Holy Wars Escalate

St. John Berchman's Cathedral
Originally uploaded by millicent_bystander

The Holy Spirit is moving in me, or something. It's the "Or something" part that really worries me. I've been drawn into great debates recently about faith and the practice of it.
Let's start with one of my newest friends, a member of an evangelical congregation. He recently asked me if I think Catholics are Christians.
He apparently does not. Um, Brother, Catholics are the original Christians. Everything else, including your church, is an offshoot. Remember Jesus established his church using St. Peter as his foundation. The Pope, the leader of the world's 1.1 billion Catholics, is a direct successor to the man Jesus Christ himself put in charge.
You won't hear Catholics asking if evangelicals are Christians. I just don't grasp that way of thinking.


More recently, I received an e-mail responding to a February post about atheists speaking at Centenary College of Louisiana. I believe that a free exchange of ideas is important to strengthen faith. Only by hearing an opposing point of view can one intelligently reject that point of view. I prefer to be taught about religion and spirituality on a higher intellectual plane than your average Bible story offers on a run-of-the-mill Sunday. It's important to have your values reinforced from the pulpit, but one comes to a better understanding through intellectual exploration. A lot of the time, in my opinion, ministers play to emotion and fear.
That has great value. It works. I just think sometimes reason goes out the window.
So, anyway, the e-mail takes me to task, asserting "Very few kids that age know anything about the evidence that supports their faith....almost none of them have read books like...""THE CASE FOR FAITH....OR THE CASE FOR CHRIST...OR EVIDENCE THAT DEMANDS A VERDICT...or any number of books written in the last 25 years that dramatically support the evidence of God and for Jesus's divinity....."
which goes back to my orginal premise that the problem is not having an atheist presenter, it's a lack of foundation offered to those "kids" over the last 18-20 years.
The e-mail also asks if Centenary offered programs to balance the atheist presentation. Well, yeah. On-campus religious organizations and activities for students include Icthus (United Methodist Student Movement), Baptist Collegiate Ministry, Roman Catholic mass, Canterbury House (Episcopal Church), Fellowship of Christian Athletes, Campus Crusade for Christ, and Soul Interest Bible study. Stepping Stones, a student-led ecumenical praise and worship service is held weekly in Brown Chapel.
For the record, my son will be a freshman at Centenary this fall. I expect the professors to challenge him. I expect the administration to bring a broad range of views to campus. I expect he will leave there a well-rounded, well-educated person. Hopefully, his faith will be reinvigorated not in spite of the fact that other points of view were offered, but because of it.
All the while, my daughter has become active in a non-liturgical, evangelical congregation. I hope after she spends a little more time there, she still believes she comes home to a Christian-based house.

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Many Religious Controversies

Memorial Garden at St. Mark's
Originally uploaded by Darrell

Centenary College of Louisiana recently invited Erik Wielenburg, an avowed atheist, to speak on campus. It came to my attention during a recent gathering at St.Mark's. Since Centenary has ties to the Methodist church, this has caused much hand-wringing and e-mail hysteria from insecure Christians among us. Wielenberg was the second non-believer to speak at Centenary this semester. A member of a local Methodist congregation got a little worked up, sending a mass e-mail asserting that parents send their students to "A Christian Methodist college for a reason." He went on, in part, "I refuse to believe that this reason is to brainwash their kids into believing that their is no God. We must do something about this. Please contact the president of Centenary, the board members, the alumni, the administration, and your church. I attended the atheists event last month and witnessed first hand how atheist spread their "word." Several students purchased her book after the event. I pray that none of those students turned against God that night."
Okay, let's not contact anyone. If these impressionable students are so insufficiently grounded in their faith that they will be "turned against God" by sitting through a couple of lectures, something has gone wrong over the last 18-20 years. This semester didn't have a lot to do with it.
The school's chaplain was compelled to respond with another mass e-mail explaining the bold concept of a free exchange of ideas. It was smart, well reasoned and right on target, saying parents have a duty to students to "Ground them in faith, engage them in reflection and in the exchange of ideas and then, when you send them to us, do all you can to encourage them to participate in the Christian worship, fellowship, study and service opportunities which we offer at Centenary."
My son has been offered a scholarship to attend Centenary. Thanks to this letter from the chaplain, I'm feeling really good about it.

Barack Obama
Originally uploaded by jurvetson

There's also a freaky line of thought creeping around the internet about Barack Obama. The mainstream media is exploring his religious beliefs because a lot of people believe he is a Muslim. He claims to be a Christian. There's a quiet undercurrent of discussion in the blogosphere that Obama may be the Antichrist. Barack Obama the Antichrist? That's way too deep for me, but I've had three people say something about it to me in the last week.
The only response I have is, "well, this is not the first time I've heard that."
Isn't it strange? I'm hearing this odd run of comments that flabbergast me beyond reasonable response. Hang onto your hat. Things are getting weird.

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