Heaven, hell and funerals

Anyone who has lived in a minister's house knows that middle-of-the-night telephone calls often bring bad news. But for many pastors there is one kind of call that is uniquely painful. There are times when the shock of death is easier to handle than questions about eternal life.

"It happens like this," noted the Rev. J. Gerald Harris, who became editor of the Southern Baptist newspaper of Georgia after 40 years in ministry. "A grieving widow would call and say with a broken heart and with tears in her voice, 'Pastor, my husband had a heart attack last night and we took him to the hospital, but he was dead on arrival. I can't believe it has happened, but we need your help. I know he was not a church member, but we would like for you to preach his funeral.' "

The pastor says "yes," of course. Then, while talking with the family, it often becomes apparent that the deceased was not a believer or may even have been someone who – by word or deed –flaunted his status as an unbeliever. Others may join the church, then walk away for decades.

This is awkward, noted Harris, for clergy who believe salvation is found through faith in Jesus Christ, alone. It's one thing to step into the pulpit and preach on the mercy of God and to speak words of comfort to a grieving family. It's something else for a pastor to go a step further and do what loved ones may want him to do – openly proclaim they will be reunited with the deceased in heaven.

Harris said he started receiving calls and emails soon after he wrote about this subject in the Christian Index, in part because this dilemma pivots where the minister draws a theological line, a line that many liberal Christians no longer believe needs to be drawn at all.

There is no question, Harris stressed, that pastors should provide comfort and care for families in these circumstances. Obviously, there is no need for preachers to speak words that would cause grieving relatives pain. However, he also is convinced that it's wrong for pastors to deliver messages they sincerely believe are not true – to embrace the doctrine of "universalism," which proclaims that all people find eternal salvation, no matter what they believe or how they live their lives.

This is tricky doctrinal territory, as Sen. Barack Obama learned during a June 10 meeting with clergy behind closed doors in Chicago.

While other conservative leaders asked Obama about controversial social issues, the Rev. Franklin Graham – son of evangelist Billy Graham – asked an openly theological question: Did the candidate believe that "Jesus was the way to God, or merely a way."

Later, Obama told Newsweek that – in a candid, personal answer – he replied: "It is a precept of my Christian faith that my redemption comes through Christ, but I am also a big believer in the Golden Rule, which I think is an essential pillar not only of my faith but of my values and my ideals and my experience here on Earth. I've said this before, and I know this raises questions in the minds of some evangelicals. I do not believe that my mother, who never formally embraced Christianity as far as I know ... I do not believe she went to hell."

In the end, Harris said, it's all but impossible to ignore this kind of doctrinal division. However, pastors do have options when handling these situations, other than delivering sermons that violate their own consciences.

In many Christian traditions, funeral rites consist of hymns and prayers that place more attention on the words of scriptures than on a minister's message. But if the family insists on a sermon that focuses on the deceased, he said, pastors can suggest that a friend deliver this message. In some congregations, loved ones offer eulogies during gatherings – fellowship meals, perhaps – following funerals.

"These questions aren't going away," said Harris. "For many people today it's not enough to be tolerant of other people's decisions and religious beliefs. Now they want a kind of positive tolerance, they want you to accept and praise other people's beliefs. You have to be willing to say what they want you to say. ... "That just isn't possible, for a lot of us."

Who gets to 'reform' what?

Believe it or not, Terry Mattingly is on a working vacation and took the week off – at least when it came time to write a Scripps Howard News Service column. Sue me. I have missed four in 20 years and, two of those times, I was just in or just out of the hospital.

So here is something to read, anyway. It is a recent post from my weblog –GetReligion.org.

If you want to read the interactive version, with the links to the stories that I mention, then just go to this URL: http://www.getreligion.org/?p=3796

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Who gets to 'reform' what?

Posted by tmatt

As any regular GetReligion.org reader would know, we go out of our way to note the exceptionally good work that many religion reporters do on this very complex and difficult beat. A quick glance in the archives will also tell you that, more often than not, we are fans of the work of Tim Townsend of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

This brings me to Townsend's latest piece on one of the most complex ongoing stories in American religion right now – the battle for control of the historic St. Stanislaus Kostka Parish in St. Louis. Normally you would add the word ?Catholic? to that title, but, you see, the status of that term is what the battle is all about.

The battle for control of this parish is unfolding on several levels and Townsend does a great job of explaining the background.

Basically, this is a showdown between St. Louis Archbishop Raymond Burke and the powers that be in this massive Polish parish. The archbishop tried to establish control by refusing to send another priest to the parish, thus denying the people the sacraments. But the parish, toward the end of 2005, found a priest who was willing to serve at their altar without permission and, thus, thumb his nose – that's what Townsend writes – at the Catholic hierarchy.

Now, that priest – Father Marek Bozek – is in the middle of a new round of controversy that has divided the parish itself. The bottom line: It turns out that a priest who is willing to monkey with Catholic doctrines about episcopal authority may, in the end, be willing to be more than flexible about other doctrines, too (which is bad news for many Polish Catholics, who tend to be rather traditional at heart). Here is the key section of Townsend's long and detailed report:

"... Bozek has reshaped the church into a community that would be unrecognizable to those 19th-century founders. His vision for a reformed Roman Catholic faith calls for supporting female ordination, allowing priests to get married and accepting gay relationships.

