For my father, a pastor

Anyone who grew up in a parsonage knows that "PK" stands for "preacher's kid."

Very early on, I rebelled against that label. But I wasn't rejecting my father, my family or the faith. When people called me a "preacher's kid," I bluntly told them my father wasn't a preacher - he was a pastor. There's a difference.

My father turned 81 this week and I thought this would be a good time to say that I'm still proud of his line of work. Of course, it's been some time since the Rev. Bert Mattingly retired from the pastorate and from his post- retirement work as a hospital chaplain. That doesn't matter. In Texas Baptist lingo, he's still "Brother Bert."

My father preached, but that wasn't what defined him. The joy, and burden, of the job is that there's more to it than that.

It's tough work and seems to be getting tougher. Ask Jim Dahlman, who recently edited the first-anniversary issue of the Focus on the Family magazine called Pastor's Family. He had only been on the job a few weeks when he read some response letters that left him weeping. Some pastors weren't burning out – they were crashing in flames.

"I read one letter after another from pastors or their wives talking about this overwhelming sense of loneliness and isolation," he said. "Over and over, they'd write things like, 'We're totally alone. We can't talk to anyone about what's going on in our lives or the pressure we're under. We're out here twisting in the wind.' "

The big pressure is for pastors to always be available to handle each and every crisis, no matter how minor. With family and friends far away, who do people call? Oprah? The all-night therapist? Yet Dahlman said people also expect pastors to be "lifestyle role models" with perfect homes and perfect spiritual lives. But it's a problem if the pastor spends too much time at family events or on prayer retreats. And church members expect well researched, practical and, preferably, entertaining sermons. But it's a problem if the pastor spends too much time studying and writing. The clock is ticking.

I'm convinced the main reason stress levels are so high is that too many people – in pews and pulpits – have forgotten that pastors are defined by who they are and what they stand for, not what skills they possess and what tasks they perform. Pastors can't be shepherds if people expect them to be superheroes.

So why was I proud to be a pastor's kid? This may sound simplistic, but I believe many churches need to hear it.

* He was a pastor – not a preacher, CEO, entertainer, clinical counselor, self-help guru or crisis-management consultant.

* He preached the Bible, not his feelings and experiences. Today, many urge pastors to make their lives open books - often forcing a faked extroversion that has little to do with reality. This has more to do with an era of mass-media confessions than solid teaching or evangelism.

* My parents have been married 57 years and I'm proud of their love and mutual commitment to ministry. Today, many churches are placing so much pressure on clergy schedules and spirits that they are weakening the very foundations of their personal lives. This has led to divorce rates that are as shameful as in society as a whole.

* He wasn't a workaholic. It wasn't until college that I talked with other clergy children and discovered how unusual it was that I spent many, many hours with my father. I'm convinced this was linked to a more balanced, realistic approach to ministry.

* My father kept on loving God, his work and his people. I have never known a pastor who didn't wrestle with fits of melancholy. Pastors are, by nature, realists who know the reality of pain and sin. And many heap criticism on them, micromanage their lives and expect miracles.

I rarely saw my father move mountains. But I did see him preach, teach, pray and embrace sinners. I was proud that he was a pastor. I still am.

Making spiritual 'Contact'

After the "Contact" sneak preview, viewers in the sold-out theater outside Kansas City were asked to complete the usual survey probing their reactions.

It was Saturday night at the mall and the Hollywood dream machine needed to know how this $90 million "event movie for intellectuals" was going to play in Middle America. Was it "entertaining," "exciting," "too slow," "thought provoking," "fun to watch," "meaningful," "emotional" and "believable"? Were the special effects good enough? Did it have enough action? Did it leave "you feeling good"?

In this case, researchers needed to add some questions, such as: "Has this movie affected your view of science and faith?" Or, "Are you more or less likely to go to church tomorrow?" Or, "Do you believe in a Higher Power? What kind?"

"Contact" is based on astronomer Carl Sagan's novel and, in one wide-screen package, tries to blend discussions of God, science, life, death, eternal life, extraterrestrial life, organized religion, unorganized religion and the origins of the Cosmos – with a Big C. That's all. Sagan died on Dec. 20, as the movie neared completion.

