The Problem of Paternity

Today we are going to take a cultural journey into the literature that comprises the older portions of our Bible.

Three important factors underlie some of the stories, behavioral admonitions and restrictions that are found there, especially in first five books, Genesis through Deuteronomy.

First: the notion of honor and shame.  Family honor is a huge issue. Keep in mind that “family” encompasses the whole larger clan, all under the leadership of a patriarch.  If one person in the clan is insulted or degraded in some way, then shame falls upon the entire family group.  When that happens, something must be done to regain family honor.

Second: far more than other possessions, land represented wealth and security.  If a family had land, there was hope of economic survival.  Without it, more than likely the family would have to offer themselves as slave labor to a larger landowner.

Third: the law of primogeniture. The eldest brother in any family would inherit the land of his father, the patriarch, with the understanding that he needed to provide for the entire family from it, including those who worked as slaves.  Once that elder brother himself became the patriarch, he also inherited the responsibility of keeping the family honor intact.

Now, this quick overview can’t even prick the surface of the underlying culture, but it is a starting place to being to understand the necessity of knowing for sure the parentage of all children.

When a young woman married, she became a part of her husband’s extended family, and her birth family no longer had any claim on her or any responsibility for her.  Her children then became part of her husband’s family, not her birth family.

Should she have married the eldest brother, her first son will then be in line to be the next patriarch.  Even so, no matter where in the family structure she marries, her children will come under the protection of the clan. If one of them is hurt or dishonored in some way, the entire clan has a responsibility to avenge that hurt and regain honor.  In other words, each child born into the clan has a claim on the entire family for protection.  Each child born into the clan, however, is coming from a womb of a woman who is NOT originally part of the clan.

OK, if you have hung with me this far, can you see just how important the issue of paternity is in this kind of cultural family structure?  If there is any question at all about the paternity of the child (remember, no DNA tests available!), the glue that holds the family together could melt away, leaving them all in chaos and poverty.

Now, how do you ensure the paternity of a child?  Thank about it–how does someone make absolutely certain that a child born into a family is actually fathered by the correct person?

It’s really pretty simple:  keep all young women under lock and key, contract to marry them off the moment they develop the capacity to bear children, i.e., at puberty, check the bedsheets after the wedding night to find “proof” of virginity, and continue to keep them secluded after marriage.

For multiple reasons, the paternity issue is equally as significant today as it was in those patriarchal times.  However, it is also pretty impossible to keep our daughters under lock and key, and since many are reaching puberty when still pre-teens, and since we just don’t do arranged marriages any more, we’ve got a real issue on our hands.

The exploration of this question is all part of this larger series:  why are our older teens and young adults leaving the church?

Join us on Sunday when I’m going to bravely wade into one of the big reasons that they have expressed–our extremely inadequate theology of sexuality.  Oh my!

Mormons, Polygamy, and Secrecy

Yesterday, when I visited the blog “Ask Mormon Girl” and made a comment on her post about the need to talk about polygamy, I also received by email all the comments following mine.

They were many, and ranged from heartbreaking to hurt and angry to condemning. Many Mormon women posted about their agony over the fact that they had indeed been taught that a polygamous marriage was a necessity in what they call the “Celestial Kingdom.”  When some responded with the possibility that the doctrine of the necessity of polygamous marriages was no longer valid, others stated vehemently that this doctrine is core to Mormon belief and people either needed to get with the program or get out. A few peaceful voices interjected, again with the possibility that this particular doctrine had passed its prime, but they were generally ignored.

Current publicity coming out of the Mormon Church would have one believe that they are essentially mainstream Christian. From what I read yesterday, and from the other research I have done, secrecy cloaks the innermost workings and the innermost doctrines of Mormonism.

That scares me.  If these things cannot be brought to the light, I want to know why not.  What must be kept hidden?  Why? Who benefits most from that secrecy? Who is hurt the most?

