Category: Faith and Wisdom (Page 4 of 6)

I: (Clapping)  Welcome back to our show.  We’ve got a real doozy scheduled here today.  Since it’s November sweeps, we’re finally going to have the show that you’ve all been waiting for.  Jesus is here to give us the low down on what the bad stuff is?

J: What would that be?

I: Why, sin, of course.

J: Oh, that.

I: So, Jesus, would you like to tell us what it’s all about?  What is sin?  What are we not allowed to do?  What do you consider bad stuff?

J: Hmm.  Well, you’re all sinners, and you’ll never hope to not be.  Got it?  Okay, good, that’s our show.

I: (sweating) Umm, Jesus, don’t you have any more than that?  We’ve got a half hour to fill here.  I thought there would be more.

J: (smiling)  A-ha, gotcha.  I had you going there, didn’t I?  Sorry, that’s my slightly impish human side coming out.  Sorry, really, I’m sorry, but there’s some truth to what I just said.  Sin is simple, and there’s nothing necessarily wrong with it, in that it is a state from which there is no possible escape.  Sin is your natural state of being.

Now, before everybody despairs, I just want to say, it’s okay.  The test is graded on a curve.  Sin is relative.  Since nobody is perfect, everybody is imperfect, and since everybody is imperfect, you only have to do the best you can.

So what is the best I can?

I: That’s what we all want to hear.

J: I got an email the other day.  It’s pretty typical, really.  It’s one of the multitudes of morally righteous, outraged, “Our society is going to hell in a hand-basket if we don’t corral these wicked people”  style diatribes.  The basis of the email was indignation at the Georgia Tech’s hosting of some sort of Gay and Lesbian fair.  It detailed all the typical propaganda points of distasteful ways in which this group of society lives its life:  Anal sex, condom use, partners, piercings, flamboyant dress, everything that could possibly offend the conservative portions of society about how “bad” and “evil” and “distasteful” these people are.  It detailed how superior are the good and God-fearing among you.  How could you not be good?  You’re offended by this perversion.  Bravo, you are special.

I: I’m sensing sarcasm.

J: You bet your sweet ass!  Nothing irritates me more than this form of moral superiority.  Look how bad and corrupt these people are.  Look how great and good and pure I am because I’m not doing those things.  In fact, I’m defending the “righteous” way, but telling everyone how bad these people are and warning them to not send their children to such a corrupt and despicable school.  Imagine, trying to understand our fellow humans, bridge a cultural gap, and bring one another closer in brotherhood.  The nerve.

No, sin, is a state in which you all live.  It’s not bad per say, but sin is something that refers to a lost opportunity, a  lost opportunity to do something good, not not doing something bad.  Purity isn’t abstinence.  Purity isn’t temperance.  Purity isn’t what you don’t do.

Example:  instead of judging gays and lesbians and any “other” that offends you, why don’t you go with love and get to know them?  A lot of people in this outcast community live difficult lives.  They either have to hide who they are, or live it out in the open, in your face style.  They are starved for love and acceptance and have been burned so many times they attempt to beat you to the punch, so to speak.  I reject you before you reject me.

Why not do the contrary thing?  You are trying to offend me, but I love you anyway.  I accept you.  Let’s find common ground.

Sure, a promiscuous lifestyle isn’t very good for you, health-wise or emotionally, but neither is being fat, an alcoholic, or intolerant.  Sin is the thing over which you trip, but not tripping in an of itself isn’t the point.  Show me a person who never tripped in his life, and I’ll show you someone who didn’t do anything.  I’ll show you a person who wasted his life.  Now that is what really offends me.

Want to know what offends me?  Go to church every Sunday, live a quiet comfortable life without offending anyone, without helping anyone, without taking any risks.  Live a good life of piety and with the self-satisfaction that you are a “good” person because you’ve done no wrong.  That offends me.  Bigtime.

