Baptists Today Blogs

Rainbow Friday

2009-11-27T06:45:00.001-05:00

I'm not sure when they started calling the day after Thansgiving "Black Friday." I know that it relates to the crush of shoppers in search of Christmas sales, and has something to do with the idea that retailers who have a good day will make it "into the black" (as opposed to the red) for the year.

One could also call it Black Friday because it begins in the black of night, with stores advertising early morning specials and openings ranging from midnight to three, four, and five o'clock in the morning.

And, I suppose that those who don't get there in time to score one of the few deeply discounted items available could find themselves in a black mood. I just hope no one gets run over in the crush this year and knocked unconscious, a different kind of blackness.

For me, the day could be called "Red Friday" because I'll spend a large part of it grading exegesis papers, except that I use a pencil instead of a red pen, so I guess it'll be more of a "Gray Friday" (lots of gray, I'm afraid).

Some of it might be a Green and Brown Friday, because although I cleaned up all the leaves in my yard yesterday, the wind filled it up again.

Whatever color your Friday turns out to be, I hope it's still tinged with thanksgiving.

Thanksdoing

2009-11-26T07:31:00.003-05:00

With apologies to Forest Gump's mama, I would suggest that "Thanksgiving is as thanksgiving does."

On a day when the theme of giving thanks is often overshadowed by the stress of travel and cooking, when old family tensions may loom as shadows in the background, when resentment over who does all the work and who watches all the football may cast a pall over the day, I think it's worth taking a moment to consciously focus on "thanksdoing."

What can I do today that will demonstrate appreciation to God and to others? What effort or attention to others can I give that lives out an attitude of gratitude?

My thanksdoing will start with getting the leaves off the lawn, and go from there. What's on your "doing" plate?

Thanksgiving is as thanksgiving does.

A novel idea: teach students

2009-11-25T06:26:00.000-05:00

David J. A. Clines, a native of Australia who lives and works in England, is the first president of the Society of Biblical Literature from outside of North America. His presidential address to the annual meeting, held this year in New Orleans, was something of a surprise.

Clines, a prolific author and publisher who spent his entire career in the Bible studies department of the University of Sheffield, entitled his address "Learning, Teaching, and Researching Biblical Studies, Today and Tomorrow."

One might have expected a stuffy sort of speech regarding the need for greater academic rigor. Instead, Clines devoted 45 minutes to a promotion of student centered learning, an intuitive, constructivist method that tries to move beyond the idea of a professor imparting knowledge to one in which the teacher helps students learn and construct knowledge for themselves. Citing Plutarch, from On Learning, he said "The mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be kindled."

For many years, Clines said, he relied on dog-eared and constantly updated lecture notes designed to impart the latest developments in biblical knowledge. But there came a day when "I realized that I needed to stop teaching biblical studies and start teaching students."

Clines said professors should resolve not to teach students anything they can forget, focusing on imparting skills rather than knowledge. This, he added, requires sensitivity to different learning styles.

I could belabor more of Clines' 20 (count 'em, 20) points of emphasis (his lecture was not an example of student centered learning), but I'll add just one more.

Professors should teach their students to think like a critical scholar he said, meaning that they should be able to approach a subject from the standpoint of critical distance, be respectful of rationality while remaining open to the subjective, be scrupulous about evidenced-based argumentation, and be committed to fairness and courtesy.

This was not the first time I've heard someone appeal to the need for more student centered learning, but it was the first time I've heard it in such a setting, with a thousand or more biblical scholars listening in.

Teaching students, rather than subjects. Now there's a thought worth considerably more thinking.

Shootout at the digital corral

2009-11-24T07:02:00.001-05:00

A highlight of the late Saturday afternoon sessions at the Society of Biblical Literature meeting was a "shootout" between the leading makers of academic Bible software programs. Having used and reviewed most of them, I thought it would be fun to see advanced users put their whiz-bang features to work in responding to five specified projects.

The presenters, in order, were Logos, the Stuttgart Electronic Study Bible, BibleWorks, and Accordance. Logos 4 showcased a cleaner user interface than I remembered from earlier versions, and demonstrated some surprizing graphical capabilities for illustrating the study of individual words, whether in English or in the original languages. It's primarily a PC-based program, though a Macintosh version that's been in the works for years has finally reached "alpha" development status.

