Please note: This post is not a statement about my position on any particular political party, or the NRA, so please do not read it as such. This post is meant to focus particularly on a theological statement about torture and baptism asserted this past Saturday night.

Normally, I try to overlook stupid or offensive things that politicians say because it pretty much happens every single day. Conservative, liberal, or radical, politicians are frequently putting their feet in their mouths. Yet in the address Sarah Palin gave at the NRA’s Stand and Fight Rally on Saturday night she made one of the most theologically offensive statements I have heard in a long time. In her twelve-minute speech, she makes this statement:

“If I were in charge, they’d know that waterboarding is how we baptize terrorists.”

Not only did she actually make this statement, but it was also received with resounding applause. I was flabbergasted and appalled by this statement as a Christian. My first reaction was to rage against Sarah Palin and those who hold similar ideologies. Then my second reaction was to take a step back, recognize that people like Palin will continue to say theologically offensive things in order to promote their own “civil religion,” and instead, use this as an opportunity to talk about torture, the nature of baptism and the life of Christian conversion.

So first, let’s talk about torture.

We often see torture as something that is inflicted against particular individuals, but in reality, it is something that inflicts violence upon society as a whole as a means of compliance, coercion, and a reinforcement of the position of those in power. To read more about the violence that torture inflicts upon social bodies in addition to individual bodies, I recommend William Cavanaugh’s Torture and Eucharist, but know that it is a difficult read.

In short, Cavanaugh argues that the practice of the Eucharist (Holy Communion) is not just a symbol, but a real, cathartic, and enacted practice that forms people in the the Body of Christ in a way that produces a social body with a deeper sense of communion than any nation-state, and thus acts as resistance to torture which seeks to fragment all social bodies other than the body that maintains power.

“Torture is an efficacious sign by which the state enacts its power over its subjects’ bodies in purest form.” (Cavanaugh, Torture and Eucharist, p. 34)

Torture is fundamentally about violence and coercion. It is an act that dehumanizes, fragments, and violates. While torture is often deemed justifiable in the name of “protection” or “national security,” ultimately, it is nothing more than violence cloaked in often-patriotic and nationalistic language and purposes. Torture is seen as a legitimate means of coercion by many when it is done by the authority of the state because we, as citizens, have entrusted our protection to that body. Yet we decry torture when it is performed by insurgent or fringe bodies who use torture with the same practice and intent.

While I can certainly understand the sometimes perceived need for the use of torture (even if I don’t agree with it) and this falls into the larger conversation of just war, right now, I think that the important thing to consider, whether you feel torture is ever justified or not, is that it is certainly, clearly, absolutely an incredible violence and an act that dehumanizes both the torturer and the tortured.

When Sarah Palin said that “waterboarding is how we baptize terrorists,” she was making a theological claim about baptism (whether she really meant to or not). As Christians, we understand baptism as a sacrament that marks the entrance into the community of faith, of entrance into the Body of Christ. Baptism is a means of grace that underlies God’s first move for us. It is about grace, love, mercy. It is about being brought into communion with Christ, with each other, and the church in every time and place.

“There is one baptism as there is one source of salvation-the gracious love of God. The baptizing of a person, whether as an infant or an adult, is a sign of God’s saving grace. That grace-experienced by us as initiating, enabling, and empowering-is the same for all persons. All stand in need of it, and none can be saved without it” (By Water and the Spirit: A United Methodist Understanding of Baptism)

To read more about understanding baptism, you can read this whole document online.

Baptism is not about force or violence. It is an invitation to grace, which is the exact opposite. The first thing that came to mind when I heard Sarah Palin’s statement was to think about the often violent history of Christianity as it became a tool of empire. Historically, as the Church became increasingly tied with the state, from the Roman Empire, through the age of conquest, and up through today, the language and practice of Christianity have be co-opted to legitimate and carry out the desires of the state. We hear accounts of Christianity being spread throughout the Roman Empire by mass baptisms at sword point. We hear stories of the conquistadors evangelizing the Americas through violence and coercion. And now we hear Sarah Palin using the theological language of baptism to advocate for torture. Now I don’t believe for a second that she is actually talking about any kind of desire to convert terrorists to Christianity (and note her unspoken assumption that terrorists are always something other than Christian), but I don’t believe that the Roman emperors cared a mite about whether or not his conquered subjects underwent actual conversion experiences. In both cases, I believe that the language or practice of Christianity is being used to create compliance with the ruling body.