Show me a gay man who has gay sex with his partner and marches in a gay pride parade and works in the Mission District of San Francisco in his free time, who fights for the rights of AIDs infected children to be adopted by loving gay couples, who is kind to strangers and invites them into his home, and I’ll show you someone who’s doing what he should be doing.  He loves his significant other.  He’s committed to love and  inspired by it to reach out to others and help them.  He doesn’t worry about himself and what people will think, or what the laws say about his rights with his significant other, or what laws say about gay couples adopting, or the multitudes of slights both big and small that he has to deal with every day by virtue of being a minority.  Does he have love in his heart?  Yes?  Well then, forget the fact that his lifestyle offends you.  Get over it.  It doesn’t bother me, why should it bother you?

I: But, Jesus, not to disagree with you, but are there some things that are absolutely right and absolutely wrong?  I mean isn’t moral relativism the slippery slope to decay and decadence and ultimate destruction?

J: (big booming God voice) Yey, verily, I shall rain fire and brimstone upon your sinful cities and wipe them from the face of the earthly kingdom.  I shall purge your wickedness so that I may be satisfied.

I: (silence)

J: (haha) Got you again.  *reaches for the bowl of cocktail nuts and pops a few* No, dude, that’s Old Testament stuff.  *munching* Look, the Divine Creator got a good healthy dose and appreciation of sin when he sent me.  Dad, just couldn’t figure out why you guys keep running around in the dark beating on each other when you were scared.  He said to me once, ‘Son, I created them.  I used the universe to breathe life into that which was devoid.  They didn’t have any right to exist, but I gave them a gift.  Why do they wail and gnash their teeth so?  Why do they not give thanks to the cosmos for birthing them?  Why does this not inspire them to greatness?’

And I said, ‘Dad, you don’t understand sin, do you?  I think I need to experience what the universe is through their eyes.  I need to feel their pain, their doubt, their limited state of being.’

So, I did.  I experienced it all: doubt, fear, and death.  I think I get what it’s like, which is why I’m here today.  Don’t worry about sin.  It’s your perpetual state of being.  It’s simply a condition under which you all live.  If it is a universal constant to the human condition, that is, it applies to EVERYONE, it is irrelevant.  Sin doesn’t matter.  Forget about it.

So, parents, if you want the best for your children or yourselves, embrace those that offend you.  Get to know them, take the opportunity to share in love with those that might be having a tough time.  Purity isn’t “not drinking” “not having sex before marriage” “not doing drugs” “going to church” and “not being gay.”  What I want for you is for you to be honest with yourselves and try as hard as you can to love the other no matter how much they offend you.

Love them EVEN when they are trying to kill you.  I mean, really really really LOVE them.  Feel it down in your bones, not as a sacrifice, but as a joy.  When I got nailed to that cross and I said, “forgive them Father for they know not what they do.”  I wasn’t saying that for my sake, like, ‘Look how holy I am, I can forgive those that would kill me.’  No, I was making a plea to the Father for them to feel just for a brief instant in their lives the love I felt for them at that moment.  For if they could feel it just for a second, if they could feel the rapture of it all, then they would realize that sin is irrelevant, and that before they got to know me, their lives were wasted on fear and hate and idle gossip, pettiness, and intolerance.  If they could have just for a second accepted that love and allowed themselves to be remade by it, then there would be no thing too hard, no mission too difficult, and nothing in the universe that did not bring them joy.

Peace out, my brothers and sisters.  I love you ALL.

From our ongoing chat with Jesus.

I: Welcome back, Jesus.  We’re glad to have you.

J: Good to be here.

I: Hey, Jesus, I wanted to ask you about Obedience.  It seems to be all the rage now.  “Be obedient” be Christ-like.  Submit to authority, go with the flow. etc.  It’s seemingly in vogue these days, and I’d like to get your take on it.

