the parish

Welcome to Crazytown; Jesus will be here shortly

On my drive time journey each morning I flip back and forth between Mike and Mike on ESPN Radio, The Bill Press Show on Air America (it used to be Young Turks...alas), Washington Journal on C-Span Radio, and CNN Headline News. Listening to Washington Journal yesterday. They were talking about the election, of course, and our current administration. People call in from all over the country for this show, so a listener gets an interesting cross-section of America. An older lady from Alabama called in yesterday. Here's the best I can do for a paraphrase:

I love the President. I think he's the best President we've ever had. If you read your Bible, you know these things have to happen. We have to be in Iraq because we have to get the Gospel in there, and the Gospel is getting in. That has to happen before Jesus returns.

The show's host was silent for a couple beats and then completely changed the subject. What was he supposed to say to that? He might have pointed out that Iraq had one of the largest Christian populations in the region under Saddam, and that is no longer the case. Seems to me that if you're a Jenkins/LaHaye kind of Christian, things are working in reverse. (And I think it's absolutely delightful that the LaHayes have endorsed Huckabee. If I was running for office and someone like that endorsed me, I might have a look at my campaign platform to discover which plank is attracting the loonies. Ron Paul should be engaged in a similar process as I write.) He also could have pointed out that the Gospel has never done well when it's spread by military force. But why say anything at all? It's not as if folks like that listen.

On a separate note, listening to the Bill Press Show this morning I heard Democrats wringing their hands over McCain's win in Florida. McCain is the only Republican capable of beating Hillary or Obama, and the Dems know it. In fact, if McCain were to run against Hillary, a crazy liberal like me will vote for McCain. And that is the problem, and it's one I pointed to about a year ago. The Dems don't seem to understand that if they run Hillary, they lose the middle, and I mean the entire middle. Even if she does the unthinkable and adds Obama as VP, I'm not voting for her, and neither will most moderates.

And how can you not love Huckabee's speech after placing fourth? He's taking this "win" all the way to the White House. I guess this is a case of "speaking those things that are not as if they were." Is this how faith enters into the campaign? Finally, it's clear. Amen.

Can We Have the Election Tomorrow?

Oklahoma participates in Super Duper Shmooper Tuesday next week. I don't get to vote in the primary. If you register independent in Oklahoma, you are prohibited from primary voting. It makes sense, sort of. The primaries are for Democrats and Republicans to determine a candidate, and since I'm neither, I'm not supposed to care who gets the major party nominations. And I really don't. I'd just as soon vote tomorrow and get this over with. Part of the problem is that I listen to news channels on XM on the way to work every morning: Air America, POTUS '08, CNN, and occasionally, if I'm feeling masochistic, I listen to the Right Wing Mental Masturbators on Fox "News." (I believe it's only fair to listen to them if I'm going to make fun of them.) I'm weary of election news, weary of polling data, weary of the scrutiny that has nothing to do with real issues, and weary of pretending it makes a whole lot of difference who wins.

Granted, if Huckabee were to win, we'd probably be in worse shape than we are with the current administration, but I suspect that no one else in either party will make much of a difference either way. And I'm tired of people arguing as if who we elect actually makes a difference. Romney is a preener; McCain can't decide who he is; Hillary is allowing Bill to show the true Clinton character by lying about Obama; Obama is as interesting as spam (the canned meat); Giuliani, thankfully, is irrelevant; and, Edwards ought to be asking what the hell he's even doing at the debates. What a glorious field! Can we switch to parliamentary government, please? We allow these knuckleheads to stand up and say, "My plan would...," and they know damn well their plans won't do anything because you have to work with Congress, with or against lobbyists, with or against interest groups and voting blocs, and with or against the polls. No one has bothered to ask any of the candidates how their plans would actually be implemented. We don't have the patience to listen that long.

