Bishop Fritz and Mrs. Etta mae Mutti Guest Speakers Tomorrow at FCC St. Joe

Once again, I'm grateful to Erin Wisdom at the St. Joseph News-Press for another great article. The article in today's paper tells about Bishop Fritz Mutti and his wife Etta Mae Mutti who will be speaking tomorrow morning at First Christian Church of St. Joseph, MO. The Muttis will be signing copies of their book Dancing in a Wheelchair at the dinner following the service. I'm looking forward to their presentation and hoping that it will help FCC St. Joe in particular and our community in general put a different face on HIV/AIDS and homosexuality.

Can St. Joseph's Poverty Rate Be Transformed? (Dialogue column 2.2.10)

I wrote this originally for The Dialogue, the newsletter of First Christian Church, Disciples of Christ, St. Joseph, MO.


19.7%! Let me spell that out for you: NINETEEN POINT SEVEN PERCENT! That is the percentage of Buchanan County children living in poverty as reported in the St. Joseph News-Press this morning. Nearly one in five children in our county live in poverty, and that’s only those below the poverty line! According to the same article, nearly 60% of St. Joseph children enrolled in public schools receive free or reduced meals, which means over half of the children in our town are living on the margins without proper nutrition. OVER HALF!

I guess the statistics on child welfare in Missouri come out at the first of February, because a week after I arrived in St. Joe—three years ago exactly—an article ran in the News-Press listing the percentage of children in poverty at 18.9%. That’s really bad news; because it means that we can really only blame the recession for less than one percent of this ridiculously high statistic. Even when the economy was better, the poverty rate for children was still high. These statistics are just the children! It doesn’t take into consideration adults, especially senior adults who are living at or below the poverty line in our community.

These facts should cause us to do more than shrug and shake our heads; we should be freaking out and ringing alarm bells. There is a systemic problem in our community that touches all of us no matter our income levels or addresses. Yet, these facts seem at odds with what I’ve experienced of St. Joseph in my three years here. On a weekly basis, it seems, I continue to meet extraordinary people from various non-profits and agencies working to help people in need in our community—Interserv, Community Action Partnership, Catholic Charities, AFL-CIO Community Services, YWCA, YMCA, Open Door Food Kitchen, Heartland Foundation, etc. etc. At the same time, my list grows longer of friends and acquaintances in government and the public schools doing similar work—Social Welfare Board, Head Start, Parents as Teachers, etc. etc. Furthermore, it seems every week there is a fundraiser of some sort for a family in need of help with medical bills or another expense. No matter what critics may say about St. Joseph, there are a whole lot of people in our community who care about statistics like the one put out today regarding child poverty.

A friend I’ve made in my time here through serving on a few community boards, who happens to have spent a career working for a non-profit service provider in St. Joseph, tells me that most of the good work happening in St. Joseph amounts to treating the symptoms rather than the problem. In other words, the really important work happening now may feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, etc. (all worthwhile efforts!) but they are of a different order from transforming the community and reducing the level of poverty and suffering it contains. To be clear, I offer nothing but admiration and praise for the many people in the trenches helping those in need in our county and town, but unless there is a game changer that will transform conditions on a broad level, the levels of poverty, hunger, homelessness, etc. will remain the same a generation from now—no matter what the national economy does or does not do.

I imagine that if anything really can occur that will transform our community, it must come from all sectors. It would need to involve government at all levels (hold your snickering please), non-profit social services, MWSU, all branches of Heartland’s operations, the business community, public and private schools, AND the FAITH COMMUNITY! I am ill-qualified to speak about any of these areas, save the last one.

When I came to St. Joseph three years ago, I was shocked and disappointed to find out there was no council of churches or clergy association (much less an interfaith group of any sort) in town. There are cooperative ministry ventures like Interserv, Open Door Food Kitchen, etc. and small groups of clergy that gather according to theology, denomination or ethnicity, but there is nothing that enables all of the churches (or synagogues, or mosques or. . . ) to speak to one another much less work together. The closest I have found is Faith in Action, which works with a group of churches that really cross denominational lines and a few agencies to match volunteers with people who have unmet needs, mainly elderly or people with severe medical conditions. Otherwise, the houses of worship that sit practically on every street corner remain essentially free agents—not talking to one another and certainly not asking if what they share in Christ might trump their differences on doctrine and social issues.

I offer no answers today for how the conditions in our community can be transformed, but I do request of my church to prayerfully consider what our church might do to help such a transformation to happen. What can we do to partner with other people of faith—both Christians and members of other religions—to work to not only treat the symptoms of poverty and its related ills but also the problem itself? I will do the same from my end. We will continue to talk and hopefully act on these issues.

Grace and Peace,
Chase

Remembering Our Baptisms (Dialogue Column 1.26.10)

I wrote this originally for The Dialogue, the newsletter of First Christian Church, Disciples of Christ, St. Joseph, MO.

I was proud of First Christian Church of St. Joseph this past Sunday morning. We tried something new in worship and to my knowledge no one freaked out, lightening did not strike from heaven nor did the building cave in. We remembered our baptisms by means of those present coming forward to have water poured on their hands and to hear the words of God: “You are my beloved son/daughter, with whom I am well pleased.” Although this wonderful idea for remembering or re-experiencing our baptisms came from our neighbor down the street, Rev. Krista Kiger at First Presbyterian Church, it seemed to me that we Disciples took to it rather easily. (I found it interesting that some of our oldest church members were the ones that made a point of telling me how meaningful the act was for them.)

I spoke briefly in the service about my own baptism and how my understanding of it developed over time, but for the sake of time, I only briefly covered how we Disciples understand baptism in practice and belief. Since we have so many new members coming from other traditions (and perhaps some long-time Disciples who have never considered it), I thought I would explain a bit more about what baptism means in our church.

As with pretty much everything with the Christian Church, Disciples of Christ, there is freedom for a variety of understandings about baptism; this may be especially true considering how the powerful act of baptism can provide meaning on different levels. The Disciples of Christ grew out of a movement concerned with, among other issues, two concerns: modeling belief and practice after the early church depicted in the New Testament and eliminating barriers between Christians of various traditions. Our current practice of baptism still reflects these emphases.

On the one hand, in this church, as with most Disciples churches, baptism is offered to individuals old enough to profess faith in Christ (often called Believer’s Baptism”) and the mode of baptism is by immersion (being fully dunked in water). This practice seems to most closely mirror that of the early church described in the New Testament. It is important to note that persons being baptized are not required to adhere to a creed or list of doctrines; they are only asked to profess faith in Jesus Christ. Although candidates for baptism are provided instruction and education about the faith, their particular understandings of faith remain their own when they are baptized and throughout their lives.

On the other hand, Disciples recognize the work of God in the lives of all Christians and respect the baptisms of other traditions, no matter how old the person was when he or she was baptized or the method of baptism (immersion, sprinkling, etc.). So, if you were baptized as an infant in another denomination or if you were sprinkled when you were old enough to profess your faith, when you join our church your baptism is accepted as valid and we do not make people get baptized again. For instance, my wife and I were both baptized by immersion in Baptist churches, but our sons were baptized as infants in a United Church of Christ congregation. All four baptisms were accepted when we joined this church.

For children, this church and most Disciples churches have baby or child dedications, where the child’s family, the church and God enter into a covenant (a sacred agreement) to raise the child in the faith until he or she is old enough to make his or her own faith decisions. Usually around the 5th or 6th grade, a class is offered to help them make just such a decision and be baptized, if they have not been already. This step is similar to confirmation in other traditions except instead of “confirming” baptisms done in their infancy, young people are choosing to be baptized. In my opinion, the differences between infant baptism and dedication as well as believer’s baptism and confirmation have more to do with mechanics than with meaning.

Disciples, like many Protestants, understand baptism as symbolic rather than salvific, meaning it is a symbol of God’s work in a person’s life rather than a necessary step for salvation. The water is not considered magic or “holy water,” but the event of baptism surely is holy, because it externalizes in ritual an inward reality that already has taken place. Just as a wedding ceremony demonstrates a couple’s love in ritual, a baptism demonstrates the love between God and a believer. It embodies the death, burial and resurrection of Christ in the life of the believer, who has chosen to die to a self-centered life and live anew in a God-centered life. Perhaps, most of all, it is a visible reminder of God’s love for each of us, one we can remember as we celebrate each person’s place in the community of God’s children.

