Imago Dei

I just finished a book called Discovering Images of God, and it has led to the question who or exactly what is the image of God? Is it the perfect body? or every body? Genesis, "In the image of God, he created them, male and female, he created them." Ok so, male and female = created in the image of God. We all agree, right? Adam and Eve, perfect bodies, created in the image of God. But what about deformed bodies? or bodies with serious mental and biological issues. Are those also the image of God?

It seems to me that people (obviously) do not see all people as equal, created in the image of God, and Christians are no exception to this. If deformity and disease and "deviance" are less than the image of God, how can that possibly be overcome? It doesn't seem fair, and how you understand biology and bodies relating to God, informs more than you might realize.

A Social Network Experiment

For the past couple days I have been enduring a drama happening with one of my "friends" on facebook. Updates look something like this:

"Is at a loss for words. Atleast I have him for now.....and hopefully after....."
"Is used up. Abused. And left to wonder why."

....Hmmm, and apparently FB is failing right now. This person's page may have disappeared just in time. Regardless, updates have indicated an affair and possible divorce. TMI (for facebook). Take it to couple's counseling please.

Anyway, with all this drama, I thought, "What kind of stories could I make up in one (or 5) sentence(s) per day?" Imagine the possibilities! You could probably entertain yourself, and others for quite a while with crazy status updates. You could even plan it out from beginning to ending, or just steal a story from history... like that book Historical Tweets.

Or you could just take the actual drama from your own life that you keep private from your friends. After all, real life? You can't write that.

I know, I talk too much about sex

As far as I know, the Catholic church has a firm stance on sex: it is only for procreation. That means no contraception and no homosexuality. Ok. But I rarely have heard protestant views on this. It is kind of a taboo topic, and when it does come up, there is little stance. I have heard in church people talk about how sex is a great thing, and I also no all kinds of protestant (and Catholic) people who "wait" to have children. So unless they are having no sex, they are not having sex for procreation. Soooo, what is sex for besides procreation? (I can think of some things, but will refrain my opinion.) And if a Christian is going to argue that it is ok to have sex for reasons other than to have children, couldn't you also argue for fornication and gay sex? Just sayin... We're not very consistent.

Camping is to Evangelicals, as Booze is to Catholics.

So I am talking with my housemate about how I am thinking of asking this guy out, and how I will approach this, and I realize, "Oh, there is this camping trip coming up. And if ever there was a time for evangelical Christians to hook up, it is on camping trips." He replies, "You know what that is for Catholics?"

"No. What?"

"Booze."

'Tis true, 'tis true.

Christians hate themselves

The other day I brought my friend (a recent M.Div. from Yale) to my church. After a less violent sermon than usual from Pastor J, I asked her what she thought. She goes, "Everyone at your church hates themselves!" Indeed, they do. My church is chalk full of people crying and holding each other and praying for each other and guilt building and who knows what else in EVERY SINGLE service. Heck, this sort of drama is potential in almost every time the church folk get together. Don't get me wrong, I do love all the emotion, but I hadn't thought of it as hating ourselves. My friend made perfect sense, and it seemed messed up how that really is the case.

Humility is good and all, but I don't think Jesus came so that we would constantly beat ourselves up over how we are lowly, unworthy, worthless, sinful, impossible, frustrating, annoying, evil, selfish, wormlike, mischievous, messed up, failing, horrible, unlovable, horrid, time-consuming, arrogant, ignorant, prideful, fearful, lazy, busy, irreverent, blaspheming, hypocrite, piles of doodoo! Yeah, no.

I am way too good at listing those things. Look what church can do for YOU!

CHRISTIANS HATE HOMOSEXUALITY!

I do not know where to begin. Everytime I go out to hang out with church folk, I return home with an endless amount of theological/religious complaints... This time I learned something: stop talking and just ask more questions. There is a reason the Socratic method is still used.

One of my friends is a very nice and very devoted Christian. She is wonderful to be around and very zealous, the type of person who keeps you on your toes. She and I were talking about a mutual friend who is gay, and his soul purpose is reconciling homosexuality with the Catholic church (good luck). And the bottom line of our conversation was homosexuality is wrong. I neither asserted nor rebuked this because whether it is "a sin" or not, you don't start a conversation with someone telling them they are wrong, also, I wasn't going to start an argument with someone who might believe in a mostly literal Bible. The conversation ended up going in a direction that bothered my friend, how is it that Christians believe all different things, but are still Christian? This is something I love, and this was troubling for her, and I could tell she had no idea how to make sense of it. Everyone has the Bible, everyone has history... How can one read it this way, and another read it another way, AND BOTH MAKE SENSE? It is a beautiful mystery.

So, it was good that this was something that baffled her. Our mutual friend is a Christian, loves Jesus, studies theology, is incredibly nice to everyone, practices what he preaches, and is gay. How can this be? she wondered. How can this be?

The path is narrow. Really hardly anyone is going to get to heaven. There are so few who know the truth. You may think you are okay, but really you are not. Those people think they are Christians, but they're not---You are going to hell. I don't think so... or maybe you are already living in hell? I hope not.

What did I learn from all this? Ask questions. When my friend began condemning the gays, I should have asked why it is important to her that that is the Truth. Why is that wrong, but woman speaking in church is not wrong? How is it relevant to her and other salvation? What is salvation... O Lord, not soteriology again.

"When did meeting people become something that we pay for?"

"When we become alienated and displaced by leaving our local communities."

A recent chat I had with a friend. We are both currently trying to figure out how to become "unsingle." And by saying "unsingle" i am emphasizing "single" therefore bringing singleness instead of that oh-so-desired companionship into my life.

I think I'll just get a beta...