So why do I care so much about an obviously ridiculous and offensive statement? Why not just let it go unnoticed and not give it any attention? While Sarah Palin’s remark is extremely far out there, nonetheless, I think it highlights not only the continued problem of Christianity being co-opted to legitimate violence, but it also points to the absolute falsity of civil religion in contrast to the truth of radical discipleship.

In his The Nature of Doctrine, George Lindbeck says,

“The crusader’s battle cry “Christus est Dominus” [Christ is Lord], for example, is false when used to authorize cleaving the skull of the infidel (even though the same words in other contexts may be a true utterance). When thus employed, it contradicts the Christian understanding of Lordship as embodying, for example, suffering servanthood.” (Lindbeck, The Nature of Doctrine, p. 64).

Lindbeck’s point is that there is a way for Christians to falsify the truth of the gospel when actions are not cohesive with belief. In this particular example that Lindbeck uses, the crusader who declares that Christ is Lord, but then uses violence to demonstrate that Lordship is fundamentally undermining that truth because violence is the complete opposite of the via dolorosa, or the way of suffering of Christ.

We are just a little over a week into Eastertide, where we continue to celebrate the risen Christ and the new life we have in him. But in order to get to Easter, we had to go through Holy Week. We remembered and enacted his way of suffering on the way to the cross. Then we like to skip to Easter and think about his glorious and triumphant resurrection. But even the resurrected Christ still had the wounds on his body from his torture and death. As my theology professor at Duke, Geoffrey Wainwright liked to remind us, “Christ reigns from a tree.”

In other words, Christ’s Lordship and kingdom are not triumphalist, full of fanfare and might, but are characterized by the suffering servant, by the one who lowers himself and gives himself always for the sake of his beloved children.

When Sarah Palin linked torture and baptism in her statement, she was ultimately undermining the work of Christ, the nature of the kingdom of God, and the gift of grace that we are offered in baptism to be a part of that kingdom community.

Christians are called to a life of radical discipleship. For those who profess Christ as Lord and claim to be a part of the Body of Christ, we must seek after Christ and allow the Holy Spirit to transform us into people who more fully reveal who Christ is to the world. While there will always places in which our lives deny Christ because we are not perfect, and we are all hypocrites in certain ways, we must seek to be of the same mind of Jesus Christ, who,

Though he was in the form of God,
he did not consider being equal with God something to exploit.
But he emptied himself
by taking the form of a slave
and by becoming like human beings.
When he found himself in the form of a human,
he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death,
even death on a cross.
Therefore, God highly honored him
and gave him a name above all names,
so that at the name of Jesus everyone
in heaven, on earth, and under the earth might bow
and every tongue confess that
Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:6-11, CEB)

Violence, coercion, and dehumanization, in whatever form they take, whether it is torture, or otherwise, is not only a violence against others and violence against communities.

It is a violence against Christ himself.

But we know that Christ does not respond to violence with violence, but rather, he has made peace through the cross.

As much as I want to rage against Sarah Palin and call her all kinds of creative names, in the end my prayer is that she comes to understand God’s grace and the gift of baptism as something not to be used as a weapon (even though she may not have meant to make a serious theological claim), but instead that it is a means of grace that welcomes anyone who will receive it as an invitation to a life that is characterized by grace, mercy, and love.

*I originally posted this on my church blog at dunbarumc.com on Monday, April 28, 2014.

 

 

I spent this past week as the camp chaplain up at Spring Heights, the camp of the West Virginia Conference of the United Methodist Church. It was far and away the best week of the year for me. There is just something very special about being at Spring Heights. For those who have never been a part of camp, it is hard to understand the beauty and the magic of it, but camp is one of the places where I know I have felt the most alive and have been the most able to hear the still, small voice of God.

I went to Spring Heights as the chaplain, expecting to be the one helping others discern how God is calling them, and that was a part of what I did. But what I didn’t expect was to hear God speaking to me in new ways, reminding me of the absolute joy of loving and serving Christ. I honestly didn’t even realize that I had forgotten that joy until I experienced it anew.

I was back from camp and back at Dunbar UMC for worship yesterday morning. The gospel reading from the lectionary was Luke 10:38-42, which is the little interlude where Jesus goes to stay with Martha and Mary. Martha is super busy working to ready the house and the meal while Mary simply uses the time to sit with Jesus. The word that jumped out at me was “distracted.” The passage repeats this word a couple of times when referencing Martha. She was just so distracted with this and that, and all with good intentions for Jesus, but nonetheless, she was so busy working for Jesus that she was failing to actually give the time to Jesus to cultivate their relationship. I picture Martha running all over the place, looking like a chicken with her head cut off. She was crazy busy. I know I feel like that a lot.

