Unemployed Theologian

'My pastor, Veronica, one Sunday told the story of a sparrow lying in the street with its legs straight up in the air, sweating a little under its feathery arms. A warhorse walks up to the bird and asks, "What on earth are you doing?" The sparrow replies, "I heard the sky was falling, and I wanted to help." The horse laughs a big, loud, sneering horse laugh, and says, "Do you really think you're going to hold back the sky, with those scrawny little legs?" And the sparrow says, "One does what one can."' ~ Anne Lamott, Stitches Hope is a funny thing. You don't realize you need it until you suddenly find yourself without it. It's intangible, almost metaphysical, yet quantifiably necessary for survival. Scripture implores us to abide in it, reminds us of its utter importance (second only to love and tied with faith), yet counterintuitively does not seem to provide much definition for it. And in a season when life seems inte...

Last year I spent a lot of time writing about Advent, and the experience turned out to be deeply meaningful, so this year I decided to take a crack at Lent. Another season of the year devoted to austere reflection in anticipation of a coming hope. Lent, like Advent, is one of those traditions mostly foreign to my people (white Evangelical Protestants). As I mentioned when reflecting on Advent, we Evangelicals largely tend to ignore the Church Calendar because it seems ritualistic, archaic, perhaps a bit spooky. We get weirded out by it. But that's on us, not on our brothers and sisters who remember and retain the beautiful, historic practices of the Calendar, who recognize that ritual can engage the head, hands and heart in service of God. Granted, mere ritual cannot replace personal communion with God via prayer or devotional reading, but I see no reason to throw the baby out with the holy water. Just as Advent commemorates the Jews' period of waiting for their Messiah, Le...

Good grief. What a week. While I'm nearing the end of my Advent-time reflections on the season, I'm afraid a pressing issue necessitates that I shelve that project to address something which has so captured the public attention. I'm talking, of course, about the scandal surrounding Duck Dynasty patriarch Phil Robertson, who was quoted in GQ magazine making controversial claims about homosexuality (and race, lest we forget). There are several troubling issues at play here which I feel warrant addressing. One is this bizarre discussion surrounding "rights" and "freedoms" which has popped up since the scandal arose. Some claim Robertson ought not be punished for exercising his freedom of speech, for voicing his personal, religiously-founded beliefs and opinions. I have no qualm here. From a democratic, political standpoint, Robertson certainly had the right to say what he did. No one is arguing he had no right to make disparaging comme...

At Christmastime it's hard to avoid religious iconography. It seems just about everywhere you look is a baby Jesus or the Christmas star, while everyone's singing or blasting old hymns about the Child, the Virgin, the curse of sin or the Angelic Host. From a cultural standpoint it's actually pretty fascinating we Americans allow ourselves to get so blatantly religious for one month a year (or longer, depending on the state of the economy), when the balance of the year we pride ourselves on our tolerance and inclusivity (real or imagined). But December belongs to the Christmas spectacle, to the trappings and traditions of the Christian holiday. Granted, what we celebrate now is often more commercial than it is Christian, more Santa than Christ, but the observation stands. I always forget the part where the baby Jesus is visited by Santa. It's actually a little surreal, a bit disorienting to see the Christian story, the story in which I find my life's meaning,...

I don't mean to be petty or argumentative, but something has really gotten under my skin lately. Every year as Christmas approaches I start to hear the same squabbles popping up left and right, causing a bizarre tension between groups of people I love very much. The Grand Poobah of these conflicts centers on the "secularization of the holiday" or more provocatively put, the "war on Christmas." The war. On Christmas. Apparently somebody's waging a war on Christmas. They better stop it, huh? Cut it out! I love Christmas! See, that's the trouble with words. "War on Christmas" is a phrase carefully engineered to draw ire from holly, jolly American Christians, and all those who enjoy Christmas (not limited to Christians). The idea is supposedly that Christmas is being cast out from the public sphere by those vicious, sneaky Communists (or whatever), or else sanitized to become a generic holiday for all people of all religions (God forbid). Ind...

There are a thousand different ways to hear God speak. So overflowing with His common grace is the created world that you really must close your eyes and ears tight to totally prevent intrusion of the Divine Beauty. And if you're not careful, even then you might actually hear God whispering to you. Still Small Voice and all that. Sometimes hearing God is as easy as flipping on the car radio to that "secular" pop station. Here in Eugene it's called KDUK (get it?), and from time to time when I'm too rushed or lazy to attach my phone or iPod to the stereo I settle for a little Top 40. Mostly it's bubblegum, dancey, wubwuby fluff, but occasionally I'm caught off guard by a legitimately moving melody, or a haunting bit of poetry. Sometimes I even hear a little Truth slip out between the hooks and drops, and I remember that a good pop song can say more about what it means to be human than a hundred sermons. Enter "Beneath Your Beautiful" by Labrint...

In the pilot episode of HBO's Newsroom Aaron Sorkin, pontificating through his curmudgeonly protagonist, calls Millennials (those of us in our late teens or twenties) the "worst. generation. ever." In his own tirade on the woes of our culture, Louis C. K. joins in on the fun, calling us "the crappiest generation of spoiled idiots." Geeze guys, tell us how you really feel. Is that fair, though? Do we really suck so terribly as that? Critics of the Millennial generation often cite our laziness and entitlement as reasons why we're the worst, which... I don't know, maybe that's fair. I certainly don't have much ground to argue we aren't self-obsessed or work-averse. We are, in fact, the "selfie" generation, infamous for compulsively sharing every thought, shoe, food item and hairstyle for the wide internet audience. It's as though each of us assumes the world would be worse off without our unilaterally compelling subtweets and ...