The Unforgivable Sin?

Today, I really don't have a statement or an idea to offer. It is more I have some incomplete thoughts brought on by feelings of disappointment and some frustration. This is more of a question that and issue that needs answering. Most people reading this probably have felt some of the things I have felt about the subject. So, I think I can risk sounding whiny.

Christians are usually willing to look past people's sins, or at least we know that we are supposed to. We know that we supposed to give love, even if someone is not morally upright. We will extend the right amount of love to the lost, in order that they may be redeemed. Why does this stop short in some issues?

Two stories might help. An acquaintance of mine is dating a someone. His family is very Christian and close knit. It has been an issue of great tension that he is dating a divorcee. This tension is so bad that she is not welcome at family gatherings. While I do not know how serious the relationship is, I know that this acquaintance is a very difficult position. He will have to choose when he should not have to.

There is another all familiar story. A young couple knows they must not have sex before marriage. Like any romantic couple, they want have sex. Following the recommendations of evangelicalism, they get married so as to not live in sin. However, it later becomes apparent that neither partner was ready for marriage, and they divorce. The young divorcee is now welcomed in church as a second-class Christian. This is a familiar story to many, and you reading this can probably put in a few names.

Now, in fairness, not all churches will do this. One of the things I liked about Mosaic was that I never felt like the few divorcees (or otherwise single people) were not fully welcome.

There is still a strong streak of metaphorical stone throwing in many churches. Divorce earns someone a permanent scarlet letter. I have great trouble understanding this kind of shaming in light of grace.

For All the Single Folks (or "Single People are Christians Too")

We all did it. We all grow up evangelicals or something similar. Then, we went to a Christian college and likely attended a few Christian college and career groups. We probably have been through a few camps and summits. We are all now the quarter life Christians out in the world.

And if any of us are not married, we’ve likely felt the pressure to hurry up and do so!

For those of us, who for whatever reason, remain single in our twenties, I like to think that our Churches get it, but the reality is that evangelical culture can sometimes be less than understanding. Folks like Josh Harris, Dobson et al make marriage seem like requisite for all “real” Christians. Fortunately, I recently stumbled on an old article written by the Internet monk that was a nice change, especially in light of the case for young marriage in Christianity today.

I won’t go through the whole article, but there are number of things in it I liked. Internet Monk asks whether we emphasize marriage to much. His answer is in many ways “yes.” Let’s start with this.

Saying that delaying marriage is bad is overemphasizing marriage. This is too simplistic, and we all know it. Don’t get me wrong. Mohler sees a legitimate problem: singleness as an excuse for immaturity and rejecting legitimate adul;t responsibilities. There are such people. I’ve met them. Kick them in the pants.
On the other hand, there are so many other legitimate, good reasons people delay marriage, it’s almost beyond belief that they are ignored. Mohler is speaking to the culture that he sees influencing America in sitcoms like “Friends.” Let me speak about the single’s culture I see at our ministry here.

Oh wise Internet Monk, you speak the truth. Thank you for affirming those who delay marriage for good reasons. Thank for reminding us that we can be faithful Christians when we live in large cities, have ambitious career, education, artistic or even religious commitments that force us to put of marriage past the ripe age of 21!

We overemphasize marriage when those who are not married are out of the “center” of the Christian community, thus violating clear implications of the ministry of Jesus. I am extremely concerned that the emphasis on marriage in contemporary evangelicalism has created an imbalance within the body of Christ. I am already sensitive to this because of my own life experience.

This is another great point. How many post-college single people stick around the college groups? Feels odd doesn’t it? One wonders exactly what we’re supposed to though, if every other demographic segregation is geared towards married people and their kids.

I would also like to speak for myself here. I am very, very, tired of how evangelical culture shuns the divorced and those who have had or are having sex outside of marriage. Why are these two things the litmus test for who is a “real” Christian? It seems very arbitrary to me.

I think he really hits the nail on the head with this though. What about dating and “courtship”?

1) Courtship is far from a Biblically established and ordained way of finding a spouse. Ever since post-Josh Harris youth speakers began saying “Don’t date. Court!” there’s been enough confusion on this topic to fill a warehouse. This essay won’t attempt to straighten that out, other than to say this: The view of family and adulthood I read in the courtship movement would be quite at home in medieval Islam. If an individual wants a parentally supervised or arranged marriage, then by all means they should have it, but nothing in the Bible compels such a thing. If we are going back to the view of women in Leviticus, please let me know.

2) Dating is not a dirty word. In fact, what I am learning is that there is so much mass confusion over single people of opposite genders spending time together that condemnation of dating is no longer a fringe activity. It is mainstream. Parents of small children confidently assert their children will not date. Those who have dated imply that it was sex, 24/7 and ruins marriage. Dating leads to depression, suicide and certain divorce. All this is said routinely.

