Christian: You Are Upset About the Wrong Things

From Patheos-

Sociologist Tony Campolo has been known, when speaking to Christian audiences, to begin by saying something like this:

I have three things I’d like to say today. First, while you were sleeping last night, 30,000 kids died of starvation or diseases related to malnutrition. Second, most of you don’t give a shit. What’s worse is that you’re more upset with the fact I just said “shit” than you are that 30,000 kids died last night.
When citing this, I have had people prove his very point by responding something to the effect of, “Yeah, I get it, but I still wish he would make his point some other way…” Ummm, that is his point. His point, in my opinion, isn’t really about the children (although it is, obviously); his point is that we (Christians) get upset over the wrong things. Our moral sense of outrage is often misdirected.

The fact that we notice the language, our being offended, before we really register the fact that children are dying, tells us all we need to know. Any focus on a crude term and not on his greater point that children are dying of starvation or malnutrition and that we might be complicit proves his very point. If there was a tiny gasp from the crowd at that word or an awkward silence—such reactions were misdirected. These people were upset about the wrong thing.


Read more at

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/unfundamentalistchristians/2017/06/christian-upset-wrong-things/#Llu6ebrZKtec2IOl.99

Does Religion Make People Moral?

From The New York Times-

Over the past 15 years, my country, Turkey, has gone through a colossal political revolution. The traditional secular elite that identifies with the nation’s modernist founder, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, has been replaced by religious conservatives who, until recently, were largely powerless and marginalized. The religious conservatives have by now come to dominate virtually all institutions of the state, as well as the media and even much of the business sector. In short, they have become the new ruling elite.

This political revolution has had an inadvertent outcome. It has tested the ostensible virtues of these religious conservatives — and they have failed. They have failed this test so terribly that it raises the question of whether religiosity and morality really go hand in hand, as so many religious people like to claim.

More here-

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/28/opinion/does-religion-make-people-moral.html?em_pos=small&emc=edit_ty_20171128&nl=opinion-today&nl_art=6&nlid=72655576&ref=headline&te=1

Why We Should Expect Our Politicians to Be Moral People

From Sojourners-

This week, Newsweek published polling data showing that “nearly 40 percent of Evangelical Christians in Alabama say they're now more likely to vote for Roy Moore after multiple allegations that he molested children.”

Surprised? You shouldn’t be.

Last October, a PRRI/Brookings study found that white evangelicals were increasingly likely to support politicians who commit immoral acts. According to the poll, 72 percent of white evangelicals at the time believed that private immorality does not disqualify a public official from fulfilling their duties in the public sphere — an increase from only 30 percent in 2011. This trend is as worryingly significant now as it was then, especially in light of the Alabama Senate race and its disturbing revelations about many leaders’ and voters’ priorities.

More here-

https://sojo.net/articles/why-we-should-expect-our-politicians-be-moral-people

Religion is good for families and kids

From The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette-

It’s a message we hear more and more: Religion is bad.

And certainly recent headlines — from terrorist attacks perpetrated by radical Islamists in Paris and San Bernardino to the strange brew of warped Christian fundamentalism that appeared to motivate alleged shooter Robert Dear at the Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs — feeds the idea that religion is a force for ill in the world.

But in “The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason,” renowned atheist Sam Harris not only asserts that the “greatest problem confronting civilization” is religious extremism, he further waxes that it’s also “the larger set of cultural and intellectual accommodations we have made to faith itself.”

More here-

http://www.post-gazette.com/opinion/Op-Ed/2015/12/20/Religion-is-good-for-families-and-kids/stories/201512200049

Eastwood and Moral Theology

From The Living Church-

If the flinty gaze and violent oeuvre of Clint Eastwood have long been your guilty pleasure, rejoice. Sara Anson Vaux has redeemed your little secret. Dirty Harry, it turns out, had an ethical vision. That .44 Magnum was just a trope, a means by which Eastwood could remind us of the wages of sin and the bloody consequences of lex talionis.

