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Bible and Theology

#165: Saints Alive

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This is mark Joseph “young” blog entry #165, on the subject of Saints Alive.

I usually avoid issues that are denomination-specific.  I don’t want to fight with other believers but promote unity and love between us.  This, though, seems to have crept up on me.

It came about because my wife decided she needed a statue of St. Francis of Assisi for our currently non-existent back yard garden, and found one online (not the one pictured) which we could have for a song and a long drive.  She has never been Catholic; she was Lutheran for many years until God moved her to a Baptist church, and although she is still more liturgical than I she shares much of my interdenominational attitude and experience.

img0165Francis

There seems to be a story connected to this.  St. Francis means little to me and only connects to two stories, one a legend about a wolf who agreed to a vegetarian diet so he could live with the friars and their animals, the other a joke about the unluckiest man in the world.  However, one of our long-term houseguests was raised Roman Catholic, and during his brief ill-fated marriage to a conservative Baptist girl made the mistake of bringing home a statue of St. Francis for their garden.  She was so upset by this that she had her father come read him the riot act for this act of pagan idolatry, and I think maybe our statue is here to say that not all Christians are so unreasonable.  However, I don’t really know why we need this statue, other than that it is apparently part bird bath (although she also wants a bird bath).  It was going to rest on our front deck for the winter, but then someone was concerned it might be stolen or vandalized, so it is now decorating our living room.

I would be more concerned, I think, had I any expectation that our guest was likely to pray to this icon.  I don’t think he does very much praying, and certainly not when he is not in trouble, and probably not when he is.  I do, however, realize that there are a lot of nuances and complications here.  The Roman Catholic Church officially states that people do not worship saints; they venerate them.  That’s a word that most people don’t have in their vocabulary, but some Dungeons & Dragons™ Dungeon Masters will recognize as the verb form of the adjective “venerable”, the oldest age category for character races in the Dungeon Master’s Guide.  To venerate, to revere, is to show someone well-deserved respect of the highest order.

That appeals to me.  There are believers I genuinely deeply respect, and not all of them are living people whom I have met.  If you tell me that St. Francis of Assisi, or St. Teresa of Calcutta, is someone deserving of such respect I can at least understand that, whether or not I share that respect.  However, one point that is worth noticing is that just about anyone I think deserves that kind of respect does not count himself worthy of it.  It is something of the enigma of veneration:  anyone who thinks he deserves it is disqualified.  That doesn’t mean you necessarily deserve it if you don’t think so, only that thinking so is arrogance of a sort that does not fit the character of the person who deserves it.  The people we most admire for their faith generally do not think themselves all that admirable, or at least don’t convey the impression that they do think that.  It makes it difficult to know who to venerate, as just about anyone who might deserve such respect to whom you offered it would reject it and turn your attention toward Jesus.  Maybe, though, it is different when you have entered heaven; maybe there are some among us who are regarded more highly in heaven than the rest, and have had to accept the burden of being special.

It is the next part, the part where people pray to the saints, where we start getting into trouble–but the trouble is complicated.

Let us first establish that most people do not confuse the statue with the person.  That is not an impossible mistake to make, and there are people who appear to make it, traveling great distances to visit specific statues or shrines where miracles have been reported, thinking that somehow the statue is, or contains, the presence of the person here in the world.  For most people, the statue is not different in kind from a crucifix or even a cross–a reminder, a focal point, a way to keep in mind the person being addressed.  It is not in that sense different from the person who comes upon a photograph of a deceased or absent family member and speaks to it as if it were that person–except, of course, that the person speaking to the saint in the presence of the statue assumes that the saint can hear.  But the request is being made to the saint, the departed believer, and not to the statue.  If that is clear in the mind of the person making the request, we eliminate one of the problems.

Of course, it still is not that different from idolatry.  Certainly there were ancient worshippers who believed that the statue or carving was itself the deity, but in the main most pagan worshippers understood that the statue was just a statue, a marker of the presence of the deity but not the god itself.  Worshipping a statue and worshipping a spirit whose presence is indicated by the statue are both idolatry–but then, so is worshipping a spirit who is not God.  There is a fine line between veneration and worship, since the former means showing respect for the object/person and the latter means expressing reasons the object/person ought to be revered (worth-ship), but let us assume it is possible to stay on the right side of that line.

C. S. Lewis explored the issue of prayer to the saints somewhere, and his analysis was interesting.  He noted that asking St. Francis, or St. Teresa, or any other departed believer (he did not name anyone specifically), to pray on your behalf is not different in kind from asking your pastor, or your spouse, or your neighbor to do so.  It seems rather straightforward, really, when you put it that way.  The problem he advanced as fatal was the issue of knowing which persons actually are in heaven.  That is a certainty we cannot have about anyone other than Jesus Himself.  We might carry the ninety-nine-point-nine-nine-nine percent out to the hundredth decimal place, but it is not actually given to us to know that Peter or Paul or Mary–or Francis or Teresa–is in heaven.  I am very confident that my sainted grandmother is there, less confident of others of my relatives, but I could not say with absolute certainty that anyone I have known is in heaven–I do not see the heart.  I am completely confident that I will be there, but my confidence is not something I can give you, and I have been known to be mistaken about some facts in the past so I might, in theory, be mistaken about any of them now.  We don’t really know who we can ask.

We have the additional problem that we don’t know how we get from here to there.  Are our departed loved ones already experiencing heaven in what we call real time, concurrent with our continued lives here on earth?  That is a possibility popularly embraced.  However, some hold to the notion of “soul sleep”, that we who die remain unaware of the passage of time until we are awakened on the resurrection day and all enter heaven together.  That would mean that Jesus is in heaven, but Peter and Paul and the others are still waiting, unconscious of the wait but not yet there.  There is also the possibility that neither of those is quite the reality, but that at the moment of death we leap across time to the moment of resurrection, not “sleeping” anywhere but simply skipping whatever time remains in this world to enter eternity on the day of a resurrection still in the future for everyone else.  In those cases, it does not matter who is going to enter heaven–no one is there to hear us yet.

Prayer to the saints also assumes that those who are in heaven are listening to those of us who are on earth.  We imagine that they are for a couple of reasons.  One is that from our earthly perspective, if we were to be taken from our loved ones and moved to heaven, we would be very interested, even concerned, with what was happening to them here on earth, and so would want to watch, listen, keep aware of their situation.  The other is that we want to believe that those who have left us love us enough that they would want to know what is happening to us.  Both of those points ignore the possibility that someone who enters the presence of God might have something far more significant to occupy his attention for the next few thousand years than what is happening to the people he left behind.  Having finally stepped into the actual immediate continual tangible presence of God, am I going to be wondering how my granddaughter is doing?  That’s possible, but somehow not likely–and I tend to think we would very quickly lose track of time, particularly if we have stepped out of time into eternity.  Let’s suppose, though, that it is the case that my grandmother wants to know how I am doing.  There is yet the question of whether heaven actually provides the opportunity to watch–as if it were the observation windows above the operating theater where students can observe the surgeons at work.  We are never told that the departed know what we are doing.  In fact, the one documented instance in the Bible of someone speaking from beyond death, of that of Samuel to Saul, suggests that Samuel had no idea what Saul was doing, and had to figure it out when it happened.  So the assumption that the departed can hear us is itself questionable.

But even if we grant all that, there is yet the question of why they would be listening to us, specifically.  I can imagine that St. Teresa of Calcutta might be intimately interested in what is happening with the Sisters of Mercy order she founded and the work progressing in India (and as we recently noted, it is getting more difficult for Christian work in India).  I might even suppose she is interested in my close acquaintance Dennis Mullins, who on one occasion some years ago wrote a song for her and presented her with a copy of the recording.  It is a far stretch to suppose she would be interested in me–I never met her, never directly supported her work, probably never prayed for her during her ministry.  It is an even farther stretch to imagine that St. Francis has any particular interest in me, and the fact that I will be one of millions to erect a statue of him in a backyard garden probably does not impact that significantly.

I think, though, that there is a fundamental problem with our attitude when we pray to a saint.  The notion we have is that somehow they are more worthy, more likely to receive an answer to their prayers than we are to ours.  It is a mistake.  If we ask our pastor to pray for us because we want someone to pray with us, that is perfectly reasonable; if we want him to pray for us because we somehow think that Jesus is more likely to hear and answer his prayers on our behalf than our prayers on our own behalf, that is not humilty, it is error.  God wants us to bring our concerns to Him ourselves, and Jesus is given to us as the “one mediator between God and man”.  When we ask others to pray “for” us we are using the wrong preposition; we should be asking them to pray “with” us, to agree with our prayers, to support us as we pray.  We are invited, encouraged, even commanded, to pray to God through Jesus Christ.  If we will not do this, our prayers to anyone else, living or dead, are not going to be of much use.  If you ask me to pray with you, I will gladly support you in prayer; if you ask me to pray for you, the best I can do is pray for whatever I hope God will give you (which might not be what you are asking), or perhaps that you will be able to find whatever it is that will enable you to pray.  God will hear your prayer.  To pray to the saints is to presume that God does not care enough about you to listen, and that someone more worthy than you needs to mention you–like having a friend who has God’s ear.  You have God’s ear, and no one is more worthy than Jesus Who makes you as worthy as Himself.

