Why Aren't "Conservatives" Liberal?

The first definition of "liberal" in my dictionary is "suitable for a freeman." That makes sense, since "liberate" shares a common Latin root with "liberal." Both derive from the word liber, "free." So much of what I hear from conservatives these days is that they want to be liberated from taxes, big government, regulations, and such. You would think from their public statements that they would find little about our society that they want to "conserve." Maybe they ought to reclaim the freedom theme and become true "liberals."

Of course, when you probe more deeply into the meaning of being a "liberal," you discover what is lacking in the "liberal" concern of the conservatives (and of those who would call themselves “liberal” as well). Here are some liberal-defining dictionary words that surely are antithetical to the mindset of both "the right" and “the left”:

·      “giving freely; generous”—certainly doesn't apply to those who hoard their wealth and hide their riches in foreign accounts to avoid taxation that otherwise would support basic human needs like nutrition, health care, education , and such.

·      “tolerant of views differing from one’s own; broadminded”—well, that supposedly applies to “liberals,” but I’m afraid these qualities are lacking on both sides of the aisle.

·      “of democratic or republican forms of government, as distinguished from monarchies, aristocracies, etc.”—I would say that the control of the top 1% in income over just about everything is a kind of aristocracy, although I’ll admit that aristocracy actually applies to “government by the best citizens,” not government by those who can afford to buy the most attack ads on television.

·      “favoring political reforms tending toward democracy and personal freedom for the individual”—that “personal freedom” thing fits both sides of the debate; though the freedoms being sought are quite different. One side seems focused on being liberated from social constraints; while the other side is dedicated to freedom from taxes, government intrusion into business practices, and so forth.

·      “favoring reform or progress; progressive”—both sides would claim this mantle, but the goals that reflect “progress” are vastly different.

My dictionary also lists some synonyms:

·      liberal implies tolerance of others’ views as well as open-mindedness to ideas that challenge tradition, established institutions, etc.

·      progressive, a relative term opposed to reactionary or conservative, is applied to persons favoring progress and reform in politics, education, etc. and connotes an inclination to more direct action than “liberal.”

·      advanced specifically implies a being ahead of the times, as in science, the arts, philosophy, etc.

·      radical implies a favoring of fundamental or extreme change, specifically of the social structures.

I guess I would call myself “an advanced progressive liberal.” Everyone else seems to me to be “radical.”

Recent Miscellaneous Reflects from My Facebook Page

Today I'm thinking aloud about a quote I ran across during seminary days. I liked it so well, I actually cross-stitched and framed it. Gender neutral concerns now prevail, so I'll reword it a little; but I find it an especially relevant insight for our day and time (and especially in this election year):
"Education is our moving from cocksure ignorance to thoughtful uncertainty."
Take that, all you who think you know it all!

There is a lot of "cocksure ignorance" at both ends of the spectrum on most controversial issues. Some are good at hiding ignorance, and some are good at exploiting it.

If education is moving from cocksure ignorance to thoughtful uncertainty, then faith is moving from thoughtful uncertainty to confident trust--sometimes in enormous strides and sometimes in a multitude of baby steps.

ELECTION REFLECTION

When I was growing up in Alabama, you didn't see many political signs in people's front yards, but you still could always tell those who were voting for the incumbent--the roads in front of their houses had recently been paved. And the owners of the paving companies and all their employees were especially loyal supporters of the candidate who sent those paving contracts their way. Back then a candidate "earned" votes by delivering perks to the constituents. 

Today, everything has been reversed. Now the corporate executives decide who can deliver the most perks to them and choose who ought to be elected. They pour millions of dollars into the candidate's election campaign (or into attack ads against their candidate's opponents). In this way they ensure that their best interests will be protected.

So where candidates used to "buy" votes, we now have the wealthy "buying" candidates. Somehow to me, neither of these seem to represent the best of a true democracy.

Is This Really "Life"?

"USA Today" has a section in its paper and in its online edition titled "Life." Today's online headlines in that section are:

▪   No beginner: Christopher Plummer could win his first Oscar

▪   Critic's Corner: "The Bachelor," "Band of Brothers"

▪   Whitney Houston laid to rest

▪   Denzel Washington's "Safe House" hits no. 1

▪   'Alcatraz' star Jorge Garcia won't be "Lost" prisoner

▪   All hail John Williams, a maestro of movies

Can someone tell me what these stories have to do with "Life"? Have we reached the point in our nation where most people live life in and through the fantasy world of the entertainment industry? Are we so engrossed with television, movies, online interactions, fantasy games, and such that these diversions have become the essence of life for us? Have “talk shows” replaced our interactions with family and friends? Have our conversations become dominated by what USA Today understands as “Life”?

Many of the headliner, blockbuster stocks of our day are media-driven with no tangible products involved. We are becoming consumers of artificial experiences, entertaining events, and distant communication. Life is being “lived” beyond our immediate circumstances and situations. Our “present moments” often are not present at all—they are experienced through a computer monitor, a laptop screen, or a life-sized television screen.

