Author: maboswell

Bibles, Flags, and Other Christian Idols

Idolatry can be subtle and pervasive. It manifests in the usual suspects like money or success and other familiar villains. But Christians ought to also be wary of the looming idolatry lurking in some of the essentials of the Christian experience.

I think of idolatry as a disproportionate worship of or devotion to something. Maybe you believe that the God who is Love—Creator and Sustainer of everything from the farthest galaxies to the nearest neurons in our brains—is the one to whom we ought to give our deepest allegiance and devotion or most permit to inform how we live and the choices we make. Idolatry, then, would be giving comparable adoration and devotion to something less worthy or worthwhile than God. Especially something that inhibits our ability to care for that for which God cares.

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Ten Other Naughty Sins of Christian Men

A well-known politician received some press earlier this week for seeming to have looked at pornography, though he denies it. I am bothered by this story, but probably not in the way I am supposed to be bothered by it.

When I was an undergraduate, there was a weekly men’s (boy’s?) group on campus. It wasn’t really a Bible study or prayer group but more like a support group for men striving to live “righteously”, some might say. I did not attend, mainly because I did not fit the athlete-heavy makeup of the group.

I do not fully know what occurred in these meetings, but I do remember how other non-participating (jealous?) students around me caricatured the men’s group with an exaggerated but probably not wholly untruthful version of what took place: young men weeping together, confessing to one another things like “I had sex with my girlfriend AGAIN…and I really want to stop” (since sex is naughty, obviously). But then these repentant men remembered that sex feels nice (not that I had any clue) and so continued to do it. Which worked well for the perpetuity of the group, because then they had something of which to repent at the next week’s gathering. A common enemy over which to connect.

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We Are Sick

My opening remarks to Camas Friends Church this morning, more or less…

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Brad told me that a theme of his reflections this morning on his experiences working with refugees in Greece would be “restoring my faith in humanity.”

As is often the case with sermons—maybe this is true for you too—that feels like the exact message I need to hear today. And to have faith in humanity is to also, I think, have faith in the God who created humanity, cares for humanity, and sticks with humanity, no matter what horrible things we say or do.

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