I can’t speak to the details of the courtship thing. I can only say that my experience with it was not positive. Believe it or not, dating and relationships is something that is learned by doing not by some kind of pious avoidance of the opposite sex. Even at my Christian alma mater, I know that many of the girls were upset about how the guys were not open to casual dating. Is the courtship movement partially to blame for this? Yes.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that people should stay single forever. My own long stretch has gone past due, and is especially poignant since my recent summer relational debacle. Nonetheless, I like that there are those out there will to openly question the “hurry up and get married” script that is so often prescribed in the evangelical land.

Thanks for reading.

Thoughts on the Case for Young Marriage

Christianity Today published an article on the case for young marriage. The author argues that in addition to teaching abstinence, Christianity needs to emphasize the virtues of marriage, specifically young marriage, to Christians. This is clearly a step in the right direction, but I have mixed reactions to the article.

For instance, the article cited that 80% of Christians have pre-marital sex. The author also admitted that "not all indulgers become miserable or marital train wrecks." It's nice of him to say so. There is however, an obvious implication here that is unaddressed in the article: of what value, then, is our abstinence culture? It seems that the promises of abstaining do not guarantee a good marriage and sex life later on. Likewise, pre-maritial sex does not curse one's later marital unions. The high statistic (80%) seems to make the abstinence culture as much of a sham as Sarah Palin's views on sex-education while bumbling to explain her pregnant 17-year old daughter. Maybe I'm harsh, but I know I can't be the only one thinking, "the Emperor has no clothes."

Nonetheless, the author advocates that teaching young people about what marriage is and what it is not. This, I think is a great idea. I have known many young marriages that have turned out beautifully, despite the economic and social hardships that he lists. Yes, getting married young, in many cases, is a still a good idea.

On the other hand, I am also old enough to have known more than a few divorced friends. This is not an issue to be taken lightly. One friend feels like he was simply "following a script" when he was married at 20. Another peer and his spouse where not emotionally or financially ready for the commitment -even despite the idea of marriage as formative institution. I could list a few more, but the examples need not be multiplied. The authors knows well that young marriage correlates with divorce. He is also right to point on that this is not a casual connection.

But in answering objections, I still have some questions -especially economics. The author is right that we have set a higher-than-realistic economic standard for both weddings and young marriages. I also think that he is right that helping young marriages economically is something that Christians ought to be doing. If more established people see new married couples in need of some kind assistance, providing that assistance should be the norm not the exception -if we truly believe it is as important as we claim.

However, I still don't think that the economic concerns can be so easily overcome. The author writes from Texas, and the situation may be very different out there. I live in Los Angeles. Very, very, few people I think, are established enough to be married here by their early twenties. Putting off marriage to either establish oneself in your career or to pursue more education is, I think, I very smart decision for many people. This kind of thinking is further exacerbated by the economic outlook of my generation. Many of us know that government services like Medicare are not going to be there for us in the future. We are also keenly aware of the high cost of raising children. These are all legitimate concerns and are completely justifiable reasons to delay marriage.

Finally, there was something that the article did not address: that the divorce rate is slightly higher among evangelicals than it is in the general populace. It very likely the lack of teaching about marriage, which the author advocates, that causes this. The consequences of the present circumstance are dire however. I think many young Christians put off marriage because they see less value to it. Why push marriage on ourselves if our ideas about marriage came from the discontent unions of many of our parents, the divorces of our relatives, or even the divorces of our peers? I do not mean to denigrate the institution. I think marriage is a good thing. But if it is the intention of older Christians to inspire younger Christians to be married, then the older generation must understand that many of the young are disappointed with the institution and why.

Too Damn Smart to Get Any?

After my previous blog on Ayn Rand and sex I have been hoping to post another follow up relational issues. Thanks to my friend Adam, I have new article that is both funny sad. Why is it that being smart doesn’t get you any?
The article starts quite wittingly:

Smart kids usually come from smart families. And smart families are usually achievement-oriented. Bring me home those straight As, son. Get into those top colleges, daughter. Take piano, violin, tennis, swimming and Tibetan throat-singing lessons. Win every award there is in the book. Be 'well-rounded.'

At the same time, there's an opportunity cost associated with achievement. Time spent studying, doing homework, and practicing the violin is time not spent doing other things -- like chasing boys or girls, which turns out is fairly instrumental in making you a well-rounded human.

Guilty as charged on my part. It’s what you get when you’re half-asian and descended from educators. I can think of a lot of other people who fit this mold too. Can we really help it if we want to be Renaissance men? Super talented ubermenschen?