J: That’s cool, man.  Let me just begin by saying.  I wasn’t obedient.  Oh, sure to the Father, but here in meatspace?  Absolutely not.  Obedience is a precious thing.  You don’t give it out to just anyone.  It’s yours and yours alone.  I mean, that’s one of the cornerstones of the universe – free will – you own it, it’s yours, but don’t try to get out of it either.  ‘I was just following orders’ didn’t work for the Nazi’s.  It won’t work for you.

Frankly I don’t want you to be obedient.  I want you to rouse the rabble, shake the dust off of institutions, kick hypocrisy in the gut, make those in authority answer to justice.  Keep it real.  Make the world a better place.

I really don’t know where you people got this *^$&…. pardon me, can I say that?

I: Um, no.  Don’t worry, you don’t mind if we bleep you, right?

J: Sure no problem, I thought we were on cable.

Where was I?  Oh, yeah, I don’t know where a good many followers got the idea that being Christian means just going with the flow, being obedient, passive, and peaceful.  What part of the Passion seemed peaceful to you?

I: Um, none of it?

J: Absolutely right, but I had an agenda and that agenda was to break down, or at least show how confining the old social religious structures were.  I tore down the temple and fed it to the people who were starving.  And they were starving, starving for inclusion, love, acceptance.  They were subjugated by an authority that didn’t serve them, and worse yet, devalued them.  I got waxed because I was dangerous, not obedient.

Actually, it’s kinda funny, Mom always said my mouth would get me in trouble.  I understood her preoccupation, but it’s weird how she was right, isn’t it?

Well, there you go.  Obedience is wack, man.  Are the kids still saying ‘wack’?

I: I think so, perhaps it’s faded a bit from the popular lexicon.

J: Now, since I am trying to be less obtuse these days, I’ll just leave you with this caveat:  Obedience is truly a hugely important trait/gift/virtue.  Be very careful to whom you give it.  I gave it to a higher calling, my vocation, my mission.  I did not rest my obedience in the hands of men, although I am perhaps a special case.  You know, you all have to place at least some measure of obedience in the hands of those that guide governments, churches, etc. but, all I can say is this:

Give it begrudgingly – very begrudgingly

Peace out.

I: Welcome back again.  We’ve just got a ton to talk about, and since Jesus seems to be indulging us, we’re just going to keep right on rolling.  J, I’ll be blunt.  What do you think about Pat Robertson’s comments about el Presidente, Hugo Chavez of Venezuela?

J: What do you mean, ‘what do I think’? I can imagine you want me to condemn Robertson for making such a comment, or perhaps you want me to justify them because he’s a ‘Man of God.’  Maybe you want to see me squirm. Or maybe, just maybe you really want to know the answer.  What is the Truth?

I:  – That last one.

J: Okay, I’m in a good mood, so I’ll just spill it all out.  You people, and I mean that in the kindest of all ways *rolls eyes*, have this tendency to… um, I don’t know, screw up.  You make mistakes.  You act in thoughtless selfish ways.  You get lost in your anger and fear.  But hey, you know, it’s okay.  Well, not okay okay but you know what I mean.  It happens.  Look, if I ever wanted anything done around here, that is, if I had to employ you in beneficial service of human-kind, and I waited for a perfect person… well, let’s just say, I’d still be waiting.  No, I’ve got to pick the flawed to serve.  Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., one of my favorites, I’ll never forget what he said to me, ‘Jesus, I’m not worthy.  I can’t serve you.  Why did you pick me?  I’m a poor poor man.’ 

I laughed in his face.  ‘Martin,’ I said, ‘I’ve been looking for someone for 400 years to help out with this slavery/apartheid thing, and where’s that gotten us.  I’m afraid you’re the best we’ve got.  Sometimes you go to war with the army you have, not the army you want.’  Apologies to Rummy.  ‘But seriously, Martin, if we don’t do something about life in America, right now, we’re going to lose another generation.  You can do something about it right now.  Sure, you’re not perfect, but at this moment, you’re the best.  You’re the best chance of helping me fulfill my promise.  Won’t you help me Martin?’  So I ended up saying Martin, I need your help.  Don’t give me that crap about how you’re not perfect, or you’ll screw it up, or whatnot.  I need your help, and I think you can do the job.