Another thing that troubled me greatly was the amount of pain expressed by these Mormon women, who wanted nothing more but to love God fully, yet were learning that to do so, they had to sacrifice their own core values to live as good Mormon women in this completely male dominated religion.

I went to sleep last night wrestling in my soul yet one more time about the damage certain religious beliefs have brought. Much of that damage has fallen on women and other particularly vulnerable groups.

I have asked in my own spiritual journey over and over again, “Is it a true religion that systematically devalues a group of people in order that others may stay in power?”

After a restless night, and with continued trouble in my spirit, I am choosing to make these thoughts public. I live in a community with strong Mormon influence and have much respect for them. Some of my husband’s relatives are devout Mormons and good people.

But core doctrines like these condemn me and the vast majority of the world to damnation.  That being the case, they need careful examination. If they are true, then a bundle of us need to convert. If they are not, then a huge number of people have been systematically and cruelly deceived.

Mormons Argue

I heard about a blog called “Ask Mormon Girl” last fall, and have periodically taken a look at it.  I find Mormonism challenging–I do not actually think it can be called classically Christian, although it certain has elements that overlap with historic Christianity.

I was speaking once with a Mormon woman who confided in me that she was so looking forward to the Celestial Kingdom where she was would be the first wife among at least two others, as her husband would then have three wives.  I was so stunned by this that I couldn’t even reply, and she quickly changed the subject.

I mention that because the blog has brought up the subject of polygamy.  You can see the post and the comments here:  http://askmormongirl.wordpress.com/2012/01/22/im-pretty-sure-mormons-still-believe-in-polygamy-am-i-wrong/

The responses fascinate me on many levels.  First, the theological arguments are as strong in the Mormon world as they are in the Christian world, and they are as prone to labeling one another “aspostate” as we are.  Second, they also face the divide between the tight literalists and the progressives who think there may be development of doctrinal stances. Third, there is apparently extreme ignorance among Mormons about the history of their faith–just as there is with traditional Christianity.

As I read the comments, I realized that I probably know more about Mormon history and doctrine than many of those being raised in the faith.  My guess is that many become Mormon after being heavily recruited by those eager young men who spend their late teens in two years of mission without having a clue that real adherents to their faith may be signing on to an eternity of domineering men taking wife after wife and women giving birth to babies in perpetuity in order to properly populate the Celestial Kingdom.

Sounds a lot like hell to me.  But then I really am an apostate to them, so perhaps it is what I would deserve.

Newt and Marriage

Well, nothing like a statement from a former wife to throw a monkey wrench into Newt’s life and campaign.  Several hours ago, this story with accompanying video were posted on the New York Times website:

“Former Gingrich Wife Says He Asked for ‘Open Marriage’” 

When this presidential candidate was married to wife number two, he was already carrying on an affair with the woman who would be wife number three.  Newt asked number two to approve an open marriage, so he could sleep around as much as he wanted.  She refused. They divorced.  And although he managed to have his two first marriages annulled by the Roman Catholic authorities, so he could have an “authentic” Roman Catholic wedding to number three, one still might reasonably make the assumption that wife number three has no objections to his wandering eye and multiple bed partners.

Yeah, I’m a little disgusted.  But am also fascinated by the comments on that article.  The public, and not necessarily Christian public, is finding Newt’s actions repugnant and indefensible.

This supports what I have long thought to be true: there is, underlying our overly sexualized media and glamorization of immorality, a deep consciousness that calls for righteousness and integrity. In the comments on the news piece about Newt, the word “hypocrite” shows up everywhere.  We, as a people, really do want to be governed by people who will make the greater good their priority and will do it by leading personal lives that reflect intentionality, morality, and intelligent compassion. Not perfection, but at least a reasonable humility and honestly.

Newt apparently doesn’t make a passing grade on a single one of core values. God forbid that a man with no character should be elected to lead this country.

Education, Yesterday and Today

I’ve seen this before, but it is making the rounds of the internet again.  It is a copy of the questions on the 8th grade exam given in Kentucky in 1912.  The questions are hard, and much is way beyond what is taught to our 8th graders today.

The kind of math is also extremely practical for a farming, rural community. If they were to function in the world, young adults needed to know these things.  As for grammar and spelling–well done here! I’m personally appalled at the extreme lack of ability many high school graduates have  to express themselves properly in writing that I see today.  Why these things aren’t taught is beyond me.

We have the best of athletic facilities, band and performance halls, extracurricular activities that take up every spare moment. But are our children really educated to deal with the world they will face?

How many know even the basics about personal finance? How many understand how completely the world is linked together and the real necessity of understanding other cultures and learning other languages with comfortable fluency? How many have any real understanding of basic biology, the workings of their bodies and what is necessary for healthy living? How many actually understand our governmental structure and are willing to participate in the political process? How many have the math and literacy skills just to fill out an insurance form or decipher a hospital bill?

They can shoot hoops and tackle opponents and make great music. This is wonderful. But there is a whole lot more to life.  Just basic literacy and an ability to write a grammatically correct sentence goes a long way still.  Texting language will not make it in the world of commerce, and we’re going to have a bunch of handicapped former students screaming for special privilege someday or wondering why they can’t get past an entry level position.

Most of the children in 1912 knew school was a privilege, did their school work in facilities that we would be appalled at, went home and worked the family farms, and still managed to get to church on Sundays.  We don’t need the same knowledge as they had–we live in a different world.  But we do need to know some things well, and I am really wondering if those things are being taught.

Here’s the exam.  See how you do on it:

On Poetry and Papyrus

Do they never read poetry? I often ask this question when I see people picking apart poetic passages in the Bible as though these were doctoral dissertations with extensive documentation, rigid logic, and grammatical precision.

Poetry reads differently. Its verbal images are meant to invoke great truths, open new worlds and connect with the hearts of its receivers. Poetry, especially biblical poetry, is intended to be read aloud to a community. The hearers use collective wisdom to understand the truths underlying the symbols we call words.

During my graduate studies, I researched the ways knowledge was passed down through generations of pre-literate societies. It’s hard for us to imagine societies without written words. The creation of inscribed alphabetic symbols, and the means to preserve such writings, are recent developments in human history. Until Gutenberg and his printing press, introduced in the mid 1400’s, only the elite had access to books. Few could read.

So it was in biblical times— few were literate in the sense of reading. But many were literate in the sense that huge portions of the Holy Scriptures were committed to memory.  In the time of Jesus, those Holy Scriptures consisted of what many now call the “Old Testament.”

It’s hard to conceive of memorizing that much information, but it was done. And so the scriptures were passed from generation to generation with astounding accuracy.

One of the reasons those words are memorable is that much of the Bible is written in the form of poetry

Poetry, with its rhythms and repetitions, with the way it builds by looping back into previous words and phrases, lends itself to memorization. This is why the King James Bible is so much easier to memorize than later translations. Translated when most people were not yet literate, its rhythms and sentence structures reflect a world of memory retrieval, not a quick trip to Google. Prose is far harder to memorize.

I am concerned that biblical poetry, translated and printed to look like normal prose text, has been twisted to “prove” modern scientific facts rather than expose eternal truths.

Some of those who insist on treating poetry as dissertation fact have come up with a six, 24 hour-day creation story and a 6000 year old earth. They call themselves the YEC (Young Earth Creationists) and vigorously defend their stances.

I was perusing some cyberspace Christian discussion boards, and found that the debate rages, sometimes with appalling lack of civility. I sense that fear drives much of the debate. With an admission that a literal (i.e., non-poetic) reading of the early chapters of Genesis is not justifiable, perhaps the rest of their faith will crumble.  So they yell “HERETIC” at those who have found real possibilities of truth and revelation about God in the discoveries of investigatory evolutionary science.

I understand such fear. It keeps God confined to an impenetrable box in a time-bound world that admits no mystery or uncertainty. Yes, I understand it because I lived in it for a long time. One step away from that certainty meant expulsion from the whole religious community, and the perceived loss of hope of eternal life.

I understand it, but I had to leave it behind, and work out a faith structure that honors the Scriptures as God’s revealed word and also honors the push for humanity to understand the world in which we live.

This refusal to see scientific exploration as holy activity is another reason the church loses so many of our teens and young adults. Vigorous scientific research suggests intriguing possibilities about our world, but the church often dogmatically insists that research is wrong, because its results don’t fit with their pre-determined stances.

It’s sad. It does the Holy Scriptures a great injustice by making them say something that would have made no sense to those who first put those words to poetry and to papyrus.

The Wading Pool

My parents, both born and bred in Indiana, uprooted their family and moved us all to Texas when my siblings and I were 10, 7 and 6. The first thing my mother did after our move was enroll us in swimming lessons. She knew that the hotter weather here meant that water activities were a big part of summer vacations.

She herself never learned to swim, and was personally terrified of water any deeper than that of a wading pool. She was determined that her children would not suffer that same fate.

The three of us became decent swimmers and divers. Any fears I had quickly disappeared as I gained skill and competence. Creative play in the “deep end” quickly took on a major role in summer fun and gave us all a great deal of physical exercise while building stamina and health.

Those memories surfaced as I began to consider a critique of one of the church’s major dilemmas:  its young adults are leaving in droves. Many say that the church is too shallow—we have not taught the “deep-end” skills necessary to integrate faith, life, love and work. By insisting that our children and youth stay in the shallow end of theological debates, where all is black and white and easily answered, we leave them unequipped to deal with a world saturated with multiple shades of gray, uncertainties, a multiplicity of morally ambiguous choices, and seemingly unsolvable problems.

The wading pool theology they’ve been fed offers no preparation for complex decision-making. They fear the deep end and often miss God’s call for full Christian living that integrates all of life..

In working last year with the church youth group, I asked them to differentiate between Santa Claus and Jesus. I believe that we feed our children a Santa Claus god and then are shocked when, at some point after learning that the Santa Claus story taught as truth is really just a big charade put on by parents, they also turn away from Jesus.

I gave the youth the words to “Santa Claus is coming to Town” and “O Holy Night” and asked them to compare the two. In many ways, Santa Claus looks a lot more powerful—after all, he’s watching them constantly and knows when they’ve been bad or good! Furthermore, they also had no real idea of what the word “holy” meant, or how to pull such a concept into their lives.

Even so, they applied themselves to the task. Slowly, the light began to dawn and we ventured together into a real exploration of the nature of the Savior. They moved from the wading pool to the deep end that night. It was startling, enlightening and life-changing. I suspected I risked the wrath of parents with that discussion, for many themselves were still stuck on a Santa Claus god.

Those whose faith teaching has kept them in the wading pool often learn to proof-text themselves through life. Proof-texting means taking some small portion of the Bible (or political stance or statement) completely out of context, linking it with other small portions, and then creating a chain of statements that, taken only at face-value, appear to support really awful things. Arguments for slavery, racism, genocide and seeing women as slightly sub-human and without basic rights have all sprung from the proof-texting mindset.

Proof-texting pastors helped create the environment that ultimately led to the Civil War and the splitting of many church bodies. The Southern Baptist Church, the Southern Methodist Church which commissioned Southern Methodist University, and other “southern” bodies were formed by those groups which proclaimed that the Holy Scriptures supported and even mandated the enslavement of certain people groups.

We’ve got to learn to swim in the deep end of theology, and teach the next generation to do the same. If we do not…I shudder at the consequence.

The “Do-Over”

I was recently reading some material about learning to face the things that scare us the most while being reminded again of how difficult real life-change is. We stay stuck in destructive habits and relationships, soul-draining jobs, and unhealthy bodies. We live enlarging our separation from the Holy One because facing the pain of change so frightens us that we choose to stay stuck.

The author of the work I was reading also suggested strongly that unless we are scarred by life, we have never really lived. We offer more when scarred, beat up, missing a limb or two, full of memories of missteps and “Why did I do that?” moments.

