Universal Life Church

The recent debacle over Bishop Eddie Long’s alleged use of church tithes to woo young men has shaken New Birth Missionary Baptist Church to its foundations. In response to the uproar, the Rev. Carlton Pearson, a televangelist, senior minister of Christ Universal Temple, and friend of Long, has taken a refreshingly different approach to the issues of homosexuality and religious plurality—one that reflects a theology of inclusion and interfaith cooperation. Although Pearson’s inclusive attitude towards gays and non-Christians has cost him the loyalty of many congregants, it highlights the emergence of a more rational and progressive Christianity for the twenty-first century.

Responding to questions from CNN news anchor Kyra Phillips, the reverend staunchly defended Bishop Long, expressing his support and forgiveness for the preacher without excusing his purported adultery. Referring to Long, Pearson said, “He’s a prince of a preacher; he’s really a prince of a person. He’s a generous spirit; he’s an incredible worker in the city. In fidelity, adultery, that’s a whole other subject.”

When asked what he would do if Long came to him and admitted that he misused church money to fund secret assignations with young men, Pearson said he would embrace Long and tell him, “We will do you right”; he then referred to a verse from the Holy Bible which tells the spiritual person to help repair the sins or faults of their friends. In reference to Long’s vociferous opposition to gay rights, Pearson explained that those who rail the strongest against an issue are most likely dealing with it in their own lives. Interestingly, it was not Long’s purported homosexuality for which Pearson held him accountable; rather, it was his underhandedness and infidelity towards his family and congregation. Indeed, he pointed out, “[i]t’s not the issue of homosexuality; it’s the issue of human sexuality” and how we reconcile our sensual with our spiritual natures.

Pearson’s sympathy for Long is not the only reason he has divided his congregation on matters of theology and church administration; he also expressed his openness to the idea than many religions offer a pathway to the divine. In his interview with Phillips, he challenged the evangelical Protestant doctrine that atonement is achieved, and salvation thus secured, exclusively through belief in the blood sacrifice of Jesus Christ: after contemplating the plight of sexual and religious minorities, he said, “I started preaching the gospel of inclusion, saying that Hindus, Muslims, Jews—everybody—has access to the grace of the god we preach, and that not only a few Christians were going to heaven.” It is certainly an iconoclastic approach to take in a denomination which generally reserves hell for those who do not believe that God must be propitiated through a blood sacrifice in order to grant mercy to humans for the imperfections he himself created in them.

Like his efforts to nurture an interfaith, pluralistic community, Pearson’s acceptance of homosexuality has also put off many in his congregation. He explained to Phillips how the traditional Christian condemnation of homosexuality conflicted with his own conscience, and how he could not bring himself to believe that gays and lesbians should be barred from heaven. “My gay friends, and I have several, over the years were some of the most sensitive, loving, creative, ingenious, generous people. Some are members of my family. I got tired of sending them to hell…. These brilliant human beings spending eternity in a customized torture chamber…it messed with my theology, and my heart.” Reflecting on the type of people Pearson describes—on their goodwill, compassion, and nobility of spirit—the average critical-minded person will understandably find it difficult to believe that God sends people to hell for being attracted to members of the same sex, and for realizing that attraction.

Pearson ended his interview with a fearless, trenchant criticism of the traditional Christian view of a vengeful and capricious god. Referring to how churches thus far have dealt with homosexuality, celibacy, religious pluralism, and sexual abuse and misconduct by priests, he said,

“The Church is having to confront its issues—its platonic, plastic, superficial portrayals of an angry god, a vicious god, an eternal place where everybody’s gonna burn, this god with this terrible anger management problem who’s gonna get you, and then he’s gonna turn you over to the devil…It’s fairytale stuff, but we bought into it, and now we have to face the fact that maybe we missed it on many of these issues.”

The reverend’s words have already rattled many people’s sensibilities. While Long denied the allegations against him to an enthusiastic applause from his congregation, Pearson has seen the numbers in his congregation dwindle since he started preaching that everybody, including gays, has a place in heaven. It is a little bit sad to see an alleged con-artist and hypocrite who opposes gay rights receive praise from his followers while a preacher with the integrity to stand up for equality and inclusion “gets the cold shoulder”, as it were.

Being an interfaith online church, Universal Life Church Monastery strongly advocates for inclusiveness, religious pluralism, and equality. Let us know what you think. Do you agree with Rev. Pearson’s stance on Eddie Long, religious pluralism, and the LGBTQ community? Is his attitude of tolerance and inclusiveness a threat to Christianity’s foundations, or is it the very kind of innovation Christianity needs to adapt in the twenty-first century?