The movie shows that Sagan, as the scientific establishment's designated media apologist, was committed to blending skepticism with a market-friendly brand of spirituality. "Contact" is not a feel-good movie for hard-shell agnostics. Rather, it's the summer science-fiction epic for millions of Americans who find pure science spiritually unfulfilling, but who don't feel they can embrace the 10 Commandments.

"This movie is surprisingly sympathetic to religion and does raise some critical questions about science," said Robert C. Newman of Biblical Theological Seminary in Hatfield, Pa., who holds a Cornell doctorate in astrophysics. "Still, anyone who worships the God of the Bible isn't going to be very happy as they walk out of the theater. ... Of course, I don't know how many people who think of themselves as traditional Christians pay much attention to what they watch or do much thinking about what movies have to say."

Sagan's heroine is radio astronomer Eleanor Arroway, played by actress Jodie Foster. In both the book and the movie she is a tough-minded, yet emotionally complex, skeptic. The key is that movie director Robert Zemeckis, in addition to simplifying the plot and adding the usual action-packed plot twists, has radically edited and altered the religious characters. The novel contains sympathetic believers and even avoids stereotypes of fundamentalists, noted Newman, one of several Christians in science who corresponded with Sagan as he wrote the book.

One pivotal figure, the Rev. Palmer Joss, is an inquisitive, but quite conservative, evangelical. In the movie, Matthew McConaughey's character has evolved into a mass-media mystic who never mentions Christianity and uses what one person calls "flowery, New Age rhetoric." Instead of a cross, Joss' necklace offers a circle within a circle - a miniature holy hubcap. He carries a slim leather volume with a ribbon marker and empty, gilt-edged pages that he fills with his own thoughts and observations - a do-it-yourself bible. He tells Arroway that he fled the priesthood because he "couldn't handle the celibacy thing" and their first theological debate occurs in bed.

But the film does contain two conservative Christians. The one person who spouts scripture is, literally, a mad bomber who raises his hands in Pentecostal praise before committing a suicidal act of mass terrorism. The other is a Religious Right politico, played by a sleazy Rob Lowe.

The movie also omits the novel's controversial ending – Arroway's discovery of "the artist's signature" within the building blocks of math and science. This concept would have been highly relevant amid today's escalating debates about whether the structures of astrophysics and biochemistry contain evidence of a Creator.

"We could give the producers the benefit of a doubt and say they're saving that for the sequel," said Newman. "You could also say that, since Sagan was so involved in the making of the movie, he must have been moving away from that concept latter in his life. ... He seemed to be growing more open to spirituality, but less open to talking about a transcendent God."

Cracks in the Anglican Communion

It's a long way from Archbishop Moses Tay's Singapore cathedral to the Philadelphia Convention Center and the Episcopal Church's latest debates about sin, sacraments and sex.

The soft-spoken Asian primate isn't planning to make the trip. Nevertheless, his voice is being heard at the 72nd General Convention of Anglicanism's bitterly divided American flock, which ends July 25. Many Episcopalians want to know: What did Tay say and when did he say it?

The archbishop has declined, via fax, to confirm or deny published reports that, during a March meeting of archbishops in Jerusalem, he proposed that the Episcopal Church be expelled from the Anglican Communion. Meanwhile, the U.S. hierarchy denies the primates discussed excommunication - at least during on-the-record sessions.

What is clear is that most bishops in Asia, Africa and other Southern Hemisphere churches believe trends among America's 2 million Episcopalians could shatter the Anglican Communion. At least 75 percent of the world's 70 million Anglicans live in the Third World.

"We are deeply concerned that the setting aside of biblical teaching in such actions as the ordination of practicing homosexuals and the blessing of same-sex unions calls into question the authority of the Holy Scriptures. This is totally unacceptable," wrote 80 bishops from 20 of Anglicanism's 35 provinces, meeting in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. "We need to learn how to seek each other's counsel ... and to reach a common mind, before embarking on radical changes to Church discipline and moral teaching. We live in a global village and ... the way we act in one part of the world can radically affect the mission and witness of the Church in another."

Tay's province immediately raised the stakes, endorsing the Kuala Lumpur statement and saying it will "be in communion with that part of the Anglican Communion which accepts and endorses the principles aforesaid and not otherwise."

