The UmBlog

At times in its past, the United States of America has found money to make restitution for things gone wrong. For example, 9/11 "The September 11th Victim Compensation Fund of 2001, created by Congress, distributed $7 billion to survivors and victims' families. There have been 2,983 families of those who died and received an average of just over $2 million tax-free per claim, according to Kenneth Feinberg, former pro bono administrator of the fund." ABC news The 9/11 memorial in NYC? "The foundation that runs the memorial estimates that once the roughly $700 million project is complete, it will cost $60 million a year to operate." NBC news Americans are paying for this, not Saudi Arabia where the 9/11 bombers came from. But America wants to "never forget." When the US violated the constitutional rights of Japanese Americans on the west coast after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the entrance to the 2nd World War, it recognized the wrong and President R...

Orbis books I've known about this book for a few years, but I have not been emotionally healthy enough to read it until now. I don't think I ever really began to understand the depths of white supremacy in the evangelical church until the Black Lives Matter movement started. When I used that hashtag and advocated against police lynchings and found myself not only removed from my church's opinion in general, but actively pushed back against. Michael Brown's lynching by a policeman in 2014 was the beginning of my steep slide into depression and out of the evangelical church. Somehow, I was still surprised when 80% of white evangelicals voted for an fascist racist. I was surprised by African-Americans were not. African-Americans like James Cone, who grew up in Jim Crow Arkansas, were all too familiar with white christians who did not see the paradox of going to a lynching Saturday night and a worship service Sunday morning.  The white supremacist christians did not ma...

In the early 1600's religious separatists fled their country from fear of persecution. The location was known to other explorers, but an epidemic had left the native population decimated and weak. The immigrants considered the epidemic and the stores of food left behind as God's blessing. However, they suffered terribly adjusting to the new world, nearly half of them died. The indigenous people had mercy on them and helped those remaining. Other immigrants came and joined the struggling outpost. They made treaties with the people who owned the land and cared for it for hundreds of generations. Then they violated those treaties, over and over and over. Not one treaty was kept. Natives were captured and sold into slavery in the sub-tropics where they died. Since they were no good as agricultural slaves, african slaves were imported. The natives were continually pushed out of their land, even the ones who converted to the immigrant religion. Natives were promised an entire ter...

There is a lovely chap on Twitter, Blake Chastain , who I first heard use the appellation "exvangelical." He even has a podcast about it. I find it a helpful term and want to explore it in my own experience. This has been a long evolution and I will use my blog to look back on my spiritual journey out of white american evangelicalism. I have written 359 book reports. I have read more books than I have written about, but I read a great deal on genocide, inspired by the atrocities recorded in the bibilical story of Joshua, conqueror of Canaan. In his story, his god tells him to have no mercy and kill men, women and children. This was explained to me by my evangelical leaders that it was more merciful to kill the kids then raise them as their own. via GIPHY Lesson learned, evangelical cognitive dissonance is real. To be widely read is dangerous in a small minded theological construct. Studying genocide makes such absurd explanations even harder to swallow. Even then I found...

Jesus said. “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” Luke 4:18 The United States is known as a Christian nation. The united States has the highest incarceration rate in the world . Both of these statements cannot be true at the same time. Cuba and Russia and China have lower incarceration rates than the US. Post genocide Rwanda has a lower incarceration rate than the US. Racially-divided South Africa has 1/2 the incarceration rate of the US. Post-Christian Europe, the bogeyman of fundamentalist preachers has 1/6 the incarceration rate of the US. Muslim Egypt has 1/6 the incarceration rate of the US. Muslim Indonesia has 1/6 the incarceration rate of the US. Non-religious Japan has 1/10th the incarceration rate of the US. Muslim Pakistan...

Equally Wed Luke 6:22 “Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man. 23 Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for surely your reward is great in heaven; for that is what their ancestors did to the prophets. 26 “Woe to you when all speak well of you, for that is what their ancestors did to the false prophets. I am reading Richard Beck's book, Reviving Old Scratch: Demons and the Devil for Doubters and the Disenchanted . As a progressive believer and professor of psychology, Beck reconciles the concept of the devil/Satan/Old Scratch with the evil systems in this world and our own selfish ways. One of the outworkings of his thinking, as I read last night, is the falsehood of separating Jesus' two commands, love God and love your neighbor as yourself as two loves, instead of one. He writes, ...loving human beings is loving God and loving God is loving human beings. Only one love is at work, with n...

