Sheppards and Lapsley Goes Blue!

Can you believe that one! The tenth presbytery to switch to inclusivity from a solid yellow history to bright more light blue! This is a presbytery in Alabama. It includes the cities of Birmingham and Montgomery. Bruce has the scoop.

The vote was a photo finish 77-75.

So like it matters getting to the presbytery meeting and getting others to the presbytery meeting and making a witness by speaking the truth from the heart.

Folks in the know say this is the big week. It is Go Blue Week. Presbyterian Welcome says that 23 presbyteries will vote this week.

Join PFLAG for Milk!

Milk is playing at the Real to Reel in Johnson City. This is from PFLAG Tri-Cities president, Kerry Holland:

... I want to encourage you to express your appreciation to the management for bringing this movie to town...apparently she had to convince her distributor that there would be an audience for the movie.

We are planning a PFLAG movie night, Friday at 7 p.m. But if you cannot make it then, go another time and bring a friend!

Let us know if you are coming at Facebook.

Ray Sez Rock the Vote

Ray Bagnuolo has posted This Is the Time.

What time is it, Ray? It is time to rock the vote.

There is a shift underway, which can be seen even in the ties and close votes that have moved toward ratification A shift that emphasizes the real chance we have of embracing the recommendation of the 218th General Assembly to ratify of 08-B.

We just may be able to do this--that is to swat that annoying B in our bonnet and turn the PCUSA inclusive. I wasn't sure when we started, but the movement toward inclusivity is picking up. The difference will be getting out the vote. Getting those progressive retired clergy to the meetings, specialized clergy, and elder commissioners. Talk it up, make the calls, let's do it.

Let the Bible Be Human

I have had a discussion over at Two Friars and a Fool about the Bible. They do good work over there. Aric has made a couple of fine posts regarding the Bible, Thinking About the Bible and Firing the Canon. The friars also post about a number of other important issues and are respectful, intelligent conversation partners.

I have been pushing and poking regarding the Bible, particularly the notion of canon and its authority.

I should say up front that people should be familiar with the Bible. It is the classic of western literature.




It is a best seller every year. It is packaged and repackaged for public consumption. There seems to be no end to the creativity of those who wish to profit by selling it.




So much other literature is based upon its themes and stories. If a person wants to be literate regarding western culture, they ought to know the Bible. To test your literacy take this interesting quiz posted on the BBC site, Do you know your biblical references?

To do my little part, I have had each congregation I have served devote a year to reading the Bible. We finished this project last year and I have kept a blog for it, Bible and Jive, complete with a reading schedule and quizzes.

I like the Bible. I have devoted much of my life trying to understand it.

However, I do not like most theologies of the Bible.

Before I go there, I should ask what is the Bible?

On one level it is a canon completed in the 16th century with the Protestant Reformation and Roman Catholic Counter-Reformation. That is when it became "a book." There is the Protestant canon and the Roman Catholic canon. Two books with a beginning and an end. The RC canon has some books the Protestant canon does not include.

Of course there are other canons as well, but for the most part these two are what people mean when they talk about "the Bible." Jews call the TaNaKh the Bible. It is its own book. It contains the same books as the Protestant "Old Testament" but the books are in a different order. It is a different book. If you change the order of the texts, you really have a different story altogether.

Obviously the individual books of the Bible were completed by various authors over time, edited, and so forth. But the product we have is a book from Genesis to Revelation and its order is part of what it is.

The authors of these various bibles or canons are the ecclesiastical bodies that determined what pieces of literature would be included and their respective ordering. This process also happened over time, building on earlier work and revising it.

I am perfectly happy having on my bookshelf a number of these various bibles. I think as I said earlier, that for sake of general knowledge and cultural literacy, we should be familiar with them.

Yet we all know that "the Bible" is much more than that. It is wrapped in theology. It is not merely a book on my shelf, but it is supposedly "the word of God." That phrase makes it a dangerous and a destructive book.

To illustrate, here is that firebrand infidel, Robert Ingersoll, from Some Mistakes of Moses:

Too great praise challenges attention, and often brings to light a thousand faults that otherwise the general eye would never see. Were we allowed to read the Bible as we do all other books, we would admire its beauties, treasure its worthy thoughts, and account for all its absurd, grotesque and cruel things, by saying that its authors lived in rude, barbaric times. But we are told that it was written by inspired men; that it contains the will of God; that it is perfect, pure and true in all its parts; the source and standard of all religious truth; that it is the star and anchor of all human hope; the only guide for man, the only torch in Nature's night. These claims are so at variance with every known recorded fact, so palpably absurd, that every free, unbiased soul is forced to raise the standards of revolt.

