Penn State, Fathering, & the Nonviolence of Christ via Pastor Rudy Rasmus

Often when people get into a discussion of the nonviolent response of Christ, and thus, of his followers, the typical response is a presentation of the hypothetical question: "But what about if someone is hurting someone you love? What would you do then?"

As one convinced of Christ's peaceable living, and as one who loves my wife and four children dearly...this is a haunting question. (It's also a little bit of a ridiculous question, not because I can't imagine it happening, but because there is a certain insanity after a while when it comes to hypothetical questions. Life is not hypothetical.). I recently read a short book by John Hower Yoder, who many see as the go-to when it comes to Christian pacificism that seeks to begin to "answer" this question. It was a great read. But part of the insanity of this over-simplified question is that there is no over-simplified answer, at least not for the pacifist.

Today, I found a video thanks again to TWOTP.com from Pastor Rudy Rasmus. I've only heard of/from Rasmus a couple of times, but I perceive him to be a man of one message: love, and love at all costs. So I was intrigued as to what his response would be in light of the Penn State child sexual abuse situation. He responds not as a pastor, but as a father who follows Christ. I appreciate his honesty.

"Daddy, I would have hated to have lost twice."



Crossing Over To Love from The Work Of The People on Vimeo.

A Great Prayer

Your kingdom come around and through and in me;
Your power and glory, let them shine through me;
Your Hallowed name, O may I bear with honor,
And may Your living Kingdom come in me.
The Bread of Life, O may I share with honor,
And may You feed a hungry world through me.

Once every three months or so, I listen to this version of Gloria Gaither's song, I Then Shall Live. I'd probably otherwise assume that the Gaither Band is a "sweet-by-and-by---someday-we'll-get-to-heaven" kind of propagation...and I'd be wrong.

Pretty much the whole song is quotable ("I've been so loved that I'll risk loving too!"), but the third verse above is such a great prayer for your day and your life, here and now.

May it be so.

After the Yellow Ribbon, Pre-Conference

Why would someone who believes in the nonviolence of the cross of Christ decide to go to a conference based around our response to and support of American soldiers?

Today is Veteran's Day. I'm right now sitting at JFK Airport in New York City on a layover from Boston to Raleigh-Durham for a Conference at Duke University. There are yellow balloons everywhere, probably 500 or so just within 100 feet of me, in bunches and making a huge archway. There is a troop of Boy Scouts, probably 15-20 of them here, waiting for soldiers from the New York National Guard to come in from a flight. My Facebook feed is saturated with patriotic pictures, thanks made to veterans, and yellow ribbons. People are remembering veterans today. This is of mixed emotions for me.

A problem with holidays is that we tend to reserve the designated celebration or thankfulness for those holidays. But my mother is my mother 365 days a year and not just a day in May. And it's good to be thankful on days other than November 25th. And we would do well to resolve to do well in our lives other than on the first day of the year.

So I fear that I will forget veterans tomorrow and the day after. It's likely that most of the country will as well. 

I've twice now read the stat that veterans of the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are committing suicide at the rate of 17 a day.

...seventeen a day...

I didn't even know that there were that many vets to go around. (I still kind of question the statistic.)

The ongoing effects of war and the results of fighting in war are so incomprehensible to me. I truly can ONLY imagine. Stanley Hauerwas calls us to consider the difficult transitions and situations that soldiers go to in the video below.

Hauerwas on moral fragmentation

And so I hate the wars. I hate that the most powerful nation in the world chose to fight them in the ways that she has. I hate the money that has gone into them. I hate that men and women from the United States have died by the thousands in them. I hate that hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Afghans have died, many of whom were not soldiers. 

Selfishly, I hate most of all that Bobby Moscillo is dead today because of the war in Iraq. 

So in a few hours I will be sitting with a group of people listening to and responding to the topic of our response to the homecoming of soldiers. 

Why am I going?

Because the compassion of Christ to which I am called is for all. I'm no great futurist or sociologist, but I can imagine that there will be veterans whose lives have been drastically affected by these wars around us for decades to come. As a pastor in a small church, I expect that I will come across many of them in the coming years. Indeed, I already have.

There are a variety of ways that evil causes us to suffer. Veterans are suffering after returning home from the evils of war the likes of which I cannot imagine. Christ's call is for his followers to identify the suffering and suffer with them ("with suffering" = com - passion). 

That's why I'm going.

Wesley's Spiritual Disciplines

When my good friend, Dr. John Reilly, first spoke to me about Wesley's spiritual disciplines as though there was a set group or list of them, I was intrigued. As much as I'm not a big fan of checklists, Wesley's writings are so extensive that having a scholar succinctly translate important aspects of what he said is helpful.

After that conversation, I went home and searched for them, but didn't easily find any comprehensive or generally agreed-upon list. I emailed John, and he sent me something that had been compiled from Dr. Henry ("Hal") Knight's dissertation, which is now in published book form: The Presence of God in the Christian Life: John Wesley and the Means of Grace. Don't look for the Kindle version and be prepared to spend at least $50 if you want it in book form. This compilation/list is at the end of this post in three parts.