I have watched for a long time the phenomenon of televangelists who have become "church" for some people. These TV audience “church members” never enter a church building or interact with fellow believers in considering matters of faith and life. “Artificial intelligence” has morphed into “artificial life,” “artificial experiences,” and “artificial faith.”

And here I am, reflecting on these matters through the very media about which I am expressing concern! Has sharing ideas through the intangible media replaced civil discourse where people engage in life together, where we work together hand-in-hand, and where we have real face-to-face conversations of substance with other? I’m thinking aloud about “life” today and about what it means to “live” in a cyberspace world where virtual reality is replacing the handshake, the hug, the face-to-face conversation, and “real life.” 

ABBA FATHER: Paul’s Argument in Galatians 3:15—4:7

Galatians 3:15—4:7 provides a carefully reasoned argument by Paul in defense of his proclamation of the gospel to the Gentiles. Buttressing his arguments with passages from the Old Testament, Paul set forth a new understanding of how God has worked since the time of Abraham to bring all kinds of people into intimate relationship with God. That relationship flows through Christ Jesus and reaches its zenith when the Spirit compels us to embrace God as Abba Father.

1.       Paul’s argument begins with the premise that a covenant, a testament or a will (think here of a “last will and testament”) once established cannot be altered or set aside (3:15)

2.       God’s covenant was established with “Abraham and his seed” and was based on a promise that the covenant would be everlasting, beginning with Isaac and his “seed” (3:16a; cf. Gen. 17:19b).

3.       Since the Hebrew word “seed” is singular in Genesis 17:19b, Paul concluded that it refers to one person. That person is Christ (3:16b).

4.       This covenant with Abraham was made by God 430 years before the law was given to Moses (3:17a).

5.       The giving of the law to Moses did not set aside or do away with the earlier covenant and its promise (3:17b).

6.       The “inheritance” that belongs to Abraham’s seed is based on the covenantal promise and not on the law (3:18a).

7.       This inheritance is a gift of grace and is not in any way the result of human accomplishments like obeying the law (3:18b).

8.       The purpose of the law was to address human sinfulness until Abraham’s seed (Christ) had come and the covenantal promise could be fulfilled (3:19; cf. Romans 5:20).

9.       The law was given through a mediator (Moses, cf. Exod. 20:19) and was put into effect by angels (cf. Acts 7:53; Deut. 33:2); but the promise to Abraham did not involve a mediator (who must represent both parties in a covenant) and was made directly by God (3:19c-20).

10.    The whole world is a prisoner of sin, and this is evidence that the law cannot save (make one alive) or impart righteousness (3:21-22a).

11.    The law locked up God’s people as prisoners and “supervised” them until faith was revealed (3:23-25).

12.    By grace Abraham’s promise is given to those who have faith in Jesus Christ (3:22b, 23-25).

13.    All who believe in Jesus Christ and belong to him become Abraham’s seed and inherit Abraham’s promise, whether they are Jew or Greek, slave or free, male or female (3:26-29).

14.    A child under the law, though a heir of the promise, is no different from a slave under the authority of the law (4:1-3).

15.    God sent the Son, born of a woman and born under the law, to redeem those under the law (4:4-5a).

16.    Christ’s redemption provides an opportunity for all to received the full rights of inheritance (4:5b).

17.    God sends the Spirit of the Son into the hearts of those who claim the inheritance so that they in the Spirit can call out, “Abba, Father” (4:6).

18.    This confession transforms slaves into sons and thus into heirs of the covenant’s promise (4:7).

The purpose of this detailed argument was to set believers free from the obligations of the law that the Judaizers were trying to impose on the Gentiles in Galatia. The redemption offered by grace through Christ countered the Pharisaic tendency to focus on earning merit through obedience to every jot and tittle of the law. Paul later stated that “Christ has set us free” (5:1). The focus on the law was a burdensome “yoke of slavery” (5:2). Paul, however, also cautioned against the “freedom to indulge the sinful nature” (5:13) and called for believers to live by the Spirit and not by the desires of their sinful natures (5:16). “The fruit of the Spirit” (5:22) would guide them to “do good to all people” (6:10).

Abba (“Father”) Part 2

Paul’s usage of “Abba” demonstrates that the term was used at least occasionally in the early church (Rom. 8:15; Gal. 4:6). Indeed, Paul’s usage may well provide us the guiding theological principle. Both Pauline epistles in which Abba occurs (Romans and Galatians) were written prior to Mark, and Galatians is generally recognized as preceding Romans in the date of composition. In both cases, Paul’s used the exact same phrasing that we saw in Mark, “Abba Father” ( ͗αββά ò πατήρ). Since Mark often is thought of as a Roman Gospel (see http://ext.sagepub.com/content/105/2/36.extract) and Paul was closely associated with Rome, the natural question arises of whether Mark picked up the phrasing from Paul rather than Jesus. Since Matthew and Luke did not follow Mark at this point, and since the Gospel of John makes no reference to “Abba,” we have to grant the possibility that the use of Abba was a theological construct from Paul that found application in Mark’s account of Jesus.