The Stuttgart Electronic Study Bible, with which I was not previously familiar, runs on the same Libronix platform that supports Logos. It focuses entirely on a scholarly audience, featuring the most advanced critical editions of Greek and Hebrew biblical texts, complete with the full critical apparatus of each, all in a searchable format. Wow.

BibleWorks 8 is also packed with features and is capable of incredible feats of linguistic searching. The presenter easily walked it through the five assignments, but relied a bit too much on codes and such that are innate to a power-user but mysterious to others, leaving the demonstration hard to follow. BibleWorks is also a PC program, but it is said to work satisfactorily on a Mac with the use of a PC emulator. The problem is, most folks who use a Mac prefer to avoid emulating a PC at all costs.

Accordance 8 is the only one of the academic Bible software programs that runs natively on a Mac, and it runs like the wind. It focuses primarily on the biblical text and supporting resources that assist with translation, and I find it more intuitive than the other programs. To the extent that you can love a software program, I love working with Accordance. Those who normally use PCs can run Accordance with a free Mac emulator program, losing only a few minor functionalities.

Olive Tree Software, which makes Bible software for mobile devices, also presented, and for the first time I really wanted an iPhone, for which it has developed an astounding product. Olive Tree also supports systems by Blackberry, Android, Palm, and several others, though Greek and Hebrew are not available on all of them. For all of their cool factor, mobile phones lack the processing power and memory needed for the kind of intensive searches that most scholars require, and there's really no need for it. Few researchers who have access to a quality desktop or laptop computer will be relying on their tiny mobile phone screen for serious work.

I've been promised a beta version of the Blackberry product when it becomes available, and will write a review when I get a chance to check it out. If it's anything like the iPhone version, it'll be terrific.

Anyone still reading by now might be interested in the five problems each of the presenters was asked to solve. Here they are (some questions are reworded for brevity):

1. Give the parsing of a word and its meaning from a standard source. (This one was easy: most of the programs provide the information automatically when the users puts the cursor over a Greek or Hebrew word. Some require clicks, some don't. All provide easy access to lexical entries for the word).

2. Show all the occurrences of a word in the New Testament and LXX, and show the Hebrew word which corresponds with the Greek in the LXX (LXX refers to the Septuagint, an early Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible). This one was also relatively easy. All of the programs allow the user to type a Greek word, paste it from the text, or click on it, and then search for all inflected forms of that word. The tricky part was linking the NT and the LXX for the search. Finding the corresponding Hebrew term for the Greek word was the simplest part.

3. Final all the occurrences of ‘oi dé in Matthew's gospel that are followed by a finite verb within the clause. This search generally required setting up a formula using syntax codes that look like gibberish to anyone not familiar with them. Accordance offers a more graphical interface, but even it requires some familiarity.

4. Show how to get all the lemmas (basic forms) of a part of speech (such as an interjection or demonstrative pronoun) and organize the results in such a way that one could write an article or monograph based on the data. Each program handled this differently, but all impressively.

5. Find all Hebrew middle weak verbs, plus all of their occurrences, and organize them in such a way that the variations of their inflections are immediately apparent. The data should enable one to write an article about variations of the Hebrew middle weak verb. Trust me, you don't want to know about this one. It involves creating intricate search formulas that reminded me of calculus.

I came away with a great appreciation for the work that goes into these programs. Most users of Bible software, even scholars, will never exploit the full power of quality Bible software -- but having more than you can use is far better than lacking the features you need.

Too much to choose from

2009-11-23T00:00:00.001-05:00

Attending the Society of Biblical Literature's (SBL) annual meeting reminds me of a big Thanksgiving dinner involving lots of people, all of whom bring a tasty dish. With food in such appetizing variety and quantity, one hardly knows where to start.

Everyone brings something to the meeting -- areas of expertise, findings from recent research, intriguing ideas for exploration -- and many of them present papers in sessions planned on particular topics. The problem is, there are hundreds of sessions to choose from.

On Saturday morning, after going through my program, I found no less than six sessions I wanted to attend, all running at the same time. The Assyriology and the Bible section was offering a roundtable discussion on the Kuttamuwa Stele (an eighth century B.C. Neo-Hittite funerary stele from Zincirli), the Book of the Twelve Prophets section included a speaker whose book I'm currently reviewing, and the Cognitive Linguistics in Biblical Interpretation section sounded really interesting. I also wanted to attend sessions on "Egytpology and Ancient Israel" and "Warfare in Ancient Israel."