Source:

CNN

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Separation of church and state has once again come under challenge in the United States with a Christian music concert scheduled to take place on a U.S. military base. Perhaps the most important question raised in the debate over the military’s actions is whether or not holding the concert violates the establishment clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

The proposed concert, “Rock the Fort”, is to be held at Fort Bragg military base in North Carolina (perhaps a good choice of location for those wishing to weasel religion into government). It is also being sponsored by the right-wing, fundamentalist Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, which made an unequivocal statement as to the concert’s evangelical agenda: on its Web site, the organization said the concert would serve as a “clear presentation of the Christian Gospel”. In response to the proposed concert, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State sent a letter to U.S. military officials warning that the concert would constitute a form of proselytizing on government property, and would therefore violate the nation’s constitution. Col. David Hillis, a Fort Bragg chaplain, even went so far as to send an invitation to local churches to help organize the event.

Defenders of the concert argue that holding a Christian concert on a military base does not necessarily violate the proscription against government establishment of religion. Graham’s organization said in a promotional publication, “[a]ttendees will have an opportunity to respond to the Gospel Evangelistic message, be encouraged by Fort Bragg Chaplains [sic] and trained counselors from off post Churches and on post Chapels, and then be offered ongoing Biblical Spiritual Resiliency training at our military chapels and local churches”; meanwhile, Hillis maintained that attendance of the concert is voluntary, that it complies with military protocol, and that he would help organize religious events proposed by other faiths as well, and not just the Christian one.

Critics, including those with Americans United, maintain that the event clearly shows a preference for Christianity over other religions, and a blatant attempt to convert military personnel by exploiting a government platform. Perhaps ironically, one of the most vocal critics is himself a member of the clergy (which is not so strange for ministers of online churches such as Universal Life Church Monastery, which defends both freedom of and from religion). “It’s not the Army’s job to convert people to Christianity”, said the Rev. Barry Lynn, director of Americans United. “This event is totally unacceptable and must be cancelled.”

Both sides seem to have some good points. On one hand, if it is truly the intent of Hillis to accommodate all religious events on military property, and if attendance at such events is voluntary, the government, one might argue, cannot be said to be promoting a single state religion over another, and thus the constitution is not being violated. (The U.S. military has demonstrated some effort in accommodating all religions, as when the Air Force accommodated pagans with their own place of worship.) On the other hand, Hillis’s claim of religious neutrality might be disingenuous, and the growing infiltration of Christianity into military events might constitute a slippery slope toward outright biased religious endorsement. For example, hypothetically speaking the military could compel its personnel to attend religious services, but not to participate in the liturgy, and thus claim it is not forcing religion on its personnel. But when this becomes routine, it could conceivably go a step further and actually compel personnel to participate in the service, but not to believe what they are being preached, claiming that church-state separation is still in place. But this does not change the fact that religion is still being forced on personnel on some level. Where does religious accommodation end and religious imposition begin?

As always, we invite our ministers to share their point of view on the matter. Is the United States military violating the constitutional guarantee of separation of church and state by holding on military property a Christian rock concert with the clear aim of promoting a particular theology or religious viewpoint? Should the problem be resolved by banning all religious events on military property?

Source:

UPI

Wikipedia

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Young black Americans have been disenfranchised by the negative influence of a pervasive thug culture, argues civil rights activist Rev. Al Sharpton. In a sermon at a Protestant church in the American south, the reverend called on young black men to take more personal responsibility, as well as to seek divine intervention, in order to improve their lives. The speech reflects the views of many blacks who see younger generations as immersed in a self-defeating culture of violence and aggression.

The 50-minute sermon took place Tuesday night at Union Baptist Church in the U.S. state of North Carolina, before a congregation of 2,500 worshippers.

Sharpton, president of the National Action Network and 2004 Democratic presidential candidate, directed criticism at the way black people have raised their children, attributing many of the social ills that young blacks and African Americans experience to their upbringing. The reverend pointed out the irony that the first mixed-race president of the United States was elected largely by young black people who suffer from aimlessness and lack a plan for their lives. It is this lack of direction that “is crippling our children”, reported John Hinton of the Winston-Salem Journal, quoting the reverend.