So respect believers who reflect this, but make your requests known to God directly.

And don’t make a big deal about lawn ornaments.  A reminder in the middle of our garden of a man who cared about our relationships with God and with nature is not a bad thing, and a better thing if it reminds us that God cares about our garden more than we do, and loves us, and hears when we pray.

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Books by the Author

#164: Versers Proceed

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This is mark Joseph “young” blog entry #164, on the subject of Versers Proceed.

With permission of Valdron Inc I have begun publishing my third novel, For Better or Verse, in serialized form on the web (that link will take you to the table of contents).  If you missed the first two, you can find the table of contents for the first at Verse Three, Chapter One:  The First Multiverser Novel, and that for the second at Old Verses New.  There was also a series of web log posts looking at the writing process, the decisions and choices that delivered the final product; those posts are indexed along with the chapters in the tables of contents pages.  Now as the third is posted I am again offering a set of “behind the writings” insights.  This “behind the writings” look definitely contains spoilers because it sometimes talks about what I was planning to do later in the book–although it sometimes raises ideas that were never pursued.  You might want to read the referenced chapters before reading this look at them.  Links below (the section headings) will take you to the specific individual chapters being discussed, and there are (or will soon be) links on those pages to bring you back hopefully to the same point here.

There is also a section of the site, Multiverser Novel Support Pages, in which I have begun to place materials related to the novels beginning with character papers for the major characters, hopefully giving them at different stages as they move through the books.

This was the previous mark Joseph “young” web log post covering this book:

  1. #157:  Versers Restart (which provided this kind of insight into the first eleven chapters).

This picks up from there, with chapters 12 through 22.

img0164Tropics

History of the series, including the reason it started, the origins of character names and details, and many of the ideas, are in those earlier posts, and won’t be repeated here.

Chapter 12, Hastings 99

I realized that I was almost to a hundred Hastings stories; but it didn’t seem to make any sense to note that in any way.

I was a bit confused on directions at some point; initially I hadn’t given much thought to the directions, but now I wanted her to have arrived on the southern slope of an island in the northern tropics.  This was not for any particular reason but that I thought the southern slope probably more habitable, and for Lauren, at least, it should always seem as if God is directing things one way or another.  Even here, where there was nothing to do, I felt the need to have God’s hand putting her in the “right” place.

The half-buried staff idea had been in my mind for a while, and at this moment I decided on it.

The rain was an abrupt choice.  I wanted to fill the space, and it seemed a good way to do so.

Chapter 13, Slade 47

The comments about the air were a sudden decision.  I rather stumbled into it.

I had thought of several possibilities for what the door from the Caliph’s palace would look like from the other side, but the abandoned barn allowed the greatest possibilities.  I also began thinking that I was going to have to bring them back here, and it might be a viable end scenario to have them walk into the front door of the barn and vanish to somewhere else.

Just about everything here was done on the spot.

Chapter 14, Brown 60

Again, Derek’s spritish name is modeled on the sprite from the other game.  It was also built on his parent’s names, Morach being a joining of Morani and Lelach.

I created the spritish accents and language in part because I had been bothered by Derek’s ability to read the minds of his parents.  Under game rules, if you read someone’s mind, you get thoughts in their language, but if you use telepathy you get ideas translated to your language.  I decided that Lelach and Morani were the children of sprites who still revered the old spritish customs and language, as so many immigrant families are structured.  But then, I also recognized that it made no sense for them to be immigrants to a place where English was spoken; it made more sense to suggest that they were natives in a place where humans who spoke English had moved in and conquered them.  This became the uncertain thing behind things Derek didn’t understand.  I began to formulate an idea that he would become the sprite who led them to freedom from oppression.  The initial idea was that he would prove himself as smart as any human, demonstrating the math skills he had learned elsewhere such as trigonometry and calculus, systems which would be unknown in this world but would have evident uses once he taught them.  Not being well versed in these myself, I was not certain how I would do that, but it was the core of the idea.

I decided as I wrote this section to do the telepathy line I had considered; doing it now that he was born made more sense than doing it before this.  I knew there were ramifications, and I was going to have to deal with these, but I figured I would.

Chapter 15, Hastings 100

Again, I noticed the number of the chapter, but didn’t let it move me.

Even as I started writing this, I had decided on the cave with the water and steam, and had decided that the gear would be underground, but had not decided whether it would be buried or in the cave, or (what I almost did) caught partly in the rock.  Once I got a good picture of what the cave was like, I decided it had to be free.

I also rather abruptly realized that this was, to all appearances, a better home for Lauren than the beach.  I had nothing at the beach that should keep her there, and the multi-use fresh water and steam supply here (plus the potential emergency shelter of the cave) commended itself.  I realized it’s where I would have camped.  Thus I had her change her plans and leave her equipment here while going for the stuff she left at the beach.

I also began to get the idea that Lauren was being forced to rest.  In her last world, she had said she did not wish to rest, but to continue to be active.  I thought it might make this stall world something of interest if I used it as a forced time of relaxation.  In a sense, God could be telling her to slow down a bit for a while, to stop doing so much and enjoy life a bit.

Chapter 16, Slade 48

The prayer was a sudden bit of remembrance from the earlier book.  Actually, I had started reading the first book again to my youngest two, as no one but me had read the final draft, and so this prayer from the first of Slade’s chapters was fresh in my mind.  It led inexorably to the religious discussion, and I needed something to give the feeling of time to the travel.

Chapter 17, Brown 61

Once Derek had made the telepathic contact with his mother, I realized that I wasn’t entirely sure why he had made contact.  It was really because he was lonely, as he couldn’t talk to anyone; but it needed to be put into some kind of conversation that was more than just, hi, how are you.  Thus I started trying to think of questions he would ask.  I reinforced the idea that something was happening that he didn’t see, in the feel of the old ways.

His mother’s question, whether he could hear her thoughts, sprang abruptly to me.  It was the obvious question; I was surprised Derek had not anticipated it.  But I had not anticipated it, and there it was staring at me.  It also led me to a good consideration of the ethics of practicing psionics on other people, which I guessed would become an important point for Derek’s stay in this world.

As Derek begins using telepathy, I decided that I could italicize all telepathic communications, and that would help the reader follow what was happening.  I should probably have done that with the first book, but I had not thought of it in time.  I went back and did it in the second book.

Chapter 18, Hastings 101

As Lauren was searching the woods, I too was searching for any reason why the beach was a better place to live.  Logically, I could say she had to land there so that all her gear would be on land, but I kept thinking there was something else.

The splash of the fish was something I noticed just as I wrote it.

Chapter 19, Slade 49

The concern about fire came to me at this point, so I included it.  Again, it led to interesting spiritual ideas, and I let it have its head–particularly as the banter between Slade and Filp is always funny when they get going.

The argument about Phasius started because I wanted Shella to interact with it, and to draw out of them some backstory.  But the backstory I invented at this moment.  It owes much to A Man for All Seasons (I think that’s the name) about Henry VIII.

I realized that Slade would have said “I love you” in a very non-committal way, that is, as one says to a friend who has just done something wonderful or wonderfully funny or helpful; but as I typed it, I also realized that these words betrayed something I had been hinting with the comments on her smile, something he did not recognize himself, and she only hoped.  As I realized that, the only response I could think for Shella to give was “Thank you, my lord,” the proper response of a lesser lady to a greater gentleman on a compliment.  And I realized that this hid her hopes behind the formality, well enough that he would not see them.

Originally this chapter ended with Slade going inside to go to bed.  But it was at this point that I realized I was setting up my threesome for a trip that would be probably five days from the border to the castle, and then they were going to have to make it back from the castle to the border without being taken by Acquivar’s guards.  I thought now that they should be preparing for that trip; that is, they should be doing something on the way that would make the way back easier.  I asked three of my sons what they would do, and Tristan suggested he would try to arrange for horses for the journey.  I realized that meant finding allies; and that I had just written a section in which a potential ally, drunk though he was, had revealed himself.  Shella, I thought, would see the value, and so I changed the course to let them wait for him.

I wanted the peasants to sound like uneducated peasants, so I played a bit with their grammar.

Chapter 20, Brown 62

I realized after I wrote the telepathic discussion with the mother, that she was almost certain to tell the father.  This was going to be a problem, for the reasons Derek considers in the book.  It was also likely that the father would suggest that the child was dangerous, that the elders should be told, and that it would mean a very short life for Derek.  I thought Lelach would do something to protect him, even if that meant fleeing with him to hide somewhere.  But the first step was that Derek was going to find out that his father thought his mother crazy because she had told him Derek had spoken to her mind.

When Derek described the choice, I, too, knew the answer.  But I don’t like the characters to always succeed, so I placed the failure in there, then the mind reading, then the success on the second attempt.

I suddenly invented the nicknames.  This was exactly the opposite direction from what I had originally intended, but it was the only thing that was going to be readable.  Besides, I could not imagine them calling each other by those long multi-syllabic names.

