Tag Archives: spiritual but not religious

Why you gotta be so mean?

I’ve got that ear-worm of a Talyor Swift song stuck in my head…

Anywho…

I’ve started researching what I hope becomes my next full length book. It’s based on the idea that the role of “pastor” can and should be thought of primarily as a “court jester.” I’m working with the title Jester/Pastor. We’ll see if it flies.

Part of what intrigues me about the Jester is the granting of the license. Jesters, also called “fools,” typically fell into one of two categories: the “natural fool” and the “licensed fool.”

Natural fools were those who’s very person amused others. From what I can glean in my limited research, these were people who had some sort of cognitive, communicative, or physical difference that set them apart from the typical population. A lack of awareness granted society permission to get a laugh at their expense.

On the other hand, there were Licensed Fools. These were performers who were trained, called, and granted permission to not only amused the court and the populace, but were also welcomed into a ruler’s inner circle. They often became an advisor of sorts. Licensed Fools were granted permission to say things that others might be thinking. Because of this freedom, Fools developed an ability to couch hard truths in humor, to soften the blow a bit, to allow those being critiqued to save a bit of face. Because of the trust engendered between a ruler and their fool, this was a delicate dance and the Fool needed to know the temperament of the ruler in order to be successful. Say too little and you’re not fulfilling your duty. Say too much and you’ve forgotten your place. And there were dire consequences for forgetting your place…

This reality is called the “Limit to the License,” and every Fool did well to remember it.

I want to suggest that pastors are like Licensed Fools. We have the privilege of being welcomed into people’s lives and we get to say things to them that others are not allowed to. But there is a limit to this license because we are not the ruler.

The limit to our license is found in the recognition that when people are on the spiritual path there are certain things they can hear and certain things they cannot. That is not their problem; a fish does not know it is in water. We must be very careful when we speak publicly. We might go too far. Like the Fool at court, we may amuse those watching, but if the Ruler cannot hear our critique then it is useless and could, potentially, be life/career threatening.

Recently, a prominent pastor has been offering what many believe to be a good and accurate critique of the Spiritual But Not Religious. In truth, I think I’m prone to agree with the theology and ecclesiology behind the argument, but I fear that this pastor has bumped up against the “Limit to the License.” In trying to offer a clarifying word, I believe that meanness has been the result. There are claims at humor, but it feels too much like when someone cuts you down and then cries, “KIDDING!” I’m not buying it. The damage has been done.

I am particularly sensitive to this because it is a tendency of mine as well. Ask anyone with whom I’ve ever argued and they will tell you that I can be a real asshole. I mean, seriously: a Class-A, #1 Asshole. I was trained as a writer and actor, was a state champion debater, raised in a religious world that prized apologetics, a personality that makes me think I’m the most original person on the planet, and have a lot of psychological baggage to work out. If you go toe to toe with me, you may win, but you’ll get beat up pretty badly. I can make you question your very sense of self worth. It’s ugly. But it’s not okay, and I’ve spent my adult life trying to reckon with it. The need especially became clear when I became a “Licensed Fool.”

So, fellow Fools, we have been called to embody something more honorable. We fail – Lord, we fail! – but we have to learn to admit it, make restitution if need be, and resolve to do it differently next time. We should live our lives in such a way that we are never asked, “Why you gotta be so mean?”

You Need To Know About This, 01/13/13

Nunya business

Elizabeth Drescher’s article from Religion Dispatches has been screwing me up all week. I’ve always had a hunch, but she has confirmed (as much as one woman can) that the “Nones” we keep harping on about are – in large part – just people who do not want to be reduced to a label. As one who feels called to nurture and support Christian community, I have to admit I’m at a loss.

I’m beginning to wonder if the hold of traditional religion on the American imagination in general and the news media in particular is so great that it is impossible for us not to imagine those without a formal, institutional religious identification or affiliation as necessarily being unbelievers…But the tenaciousness of this imaginary label [“Nones”] seems also to extend to unbelievers themselves, who have often been just as quick as religionists to claim Nones as atheists, secularists, or other varieties of unbelievers despite plentiful demographic and anecdotal evidence to the contrary.

None Means None (Not Atheist, Agnostic, Unbeliever…)

Da Bears

In early 2010, I sat in my rocking chair with a serious pair of headphones on and my eyes closed, and caught my breath no less than a dozen times listening to Mumford and Son’s Sigh No More. Ever since, I have been on the search for an album that would reintroduce me to that experience.

I found it. Bears of Legend’s Good morning, Motherland is a most extraordinary collection of music.

It conforms to some pop sensibilities, but to call it “pop” would diminish it. It appears to be a concept album, but that would place too much burden on the narrative. It has all the traits of folk, but I’m not versed enough in traditional Quebecois music to know.

I just think its lovely and astounding and good. I hope you do, too.

(Make sure and watch until the end. It’s gripping.)

Oh, the places I don’t really want to go…

I have a friend who uses big words. He uses them on purpose and not in a way that makes you feel stupid when he does it. The other day he told me he was “facile” in regards to something. I had to go look it up. I learned something.

But guys like him are becoming rare.

Knowledge is easier to obtain now than in used to be. There is no shortage of information. If I want to know something, Wikipedia is just a browser away. “define:[word]” is one of my favorite Google searches ever.

I don’t need some smarty-pants to tell me things any more. I can go find it myself. And, yet, I often don’t.

There is an overabundance of information at our disposal. We don’t know what to do with it all. There have been studies after studies done that show that the more choices we have, the less content we are.

Do you remember when you first began shopping for yourself and stood in the aisle looking at all the different kinds of spaghetti sauce you could buy? It’s overwhelming. A few nights ago, I spent 2 hours trolling Bandcamp, looking for new music. Any kind of independent artist you could want is there, but I was having a damn hard time finding anything through the crowd. There’s just too much. I have this fear that I’m going to miss something good, that I’m going to spend my hard earned cash on something when the thing I really want is one more click away…

It seems to me that pastors have a unique opportunity in this moment. We have an opportunity to recognize our role as the new Public Intellectuals.

An Intellectual is a person who concerns herself with the life of the mind. She is passionate about ideas and the ways those ideas shape the way we live. She is concerned about her thinking being “critical” in nature. Rocks must be overturned, doors opened, avenues explored. She does not shy away from hard truths, and goes where information leads her. She always knows that deeper and deeper realities are discoverable even when her colleagues stop.

What makes a pastor a Public Intellectual is that she does not have the luxury of this exploration being private. By the very nature of her calling, a pastor is asked to do this wrestling in public. In front of other people. Where she might be criticized.

And this is the rub.

Pastors succumb to doing a lot of things they should not, but they often shy away from being the primary person in a community asking questions that have no destination for certain. The truth is that we have been given tools that a lot of people do not have in order to navigate the questions that a lot of people are asking. But we still have to ask them. We still have to give our best answer, and then ask people what they see.

There is a lot of religious information out there, and with a populace that is not slowing down in their drive to be “spiritual,” the need for someone to authentically help navigate all that information is at an all time high. Folks don’t need to be spoonfed the answers, but they want to watch us run the obstacle course of faith first – complete with tripping and falling – because watching us run it will give them courage to run it themselves.

This isn’t easy work, but it’s fairly straightforward. It requires that we steel our spines and go places we might not otherwise want to go.

But it is important work, and our people need us to do it. Pastors, we can no longer afford to be facile about our work as theologians. (See what I did there? 🙂 )