This aimlessness, and the violence, frustration, and indolence that it engenders, can be attributed to the pervasiveness of rap music and hip-hop culture in the lives of black youths, continued the Reverend. “Too many parents”, Hinton paraphrases him as saying, “allow their children to be influenced by a culture of rap music, gangs, drugs and decadence.” He added that “too many rap artists use racial slurs about blacks in their music”, pointing out the word nigger is not always used in a tongue-in-cheek, empowering way, but also in a despairing, self-degrading way; he also criticized how rappers “refer to black woman as prostitutes”, pointing out the rampant misogyny and alpha-male machismo encouraged by the music.

Sharpton also compared black youth culture in America today with black youth culture in America when he was growing up, criticizing the cynical mindset and self-defeating attitude of many young people in the community. Things were much different when he was young, he argues: “[w]e were taught pride. We were down, but we were not cursing out our grandmothers. You don’t celebrate being down.” Moreover, he said, young people should stop finding excuses in low self-esteem, bad drug habits, and bad relationships, and they should take responsibility for their own success: “Even if you are not responsible for being down, you are responsible for getting up. Everyone was born to serve some purpose”, he said, suggesting that young blacks keep themselves oppressed when in fact they have the opportunity to liberate themselves.

Perhaps the central message of the sermon, along with that of taking personal responsibility, was one of divine entreaty: the reverend emphasized the importance of invoking the aid of God through prayer and meditation in order to redress past crimes, regain a sense of purpose in life, and achieve the equality, respect, and dignity which they deserve. “A delayed decision is not decision at all”, Hinton quotes him as saying. “You will never be what you were born to be until you say, ‘I want God’s help right now.’”

Sharpton’s words might seem controversial: while some may view his message as common sense and good advice, it may also strike a nerve in young blacks who have found a place in the hip-hop community. At the end of the day, though, the reverend stands up for principles most of us would also stand up for: self-respect, respect for women, equality, personal empowerment, and a sense of wholeness and purpose in life.

We are always happy to hear the thoughts of our ordained ministers. By criticizing “thug” culture and hip-hop music, is Sharpton attacking a valid facet of black culture, or a violent and harmful form of self-imposed oppression? Let us know what you think. (Feel free to read more on the subject by visiting our blog post on Bill Cosby’s criticism of African American Vernacular English.)

Source:

Winston-Salem Journal

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In a country like the U.S., new religions are popping up all the time, so it should come as no surprise that there is a church out there founded on the art of body modification. Despite the church’s legal status, officials at a school in North Carolina have expelled one of their students, who follows the religion, for wearing a nasal stud in class. Not only does the case parallel similar situations with interfaith online churches, but it further exemplifies how easy it is for local governments to get away with marginalizing obscure minority religious organizations.

When Ariana Iacono, 14, returned to school at North Carolina’s Clayton High School wearing a tiny stud in her nose (the size of a pinhead), school officials suspended her, leaving her to catch up on her schoolwork at home. According to Iacono’s mother, Nikki, reports Sarah Netter of ABC News, the principal said he had researched the Church of Body Modification and determined that Iacono did not have to wear the stud in school to practice her religion. Netter also reports that Iacono has already been disciplined by school officials with one, three, and five-day suspensions, and that the girl faces a ten-day suspension and a recommendation for attendance at an alternative school if she returns from her latest suspension with the nose stud still in place.

School officials have defended the decision. The school uses its own set of points or criteria to determine legal church status and whether a given practice reflects a person’s spiritual or religious faith, and it does makes written exemptions for cases in which body modification is seen to constitute a form of religious practice. These criteria include the following:

• a copy or citation of recognized religious text [such as the Bible]
• a written statement by a religious authority
• specific examples of sincerity of the student’s religious beliefs

Iacono’s piercing, they argue, failed to meet any of the criteria in their list. The nose stud, argued Johnston County Schools spokeswoman Terri Sessmons, was not supported by the teachings of any religious text or a written statement by any church authority or clergy member, and it did not reflect sincerity of religious belief.

But Church of Body Modification members have criticized the actions of the school and the basis for its decision, which they regard as a form of religious intolerance and possibly an infringement on constitutional guarantees to the free exercise of religion. One of these critics is Richard Ivey III, a 22 year-old former Jehovah’s Witness who serves as a minister in the church and also works in a tattoo and body piercing shop. Quoting Ivey, Netter says, “[the school principal is] basically saying that because he doesn’t understand it, it can’t be a sincerely held religious belief…. How do you judge someone’s sincerity when it comes to religion?”

