I like this story in Mark because it talks about the power of faith. Later in the story Jesus seeks out the woman in the crowd and complements her by saying that it wasn’t Him, but her faith that made her whole.

Faith and healing in modern times, however, is a much touchier subject.

The recent case in Minnesota of a child diagnosed with Hodgekins Disease raises a lot of questions about individual rights versus government rights.

I think it is easiest if you extract religion out of it for a moment and simply discuss what choices an individual has.

So should the government have the right to lock up an individual who has a communicable disease?

In general, I think that the simple answer is yes. People should not be allowed to infect other people. The more complex answer, however, is that in practical terms the government doesn’t have the ability to exercise this right on any sort of a widespread basis. Swine flu and AIDS are only a couple of examples. So, though the government has the right, it has very limited ability to exercise that right.

Backing up from there, should the government have the right to intervene and prescribe care for someone who is unable to declare for themselves the sort of care they need?

This is the Terry Schiavo case. The answer from the courts is no. The next closest relative has the right to determine care (or lack thereof) for an adult who can’t decide for themselves, hasn’t left any instructions for the court, and is otherwise in a persistent vegetative state.

Backing up from there, should the government have the right to prevent an adult from enlisting the aide of someone else in order to end their own life?

The courts here say yes. State governments can prohibit or allow assisted suicide.

Backing up from there, should the government limit the medical choices an individual has?

Here the courts say yes. The government has the responsibility to determine what is effective and what isn’t. As a result, individuals have had to go to other countries to get treatments that are illegal here. Clearly there are a lot of issues here. Acupuncture is just one example of an ancient technique that has only recently been accepted by western medicine as effective.

Finally we get to parents and children. The government has a responsibility to oversee the sort of care children receive. So parental rights can only be exercised to the boundaries that the government has described. If parents or legal guardians step over those boundaries, the state can assume custody of the child in an effort to protect them.

One example is whether or not the government should have the right to require children to be immunized?

Again the courts here are fairly clear. In the interests of public health, the government has mandated that children who associate with other unrelated children (school, athletics, etc.) have to be immunized. The greater good here is to prevent outbreaks of childhood diseases and also take steps to eradicate those diseases. The reality is that there is some risk to the injections and those whose parents opt out of immunization only endanger themselves and any other children who have opted out. So as long and the bulk of the adolescent population is immunized, the risks are small.

The government is in a difficult position because they have an obligation to step in where there is evidence of neglect. The challenge in the MN case is that they law has no way of measuring how much the parents love their child, how much the child loves the spiritual concepts that his parents espouse, and what his ability is to really understand the potential consequences of his actions. The court also has no way of knowing how effective the treatment he has chosen will be, so they can only decide based on the opinions of medical professionals who are only familiar with conventional medicine.

The bottom line is that we are dealing with the challenges of the human patterning the divine. Human laws will never reflect the wisdom of the divine. Human constructs work fine most of the time. It is the exceptions to the commonplace where they fail very badly.

In the case of the MN boy, the physician has intervened and offered to expand his treatment to include some of the methods the parents were seeking as well as the more conventional course of chemotherapy. The boy and his mother returned home agreed to follow the direction of the court.

This is the basis for the first of the two creation stories in Genesis. In Scientific terms, this was the big bang. There is a second chapter in Genesis that introduces a talking serpent, but has a much less optimistic ending with man becoming a mortal sinful being. This pretty much set the stage for discussions that fundamentalists and progressives have been having ever since.

Scientists working on expanding quantum theory to the operation of the universe have come up with a second chapter of their own.

It wasn’t too long ago that scientists created the concept of dark matter to explain why the universe kept expanding. Based on the matter that we could see, the expansion from the Big Bang should have slowed significantly by now. So these clever guys said that there must be something else out there left over from the Big Bang of creation that we just couldn’t see that kept things running away from each other.

In 1998, scientists actually observed a phenomena which supported the theory of dark matter.

The problem is that another pair of scientists have now concluded that the observation itself may have altered the nature of this matter and as a result altered it’s ability to force the universe to continue to expand. This alteration will ultimately result in the universe collapsing back on itself like the film of the Big Bang run in reverse in very slow motion.

The reason why this argument has interest from a spiritual point of view is that it suggests that those that think the deepest about physical reality are telling us that this reality is actually an expression of our thought. In other words, we through our thought create our reality rather than some absolute reality acting on us to control or influence our thoughts.

If that is true, then where can we turn for dependable truth?

At least for me, the being that made the universe seems like a logical choice.