Recently, I was able to hear John present some work from his own dissertation, and he gave what I think is a more comprehensive work. This list is his own compilation. Some asked me to share this when I returned, so here they are - John Wesley's Spiritual Disciplines:

• Prayer - Personal/Corporate
• Fasting - Personal/Corporate
• Journaling - Personal
• Solitude - Personal/Corporate
• Silence - Personal/Corporate
• Bible Reading - Personal/Corporate
• "Feeding" the Poor - Personal/Corporate
• Christian Conferencing - Corporate
• Circumstantial Grace - Personal/Corporate

John was continually insistent on reminding us that all of these are framed around, pointed at, and intentionally directed to a heart of love. So the practices don't matter unless they are directed at this purpose.

Now I don't believe that they were ever presented in such a list/form by Wesley himself. Let's remember that Wesley's writings are extensive. Sometimes I feel like if something can be said one way or another, then Wesley said it that way at some point. He often changed his mind. So a single voice in the totality of his writings is often difficult to ascertain. Nonetheless, I find the above list helpful as I consider my own discipleship and the oversight of others. They can certainly be demonstrated to be within the totality of Wesley's encouragement to those who listened to him.

I'd love to believe that in the next several weeks I might blog a post commenting on each one, but those who know me know that this will not happen. So let me comment generally:

For me, discipleship is firstly formed by Christ. As I look at this list, I can understand from the witness of scripture Jesus Christ himself participating in a form of each one, with the exceptions of journaling and perhaps silence (we might assume it from his regular solitude, but it's not there explicitly). But the rest are easily demonstrated to be within his own discipleship, even in both forms and all of them are within scripture. I haven't yet explained that this list was given with the distinction of whether or not each practice can be either personal, corporate, or both. Wesley apparently encouraged the distinction, and practicing each both individually and in community as was possible.

Any time a list is presented, one runs the risk of codification or fostering legalism. I'm willing to run that risk since discipleship is so impoverished these days. At least in my own tradition, discipleship generally means "Sunday School" and "book studies." The intentional and regular practice of fasting, solitude, silence, etc. is reserved for old saints, super-pastors, and monks. Even for a denomination that prides itself on compassionate ministry, it's vastly encouraged as a means to change the world rather than to change me.

There are obviously things not on the list, namely for me: evangelism. While evangelism is generally not considered an act of discipline/discipleship, I argue that it indeed is. Jesus, in forming his own disciples, sent them out to evangelize as an act. Evangelism is a spiritual discipline and is the last one Jesus handed on in the synoptics. Making disciples is part of our discipleship in Christ. 

Now, for the list as given from Dr. Knight:

All means of grace have as their end the life of love, the Christian life.

General Means of Grace

• Universal obedience
• Keeping all the commandments
• Watching
• Denying ourselves
• Taking up our cross daily
• Exercise of the presence of God

Instituted (Particular) Means of Grace

• Prayer: private, family, public; consisting of deprecation, petition, intercession, thanksgiving; extemporaneous, written
• Searching scripture by reading, meditating, hearing; attending the ministry of the word, either read or expounded
• The Lord’s Supper
• Fasting, or abstinence
• Christian Conferencing, which includes both the fellowship of believers and rightly ordered conversations which minister grace to hearers

Prudential Means of Grace

• Particular rules or acts of holy living
• Class and band meetings
• Prayer meetings, covenant services, watch night services, love feasts
• Visiting the sick
• Doing all the good one can, doing no harm
• Reading devotional classics and all edifying literature

Why give a nod to Halloween?

I have a love-hate relationship with Halloween.

Not big on the candy, costumes, and hoop-la.

But I think it's a great opportunity to remind us of life & love.

I don't really single it out. There are aspects of Easter and Christmas that bug me too. And I find little value in Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Mothers'-Fathers' Days, and Flag Day. (Flag Day... Really?!)

Anyway, Halloween is today. Our culture knows this: the day is second only to Christmas in terms of dollars spent in anticipation of (industry expected $6.9 billion for Halloween this year). I know it goes with the ages of my children, but it seems like the hype surrounding Halloween grows each and every year. My kids were invited to wear their costumes at their music recitals. They were invited to parties (on nights other than Oct. 31). My oldest - in first grade - even got a "boo-gram" again this year. (Kind of fun, actually: another child tapes candy to a piece of paper that says, "You've been BOOED!", puts it on the doorstep, rings the bell, and runs away.) The lawn and house ornaments and lights, etc. are so overdone, it's not even funny.  There are enough blow-up spiders on roofs in Hingham to make any arachnophobe tremble. It's unbelievable.

And why...?

With Christmas or Easter, we might explain that at least most people value the story and Christian tradition behind the holidays.

But Halloween...? Do people know?

Before I get to that, I almost forgot: my first-grade son Brayden came home from school one day last week and said, "Hey Dad, do you know the holiday called 'Day of the Dead'?"