Gary Laderman, professor and chair of the Department of Religion at Emory University, suggests the school has no rational basis for invalidating Iacono’s practice, arguing that it is simply misunderstood because of its novelty: “I think there is much more to religious life and culture than God…. To me [body modification] is a great illustration of an alternative form of religious practice and commitment [that we’re not] used to”, adding that these alternative spiritual practices face particular prejudice in the highly conservative American south, which tends to lag behind the rest of the developed world in terms of social progress. Referring to the principal and the school’s religious exemption criteria, Iacono herself argued, “I don’t think it’s fair that he can determine what’s necessary for our religion, for me and my beliefs”.

So is the Church of Body Modification a legitimate religious institution, and does Iacono deserve an exemption from the school’s dress-code? Perhaps it is more legitimate than many would think. Netter points out that the church is officially incorporated and has a president residing in Pennsylvania, where it is registered as a non-profit organization; Laderman also notes that it is recognized as a legal entity by the government. If the government is satisfied that the organization is a real church, and if the public school system is part of the government, well, it follows that the public school system should as well. The church even has a doctrine: for members, body modification represents the unification of body, mind, and spirit through art, a means of accessing the divine. And just like home churches, which serve as intimate gathering places for worshippers, members gather at each other’s houses to practice their religion.

Besides, the criteria provided by school officials are not necessarily valid. Some religions do not have published religious texts, but only oral traditions, while others have no hierarchical structure, every member being a clergy member, and it is tremendously difficult to prove that Iacono’s piercing is not a sincere expression of her faith. And even if a statement by a church authority were a necessary criterion, we have already established that the church does have legally ordained ministers—Ivey is one of them.

Whether or not Iacono succeeds in changing the minds of school officials (she and her mother have now appealed to the ACLU for legal assistance), one thing seems certain: religion is constantly metamorphosing and re-inventing itself, requiring us to re-define it, and new religions are springing up every day, heralding new trends in spiritual life in the United States.

What do you think? Should Ariana Iacono have been suspended for wearing a tiny little nose-stud, even though she claims it constitutes a form of religious observance, and does her punishment constitute an infringement on religious freedom?

Source:

ABC News

Wikipedia

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There is bound to be some case or another at any given time that challenges the constitutional rights of the individual—if not, it is only a matter of time until the next case pops up. (Democracy is an ongoing experiment, it seems.) So what happens when a child molester who is on probation wishes to attend church? According to the supreme court of the U.S. state of New Hampshire, barring such an individual from attending church for the foreseeable future does not infringe on his or her constitutional rights and freedoms.

The New Hampshire state Supreme Court recently confirmed the ruling of a lower court which bars convicted sex offender Jonathan Perfetto, of Manchester, N.H., from attending a Jehovah’s Witnesses kingdom hall until his probationary period has ended. Perfetto has a long history of committing sexual assault against both children and adults. He served time in prison when he was 17 for molesting a younger male relative and again as an adult for assaulting several women. In addition, he was convicted in 2002 for possession of child pornography. The decision came despite Perfetto’s insistence that he would be accompanied to church under the supervision of a chaperone.

Explaining how the decision would not interfere with the free exercise of religion, the court argued that Perfetto would be able to practice his religion in other ways, without attending church. However, an exact outline of the method whereby Perfetto would be allowed to continue practicing his religion was not readily apparent, and it remains unclear whether church attendance is necessary in order to be a practicing Jehovah’s Witness.

Whether or not Perfetto can really practice his religion without attending church is a crucial question. Taking the court’s argument to its logical conclusion, if church attendance is unnecessary to practice one’s religion, there is never a time when the court is out of place to bar an individual from attending church; church attendance is no longer a right pertinent to the free exercise of religion. But a congregation and a place of worship are fairly basic components of religious observance—even the IRS itself, with its Fourteen Points, stipulates such a requirement in determining the legal status of churches for tax purposes. (Interfaith online churches such as ULC Monastery recommend using these as a guide for tax purposes.) Three of these criteria are as follows:

• Established places of worship
• Regular congregations
• Regular religious services

Others refer to a system set up for educating and training clergy members. If these are the official criteria for legal church status according to the government of the United States, it seems as if the government might be contradicting itself by playing down church attendance as an integral part of religious observance.

Of course, the argument could be made that when two rights butt heads, as in the case described above, it is more important to protect potential sex abuse victims than to give their victimizers permission to attend church.

Share your thoughts with us. Should Perfetto be allowed to attend church as a form of religious freedom, even though he is a convicted sex offender?