I ended up attending a session called "Iconography and the Hebrew Bible," mainly because the lead lecture was to be "1 Samuel 31 and the Battle of Til-Tuba/Ulai River: Shared Narrative Topoi." The "Battle of Til-Tuba/Ulai River" refers to an Assyrian wall relief portraying Ashurnasirpal's victory over the Elamites in 653 B.C. It's part of the British Museum collection, but I saw it last year at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, where it was on tour while the British Museum renovates. It's a fascinating piece of art, replete with evidence of what warfare in the ancient Near East was like, and I wanted to hear how the presenter compared it to the Battle of Gilboa, where Saul died (in both accounts, the defeated king and his son are beheaded and put on display).

Alas, because I arrived and took a front row seat early, I missed the notice that was later posted at the entrance: the Til-Tuba presenter couldn't make it. The lead paper then became "The Ekphrastic Image in Song 5:9-16." That was still interesting, because I learned a new word (I don't run across "ekphrastic" very often). The presenter was arguing that the description of the male lover in Song of Solomon 5:9-16 sounds very much like someone describing a decorated statue. The pictures and the presentation were interesting, but the premise seemed rather obvious to me, so I took it as no great revelation.

The afternoon held two more fun-information-filled sessions, while the evening featured the president's address (more on those later).

The meeting and its embarrassment of academic riches goes on through Tuesday. Unfortunately, I'll be leaving early on Monday to get back for my Old Testament "Prophets and Poets" class. No doubt, they'll be waiting anxiously to hear all about ekphrasis and other obscurities I've picked up at the annual meeting.

Then again, maybe not.

[The image is a section from the Battle of Til-Tuba/Ulai River, in which the Elamite king is being relieved of his head.]

Cogdill to step down, not away

2009-11-19T22:36:00.007-05:00

There have been a lot of long faces around the Campbell University Divinity School (CUDS) this week: Dean Mike Cogdill announced Thursday that he plans to step down as dean at the end of the school year. The good news is that he plans to remain on the faculty.

Cogdill, who was chair of Campbell's undergraduate religion department before being appointed as founding dean of the new venture, has been living and breathing Campbell divinity for 14 years. He's driven uncounted miles, spoken in scores of churches, attended hundreds of meetings, and asked thousands of people to pray for the school, send their students, and maybe even throw in some money.

As we know by now, Cogdill's efforts have not been in vain. Under his good leadership, the school opened in 1996, a year earlier than planned. It grew steadily, and has become one of the largest and healthiest of the "new breed" of Baptist divinity schools formed during the past 20 years. For the past several years, enrollment has averaged around 240 students. The divinity school's endowment, mostly in the form of more than 300 endowed scholarships, is the largest of Campbell's six graduate schools. CUDS has strong partnerships with a variety of Baptist groups, innovative programs, and students from across the Christian spectrum.

The past few years have been particularly eventful, as Cogdill led the faculty and staff through the process of full accreditation by the Association of Theological Schools (granted, with flying colors, in June 2007), and played a significant role in helping to set the course and raise the money for the university's new Butler Chapel, just dedicated in October.

It's no wonder he's ready for a break. In an email to students, Cogdill said his work as dean has been a dream come true. He told the faculty that he has contemplated the change for some time, and believes it is the right time for a transition. In a prepared statement, he said "It is now time in my life to give thanks for this wonderful chapter of ministry and to embrace the new opportunities for the future. I look forward to continuing to help the Divinity School prosper and grow as a full-time member of the faculty.”

I'm one of many who want to join in voicing our thanks for this "wonderful chapter of ministry" in Mike Cogdill's life, and for the many students, faculty, staff, and others who have been touched -- and will continue to be touched -- by his whole-hearted commitment to "Christ-centered, Bible-based, and ministry-focused" leadership.

Stopping traffic

2009-11-18T06:22:00.006-05:00

In yesterday's foggy dawn, as I drove Samuel's carpool to school, we noticed traffic beginning to back up at an unusual spot on the road. We're accustomed to backups, for the formerly rural area in which we live is now peppered with subdivisions and shopping centers. Leave five minutes late, and you can add an additional 10 minutes to the ride.

As I noted, however, traffic backed up at place that's normally clear, and we crept along behind a string of tail lights for some time before the holdup became apparent: a dog was sitting in the road.

The dog was rather large and nondescript, with a dark coat of mottled black and brown. He sat on his haunches dead in the middle of the eastbound lane, erect but unmoving, with a mournful expression. Parents who drive their children to a bus stop nearby were standing by the road, patting their thighs and pleading with the dog to move out of the traffic. No one, however, was venturing into the road to lead him off.

