I’ve never shied away from a divisive topic. As clergy, avoiding what is on the hearts and minds of congregants is sinful. Let me also give you some background about the perspective from which I write. I try my best to live according to the way Jesus served the last supper with his disciples. He dined with both Simon the Zealot (who took up arms against Rome) and Matthew the Tax Collector (who supported the Roman authority). Jesus also offered his body and blood to Judas who betrayed him and Peter who denied him. I believe in small government, but I believe this government should allow homosexuals the same rights as heterosexuals. I believe in low taxes, but I think this revenue should be used so that all have access to health care. I am pro life, which means that I am also against capital punishment. I’m not against the 1%, but how many wealthy empty the trash can in their office or mop the lobby floor? So, am I right or left? Small government, low taxes, and not burning the 1% would put me on the right of things. Civil rights for homosexuals, universal health care, and understanding that abuse of the poor is what got some into the 1% would put me squarely with the left. So who am I?
You may disagree with all of the above, or you may think that being centrist or following the via media means you don’t stand for anything at all. Fine. I’ve been burned before. It hurts. It really hurts. It leads to depression, making you not want to get out of bed most days, but living into Christ at the last supper, offering himself to Judas and calling to the table people who despise one another is a sword on which I’m willing to fall.
So, should I support Komen or Planned Parenthood? It seems that I’m supposed to pick a side. Is this a debate about women’s health or is this a casualty of heavyweight ideologies trying to knock each other out? It’s like the recent attempted boycott of JC Penny’s because Ellen is their spokesperson. You mean to tell me that a homosexual is unfit to be a spokesperson for fashion? You’re kidding, right?
What’s fundamentally going on here? Although I think the same issue is playing out in the American society, I’m not a sociologist; however I am clergy, so I feel confident talking about the church. I think fundamentally we are experiencing an identity crisis. It’s not that we are trying to figure out who we are, but the expression of who we are has gone awry. In post war, 1950’s mainline protestantism, people expressed identity through institution. “To which church do you belong?” would be a common greeting. It’s not that people were more holy or more christian fifty years ago (remember that blacks and whites couldn’t eat together?) it’s that people found identity through institution itself. Elks Club, Neighborhood Association, bowling leagues . . . institution was our general form of identity expression. Our society has changed. It’s not a liberal/conservative issue. It’s a systems issue.
I think Gil Rendle in “Journey in the Wilderness” is right on the money. He outlines several causes of this identity shift. First is the secularization of culture which has led to an individualization and privatization of the religious experience. The church I choose has more to do with the way the church serves me than how I am called to serve others. Second is a distrust in institution itself. Churches and governments alike have failed in living up to their ideal. Between clergy sexual misconduct and political lies, there is an appropriate institution suspicion. Third is a demographic shift. More conservative congregations have a higher birthrate (to which Rendle attributes 76% of religious conservative growth). More mainline congregations are finding trouble in communicating value because the smaller number of children within these congregations are upwardly mobile, going off to school, and establishing lives away from home. In other words, mainline children leaving home find a church (or nonprofit or what have you) which feels like home regardless if it is the home denomination. Or conversely, children have had a bad experience and home and they run from their home church or home experience (here’s a quick jab–some of my older friends have complained that this generation has lost its moral compass, but my question is, “Who raised this generation? Not entirely fair, I know. It’s not solely the parents fault, but it’s not my fault alone either). Fourth, is the presence of other faiths and traditions in America. Fifty years ago, a diverse group would be a Baptist, a Methodist, and a Catholic in the same room. With a world growing increasingly small, ecumenism and diversity has a new and vibrant context.
Our society is changing. I’m not arguing that it’s better or worse. In fact, arguing that today’s world is better or worse would imply an ideal center, and this would be hard to find, considering that when God made the heavens and the earth, God proclaimed that it was good, not perfect. It’s not better or worse, but it is different. Some things are better. People around the world can talk face to face with the click of a button. This blog post can circumnavigate the globe in the blink of an eye. I consider this to be, in general, a good thing, but before placing Steve Jobs and a pedestal proclaiming that he is the ideal American Entrepreneur, assembling iPhones doesn’t lower American unemployment. Some things are not for the better. Technology affords us instant communication or instant gratification if spending time on the wrong sites. Cyberspace also hasn’t figured out how to handle conflict. Texting allows us to communicate more quickly, but its hardly better than shaking a hand. Don’t get me started on cyber-communion.
Today we corporately express identity through political party, meaning that everything in my life is to line up with either the right or the left. A politician running squarely in the middle, seemingly regardless if it what might be best in some situations, would not be elected. Ideology is the new institution. For example, recently a colleague of mine was part of team who was helping an institution hire a new staff person. One on the committee said, “They need to know that we are a conservative institution.” What does this mean, exactly. Is conservatism the institutional goal? It’s certainly not in the mission statement. Does this mean that folks left of center need not apply? What about those in the institution which are more than left of center? Are they weeding them out? There’s nothing necessarily wrong with searching for someone in the left or right, but at what cost?
So to the title question: Should I support Komen or Planned Parenthood? Follow your conviction. Follow your heart. Is it wrong to pull your support from Planned Parenthood? Is it wrong to run the race for the cure if you also support Planned Parenthood? My question is the “why.” Are we choosing sides to benefit women’s health? Are we choosing sides because we feel that this group or that group will finally defeat cancer? Or are we choosing sides because of our own personal ideology? I think the missing voice is the survivors. Has your life been spared because of a Planned Parenthood free breast cancer screening? Are you running the race because of a new treatment with funds raised by Komen? Was there ever a terrible complication in which you had to choose between your wife or your newborn? What’s the role of Ideology in such a situation?
There’s more to say, but I also have to get going to my day job! I’ve rambled on long enough. What do you think?