Ironically, I believe that it is a drive to accomplish and to have a list of accomplishments that make someone attractive. All other things remaining equal, would you want to date someone who has completed college or someone who didn’t? Or how about someone who plays an instrument well as opposed to with mere proficiency? Is someone with a black-belt in Aikido more or less interesting than someone without?

Intelligent type A personalities have such a horrible catch-22 when it comes to dating. They can attract, but are too busy to do anything about it.

Let's say by 'smart' we mean 'in the top 5% of the population in terms of intelligence and education'. Generally speaking, smart people seek out other smart people to hang out with, simply because they get bored otherwise. And if they're going to spend a lot of time with someone, intelligence in a partner is pretty much a requirement.

This makes sense to me for the similar reasons as I explained in the Ayn Rand blog.

I think that healthy, confident, people (perhaps men in particular) seek out their equals. Sadly, those who join MENSA find their pools small. I think the article gives some good advice: loosen up.

I still can’t stand stupid girls though.

Finally there is this.

Here's an incontrovertible fact: every one of your ancestors survived to reproductive age and got it on at least once with a member of the opposite sex. All the way back to Homo erectus. And even further back to Australopithecus. And even further back to monkeys, to lizards, to the first amphibian that crawled out of the slime, the fish that preceded that amphibian, the worm before the fish and the amoeba that preceded the worm.

And you, YOU, in the year 2009 C.E., the culmination of that miraculously unbroken line of succession, you, Homo sapiens sapiens, not just thinking man but thinking thinking man or woman, are the only one smart enough to SCREW THE WHOLE THING UP.

I actually laughed out loud when I read this. Isn’t intelligence supposed to be an evolutionary advantage? I guess not. This creates a whole new level to future idiocracy.

I dedicate this blog to all my friends who are also token single guys. You all know who you are.

Thanks for reading.

Ayn Rand on Sex

The recent string of marriages and long term relationships have got me thinking about some kind of positive view of sex. Obviously, the Christian faith doesn’t teach that sex is dirty. My many theologically minded friends and I have often joked about the bizarre sexual repression of Victorianism. Yet still the other extreme is really not right either. In Atlas Shrugged, I came across something interesting. Ayn Rand (among the mountains of other expositions) dealt with sex in it. Like just about any secular philosophy, I found a lot of good and some things bad. Either way, at least it gives a secular justification to prefer something other than skirt chasing.

The exposition is the in the form dialogue. Two Characters, both super-men in their own rights, have a frank and intimate discussion on the subject: one is Francisco, another is Hank Rearden. The two men already respect each other as equals. Francisco has even gone to the point of telling Rearden that he is “one of the last moral men in the world.” Hank Hearden is confused by this compliment because Francisco is an apparent rich play boy who is always in the company of women -not exactly someone that you would accept a comment on morality from. What makes it even more confusing for Hank has never thought of Francisco as a low-brow kind of guy. Francisco responds to this confusion:

[Francisco asked Rearden] “Do you know of your own first-hand knowledge that I spend my life running after women?”
“You’ve never denied it.”
“Denied it? I’ve gone to a lot of trouble to create that impression.”
“Do you mean it isn’t true?”
“Do I strike you as a man with a miserable inferiority complex?”
“Good God, no!”
”Only that kind of man spends his life running after women.”

Naturally, this is something that is probably grating in our world of rap stars and Hugh Hefner’s. Fortunately for us, Francisco goes on to explain what he means. First, love and the sexual impulse are not blind, uncontrollable, forces in his world. Rather, sex is connected with our minds and our views of ourselves. He says, “A man’s* sexual choice is the result and sum of his fundamental convictions… Show me the woman he sleeps with and I will tell you his valuation of himself.” In other words, who we are attracted to depends largely on how we subconsciously (or consciously!) view ourselves. A man “will always be attracted to the woman who reflects his deepest vision of himself.” From here, he either expresses his own value, or he fakes it.

Francisco goes on to describe two types of men. The first is Ayn Rand’s hero. This man, as Francisco says, “will want the highest type of woman he can find, the woman he admires, the strongest, the hardest to conquer –because only the possession of a heroine will give him the sense of an achievement, not the possession of a brainless slut.” In other words, real men don’t chase porn-stars and strippers. These women, at very minimum, act like brainless meat. Instead Ayn Rand’s hero will look for someone as accomplished as himself, as moral as himself, as hard-working as himself and so on.