As Vaux says in her preface: “Seen along a forty-year continuum, Eastwood’s movies reveal stages in an unfolding moral ontology — a sense of being in the world.” Eastwood, it seems, is interested in the narrative exploration of “justice, confession, war and peace.” So it is time for all of his closeted fans — you know who you are — to come out and enter into conversation with this irascible, iconic and gifted filmmaker.

Of course Eastwood’s oeuvre is more than Dirty Harry or the avenging angel characters of his many westerns. His work consists of an astonishing number and variety of films: J. Edgar, Invictus, Gran Torino, Letters from Iwo Jima, Million Dollar Baby, Mystic River, The Bridges of Madison County, and a host of other projects many of us have never seen. Whatever your view of Eastwood, he is more, much more, than you might suppose. He has directed 31 films to date. His filmography, as listed on IMDb, includes 605 entries, an amazing body of work. Eastwood has been as prolific as he has been influential. And as Vaux makes clear, his artistic and moral vision has constantly evolved, while the themes that interest him have remained remarkably consistent.

More here-

http://www.livingchurch.org/eastwood-and-moral-theology

Roller skating was once thought to be evil

From Pottstown PA (thought this was interesting)

Roller skating today is looked on as an excellent way to combine fun and aerobic exercise. From the popularity it enjoyed in the 1880s, it is obvious that people, at least some of them, enjoyed it.

But many of that era thought roller skating was evil. Actually it probably wasn't that roller skating was evil, but the fact that it was done in skating rinks, buildings where young people were unsupervised and allegedly subject to potential evil influences.

This message that roller skating rinks were dangerous was delivered from the pulpits of churches all over the United States.

On Sunday, Jan. 18, 1885, the Rev. J.P. Miller, pastor of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Conshohocken, delivered a sermon that warned his flock to beware of the "folly and dangers of attending skating rinks." He used as his text Jeremiah 5:26, "For among my people are found wicked men; they lay in wait as he that seteth snares; they set a trap; they catch men."

More here-

http://pottsmerc.com/articles/2011/07/04/life/srv0000012207628.txt

Is it morally right to celebrate bin Laden's death?

From CNN-

One newspaper headline eulogy read, “Rot in Hell.” Televised chants echoed:
“U.S.A.! U.S.A!”

Americans spilled into the streets for spontaneous celebrations after news spread that Osama bin Laden, the al Qaeda leader behind the 9/11 terrorist attacks, had been assassinated.

Yet another reaction took place in more sober moments as people of faith watched the giddy celebrations with a tangled mix of emotions.

Is it morally wrong to celebrate the assassination of bin Laden in such a festive, patriotic way?

That’s the question that troubled Danielle Tumminio, an Episcopal priest, who fought back tears as she digested the news that bin Laden had been killed.

Tumminio was in New York on September 11, 2001. Her Long Island neighborhood, filled with lawyers, stockbrokers and firefighters, lost scores of people in the attacks.

“I remember coming home and smelling the smoke, seeing the debris and going to the funerals,” Tumminio says. “I actually studied abroad because I wanted to get away from feeling unsafe.”

But when Tumminio saw images of Americans celebrating, she felt something else: moral ambivalence.

More here-

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/05/02/is-it-morally-right-to-celebrate-bin-ladens-death/comment-page-1/

The Mockingbird parables: Christian lessons in Harper Lee's classic

From CNN via my daughter "Scout"

The social relevance of Harper Lee’s classic To Kill a Mockingbird and the subsequent film is profound. It has remained a beacon of hope for the marginalized, pointing the way toward our continued pursuit for equality.

The novel has been described simply as the story of one man’s stand for racial justice, but we cannot ignore the other valuable messages–including Christian ones-for today’s culture of distrust.

From Wall Street to Washington to Main Street, it seems our decisions are governed by what is financially, politically, and socially expedient. Oour faith is more of an afterthought than a guiding force.

The many lessons of Lee’s novel can lead us back to a restorative way of making choices by following these four principles:

1. Try understanding others. The theme is revealed in lawyer Atticus Finch’s memorable explanation to his daughter: "You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view–until you climb into his skin and walk around in it."

More here-

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2010/09/03/the-mockingbird-parables-christian-lessons-in-harper-lees-classic/