If you haven't figured it out yet, this site is a branch office of the Department of Unapologetic Christianity. I know, you're thinking "But Blackiswhite, if something sets you off, you can curse a streak that can make a sailor blush." You're right. I can. The product of a childhood in a shop town, and a part that emerges from time to time. "But Blackiswhite, you can conjure mental images that no self-respecting follower of Christ has any business thinking." I'll admit it. In the immortal words of St. Garibaldi [Think Babylon 5, for those of you who don't understand the reference. If that doesn't help, all I can say is watch the series. Yes, it's that good.] "I can dream real dark." If you don't understand what the world is capable of, then you are helpless in the face of its onslaught.
As a clerk in the abovementioned department, I keep trying to better understand Christianity and God. The Bible is a great place to start. There are even versions that explain the actions of the people in it, the customs referred to, and some of the knottier passages. I have also found the writings of C.S. Lewis helpful in expanding my understanding of Christianity. I have not yet read them all. I am on my second tome at this time, The Problem of Pain. I have to work mentally to read him and get the whole thrust of his writings. This means I read him very slowly. Maybe only a chapter a week. I would like to share some of the more pointed passages with any who stop here to read, and since it is my blog, I can.
This week, I'll start with this exerpt from the chapter "Divine Goodness".
"But creatures are not thus separate from their Creator, nor can He misunderstand them. The place for which He designs them in His scheme of things is the place they are made for. When they reach it, their nature is fullfilled and their happiness attained: a broken bone in the universe is set, the anguish is over. When we want to be something other than what God wants us to be, we must be wanting what, in fact, will not make us happy. Those Devine demands which sound to our natural ears most like those of a lover, in fact marshall us where we should want to go if we knew what we wanted."
The thrust of this as I understand it is that God knows each of us as a Creator. As this is the case, He knows our strengths, our weaknesses, and our purpose in the larger scheme of things. If we follow the rules He set forth, we can come to know Him, and as we change to meet Him on the terms He intended, and find our purpose, we will then find happiness.
It seems to me that this can be applied to our society. So many reject the 'moral' component of our law, which is rooted in Judeo-Christian belief, on the opinion that God doesn't understand them, which runs contrary to the thought of a Creator. Just look at the gay rights movement. This is a group not satisfied to be let alone. No. They always want more. It isn't enough that in most parts of the country, people were satisified to leave people to their own devices about what went on behind their bedroom doors. I think most reasonable people would agree that if homosexuals wanted to keep their sexual orientation private, to the extent that such a thing is possible, the rest of us were willing to let them keep things that way. But this group, festering in its unhappiness, had to 'come out of the closet'. Remember "We're here, we're queer, get used to it."? Still not satisfied. Society now had to confer an official status on their relationships. Civil Unions burst onto the scene.
As a Christian, I find the practice abborhant. If you are a Christian, then you accept the Bible and its teachings. Leviticus is clear: Homosexuality is against the word of God. A church willing to act as if it was never written cannot keep communion with God and Christ. There is no way to explain it away. I hear you grumbling, "So you don't you put them to death, as Leviticus requires? Easy. The same reason I do not stone prostitutes and adulterers. Because Christ put an end to it.
As a lawyer, I can understand that two people who have committed to each other should have some of the same rights as men and women who have committed to each other in the sacrement of marriage. However, I am also aware that careful planning and the execution of the correct legal documents ahead of time can address all or nearly all of these purported 'needs' without requiring the sanction of a society that does not follow or approve of the practice. [And for those of you seeking proof, look no further than Defense of Marriage Laws, and Initiatives around the country.] Yet this still wasn't enough. They demanded the RIGHT to marry. Now, this is an interesting turn of events. Black Law Dictionary defines marriage as between a man and a woman. It has been understood as such for centuries. In my business, that is called "precedent", and it will win trials in normal circumstances. Not so here. For over a decade, the pink swastika brigade, driven by a need for acceptance, forced if not willingly given, has portrayed anyone believing that that their lifestyle is wrong and is a sin as intolerant and bigoted, and was willing to practice intolerance in any degree to oppose opinions contrary to their own. The powers that shaped opinion by contolling what we see and hear were only too willing to play along. In confusion, there is opportunity. By brandishing their tolerance for all to see, and bludgeoning all who believed such practices to be wrong, they succeeded in planting the germ in the collective mind of society. The result was that when a legal challenge to the traditional definition of marriage got to a court, the court was willing to find in favor of a constitutional right to marry based on a lifestyle preference rather than circumstances beyond the control of the participants, ignoring that vital component in the federal cases it cited to justify their 'tolerant' and 'enlightened' decision. The short-sightedness of this court will take us further down this road, and the behaviors that we as a society will be forced to condone are at least for the present, shocking and inconceivable. But remember, twenty years ago, the same thing would have been said for the current set of circumstances. This too was addressed by Mr. Lewis, in the subsequent chapter, "Human Wickedness."
He discussed how the original power of Christianity was the fact that it brought good news to man, at a time when there was a belief in Divine anger, and the consequences of it. There was a way to get right with God. He then noted that:
"But all this has changed. Christianity now has to preach the diagnosis-in itself very bad news-before it can win a hearing for the cure."
He pinpointed two sources for this change in perception. The first is a century's worth of focus on "kindness" as the sole virtue that a member of society should cultivate. The failing of this particular focus is that cultivating kindness for kindness' sake alone require no effort on the part of the person. Because this is so, all can believe themselves possessed of the virtue without ever understanding the practice or the reason for it.
The second he called "the effect of Psychoanlysis on the public mind, and, in particular, the doctrine of repressions and inhibitions."
The best explanation, and the one that is evident in society today?
"Whatever these doctrines really mean, the impression they have actually left on most people is that the sense of Shame is a dangerous and mischevious thing. We have laoboured to ovecome that sense of shrinking, that desire to conceal, which Nature herself or the tradition of almost all mankind has attached to cowardice, unchastity, falsehold, and envy. We are told to 'get things out into the open', not for the sake of self-humiliation, but on the grounds that these 'things' are very natural and we need not be ashamed of them."
I wonder if he knew how prophetic his words would be. Babies out of wedlock. Gay marriage. Infidelity. Teenage pregnancy. Teenage drinking. Persistant drug use. Pornagraphy on prime time television. Daytime television talk shows.
His answer?
"A recovery of the old sense of sin is essential to Christianity."
You mull it over and get back to me.
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