Luke 6:21b, 25b "Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh....Woe to you who are laughing now, for you will mourn and weep." One of the weirdest things going on in our society today is the refusal of those who will not empathize with the students who have lost friends and classmates to school shooters. This is an extension of the racist refusal to empathize with African American men, women, and children who have been shot in cold blood by American police forces. In the first circumstance, which I saw first with Sandy Hook, and now with Marjory Stonemam Douglas, the accusations of "crisis actors" portraying grief and horror instead of real students and real parents and real teachers and real first responders actually witnessing mass murder and suffering horribly from it. Then I see media figures mocking the appearances of these survivors; adults are actually bullying children from their high profile positions. Instead of mourning in sackcloth and a...

World War 2 was started by agressive nations motivated in part by racial supremacy. Hitler told Germans and Austrians that they were the superior race of Aryans. He also used the European Jewish population as a scapegoat for all the ills they had brought on themselves when they lost WW1. The Japanese also considered themselves a superior race and saw a distinction between themselves and all other Asian people in China, Korea, and the Pacific islands. In Japan, anyone not Japanese was sub-human. In central Germany, anyone not "Aryan" was sub-human as well. The United States sent to the slaughter nearly 300,000 Americans to defeat these racist ideologies. Ironically, the United States had its own racist ideologies to defeat within. Eighty years prior to WW2, over 200,000 Americans died in conflict over this very issue in the Civil War. Before and after that war, the US used genocidal means to eradicate it's own aboriginal population. A footnote in American history Hitle...

In response to the meme #blacklivesmatter some white supremacists tried to counter with the meme #alllivesmatter. African Americans have consistently responded saying "black lives matter" does not contradict all lives matter but points to the problem of disproportionate human rights violations against people of African heritage. In other words all lives do NOT matter if black lives do NOT matter. It fell on deaf ears. White supremacists claim any protesters who affiliate with black lives matter are terrorists. They are including many whites and many, many clergy. But when one shouts, nuance is not necessary. This weekend a white man from Ohio drove his car into a crowd of counter-protesters in Chralottesville, Virginia. This small city decided to honor the injustice against black americans by renaming parks who had previously honored slave holding, secessionist generals from the Civil War, Lee and Jackson. The insecure men of the alt-right held a rally to protest this. Th...

Jesus talks about generosity in terms on not letting your right hand know what your left hand is doing. The metaphor works on his teaching to not trumpet our charity but rather to keep it quiet, so that our Father who sees in secret will reward us. However, there are some things the church does in disconnect that should not be. Take the story of the African American christian man Richard Allen. Richard Allen was born into slavery in pre-revolutionary America. However, he was allowed to work side jobs by his owner in Delaware to purchase his freedom. He became a free man in 1786, in the newly independent United States. Before his freedom he became a Methodist. He became a preacher and attracted a growing congregation of black men and women to a small white church, whose white elders grew uncomfortable with their diminishing racial ratio. Allen asked the church to let him have a place for his swelling black congregation. They refused him, but offered to let he and other black church...

Bible translation is not simply replacing a hebrew, aramaic, or greek word for an equivalent in the receiver language. Take for example the greek New Testament word, "agape". In modern English translations it is translated to the word "love." In Jacobian England, the translators of the King James Bible chose "charity." I think we Americans might need to go back to the KJV word. As many evangelicals know, ancient Greek has at least 4 words  that could be translated into "love". Agape is the word given special emphasis by the New Testament writers. But when we Americans think "love" we water it down. But when we hear "charity" we are forced to think about personal expense, compassion for one in need, generosity, withheld judgment, as well as love. Charity can also remind us of being lied to, of turning the other cheek when slapped, of blessing those who are our enemies, and of taking risks that sometimes turn out poorly. The t...

As the Guardian reports , Turkey has recalled its ambassador from Berlin after German MPs approved a motion describing the massacre of Armenians by Ottoman forces a century ago as genocide – a decision that the Turkish president said would “seriously affect” relations between the two countries.  Those whose families were traumatized by Turkey's actions are grateful for the acknowledgment of their suffering. Turkey's offense over this acknowledgment is so notorious there are even several wiki articles about it. Here is one . Armenian embassy members hold posters reading ‘Recognition now – thank you’ during the meeting in Berlin. Photograph: Michael Sohn/AP It's not like Germany doesn't know anything about committing and apologizing for genocide. Atrocities are not unknown in the United States either. I have 87 posts here on the treatment of native Americans by the white government. The ongoing treatment of African Americans is no longer as bad as slavery b...