Thanks in large part to Reagan and Bush II, we are well along the way to an imperial presidency, and that assumption is reflected in the campaign promises of the candidates. Huckabee actually tells people he'll disband the IRS. Gee, Mike, how does a president do that unilaterally? Unless he's an imperial president. Bush has taken the hubris to new extremes (anyone know how many times his administration has claimed executive privilege?) while we sit back and watch the Constitution get shredded by people who claim to believe certain documents, religious and political, are unchanging guides to truth.

So, let's stop the dog and pony show early. Let's vote tomorrow, put some politician in office so that we can love or hate him/her in the next two years, justify or vilify his/her decisions, and watch the gap between rich and poor continue to grow while the middle class disappears. I love America. Amen .

The Open and Affirming SBC

It appears there was greater openness at the Southern Baptist Convention's annual meeting a couple years ago than they've shown recently. Thanks to J-Fo for sending this along. Did anyone make it to the "gay partners in Baptist ministry" breakout session that year?

Death, Madness, Eschatology

When I was 15 my mom went mad...really mad. My older brother and I locked ourselves in our bedroom by propping a chair against the door to keep my mother out. My father had called.

"I found a rifle in the trunk of the car wrapped in a quilt," he told me.

"What should we do?" I asked.

"Stay in your room. Don't leave with your mother," he answered.

They were separated. He'd been having an affair. She found out. He moved out. We were in Oregon. I'm pretty sure the weather doesn't really contribute to mental health in that gloomy state. Still...

We spent the next couple hours listening to the ravings of a madwoman as she smashed dishes, screamed, cried, and babbled in an unfamiliar voice. It's difficult to be the sons of a nurturing, pentecostal, stay-home mom and not reach out to her when we heard her in that state. But there was the rifle...

I don't remember how that year resolved. Most of the next six months are no longer in my memory. My brothers tell me stories, but they lack confirmation in my mind. They seem plausible: family meetings ending in fights, periods of silence and fear, dinners where everyone is asked to "be honest," but no one really wanting to hear anything approaching a clear-eyed assessment. We moved back to Oklahoma. There's a longer story that involves my mother climbing out of depression and madness only to fall back into both when menopause set in, but I'll save that for a memoir.

We went to a funeral today. Susan's maternal grandmother died Sunday after a protracted battle with age. She was 86. Susan has spent 10 of the last 11 weekends away, spending time with her "mema" and her family. My wife has twelve siblings, none full brother or sister: halves and fosters abound. Mema was the constant in most of the kids' lives. When their parents were too fucked up on meth or alcohol or divorce to care for their kids, Mema fed them, loved them, told them stories, mothered them. She divorced the man who molested most of the girls in the family. Too late for the girls, I'm afraid. Still, she was a good woman.

Mutt preached her funeral. He's been a family friend for decades: married most of them more than once and buried a few. He actually choked up at Mema's funeral. He told the family, that incorrigible, reprobate, damned family, that the rapture would be here soon and they needed to be saved to be included. Why did they want to be included? Because that way there would be a giant family reunion in the sky, and "everyone will be there." (Except the ones burning in hell, but some things you don't say at a funeral.) Fifty or so members of the family there, of which about five go to church, yet we still get to hear a sermon about salvation, "I'll Fly Away", and warnings about realized eschatology.

Susan's family has struggled with madness too. We've talked about the likelihood that we'll be infected with it. Since most of the family members we know showed signs before 40, we feel pretty confident that we'll be okay. I learned at 15 to be fatalistic about madness: whatever happens will happen, and barring the drooling and shuffling that goes along with strong anti-psychotics—the kind of drug that removes what it is to be human and emotional and alive and giving a shit—the mad one will do what she chooses. Prayer won't work. Counseling won't work. Hope won't work.

So the hot, hopeless, hairdresser wife was in the tub tonight, crying, worried about a friend and about her family, and she finally arrived at the theodic epiphany that trumps all soteriology: "If someone asks God for help, why can't he just help?" Amen. Selah...