And then there is Mary. She just plops herself down at Jesus’ feet. No distractions, no worries. She just sits and listens.

As I took in the words of this gospel text, I began to reflect on my time at Spring Heights in light of that story. I began to think about all of the distractions and worries that so often plague each of us in our daily lives. I began to think about how much like Martha so many of us are. And then I began to think about Mary, and how all of her potential distractions and worries were somehow pushed aside and she just sits down with Jesus. And then I thought to myself, “This past week, I got to be like Mary.”

See, camp creates that space. Camp creates that possibility. Camp allows us to leave our distractions and worries behind for a time and simply open ourselves up more to hearing the voice of Jesus. Camp at Spring Heights isn’t just about the fun, the friendships, or the new experiences. It is about a sense of belonging. It is about a sense of belonging to one another as the Body of Christ, but also of belonging to Christ himself. It is about being able to sit down at the feet of Jesus, our distractions pushed aside.

I probably had more conversations that I can count this past week with both staff and campers about how they feel like they are hearing God speaking to them in a way that they haven’t heard in a long time, or maybe even ever before.

One particularly powerful moment happened at the closing campfire on Thursday night. I had just given a brief message focusing on God meeting us in a special way at the communion table, and the joy that we experience when we get to sit down and share a meal with people we care about. I shared a little bit of my own personal experience of coming to the communion table in a time of great need, knowing that Christ would be there with me. I asked them to listen for Christ knocking on their doors, asking to come in. After communion, one camper who was maybe 10 or 11 asked if he could speak to the group. He stood up in front of everyone and said that when he dipped the bread into the cup that he just felt like God was there and that all of the difficult things in his life just vanished for that moment. He continued on to say that he just really felt like the Spirit of God was with him and that God loved him and that he had let Christ into his heart in a real way.

God was clearly speaking to us. And we were actually listening. I was actually listening. I was asking others to listen for the voice of God. I didn’t realize that I would hear a knocking on my door too!

In the gospel story, when Martha complains to Jesus that Mary isn’t helping her with all of her work, Jesus replies, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things. One thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the better part. It won’t be taken away from her.”

Many of us, campers and staff alike, experience this “better part” of sitting with Jesus at Spring Heights.

Spring Heights may be one of the most significant spaces and opportunities for ministry and spiritual formation for children, teenagers, and young adults that we have as the United Methodist Church in West Virginia. While spiritual formation cannot be relegated to one week of camp in the summer, nonetheless, Spring Heights creates the space to hear God’s voice in a new and intimate way. And that is, indeed, the “better part.”

In the opening moments of The Hunger Games, we are immediately introduced to the dire poverty in which Katniss Everdeen and the rest of her community live. It is a community stretched to the brink of existence by hunger, lack of resources, and (nearly) complete dependence upon the controlling Capitol to provide for its “second-class” citizens of District 12. Katniss, herself, is a character that struggles to break out beyond the restrictive and controlling grasp of the Capitol in order to combat her and her community’s poverty.

As Marty Troyer points out in his reflection on The Hunger Games (which is well-worth a read),

Katniss Everdeen is a petty criminal. She’s a poacher on government land, uses tools that have been outlawed, and operates comfortably in the black market. She also happens to be one of the most ethical, courageous, smart, complex, and bi-cultural heroines of modern day literature. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins is not the story of Katniss’ transition from criminal to hero. It’s the story of Katniss, criminal-hero. Katniss’ criminal behavior  is a symptom of the staggering poverty forced upon her marginalized community by those with power.  She acts in order to survive. Period. Her poverty is not due to being economically disadvantaged, culturally deprived, or underdeveloped, as if it were her own fault.

He makes an extremely important point: poverty in The Hunger Games (and frequently in real life) is caused and controlled by systemic injustices meant to keep power located in the hands of a few. Poverty is not always caused by laziness or personal choices. Katniss breaks the law because of her situation, not because of an out-of-whack morality. She, the law-breaker, is, in-fact, morally superior to the Capitol, the law-maker. (I’ll talk more about this issue of ethics, law, and goodness in a different post).

As Katniss’ narrative story begins to unfold, and as the social, cultural, and economic realities of Panem become clearer, a dichotomy begins to emerge: that of charity vs. justice.