Someone who is secretly insecure is far worse off. Someone who feels worthless “will be drawn to a woman he despises-because she will reflect his own secret self, she will release him from that objective reality in which he is a fraud, she will give him a momentary illusion of his own value.” So the problem with a play boy is this: since they have little value in themselves, and they secretly know it, they try to create through sex with someone equally empty. This is, in Ayn Rand’s terms, is putting the effect (sex) before the cause (self-worth). This is much of fraud as someone who has a college diploma without finishing college, buys a BMW on money they didn’t earn, or takes control of a railroad that someone else built. Most obviously, it may be the attempt to use the effect and expression of emotional intimacy to create emotional intimacy.

Some Flies in the Ointment?

Naturally, there are somethings I don’t like. Ayn Rand believes that sex is a selfish act, and cannot be done any other way. Additionally, what someone admires in another person is all that one sees as good in oneself. Now obviously, people may have sex have their own “rational self interest” but in Christianity I can’t see why it should ever be only this. One’s own interest and the interest of the other need not be disjunctive. Furthermore, Love can never be just a simple extension of narcissism.

Also, in this same conversation, Fracisco decries “charity” as a pitiful response to flaws whereas his idea of admiration is a response to values. It’s evident from the rest of the discussion that this is an implicit criticism of Christian love. What confuses me is that in Christian charity people may respond to flaws, but never because of flaws. Acts of mercy and charity overlook flaws precisely because it sees values -potential values, but still values.

Even beyond that, the type of Love that a Christians have when they take pity or charity on someone in need is different than the kind of love that motivates them to seek out a partner, which in turn is different than the love they have for friends. Ayn Rand is on to a good start, but her look at love here seems very binary, whereas Christian charity is multifaceted.

The end?

So there it is. I really think Ayn Rand had something worth saying here. I like the idea, and am more happy to think of sex and romance being tied closely to my code of values. I like the idea that who I seek out and may be interested in are naturally those who closely reflect those values. I think she is clearly also right about sex and a sense of low self-worth. Even more right that people may use sex to fool themselves.

Naturally though, I think Ayn Rand was off about sex being a purely selfish act. I can’t imagine a healthy sexual relationship can ever happen between two narcissists, and anyone who wants to be lovers to anyone will have to overlook flaws.

Thanks for reading. Please feel free to comment!

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* My apologies to those of you who have the "XX" chromosome set. Obviously, I write from the "XY" perspective. I can't help my gender or what Ayn Rand wrote.

Myth of the One

There is a common evangelical myth that God picked out a spouse for you, and that are you are destined to meet this person. I don’t know why it has taken me so long to blog on this. This subject has come up in many conversations with my friends. More than a few events in the past few years have made reflect on the gravity of this error. I have no idea where my blog will go in relation to this. For this blog, I can only describe its ugly consequences. For sake of brevity, I will call the idea that God picks our spouses for us as the “myth of the one.”

Some of you may have read God of the Possible. In it, Greg Boyd relates the tragic parable of “Susan.” Susan came to him very angry one day. It took Greg Boyd some time to figure it out that she was angry at God. Susan had a dream to be a missionary to Taiwan, and she believed strongly in the myth of the one. She met a nice man who also wanted to be a missionary. They dated. He eventually proposed. Surprisingly, instead of saying yes right away, she prayed about it for some time. God told her that this was, indeed, “the one.”

The story book marriage did not go well. He had an affair. They reconciled through careful pastoral care, but he cheated on her again. He was emotionally abusive on top of that. They finally divorced, but it was only afterwards that she found out that she was pregnant. So much for Jeremiah 29:11.

Now we all know what the “myth of the one” is supposed to look like. The whole point of the myth of the one is that such trauma should never occur. God somehow brings us to beatific relationships that last. What we do is just “seek him.” Dating is supposed to be replaced with “courting” for these reasons. Once God has ‘revealed’ our spouse, our relationship should happy and fulfilling. The Susan story is a dramatic counter-example to this. Further examples could abound, but I need to repeat them here.

I know that most people who are reading this do not believe in the myth of the one. Obviously, I do not either. However, I think that there a lot of Christians who do. I think the consequences, like the Susan story, are horrible. Contrary to preparing people for marriage, actually often encourages premature marriages.
Some may object at this point. Someone reading this could be thinking that they followed, or knew someone who followed, the myth of the one and are happily married. To this I say, “Congratulations, I’m happy for you.” As happy as that is, it still does not overcome the numerous Susan stories out there. To be sure, there are many people who do “find the one,” but I cannot help but feel they are an exception.

What I have never figured out, is exactly where this myth comes from. Did it start in youth ministries as the only way to curb the hormones? Was it someone’s own resolution to a bad dating relationship? Does it come out of perfectionism? Some ultra-strong version of Calvinism?

If anyone has any ideas, I am quite open to them.