Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places

I think it's part of the human condition that many of us feel lonely, if not all the time then at least from time to time. And if you're single, it's easy to think the antidote for loneliness is matrimony. But according to Henri Nouwen, those who marry because of loneliness will likely end up as lonely spouses. Our condition is not changed by our circumstance.

We ignore what we already know with a deep-seated, intuitive knowledge - that no love or friendship, no intimate embrace or tender kiss, no community, commune or collective, no man or woman, will ever be able to satisfy our desire to be released from our lonely condition. This truth is so disconcerting and painful that we are more prone to play games with our fantasies than to face the truth of our existence. Thus we keep hoping that one day we will find the man who really understands our experiences, the woman who will bring peace to our restless life, the job where we can fulfill our potentials, the book which will explain everything, and the place where we can feel at home. Such false hope leads us to make exhausting demands and prepares us for bitterness and dangerous hostility when we start discovering that nobody, and nothing, can live up to our absolutistic expectations.

Many marriages are ruined because neither partner was able to fulfill the often hidden hope that the other would take his or her loneliness away. And many celibates live with the naive dream that in the intimacy of marriage their loneliness will be taken away.

- Henri Nouwen, The Wounded Healer, pp. 84-85.

In Praise of Celibacy

I'm still waiting for a preacher to read 1 Corinthians 7.32-35 at a wedding. As a lover of irony, I'll make sure it's read at my wedding...if God makes me get married some day. Don't hold your breath waiting for that.

I talk to a lot of people who somewhat recognize the value of celibacy (a.k.a. singleness), but very few seem to value it as a high calling. Jesus did, not only for Himself but also for His followers (Matthew 19.10-12), but somehow we zip right past those comments of His, putting them in the "Idealistic But Not Realistic" category of the things He said that we don't like.

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Marriage obviously has its place, and it was God's idea. My intention is not to demean marriage, but to advocate that singleness should be seen as equivalent in value, not as Plan B or Second Best. Marriage and singleness are both Plan A...the only question is which Plan A God wants you to have.

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The Christianity Today website just posted an interview with Christine Colon, who with Katie Fields cowrote a new book called Singled Out: Why Celibacy Must Be Reinvented in Today's Church. I just ordered the book and am looking forward to some good reading that will confirm my prejudices. My only regret, so far, is that Colon and Fields didn't draft a celibate/single male as an additional cowriter. That oversight probably dooms the book to be read almost exclusively by women. Nevertheless, here are a couple excerpts from the interview:

Celibacy can be a radical testimony to God's love and provision, because it reminds us that our ultimate fulfillment has to be union with God. That is equally true for married couples, but oftentimes marriage is seen as, once you have that partner you will be fulfilled. And that's a lie. With celibacy, you have to come to grips with that early on, to say, "My fulfillment lies in God, and there are always going to be these longings unfulfilled here on earth," but that's a good thing — if everything were fulfilled on earth, we wouldn't need God.

Marriage is the metaphor for God's exclusive love for his church, and it's a good and powerful metaphor. But singleness is also a metaphor of God's love — the aspect of God's love that extends to everyone. Oftentimes church communities become so ingrown and focused on, "Let's build up our families, let's build up our community." Wait a second, what are we here for? Singles don't have that exclusive relationship, so we need to build relationships out. And the church itself needs to as well.

...

We wanted to look at celibacy as a state in which we are content with where God has called us, and are also willing if God calls us to a different state. We're not eliminating the possibility of marriage, but we're not put on hold until marriage comes. It's not, "I vow to be celibate until I die." It is saying, "God has called me to this state; I am going to serve God right here. If he calls me to marriage, great. I will serve God there. If he doesn't call me to marriage, fine. I'm going to serve God as a single person." With celibacy, we're trying to draw from the past but not be wrapped up in, "You've made your vow, and you're done."

You can read the entire interview here, and CT's review of the book here.

Visit a Christian Brothel Near You...Or Start Your Own

Earlier this week, I mentioned my discovery of blogger Nate Claiborne. In today's entry, he paints a vivid picture of Christian idolatry. Here are some excerpts:

When one realizes that Bible starts and ends with a marriage, the pieces may seem to fit together a bit smoother. Enclosed within the humble beginnings of human marriage was the divine mystery of ultimate marriage.... If our marriages between men and women are to reflect the marriage of the people of God to Christ, then defiling that relationship with Christ is analogous to defiling the human relationship with one’s spouse.

…

This is why God presses the Gospel on the whole of our lives, this is why not paying close attention to our devotion to God is like adultery. To see this maybe more clearly, let’s use an example.

I am getting married tomorrow…to my lovely fiance Alexandra Kaufman. We are entering into a covenant before God to pledge ourselves only to one another, until death do us part. Considering that we are both virgins, the honeymoon will be quite the intoxicating, blissful experience as well. But suppose sometime around the first of the year something changes.

Alexandra initially only came to me for sexual fulfillment, but somewhere along the line her heart starts to wander a bit. It’s not as noticeable at first, we continue on as usual. But then after a while, she starts bringing home other guys to sleep with. This goes on briefly before I casually remind her that she is supposed to come to me for that kind of fulfillment. With that in mind, she apologizes and then does just that.

But by doing that, all she changes is that now she expects me to find the other guys for her. She comes to me for fulfillment, but she wants me to give her all manner of other men to satisfy her rather than myself. She could have the only type of fulfillment she was meant to have if she would only just ask for it, but she continues sowing her wild oats even within our own bedroom. I don’t particularly seem to mind though, because she is at least nice about it and she makes sure to not interfere with my sleeping habits. We both continue on in this sort of affair, because after all, it’s only marriage, right?

I would be worried if anybody reading this was not appalled at the possibility of my marriage…turning into something like this.

However, we often don’t seem too appalled when our relationship with Christ, which is pictured as a marriage turns into something like this.

We start out fully devoted, only to slowly turn our affections to things of this world. Maybe later we get gently rebuked and come to our senses, but instead of giving up our idols, we merely start coming to Christ to get them. What is worse still is that we fully expect God to respond in the above manner and not particularly mind if we are out busy working the streets, spreading our legs for whoever passes by, so long as we come on Sundays and renew our vows.

How would Alexandra feel if I went to the strip clubs 6 days a week and rounded out the night by picking up a prostitute, so long as I came to her at least once a week for a passionate reconnection?

How should God respond when we do the same thing?

In Christianity in America, this is the course of the mainstream. One glance at some of the largest churches in America reveals that they are run more like brothels. People come and are encouraged in their adultery by appealing to the idolatry of health, wealth and happiness as what God intends to give to us rather than promoting the orthodox idea that it is Himself that is to be most treasured by us.

If you'd like to read his entire entry, it's here.

Picture: Nicolaus Knuepfer, Brothel Scene

Why I'm Still Single

When I got to Oregon State University for my freshman year of college, I started out attending the meetings of Campus Crusade for Christ. But a guy across the hall was involved with a similar group called The Navigators, and that's the parachurch organization I ended up committing to. When I transferred to the University of Oregon the next year, I got involved with the Navs there. Then I worked for the Navs for three years in Eastern Europe, before returning to the U.S. for grad school and 2-1/2 more years of Nav campus involvement. All together, it's almost 10 years of direct involvement, and I've maintained a lot of contacts over the 24 years since I got out of grad school.

That may go a long ways toward explaining why I'm still single.

On campus, one of the taunts - or badges of honor, depending on your perspective - was "Navigator Neverdater." Unlike Crusade, we weren't known as a marriage factory. In fact, it was rather the opposite. Early in my college career, someone said that you only have 4 or so years in college, and it's an unparalleled time for growth in your Christian walk, so why not focus on that and save the dating/marriage stuff for later? Sounded good to me, so I made a commitment not to date until after college. Only when I started getting interested in someone during my missionary years did I remember that my commitment had expired. So we dated a couple times, but she married my friend, instead. They're now Navigator staff.

All of the above is simply to introduce this delightful video from a Navigator college student. It's clear that this part of the DNA of the Navs is still recognizable. Of course, the Navs are defined by something much different than collegiate dating practices, namely such things as Scripture Memory, Bible study, discipleship, and spiritual reproduction. And also of course, most people involved with the Navs do get married. Nevertheless, if you were involved with the Navs in college, you'll love this video, and if you weren't, you'll probably find it rather funny, too:

Is This Good News or Bad?

Today's newspaper reports that the Presbyterian Church (USA) has voted once again to reject a measure that would have allowed for sexually active gay clergy in that denomination.

The church rule that remains in effect requires "“fidelity within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman or chastity in singleness.”

So, is it good news that the measure was defeated? Or is it bad news that 40+% of the presbyteries voted against fidelity in marriage and chastity in singleness?

Bishop Gene Robinson and Me

Last night, I went to hear Bishop V. Gene Robinson speak at the Emory Law School. If you don't already know, Robinson is the gay Episcopal bishop of New Hampshire whose ordination has been a catalyst for schism within the Anglican Communion. For better or worse - and I believe worse - Robinson is a history-changer. He's not a "celebrity" like Britney Spears, but he will be remembered in the history books, possibly for centuries, while Britney won't even merit a footnote.

Despite arriving half an hour early, I found no seats available in the auditorium. But caught up in a last minute scrum, I somehow ended up in the front row - a great place for a view, but not so great if you're not going to applaud (I didn't) or give him three standing ovations (I didn't give him even one). Awkward, indeed. At least I didn't hurl tomatoes, or invective.

And it was draining. When it was all over, I felt like I do after a long, tense, enervating movie.

Robinson spoke for maybe 45 minutes, then had a short colloquy with a fawning Harvard professor, then took several questions from the audience. It's not surprising that Robinson likens his situation to that of the campaigners for black civil rights or equal rights for women. He accuses himself of racism and misogyny, which I guess is designed to provide a foundation for accusing those who oppose him of heterosexism (he said he avoids the term homophobia). Victimhood is a strangely comforting position to be in for many, Robinson apparently included.

I won't attempt a detailed recap of his talk or the questions. In some ways, the non-sex-related comments he made were the most illuminating. They certainly explain how he can arrive at the conclusion that it's just fine with God if you are a practicing homosexual. Here are some statements I found "interesting:"

• "I do not believe that Jesus is the sole revelation of God to man." Other faith communities are also OK to God.
• Homosexual behavior is "not immoral, sick, disordered, misguided."
• "You can't find too many definite proclamations in Scripture," so people an use the Bible to say anything. We have a "flawed understanding" of such Biblical words as "abomination."
• "I believe the Scriptures to be the Word of God, but not the words of God."
• Jesus is God's highest revelation. The Bible isn't. [But how do we know anything about Jesus apart from the Bible?]
• Jesus said, "I will send the Holy Spirit to lead you into all truth." The truth the Spirit is leading us to now is that gays and women deserve "full inclusion."
• Regarding divorce and remarriage: "In spite of the explicit injunction against it from the mouth of Jesus Himself," the Holy Spirit has led us to accept divorced people who remarry. [Thus the Spirit can contradict Jesus.]
• Straight Christians focus on homosexuals so they won't need to deal with their own sexual issues. [He doesn't know the straight Christians I know!]
• "It is time that Christians and Jews actually read the holy Scriptures." [The old canard. Besides myself, I know plenty of Christians who have read the Bible several times through and arrive at conclusions very different from Robinson's.]
• "I helped start a group for 12-21 year old [gay] teens."
• "People who oppose me are only believing what they were taught." [None of his opponents has carefully studied the matter?]
• His advice to gay Catholic priests is that the ordination of women is a good first step on the way toward the full inclusion of homosexuals.
• "There are as many sexualities as there are human beings."
• "God is omni-vulnerable."

There was more, of course, but the above gives you a good flavor of the evening. One thing I listened carefully for, and didn't hear, is any suggestion that whether we're gay or straight, we're called to be continent (i.e., celibate) until marriage or something roughly equivalent. Robinson himself is in a committed relationship and has a "spouse," but at no time did he suggest that spousal fidelity should be normative. He'd lose a lot of gay supporters if he were to advocate such a position, and I still wouldn't agree with him, but I think his position would be much easier to defend. As it is, it comes across more like, "People should be free to do what they want to do, as long as it's loving (and not child abuse or other things I don't think are OK)." That position is intellectual mush, no matter how palatable you make it.

And Bishop Robinson does know how to make heresy palatable. He is witty and winsome. He presents a persona that's hard to dislike, and some of his humor is top-notch. His captor the devil is a liar, and though the Bible doesn't say it, I expect he knows some good jokes, too.

How to Know When to Get Married

Well, I went to a wedding yesterday, and nothing happened that was as interesting as what I offered you last week. Nevertheless, I saw an old friend there whom I haven't seen for perhaps a decade, and we had a great time catching up at Starbuck's afterwards.

Earlier in the week, I was having dinner with a different friend, and the topic of marriage came up. I was reminded of an article I read 15 years ago in Details magazine. It may be the most profound article on marriage I've ever read - surprising, perhaps, considering the marginally sleazy magazine it appeared in and the fact that it was penned by Gordon Gano of the Violent Femmes.

Gano's entire essay was brilliant, but I'll limit myself here to what he says about readiness for marriage. How do you know when you're ready? It's simple, really: You should only get married when you're depressed. Read on:

[I]n terms of my opinion and mine only, I will state that it's best to marry when one is depressed. How will one know what one wants - if one wants to marry, if one is ready to commit - if one is buoyed up by a false sense of hope and happiness? To paraphrase a science journal that has since left my grasp: Depression's great benefit is that the depressed subject tends to withdraw attention from wasted enterprises. What a great time to marry!

Which leads to my next question/answer: When does one know that it's time to marry? When one has no hope. When one has given up all hope of ever being able to be happy with someone other than that one special someone, and (now watch this closely) when one also realizes that that happiness isn't even possible with that one special man or woman. Then it's time.

Marriage must be entered into with the proper sense of hopelessness, so that when its own hopelessness arrives it can be welcomed with open arms. Marriage may be a crucifixion of sorts, but after comes the resurrection. Marriage is believing that, despite the cross, there is coming an Easter; the tomb will open.

...

For my part, I married my best friend. I was motivated by a lot of fear and hopelessness, and I was, of course, depressed. And because I was depressed - not despite it - I don't doubt my decision. I'm glad to take part in continuing to create the mystery of matrimony. It intensifies life. It raises the stakes. It is saying yes to life, to change, challenge, suffering, death. And yes, yes, yes to the open tomb.

- "Balls and Chains," Details, July 1993, p. 62

Potato, Potahto, Tomato, Tomahto. Let's Call The Whole Thing Off (?)

Apropos our discussion of marriage, here a story of an evangelical marriage that is lasting, and even doing pretty well, albeit with a twist . . .

What happens when the leader of an anti-Mormon ministry is married to a Mormon? Not what you'd probably think.

Read the article from the St Petersburg (FL) Times here. It's too long to paste in this entry, but it's worth the read.

Although I'd strongly discourage a follower of Christ from marrying someone who isn't (and that's what I believe the Bible teaches, as well), it appears that this was a case of two nonbelievers marrying, then one of them later coming to faith in Christ. The article doesn't state that explicitly, but that's the way it looks to me. In which case, this article portrays a "mixed" marriage that's actually pretty attractive. Check out the husband's comment about what he considers his role in the marriage to be. No wonder they get along.
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(You might also want to check out the husband's web site: WhatMormonsDontTell.com . You can learn some good things about Mormon beliefs there.)
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(And the lyrics in the title come from George and Ira Gershwin's song here. If you haven't heard the version recorded by Ella and Louis, your life isn't complete: Disc 2, Track 5.)

News You May Have Missed: Muslims Debate the Propriety of Wife-Beating (And a German Judge Supports It)

As you'll read below, some Muslims argue that wife-beating is an acceptable last resort, when necessary to save the marriage. A civil judge in Germany last week agreed. But other Muslims disagree and are looking for new ways to translate the "beat" word that occurs in the Quran. Just thought you might like to know what the "religion of peace" is thinking about these days. (Link to the original NY Times article is here, or you can read the reprint below.)

March 25, 2007

New Translation Prompts Debate on Islamic Verse
By NEIL MacFARQUHAR

CHICAGO — Laleh Bakhtiar had already spent two years working on an English translation of the Koran when she came upon Chapter 4, Verse 34.
She nearly dropped the project right then.
The hotly debated verse states that a rebellious woman should first be admonished, then abandoned in bed, and ultimately “beaten” — the most common translation for the Arabic word “daraba” — unless her behavior improves.
“I decided it either has to have a different meaning, or I can’t keep translating,” said Ms. Bakhtiar, an Iranian-American who adopted her father’s Islamic faith as an adult and had not dwelled on the verse before. “I couldn’t believe that God would sanction harming another human being except in war.”
Ms. Bakhtiar worked for five more years, with the translation to be published in April. But while she found a way through the problem, few verses in the Koran have generated as much debate, particularly as more Muslim women study their faith as an academic field.
“This verse became an issue of debate and controversy because of the ethics of the modern age, the universal notions of human rights,” said Khaled Abou El Fadl, an Egyptian-born law professor and Islamic scholar at the

University of California, Los Angeles.
The leader of the North American branch of a mystical Islamic order, Sheik Muhammad Hisham Kabbani, said he had been questioned about the verse in places around the world where women were struggling for greater rights, but most of all by Westerners.
Women want to be free “from some of the extreme ideology of some Muslims,” the sheik said, after delivering a sermon on the verse recently in Oakland, Calif.
[In Germany last week, a judge citing the verse caused a public outcry after she rejected the request for a fast track divorce by a Moroccan-German woman because her husband beat her. The judge, removed from the case, had written that the Koran sanctioned physical abuse.]
There are at least 20 English translations of the Koran. “Daraba” has been translated as beat, hit, strike, scourge, chastise, flog, make an example of, spank, pet, tap and even seduce.
“Spank?” exclaimed Professor Abou El Fadl, who has concluded that the verse refers to a rare public legal procedure that ended before the 10th century. “That is really kinky. That is the author fantasizing too much.”

Ms. Bakhtiar, who is 68 and has a doctorate in educational psychology, set out to translate the Koran because she found the existing version inaccessible for Westerners. Many Jewish and Christian names, for example, have been Arabized, so Moses and Jesus appear in the English version of the Koran as Musa and Issa.
When she reached the problematic verse, Ms. Bakhtiar spent the next three months on “daraba.” She does not speak Arabic, but she learned to read the holy texts in Arabic while studying and working as a translator in Iran in the 1970s and ’80s.
Her eureka moment came on roughly her 10th reading of the Arabic-English Lexicon by Edward William Lane, a 3,064-page volume from the 19th century, she said. Among the six pages of definitions for “daraba” was “to go away.”
“I said to myself, ‘Oh, God, that is what the prophet meant,’ ” said Ms. Bakhtiar, speaking in the offices of Kazi Publications in Chicago, a mail-order house for Islamic books that is publishing her translation. “When the prophet had difficulty with his wives, what did he do? He didn’t beat anybody, so why would any Muslim do what the prophet did not?”
She thinks the “beat” translation contradicts another verse, which states that if a woman wants a divorce, she should not be mistreated. Given the option of staying in the marriage and being beaten, or divorcing, women would obviously leave, she said.
There have been similar interpretations, but none have been incorporated into a translation. Debates over translations of the Koran — considered God’s eternal words — revolve around religious tradition and Arabic grammar. Critics fault Ms. Bakhtiar on both scores.
Ms. Bakhtiar said she expected opposition, not least because she is not an Islamic scholar. Men in the Muslim world, she said, will also oppose the idea of an American, especially a woman, reinterpreting the prevailing translation.
“They feel the onslaught of the West against their religious values, and they fear losing their whole suit of armor,” she said. “But women need to know that there is an alternative.”
Religious scholars outline several main threads in the translation of “daraba.”
Conservative scholars suggest the verse has to be taken at face value, with important reservations.
They consider that the Koran holds that force is an acceptable last resort to preserve important institutions, including marriages and nations. Some scholars have accused some Muslims of trying to make the verse palatable to the West.
“I am not apologetic about why the Koran says this,” said Seyyed Hossein Nasr, an Islamic scholar who teaches at George Washington University. The Bible, he noted, addresses stoning people to death.
Sayyid Qutb, an Egyptian whose writings underpin the extremism of groups like Al Qaeda, published extensive commentaries about the Koran before he was hanged in 1966.
Islamic tradition states that Muhammad never hit his 11 wives, and Mr. Qutb considered a man striking his wife as the last measure to save a marriage. He cited the prophet’s horror at the practice by quoting one of his sayings: “Do not beat your wife like you beat your camel, for you will be flogging her early in the day and taking her to bed at night.”
The verse 4:34, with its three-step program, is often called a reform over the violent practices of seventh century Arabia, when the Koran was revealed. The verse was not a license for battery, scholars say, with other interpretations defining the heaviest instrument a man might employ as a twig commonly used as a toothbrush.
Sheik Ali Gomaa, the Islamic scholar who serves as Egypt’s grand mufti, said Koranic verses must be viewed through the prism of the era.
The advice “is always broad in order to be relevant to different cultures and in different times,” he said through a spokesman in an e-mail message. “In our modern context, hitting one’s wife is totally inappropriate as society deems it hateful and it will only serve to sow more discord.”
A caller on a television program in Egypt recently asked the mufti if he should stop sleeping with his wife if she was causing discord, the spokesman said. The mufti replied that the measures in the verse were meant to bring harmony, not to exact revenge.
More liberal commentators, particularly women, say the usual interpretation reflects the patriarchal practices of the Arabian peninsula.
This school holds that the sacred texts have become encrusted with medieval traditions that need to be scraped off like a layer of barnacles. Some Saudi women have been trying to do this by emphasizing the public role played by Aisha, one of the prophet’s wives, while the Asma Society gathered Muslim women from around the world in New York last fall to explore the establishment of a female council to interpret Islamic law.
Some analysts hold that the verse cannot be rendered meaningfully into English because it reflects social and legal practices of Muhammad’s time.
“The whole idea is not to punish her,” said Ingrid Mattson, an expert in early Islamic history at the Hartford Seminary and the first woman to be president of the Islamic Society of North America. “It is like a fear of sexual impropriety, that the husband takes these steps to try to bring their relationship to where it is supposed to be. I think it is a physical gesture of displeasure.”
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company