progressive involvement

"If Obama were Pope," by Professor Hans Kung

President Barack Obama has succeeded in a short time in leading the United States out of a mood of despondency and a back-up of reforms, presenting a credible vision of hope and introducing a strategic shift in the domestic and foreign policy of this great country.

In the Catholic Church things are different. The mood is oppressive, the pile-up of reforms paralysing. After his almost four years in office many people see Pope Benedict XVI as another George W. Bush. It is no coincidence that the Pope celebrated his 81st birthday in the White House. Both Bush and Ratzinger are unteachable in matters of birth control and abortion, disinclined to implement any serious reforms, arrogant and without transparency in the way in which they exercise their office, restricting freedoms and human rights.

Not that "religious" is necessarily a good thing

Gallup says that Mississippi is our "most religious" state.  85% of the folks there cite religion as being very important in their life.  The rest of the top five are all Bible-belt states:  Alabama (82%), South Carolina (80%), Tennessee (79%), Louisiana (78%), and Arkansas (78%). 

New Englanders are generally the "least religious."  In Vermont, 42% said religion was very important in their lives, followed by New Hampshire (46%), Maine (48%), Massachusetts (48%), Alaska (51%) and Washington (52%). 

"New England is now slightly ahead of the Pacific Northwest in terms of the high rate of unchurched people," said Silk, co-author of One Nation, Divisible: How Regional Religious Differences Shape American Politics.

Silk attributed the falling level of religious influence in New England to the decline of the Catholic population within that region.  Nationally, immigration from Latin America is helping the Catholic church maintain its number of adherents in the United States, but immigration has had less impact in the northeast.  In addition, the northeast was the area where the pedophilia scandal in the Catholic church struck most openly, and generated the strongest opposition.

"Most religious," by the way, does not mean "most Christian."  Outward expressions of emotion and piety have very little to do with the actual practice of the Christian faith.  

 

Happy birthday, Franklin Delano Roosevelt

127 today.  As my Republican grandfather put it, "Franklin Delano Roosevelt saved our farm."

Mystery worshipper "embarrassed about being an American Christian" after visit to New Life Church in 2006

See ship-of-fools for the Mystery Worshipper report on visiting New Life Church, Colorado Springs in 2006.  That day, the church was celebrating then-pastor Ted Haggard's 50th birthday.  Excerpt:

I don't even know where to begin. My experience at New Life Church was a total sensory orgiastic experience, from start to finish. There was a fog-maker in the sanctary, there were migraine-inducing spotlights swirling about during worship (if I stayed long enough, would God heal my migraines?), worshippers – uh, what's the word? – "pogo-ing" up and down, full on dancing provocatively, kids in red, blue and yellow shirts forming a sort of tiny moshpit in front of the stage (thankfully, no one jumped into it), people just wandering about and "ushers" who looked like Secret Service (really, they wore dark suits, sported tiny headsets and never smiled). And that's just the beginning. This service celebrated "Pastor Ted's 50th birthday, and the celebration included: ten motor scooters driven into the sanctuary, a fertilizer machine, a year's supply of ice cream bars carried to the stage by children, a pup tent and a real John Deere tractor ridden into the sanctuary (yes, the gasoline smell was also distracting). Then there was the moment blue and yellow streamers liberally fell from the scaffolding and landed on my head. During the sermon, I was distracted by Ted Haggard's breath; yes, I could see his very breath due to the presence of the fog-making machine. Everytime he turned his head a certain way, I could also see spittle project forth. Thoughts of avian flu and "are the vents open?" ran through my head.

Did the service make you feel glad to be a Christian?
No. Without being political, let me just say I was embarrassed about being an American Christian, and scared that 13,000 people are influenced by the message, and worried that Ted Haggard bends President Bush's ear every week (and vice versa).

Denver: the nation's favorite city

So says this Pew Research Center poll.

Quote of the Day

Pope Benedict “does not see that he is alienating himself from the larger part of the Catholic Church and Christianity.  He doesn’t see the real world. He only sees the Vatican world.”

Prof. Hans Kung, University of Tubingen

We are not those Lutherans

A California high school affiliated with the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS) and the Evangelical Lutheran Synod (ELS) has expelled two students for being lesbians.  The two young women sued the school for discrimination, but the California Supreme Court upheld the school on the grounds that the school is a social organization and therefore not covered by the state's anti-discrimination laws. 

The lawyer for the students got to the nub of the matter.  According to the San Francisco Chronicle:

Kirk Hanson, a lawyer for the two girls, said he was disappointed and would talk to them about a possible appeal to the state Supreme Court.

According to the court, he said, "if you're a religious school, you can discriminate on any basis you want."

Not in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, you can't.

Meet Lilly Ledbetter

Strangely cool

Kansas snow train clears the tracks.

Pope Benedict lifts excommunication of four rebel "bishops"

Pope Benedict has lifted the excommunication on four bishops who are part of the Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX).  The four were ordained as bishops in 1988 by then French Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre who founded the SSPX as a protest against the reforms of Vatican II.  At least one of the four believes the holocaust did not happen, and that there were no gas chambers in Nazi Germany.

They were excommunicated in the first place for not obeying papal authority, which is, technically speaking, a theological issue and not a political one.  You don't get excommunicated on the basis of political views, only for what the Roman church considers heresy, which usually amounts to questioning or flouting papal authority.  Technically speaking, the Vatican is not concerned with their political views, only their position on the question of papal authority.  Acknowledge that, all is forgiven, and welcome back.

There is a significant political question at the core of this action, however.  This is yet another effort by Pope Benedict to shore up his base on the right.  Benedict says that one of his high priorities is the "re-evangelization of Europe."  This is a laudable goal.  If, however, he intends to re-evangelize Europe by aligning with revanchist elements in the church and calling Europe back to the "old time religion," and old time orthodoxy, his effort will be a dismal failure.