"One reason Archbishop Tay isn't talking to the press ... is that he believes the southeast Asia resolution says everything that he needs to say," said Father Bill Atwood of Dallas, a traditionalist who has spent a year crisscrossing the globe visiting traditionalist bishops.

Those final words - "and not otherwise" - signal that Singapore may back efforts to break communion with those who support the Episcopal Church's de-facto policy of blessing same-sex unions and ordaining those sexually outside of marriage. An Episcopal court already has ruled that Episcopalians have no "core doctrine" on marriage. Bishops and delegates gathered in Philadelphia will consider several other progressive actions linked to sexuality.

However, Third World events have caused a strategic reversal. Right now, the Episcopal establishment is emphasizing unity and quiet change, while the right wants painful clarity, such as a yea-or-nay vote on the Kuala Lumpur statement. Why? A doctrinal earthquake in 1997 would rock 1998's Lambeth Conference in Canterbury, a once-a-decade conclave in which Third World bishops share the spotlight with richer and more powerful First World bishops. If the Episcopal left is patient, its leaders won't have to face overseas prelates until 2008. This also will be after the retirement of morally conservative Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey.

In his diocesan newspaper, Philadelphia Bishop Charles Bennison said clear action on same-sex unions might have to wait until 2000. "When this one goes over the top, I want it to go over in such a big way that everyone is swept along with it and it becomes a slam dunk," he said.

But it will be hard to keep peace in a communion that is stretching to include bishops with clashing views on everything from biblical authority to the acceptability of worshipping other gods at Christian altars. Also, some Episcopal progressives believe they have waited long enough.

"The matter of same-sex relationships and their blessing by the Church is extremely complicated and conflicted," wrote New Hampshire Bishop Douglas Theuner. "After nearly 2,000 years, there is not consensus in the Church Catholic about the nature and purpose of marriage or about the role of sexuality. ... If we were able to act only when the Church Catholic is of a common mind, we would not be able to act at all."

Hong Kong II: There's More to Life than $

In the beginning, Communist leaders tried to crush all belief in a power higher than the state.

That didn't work, so these regimes changed strategies. While brute force remains an option, the goal today is to let religious groups live and even grow - in tiny plots groomed by atheistic gardeners. The bottom line: Martyrs are more dangerous than apostates.

If there is anything that people understand in Hong Kong, it is the bottom line. Thus, it's highly unlikely that China will strangle the goose that has proven it can lay golden eggs, said Hong Kong Democratic Party chairman Martin Lee. He was speaking to a circle of journalists and Christian scholars days before the July 1 rites that tossed his party out of power.

Instead, China will build a cage of rules and regulations. China wants Hong Kong to remain an economic success. America wants Hong Kong to remain an economic success. "But there is more to life than rising economic statistics," said Lee, an active Roman Catholic. The question that journalists, human-rights activists and religious leaders must keep asking is, "Why can't I do today what I was able to do yesterday?", he said.

At first glance, Hong Kong's new laws on religion appear to maintain the status quo. But the laws are terribly vague.

Article 32 in the Special Administrative Region's Basic Law states: "Hong Kong residents shall have freedom of religious belief and freedom to preach and to conduct and participate in religious activities in public." Article 141 uses similar language, but adds that the government pledges not to interfere in religious groups' internal affairs, except when such activities "contravene the laws of the Region." At the moment, these laws are controlled by politicians and tycoons appointed by Beijing. Also, China has ruled that the standing committee of the National People's Congress - not Hong Kong's court of final appeals – will ultimately decide disputes about the Basic Law.

However, it is Article 23 that causes the most concern. It states that Hong Kong's new leadership "shall enact laws ... to prohibit any act of treason, secession, sedition (or) subversion against the Central People's Government, ... to prohibit foreign political organizations or bodies from conducting political activities in the Region, and to prohibit political organizations or bodies of the Region from establishing ties with foreign political organizations or bodies."

The standing committee on the mainland already has annulled or altered dozens of Hong Kong laws that affect political parties and dissidents – but may also apply to religious groups. Three of these changes could be crucial.

It will, for example, be harder to form "voluntary" or "non- governmental" associations and such groups now face tighter controls. Religious leaders of all kinds are watching for any signs that China may open a Hong Kong branch of its Religious Affairs Bureau.

Hong Kong's rulers will keep a closer eye on those with ties to overseas "political" groups. Obviously, if it's hard to separate politics and religion in the United States, it will be hard to do so in China. What happens to Hong Kong Baptists if the Southern Baptist Convention in America continues to fight China's compulsory abortion policies? Is that "political"? What if the Vatican continues to resist efforts to throttle papal loyalists in China? What if Hong Kong Buddhists retain ties with those who plead for Tibet? Finally, anyone who opposes these changes will find it much harder to protest in public.

Meanwhile, debates rage on in Washington, D.C., and elsewhere. Some argue that economic freedom will protect political rights, which will lead to religious liberty. Others insist that religious liberty must come first – the bare minimum of what it means to be free.

Truth is, said Lee, these civil liberties are woven together. "Nothing terrible is going to happen on the first of July," he said. "China's leaders are not fools. ... The key word is 'control.' China does not want to kill the goose – only keep it from flying free."

Silence and Tension in Hong Kong

HONG KONG - This weekend, thousands of Lutherans will arrive for their World Federation's ninth General Assembly, flowing into this city's new convention center in the wake of what seemed like most of the world's diplomats and news crews.

Commentators will hail the gathering as another sign that life is continuing as usual with red Chinese flags flying overhead.

The reality is more complicated than that. The decision to hold this Lutheran assembly in Hong Kong was made five years ago and it drew a behind- the-scenes reaction that raised eyebrows. Officials at the New China News Agency - the Chinese hierarchy's Hong Kong voice before the handover - began asking if the assembly would address any "political" issues.

Eventually, the Lutherans got the nod. But religious leaders got the point.

"This is Hong Kong. This is one of the most international cities in the world," stressed the Rev. Kwok Nai-wang, director of the Hong Kong Christian Institute. "Day in and day out, we have international meetings of all kinds here. We have never had to ask for the government's permission. This was a signal that things would be different after July 1."

Religious groups in the new Hong Kong Special Administrative Region have been promised that little will change. Article 32 of its Basic Law seems clear: "Hong Kong residents shall have freedom of conscience. Hong Kong residents shall have freedom of religious belief and freedom to preach and to conduct and participate in religious activities in public."

Once again, the reality will almost certainly be more complex than that. China's leaders have repeatedly said that Hong Kong must retain its unique role as one of the world's most freewheeling financial markets and as the economic gateway to the mainland. Yet the region's new leaders also have taken the first steps to control – not crush – those who want to defend human rights in Hong Kong or to advocate changes in the mainland.

In the weeks ahead, media attention will focus on critical issues of economics, dissent and freedom of the press. Yet these issues will also affect people in churches, temples and mosques. After all, Hong Kong has for decades served as the hub for hundreds of religious groups with regional and global ties. Multinational corporations are not the only groups that worry about losing control of their Hong Kong assets. Politicians and reporters are not the only people who fear losing their right to speak in the public square.

"Freedom of religion – if you limit that to freedom of worship – is certainly going to be safe," said Kwok, who led the Hong Kong Christian Council from 1977-88. "If we want to meet our social responsibilities to the poor, or if we challenge social structures and policies, we will be in trouble. ... But faith cannot be merely a private matter, if it is truly free. It is a matter of public action. That will place us on a collision course."

Most Hong Kong religious leaders issued cautiously optimistic statements in the days leading up to this week's handover. Others had varying reasons to remain silent.

Because of Hong Kong's history as a British colony, its Anglican churches and schools have close ties to the government and to the tycoons that govern the city. Also, as much as 80 percent of Roman Catholic education and social work in Hong Kong is government subsidized. The leaders of these 400 establishment parishes have clout, but can ill afford to rock the boat. Hong Kong insiders call this "The Unholy Alliance." Meanwhile, those who lead the region's 800-plus evangelical churches and mission groups insist that they will stay focused on ministry, while avoiding controversial public issues.

"We are not saying that nothing bad is going to happen," said a Baptist leader, who asked to remain anonymous. "We are saying that there is a piece of paper that says nothing bad is going to happen."