This morning I went to worship at Capital Church in Salt Lake City. I attended the Saturday night services at Capital when I was in college, and worked on Sunday mornings. It is a new age church as I think of them - Christian rock band, jumbo screen for song lyrics and very well-designed graphics that accompany and enhance pastor Troy's messages, which tend toward 35-40 minutes and are funny, challenging, and firmly based in scripture.
I had many thoughts this morning.
First, all the hymns emphasized eternal life and triumph over death. "The grave has no power over me," we sang, Suzanne leading us powerfully on stage, in this windowless room that felt like a Christian club on Sunday morning, so different from the traditional (New England) white, windowed sanctuary of First Unitarian Church where I went last week. So what about this eternal life? I just think it's such a strange phenomenon that all of these privileged, mostly white folks, are so determined to overcome death. It seems to bespeak less a triumph over metaphorical death and evil, but a resistance to perfection and mortality.
In the sermon, Troy admonished us to "watch it" with regards to the devil in our lives. This sounds like a traditional, Bible thumping admonition, and in many ways it was, though he tried to couch it in palatable terms. He talked about how hard it is to look at our problems (drinking, lust, and anger are three he spoke about) - how we would rather do anything else.
This is a trouble I discuss sometimes with spiritual folks interested in the future of religious community. If spiritual life is really going to demand that we look fearlessly within and work on what we find there, it's going to be very unpleasant. What is our commitment mechanism? What will keep us going back to a church where we feel we are asked to look at our deepest fears, at our unwillingness to forgive, at our unwillingness to give up control?
Troy did not answer this difficult question, and continued only to tell us that we need to "watch it" on our own. He didn't speak at all of the role that community plays in helping us be vigilant against negative patterns, or in dealing with them once they're here. Actually, that's not true. One of his homework assignments (the homework assigned after the closing hymn is one of Troy's trademarks, and I think it's excellent) was to seek input about the issue on your mind (drinking, lust, anger) from someone who loves you and loves God.
This, I think, should have gotten some explication during the sermon. How do you find people like that? How do you create spiritual relationships? That's the trick, and too often church's aren't the place where people are willing to become vulnerable. And this was my problem with Troy's sermon. He spoke of things like anger, depression, lust... as things that you need to be 100% free of.
Unrealistic.
An admonition to do whatever you have to do to keep the devil away from you, to make sure the devil never comes near you, can only promote a blustery refusal to admit one's constant dance with darkness. Life is dealing with the dark thoughts that come up - anger, lust, greed, fear. But "dealing with" is different from "resisting" or, worse, "denying place". I feel many probably left Capital Church today determined once and for all to resist their human impulses toward anger and lust, on their own. Given how hard that is, I anticipate they might then feel significant shame that they could not do what Troy told them was necessary: they couldn't "watch it" enough to be safe from the thoughts that are built into the human psyche.
During the music part of the worship service, ushers guided late-comers to the empty seats (by the end of the 15-minute music session, there were probably 500 people in the room). These men, young, fit, tall, attractive, white, glad-handed each other, shaking hands with the people at the ends of rows, grasping each others' shoulders, slapping each other congenially, and then requesting that worshippers move up to make room for more worshippers. It was a show of Christian male congeniality and general Christ-like perfection. These men were successfully "watching it," far from sin and safe from the devil. They smelled too good for the devil to be close to them. This ritual made me question whether Capital, and most church communities, are the kind of setting in which people might become an intimate community ready to sit with problems and seek God's guidance.
Troy spoke a great deal about Richard Beck's idea of "spiritual warfare." The term rankles, as does any metaphor used in the legacy of Christ (the pacifist) which compares spiritual practice to violence. The idea of being at war with one's demons is finally one I have started to amend in my own thinking. I used to think of my character defects, such as fear, selfishness and anger, as things against which I needed to maintain constant vigilance, and which I needed to strike down decisively as soon as they reared their heads. Recent study has changed my opinion on this point.
Tara Brach has a podcast episode called From Dragons to Schmoos: Meeting life with Compassionate Presence in which she talks about disarming your negative thought patterns by simply accepting them. Well, accepting them for the time being. The idea is to say, "Hello, anger, I see you. I see you and I know you are there for a reason. Let's have tea together. Let's talk about why you are so fired up. You don't have to go anywhere, just know that I am aware of you. Let's talk."
This compassionate opening of space is what takes the ferocity out of the attack. How can something remain terrifying in the face of an invitation to tea? If I look at the parts of me that cause trouble, and label them bad, and try to distance myself from them, do I not give them a great deal of power? What if I accepted them entirely, without qualification, and invited them to tea?