Source:

The Oklahoman

Wikipedia

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Given the official separation of church and state in the United States, it might seem perfectly intuitive for a politician to attend a conference on freedom from religion. Not necessarily so for a substantial number of Americans. One politician’s plan to welcome the Freedom from Religion Foundation in her state next month might jeopardize the future of her political career, say academics. The indignation her speech will likely stir up among religionists further reflects the preoccupation Americans have with the religious beliefs of their leaders.

The Freedom from Religion Foundation conference, an annual event comprised largely of atheists as well as some secular and theistic humanists, will stand out in particular this year because it will include a speech by the highest-ranking politician yet—Wisconsin Lt. Governor Barbara Stanton. Initially the foundation expressed surprise at Stanton’s acceptance of their invitation to speak: “Normally, we get the cold shoulder by public officials”, said foundation co-president Annie Laurie Gaylor.

But Stanton’s decision to speak at the conference might prove off-putting to potential voters in future elections. Despite constitutional provisions barring state religion, and despite the fact that there is no religious test for office with the aim of weeding out atheists, since the 1980s U.S. politicians have experienced increasing pressure by the public to demonstrate their religious “qualifications”, explains Pam Selman of The Badger Herald, quoting political scientist Howard Schweber. Pelman also reports Schweber as saying, “American public officials sometimes begin political downfall when they associate as non-religious or atheist”. Meanwhile, political scientist Dietram A. Scheufele points out that “[t]he central role religion has played in recent years is dominating the discussions around the candidates”. White Christians do not appear to be growing any less adamant about the religious foundation of their nation and the importance of religious faith in their political leaders. Case in point: the recent, highly sensationalized media discourse over whether or not Barack Obama is really a Christian—a discourse which need not even be happening in the first place if the president of the United States is supposed to be leaving his religion at the door when he walks into work each day.

However, the religious scruples of constituents seem to be of little concern for Lawton. “Lawton is not seeking re-election as lieutenant governor and announced last year she will not run for governor for ‘very personal reasons’”, Pelman reports. With nothing left to lose politically, then, it seems a little less kamikaze-like for Stanton to defy the evangelical Christian right wing and reach out in sympathy to those who fear for the future of America’s secular foundation. But Lawton is not simply waiting till the end of her political career to shout out, “Told you so! I’m really a big, fat atheist!”; she is basing her decision on personal convictions about democracy, which for her is not just about cow-towing to the tyrannical whims of majority constituents: “My father repeatedly risked his life [in the military] to preserve the integrity of this democracy where a clear line between church and state is maintained,” Lawton said. “All of them were patriots in the most profound ways, and I work to honor their legacy.”

A novel idea. Her father was a patriot—not for pumping some chauvinistic, fundamentalist Christian worldview into secular politics while waving a flag, quoting scripture, wiping away tears, clapping his hand to his heart, and echoing tired platitudes in some deceptively saccharine display of emotion; rather, he was a patriot for defending democracy against potential theocratic coups d’états which violate the venerable principles of Enlightenment philosophy enshrined in the very constitution which religious zealots repeatedly cite to advance their own agenda. An ironic twist.

But why have Americans grown so obsessively religious—almost to the point of being schizophrenically paranoid about other religions (even when these are uncannily similar to their own)—and why have they grown so hostile towards the fundamental concept of separation of church and state? Perhaps it has to do with education. The average American is shockingly ignorant about the way their own government operates (to say nothing of the way other countries are run) and about the guarantees outlined in their own constitution, let alone the historical and philosophical context of and motivations behind these; exacerbating this is their intellectual torpor and ineptitude in critical reasoning. Perhaps it has also to do with insecurity. As the United States gradually becomes less white and less Christian, and as moderate Republicans begin to view the institution of marriage more as a loving commitment than as a breeding program, the ever-shrinking white Christian male bourgeoisie will doggedly re-assert with inexorable pride their white heritage, Christian faith, and maleness over other groups who dare take an equal slice of the American pie. And they have enough money to do so.

Of course, these are just hypotheses, but we must begin somewhere, mustn’t we?

We invite our ministers ordained online to share their thoughts about Lt. Governor Lawton’s proposed speech at the Freedom from Religion Foundation conference. Why is it suddenly such a big deal here and now in the 21^st century for Lawton to be welcoming a convention of activists who defend a concept on which the country was founded in 1787? Do you think that a political leader’s religious beliefs are integral to his or her political work, or do you find such beliefs irrelevant so long as he or she does a good job?

