Archive for August 2012
My God is Rated R
Posted on: August 31, 2012
A child-safe version of the Bible features a cartoon Jesus on the cover. But a faith based on this two-dimensional caricature won’t hold up in a grown-up world.
At church on Sunday, B got a giveaway bible, just a little pocket New Testament that had been left over from a previous event. He is a budding reader, so he came home that day and sat down to start reading it. J and I were both intrigued with what he might possibly grasp, and wondered how to interpret the gospels with him.
Ever the ardent atheist, J chuckled and remarked, “You know, it always cracks me up that your faith, that the Bible, is not age appropriate. Your God is not safe for children.”
He’s right, of course. From Cain and Abel to the mass slaughter of Canaanites to the stoning of an adulteress to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, the Bible is loaded with the kind of violence that we would ban from video games and television programs for children. Biblical clans generally set bad examples for the “traditional family values” that we want to instill in our children—Joseph’s brothers sell him into slavery, sisters Leah and Rachel try to destroy each other over a man, Paul says it’s better not to get married to focus on the Gospel. Even Jesus disses his family when they try to get in the way of his ministry. Hardships like poverty, disease, natural disaster and corrupt rulers fill every page.
“Last Supper,” by Fritz Eichenberg, shows that Jesus came to dine among the poor, not the pretty.
Then there’s all the sex stuff—and not just the beautiful erotic poetry in Song of Solomon. Abraham tells his wife Sarah to pretend she is his sister and become the king’s mistress. Visitors are threatened with rape in Sodom and Gomorrah. Onan is struck down for “spilling his seed on the ground.” (Yes, that means what you think it means.) Tamar dresses up as a prostitute to trick her father-in-law into getting her pregnant. And we haven’t even made it out of Genesis yet.
God’s story is clearly rated R. When we introduce children to God, we carefully select the stories of Jesus welcoming children and multiplying loaves and fishes, Jonah and the whale, Daniel and the lions, Moses and the ten commandments, Abraham and Sarah laughing at the impossible promise of a baby. We carefully omit the content that is inappropriate for young children, and avoid the parts that would be considered NSFW* as a Youtube video.
While J intended his remark as a gentle taunt, I am proud to claim an R-rated God and an R-rated faith. My life and my world have no need of a squeaky-clean God with a scripture full of nice and pleasant stories. Violence, sex, poverty, broken families, twisted relationships abound in the world we live in. They weigh heavy on the lives of people everywhere and threaten to drown them in despair. We need a God who can enter that kind of world and still find a way for the divine light of hope, love and peace shine through. I do not need the Divine Disney to create a magic kingdom insulated from poverty, violence, sex and oppression. I need a God who comes to dwell among the grit, the grime and the graphic and somehow finds a way to redeem it all in the end.
“Pieta” by Paul Fryer, a graphic reminder that Christ came to show love to the worst people in the worst circumstances.
The R-rated story of God in the Bible makes possible a mature faith for an adult world. Stories of violence show me that God can go with us into the valley of the shadow of death. Broken families help us to know that we are not alone in our imperfect relationships, and God knows our struggles to love and be loved. Sex in the Bible reveals that intimacy is a gift from God, and sin only enters sexuality with power, violence, deception and manipulation. The prominence of the poor, the ill and the outcast in the Bible teach us that hardship and oppression cannot separate us from God’s love, nor should it separate us from loving one another. The prominence of sinful biblical heroes reminds us that God loves us and God can use even our messed-up lives for good and holy purposes.
The world is not rated G, so neither is our God. The R-rated God comes to R-related people in an R-rated world, to change the “R” from restricted to redeemed, by the power of love. I’ll claim that rating for my faith any day.
*NSFW is code for “not safe for work,” and usually applied to videos or online materials with graphic content.
Book Review: Her Fearful Symmetry
Posted on: August 8, 2012
Her Fearful Symmetry, Audrey Niffenegger, Scribner, 2009, 406 pp.
I adored The Time Traveler’s Wife when I read it a few years ago, and I found Audrey Niffenegger to be a brilliant, intricate storyteller. When I saw her second novel on the library shelf, I grabbed it greedily. Her Fearful Symmetry was dramatically different than The Time Traveler’s Wife, but it did not disappoint.
Her Fearful Symmetry is a dark and sophisticated ghost story, set in the neighborhood and backdrop of London’s Highgate Cemetery. Although the novel is contemporary, the setting is so Victorian that I frequently found myself startled at references to cell phones, e-mail and modern life. The novel takes place after the death of Elspeth Noblin, who has left her London flat and all her estate to her nieces, daughters of her twin sister Edie, and twins themselves. The twin nieces, Julia and Valentina, have never met their aunt, and their mother refuses to discuss the separation. They are only 21, and they are developing their adult identity and negotiating separate lives as twins. In order to claim their inheritance, they must come and live in the flat for a year. There they meet Elspeth’s neighbors, including her lover Robert, a reclusive Martin suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder, and Highgate Cemetery and its residents. As the story unfolds, the girls get to know their aunt Elspeth as well—and not just through the eyes of others. The haunting of this tale slowly turns darker and more monstrous.
The story tells of love and death and love beyond death, of the intermingling of the souls of twins and lovers, of the possibility of healing and hope. To tell more might be to give too much away, and this novel is too good to spoil. Read it and enjoy it. I’ll have to eagerly await Niffenegger’s next offering.
Prayer for the First Day of School
Posted on: August 8, 2012
- In: Mom Moments | Reflections
- 7 Comments
Mothering God, my son starts kindergarten in the morning. Please watch over my tiny child, my most precious one, as he climbs up those giant steps and into the mouth of the big yellow bus, its insides wriggling with elbows and knees and backpacks and lunchboxes. Give him calm in the chaos. Let him catch the excitement of his peers, but not their cruelty. May it be the grand adventure he dreams it to be.
Once that bus swallows him up, I can’t accompany him. I can’t hold his hand, and I can’t make sure that he gets where he’s supposed to go. So I’m imagining you, Mama God, standing beside him, a firm hand on his shoulder, your swishing skirts providing a path through the chaos and a safe place to hide if he gets too nervous. Take his hand when I can’t, and guide him where he needs to go.
Back when I was his whole world…
Since before he was born, I have been trying to protect him and keep him safe. I made sure his environment was safe with crib rails and car seats, baby gates and bike helmets. It was a small world, and I could keep it padded and protected. Now his world is getting bigger. I want his world to be as big as it can be, even if it means I can’t protect him from it. Remind me that this whole big world is still in your hands. Show him all its glorious expanse, but promise me he’ll always be in your care.
I want him to go to school to learn, and not just ABCs and 123s. I want him to learn how to be a friend. How to make good decisions. How to get along with all kinds of people, even mean ones. How to say “no.” How to fail and try again. How to lose and still have fun. How to deal with stress. How to overcome adversity. These lessons aren’t learned with books and worksheets. They can’t be learned in a “safe” environment. They hurt sometimes. Teach him hard-won lessons, because those are the ones that matter, but do not let his spirit be broken. Give him courage and resilience and companions for the journey.
Reassure me, O God, that my one precious child will never be lost in your care. Mother him for me when I cannot. Help me teach him to walk away from me. Hold me tight when I have to let him go. Amen.
Little boy in the big world.
For The Someday Book 