It also seems logical to me that if He created all to be good, it was good then and should still be good now. So when I see what appears to be evidence of poverty, sickness, war, and hate; where did the good go? Did God somehow change reality, or perhaps has my thought and the thought of millions of generations of humans warped our perception of good into our own human version of reality?

My sense is that God doesn’t change. He is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. We are the ones who have an opportunity to change by figuring out how to be more like Him. As we learn how to be more like Him, our reality changes too. The lame walk, the dumb speak, the blind see, the poor have the gospel preached to them, wars cease, and all men treat each other as brothers.

Jesus proved that it doesn’t take much to change the world. Just an open mind and a willing heart.

Happy Thanksgiving

Jesus ability to heal others really bothered the religious establishment because it went against their understanding of how the world worked and what the Bible meant.  The Pharisees were obsessed with condemning sinners.  They felt that those who were disabled were being made public examples by God for their sins.  They also felt that only God could forgive sins. So when Jesus healed a blind and dumb man, the only explanation they could come up with is that Jesus must be in league with Beelzebub, because only God can heal sin, and obviously this man was a sinner. 

As he always did, Jesus had something for the Pharisees and something for us.  He challenged the Pharisees logic by pointing out that Satan would have no reason to want to forgive sin or heal anyone. 

What he had for us was the promise that he wouldn’t be the only one who would heal.  Our children will be healers too and as such they will also be our judges because they will heal the problems we create. 

Our children today are telling us that they have problems with Christian Churches in the United States.

In a recent survey published by the Bama Group, only 60 percent of 16-29 year olds consider themselves Christian.  That is a dramatic shift from the 77% of 60+ year olds who answered the same question.

Those who don’t consider themselves Christian feel organized religion is hypocritical, judgmental, and too political.  They generally are very favorable to the basic teachings of Christianity (77%), but feel that organized religions no longer represent those teachings and values.  As a result only 16% say that they have a good impression of Christianity.

What is even more eye-opening is that 50% of those in this age group who do go to church share those same views.

One of the key issues separating young people from organized Christianity is the hostile position many churches hold to homosexuality.  80% of those who call themselves Christian and 91% of those who don’t describe organized Christianity as “anti-homosexual”.

Numerous surveys have shown a growing majority of young Americans have a relaxed, tolerant attitude toward homosexuality. A 2001 Kaiser Family Foundation poll found that 60 percent of Americans ages 17 to 29 support same-sex marriage, yet same-sex marriage is illegal in 49 of the 50 states.    

One pastor familiar with the study said, “How did homosexuality become such a huge issue for us?  As I see it, it’s no different than any other sexual sin.”

I can’t answer him, because I ask myself the same question.

What I can see is that our children have a better grasp on the basic values and teachings of Jesus than many of us do.  Their love of their brother isn’t blinded by hate or fear.  They will be our judges.  Fortunately, they will also be our healers.

The most perfect man to ever have walked the earth was Jesus. The rest of us are all just pale imitations doing our best to figure out how to measure up to his example.

This post was inspired by a recent column by my friend Tom Treece. Tom is so wonderfully open, honest, and humble in his efforts to work through the challenges he sees around him. In this case, he was openly wondering why we treat those who disagree with us so badly.

That bothers me too. It’s one of the reasons why I write. I hope that if I can express my particular view in a well reasoned way, it will encourage others to do the same.

Here’s my thought for Tom and others that are trying to figure out how to deal with this situation. I think the Bible in general, and this quote from Paul’s letter to the Ephesians in particular, gives us some insight.

None of us are perfect. Those that claim to be are false prophets and should be ignored.

None of us have all the answers. Those that claim to have all of the answers usurp God’s position and so their advice should also be ignored.

All of us are blessed with talents and insights. Those that suggest otherwise are saying that God somehow made a mistake. Who are you going to believe?

Our talents and insights are given us by God to accomplish His purpose. That means that there is a reason for every person on this planet to be here at this time and place. It’s your job and no one else’s to find out what your part in that plan is. You can’t do it for anyone else, and no one can do it for you.  You have to work out your own salvation.

Each of us reflects some portion of God’s perfection because we were all made in His image and likeness. If we could look at everyone all at once, we would glimpse the face of God. If you leave anyone out because of politics, belief, gender, race, or sexual orientation, you are missing some part of God.

If we want to follow Paul’s advice and aspire to at least a measure of perfection, we have to first seek out what we all have in common with Jesus – our humanity. Those of us who are Christians also have the responsibility of coming together in the unity of our faith. Paul is saying we have so much more in common than we have in difference that we are wasting precious time and energy arguing when we should be doing.

It’s very easy to get caught up today in pointing out another’s weaknesses and failures. Whether it is Pete Stark calling out President Bush, Rush Limbaugh calling out war-protesting soldiers and 12 year old kids, or just about everyone attacking Hillary Clinton; none of them are perfect. None are devils. All have the potential to be angels. All of them are made in God’s image and likeness.

If you want to see change, a good place to start is by rejecting the public spectacle of character assassination as entertainment. This is our modern day equivalent of the Roman Coliseum. Instead of watching Christians being eviscerated by wild beasts, millions tune into their favorite media outlet to cheer the dismemberment of a person’s reputation.

If, like my friend Tom, you end up being the one being chewed on while others cheer, there some solice if it is for Jesus sake, He said in the Sermon on the Mount that He feels your pain because He and other prophets were treated the same way and worse.  As a result, there is special place in heaven for your reward. 

If you are one of those who have been cheering the public persecution of your favorite victim, cut it out!  Suppress that blood lust and think about how angry you were when it was your guy getting the same treatment.  Once you’ve got that out of your system, pray to see the world as God sees it. Focus on our shared divine sonship and the world will change. We will all gain a measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.  We can certainly use it.

I was particular struck by the Confucian concept of ren. In simplest terms, it is a form of the golden rule. In practice, however, it is much more profound.

What we know as the Golden Rule shows up in the Bible in a number of places including the second great commandment given by Jesus.

“Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying, Master, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” Matt 22:35-40

Confucius took this much further. In his thought, it wasn’t sufficient to simply wish good things for your neighbor, or refrain from inflicting on your neighbor whatever you wouldn’t want inflicted on you. Confucius articulated what “love” in “love they neighbor” really meant.

In order to achieve ren, you had to seek to achieve your life goals through your neighbor. You had to love your neighbor so much that you seek to bestow on your neighbor all of your life’s hopes and dreams.

Your path to financial success, for example, starts with doing all you can do to make others financially successful. Your path to security is by making others secure. You path to respect is by respecting all others. Ren is an idealistic state that even Confucius agreed was likely beyond the grasp of most students. The path to ren, however, is one that Confucius felt all should follow. As one description put the Confucian idea, a good life is an endless aspiration for ethical perfection.

As I was thinking about ren within the context of our proud Christian nation, I thought it might be interesting to analyze how our current policies would change. Instead of trying to return to some mythical fundamentalist golden age, as some Christians are teaching, what if we as a nation strove for ethical perfection.

We would see our economic success from a global perspective and focus our attention on helping the poorest countries get their economies going. How do you think that would affect global stability? We would invest in clean water for developing African countries before we tried to sell them weapons. We would use our military might to protect the most vulnerable (e.g. Darfur) rather than those who had oil to sell. Our policies would conserve earth’s resources for our neighbor’s use rather than exploit them. Wouldn’t that be a breathe of fresh air (pun intended)? We wouldn’t torture, we would help free those who were at risk of torture. We wouldn’t start wars, we would help end them.

You might say this is fantasy and could never work. Many would say that unless every nation shared our values, these policies are too risky and idealistic .

I agree that Confucius was an idealist and saw more in men than maybe they saw in themselves, but then so did Jesus.

This particular Bible verse is a favorite of mine.

I leaned on it heavily during one of the more difficult times in my life.

As a country, we’re going through a difficult patch right now too and could benefit from remembering our need for humility.

As we honor those who have served our country in the past, we also have to cherish those who are serving today. We’ve put almost 200.000 brave men and women in harms way in a foreign country. We’ve asked them to fight a war which we started under what we now know to be false pretenses. They have engaged what they thought were the enemy, but in the process we have radicalized a country, weakened ourselves, and strengthened the real enemy (bin ladist Islam).

Those who support this path of action claim that victory is just a matter of will. With more patience and commitment, they claim, we will achieve our goals in Iraq. I don’t think that it is a question of will. I think it is a question of understanding.

I just heard an interesting comment on NPR by a Chaplain Major John Morris who has served in Iraq.

“In this fight, which we call the global war on terrorism, we say that we understand that the people we’re fighting are motivated by an ideology that’s rooted in an aberrant view of a religion. It’s a great line. But I’ve often had to really be forceful with commanders that, ‘You don’t understand. These people are tapping into something in a spiritual realm. And if you fail to take it seriously, it doesn’t matter how long we fight, we will not defeat them.’”

“We’re in a war. But this is a war where you can’t kill enough people to win because this has a spiritual motivation to it. You’ve got to have more tools than kinetic energy. And that’s how I talk to commanders because they understand kinetic energy as firing of a weapon system.

That means we have to take seriously religious leaders. We have to take seriously the religious worldview of people. We have to think that when we fire that weapon and we miss, that round goes somewhere. And when it hits somebody else that’s innocent, it has a ripple effect on a culture that takes seriously life and death, clan and family. That when we search mosques, it has an impact, whether the mosque was used as an armory, which I often saw that it was, or not. There is an impact.”

I don’t think that the American people have as clear a view as Major Morris, but what they do grasp is that the current strategy is fatally flawed. I’m not sure that the American people understand what we should do next, but they do understand that we have to change what we are doing now.

As Major Morris said, this is not a war that we are going to win with bullets and soldiers and the sooner we realize this, the sooner we will be able to starting doing what we as a country do best. We are the best at giving those with good ideas an opportunity to be successful. We are the best at providing families an opportunity to build a better life for their children. We are the best at assimilating immigrant cultures into our own.

We will win the war against fundamentalist Islam by figuring out how to solve the fundamentalist strife in our own country. That is going to come from prayer and the realization that what we have in common is far more important that what we have in difference. Then we have to take those lessons of loving our neighbor as ourselves and apply them globally. When we accomplish that, we will wake one morning to find that our enemies have disappeared because they have become us and we them.

“Thou shalt seek them, and shalt not find them, even them that contended with thee: they that war against thee shall be as nothing, and as a thing of nought.” Isa. 41:11-12

Happy Memorial Day

There are a lot of different ideas floating around in the soup of public thought. There are those who are concerned about the volatile mixture of firearms and easy access to college campuses. We’ve turned many of our high schools into limited access “green zones” in an effort to create a safer space. The whole concept of a limited access college campus seems to fly in the face of an open forum for exploration and the free exchange of ideas.

There are also those who are concerned about immigrants and willing to blame this incident on foreigners. That is understandable, but also short sighted. This country has gone through several waves of xenophobia. The resulting restrictions didn’t make the country any safer. In hindsight, the Japanese internment camps, for example, were an embarrassment to a democratic society that claims to believe in the rights of the minority and the rule of law. The vast majority of our citizens are here because someone came here from some other country. The great strength of this country is the fact that the American dream that attracted our forbearers still works today. Those who come here to pursue that dream are the ones who are building our country’s future.

Finally there are those who are concerned about how to deal with the disaffected, disturbed, or otherwise isolated individuals in our society who may at some time try to harm others. This is not so different from the discussion that we should close the borders and lock up all of the foreigners. Just substitute those with mental or physical challenges and you have pretty much the same thing. The Supreme Court is trying to decide, for example, whether it is constitutional to execute the mentally incompetent. As the parent of a special needs child, I can tell you that blessings come in all different sorts of packages. The more unique the package, the more special the blessing.

At the end of the day, it is all about fear. For those who don’t believe in God, it is the fear that man is unpredictable, life is fragile, and everyone is at risk. For those who believe in a loving God, that fear has its foundation in the thought that there can be an evil power at work in the world that is greater than God.

What comes to mind is the story about the Gaderene man in Mark and Luke. He was out of his mind, violent, could not be bound, lived in the graveyard, and everyone was afraid of him. Everyone, that is but Jesus, who healed him. He healed him by driving out all of the thoughts (characterized as devils) that this man had about himself that prevented him from acting in a more civilized way. The healing was so dramatic that people from the town rushed out to see what had happened. What they saw was a new man sitting by the fire “in his right mind”. They were terrified because they had a lot invested in the “old” man too, and it was difficult for them to accept any other reality. Gadarene has now come to mean anyone who rushes to their own destruction in a panic.

We have the same choice today.

In our fear and panic, we can look at the situation in Virginia and only see a deranged, violent, murderer. In accepting that, however, we also have to accept a bunch of random innocent victims and a God who doesn’t care or is powerless to do anything about it.

Those who trust in God’s power and His love have another choice. It’s the same choice that Jesus made. We can reject popular opinion, and work to see the same perfect child of God in Virginia that Jesus saw in the Gadarene hills. Allowing ourselves to see this man also frees us to see those children and all children forever secure in the embrace of their Creator. Finally, this healing view confirms that God is an ever present help in trouble and available to all who seek His comfort.

I know that some of you are skeptics and wonder what the point is. But those folks from the village were skeptics too. They weren’t going to believe until they saw it themselves and even then didn’t understand it and were afraid of this new world. I’m simply reminding you that you have a choice about what sort of world you would like to live in too.

“I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live.” Deut 30:19