Archive for September, 2007:
we’re not in Scotland anymore, Toto
Men need help.
A friend asked me recently if I was a fan of the show “Everybody Loves Raymond.” I told her I was “sort of” a fan. I explained that my one grievance with the show was that the husband (Ray) was perpetually portrayed as an idiot who was always wrong, while his wife was always right. Episode after episode shows Ray to be a helpless moron, while his wife rarely makes a mistake against him. For my money (not that I have much), I prefer Roseanne as a show that made a decent attempt to show actual family life.
While Everybody Loves Raymond takes the stereotype against men too far, I also fear the stereotype is too close for comfort. We men do need help. Always have. Probably always will. Especially younger men, some of whom somehow amazingly enter into adulthood without the slightest clue how to do laundry, cook a meal not out of a box, iron a shirt, or treat a lady in public. At least knowing some of these skills would go a long way.
Thankfully, Burnside Writers Collective has recently published an interesting article on the state of the “gentleman” in modern (postmodern? … whatever) Christianity, along with some tips. We have a lot to learn, myself included. What do you think? To old school for you? Desperately needed in today’s world? More important stuff to consider? A little too patriarchal for your tastes?
Start talking, please.
A Basis For Community
In my last post I discussed the human need for relationship. I argued that we are relational beings because God has always been relation as a Trinitarian God (meaning God is one being with three persons). I also proposed that the New Testament shows how the early church was a picture of solid community, but that the church in North America is not. This discussion has lead to another important question: Upon what is community based?
Community cannot be based purely on our mutual need for each other. This reduces community to a symbiotic relationship instead of seeing it as a beautiful living out of the way we are designed. Community based on need could then be likened to a commercial exchange. “I need help in this area, you need help in that area, so I guess we can help each other.” But community is far more involved than this. There is not only a willing component, but a desirous one. “I want to help you, you want to help me.” Community must be based on more than the fact that we need community.
the need for hope
In the 1820’s, the slave trade was senselessly alive and well in the United States. There was not enough political support to outlaw the practice at this time, though a few called for its eradication.
But in this decade of widespread slavery in the U.S., an unremarkable slave woman named Harriet Tubman was born. She became a runaway slave later in life, and went on to steal other slaves to freedom using the Underground Railroad; she was an abolitionist that inspired others to escape. She helped the north during the Civil War.
Here, an example of hope coming from within something senseless.
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