Notice Ingersoll's point. It is not the contents of the Bible, but the theology of the Bible, the halo it places around bad texts, and the authority given to it that makes it "palpably absurd."

Think of the damage that the authority of the Bible is doing in our culture.

• Because of the Bible, religious zealots deny gay and lesbian people basic rights.
  
• Because of the Bible, women are shamed into positions of subservience to their husbands.
  
• Because of the Bible, science is under attack in our public schools.
  
• Because of the Bible, holy wars are justified.

Granted, the Bible has been a resource for liberating movements. The Bible can be and is used to provide a critique of tyranny and injustice. Dr. King brought Amos alive in service to the civil rights movement:

Let us justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an everflowing stream.

I find much in the Bible that is inspiring and that challenges me to be a better person. But that is not because of but in spite of its supposed authority. The baggage of its supposed authority is doing more damage than good. Amos' critique of injustice is just as true whether or not he was "inspired by God" or not.

It is a book. Its contents were written by human beings, every jot and tittle. Let it be human. Let it be the creative work of our ancestors. Let us read it. Let us read it critically. Read it devotionally if you wish. Wrestle with it. Preach from it if you like. But let it be human.

I fail to see the benefit of finding ways to prop up its authority. I think I understand the psychology of this task. We still wish to cling to the apron strings of mother church with its dogmas, creeds, and watchful eye. To that I quote from the good book:

When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways.

Three Presbyteries Flip for Justice!

Just got the word that three presbyteries that previously voted against inclusion, all voted in favor of the new G-6.0106b today!

Huzzahs for

1. Maumee Valley, 65-58
   
2. Great Rivers, 85-74
   
3. Scioto Valley, 115-88

The score is now 23 for and 38 against. Check out the chart.

Nine presbyteries have reversed their vote to a more inclusive position. None (that is zero) have gone the other way.

We have had heart breakers. Cincinnati was a tie a week or so ago, which means no. Others lost by just two or three votes. Every presbytery is a "swing" presbytery. Get out the vote! Every vote makes the difference.

My clerk of session received in the mail propaganda from the Presbyterian Coalition today. They are working it. Those who are in favor of inclusion need to as well.

Make sure you get folks to the presbytery meeting, and if possible, get folks prepared to speak!

Good work, you inclusion mongers!

Solar Living

I am enjoying Don Cupitt's latest book, Above Us Only Sky: The Religion of Ordinary Life. In it he describes what he calls solar living:

So what form can religion take? If there is only this life, which is a movement of signs, and my own life, which is just one identifiable strand in the whole process, then the task of religion is to give us the courage and strength to commit ourselves wholeheartedly to
life. Only we create the world, and only we can redeem it. By solar love of life we can inject meaning and value into life for everyone....

...solar living is, or tries, to be, purely affirmative. It is also purely expressive. That is, we are not labouring to purify our souls so as to be ready for the Day of Judgment, and we do not spend our lives in forging a unified self to be a kind of monumental achievement. No, there is no Soul or Real Self, because everything that we are is flickering, shifting and ambiguous. The only way in which we can get ourselves together and become ourselves is in and by our self-expression, through which we put out, or present, images of ourselves. But as soon as I have expressed myself time moves on, and my expressed self must be abandoned without regret, because of course solar living requires us always to move on and never to become 'attached' to any version of ourselves. Solar living lives by dying all the time, as it continually leaves selfhood behind. That is how it conquers the fear of death, by making a full acceptance of death into part of the way we live. pp. 61-63

I started blogging two and half years ago. It was the result of a personal depression. I was depressed over the loss of our world with its cars, economic growth, and progress. This age is coming to an end. This age of sustaining and growing our economy through non-renewable resources (oil, coal, gas, etc.) is ending. I was just coming aware of it (slower than many, but apparently not all).


We are right now at the top of the peak and are sliding down the right side. As this reality sunk in, I became very depressed--seriously depressed. I started this blog as therapy. Because as I was despairing about our future, I couldn't get over my personal anxiety about what this loss entails.

I could not stop worrying about myself, my personal finances, my job, my home, my future. What would I do about my food, my shelter, my health? Then of course, I felt guilty that I was only thinking about myself. I went into a period of self-blame for not saving more, for not knowing how to grow beets, for having a mortgage and other debts--in short, for not "providing" as I felt I should. I felt that I should have known this was coming and prepared for it.

I think this is what is keeping us from looking at reality. It is too painful and anxiety-producing. We cannot imagine life in any other way than as we know it. This, I think, is a psychological or spiritual issue. We can learn and argue from a standpoint of reason. It is clearly obvious that we have peaked. By plunging our non-renewable resources through a growth economy that cannot sustain us, we have reached our summit. But it is too painful to admit. There must be 500 years of coal, or still unknown deposits of oil, or oil shale that will keep us going for hundreds of years. When someone offers up that kind of palliative, we eagerly consume it along with our next tank of gas.