I surmised that the dog had probably wandered into the road and been hit by a car (that was later confirmed by a witness). The car had kept going; the dog remained. Though it had no outward signs of physical damage, the canine must have had a blow to the head that left it temporarily traumatized: it just sat down and refused to move.

Like most of the traffic, we were going westbound, so we were able to proceed slowly by (sorry, eastbounders). I don't know how they finally got the dog out of the road or whether a pet ambulance was necessary.

After depositing my glum passengers at school, I drove through the fog toward my own teaching assignments and pondered how that dog in the road reminded me of folks I've known who react to change as if it's a blindsiding blow to the head. Unable to accept the notion that the world is moving on around them, they choose to become obstructionists, planting themselves firmly in the path and daring anyone to try and move them. I've met some of those folks in churches. The U.S. Congress is loaded with them (especially when it comes to judicial appointments). We've all met human roadblocks.

I appreciate others' pain and try to be understanding -- sometimes changes come that I don't like, either. Sometimes a bit of obstruction is necessary to slow things down and ensure that we make good decisions. At other times, it's an unnecessary obstacle designed mainly to clog the process and feed someone's need for attention or influence.

In either case, few people want to risk getting bitten, granting the dog in the road surprising power. It's worth pondering, when our obituaries are written, if we'll be known for something other than blocking traffic.

Is God in your genes?

2009-11-16T07:25:00.004-05:00

An article in the New York Times recently explored arguments for the existence of a "God gene" and its potential evolution among humans.

Say what?

It's not a particularly new idea: archaeologists, anthropologists, and other varieties of social scientists have observed for some time that religion of some sort has developed in just about every known civilization, and at various stages of cultural development. Evolutionary theory would assume the near-universal existence of religion implies that natural selection favors it.

It's not hard to imagine why: religion has the potential of promoting social cohesion, a moral order, self-restraint, and altruistic behavior. Those who are (genetically?) inclined to adopt their culture's religious tenets might be more likely to fit in and be successful in passing on their genes.

Many religious folk are likely to take offense at the notion that natural selection could have anything to do with the development of religion. But, I have heard Christian apologists argue for the existence of God by saying that humans have an innate longing for God, ergo, God must exist (and have put the longing in our hearts). I've always thought that logic was a bit lame, but one could apply the "God gene theory" in the same way: if humans have a gene that predisposes them to a belief in God, does that imply that God put it there?

I can't answer that question, though it's an intriguing thought. A primary objection to the idea is to ask why some people would have the "seek the divine" gene and some people wouldn't, though a firm Calvinist might contend that's evidence of predestination.

These days, perhaps the most troublesome aspect of the God gene theory is the underlying assumption that religion functions to promote moral order and "patch up the social fabric." In the past three decades or so, we've been more likely to see religion used in divisive ways. Whether it's a division within a denominational family, within a country (e.g., the religious right and left in America), or between global cultures, each thinking their religion should reign supreme, humans are quite capable of using religion to rip the social fabric apart.

Does that mean we also have an "evil gene"?

That one's easier to defend: we call it "original sin."

[Image from www.lifespan.org]

BSCNC shrinks budget, pushes evangelism

2009-11-13T06:36:00.004-05:00

This past year, for the first time in many years, I didn't attend the annual meeting of the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina (BSCNC). I didn't feel particularly welcome, for one thing: messengers at the previous year's meeting had voted to eliminate any options for supporting the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (CBF), and rhetoric from the floor was decidedly harsh toward those of us who no longer pledge allegiance to the Southern Baptist Convention.

The other reason is that two of my classes at Campbell conflicted with the meeting, and I thought my efforts would be better spent there.

Norman Jameson's informative article on the Biblical Recorder website reports that messengers finalized changes to the constitution and bylaws that formalize an end to direct relationships between the BSCNC and Woman's Missionary Union of North Carolina, Baptist Retirement Homes, and the five colleges and institutions that had remained affiliated with the convention. All of those changes had been in process for years, so actions at the meeting were mainly formalities. The only real discussion, apparently, concerned objections of some messengers to scholarship funds for students attending the Baptist colleges.

After a dismal financial year, the convention approved a sharply lower budget, down from $39.2 million to $34.8 million, more in line with current income and roughly on par with budget levels from ten years ago. The new budget eliminates optional giving plans (previously known as Plans B, C, and D), consolidating all gifts into a single plan that sends a larger percentage, for the fifth straight year, to the Southern Baptist Convention.