Tonathel is obviously Moses in another world.  The idea of Derek now being connected in his mother’s mind as a potential deliverer with religious connotations came to me, and it fit in with Derek’s hopes expressed in the end of the previous book.  I drew those connections forward.

Chapter 21, Hastings 102

Between writing Hastings 101 and now I had given consideration to the ramifications of the fish, and the birds.  Were they sentient?  Were they dangerous?  I started this with little idea how Lauren would resolve those questions, but they did seem the questions she would be asking at this point.

Chapter 22, Slade 50

Originally this section was going to begin with Slade’s recognition that he had to do something to prepare for an escape route.  But as I had planned that opening, I didn’t know what it was going to be, and after talking to Tristan I went back and changed the previous section to start the process of making allies.

The names came out of thin air when I needed them.  I was somewhat torn between having the drunk be part of some connected conspiracy, which I thought helpful but unlikely, and having him wish to hide all sympathies for the priest given the danger of supporting him, which I thought useless though probable.  I tried to find a middle ground on that.

Before I wrote this section I got Kyler’s input on the same question of preparing for the return.  Where Tristan had suggested speed, facilitated by horses, Kyler suggested stealth.  I had, while asking the boys, considered the possibility that Shella might create the illusion that Phasius was still in his cell; now I had them getting Phasius out of the castle and reaching a place where horses were available to ride from there to the next point, change horses and ride to the end of the valley, where they would have to rest and abandon the horses.  Tristan also suggested that if there were only one road in their direction and they were on it, they would easily block any messenger from getting beyond them to alert troops down the line.  The last leg, up the mountains, would include at least one good hiding, possibly involving invisibility provided by Shella, and a battle in which Slade could defeat a dozen guards.

The only idea I have at this point for Phasius is to run into the abandoned barn and be whisked away.  I don’t even know where he would go.

This has been the second behind the writings look at For Better or Verse.  Assuming that there is interest, I will continue preparing and posting them every eleven chapters, that is, every three weeks.

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Bible and Theology, Music

#163: So You Want to Be a Christian Musician

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This is mark Joseph “young” blog entry #163, on the subject of So You Want to Be a Christian Musician.

I have been a Christian musician–performer, composer, arranger, founder and/or director of bands–for near half a century now.

It might be argued whether that alone puts me in a position to give advice on the subject.  After all, although I have recorded an album, it would be debated whether I was ever a “successful” Christian musician.  I am not in much demand on the circuit and never have been.  However, from the time I was in high school, later in college, and then during five years as first a disk jockey and ultimately program director of a major Contemporary Christian Music radio station I talked to dozens, possibly scores, of successful Christian artists, and nearly always asked them that question:  what advice do you, as a successful Christian musician, give to anyone who wants to do what you do.  I asked such people as Noel Paul Stookey, Dan Peek, Phil Keaggy, Scott Wesley Brown, Glad, Brown Bannister, Chris Christian–well, I don’t even remember everyone I asked, let alone what they all said.  However, four of them I do remember, and I will give you something of the gist of what they said for your consideration.  I will also comment on that advice, because I think it worth contemplating.  I also think, in retrospect, that it is probably good advice for anyone who knows what he wants to be or do, and particularly for those who want to pursue artistic endeavors.

Larry Norman, perhaps the original nationally known self-identified Christian rock musician
Larry Norman, perhaps the original nationally known self-identified Christian rock musician

I will mention Barry McGuire first–probably the first truly prominent secular musician to become a leading contemporary Christian artist, who had been with The New Christie Minstrels, starred in the Broadway production Hair, and soloed with the hit Eve of Destruction, but whose signature song following his salvation was Happy Road–mostly because I do not think I can articulate what he told me.  What I remember is that the concert somewhere near Boston had ended and he was out among the audience, mobbed by people, but he heard my question and focused his entire attention on addressing it, addressing me and the rest of the audience, as if the question genuinely mattered.  What he said, and perhaps what he did, caused me upon returning home to write a song entitled Mountain, Mountain, about being what God made you to be instead of trying to be something you perceive to be great.  That actually is a good starting point for this, but we will return to it.

I was one of several reporters interviewing B. J. Thomas at Creation ’83.  At that time he was probably the most successful secular artist to turn to Christian music as an entertainer, his song Home Where I Belong introducing the singer of Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head and I Can’t Stop This Feeling to a Christian audience, and he had a hard time in the Christian music field precisely because he was an entertainer, not a minister.  What he said, though, was don’t think you missed your break, or that you are still waiting for your break to come.  If you are diligent, many breaks will come to you, and if you are good you can make one of them work for you, and if you miss it, another will come.

Ted Sandquist was probably the original contemporary Christian worship leader, with songs like Eternally Grateful, All That I Can Do, and Lion of Judah.  I’m afraid that when I caught up with him after a concert, his answer could have been a wonderful book, delivered orally in under a minute.    He spoke about things he called scope and ministry, and to a large degree was the first person ever to get me thinking of some of the things I discussed recently in the music ministry series–along with whether your calling is to be nationally known or simply serve in a local congregation.  In short, his advice was to think in terms of ministry, whether you are called to it, and what is the nature and extent of your calling.  If you follow this web log, you have already seen the extensive materials I have written on that.

Finally, I caught up with Larry Norman after one of his concerts at Gordon College.  Larry is probably the original nationally-known Christian rock musician, best known for I Wish We’d All Been Ready, Sweet, Sweet Song of Salvation, and the album title Only Visiting This Planet.  The intensity of his response was overwhelming, and the focus of it was in the question, why do you want this?

Before I address that further, I should mention two things about Larry that I learned separately from that.  One is that he was known for a gift of discernment, that he could see things about people that they often did not recognize about themselves.  It may well be that he would have given different advice to someone else, but that this was what he thought I needed to hear.  The other is that he had a very hard life as a Christian rock musician.  Often he would play a concert and after the fact be informed that “apparently the Lord did not provide” enough money to pay him.  He was then criticized for subsequently insisting on signed contracts for concerts that could be enforced against those who did not pay what they agreed, and quite specific terms concerning what his hosts would provide such as accommodations.  He rubbed shoulders with people like Paul McCartney, but he did not find the life at all glamorous or enriching.  That might have impacted his view as well.

However, I think that there is a level to that advice that we all need to hear:  Do not want that; it is not something to want.

It came to me recently, as I had again heard a story of some Christian band that had been formed to provide music for one event who then found themselves propelled to the top of the Christian music charts and sent on national and international tours.  The famous story is that of Amy Grant, who at sixteen spent a bit of money on some studio time to record a song for her mother’s birthday, and the recording was heard by Christian record producers Brown Bannister and Chris Christian, who quickly signed her to a major Christian label recording contract and propelled her to stardom–perhaps the first contemporary Christian recording artist to crossover into secular success.  God clearly sometimes chooses some people to be “successful” Christian artists who had made no effort to be that; it makes sense that He has a hand in choosing those whose success appears to be built on years of hard work.  There are equally many stories we do not hear, of people who worked hard to achieve what never came, and of people who hoped maybe that one day lightning would strike, as it were, and they would be propelled to success, to whatever level of fame is found in Dove Awards and Christian music chart-toppers.  If God wants you to be there, He will get you there; it may be that He wants you to work hard at your music and stay where you are, and it should be sufficient motivation for the work that God is pleased with it.

It is also the case that this is not something to want.  The work of a “successful” Christian musician is hard work–constant travel, brief stays in strange places, one performance after another.  I have seen how tired such people often are, but this is what they do, and they will do it again tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow.  It wreaks havoc with family life, as either you take your family with you to hotels or more commonly in a camper, or you leave them behind while you travel for weeks or sometimes months without them, sleeping in the “bus”, a modified camper shared with the rest of the band.  Those who make it work either managed to reach a high enough level of success before marriage that they were able to do very short tours and fly to most events, or have other jobs frequently as pastors such that they finish concerts Saturday night and are in church Sunday morning.  And the money is not all that good–better, perhaps, than it was for Christian artists a few decades back, but the entire music industry is changing, in a sense collapsing, so that even the major stars do not make what they once did.

Of course, it is not so much the money as the recognition, that you are on stage, people are listening to your songs on the radio and the Internet, you are traveling the world singing.  That is also called fame.  But then, fame in the entire music industry is not what it was–if you heard a list of the twenty most successful musicians in the world today, it is likely that you would not recognize several of the names simply because styles have fragmented, and no one is truly informed about rock, rap, country, Christian, and the wealth of other genres that command substantial but discrete audiences.  Take it from me.  I might not be a “successful” musician, but I am world famous–as a role playing game author and theorist, defender of hobby games, time travel theory writer, and general writer–and it has almost no cash value and very little impact on my daily life apart from that I have to do the work.  Or hear Paul Simon.  He tells a story of a night when he and Art Garfunkle were sitting in a car in a park under one of New York City’s many bridges, and a song came on the radio–their song, Sounds of Silence, which the disk jockey announced was now the number one song in the country, by Simon and Garfunkle.  At that moment, Art Garfunkle said to him, “Gee, wherever those two guys are right now, it must be a real great party.”  Being at the top of the chart doesn’t mean nothing, but it doesn’t mean much.