When Jesus told the story of the good Samaritan he tried to enlighten his listeners on the principle that we are all children of God. All of us are each other's neighbors. He wants all of us to love our neighbors. In the kingdom of Jesus, there is no us and them, just us. Even enemies are us. Jesus tells us to bless our enemies, like we would our friends. Our neighbors are those in need. Who is not in need? Jesus teaches that when we help those in need, we are worshipping him. "Whatever you have done to the least of these, you have done to me," and it's corollary, "Whatever you have not done to the least of these, you have not done to me." Matthew 25. Who are the privileged in the society I am a part of? Me. I am a white, educated male. Who suffers under the privilege of white males in my society? Women. African Americans. Minorities...racial and sexual. These two topics in particular are huge this week in America. 1- A young white man sat in on a Bible ...

When poor minorities riot over unjust treatment, privileged majority observers speculate about the family breakdown that must be the cause of so much property damage. But the privileged majority observers never seem to worry about what psychological conditions lead to the police officer mindset that justifies capital punishment for non-capital offenses. Running away from a police officer is not a capital offense. Wrestling with a police officer is not a capital offense. Carrying an air soft pistol is not a capitol offense. Stealing cigarillos is not a capital offense. Selling single cigarettes is not a capital offense. Resisting arrest is not a capital offense. Walking down a dark stairway is not a capital offense. Property damage is not a capital offense. But the law disproportionately forgives or justifies the citizen wearing blue, allowing capital punishment... summary execution... murder. When trials do happen, poor minorities are disproportionately incarcerated, breaking dow...

As I meditated yesterday on the presence of God, I returned to the image of Christ's descent from the cross , after he died, as he was prepared for a quick burial. I placed myself in the scene. I wanted to clean his wounds. I kept splashing the vinegar on my hands and rubbing my fingers over his chest and over his cuts. His gashes from the whipping were deep. I know it's gross, but my fingers kept bouncing in and out of his flayed flesh. While I washed his body, I wondered who else was with me, preparing him in adoration. I knew Mary was around, but I didn't see her. As I looked down his body, toward his legs I saw Mike Huckabee. I was as surprised as you are. He and I are only united in our relationship with Jesus. Mike and I are very different in our political ideology, and we do not agree on many areas as to how Christ's ethics should be applied civically. In my meditation, we also disagreed on how to get the body ready for burial. Mike was in a rush. He want...

When I'm left speechless, I have this gift from Jesus that keeps on giving. Our Father who are in heaven ......I need someone bigger than the most powerful country in the world, who is above all, knows all, and can bring justice to all. Hallowed be your name ........all other names are corrupt, the United States of America, the justice system. Let your kingdom come, let your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven ......bring to earth the ethos of love of neighbor, of justice, of mercy. Give us this day our daily bread ....because in weeks like this, our food is tears, where justice is denied to minorities, where men of color are presumed guilty until proven innocent, if they survive to be proven innocent. Without hope in you our souls will starve. And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us .....Forgive us of cynicism, despair, nihilism, self-righteous anger, selfishness, and forgive those who murder out of fear and selfishness, cynicism a...

My personal challenge for the Advent 2014 season is to count my blessings. I saw on Richard Beck's blog today a post on counting our blessings as the cheapest form of therapy. I tend to see the shadows instead of the light that makes them possible. Thus, I miss the light and the ensuing joy. Today's blessing is the perseverance of the black saints. I am not speaking in Calvinistic terms though. I'm speaking of the black american saints, who persevere despite the social opposition they endure daily. The opposition that has come to the forefront of a national conversation sparked by Ferguson. Many of their white brothers and sisters in the church, and some of their non-white brothers and sisters, are not interested in their painful stories. But they persevere. Jesus talks about them. They are the proof to Jesus' sermon on the mount in Matthew 5. 3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 4 Blessed are those who mourn, for the...

I took vacation days before the Thanksgiving break to enjoy an entire week of vacation. Enjoyment for me includes reading big and difficult books. This week I read the final installment of Rick Atkinson's World War 2 trilogy, The Guns at Last Light . In light of this week's riots in Ferguson, Missouri after the grand jury conclusion, this observation of Atkinson's struck me. Liberated prisoners from German work/prison/extermination camps were asked to "'Keep disclipline ...Let your behavior be a credit to your national honor.'" Instead, starvation, revenge, indiscipline, and chaos often created what Allied officers called a "liberation complex." SHAEF had presumed refugees "would be tractable, grateful, and powerless after their domination from two to five years as the objects of German slave policies." As an Army assessment concluded, "They were none of these things...newly liberated persons looted, robbed, murdered, and in so...