Today the valley is buffeted by strong winds and driving rain, covered all over by fog. I have all the supplies for baked mac'n cheese (I hope), for the Annual Meeting/Potluck tomorrow. But I'm not going to worry. I'm trying not to worry about running for vestry. Reading the sheet of expectations, I kept thinking... "These folks think I am a lot more spiritually mature than I actually am."
But - well - I am praying more than I used to, and perhaps more honestly, too. Our rector lent me this massive brick of a New Oxford Annotated Bible (New Revised Standard), which I've been getting sucked into (!!!). You know I've never read a modern translation before? And - don't get me wrong, I do like archaic English - but I absolutely love reading a translation that's actually written in the language I live in, if that makes sense. And... well, it's not just that it's simpler to understand (in some ways), but also this translation/version feels more honest, and more direct. (I'm probably reading into it a bit.)
So, that and this other book, The Heart of Christianity, by Marcus Borg. I have to say - it was a lot easier being a Fundamentalist. "This is true; everything that contradicts it is not. Believe that and you will be Saved." Now, I think about faith as something alive, I have to look for meaning rather than just accepting literalism. It's not enough to just blindly accept what you're given - this kind of belief has me questioning myself, questioning the Scriptures and their authors, questioning everything.
I'm having to reexamine all the assumptions I had made about life and metaphysical reality. It seems unfair that I somehow internalized all this stuff without, it seems, any conscious consent. Like the doctrine of Hell - I let go of that years ago, but there are still tendrils clinging to my hindbrain that won't be removed.
More insidious, though, and more dangerous, is literalism in the Gospels. This hurts, you see, for it is so very close to the center of my faith. Can I really be a Christian without believing in every miracle in all four Gospels? All of them? Okay. Maybe I can. Embellishment happens. And then - maybe easier, because of the inherent contradiction and the poeticism in the accounts - the Shepherds, the Magi, the kind of awkward shoehorning by the author of Matthew of prophecies wherever he can fit them in.
And then, just when you thought you were safe, we come to the virgin birth. And this hurts, and this is hard, but eventually, I realize that, once again, what matters is the meaning.
And then you hit, for some folks, the resurrection, and that's where I go, "No, no, whatever else I'm letting go of, this is something I believe very truly." I don't know how I feel about the whys of the Crucifixion, but I believe in that, and I believe in the Resurrection. Because, and here's where my understanding gets way un-Orthodox, why witness otherwise. People like to point out that a lot of Old White GuysTM got really rich and powerful off of telling this story (sort of), but the fact is, the disciples and the apostles were not made rich or powerful for telling it. Any of it. They were persecuted, and attacked, and cast out, and their Lord and Savior who they had looked to for salvation was, at least in a physical easy-to-point-to sense, gone from the world. Why keep going? Because something beautiful, something amazing, happened when Jesus of Nazareth was resurrected, and his disciples found that the Good News they had been taught needed to be shared. This message was so radical, so revolutionary, so important, that they risked and suffered their freedom and their lives to spread it.
So I guess the miracles - the loaves, the walking on water, the demons, maybe the healing - is far less important than the fact that the meaning of that message, the truth that shines through the many, many layers of human fallibility that lie between Christ's life and our own, is so important, and shines such a light through our lives, that we cannot help but share it.
One can only hope, right? I mean, the whole "Live God so well people see the Spirit through you" sounds all impressive, but if we're being honest I still feel like the wrong man for the job. It's my best friend here in town, a staunch atheist, whose response to "Yeah, it's just a mile or so down the road" is "Well, I'll walk you there, and then we can walk back together," whose response to "Oh bollocks it's cold out" is "If you need a coat, I've got one." So I guess all I can do is keep trying to emulate Christ as well as my friends seem to, effortlessly.
I suppose I should say, here, that in between writing the first part of this entry (up to the virgin birth), and the second (everything after that), I: got dumped hard on the ground by a big yellow dog, made baked macaroni for the church's annual meeting, attended church, and, uh, sorta got elected to the Vestry. So I am feeling inadequate and worried, but I figure maybe... well, I'm back to trusting the judgement of those around me. Which is just as well, I suppose.
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