Of course, get enough fame, and you have to reorganize your life to insulate yourself against the crowds.  You are not going to get that kind of fame doing this, and the admiration you do get will perhaps bring a smile to your face from time to time, but it’s going to prove to be much less than you imagined.

More on point, though, and connecting what Barry McGuire said to what Larry Norman said:  this is not something you should want.  What you should want is to know God, to become what He made you to be, and to seek to do what He wants you to do in life.  If that includes being a famous or successful musician, He will bring you there; He won’t lead you where you want to go, though, only where He knows you will become the best you He made you to be.  One thing I needed to learn over the years was that had I been a successful Christian musician early in my life I never would have been any of these other things–I never would have written the role playing game or become involved with the hobby gamers whose lives I have in some small way touched, never would have undertaken to write about time travel, never would have studied law or written about politics, never would have become chaplain of an international online organization, never would have done most of the things for which I am recognized.  There was so much of who I am that I never would have discovered, that no one would have known, had God moved me in a straight line to what I always thought was the only thing I could do well–music.  He wanted me to become the teacher, the writer, the influence that I am.  I might have been a great musician, but I would never have been anything else.

Peter Hopper was the drummer in a band called Rock Garden, who played their penultimate concert at Carnegie Hall.  I never talked with him despite having a more than passing acquaintance with the band’s rhythm guitarist Dennis Mullins, but a few weeks after that concert, after they had played their farewell concert, I heard him speak about it.  It was what he had wanted all his life, and as he sat on stage playing for the crowd he looked around and said, is this really what I wanted?  Why did I want this?  He told us that God promises that if we seek Him He will give us the desires of our heart, and said that in his experience God had done that, given him what he had always wanted, so he would be able to see how empty it really was, and how the only thing worth desiring was God.

So don’t want this.  Don’t want to be a musician, or anything else for that matter.  Want to know God, and to find His path for you.  That’s the only desire in life that is guaranteed to be fulfilled and to satisfy.  It is also the only path that will bring you anywhere worth being.

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Bible and Theology, Law and Politics

#162: Furry Thinking

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This is mark Joseph “young” blog entry #162, on the subject of Furry Thinking.

If you are in the gamer community you probably have already heard or thought most of this.  Ridiculous news travels fast.  For those who are not, well, it’s worth getting you up to speed a bit.

A British company known as Games Workshop publishes a game under the name Warhammer 40K.  The “40K” part means that it is set in a far-flung (forty millennia) future in which, perhaps somewhat ridiculously, primitives fight with mechas.  The game makes significant use of miniatures, which the company produces and sells.  These miniatures are entirely made of plastic, but some of them have designs that include the image of fur clothing or covering on people or machines.

PETA, that is, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, is protesting this.

Image by Erm What https://www.flickr.com/photos/ermwhat/
Image by Erm What https://www.flickr.com/photos/ermwhat/

I am tempted to join the chorus of those who assert that PETA has lost it–it being at least the last shreds of credibility that the organization had.  I would prefer to think that they are intelligent people who have sound reasons for their position, and so I would like to attempt at least to understand them.  I do not agree with them, because of what I think are some fundamental issues, but in order to discuss those issues I think it is important at least to attempt to grasp their view.

The stated issue is that the appearance of fur on the models, even given that it isn’t even faux fur but just molded plastic in a roughened pattern that looks like fur, sends a wrong message.  That in itself is a bit ridiculous–as one father of a gamer reported his daughter asking, how can PETA tell whether the plastic molding representation is supposed to be real fur or fake fur?  However, we should give PETA the benefit of the doubt.  They could reasonably object to the use of fake fur for much the same reason:  it is popular because it looks like real fur, and in looking like real fur suggests that killing animals for their fur is an appropriate human action.  People should not kill animals for fur today, and suggesting that it will be acceptable to do so forty thousand years in the future is just as unacceptable.

In its argument, PETA includes some detail about the inhumane ways in which animals are either trapped or hunted and killed, or raised and killed, for their furs.  Within the context it’s a bit ridiculous–for all we know, in the Warhammer world such furs might be grown in vats of cultured skin skin cells that have no innervation and no central nervous system, and thus no real pain.  Fur might grow on trees, genetically mutated or modified.  They might have devised completely painless methods of hunting, trapping, and killing fur-bearing animals.  Extending an argument based on the details of actual modern treatment of such animals to the distant future is indeed silly.  However, it is probably not the distant future with which PETA is concerned.  If they still exist in forty millennia they will undoubtedly argue whether any of those methods are truly humane; their real argument is not whether these are appropriate actions in the future, but whether they convey an appropriate message to the present.  Their position in the present is that it is fundamentally wrong to kill animals for their skins, and so the suggestion that it will be permissible in the distant future is a wrong message, because it always will be–and by implication, always has been–wrong for people to do this.

That is where PETA and I part company on this issue.

Somewhere I have seen, probably in some natural history museum, a montage of a group of primitive men dressed in furs using spears to bring down a Woolly Mammoth.  That display, to my mind, communicates something of the reality of the lives of our distant ancestors.  Yet if PETA is to be taken seriously, that display sends the same kind of wrong message as is sent by the Games Workshop miniatures:  humans have killed animals so as to clothe themselves in the furs, and are engaged in killing another animal.  It might even be argued in their favor that one of the theories for the disappearance of the Siberian Mammoth from the world is that it was hunted to extinction by primitive humans (although in fairness it has also been suggested that they died due to the decline of their habitat at the close of the last ice age).  Yet wearing furs and killing animals was how those humans survived, and thus the means by which we have come to be alive today.

I think that PETA would probably assert that the humans had no higher right to survive than the bears and wolves and deer and other creatures they killed for those furs, or the mammoths they hunted for meat and skin.  PETA has an egalitarian view of the creatures of the world, as I understand it:  all creatures are created equal, and have an equal claim to continued life.  People have no right to kill animals for their own purposes, whether for clothes or for food or for habitat.

One reason this view is held is that people believe there are only two possible views.  The perceived alternative is to believe that humans have no obligations at all to other creatures, and can use them however we want, kill them with impunity, torture them even for no better purpose than our own entertainment, eat them, and wear their bodies as clothing and jewelry or use it to adorn our dwellings.  Put in its extreme form, this position is indeed reprehensible, and I object to it as much as PETA does.  However, these are not the only two positions.

Still, that “reprehensible” position is at least defensible.  PETA can argue that the human species has no better right to survive than any other creatures, but it is equally true under that argument that our right to survive is not any less.  Other creatures do not, by this fundamentally naturalistic argument, owe us their lives, but neither do we owe them theirs.  If our survival is enhanced at their expense, it cannot be asserted that we have less right to survive than they.  In the abstract the claim that we do not have a higher right sounds good, but if the issue were to be whether you or I would survive, it is very likely that you would choose you, and if it went to court after the fact and it was reasonably clearly apparent that it was “you or me”, the courts would undoubtedly exonerate you for choosing your own survival over mine.  The simplest form of that is the self-defense defense, but it’s not the only situation in which this is a factor.  Our ancestors killed animals and ate them and wore their furs because in a very real sense it was “them or us”, either we kill these animals and protect ourselves in their skins or we die of exposure.  Certainly I think that killing for furs that are not needed for our survival but merely decorative is selfish, but under a naturalistic viewpoint I can find no basis for saying that it is wrong to put the needs and preferences of other creatures above our own.  Further, I would not condemn an Inuit for his sealskin boots–it is part of his survival, and it is not clear that modern boots are either as easily available to him or as effective for the purpose.

Yet I do not intend to defend that position.  I think there is a third position that covers the concerns of both PETA and the Inuit.  Man is neither the equal of the other creatures in this world nor the owner of them.  We are their caretakers; they are our charges.

That means that sometimes we have to kill them, responsibly.  The best example is the deer of North America.  In most of the continent, and particularly most of the United States, deer thrive but the predators that kept their numbers in check have been decimated.  Without wolves and mountain lions in significant numbers to kill and eat the deer, their natural reproductive rate (geared to replace those lost to predation) quickly overpopulates the environment.  Certainly we have the selfish concern that they will eat our gardens, but even without that part of the problem they will starve in droves, because there is not enough food to feed them all.  The lack of predators is our fault, but only partly intentional.  Certainly we took steps to protect our children from creatures that would recognize them as a potential meal, but it is also the case that we frighten them, and so as we expand they retreat.  That means that deer will die, and their bodies litter the wilderness–and the alternative is for us to maintain managed killing of the overpopulation.  Licensed hunting is an effective and economical approach.  There might be other ways–such as rounding up herds into slaughterhouses and selling the meat on the market–but PETA would find these at least as objectionable.

It also means that we have the right to kill them when in our view it meets our needs–such as taking cattle and pigs and fowl to slaughterhouses to put meat on our tables.