Read more about atheism and humanism by visiting the ULC Monastery Guide to Divinity.

Sources:

The Badger Herald

Wikipedia

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A new trend is emerging among Internet users—religious search engines. The search engines offer users an opportunity to search for information on the Web which supports their religious faith, filtering out content which might offend the religious scruples of users. While the trend has its supporters, who point out the growth in the religious market made possible by the search engines, it also has its critics, who argue that the search engines simply reinforce the right-wing fundamentalist beliefs which users already hold.

The new religious search engines offer an alternative for many fundamentalist Christians, Jews, and Muslims, who simply find too much information that they disagree with on popular sites such as Yahoo! and Google.

One of the more popular sites is I’mHalal, a Muslim search engine created in the Netherlands which reflects the views of its Islamic users. Creator Reza Sardeha says that he created the site because the Internet, which contains information contrary to Muslim beliefs, was essentially off-limits to most followers of the Muslim faith. Housain Benyounis, a 44 year-old Muslim from New Zealand, says he feels comfortable letting his son use the site because it automatically filters out pornography. In addition, he explains, a search for the term “sex” will only yield results which reflect a Muslim view on sex. The filters can be so restrictive, however, that a search for “sexuality” will yield no results whatsoever. Sardeha says the search engine still needs some fine-tuning.

Another popular religious search engine is the Colorado Springs-based SeekFind, which was created for the Christian community. Like the I’mHalal, the Christian site is vigilant in filtering out content which does not already reflect the religious views of its users. For Shea Houdmann, who runs the site, the purpose of the search engine is “to promote what [Christians] believe to be biblical truth”, reports Habiba Nosheen of NPR. Not only would a search on SeekFind exclude pornography, but a search for “Democratic party” would turn up a site on Marxism as its first result, and a search for “gay marriage” would only yield sites which present arguments opposed to same-sex marriage and weddings.

Some critics view the search engines as a form of censorship. Houdmann defends his site, saying, “In a sense, I guess kind of what SeekFind does is a form of censorship, but I would more describe it as selective inclusion”. Meanwhile, Michael Gartenberg, a partner at technology research firm Altimeter Group, outright denies the accusation of media censorship by Christian Web site administrators: “It’s no more censorship than if I find something on television that I find offensive to me and I could change the channel”. In addition, Gartenberg notes, the religiously themed sites are bring new users to the Web. However, as Nosheen reports, opponents argue that “allowing people to only access material that they already agree with will lead to an intolerant society”.

Of course, in a democratic society which protects the free exercise of religion through constitutional guarantees, anybody has the right to create Internet search engines which filter out material that contradicts their religious beliefs—if users do not approve of the filtering or censorship system, they can always go to Yahooo! or Google for objectivity. But that is beside the point. The real question is not whether or not an individual legally can operate such search engines—the real question is whether or not it makes any sense. And it does not make sense if one things about it. It makes no sense to use an Internet search engine to find information with merely confirms beliefs one already holds, since the whole purpose of research is to learn new things that re-shape what one already knows about reality. On the SeekFind homepage, a quotation from the Bible attributed to Jesus, Matthew 7:7, reads, “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you”. Well, yes. If one seeks what one already believes, one will find what one already believes—with one’s head buried beneath the sand. One never discovers anything new. Therefore, one never need fear the prospect of one’s beliefs ever being challenged by a dissenting view.

Religious search engines are not intended to provide an unbiased, objective account of reality—they are intended to re-iterate the beliefs to which their users already cling. These beliefs are typically anti-socialist (because Jesus certainly never taught selfless outreach and charity for the needy), anti-gay, and sexually puritanical. For the rest of us, however, the mainstream search engines provide the balance of perspectives which we crave, since we are curious about the points that other perspectives have to offer, as well as what motivates them.

We would like to know the thoughts of our ministers ordained online. Do religious search engines re-affirm the religious heritage of their users, or do they simply tell their users what they want to hear?

Sources:

National Public Radio

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The question may seem a little passé, but it still entices many. After all, if we had an answer, it would mean a fundamental paradigm shift for the world’s largest religion. While some Christians doggedly maintain the divinity of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, others question the claim while emphasizing the importance of the message behind the personality. So which is more important—the divine heritage, or the divine message?