What can you take from that?  Well, for one, the Son of God asking for help?!  I mean comeon.  That’s heavy.  I may be the Son of God, but I have an ego the size of some quantum particle you haven’t discovered yet.  I ask for help every day.  I’ve asked you all for help.  You can respond in a variety of ways.  You can ignore it, say no you’re too busy, cry about how you’re not worthy, or just suck it up and make it happen.

And how does this all relate to Chavez, Robertson, and foreign policy?  First of all, if you fix on what I’ve been saying, you’ll notice that I promote, not demote.  Robertson and Bush and the US State Department have a big beef with Chavez right now.  I’ll grant that he’s been a agitator.  He’s no angel, let me tell you, but he has done some good things.  He’s sponsored Cuban doctors in South America in medical programs for the poor.  He’s helped the poor in his own country.  He’s forging an alliance with an isolated and ravaged country.  Maybe his motivations are wrong, but the best thing any person in the US State Department can do right now to steal his thunder, his rhetoric…

Give him a round of applause.  Hey Hugo, I like what you’re doing down there.  We stand with the people of Venezuela, and congratulate a leader like you for your concern for the downtrodden and mistreated.  Is there anything we can do to help?

Is it naive?  It won’t work, you say?

Like what you’re doing now is working so well, right?

Peace out.

…And no philosophy, sadly, has all the answers. No matter how assured
we may be about certain aspects of our belief, there are always painful
inconsistencies, exceptions, and contradictions. This is true in religion as
it is in politics, and is self-evident to all except fanatics and the naive.
As for the fanatics, whose number is legion in our own time, we might be
advised to leave them to heaven. They will not, unfortunately, do us the
same courtesy. They attack us and each other, and whatever their
protestations to peaceful intent, the bloody record of history makes clear
that they are easily disposed to restore to the sword. My own belief in
God, then, is just that — a matter of belief, not knowledge. My respect
for Jesus Christ arises from the fact that He seems to have been the
most virtuous inhabitant of Planet Earth. But even well-educated Christians
are frustated in their thirst for certainty about the beloved figure
of Jesus because of the undeniable ambiguity of the scriptural record.
Such ambiguity is not apparent to children or fanatics, but every
recognized Bible scholar is perfectly aware of it. Some Christians, alas,
resort to formal lying to obscure such reality.
– Steve Allen, comedian, from an essay in the book “The Courage of
Conviction”, edited by Philip Berman

We got such a great response from the last informal chat with Jesus, we decided to follow it up with a second more formal part – well formal in that there will be questions, and we hope answers.  Jesus was very forthcoming last time, so we’re hoping to get a window in on ultimate Truth today.  Keep your fingers crossed folks.

I: Jesus, it’s nice to see you today, err I mean, ‘Jesus, the Savior, it’s nice to see you today.’

J: “Haha, that’s a good one.  (Jesus wipes a tear from his eye.) Whoo, *chuckle*.

I: So, Mr. Christ.

J: Call me Friend.

I: So, Friend, we on this planet have some burning questions for you.

J: Shoot.

I: We’re hoping you can clear up some things for us.  Maybe give us an update on your last best seller, “The Good News.”  I know you’re working on a sequel, but we’re hoping maybe you can give us a peak.

J: Be glad too.  In fact, it’s not so much a sequel as a 2nd edition.  It’s different of course, but all the basic information is there.  It’s just that it’s been nearly two thousand years, and a lot’s changed since then.  I thought an update was in order.  To some of your readers it will all seem new.  I’m trying to really get the message across to this modern age of good people who are looking for a purpose.  It might be considered a self help book, but I think if you look closely, it’s really an “other-help” book.

I: That’s interesting, care to give us an example.