Those who can claim such painful experiences have gained power to make significant change. Those who have so protected themselves from the pain of being hurt or facing something hugely challenging with the high prospect of failure let fear make their decisions for them. When fear wins, it shuts people down. However when fear is used to discover courage, then hope emerges.

One of my mentors in the Christian faith often reminded me that it is dangerous to follow a spiritual leader who does not limp. My mentor was referring to Jacob, the son of Isaac, son of Abraham, whose many sons formed the core population who would eventually offer to us the one we know of as Jesus.

According to the Scriptures, Jacob wrestled with an angel as he prepared to meet the brother he had so grievously wronged years before. As the story goes, the angel touched Jacob’s hip and he limped for the rest of his life, a permanent reminder of the wrestling match that changed his life. A duplicitous man, full of schemes, deceits and self-protective strategies, Jacob, though clearly always flawed, also began to face life more straight-forwardly after that experience.

Which brings me to the point of this article, coming just before the end of 2011: the “do-over.”

All of us need one. Really. We need to take a hard look at the places where we’ve messed up. We need to list the important things we’ve learned from those experiences. It helps to be aware that if we haven’t learned anything, then we have not just messed up, but we have engaged in more tragic actions.

Then see how to move forward

That, at its best, is what the turning of the calendar to 2012 can do for us.

We can take this time, when almost everyone emerges from the over-everything of the holidays (food, liquor, spending, decorations, obligations, parties, family, loneliness, late nights, deprived sleep) knowing that something needs to change.

Then, we face the pain of change. It is never easy. Yet, when we see honestly the need for the do-over, we also get to come face-to-face with God in what can be an especially hopeful way. For God’s mercies are new every morning.

In the mercies of God, our scars, our wounds, our memories, our failures, our fears that bring us death can find transformation to strength, beauty and courage.

Let the holy light of God shine on our unholiness. Receive the love that says, “I have bought you with a price. You are now my beloved child. Your scars and your failures can teach the world about grace and hope if you will just receive My love.”

I, too, need to re-hear those words. I, too, need the “do-over.” I need grace to wash over me. I need to experience the transformation of my past failures and scars and carry it with me in confidence to face the pain of real growth. Then intimacy with God will touch all I do with its own experience of new mercies. This is the Good News that has been so fully announced during Christmas worship. A great joy is here.

Happy New Year, Everybody!

I call this the muddle morass of the middle-aged mind.  This comic strip is just so delightfully true.  At least all the bad memories went out the window with the good ones!

The Container, Sock and Pen Mystery

I like to start the new calendar year with my life in order. I like to, but it has never happened yet. However, this year, with the indefatigable help of my good friend, Vicki, I did a two day cleaning frenzy of my church office. Yes, folks, the skyscraper piles of dust, the cobwebs hanging from the ceiling, the disordered bookcases and desk top are now, momentarily at least, a thing of the past.

This morning, after a leisurely breakfast and getting myself geared up to go out to the garden on this gorgeous day and do some preparation for the early spring vegetable plantings, I thought, “perhaps I should give the cabinet where I keep the plastic containers a quick re-ordering.”

Right. Fantasies abound on this last day but one of 2011.

Containers with no lids, lids with no matching containers–soon my kitchen floor was covered with such things.  It was time for radical action: Any item that could not me matched, container and lid, was headed out the door. Soon, a bag was full.

Where do they all go?  All those unmatched pieces reminded me of the hours I spent when my three sons were young trying to match their socks.  I’d watch the pile of unmatched socks, gathered from week to week, growing larger until periodically I’d give up and cut them up for cleaning rags.

And where do all my pens go? I buy nice ones that write smoothly, generously offering ink to paper, but the only ones I can ever find are those awful throw-away ones that drag reluctantly across a piece of paper, as if hoarding their ink supply against a future famine.

Will this mystery ever be solved?

It is a nice day of small complaints. The sunshine calls. I’m heading out the door.