Now I vaguely remembered hearing of this Mexican holiday, but at the moment, I just assumed he was confused: "You mean All Saints' Day, right?"

Brayden: "No, Dad. We learned in Spanish today about Day of the Dead. It's in Mexico. They all go into the cemetery and think about the dead."

Me: "Okay, Brayden, but that sounds a lot like our All Saints Day."

Brayden: "Well what's All Saints Day?"

Me: "It's a day when we remember those who have died in Christ."

Brayden: "Oh, no. Not that, Dad. My teacher said Day of the Dead has nothing to do with Jesus. It's not like rising from the dead."

[...silence...]

Me: "Um, Brayden, when is Day of the Dead?"

Brayden: "November 1st."

Me: "Hmm...that's the same day as All Saints Day. So I imagine that they're related. ...so Jesus is kind of important to All Saints Day."

Brayden: "That's not what my teacher said. She said it has nothing to do with Jesus."

Now I have a lot of respect for public school teachers, so I let it drop for the moment. I looked it up and remembered hearing in the past about Day of the Dead, which is indeed a national holiday in Mexico. Yep: while pre-dating even Christ with Aztec roots, the day is intentionally set on November 1st and 2nd in connection with All Saints/Souls Days. Not even sure why I looked it up.

But "it's got nothing to do with Jesus," of course. :-p

Anyway, I actually want Brayden to know about All Saints Day. So we've been having some conversations. Here's why I think Halloween is an opportunity for we who follow Christ and why I am up for working a bit to re-claim All Saints Day:

We're horrible at dealing with death. I wish I was talking about just American society in general, but it's true of my church tradition as well. So All Saints Day is a wonderful way to remind us what we believe about life, death, and resurrection by the Resurrected One himself, Jesus Christ.

So, I wrote the below for our church. For the third year in a row, we are handing out hot apple cider (for warmth), glow bracelets (for safety!), and candy (I guess because we're supposed to) to those who walk by the chapel. We're also adding about 75 milk jug luminaries around the property to light up the neighborhood. I may even pull out a table and light our red sanctuary candles that we have in memory of those saints who've gone before us. I'm hoping this continues to catch on for our church community. 

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Why would an evangelical Christian church do anything on Halloween?

"There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear..."

John was one of the first followers of Jesus Christ. He wrote the above words in one of the books of the Bible that's attributed to him. In today’s contemporary world, one in which much is built upon or informed by fear, our church believes rather that love is to be at the heart of what we do.

So we reject any continued and intentional effort to instill fear in anyone. Quite frankly, much of what causes fear these days is nothing at all to even be feared!

Life, Death, and Resurrection

What about participating in the evil of Halloween? It's true that many see Halloween as a night of opportunity for interacting with "evil," whatever that may be or look like. And this has mostly come from the subject of death and "what happens" after death: the folklore of ghosts, ghouls, zombies, and other scary things that we'd otherwise rather avoid. The mockery made of these things may actually be well-played, for in mockery, we are often seeking to rise above the things that scare us. But sometimes we mock things as an easy way to avoid dealing with an otherwise difficult subject.

What might be well-intentioned mockery to a child (or adult!) on October 31st may take form in untrue yet seemingly realistic and very influential ways when Grandpa or Mom or Brother dies any other time of the year.

For Christians, we don't fear death. We acknowledge its reality, but we seek to overcome it by the Resurrected Christ. We seek to speak life, light, hope, and love in the midst of death. As far as we know, we will all die someday. But those who follow the Risen Christ think differently about death, knowing that death is not the end, but a state of "rest" in which the dead are "waiting" for the return of Christ and the Great Resurrection.

So people who have died aren't wandering spirits, but instead are...well...dead. You've likely seen the popular usage of "R.I.P." on decorative Halloween tombstones, which means, "rest in peace." Well this is meaningful and not at all scary for Christians: that those who have died in Christ now lay in rest, waiting for his return.

For we who remain, we remember the dead (even with sadness sometimes), but we don't fear them! We acknowledge death, but we don't "meddle" in it. Death is for real and while mockery may help ease the all-too-often real "sting," for those who follow Christ, the true avenue to overcoming death and the hurt, despair, and other difficult things surrounding it is found in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.

So we "practice" the things of resurrection now: life, love, light, hope, and peace.

You may know that the Halloween of today is a descendant of a holiday of the Christian Church. Even today, many churches still give a slight nod to what is called "All Saints Day" (and also for many, the subsequent "All Souls Day"). All Saints Day (or "All Hallows Day") is November 1st and the night before ("eve") has since become "All Hallows Eve" or Halloween.

For Christians, remembering our dead is a way to proclaim the continued reign of the Resurrected Christ. We don't fear them in their deaths...we celebrate their lives. Surely we miss them. But in Christ, we know that death is only temporary.

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I'm looking forward to finally preaching two corresponding series this coming Lent & Easter on death and life. I think we need it. Jesus was pretty intent on bringing healing to people, good morals and all. But his life & ministry culminated on the cross and out of the empty tomb. This is our message.