The traditional view of Christ’s divinity has been stalwartly defended by Christians in Lebanon, who recently persuaded Muslims in the country to stop airing a television series that depicted Jesus Christ as a mere prophet. (Muslims revere Jesus as a prophet, but not as the Messiah.) The effort was defended by Bishop Bechara Rai, president of the Episcopal Commission for Mass Media in Lebanon, who maintained that Christians objected to the “distorted” depiction of Christ by Muslims. As Rai tells Reuters, the events explored in the seventeen episodes “were fully wrong, or partially wrong or distorted and were inconsistent with the Bible [recognized] by [The Roman Catholic Church]”. He adds that the series “also denies the divinity of Christ”, portrays Judas as the victim of the crucifixion, and also leaves out the resurrection. Well, clearly. After all, it is a series aired by Muslims in a largely Muslim democracy, which means that any depiction of the life of Christ—whether Muslim, Christian, or other—is legally sanctioned. What is so surprising about that? But the important point is that some Christians still place emphasis on the divinity of Christ.

On the other side of the debate are the progressive Christians who have challenged the divinity of Christ. Last month, a group of one hundred religious scholars attended the 25^th annual Jesus Seminar, where they challenged the authenticity of sayings attributed to Jesus Christ. The event is part of a growing tradition of skepticism among Christians over the literal truth of the gospels as well as the authorship of its four books.  The first seminar was held in 1985 by Robert Funk, who rejected fundamentalism in his youth and sought a forum for scholars to debate Biblical inerrancy; it has since popularized the notion that Christ was mortal. Conservative critics argue that members represent only a minority view and seek publicity; members argue that publicity is the whole point—that spreading the view of Jesus as a very human social justice advocate, and not a blood sacrifice for human sin, is paramount. For member Lane McGaughy, the seminar democratizes the debate on the character and teachings of Jesus Christ: “It’s opened up some very interesting changes in a lot of these so-called dying churches. Because of the Jesus Seminar, a lot of people feel that they have permission to ask questions that they never before thought they could ask in church.”

Jesus was a mortal and fallible social justice activist whose corpse may well have been eaten up by maggots centuries ago. Not a flattering vision, but perhaps one whose teachings offer just as much hope as a compulsory blood sacrifice. In C.S. Lewis’s religious allegory The Chronicles of Narnia, Aslan looked nonplussed at Lucy when she asked whether he could forgo the “Deep Magic” (the ritual blood sacrifice to appease the deity from beyond the eastern ocean), for such a question was unthinkable. The blood had to be spilt. But the Jesus Christ which thinkers such as McGaughy contemplate teaches salvation through just treatment of the poor, weary, and downtrodden, without the need for a sacrifice to propitiate a bloodthirsty god. This Jesus offers a simple—and much more humane—message of spiritual transcendence through goodwill and magnanimity towards one’s fellow human being.

So does the divinity of Jesus Christ, as well as the doctrines of grace and atonement closely connected with it, really matter in the ultimate scheme of things? Does God—whatever this may be to you—take pleasure in blood spilt as recompense for human imperfection, or does she/he take pleasure rather in the knowledge that his/her creatures show love, empathy, and kindness for one another? And who ultimately gets to determine “God’s will”—those who accuse others (e.g. ministers ordained online) of doing so, but who nonetheless do so themselves? Let us know your thoughts on the subject.

Sources:

Reuters

The Huffington Post

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Perhaps it was inevitable, but a new company that develops markets for smartphone applications used in major countries around the world has proposed market development for a new “Jesus app”. The company, AppTech Corp., has submitted a proposal to Apple, Inc., to sell the new app through the Apple Store. Like the online church, the consecration of laptops and mobile phones, and the podcasting of prayers and sermons, the Jesus application reflects a growing reliance on technology as a medium for religious practice.

The plan has been launched by an AppTech subsidiary, AppTech Global, which develops mobile application markets in emerging regions such as China, Japan, Latin America, and India. (One company develops the application software itself, AppTech develops the market and advertises the product, and a company like Apple actually sells it through their store.) The company’s marketing effort includes translation of English-based applications into multiple languages corresponding with these markets, such as Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Japanese, and Hindi. Given the presence of the Roman Catholic Church in Latin America and Iberia, the company has placed priority on translation of the Jesus app from English into Spanish and Portuguese. Followers of the Roman Catholic faith, as well as Christianity’s manifold Protestant denominations, will be able to access the application’s religious-themed features virtually anywhere in the world, and on any mobile platform, including the Apple iPhone, Microsoft Mobile, Google Android Nexus One, Palm, Research in Motion, Verizon Droid, and China’s oPhone.