The issue of whether we should refrain from killing animals for clothing is a more complicated one.  After all, in Genesis 3:21 we are told that God made garments of skin for Adam and Eve when they were inadequately clothed in leaves, and we take that to mean that it was the skins of animals, and that thereafter we dressed ourselves in animal skins following the example God gave us.  On the other hand, we have other materials now which are at least as good, and we have a shortage of animals, at least measured against the number of people we have to clothe.  We can provide for our needs without killing a lot of animals, and so we should prioritize our responsibility to care for those we still have.  That does not mean we cannot use fur or leather as part of our clothing; it means that such use should be limited to situations in which it is the best choice for the purpose.

It also means that in a distant future in which animals, including predatory animals, are plentiful and humans are struggling to survive, our present standards about killing creatures for fur or wearing the skins of animals who died or were killed for other reasons simply do not apply.  Most of those who are intelligent enough to be able to play complicated miniatures wargames are also intelligent enough to understand this, even if PETA is not.

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Bible and Theology

#161: Pseudovulgarity

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This is mark Joseph “young” blog entry #161, on the subject of Pseudovulgarity.

At an hour ridiculous by just about anyone’s standards, the dog rousted me to let him out.  A word went through my mind as I sat up.

I’d like to be able to tell you that the word was “Hallelujah”; it was not.  What I can tell you is that it was not any word that is ordinarily recognized as a curse or swear word or vulgarity.  It was, rather, one of those words made up by some science fiction or fantasy writer to give the characters foul language that doesn’t have any real meaning and so won’t be nixed by the censors–not the one used in Red Dwarf, but that sort of thing.  In fact, the words that went through my head next were, “He can curse in six imaginary languages.”  I can’t, but it is a silly notion, and raises the question of how we as Christians should regard such speech.

img0161Dwarf

Words are avoided for several reasons, and we should understand why specific words are avoided–but I am not going to delve into explanations of individual words.  Some are called “vulgar” by which we mean “crass”; they refer to objects or actions which are not discussed in “polite society” and so it would be rude to use them.

Problematically, some words which make this list have perfectly appropriate uses within certain contexts, but become offensive when they are used in an insulting way.  An expression that means being condemned to eternal punishment is probably appropriate declared from the pulpit, but not expressed as a wish aimed at an individual.  The proper word for a female dog among breeders at a kennel club show becomes vulgar when applied to a person; in its original sense it becomes obscene.

Obscenity is perhaps vulgarity up a notch:  these words usually refer to actions which decent people disdain because they are in some sense morally repugnant.  “Rape” might have been on this list except that we need a name for that crime; it will serve, though, as an example of other words which are not used because they refer to acts themselves regarded immoral.

The other category of avoided words involves the commandment not to use the name of the Lord in vain.  Here the problem is that no one should invoke God disrespectfully, and it is commonly done.  All “offensive” words are considered offensive to people, or at least to “decent” or “proper” people; those in this category are considered offensive to God, but also to people who would be offended by disrespect toward God.

Prior to the early 1970s respectable people did not use such offensive language in conversation, public or private.  This ended with the release of the transcripts of what are called the Watergate tapes, recordings of conversations in the Oval Office in the White House, in which the words “expletive deleted” probably were the most common longer than three letters.  These announced to the world that the respectable speech of our leaders was a facade covering considerably more corrupt language in private.  It is certainly ironic that Richard Nixon is still roundly condemned in nearly all quarters, but his example in this followed by so many.

This covers most of what we consider “foul language”, and most of us feel that if we manage to keep this out of our speech we have done well.  I wonder, though, whether we have.  The other day someone who uses entirely too much foul language asked me whether there was something he could say instead.  I suggested Praise the Lord; I do not know whether he has implemented an effort on this front.  I do recall a pastor friend of mine telling of a deacon in his church with Tourette’s who apparently spoke no foul words and so his expletive outbursts were all on the order of Alleluia, Amen, Praise God, and that answered a question I had had about the syndrome in people who had not learned any bad words.  Most Christians make a point not to say anything that falls into any of these categories; some don’t consider it a significant issue.

What is somewhat more intriguing is the use of substitute words.  The language is littered with them–“gosh” and “golly”, “gee” and “geesh”, and words like “heck”, “darn”, “dang”, “sugar”, “frigging”, to replace more vulgar language.  These words we use in order keep our language “clean”–but do they miss the point?

The phrase “apple-polisher” does not immediately call the image from which it is apparently derived; “brown-noser” is closer to the vulgar original, but you don’t want to think about what that one means.  The fact that we avoid the words but convey the ideas is not especially commendable.  In college I was very good at creative invective until an event I have recounted elsewhere shocked me into the realization that some people were hurt by words which to me were a game.  If what you say is intended to give offense, it is not really inoffensive to say it without offensive words.  Perhaps more fundamentally, if the use of a word reflects a bad attitude within, a replacement word to express the attitude does nothing about the attitude.

I am of the opinion that we as believers should avoid using words which offend–not merely those which are offensive to specific races or subcultures, but those which are offensive to polite society.  The use of invented vulgarity, in the form of invented words, is probably reasonable for inclusion in fiction, particularly fantasy and science fiction, to give the feeling of a real lower-class culture (I still see the use of such words as the language of the lower classes, and the fact that Nixon and his aides used it lowers my opinion of them far more than it raises my opinion of the use of such language).  In my own writing I manage to avoid most of it, and while I’m prejudiced I don’t think my prose suffers for it.

As far as substitute words in daily use, to the degree that they reflect negativity, invective, or distress, we probably should learn not to use them–not because the words themselves are bad, but because they convey attitudes which we ought to be eliminating in ourselves.  We mistakenly think that something which happens is bad because at first impression we don’t like it, but every gift from God is good, and He gives us our days and our lives.  Certainly there are people who harm us or others, and we are right to hate what they do–but that they do it tells us that they need to be repaired, need God’s love and ours to escape the darkness in which they are living.  They don’t need our foul language or our not-foul replacement language or our invective or insult or disdain.  They need our help.

So if you wondered why words of that sort mattered, maybe this will give you some notion.

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Bible and Theology, Elections, Law and Politics

#160: For All In Authority

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This is mark Joseph “young” blog entry #160, on the subject of For All In Authority.

O.K., show of hands:  how many of you have been praying for our new president?

I see that hand.

img0160Trump

No, I appreciate this.  I have never been much of one for canned uninformed “pray for the President/pray for the leaders”–I never know what to pray, and I’ve been a political writer for several years, and still don’t know what to pray.  Part of the difficulty I face is that we are told to give thanks for the answers to our petitions, but for most of what I can imagine asking I have no reason to expect to see how God has answered–I am not privy to cabinet meetings nor to the thoughts of men.  Part of the problem is that it is very easy to want God to move our leaders to my political opinion, and God does not generally do that, or at least not that I’ve recognized in others.

But I am upset about the people who have been protesting, and particularly because I know that at least some of them would take the name “Christian”.  I do not mean that Christians should never protest.  I am not even saying that Christians should never be involved in overthrowing governments–that’s simply more than I know.  However, the call we were given was to pray, not to condemn.  In a modern democracy, the proper function of protest is to communicate our opinions to our leaders, not to condemn them for theirs.  Communicate, certainly; do not condemn.

One of those who taught me along the way made the statement God gives you the person that you need, not necessarily the person that you may want.  I do not even now remember to what exact situation he was applying that, but I have recognized it in connection with spouses, pastors, and particularly governments.  (I suspect it applies as well to parents, although I was out of the house and married before I heard it; I wonder to what degree it applies to children.)  Proverbs has a verse which in the original speaks of a lot falling in a lap, an archaic concept among archaic concepts for which the Christian Gamers Guild has found a modern translation, “We may throw the dice, but the Lord determines where they fall.”  Benjamin Franklin noted that if sparrows do not fall without God’s notice, nations certainly do not rise without His aid–and that would undoubtedly apply as well to governments.  At this point we know, incontrovertibly, that God chose to make Donald Trump President of these United States.  We may debate whether that is upon us a blessing or a curse, a reward or a punishment, a path forward or an impediment to truth, but whatever it is, it is what God decided we needed.  This is God’s gift to us, what He has given.

And every gift God gives is good.

Don’t choke on that.  Understand, as I know I have said previously and elsewhere, that when the Bible says that God’s gifts are good, it does not mean necessarily that we will like them.  All things work together for good to them that love God and are called according to His purpose it says in Romans 8, but it does not mean that everything that happens to us will be pleasant.  Eat your spinach, it’s good for you–this is the kind of good Paul meant there, that whatever comes to us benefits us, whether we enjoy it or not.  Suffering produces endurance.  When Jesus says that God gives both sun and rain to the good and the bad, the righteous and the unrighteous, He did not mean that we all get good things and bad things–he meant that we get the good that is the sun and the good that is the rain.  I do not yet know whether this presidency will be steak or Brussels sprouts–the good I will enjoy or the good I need to endure–but I know that it has been given to us and it is good.

