A Christian Liberal is NOT an oxymoron.

Posted by XT on November 25th, 2007 in Progressive Faith

There are few things as frustrating and devastating to someone who works in this medium that doesn’t really exist than to lose your website. I’m still not sure what happened with the Wordpress upgrade, but it hosed me good. I tried to recover, but I’m really not a techie kind of guy. I’ve learned enough to make the site do most of the things I want but I really don’t care to get into the details of website development and/or database doo-hickeys. I don’t really want to be a website designer, I want to be a writer. I just have to do a few other things to actually get around to writing around here.

But I had to stop and take stock of what I am doing here. If I focused on actually writing stuff that could be sold, for example, would I be any better off? Having written more days than not over the last three years, I still have a fairly small crowd of people who stop by here on anything close to a regular basis. I suppose if all of my regular readers gave me a thousand dollars a year I could make a career of this, but that isn’t about to happen (though if you want to send me a thousand bucks, I’ll gladly give you my address).

So what am I doing around here? There is a danger in looking towards the Bible for such specific questions, because almost anyone can find any answer they want somewhere in there. So I bided my time and held my tongue and tried to listen to that wee, small voice that might not be my own. What I kept hearing is that I might need to refocus, but I’m not exactly done.

This was the scripture we looked at this week:

Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! says the LORD. 2Therefore thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, concerning the shepherds who shepherd my people: It is you who have scattered my flock, and have driven them away, and you have not attended to them. So I will attend to you for your evil doings, says the LORD. 3Then I myself will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the lands where I have driven them, and I will bring them back to their fold, and they shall be fruitful and multiply. 4 I will raise up shepherds over them who will shepherd them, and they shall not fear any longer, or be dismayed, nor shall any be missing, says the LORD.
5 The days are surely coming, says the LORD, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. 6 In his days Judah will be saved and Israel will live in safety. And this is the name by which he will be called: “The LORD is our righteousness.”

I’ve bounced around in Christian churches a bit. I’ve sat in enough pews to know that some people actually aim at divisiveness and some have it thrust upon them reluctantly. For far too long I felt like something was wrong for me because I couldn’t justify with my knowledge of scripture what I was being told was God’s will from the pulpit and church bulletins. I eventually felt like I could either go to church and make it a hollow experience by divorcing my mind and heart from the action, or I could seek my own path, using all the gifts of reason and faith I have, and forgo membership in any congregation. Since I find it generally too difficult to pretend to be something I’m not, I chose the latter, time after time.

I’ve discovered a wonderful little congregation in Secaucus that has made that choice a false one. Not only is their exercise of faith carried out with a wonderful acceptance and openness that I’ve found too often lacking, but they are willing to support the spiritual development of each member with a heartfelt smile and sense of joy. Even if it leads in a direction of which they aren’t entirely sure, they are secure enough to give space to grow roots and spread wings - sometimes simultaneously.

But I don’t think I’m alone in that earlier troublesome feeling I carried towards religion. I know that polling data shows that a significant portion of Americans believe in God but just don’t drag themselves to church on a regular basis. Knowing that it is human nature to find time for those things that we find rewarding and important, this gives us a clue as to how we see church from a societal point of view.

I don’t write, necessarily, for those who already agree with me - though I’m happy to have their company. I don’t write for those who will never agree with me - though, again, I’m happy if they stop by and enjoy the reading. It isn’t for the people of my congregation and it isn’t for those shepherds pushing division and ultimate destruction. It’s for those other sheep out there.

You see, sheep naturally want to be together and they can actually get ill if they are kept apart from their own. This is why a ewe will follow the echo of its bleating lamb for miles - even into the jaws of death - as long as it has ears and legs.

Or maybe a blog.

Technorati Tags: Wordpress