J: Sure, yeah it’s super interesting and once you get it, very enlightening.  The other day, one of my children was walking into a gasoline station.  As he stepped toward the entrance, he realized he’d not looked at the pump number… you know, so he could have the cashier activate it once he stepped inside.  He strained his neck trying to figure out what pump it was, but couldn’t quite see it.  Suddenly, another of my beautiful children, a homeless man, offered that it was pump number two.  The homeless man was looking for a few cents of course, and I noted that the first man didn’t have any cash on him… which was okay.  So the first man offered him a thanks, paid for his gas, and left thinking of the homeless fellow who’d watched him intently and offered up the very thing he needed when he most needed it.  The gasoline buyer took with himself a beautiful lesson about what it means to be human, for what we are predestined, and why we exist.

I: for each other?

J: Yup, you got it.  That’s it.  Nothing more complicated or simple than that. Find a way to help.  Promote.  Don’t demote.

I: That’s a nice story.  So that’s a glimpse of what we’re going to see in the 2nd edition?

J: I think so.  I have to get with my editor.  I’m either too wordy or not wordy enough.  I never know the right balance.  I love you all, but sometimes you’re a confusing audience, and I love that by the way.  Many pore over every word looking for meaning, losing the forest for the trees.  Others just skim over parts that they think aren’t important.  As a result, I’m going to go with an old standby – the parable – it worked two thousand years ago, I think it will be successful in this age.  People seem to respond to stories very well.  I guess I just need to update them to make them more relevant.  Not a lot of people are farmers and fishers today, so that’s one area we have to update.  It is coming along nicely, though.  I think people will really enjoy it.  And for God’s sake (*chuckle*), don’t fight over it.

I: Thanks for talking with us today.  Stay tuned to this channel for more of our chat with our Friend, Jesus that cat from Nazareth.

J: Thanks, appreciate the opportunity.  Peace out.

The most costly of all follies is to believe passionately in the palpably not true. It is the chief occupation of mankind.
— H.L. Mencken

Jesus said, "Dude, relax.  It’s not about all this, even though
it is.  Look, it’s hard to explain, but you gotta lose yourself to
find yourself.  You’ve gotta give up your salvation to get
it.  But you know that it shouldn’t be your aim, and believe me I
can tell.  I’ve got this omniscience thing going on.  Do you
run up and help the homeless guy because he’s ‘Jesus’?  I get that
a lot, and I’m all like, ‘Dude, you’ve got eyes, right?  He’s not
me.’  No, I’m right here.  He is a child of mine, though, and
I’d appreciate it if you’d help him out but not for me, though. 
No no.  It’d be great if you could help him out for him. 
Know what I’m sayin’?  It’s kinda like that for most things. 
I’m not all into this mysticism thing.  Dad put the universe
together to be internally consistent.  It doesn’t violate any
rules.  Stuff doesn’t just magically happen.  There’s a
process. Dad’s big on process.  In fact, he got a little carried
away with process, and that’s why he sent me.  Had to get back in
touch with humanity. 

Anyway, where was I?  Oh, yeah,
Fear.  Fear is probably the toughest thing I’ve ever had to deal
with, both what I experienced, and what I observed in all of you. 
Fear is just the worst.  It binds up your hearts in ways that you
couldn’t imagine.  You see, I don’t want you to live like
that.  Fear really just makes me sad.  It’s really hard for
me to see people wanting so bad to save themselves that they forget to
love, forget to put themselves out there for others.  All they
want to do is connect to me, worship me, all the while hitting each
other with that book.  I’ve got mixed feelings about that book,
btw.  It’s not like I don’t get into it, but I understand the
limitation that people have trying to describe life-changing events,
changes in direction that come with a profound, transforming,
life-altering, some say mystical revelation.  I understand that
it’s tough to put it down on paper, so I empathize.  But some of
it is just so wrong.  All that stuff about retribution and fire
and brimstone – water to wine (I mean, geez, it was there all along,
but they had to do the whole, Oh look Jesus turned water to wine. 
It was really embarrassing. Yikes).

