnessing – and, God help us, enabling – the slow death of God… in the way that Nietzsche really meant his phrase: when God become irrelevant in a society, He IS dead to its people. God is not really dead, of course: if you listen quietly you can hear Him weeping.

And those other sounds, if you listen closer, whether from unmarked graves or hospital dumpsters, are the cries of millions and millions of babies.

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Click: Psalm 139 – Jesus Loves Me