Yet we know. And we refuse to know.

So I have struggled and wrestled with my inherited religious tradition to see if I might find a psycho-spiritual resource or a "theology" for this new millennium, this new age to come that is not here but arriving quickly. How do we live when one age chaotically transitions to the next? How do I personally live, knowing that I cannot "provide" the way I have, knowing not what the future will bring, but knowing that life--my life--twenty years from now will be completely different than it is today?

Perhaps this is where Don Cupitt's concept of solar living is helpful:

the task of religion is to give us the courage and strength to commit ourselves wholeheartedly to life.

This is life. The chaotic transition is life. We won't come out the other side for perhaps a century or more. We here today won't see that promised land where our descendants sustain themselves on renewable sources of energy. We might glimpse it now. We must prepare for it now, but we won't get there.

Our trek will be a chaotic wilderness trek. Our economies will fall; our standards of living (which for Americans were unjust and unsustainable to begin with) will fall. The age of petroleum will be seen by future historians as a strange blip that brought with it amazing knowledge and the ability to see into the deepest corners of space. It also brought the near destruction of the planet (if future historians are around it won't be complete destruction, but that isn't a sure thing from our vantage point).

We must begin this trek, bravely, with a commitment to life, with a willingness to let go of our attachments, with an attitude of solar living, to create and re-create ourselves anew each day.

Perhaps most importantly, we need to see this loss (and grieve it we must) as a necessary precondition for a sustainable future for our descendants on this beautiful and fragile home.

Life is us, life is all this, now. p. 116

The Meaning of Life, Part 17

Somebody ought to tell the truth about the Bible. The preachers dare not, because they would be driven from their pulpits. Professors in colleges dare not, because they would lose their salaries. Politicians dare not. They would be defeated. Editors dare not. They would lose subscribers. Merchants dare not, because they might lose customers. Men of fashion dare not, fearing that they would lose caste. Even clerks dare not, because they might be discharged. And so I thought I would do it myself.

There are many millions of people who believe the Bible to be the inspired word of God -- millions who think that this book is staff and guide, counselor and consoler; that it fills the present with peace and the future with hope -- millions who believe that it is the fountain of law, Justice and mercy, and that to its wise and benign teachings the world is indebted for its liberty, wealth and civilization -- millions who imagine that this book is a revelation from the wisdom and love of God to the brain and heart of man -- millions who regard this book as a torch that conquers the darkness of death, and pours its radiance on another world -- a world without a tear.

They forget its ignorance and savagery, its hatred of liberty, its religious persecution; they remember heaven, but they forget the dungeon of eternal pain. They forget that it imprisons the brain and corrupts the heart. They forget that it is the enemy of intellectual freedom. Liberty is my religion. Liberty of hand and brain -- of thought and labor, liberty is a word hated by kings -- loathed by popes. It is a word that shatters thrones and altars -- that leaves the crowned without subjects, and the outstretched hand of superstition without alms. Liberty is the blossom and fruit of justice -- the perfume of mercy. Liberty is the seed and soil, the air and light, the dew and rain of progress, love and joy.

--Robert Ingersoll, About the Holy Bible, 1894

A Bumpy Ride

Ever read anything by James Howard Kuntsler? You ought to. He blogs at Clusterfuck Nation. Oops, what was that word, Mr. Minister? Did you write the F word without asterisks? Yes, sorry, I did.

If that disturbs you, you should read his stuff. Honest, reality-based, truth-telling. His latest post for Presidents' Day describes the history of our most recent American presidents and the energy reality they each chose to deny in their own special way--except of course, Carter, the one we booted.

Kuntsler writes:

Mr. Obama is not dim. The euphoria that attended his election was largely about acquiring a leader of first-rate intelligence and sensibility, compared to his lamentable predecessor. I like to think that Mr. Obama really does know what's up -- that "change" means we have to live a lot differently, not mount a campaign to sustain the unsustainable. I suspect that President Obama has learned over the last several weeks that the nation's banking system and economy -- indeed, the whole world's -- are in way worse shape than anyone imagined before January 20. He is faced with the immediate crushing problem of appearing to do something while a tsunami of catastrophic debt deleveraging sweeps away the first outlier nations and their economies and bears down on the G-7. I suspect that in a few weeks, or possibly even a few days, Mr. Obama will have to start announcing all kinds of new and more drastic measures that will shock the stunned American public -- things like bank holidays, nationalizations, possibly even dollar devaluation.