Anyway, so you’ve got these
people who are fearful hitting each other with this book like that’s
going to solve something.  Then you’ve got these other people who
are afraid to speak my name for fear of being labeled ‘one of
them.’  I empathize with that too.  Humans like to bottle up
these magnificent soaring attributes of faith, love, devotion, and
service into valuable commodities that they can own and keep
away from others, thereby increasing their perceived value (I picked
that up in a business class I took a while back).  So you hoard
your little trinkets hoping upon hope that they will appreciate and
then you’ll have something of value that your neighbor might not
have.  Of course the root of all this is that you’re afraid that
your future isn’t secure, that your faith might not be the right one,
that you’re on the wrong path.  By increasing the quantity of
like-minded individuals in your little "group" you increase your
value.  I like to call it Amway Christianity. 

Sigh, Dad and I got a good laugh out of that one, but I digress. 

So
we pre-package up all this magnificent stuff into these little
bundles.  Let’s call them words and symbols… or better yet,
let’s call them gangs.  Yeah, I like that.  So you’ve got
this quasi-believer, somebody who’d fallen away from the faith. 
Let’s call him an agnostic.  He just feels uncomfortable about all
these gang symbols.  He’s doesn’t want to get gunned down in enemy
territory, so he uses safe words like "mojo" or my personal fav "may
good thoughts be with you."  Jesus! (can I say that?) just say
I’ll pray for you, it’s not gonna kill you, and anyway that’s what good
thoughts are.  Sigh, no really it’s all good. 

I
don’t care what color you wear, or what you call prayer, good thoughts,
or mojo.  I know what you intend, and what’s more important, I
hear ya, dude.  Don’t matter what you call yourself, whether you
don’t like Jesus freaks (actually that’s our team name for a little
basketball league we put together up here… really does a number on
the opposition) ’cause you’re afraid or whether you don’t like gays and
hippies because you’re afraid, because they are subverting society and
the sanctity of marriage.  I know, and it’s okay.  But I’ve
got to say it just one more time in the hopes that it will sink
in.  I made you all (look, if it makes you feel better that you
just sprang into existence, that is perfectly okay with me as long as
you’re not afraid).  Better a courageous agnostic than a craven
Christian, I always say.  But you know I’m always rooting for that
craven soul, that lost, fearful, small little mustard seed.  I
keep saying, grow little seed, grow.  Encompass the world. 
Show me what you can do.  When you screw up – and you will – I
don’t go all retribution like.  I keep hoping upon hope that
you’ll put it together and make the shot.

And finally, I
don’t fear that you’ll fail.  You will.  I know that each
life lived is an opportunity.  It’s your chance to grow that
mustard seed of a spirit you have.  Whatever you do with it is
your choice, but I’d like to see you really come alive out there. 

Hey, this has gone on longer than I intended. Sorry about
that.   What do we do, you ask?   Okay, here it is,
but don’t tell anyone you got this from me.  We’re big on the
whole "figuring it out yourself thing" around here.  Chalk it up
to Dad’s whole "process is important" thing.  Whatever. 

Whatever
light you have that you use on yourself is wasted.  Whatever gift
you have that you don’t share with others to help them out is
wasted.  There’s this cool little story that I heard a bit
back.  In hell (which doesn’t actually exist, but after hearing
this, we’re thinking about putting one in just to see if this would
actually happen), inhabitants stand with their hands tied to a six foot
spoon over a pit of food.  The inhabitants are in a perpetual
state of hunger because they can’t feed themselves.  In heaven
(and this is the part I love) it’s the same deal, except no one goes
hungry.  Everybody feeds each other with their spoons.  I
don’t know if it’s because they’re less dumb or less selfish.  I
suspect the latter.   That’s it.  That’s all there
is. 

Peace out."