Bozek's stands have attracted hundreds of new St. Stanislaus parishioners who share the priest's reform-minded vision.

"But they have also divided the church, pitting newer members against traditional parishioners unhappy with how far the priest has gone in condemning the Roman Catholic church. There have also been questions about the priest's trappings. He has negotiated a 143 percent salary hike, moved into a $157,000 Washington Avenue loft and leased a 2008 BMW for $450 per month.

Some parishioners point to another sign that alarmed them: Bozek, while in Poland last year, bought a silver ring custom-made for a bishop there. When he returned, he showed the ring to his parish at a Sunday Mass and spoke about it from the pulpit. Because it's a bishop's ring and he is only a priest, Bozek says, he has not worn it.

But he won't say he never will, he does not rule out the possibility of becoming the leader of what he calls "an 'underground Roman Catholic' movement."

All kinds of people are involved in this story, literally from the Rev.Sun Myung Moon to the Womenpriests network that causes earthquakes in the GetReligion comments pages whenever its name is mentioned.

Like I said, this is a very complicated story. Read it all.

But here is my question. Let's back up to that crucial paragraph in which Townsend has to describe what Bozek is up to at the parish.

The story, you see, is about the priest's vision for a reformed Roman Catholic faith and his reform-minded vision.

You see, 'reform' is one of those loaded religion beat words. If you look that term up online you see a number of definitions, but you'll get the drift. To 'reform' something means to:

* make changes for improvement in order to remove abuse and injustices; 'reform a political system'

* bring, lead, or force to abandon a wrong or evil course of life, conduct, and adopt a right one; 'The Church reformed me'; 'reform your conduct' ...

* a change for the better as a result of correcting abuses; "justice was for sale before the reform of the law courts" ...

* improve by alteration or correction of errors or defects and put into a better condition; 'reform the health system in this country'

* a campaign aimed to correct abuses or malpractices.

I think you get the point. When traditional Catholics read that kind of language, this is what they see. They see a newspaper saying that the liberal priest is trying to reform the abuses and injustices of the Catholic Church. So there.

Why doesn't the story say that the archbishop is trying to reform the priest and the parish? Who is reforming what? In other words, who is guilty of corruption and abuses?

However, please note that Townsend has tried to attach the word 'reform' directly to the views of the priest. This is his vision of reform. It is what he considers reform.

My question is simple: Does this work? Is there a wording that would be fair to both the priest and to the archbishop? Is it any better to say that the parish is attracting Catholics who share Bozek's 'progressive' vision? That share his desire to 'innovate', when it comes to crucial doctrines in Catholic moral theology? Is there a better way to say this, one that is both accurate and fair to partisans on both sides?

Dark Knight of the soul

For many years, Marc Newman used a simple test when asking college students if they thought some actions were always right and others were always wrong – slavery.

Then something strange happened in his philosophy of communication classes. Students began arguing that slavery might be acceptable in certain cultures and under certain conditions. Besides, who were they to judge others?

So here's a new question. What if you had two ferries and each contained a bomb. One ferry is full of criminals, while the other contains ordinary citizens and, there's a catch, each contains a remote control that can trigger the other boat's bomb. Then there is this sick Joker who vows that he will destroy both, if one doesn't destroy the other.

Wouldn't it be moral for the good guys to destroy the bad guys?

This is, of course, a soul-wrenching scene in "The Dark Knight," the Batman sequel that is soaring toward the $500 million dollar mark at the U.S. box office.

"The audience is torn between these two choices and that's the point," said Newman, who teaches courses on the rhetoric of film at Regent University in Virginia Beach, Va. "You want to see good triumph over evil, somehow. But just look how far these movies have to ratchet up the nature of these violent acts so that the whole audience can agree that they're evil."

Newman believes that one reason that consumers are paying – over and over – to see this dark, distressing movie is that they are drawn to its depiction of a culture in which violence has become senseless, random and all but unstoppable.

In one nihilistic sermon, the villain with a death-mask smirk tells the powers that be, "Do I really look like a guy with a plan? You know what I am? I am a dog chasing cars. I wouldn't know what to do with one if I caught it. I just do things." Later, he proclaims: "Introduce a little anarchy, upset the established order and everything becomes chaos. I am an agent of chaos. Oh, and you know the thing about chaos? It?s fair."

This note of despair fits the times. Thus, the movie strikes a chord.

"We see in 'The Dark Knight a fictional expression of our own world gone mad," argues Newman, at his MovieMinistry.com website. "Under interrogation, The Joker rejects the idea that his is some alien ideology. Providing his analysis of the bastions of rules and laws – the police department – The Joker explains, 'You see, their morals, their code, it's a bad joke. Dropped at the first sign of trouble. They're only as good as the world allows them to be. I'll show you. When the chips are down, these civilized people, they'll eat each other. See, I'm not a monster ... I'm just ahead of the curve.' "

The question religious believers have to ask, he said, is "whether The Joker is right."

Newman is not alone in hailing "The Dark Knight" as – like it or not – a must-see epic for clergy and others who want to keep their fingers on the cultural pulse. But there are strong voices of dissent.

"No movie I've ever seen has been so emotionally disturbing and spiritually oppressive," warned Brian Fitzpatrick of Human Events. While some claim that the movie's tale of good and evil contains essentially "conservative" values, he argued that it "showcases violence, betrayal and sadism in the name of frivolous entertainment. The movie is morally corrupt."

The key to this tension, noted Newman, is that "The Dark Knight" leaves viewers yearning for its anti-hero – Batman is aware of his own flaws and mixed motives – to find a way to remain true to his personal vow to defend the innocent, even if that means bending society's rules.

As this movie lurches to its conclusion, it becomes clear that the Joker has only one goal and that is to strip Batman of his moral convictions, to shatter his belief that good can defeat evil without being corrupted.

This implies that some kind of moral absolutes do exist.

"But we are left," Newman added, "with an important question: Where does Batman get his convictions about what is right and what is wrong? He has a moral vision, but where did it come from? That isn't in the movie. There are no answers there."

Anglican beat goes on

The career of Bishop Catherine Roskam of the Diocese of New York has been built on her skills as a cross-cultural ambassador for the modern Episcopal Church.

She led the International Concerns Committee of her denomination's executive council, helped create her diocese's Global Women's Fund and has worked as a consultant on issues of cultural sensitivity. In some circles, she is known as the bishop who dared to rap during a "Hip Hop Mass" a few years ago in the Bronx.

"My sistas and brothas, all my homies and peeps, stay up – keep your head up, holla back and go forth and tell it like it is," proclaimed the bishop, in her benediction.

Thus, the diminutive, white-haired assistant bishop was an unlikely figure to inspire bold, angry headlines during the recent Lambeth Conference of bishops from the global Anglican Communion. This 20-day gathering had been carefully planned by the archbishop of Canterbury and his staff to focus on prayer, Bible study and small-group sessions called "Indabas" – a Zulu term for tribal meetings – in private settings that did not include journalists.

It was especially important not to inflame already painful disputes between Third World traditionalists and liberals in the United States, Canada, England and elsewhere.

Then, during planned discussions of domestic violence, Roskam spoke out on an unlikely topic – bishops who beat their wives.

"We have 700 men here. Do you think any of them beat their wives? Chances are they do," argued Roskam, in The Lambeth Witness, a daily newsletter for gay-rights supporters in the 77-million-member Anglican Communion. "The most devout Christians beat their wives. ... Many of our bishops come from places where it is culturally accepted to beat your wife. In that regard, it makes conversation quite difficult."

The key, she added, is that, "Violence against women, and violence against children for that matter, is violence against the defenseless. With women, it goes hand-in-hand with misogyny."

The New York bishop's accusations rocked the conference, which was already tense due to the absence of about 280 conservative bishops – many from Nigeria and Uganda – who declined to attend due to the presence of U.S. leaders who backed the 2003 consecration of the openly gay and noncelibate Bishop Gene Robinson of New Hampshire. Only 617 Anglican bishops pre-registered and some of those failed to attend, according to a report in The Living Church magazine. Thus, nearly a quarter of the bishops in attendance came from the small, but wealthy, U.S. Episcopal Church.

The most damaging part of Roskam's pronouncement was her tone of moral and cultural superiority, noted commentator Riazat Butt. It was easy for bishops from the Global South to read between the lines and find painful traces of colonialism.

"What bishops should be ... concerned about is her insinuation that a non-white culture leads to domestic violence and that white, western culture is too civilized and too advanced to allow such atrocities to occur," argued Butt, in The Guardian. "Roskam fails to recognize that domestic violence affects people regardless of their class, ethnicity, religion, gender or geography."

The whole episode brought back memories of the 1998 Lambeth Conference, when a rising tide of African and Asian votes helped produce a pivotal resolution – the vote was 526 in favor, with 70 opposed and 45 abstentions – stating that sex outside of marriage, including gay sex, is "incompatible with scripture."

The Anglican primate of Scotland said that particular resolution left him feeling "lynched" and was the result of Third World bishops trying to "Islamify Christianity, making it more severe, Protestant and legalistic." One outspoken American bishop complained that many Africans have "moved out of animism into a very superstitious kind of Christianity."

Now, a decade later, a female bishop from a liberal diocese in America provided new evidence that these kinds of cultural stereotypes are hard to bury.

This kind of guilt-by-association game is not going to ease tensions in the Anglican Communion, noted Archbishop of York John Sentamu.

"I have never beaten my wife, although I can't talk about other people," Sentamu told the London Times. "There is a danger of stereotyping people because of the culture they come from and assuming they must surely be doing it. ... I hope Bishop Catherine has got figures and numbers and people. Because if not, she is in danger of causing an unnecessary rumpus."