As I've said more than once, I believe this basically honest and intelligent president will have to take on the role of the nation's hand-holding camp counselor or school teacher. When the time comes that he assumes this role, I think he'll do it pretty well, even though great pain and misery will be abroad in this land.

I tend to think this whole stimulus thing is drop in the bucket. We don't need more bridges and roads, because frankly, we don't need any more cars. Within a few years we will be car-free whether we want to be or not.

I, too, think Obama sees what is happening. I think they all did. The difference is that perhaps Obama will tell the truth about it, eventually. He has to as it is all crashing around him. We are in for a bumpy ride.

Drill Baby Drill?

In part five, Dr. Bartlett continues his conversation on coal by quoting journalists.

He provides this important rule of thumb:

Don't believe any prediction of the life expectancy of a non-renewable resource until you have confirmed the prediction by repeating the calculation.

And this corollary:

The more optimistic the prediction the greater is the probability that it is based on faulty arithmetic or on no arithmetic at all.

Here is a doozy from Time Magazine:

Energy industries agree that to achieve some form of energy self-sufficiency the U.S. must mine all the coal that it can. (May 19, 1975, p. 55)

Dr. Bartlett invites us to chew on that one for a minute. What does this mean? To paraphrase:

"the more rapidly we consume our resources the more self-sufficient we'll be."

Yup, pretty dumb. He quotes from the energy adviser to President Ford:

We should be trying to get as many holes drilled as possible to get the proven (oil) reserve. (William Simon on CBS, August 31, 1977)

Sounds like "drill, baby, drill" doesn't it? The faster we can get that last drop of oil out of the ground and finish using it, the better off we will be, is how Dr. Bartlett paraphrases this wisdom.

He moves on to Dr. M. King Hubbert. Here is some trivia. What was the first year that the U.S. had to import more oil than it was able to produce domestically?

Answer: 1994. Since then we have imported more and more oil. Currently (2007):

• the U.S. produces 8. 5 million barrels of oil per day.
• the U.S. consumes 20.7 million barrels of oil per day.
  

So what about the Arctic Wildlife Refuge? Lots of oil under those polar bears, right? The estimate is 3.2 billion barrels of oil. At most, 10.4 billion barrels. That sounds like a lot. Let's round that off to 10 billion. At current use, 20 million barrels per day, it would last 500 days--not even a year and a half.

My theory is that we cannot stand sobering news and will invent and repeat any kind of nonsense so that we can stay in denial. Those who are interested in short-term gain will gladly give us false hopes so we keep consuming. Here is part five:

Part six next time.

Five Hundred Years of Coal?

It has been two months since I posted on Albert Bartlett's lecture (now on video) Arithmetic, Population, and Energy.


You can also read the transcript courtesy of Minnesotans for Sustainability. You will also want to watch Chris Martenson's Crash Course. I will eventually post on it as well.

This Youtube version of Bartlett's lecture is simply his lecture chopped into eight parts of equal length. I have posted and commented on the first three:

Introduction
Bartlett 1: The Greatest Shortcoming of the Human Race
Bartlett 2: Zero Population Growth Will Happen
Bartlett 3: Time in a Bottle

And now, part 4.

In section four, he talks about coal. You may have heard this statement in regards to coal:

"At current levels of output and recovery these American coal reserves can be expected to last more than 500 years."

Bartlett says this is a dangerous statement. It is dangerous because it is true. But the danger is that people take the sentence apart. The important part of this statement is its beginning: "At current levels..."

That means if and only if we remain at zero growth in terms of coal production.

Another caveat. Of the coal reserves, only half are recoverable based on the U.S. Department of Energy's own numbers. That knocks the number down to 250 years already. But that is not all.

Between 1971 and 1991 coal production increased at a rate of 2.86% per year. How long would coal last at this growth rate?

Answer: Between 72-94 years.

The only way to get the 500 year figure would be to do two highly improbable things. The first is to find a way to recover 100% of the coal in the ground. The second is to have 500 years of zero growth of coal production.

He concludes that in conversation with coal mining companies in Kentucky and W. Virginia, they report they have maybe 30 years left (at the time of this video) before coal mining is no longer economical. Then what do we do to switch on the lights?

Of course, the 500 year figure is trotted out to make us feel more secure about oil reserves as if coal will substitute for oil. But this 500 year figure is about current energy needs. According to Dr. Bartlett, coal provides about 1/5 of the energy we use in this country. If we moved to 100% energy from coal we would have to divide time remaining by a factor of five.

The next time someone tells you we have "500 years of coal left," invite them to check this video, and check the facts.

Part five next time.

Here is part four: