of eating disorders and the 100 IQ

When I was DRE at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Denton, TX, I had several wonderful opportunities to attend retreats at Mo Ranch (where I also got to talk to Reverend Sinkford who changed the way I think about religion, but that’s another post).  Mo Ranch is a Presbyterian retreat in the hill country of Texas.  I’m a Floridian, so they looked like mountains to me.  We went in January.  It was beautiful.  Lots of time for personal reflection, meditation, networking, and standing in line for breakfast with Presbyterians.  “Do you know what the problem is with Unitatian Universalism is?” asked a Presb minister one morning.  I eyed him.  He looked friendly enough, but it was pre-coffee.  I braced myself.  I am only a DRE after all, and I am a guest here.  I fortify myself with an extra helping of scrambled eggs. “Um….”maybe another waffle, too.”What?”  I asked, ready to defend my religion to the death or at least to the end of the buffet line.  “You only take smart people.”  Bacon, sausage, pasteries.  Yes, more pasteries.  “Oh..well, it’s not really a requirement really,”I stammer lamely.  Where is the butter? But truth be told…. ok,  I got nothing.  It’s true.  The congregations I’ve attended are particularly well-educated.  Is that who we are?  The smart church?  We ask people to think for themselves.  That doesn’t mean they need a PhD. to do it.  What image are we projecting that personal journies are  entitlements only  to the big-brained?  Can’t anyone be a seeker?  Arguments about IQ tests aside, do we offer nothing to the left slope of the bell curve?  Or is that who we are?  Intellectuals with science and reason on our side.  Let the sheep follow the preachers, for perhaps they need someone to guide them.  Are we suffering from the sin of pride (excuse my language) that we are the church of the intelligencia?  Is that who we are?    If we believe in the inherent and dignity of all people, can we not find a way to open ourselves to yet another population who is underserved: the average?

WHO AM I?

One heck of a poet, Carl Sandburg passed away on this day back in 1967, the year of my birth. One quote of his I really like is “There is an eagle in me that wants to soar, and there is a hippopotamus in me that wants to wallow in the mud”

Below is one of my favorite poems by him, called “Who Am I?”

MY head knocks against the stars.
My feet are on the hilltops.
My finger-tips are in the valleys and shores of
universal life.
Down in the sounding foam of primal things I
reach my hands and play with pebbles of
destiny.
I have been to hell and back many times.
I know all about heaven, for I have talked with God.
I dabble in the blood and guts of the terrible.
I know the passionate seizure of beauty
And the marvelous rebellion of man at all signs
reading “Keep Off.”

My name is Truth and I am the most elusive captive
in the universe.

Check out the website where I got “Who Am I?” if you are interested.

 

Soapbox Sunday

So, what is the word on Soapbox Sunday? Was it filled with lots of exciting commentary?

I had an obligation to attend the Episcopal Church in Newton MS this morning. There are times I have to support the religion of my partner. Their congregation sits at about 5–yes, I said 5! Today, with Freeman and myself, there were a total of five.

The dogma, of course, I just had to overlook, but a pause to have quiet time and a full service of prayer was nice.

Episcopals in Newton are not numerous–mainly Pentacostals, Charismatics, and Baptists (with a smathering of hidden atheists, non-churched, etc).

I would have loved the Soapbox Sunday–sorry to have missed it.

How Nice Was Easter?

No clever words. Just many thanks to Susan Knipe and everyone who helped put together our wonderful Easter service at the lovely Mynelle Gardens.   Also, thanks to Natalie for picking Lumpkins BBQ as our Lunch Bunch spot this week.  I’m a little sad I didn’t know about that place before, but I’m glad I know about it now.  Those of you who already knew of Lumpkins’  greatness should just think of me the way I think of those people who are  just finding out about Lost: too bad you missed out on the beginning, but get ready(especially since I was already full by the time they brought out the peach cobbler today) to do some serious revisiting.

The Politics of Anti-Christ

Several weeks ago, I walked into a barbershop and took a seat. To busy myself, I flipped through a couple of magazines. The barber in front of me struck up a conversation with the fellow seated before him.  The barber was short, white and in his 60s. The customer fit the same demographics except for few things. One thing was he was a bit odd—before taking his turn, the customer sat very close (almost hugging) to a gumball machine. About every five minutes he would get another handful of gumballs and shove them into his mouth. Another difference between the customer and the barber was that the customer was quite unkept. I can not remember the exact words but the conversation went something like this:

Barber: I was listening to Jimmy Swaggart[1] last night on the radio.

Customer: hmmm

Barber: He talked about the Obama and the coming of the Anti-Christ. [Actually, I interpreted the barber, through his gestures and nuances in his speech, to suggest that Obama and the Anti-Christ were one and the same.]

Customer: I am glad that Swaggart didn’t run for president.

Barber: hmmm

Customer: Bush was not much better.

Barber: But Bush Senior and Reagan were right.

Customer: ….

That experience got me to wondering just how many Americans believe in Armageddon and or the anti-Christ. Consider these results from a 1999 Newsweek nationwide poll of 755 adults.(Woodward and Underwood 1999). Forty percent of all respondents believe in Armageddon. The range is from a high of 71 percent of Evangelical Protestants to 18 percent of Catholics.

Q. Now, regarding your own religious beliefs: Do you believe that the world will end, as the Bible predicts, in a battle at Armageddon between Jesus and the Antichrist?

	All Adults	All Christians	Evangelical Protestants	Other Protestants	Catholics
Yes	40%	45%	71%	28%	18%
No	42%	39%	18%	54%	57%
Don’t know	18%	16%	11%	18%	25%

Another question asked respondents, who believed in biblical prophecy about Armageddon, “Do you believe the Antichrist is on Earth now?” Forty-seven percent said yes, 31 percent said no, and 22 percent did not know.

The Public Policy Poll (PPP) conducted a survey in September 2009 in New Jersey of 500 likely voters (Debnam 2009). They were asked, “Do you think Barack Obama is the Anti-Christ?” Overall, eight percent of the sample agreed that the president was the anti-Christ and 13 percent were not sure. Likewise, eight percent of male and female respondents agreed that Obama was the anti-Christ. By race and ethnicity, 7 percent of whites and 24 percent of Hispanics said yes. What is even more interesting is the percentages by race of respondents who were not sure if Obama is or is not the anti-Christ: 12 percent for whites, 18 percent for Hispanics, 11 percent for African Americans, and 15 percent for others.

Another interesting finding in the PPP data is that 5 percent of Obama voters thought he was the anti-Christ and another 5 percent who voted for him were not sure! Refer to table below.

By Voting Pattern

	Total	McCain	Obama	Someone Else/Don’t Remember
Yes	8%	12%	5%	5%
No	79%	68%	90%	77%
Not Sure	13%	21%	5%	18%

The latest data on Obama and the anti-Christ is from the people at Harris Poll. Harris Interactive conducted an online poll in the first week of March 2010. There were 2,320 respondents (Taylor 2010). Respondents with higher levels of education are less likely to agree that Obama is the anti-Christ. Eighteen percent of respondents with only high school or less agreed, followed by 13 percent for respondents with some college, 9 percent for college graduates, and 4 percent for post-graduates.

Next, I compared the New Jersey PPP results with the National Online Harris results (Yes, Obama may be/is the Anti-Christ) along political ideology and party affiliation. Nationally, Republicans and Independents are much more likely to believe Obama is the anti-Christ than for the New Jersey sample. This is especially true for independents, where nearly three times as many independents at the national level agree with the statement than do the New Jersey sample of Independents.

By Poll and Party Affiliation

	New Jersey	National
Democrat	6%	6%
Republican	14%	24%
Independent	4%	13%

Respondents at the national level are more likely to say that Obama is the anti-Christ but the magnitude of difference along political ideology about this question between the New Jersey and national sample was not as large as was the case for party affilliation.

By Poll and Political Ideology

	New Jersey	National
Liberal	—	8%
Moderate	6%	9%
Conservative	18%	24%

References

Debnam, Dean. 2009. Obama Popularity Dropping in New Jersey. Raleigh, North Carolina: Public Policy Polling http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/surveys/2009_Archives/PPP_Release_NJ_916.pdf.

Taylor, Humphrey. 2010. ‘Wingnuts’ and President Obama. Harris Interactive http://news.harrisinteractive.com/profiles/investor/ResLibraryView.asp?BzID=1963&ResLibraryID=37050&Category=1777.

Woodward, Kenneth L., and Anne Underwood. 1999. “The Way the World Ends. (Cover story).” Newsweek 134:66.

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[1] Jimmy Swaggart is a famous radio and TV evangelist who ran into trouble in the late 1980s for soliciting sex from a prostitute.

What do we need a minister for?

In my copious free time, I was able to read a fascinating paper by Daniel Dennett and Linda La Scola called Preachers Who are not Believers.  In it, several Christian ministers from different denominations confess to not believing in God or at least not the version of God they encourage their congregations to believe in.  To those of you with clergy training or experience, my shock at this may seem incredibly naive; like those people who send back food at restaurants and genuinely expect their new dishes not to be tampered with by the waiter. But I must say I was floored.

Not by the atheism — I haven’t really believed in God since I stopped watching Reading Rainbow (okay, aged out of Reading Rainbow’s target demographic) — but by the fact that these ministers still preach before congregations that would have them tarred and feathered if they knew they were unbelievers.  Why don’t they just switch denominations or churches or something?

I’m still new to UUism, but as far as I can tell, a UU minister could be an atheist and still be useful to his/her church. Why?  I ask this question seriously because even though I don’t believe in a God, I’m still pretty spiritual.  I believe that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in my philosophy (feel free to quote that and attribute it to me) and that there should be people with the courage and patience and temperament to help guide others to finding out what those things are for themselves.  Should those people be called ministers if they work outside a particular belief system?  Is it bad faith for unbelievers who do that good work to do so within the context of spiritual traditions in which they don’t believe?  I would really like to hear your thoughts.

Check out the paper and the follow-up article. They’re both really good.  But you don’t have to take my word for it.

Overheard at Lunch Bunch : The Help

A lively and wide-ranging discussion at lunch today led to us discussing the book The Help by Kathryn Stockett, who will be in town next week.  I haven’t read the book yet, but I talked about my aunt Ruthie who actually worked as a maid for a number of years.  I understand that the book portrays a loving and inspiring bond between the lead character and her maid.  I’m sure there were some situations like that, but that was not the case at all with my aunt.  The stories I remember my aunt telling were quite bitter (and, in a few cases, hilarious) but they intimated a type of bond too.

Natalie M. raised the most interesting question concerning the whole thing: Can a servant really love the people she’s paid to serve in that situation?  In such a circumstance, how can the person being served tell the difference between real love and the “care” that a maid is paid to provide?  I mean how long can you do someone’s laundry without caring about them even a little bit?  Which things are you doing from the heart and which ones are you doing “on the clock”? Does that distinction make a difference?  Like I said, I haven’t read the book. Maybe it raises exactly those questions.  Though we didn’t stay on the topic very long (just minutes later we were all gushing about the homemade ice cream we were having for dessert), I thought it was interesting enough to share here.