Although few details have been released about the exact nature of the new app’s features, at least one aspect of the plan can be said in some way to genuinely reflect the fundamental teachings of the Christian faith: “AppTech will donate twenty percent (20%) of all company revenue from sales of the $.99 ‘Jesus App’ to benefit the American Cancer Society” said Softpedia, quoting AppTech staff. According to Softpedia, CEO Eric Ottens explained, “[w]e believe that it is entirely possible to do well while doing good at the very same time”. So while at first it may seem as though corporations are exploiting religion on a massive scale in order to line their own pockets, on second thought using the Jesus app, at least with a knowledge where a huge chunk of the revenue goes, seems like a rather charitable and Christ-like thing to do. If we are to ask “What would Jesus do?”, and if Jesus would naturally give to the needy, well, the son of God just might purchase his own app, wouldn’t he?

It is amusing to observe how innovations in communication technology initially face the wrath of evangelical faith groups only to gain acceptance later on by the very same groups as a legitimate means of practicing their faith. At first television was a pop-culture tool of the devil, then right-wing Pentecostal televangelists figured out how to exploit it for their own purposes; rock and roll was the music of Satan (actually it was inspired by the music of poor black Americans), then Christian rock bands emerged, co-opting the genre to spread the gospel; now the Internet, once feared by conservatives everywhere as one massive storehouse of pornography, has been shown to provide vital social networks for churches to galvanize their congregations and make religion more appealing and accessible to technologically savvy youth. How, then, is a smartphone application which benefits cancer patients (at a whopping twenty per cent of revenue) any less divine in its purpose?

It is tempting to imagine what users of the new app will be able to do, but time will tell soon enough if and when Apple approves sale of the product through its store. Meanwhile, what do you think about the new Jesus app? Is it a tacky marketing ploy to lure customers and make a profit, or is it a legitimate and surprisingly generous means of practicing religion in a technology-immersed twenty-first century?

Source:

Softpedia

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One of the first weddings of its kind in the world will take place when a major Scandinavian airline finds a couple to perform a wedding ceremony for in-flight, aboard one of their aircraft. The search is part of a competition held by SAS, an airline co-owned by the governments of Sweden, Denmark, and Norway, as a part of a social network and media campaign called “Love is in the Air”.

The wedding is expected to be held at the beginning of the Christmas season, on 6 December, on an Airbus A340 flight from New York to Stockholm. The competition is similar to others which have offered luxurious or one-of-a-kind deals for winning couples: contestants can go to a special Web site (http://www.flysas.com/love) to set up a profile, compete for votes, and hopefully come out the winners. The idea is that visitors to the site vote on the courtship narrative they find most inspiring and then vote for the couple represented in the narrative. The couple with the most votes for their story wins the prize: a modern wedding ceremony officiated onboard an airplane.

But the prize doesn’t end with a mere ceremony aboard an airplane. After spending time in one of Europe’s great havens of liberalism, the winning couple will be flown back in business class to New York, where they will receive three nights’ accommodation in the W Hotel, after which they will be flown to Los Angeles and spend three nights at the Andaz West Hollywood. Not a paltry reward for some persuasive essay-writing skills.

It remains to be seen exactly how the legal wedding officiant, best man/woman, and bridesmaids/men will be accommodated, but one thing is for sure—there will be no problem finding an audience among the over 200 seats on the aircraft. Besides, why should such predictable weddings traditions be shoehorned into every ceremony as if they were timeless, essential components? There’s nothing wrong with mixing and matching, or with re-imagining the traditional wedding, if at the end of the day it makes a meaningful impact on bride and groom.

But the reader will ask, “Yes, but how exactly does this make SAS so special? After all, airlines have been hosting weddings on board airplanes for decades.” What makes SAS so special is the fact that their wedding would be the first on-flight same-sex wedding ceremony in the world. As the airline’s chief commercial officer, Robin Kamark, said, “SAS is the national airline of three of the world’s most liberal and progressive countries in the world, especially when it comes to LGBT rights, so we feel this is a natural celebration of love.” Perhaps it is time for the United States to catch up, but that will probably take decades of looking to other countries to make the first move.

We would like to hear about the unique wedding stories of those who have become ordained online as a minister with Universal Life Church Monastery, whether this is your own wedding or a wedding you have officiated, an extreme adventure wedding, a retail store wedding, or some other ceremony that is in some way quirky or unconventional. What was your inspiration for celebrating this special sacrament of love? Feel free to share with us.

Source:

MSNBC

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