Tara Brach's talk also doesn't talk about the role of spiritual community in facing these dragons. Talking through things with someone who loves me and loves God seems to me an essential step toward reducing their power over me. I just wish our community were better at fostering that kind of community.
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| From the Capital Website |
I had many thoughts this morning.
First, all the hymns emphasized eternal life and triumph over death. "The grave has no power over me," we sang, Suzanne leading us powerfully on stage, in this windowless room that felt like a Christian club on Sunday morning, so different from the traditional (New England) white, windowed sanctuary of First Unitarian Church where I went last week. So what about this eternal life? I just think it's such a strange phenomenon that all of these privileged, mostly white folks, are so determined to overcome death. It seems to bespeak less a triumph over metaphorical death and evil, but a resistance to perfection and mortality.
In the sermon, Troy admonished us to "watch it" with regards to the devil in our lives. This sounds like a traditional, Bible thumping admonition, and in many ways it was, though he tried to couch it in palatable terms. He talked about how hard it is to look at our problems (drinking, lust, and anger are three he spoke about) - how we would rather do anything else.
This is a trouble I discuss sometimes with spiritual folks interested in the future of religious community. If spiritual life is really going to demand that we look fearlessly within and work on what we find there, it's going to be very unpleasant. What is our commitment mechanism? What will keep us going back to a church where we feel we are asked to look at our deepest fears, at our unwillingness to forgive, at our unwillingness to give up control?
Troy did not answer this difficult question, and continued only to tell us that we need to "watch it" on our own. He didn't speak at all of the role that community plays in helping us be vigilant against negative patterns, or in dealing with them once they're here. Actually, that's not true. One of his homework assignments (the homework assigned after the closing hymn is one of Troy's trademarks, and I think it's excellent) was to seek input about the issue on your mind (drinking, lust, anger) from someone who loves you and loves God.
This, I think, should have gotten some explication during the sermon. How do you find people like that? How do you create spiritual relationships? That's the trick, and too often church's aren't the place where people are willing to become vulnerable. And this was my problem with Troy's sermon. He spoke of things like anger, depression, lust... as things that you need to be 100% free of.
Unrealistic.
An admonition to do whatever you have to do to keep the devil away from you, to make sure the devil never comes near you, can only promote a blustery refusal to admit one's constant dance with darkness. Life is dealing with the dark thoughts that come up - anger, lust, greed, fear. But "dealing with" is different from "resisting" or, worse, "denying place". I feel many probably left Capital Church today determined once and for all to resist their human impulses toward anger and lust, on their own. Given how hard that is, I anticipate they might then feel significant shame that they could not do what Troy told them was necessary: they couldn't "watch it" enough to be safe from the thoughts that are built into the human psyche.
During the music part of the worship service, ushers guided late-comers to the empty seats (by the end of the 15-minute music session, there were probably 500 people in the room). These men, young, fit, tall, attractive, white, glad-handed each other, shaking hands with the people at the ends of rows, grasping each others' shoulders, slapping each other congenially, and then requesting that worshippers move up to make room for more worshippers. It was a show of Christian male congeniality and general Christ-like perfection. These men were successfully "watching it," far from sin and safe from the devil. They smelled too good for the devil to be close to them. This ritual made me question whether Capital, and most church communities, are the kind of setting in which people might become an intimate community ready to sit with problems and seek God's guidance.
Troy spoke a great deal about Richard Beck's idea of "spiritual warfare." The term rankles, as does any metaphor used in the legacy of Christ (the pacifist) which compares spiritual practice to violence. The idea of being at war with one's demons is finally one I have started to amend in my own thinking. I used to think of my character defects, such as fear, selfishness and anger, as things against which I needed to maintain constant vigilance, and which I needed to strike down decisively as soon as they reared their heads. Recent study has changed my opinion on this point.
Tara Brach has a podcast episode called From Dragons to Schmoos: Meeting life with Compassionate Presence in which she talks about disarming your negative thought patterns by simply accepting them. Well, accepting them for the time being. The idea is to say, "Hello, anger, I see you. I see you and I know you are there for a reason. Let's have tea together. Let's talk about why you are so fired up. You don't have to go anywhere, just know that I am aware of you. Let's talk." This compassionate opening of space is what takes the ferocity out of the attack. How can something remain terrifying in the face of an invitation to tea? If I look at the parts of me that cause trouble, and label them bad, and try to distance myself from them, do I not give them a great deal of power? What if I accepted them entirely, without qualification, and invited them to tea?
Tara Brach's talk also doesn't talk about the role of spiritual community in facing these dragons. Talking through things with someone who loves me and loves God seems to me an essential step toward reducing their power over me. I just wish our community were better at fostering that kind of community.
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