The same side of two coins? Or opposite sides of the same?

Very interesting blog entries and discussions that seem to cover different aspects of current evangelical thought. These folks aren't talking about fundamentalism, obviously, but they still spoke to my own experiences.

First, The Scandal of the Evangelical Heart, by Rachel Held Evans.

I'm new to Rachel's writings, but a lot of what she has to say resonates with me deeeply. When she writes:

A lot of people, when they catch pieces of my story, assume my doubts are of the intellectual variety. They assume I’m just a smart girl stuck in the Bible Belt asking pesky questions about science, history and politics that my conservative evangelical culture, with a bent toward anti-intellectualism, simply cannot answer.

I understand. Having a scientist in the family has raised a lot of questions, especially as I've seen him dig deeply into the biology of plants and animals, as he has done since he was a little boy. I've heard him subtly reject the creation story with perhaps a little bit of arrogance. (Does anyone know of an 18-year-old who doesn't think he knows everything?) His journey as a scientist has been my journey as his mom and, though I still firmly believe that God created the heavens and the earth and all that are within them, I've come to the point where I just don't care about just how that happened. (I mean, I wasn't there. You weren't there. Even the writer of Genesis wasn't there. Just God, who has a tendency at times to speak in highly figurative language. See: Solomon, Song of.)

Rachel goes on to say that her real disconnect comes more from an emotional viewpoint than an intellectual one.

But the questions that have weighed most heavily on me these past ten years have been questions not of the mind but of the heart, questions of conscience and empathy.

This has bugged me a lot about Christian fundamentalism, especially as defined by those I used to hang out with. To be true to Christ, you have to separate from others. There's no joining hands to help the poor if those we're joining hands with do not believe as we do, down to the last jot and tittle. You don't use programs that have pictures we don't approve of, or which are offered to churches we wouldn't partner with. (See: AWANA) There's no fellowship with believers outside our little circle.  Only with those who act, think, dress, and believe exactly as we do. "The dwarves are for the dwarves!"

The other blog is by Peter Enns and riffs off of Rachel's post with a focus more on the intellect: The Deeper Scandal of the Evangelical Mind: We Not Allowed To Use It,

After an introduction about Mark Noll's books, The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind and Jesus Christ and the Life of the Mind, Peter suggests that Noll is too optimistic in his conclusions. He points out that:

In my experience, the real problem isn’t simply a failure on the part of Evangelicals to engage the world of thought. Evangelicals earning higher degrees and publishing their findings in the wider intellectual community isn’t what’s needed.

The real scandal of the Evangelical mind is that we are not allowed to use it.

I have heard this said of Fundamentalism by many different sources. Fundamentalist universities turn up their noses at the greater academic world, as seen by their refusals to seek accreditation, to submit papers to peer review, and to keep on faculty those whose entire academic career, from undergraduate to PhD, has been within their own walls.

Peter says that the biggest problem is:

Evangelicalism is not fundamentally an intellectual organism but an apologetic one. It did not come to be in order to inspire academic exploration but to maintain certain theological distinctives by intellectual means. These intellectual means are circumscribed by Evangelical dogma, though avoiding Fundamentalist anti-intellectualism.

Again, fundamentalism = anti-intellectualsm. This is so true! At Stuff Fundies Like, we often discuss how it's more important in fundamentalism to hear The Call ™ to preach than it is to actually receive any real training in how to do it! Depending on the particular niche of the network you belong to (make no mistake: there IS a network), nine months to a year's worth of "Pastor's School" may be considered enough to make you a Bible scholar. (Who needs to study Greek or Hebrew or church history, haymen? That good ol' KJB is good enough for us! blargle blargle)

Sigh. Enough ranting on my part. I recommend both articles as studies of how our minds and hearts both need to be fully engaged in our service for the Lord, regardless where our practice falls in Christendom.

Been a while since I've posted here!

But as one of my goals for this year is to post just about every day, this blog is to be resurrected as well.

Today was a red-letter day, I guess. After God knows how long, Hubby and I actually went to church.

Yup. Sat in a morning service among a group of believers and worshiped -- I think.

This church is the only one of the three SBC fellowships within walking distance that we hadn't yet tried. (Seriously, we have three SBC churches on less than a mile of road. Almost literally a church on every corner!) The one we tried first is across the main drag in our neighborhood and down about a block. Its sanctuary is directly across the street from our car repair garage, but they didn't use the sanctuary when we visited them. The congregation -- of which our neighbors were part at the time -- met in the gym. They had a praise band and projected the song lyrics on a screen. The preaching wasn't bad, but the acoustics certainly were! Sunday school met in the little rooms off the back of the sanctuary. I don't remember much about the class other than there were quite a few young families represented.

Now this congregation has merged with another, smaller group, changing their name to accommodate both. They're renting out their sanctuary to a Hispanic church of the Catholic persuasion ... which is bursting at the seams whenever there's a service.

The second one we tried is literally just around the corner from us. It has a small, older congregation, many of whom are not from the neighborhood. They used pre-recorded music and, again, projected the song lyrics on the screen. The problem I found with this was, not being into contemporary Christian music, we often knew neither the lyrics nor the tunes. They used the official Southern Baptist Sunday school materials. The youth group, which the boys visited, was made up of kids mostly from another town entirely. No one from their school was in it. The preacher, an older man, taught on tithing the week before Christmas. We came back after the holiday, when he was back from vacation, and he started a new 5-part sermon series on ... tithing. Yeah. Right.