Grace and Peace,
Chase

Hope for Haiti album--highly recommended!

As a U2 fan, I had to buy the Hope for Haiti album on Itunes, since Bono and Edge were apart of the song Stranded (Haiti Mon Amour). It's a great song, but so is the whole album. My favorites are Stevie Wonder singing "Bridge Over Troubled Water," John Legend singing "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child," and Justin Timberlake singing leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah." It gets five stars out of five stars on the Chase Peeples Rating Scale.

Dave Tushaus--Drum Major for Justice

Congratulations to David Tushaus for receiving a Drum Major for Justice Award! The award is given to community members who follow MLK's legacy with an "outstanding commitment to the underserved and underprivileged." Dave, I am proud to be your minister; we are so fortunate to have you at First Christian Church!

The name of the award comes from MLK's sermon, "The Drum Major Instinct"where he declares,

"If any of you are around when I have to meet my day, I don’t want a long funeral. And if you get somebody to deliver the eulogy, tell them not to talk too long. (Yes) And every now and then I wonder what I want them to say. Tell them not to mention that I have a Nobel Peace Prize—that isn’t important. Tell them not to mention that I have three or four hundred other awards—that’s not important. Tell them not to mention where I went to school. (Yes)
I'd like somebody to mention that day that Martin Luther King, Jr., tried to give his life serving others. (Yes)
I'd like for somebody to say that day that Martin Luther King, Jr., tried to love somebody.
I want you to say that day that I tried to be right on the war question. (Amen)
I want you to be able to say that day that I did try to feed the hungry. (Yes)
And I want you to be able to say that day that I did try in my life to clothe those who were naked. (Yes)
I want you to say on that day that I did try in my life to visit those who were in prison. (Lord)
I want you to say that I tried to love and serve humanity. (Yes)
Yes, if you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice. (Amen) Say that I was a drum major for peace. (Yes) I was a drum major for righteousness. And all of the other shallow things will not matter. (Yes) I won't have any money to leave behind. I won't have the fine and luxurious things of life to leave behind. But I just want to leave a committed life behind."

Update on the Bible Verse Rifle sites

After press coverage, it appears the Bible verses will be removed from US military rifle sites. (see my previous post on the matter)

I'm just waiting for the "First they took God out of the schools. . . " crowd to get upset about this.

Wrath of God Roundup

Here's a roundup of articles I've found interesting and/or meaningful regarding seeking a theological explanation for the Haiti earthquake.

Looking for a cause for the Haiti earthquake? This op-ed by David Ignatius at The Washington Post a good place to start. It contains interesting references to Susan Neiman's book Evil in Modern Thought and the responses to the Lisbon earthquake of 1755 by Kant, Voltaire, Rousseau and others.

The best response I've read to Pat Robertson's declaration that the cause of the Haiti earthquake was the nation's "pact with the devil" came in the form of a fictitious letter from Satan to Robertson published in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. I wish I were this witty, clever and prophetic.

Mark Hulether, University of Tennessee religion professor, has an article about the real reasons Pat Robertson is dangerous. he asks the question of whether getting upset about these periodic outrageous statements does more harm than good. He notes, "Comments by Robertson that are racist, sexist, arrogant, complacent, misleading, and/or embarrassing are like a bus: if you miss one today, there will be another tomorrow." Instead he lists five things that demonstrate how Robertson's politics, business interests and writings are the things we should really be worrying about.

However, the best article I have read is by Paula Cooey, religion professor at Macalester Colege--I'll be looking for her other writings. From a position that values theological struggles, she writes about the tendency by people of faith to blame the victims--e.g. Pat Robertson, let God off the hook--e.g. It's God's will--everything happens for a reason, or alternately to dismiss the concept of a loving God altogether--e.g. Voltaire's Candide. Her discussion of the Lisbon earthquake of 1755 and the responses to it, the Wesley brothers' hymns, Camus' The Plague, and so on becomes an appeal for people of faith to quit their navel-gazing and help the suffering. She declares that we cannot question the justice of God while we sit on the sidelines ignoring the injustices facing humanity.