On the other hand, Peter also was closely associated with Rome; and Peter was one of the three disciples Jesus took with him a little farther into the garden where the prayer recorded in Mark 14:36 was spoken (Mark 14:33-40; Matthew 26:37-37), though both Gospels imply that Peter and the other two disciple slept through most of Jesus’ time of anguish. Still, we cannot exclude the possibility that within the closest circle of Jesus’ followers were those who had actually overhead Jesus referring to God as “Abba.” We also might expect that Jesus prayed in his native Aramaic in this context rather than in Greek and that the addition in Mark is “Father” as an explanation for Greek readers rather than the other way around. We also should note that Paul was a Diaspora Jew who was fluent in Greek, wrote in Greek, cited the Greek translation of the Old Testament (the Septuagint), and “at points betrays Hellenistic influences” (A. C. Purdy, IDB, III, 688). I think it unlikely that the Aramaic “Abba” would find its origins in him, but it would find a more natural place in the vocabulary of Jesus.

Abba (“Father”) : Part 1

“Abba” is the English transliteration of an Aramaic word (אַבָא), forms of which were used in late portions of the Old Testament (Dan. 2:23; 5:2,11,13,18; Ezra 4:15; 5:12) and in three passages in the New Testament (Mark 14:36; Romans 8:15; Galatians 4:6). The Aramaic word is pronounced “ab-ah” (ab as in abs), but in English it most often is pronounced “ah-bah” from its Greek equivalent ( ͗αββά), which was derived from the Aramaic. The root word is shared in a broad range of Semitic languages, and the Hebrew word for “father” (אׇב) is among those. The plural forms of the word often are translated “fathers” or “ancestors.”

Biblical interpreters often have emphasized that Abba was the appellation applied to the father in the intimacy of the family circle. New Testament scholar Joachim Jeremias popularized this idea after witnessing a child in the Holy Land running to greet his father while crying out “Abba, Abba.” Earlier scholars like Dalman and Lietzmann had previously explored the term. In English, Jeremias’ idea often is illustrated by contrasting the formal title “Father” (πατήρ in Greek) with the more intimate “Daddy.” While the family connection certainly is true, the idea of Abba implying a special kind of intimacy may be somewhat overblown. The usages in Daniel 5 and Ezra certainly show a formal application of the term in the Babylonian court.

Some early Greek-speaking Christians borrowed the Aramaic term and carried it over into their cult language as a vocative used in prayer. This is popularly understood to have been derived from the actual term Jesus commonly used in praying to God, a conclusion based solely on a single example in Mark 14:36. In Mark’s account, Jesus, engaged in anguished prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane, began his prayer, “Abba Father” ( ͗αββά ò πατήρ). Since Mark generally is recognized as the oldest Gospel, this certainly is a significant appellation. Somewhat troubling, however, is the fact that Matthew and Luke (who are widely assumed to have drawn upon Mark’s Gospel) do not follow Mark’s use of  ͗αββά in their Gethsemane accounts but instead employ πατήρ μου (“my father” in Matt.26:39) and πατήρ (“father” without a possessive pronoun in Luke 22:41). In addition, the model prayer that Jesus taught his disciples to pray used the more common Greek word for “father” (πάτερ, Matt. 6:9 with the possessive “our” and Luke 11:2 again without a possessive pronoun). Standing alone, this evidence might support an understanding of Jesus’ personal intimacy with God; but does it justify a similar intimacy for those of us who are Jesus’ disciples?
(To be continued)

My Offertory Prayer for 1/1/2012

O God, we often sing of you as the God who is our help in ages past, and we stand today at one of those junctures in our lives where we look back in reflection upon a year just past. We are seeking understanding and a clear perspective on all that has transpired during this past year. When we think of our lives, our families, our church, our community, our state, our nation, and indeed even our world, we confess that much of what we have seen this past year is discouraging. And so we plead for your help again, today, just now, in these troubling times. For our weaknesses, our omissions, our failures, our infidelities, our sins, we plead for your forgiveness and pray that you will once again give us a fresh start. Unburdened by our pasts and renewed in our commitments, let us not just ask for your help, but let us open ourselves to your presence and submit ourselves to your guidance and direction in the days ahead.

We also sing of you as the God who is our hope for years to come, and we stand today in this first new day of this new year and plead that your hope might fill us as we contemplate our futures. Our world is troubled, and we sense real dangers on so many fronts. Give us hope and a commitment to strive for peace. Our nation will be making significant choices in the year ahead that will shape what our country and our society will be in the years to come. Give us hope and guidance. Our church and our families face hard and difficult times. Give us hope and a commitment to strive for deeper faith, strengthened bonds of love, and renewed dedication of all we have and hold for your service.

It is in that last petition that we come now to give our offerings of obedience, of thanksgiving, and of dedication—offerings channeled through this church, but given to you. Bless us as we give; bless our church as it serves as a steward of your resources; and bless every act of worship, every ministry, every missionary endeavor, every effort to teach your people, and every gathering where your people plan, prepare, and engage in service—bless all that will be enabled through these gifts we give today and through the offerings will faithfully give throughout 2012. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.