These folks came to the door on Saturday to let us know where the church was and invite us to service. It was this, plus a rather pointed comment from my sweet MIL about being in church, that propelled me out the door today to try the third of these SBC bastions.

This third church is down the other end of our street and across the main drag from us. It's a very visible church at the top of a hill and they have one of those animated LED signs down by the highway. It's been around for a long time and bears the original name of the area. (Most people call the neighborhood by the newer name, the one the first SBC church I mentioned bears.) Today they met in the fellowship hall as the sanctuary's heating system was broken. We've actually been in the sanctuary before; the elementary school held one of its end-of-the-year 5th grade award ceremonies there.

Music was very traditional -- all hymns we've sung a thousand times -- using an actual hymnal and played on a piano. The preacher was younger though the congregation seems to be older. He read an entire chapter of 1 Timothy, but didn't seem to stay focused on the text. (He also told a long story that he never finished.) Hubby had trouble hearing him at times, and didn't sing, which made me sad. I was pleased to see that the song leader was a (very pregnant) woman and that the church used women as deacons and ushers. This church also has AWANA (from age 2 through high school) which is a point in their favor IMO.

We may go back and give them another try. It usually takes two or more visits to decide whether or not a congregation is for us. I may ask about the teens, too, so I can get a feel for whether or not they go to the same HS as Boy #2. Might be good for him to have a few schoolmates to hang out with.

At least I can report to the MIL that we did go to church... :)

Blending my reading into my writing.

I’ve been reading a lot lately about some pretty serious religious stuff. Patriocentrism (a.k.a. Biblical patriarchy), the Quiverfull movement, and the teachings of hyper-fundamentalist Bill Gothard. A lot of my reading has stemmed from two blogs: Razing Ruth, and The Commandments of Men. Some of this has also been discussed at the Stuff Fundies Like forum, and I’ve read several other blogs that have their jumping off points at either of the previous two.

It’s fascinating and horrifying at the same time, reading about how “Ruth” escaped her oppressive family with their ties to Bill Gothard, their patriocentrism and their adherence to the Quiverfull lifestyle. Why did she escape? To keep from marrying the jerk her father allowed to court her. (Good news is that she’s now engaged to the man of her choice!)

Then there’s Lewis, a pretty cool guy who was once engaged to a young lady from such a family. Go read his story; it will break your heart. His bride-to-be was isolated and pressured by her family to drop him. He speaks out on his blog against Biblical Patriarchy and courtship.

Now, how does this fit into my writing?

Well, I’m still working in fits and starts on Moonstrike, my Thunderbirds, “Tracy sister” fanfic, and I wanted to find a reason for two different things. One, why Jeff Tracy and his wife, Lucille, had six children in the first place (six is even considered a large family today; think of how it would be looked on thirty years from now). And, two, why Jeff didn’t ask Lucille’s parents for help in raising the kids after her death.

My answer? Lucille came from a family like the one “Ruth” came from. Like the one Lewis’s ex-fiancée came from. And, like “Ruth”, she fled her home to fulfill her dream of going to college… and marrying Jeff. And as in Lewis’s case, Lucille’s father would have kept his daughter from Jeff if he could.

So, that’s where my reading has blended into my writing. I know it will be unique. I just hope it rings true.

Thank you, “Ruth” and Lewis, for sharing your stories with me. I hope my using them as inspiration doesn’t offend you. If it does, please be honest and let me know.

Rumble, Rumble, Rumble. Mutiny, Mutiny, Mutiny.

I am in a foul mood today, and it’s far too complex and time consuming to explain why. It all has to do with last Friday’s edition of ABC’s 20/20, and the fallout from that. Just to make it perfectly clear, what happened to those women makes my blood boil, as does the response from the so-called “men of God” who have been writing about it (and screaming about it from the pulpit) ever since. My FB friends list has been full of it, mostly from those who support the women (and, in some cases, are the women) involved. If you want to get the full skinny on it, I suggest checking out Stuff Fundies Like; they have a lot of discussion on the matter both on the blog and on the forum.
However, what finally took me from annoyed to foul moodiness has nothing to do with this. It was a friend of mine complaining that her mail carrier won’t stop, get out of his/her truck, and personally deliver their mail to the door because her son’s truck is parked out front and blocking their street-side mailbox. Instead, s/he honks for them to come out and get their mail, and if they don’t come out right away, moves on.
Clue bat time: the mailman isn’t even obligated to stop and honk if your street-side mailbox is blocked. Not because they are “lazy” but because they are far too busy, and on a schedule.  They take too long on their route, they get in trouble. As a carrier’s wife with a husband who actually WALKS his route, and does deliver door-to-door, this infuriated me. Hence the foul mood.
I’m going to try and stay away from FB (and my other blogs) for the rest of the day. I’ve had enough.

Turns out this might have another use altogether.

I'm a recovering Christian Fundamentalist from the "Bob Jones University" (BJU) school of thought. But as I've drifted away from my BJU-orbital church, I've started examining my beliefs to figure out just what it is that I believe about Jesus Christ, his Church, his Word, and how these things affect me, my family, and my personal walk with Him.

I know I'm saved. That has never been in doubt. For many years, however, I feel like I've been told what I should believe, and I've absorbed a lot of teaching (doctrine), that I'm not sure I understand or believe in any more. I've been doing a lot of reading and participating in discussions, all to learn what other people think the Bible says. It's also clear that I should be reading my Bible more to discover its truths for myself, and I'm going to try and do that.

This blog will at least be a jumping off point for some of the other Christian blogs I visit that are on Blogger. As I try and figure out what I believe, I might discuss some of those findings here. Who knows? Someone else might be blessed.