::SPOILERS AHEAD::

Right after Katniss has volunteered as District 12’s female tribute, Peeta Mellark is chosen as the male tribute. For her, this is the worst possible person who could have been chosen. While they have never officially met prior to this point, Katniss remembers a particular encounter they had when they were younger that has left her feeling eternally indebted to Peeta.

Several years prior, after her father is killed in a coal-mining accident, Katniss is forced to grow up quickly and find ways of providing for her family. Unfortunately, due to her young age and the oppressive poverty in her community, she, and her family become in great danger of starving to death. She is pushed to the point of attempting to steal crumbs from a trash can (which is punishable by death).  As she is going through the trash at the bakery, Peeta’s mother comes out and yells at Katniss, threatening to call the Peacekeepers while Peeta watches everything from the window. As Katniss backs away, at the end of her rope, Peeta intentionally burns a loaf of bread so it will have to be thrown away. Peeta then, under the wrath of his mother, takes the bread outside, pretending to throw it away, but instead tosses it to Katniss.

For Katniss, this one act is something that allowed her to get through this darkest, crisis moment. Peeta’s loaf of bread made a big difference in Katniss’ life. As she says,

To this day, I can never shake the connection between this boy, Peeta Mellark, and the bread that gave me hope, and the dandelion that reminded me that I was not doomed.

Peeta’s act of charity brought a new sense of hope to Katniss and her family. It helped them to survive. His act of charity, however, did nothing to change the reality of District 12. It did nothing to change the root causes of poverty or challenge the corrupt, power-hungry Capitol.

As we move through the trilogy, we find that Katniss is drawn into the world-transforming work of seeking justice. As she becomes the symbol of revolution, of resistance, and of speaking truth to power, Katniss becomes an agent of change. Throughout the first two books of the trilogy, as Katniss acts and struggles through her fate of being a tribute not once, but twice in the Hunger Games, the injustices of the Capitol become more and more evident, and those injustices become more fully articulated. Katniss, herself, becomes increasingly more aware and more willing to challenge the political and economic machine of the Capitol. She begins to look for ways to act out the words that Peeta said to her the night before the Hunger Games began in the first novel:

I don’t want them to change me in there. Turn me into some kind of monster that I’m not…. I keep wishing I could think of a way to…to show the Capitol that they don’t own me. That I’m more than just a piece in their Games.

Throughout the trilogy, Katniss begins to work in greater and greater ways that  undermine the system and framework by which the Capitol operates and enforces its power. It begins in the moment that she steps up to sacrifice herself in place of her sister, and continues through her care for Rue as she dies, preparing to eat the poisonous berries with Peeta to ensure the Capitol doesn’t have its victor, through her willing participation in the revolution that ensues against the Capitol. In other words, Katniss is seeking justice: an end to the oppressive rule of the Capitol, and she is willing to sacrifice even her own life in order to see this transformation brought about. It is messy, painful, and comes at great cost to her own personal life and relationships.

When we place the act of Peeta’s charity next to Katniss’ struggle for justice, we realize that both are necessary pieces of the story, but that apart, they mean nothing. Peeta’s act of charity is an important one to Katniss. It reaches out to her in a moment of personal desperation. It helps her through a crisis moment. It gives her a moment of hope, and gives her new strength to see a new day. But ultimately, it does not change the reality of Panem. It doesn’t change the oppressive systems that are in place. It doesn’t lift District 12 out of its circumstances of dire poverty. Yet, without Peeta’s bread, Katniss may never have been able to be the person that she becomes.

In our society, we aren’t too bad at charity. Many Americans are pretty generous at giving money to non-profits who seek to help people get through crisis moments. This is not a bad thing in and of itself. Giving to charity, offering a meal or clothing or shelter to someone in need is a good and necessary thing. Nonetheless, if we stop there, then we do nothing beyond what Peeta did for Katniss. It is worthy and good and meaningful on a personal level, but it does nothing to change the realities of our world that often hold people in places of powerlessness and poverty.

The work of justice often involves inconvenience and sacrifice. Perhaps it means lobbying to remove or create laws that protect people at the margins of society. Maybe it means refusing to buy from companies that take advantage of its employees. It could means speaking truth to power about the way that our imperfect economic and political systems are hurting the “least of these.” Depending on where you live in the world, it may mean being a part of a revolution against a corrupt ruling authority that could cost you your very life. The work of justice is messy and not always clear, but the work of justice always seeks to lift up and protect the powerless, the weak, and the vulnerable.

The Hunger Games highlight the significance of these two sides of the same coin: charity and justice. The former may change individual lives, but the latter seeks to change the world.

Stay tuned for the next post: Sacrificial Love