In the early days of the church, nearly all Christians lived in or near Jerusalem.  Then a terrible thing happened.  A Christian named Steven was lynched by a mob.  Instead of the rioters being brought to justice, the local ruler arrested one of the top people in the church, a man named James, and had him executed.  The persecution of believers had begun.  Many, including some of the leaders themselves, fled Jerusalem, left the province known as Judea, and sought homes elsewhere in the Roman Empire.  It was undoubtedly something they would have prayed to end, despite the fact that Jesus told them it would happen–and we see in hindsight that these fleeing believers carried the message with them into places it would not have reached nearly as quickly otherwise, so the church spread and grew as others heard the gospel and believed.  Christians had been told to take the message into the whole world, but were rather complacently sitting in the one small town (and face it, as capital cities of the time went, Jerusalem was a small one) sharing the message mostly with people who had already heard it or knew where to hear it if they were interested.  We needed that trouble to move us in the right direction.

Therefore I know what to pray.  I pray that God will give wisdom to this man and his advisors, so that they will accomplish the task God has given them in the best way possible.  I do not know what that task might be, nor do I know to what degree the answer to my prayer will involve God clearing the path for what the man wants to do and to what degree it involves God impeding that path so that only part of the human program will be accomplished.  I do know that God will accomplish His purpose, one way or another, and the current presidency is part of that.  We are instructed to pray, and not given much understanding of what to pray, but this is enough.  One way or another, this should move us in the right direction.  We might not know what the right direction is (and for those first century Christians it seems to have been every direction as long as it was motion), but we know that God is moving somewhere and will bring us where He wants us to be.

So let us pray.

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Bible and Theology, Law and Politics

#159: To Compassion International

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This is mark Joseph “young” blog entry #159, on the subject of To Compassion International.

Compassion International is shutting down all of its operations in India because the Indian government has been objecting to aid coming from outside India for relief efforts.  There is evidence that it is because Hindu nationalists are trying to shut down Christian ministries; India is now 15th on the Open Doors’ list of places where it is hardest to be Christian.

Someone has said that when God closes a door, He often opens a window.  I’m sure that the organization has long honed its methods, and has a clear idea of how to do what they do to make it work–but now it is not working in India, and they may have to rethink their approach there.  The words “creative financing” and “creative accounting” sometimes have an “iffy” sense to them, but I think in the present situation the organization needs to be creative in how they deliver their aid to those children.

I would like to make a suggestion that might get them thinking in a workable direction.

img0159Compassion

India certainly has a tourist industry.  We know that people travel to see the Taj Mahal and other sites within the country.  At present they are turning away aid connected to a Christian ministry–but it is doubtful whether they would ever be turning away tourist dollars.  I am thinking that if Compassion International set up facilities in India modeled on hotels or restaurants or other tourist services, then said they were part of the tourism industry but listed the rooms at exhorbitant prices, such a model might work.  Couriers could bring money into the country and “pay” the hotel, which could then use the money to “purchase” supplies at low rates from an international supplier (Compassion International).  Native workers for the organization would become employees of these facilities, and the children they wish to help could be listed in any of several ways so that they would receive the benefits–employees, dependents, stockholders, whatever method works under Indian law.

Let us suppose that we list the children as employees of the hotel.  A courier arrives, checks in as a guest and stays overnight, paying the thousands of dollars that would otherwise have been spent on child care to the hotel perhaps by electronic transfer from the organization’s account to the hotel’s account, which might be in an international bank (depending on Indian law).  The hotel then spends most of that to buy food and supplies from its suppliers, and pays the children an official wage.  The children would be required to do the work of attending school (one of the benefits currently provided by Compassion International to its children), and school attendance would include free meals for the school day, and the employee benefits package would include fully-paid medical care.  “Uniforms”, that is, free clothing, would also be provided for school and work.  Some of the older children could be given tasks related to running the operation, such as working in the kitchen or cleaning the facilities, so that there is actual labor being performed by the employees.  Sponsors who currently are seen as donating money to provide benefits for individual children would be recouched, in legal terms, as providing for the salary and benefits of individual child employees.  In the United States they would continue donating to a non-profit charitable organization; that organization in turn would be, on the books, investing capital in a for profit corporation in a foreign country that is operating at a constant loss.  In doing this, the organization manages to deliver its care, much the same care as it is currently delivering, and the Indian government cannot prevent that care from being delivered without creating a lot of laws that are going to severely negatively impact its tourism trade.

Certainly the system would incur taxes and tariffs, but how serious can we be about wanting to help these poor people if we are unwilling to deal with such government regulations and costs?  There might be official industry standards to meet, but we deal with those problems in our own country–soup kitchens and homeless shelters are required to meet commercial facilities standards in order to deliver services to the homeless, and while it is an impediment to meeting those needs it is one that we overcome regularly.

I am not on the ground in India; I don’t know how severe or complex the problems actually are.  I think, though, that we are looking at some of the poorest people in the world, and I understand it is one of Compassion International’s largest national efforts, so I am hoping that if they give it some consideration they can find a way to continue delivering aid to these starving children within the strictures being imposed by the government and whatever other opponents they face.

I pray that they will find a way.

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Law and Politics

#158: Show Me Religious Freedom

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This is mark Joseph “young” blog entry #158, on the subject of Show Me Religious Freedom.

It appears that Missouri has become a battleground for issues of church-state relations.  During the election we noted in web log post #126:  Equity and Religion that there was a ballot issue related to a cigarette tax to fund childhood education which included controversial language permitting such funds to go to programs sponsored by religious institutions or groups.  The measure was soundly defeated, incidently (59% to 40%), but whether that was due to opposition to the almost unnoticed clause about funding religious groups or to the near one thousand percent increase in the cigarette tax can’t be known.  The state is back in the news on the religion subject, as a lawsuit between the state and a church school is going to be heard by the United States Supreme Court this year.

The case is Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, Inc. v. Pauley, and SCOTUSblog nicely summarizes the issue as

Whether the exclusion of churches from an otherwise neutral and secular aid program violates the Free Exercise and Equal Protection Clauses when the state has no valid Establishment Clause concern.

But perhaps that will make more sense if we put some detail to it.

img0158Tires

Missouri runs a program that collects used tires and recycles them into playground surfacing material, providing schools and other facilities with a durable but softer play surface.  The program is funded by a surcharge on new tires–technically tax money dedicated to the purpose of handling scrap tires.  Trinity Lutheran Church runs a school which has a playground used by the students but also by neighborhood children.  They applied to the program to resurface that playground with the safer materials, but were refused on the grounds of a church-state issue.

Some would argue that the “separation of church and state” is on the state’s side in this, but that is not in the Constitution.  The Establishment Clause means only that the government cannot show favoritism between various religious and non-religious organizations; it can’t promote any specific religion, nor can it oppose any specific religion.  It will be argued as to whether providing playground surfacing materials to a church-run school might be promoting that church, but that is not all that is at stake.  Missouri is one of thirty-eight states which have what is known as a “Blaine Amendment”, after Maine Senator James G. Blaine who in 1875 proposed an amendment to the United States Constitution along these lines.  The Constitutional amendment proposal failed, but the majority of states adapted the concept to a variety of state constitutional amendments which were adopted and are still the law in those states.

The mindset of the nineteenth century was so very different from ours today that it is difficult to grasp.  If ever the United States was a “Christian nation” (I do not believe such an entity ever has or even can exist), it was so then.  Protestant denominations were separated from each other in friendly competition, and often worked together in evangelistic outreach; we had come through two “Great Awakenings” from which the vast majority of Americans, and particularly those who were neither Jewish nor recent immigrants (such as the Chinese in California), were Christians in Protestant churches.  However, those new immigrants–particularly the Irish and the Italians–were predominantly Roman Catholic, and Protestants still feared Catholicism, and not entirely unreasonably.  The fear arose because in countries dominated by Catholicism governments were perceived as following the dictates of the church–a fear which remained in this country until then Presidential candidate John Fitzgerald Kennedy made his September 1960 speech on the subject.  As a result, Blaine was the tip of an iceberg of an effort to prevent Catholicism from conquering America through the democratic process, perceived as in effect making the Pope our de facto emperor.  (We see similar efforts today reacting to the fear that Islamic immigrants will conquer by democratic process and impose Sharia Law on America.)

The word used was “sectarian”, and we might find that word inappropriate for its meaning.  After all, even at the dawn of the 1960s public school classes were opened with prayer and a reading from the Bible.  However, these were Protestant prayers, prayers that would have been embraced by every denomination from Episcopalian to Lutheran to Presbyterian to Baptist to Pentecostal.  They were thus viewed as non-sectarian, not preferring any one Christian denomination over any other.  Up until Pope John XXIII, Catholicism regarded all Protestants as condemned heretics (and it was more recently than that that the church has reached the position that there might be salvation outside the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches).  That was seen as the divisive position; the Protestant’s rejection of that was not seen as divisive, because Protestants were otherwise united and respected each other’s beliefs, at least in this country.

Blaine’s effort was attempting to prevent state money from going to Catholic education (“sectarian schools”).  Missouri’s version is considerably more strict.  It reads:

That no money shall ever be taken from the public treasury, directly or indirectly, in aid of any church, sect or denomination of religion, or in aid of any priest, preacher, minister or teacher thereof, as such; and that no preference shall be given to nor any discrimination made against any church, sect or creed of religion, or any form of religious faith or worship.

Arguably, read strictly this would prevent underpaid teachers in private religious schools from receiving food stamps or Aid to Families with Dependent Children, or prevent unemployed ordained ministers from getting welfare or social security.  No one has made that argument to this point; such programs were then not even imagined.

So this is what the First Amendment actually says:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

The sense is that the government will not interfere with the opinions of the people, or the expression thereof.  In a sense, the government has to be “opinion blind”–it can’t decline to give food stamps to a member of the Libertarian Party, or refuse to hire someone who previously worked for a Catholic charity, or decide whether someone can speak at a public meeting based on whether he was once Boy Scout or Mason or Gideon.

It would also seem to mean that the government cannot decide that an organization cannot receive public funds for a strictly secular purpose based on whether it is a religious organization.

Let us for the moment take the name out of this case.  Let us suppose that the plaintiff is the Columbia Community School.  It happens to be run by the Columbia Community Fellowship, but is incorporated separately as an educational institution.  Thus the application for materials from the program says that the applicant is “Columbia Community School”.  The question suddenly becomes whether the people who make the decision have the right to ask whether “Columbia Community School” is a religious organization–which under our hypothetical it is, but you would not know that from the name on the application.  Would it be a violation of the first amendment for the government to inquire whether the school is a religious organization?  Two points should by raised.  One is that it is established that the playground is used by children in the neighborhood who have no connection to the school; the other is that many public and private schools rent or even lend their facilities to groups for meetings some of which use these facilities for religious worship services–a use which the courts have agreed is legitimate, and indeed that it would be unconsitutional to forbid such use solely on the basis that publicly owned properties are being used by private individuals for religious purposes on the same terms that they are being used by other organizations for other purposes.  It thus seems that it would be illegal to ask the question, and the only reason the issue exists here is that we assume an organization with the words “Trinity”, “Lutheran”, and “Church” in the name is a religious organization.  While that seems a safe assumption, it is as prejudicial as assuming that someone with the given name “Ebony” or “Tyrone” must be black.

Let us also consider this aspect of the separation of the organization from the purpose.  Brigham Young University is clearly connected to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (The Mormons).  It also receives government grants for scientific research.  Should the fact that the school was founded by a religious organization for religious purposes disqualify it from receiving such monies?  If so, should the same rule apply to schools like Princeton, Harvard, Yale, and Notre Dame?  Patently it is legitimate use of government money to support academic research in secular fields, even if performed by religious persons at religious institutions.

It appears that the only sane conclusion here is that the government cannot discriminate against religious persons or institutions in the disbursement of aid for secular purposes.  We might argue that there is a fungible resources issue, that the money the church does not have to spend on playground resurfacing is money they can use for religious purposes, but ultimately the only use that this paving material has is to create safer play surfaces for children, and the only way the church can get that material is through the government program, so denying it would be making “a law respecting an establishment of religion”, clearly forbidden by the Bill of Rights.

The Blaine Amendment, at least in the form it has in Missouri, is unconstitutional.

We’ll see whether the Supreme Court agrees with that later this year.

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Books by the Author

#157: Versers Restart

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This is mark Joseph “young” blog entry #157, on the subject of Versers Restart.

With permission of Valdron Inc I have begun publishing my third novel, For Better or Verse, in serialized form on the web (that link will take you to the table of contents).  If you missed the first two, you can find the table of contents for the first at Verse Three, Chapter One:  The First Multiverser Novel, and that for the second at Old Verses New.  There was also a series of web log posts looking at the writing process, the decisions and choices that delivered the final product; those posts are indexed along with the chapters in the tables of contents pages.  Now as the third is posted I am again offering a set of “behind the writings” insights.  This “behind the writings” look definitely contains spoilers because it sometimes talks about what I was planning to do later in the book–although it sometimes raises ideas that were never pursued.  You might want to read the referenced chapters before reading this look at them.  Links below (the section headings) will take you to the specific individual chapters being discussed, and there are (or will soon be) links on those pages to bring you back hopefully to the same point here.

There is also a section of the site, Multiverser Novel Support Pages, in which I have begun to place materials related to the novels beginning with character papers for the major characters, hopefully giving them at different stages as they move through the books.

This covers the first eleven chapters of the book.

img0157Ocean

History of the series, including the reason it started, the origins of character names and details, and many of the ideas, are in those earlier posts, and won’t be repeated here.

Chapter 1, Slade 43

I had already decided that Slade would return in the third novel, and that right from the beginning he would be on this quest on behalf of the Caliph of the West Wind.  It seemed the place to start, particularly as my immediate audience wanted Slade back, I was very uncertain what I was doing with Derek, and even less certain what I was going to do with Lauren.  I knew quite a bit about the end of this book already, including that Filp would die on this venture but Slade would marry Shella and take her with him henceforth (perhaps also inspired by Chris Jones, whose character in my game married one of the princesses from The Dancing Princess).  I knew that Derek, Lauren, Bethany, Slade, and Shella would all be fighting together against the vampire Tubrok.  I knew that Lauren would free Merlin (and I knew where he was, but not how she would free him) during a critical confrontation.  I knew that she would use the spell which killed Horta, and that it would again kill her but only weaken Tubrok, that Derek would be horrified at seeing this.  I thought probably Derek would deal the fatal blow, but did not know how.  What I did not know was how to transition Slade from the very peaceful Parakeet world to the beginning of this venture.  I made it up as I wrote.

When writing books in series, one of the initial problems is how to introduce characters that your series readers already know and your new readers have never previously encountered.  Here I reintroduce Bob by talking about his feelings about that previous rescue mission.  I also give Lauren a touch of introduction, which will make her appearance a bit easier in the third chapter.

This is one of the unusual universe transitions:  Bob does not die, but in essence gates into the supernatural realm (what we call the “border supernatural”, places where mortal and supernatural beings can meet with each other without entering the other’s true realm) and then is sent from it to another universe.

Bob does not yet realize where he is, only that it is incongruous with his expectations.

Chapter 2, Brown 56

Again with Derek I have to put together who he is and what last happened to him.

I had committed myself to The Zygote Experience, an idea that was included in Multiverser:  Referee’s Rules and formalized in Multiverser:  The First Book of Worlds.  But I was undecided whether Derek would be born a human or, for some reason that kept playing in the back of my mind, a sprite.  I thought that it would be interesting to make him a small flying person; and although I had no idea how I was going to get him back to being human or what I would do about the wings as he transformed through successive worlds, the idea kept coming back to me.

It is that world description that suggests the player should not be given sufficient information to know where he is.  I wanted to keep the reader uncertain as well.  Yet I needed to move the story forward apart from the birth experience, and the mind of the mother made sense.  Thus I had to commit, and I went with the sprite.

The world description gives a lot of information about what an unborn child experiences, beginning as a zygote.  By this point Derek is a blastocyst.  Although the game does not dictate the notion of spirits, too many things in fiction rely on them for them not to be real in the game world, and thus Derek, whose spirit is now twenty-two or twenty-three years old, is able to think and make observations while still a blastocyst—although the fact that his body is so new means he is always falling asleep.

The moment when he realizes he is hungry is part of that blastocyst growth prior to implantation:  the energy and matter that had been in the single-celled zygote has been spent and divided to create a multi-celled blastocyst, and at this point it is floating inside the fallopian tubes on the way to the uterus.  Until it gets there and becomes implanted in the uterine wall, there is no additional sustenance coming into the body, and it would feel depleted to some degree.

Chapter 3, Hastings 96

The odd thing about this world was that I had no idea what to do with Lauren at all.  In a sense, this was what I would in play have called a stall world–a place I could drop her where nothing would happen for a bit and she would spend time running around doing things that looked worthwhile until I could think of what to do with her.  I needed to move Slade’s story forward, and that meant I needed to write Lauren’s story; but I didn’t know what her story should be, so I just wrote something to see where it would go.  The volcano was there partly to give credibility to the island and partly to give me a potential danger to help get her out of here.  I quickly decided that she should be cut off from any contact with other land, as the reader would wonder why she did not attempt to reach it.

I had developed this world, or a world very like it, for demo games.  I had run a game at a Delaware game shop called Days of Knights, and discussed demos with the proprietor.  He said that whatever it was that made the game special, that had to happen within the first half hour of play.  I had previously had the problem that I would start all my players in a gather world and they would often stick there for a long time—which is great for campaign play, but terrible for showing what Multiverser can do.  I needed a world in which I could put all the player characters, give them a bit of an introduction to the game world, then kill them all, abruptly and with certainty, so they could all go to different worlds.  I decided on what I dubbed Tropical Island, a volcano that could go off whenever I decided it should.  I’ve used it fairly consistently since then as the starting world for new players in convention and demo games.  I didn’t change much here, although in game I tend to keep the psi and mag biases very low to limit their options.

Again the point is to introduce a character known to the readers who came from the previous book but new to those who are joining the story here.

The stick in the sand is a trick taught to scouts, although she doesn’t do it exactly right.  The trick is to align the stick with the direction of the sun so it casts no shadow, and as the sun moves west its shadow will appear pointing east.  That does not matter to Lauren; what she needs to know is whether the sun is moving, whether it’s morning or afternoon, and how long the day is likely to be.

Chapter 4, Slade 44

Having found this way of getting Slade out of the Parakeet world, and having realized that somehow he was bringing the humor back into his own story, I kept moving forward with my beginning.

It was at this point that I finally worked out what the quest was, and why Slade would have to do it.

The line “Welcome to my parlor” is the beginning of a quote that continues, “said the spider to the fly,” and so is about walking into a trap.  Slade uses it because he does not know what to anticipate, but if it’s a trap he’s unlikely to be able to escape it whatever he does.

The caliph corrects Slade’s grammar unobtrusively:  he looks well; he is good.

The caliph is explaining the concept we called the “border supernatural”, those places that are like the spirit world but also like the material world, where spirits and mortals can meet and interact as if in the spirit world but not actually in that incomprehensible place.

Majdi is the name of a close family friend who does not ever use his first name, spelled Magdi but pronounced with a soft g.  I needed an Arabic name, and my friend is Palestinian and of Muslim parents, so I figured it was close enough without sounding stock.  Acquivar and Phasius, and most of the names I used, I invented from whole cloth.

As mentioned, I knew before I finished the first book that Filp and Shella would be here in the third, and several of the major events that would happen in connection with them.

Chapter 5, Brown 57

The pattern of the sprite names is probably owed to E. R. Jones.  He created a sprite character for a fantasy game in which I played, named Lanethlelachtheana.  I heard it and recorded it as Laneth Lelach Theana.  When I started writing these characters, I thought Derek would make the same mistake as I; and I obviously copied elements of the other name into Theian Orlina Lelach and her husband Theian Alanda Morani.

I also began to debate whether, or when, to have Derek attempt telepathic contact with Lelach.  I didn’t want to do it, for a host of reasons, but I was beginning to think my story would die on the vine if I didn’t do something with it.

Continuing the follow the notes of The Zygote Experience, Derek has just experienced implantation—he is now attached to the uterine wall, and so feels his mother’s movement.  This also results in the influx of sustenance, as he is no longer relying on the initial food supply of the ovum for continued growth.  The heartbeat is also an early development following implantation, and he notices it but credits the notice to the fact that he is following an interesting story by mind reading.

Chapter 6, Hastings 97

I still didn’t know what she was going to do, so I was filling the space with things that might lead somewhere.

When I wrote this, I had a clear idea in my mind as to what that particular motion of the shadow signified; however, it may be easier to go from what shadow motion a specific path of the sun would produce than to go the other direction.

Chapter 7, Slade 45

I had not considered the idea of retelling the backstory of how Slade found the bottle; but the presence of Shella gave me the opportunity, so I attempted to do so as swiftly as I could.  I cut it where I did because I’d had enough dialogue about things the reader might already know, and didn’t want to compound it with dialogue about things they had just read.  In fact, at this moment I was not certain how I was going to repeat the information about the quest without seeming to repeat it.

It was easy to recall Filp’s suspicious nature; his character fell into place quite quickly.

Chapter 8, Brown 58

Again, I decided that what works well stretched out in a game has to be compacted in a book; so I moved forward to the end of the pregnancy.  I also recognized that it would be difficult to keep the reader in the dark much longer (if indeed he had not already worked out what Derek had not), even with my suggested interpretations.

The perspective that the tank seems to be shrinking is of course because he is growing rapidly and the tank is the same size.  However, he is unlikely to recognize that—we don’t really notice that we are growing until we realize that things around us seem smaller and we know they can’t be, and there is nothing around him he can easily use for a size reference.

Chapter 9, Hastings 98

Left or right was actually the title of a Game Ideas Unlimited article I had done and recently referenced in another article, so it was in my mind as I wrote the opening words of this chapter.  Oddly, the point of the article is that the referee can make such decisions not matter, and that was poignantly so in my mind here, as I still had no idea what she was going to do.

I was wondering whether the objects of Lauren’s quest should be buried.  I kept swithering between having the rod (for I had decided that was her first target) be in the water, on the beach, or buried.  I also began to think of the idea of a cave.  Actually, I had wondered about a cave as a potential place for adventure already, but had back-burnered this because I had the equipment quest to occupy my attention and I didn’t yet know what I would do in the cave.

The part about climbing being easier than descending is something they teach in Scouts.  I’m not quite sure why it is so, but the body does seem better built for ascending.

Chapter 10, Slade 46

I invented the breakfast on the spot.  I had not considered anything of the sort until I started writing this.  It was partly because I needed to get Slade up and partly because I recognized the need to show the hospitality of the Caliph.

The discussion of life and death was also unplanned; it just seemed to flow from the conversation.

Chapter 11, Brown 59

Nothing here was new except perhaps the “Wa maa” for “Where am I”.  I thought that seemed plausible, given the sounds I heard newborns make when I had them myself.

The wings should be a surprise even for anyone who had worked out that he was being reborn.  She does mention flying at one point, but it’s only a passing reference early when Derek is certain that he’s listening to crazy thoughts or fantasy dreams.

This has been the first behind the writings look at For Better or Verse.  Assuming that there is interest, I will continue preparing and posting them every eleven chapters, that is, every three weeks.

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Law and Politics

#156: A New Slant on Offensive Trademarks

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This is mark Joseph “young” blog entry #156, on the subject of A New Slant on Offensive Trademarks.

Anyone following the Redskins trademark dispute will be interested to know that the United States Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case that is going to impact that–not the Redskins case itself, but a case close enough in its content that a Virginia federal appeals court has put the Redskins case on hold pending the outcome of the present case.

The case, Lee v. Tam, involves an American rock band whose members are all Asian, who want to trademark their band’s name, The Slants.  The U. S. Patent and Trademark Office refused to register the name on the grounds that it was disparaging of Asian Americans.  However, the Federal Appeals Court for the Federal Circuit overturned that decision, stating that it was an unconstitutional impingement on free speech, concluding that the provision under trademark law forbidding such protection of any trademark which “[c]onsists of…matter which may disparage…persons, living or dead, institutions, beliefs, or national symbols, or bring them into contempt, or disrepute” is unconstitutional on its face.

The Patent and Trademark Office has appealed, and the Obama Justice Department has supported that appeal.

The Slants performing at the 2016 Saboten Con at the Sheraton Grand Phoenix in Phoenix, Arizona, photo by Gage Skidmore.
The Slants performing at the 2016 Saboten Con at the Sheraton Grand Phoenix in Phoenix, Arizona, photo by Gage Skidmore.

Simon Shiao Tam, founder of the band, argues that they took the name as a way of embracing their Asian heritage, and that it neither offends those Asian Americans who are their fans nor is intended to do so.  He also points out that “slants”, while popularly used as a racial slur, has other non-racial meanings (unlike “Redskins”, “Nigger“, and similar epithets).  Still, the question isn’t whether the word can be used in an inoffensive manner, but whether the government can deny a trademark on the grounds that some might take it to be offensive.

One of the arguments raised by the government is that the State of Texas won a decision that they did not have to permit a personalized license plate design which included the Confederate Flag.  There, however, the argument was that since the plate is an official government document issuing such plates would be as if the government were endorsing the use of that flag.  It is, perhaps, a weak argument–the government cannot legally be endorsing all the organizations which apply for such plate designs, many of whom have political or religious connections–but it is weaker applied to trademarks, as the Office has repeatedly asserted that the issuance of a trademark does not indicate endorsement of what it represents.

Against the government, enforcement of the rule has been uneven.  Numerous trademarks have been issued that include racial epithets or other offensive language.  If the government wins, many of those might have to be rescinded, and might end up in litigation.

Against The Slants, there is at least some reason for enforcement of a rule against offensive trademarks.  A broad decision here could open the door to a wealth of product names far more offensive to far more groups.  A narrow decision would probably have to take the line that whether the trademark is offensive must be determined in the context of whether the audience would perceive it so.  The slogan “Bring your bitch here” is probably not offensive if it is used by a groomer or veterinary clinic, but would be so at the entrance to a bar.  However, the harder case would be whether accommodations near the Westminster Kennel Club dog show could use that slogan to let breeders and trainers know that their animals are welcome in the rooms or dining areas.  Yet the court might here find that context matters and still rule against The Slants, since the question would be whether “slants” is an offensive Asian epithet and they are an all-Asian band.

Ultimately, though, as Ray Bradbury reminded us half a century ago, everything worth writing is offensive to someone.  Any effort to censor free expression in trademarks is doomed to failure, because the issue of what is and is not offensive is too subjective to legislate.

I am inclined to think that people who register and use offensive trademarks in order to be offensive will alienate potential customers and pay an economic penalty for it.  That should be a sufficient disincentive to the practice.  Otherwise, our high courts will spend a tremendous amount of time reviewing lawsuits over whether individual trademark applications are or are not too offensive under whatever standard is adopted.

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