For the first time, the entire meeting was held in the Koury Convention Center in Greensboro. The added convenience didn't help attendance, however: it continued a downward trend that has persisted since the 1990s and accelerated in the past five years (the above graph shows the decline from 3,200 messengers in 2005 to 1,836 this year; in the 1990s, attendance topped 6,000).

Undeterred by signs of decline, the convention launched a new three-year program to pump up evangelism efforts, called "Find It Here."

Given the convention's virtual and not always friendly separation from CBF supporters, WMU NC, and the colleges -- and its increasingly tighter bonds with the SBC -- it's no surprise that more moderate Baptists are finding fewer reasons to continue supporting the BSCNC. If not for the good work of N.C. Baptist Men, longstanding support for Baptist Children's Homes, and appreciation for the BSC's conference centers like Caraway, Caswell, and Hollifield, there would be even less reason for remaining involved.

I loved the BSCNC for a long time, and continue to wish it well. Even so, the words of an old Roger Miller tune come to mind: "More and more I think about you less and less."

Got time for two lives?

2009-11-11T05:22:00.000-05:00

Here's a new approach to a long-distance interview: the Chronicle of Higher Education (subscription required) reported Nov. 9 that academic advisors at Pennsylvania State University are now required to schedule at least two hours per week for meetings with students in the virtual world of Second Life.

As if personal meetings, phone conversations, email, texting, Skype, or iChat didn't give enough options for communications already.

Some readers may be unfamiliar with Second Life (you can see an introductory video here). It's basically a membership website through which one can enter a graphical 3-D virtual world and have a "Second Life" through an online avatar who can interact with other people, buy land, conduct business, or just about anything else. Many businesses, schools, and even churches have a presence in Second Life: a person can buy a car, attend a sales meeting, take a class, campaign for president, dance in a nightclub, or listen to a sermon -- all while in your pajamas.

You can also (so I've heard), make new friends, try out life as the opposite gender, flesh out your alter ego, or have an online affair, complete with virtual hanky panky (check out this story). That sort of thing illustrates the two-edged nature of such sites: on they positive side they can be used for entertainment, for business, for serious conversations, and now for meetings with one's academic advisor. But, they can also become portals to escaping the real world and investing one's energies in a fantasy while ignoring one's family.

Penn State apparently feels there is a need for academic advisement in Second Life, but I personally hope such requirements don't make it to my school. I'm already short on sufficient hours in the day to do what I need and want to do in my first life. I certainly don't have time for a second one.

When walls fall

2009-11-09T08:22:00.007-05:00

For the past week, Germans have been celebrating the 20th anniversary of the memorable Nov. 9 evening when the gates of the Berlin Wall were opened and people long separated by concrete and checkpoints were able to travel freely between East Berlin, a part of the Soviet bloc, and West Berlin, an ally of the West.

After years of standing as a firm dividing line, most of the wall was quickly torn down. I remember seeing a part of it standing on display at the North Carolina State Fair. Family and friends were reunited after years apart, commercial opportunities blossomed, and the scent of freedom filled the air.

When I remember the excitement of those heady days, I can't help but think of an even longer, even higher wall that the State of Israel continues to construct, confiscating Palestinian land to build a much longer barrier, twice the height of the Berlin Wall, between Israel and the West Bank. The primary excuse for the wall is security; the ultimate effect is the isolation and oppression of many Palestinian people who can no longer travel to work in Israel or even farm their own land.

There's a Bible story about how the walls around Jericho came tumbling down for the Israelites. Today, longer walls and fierce fences are going back up.

Physical walls that imprison or isolate also remind me of the ideological walls that divide people of different religions and different political persuasions, as well as the pain-induced emotional walls that keep so many families and former friends apart.

Walls are fed by fear and mistrust, but they fade before open and willing hearts.

We may long for the day when all walls may come down, but that is not enough. Jesus did not say "blessed are the peace-longers," but "blessed are the peace-makers."

We have work to do.

[Top photo from http://www.destination360.com/europe/germany/berlin-wall-museum. Bottom photo is mine, taken from inside the wall that surrounds much of Bethlehem.]

Stretch, don't snap

2009-11-06T06:53:00.003-05:00

I wish I knew what to say, what to advise, what to suggest in the light of recent stories in which people with guns fell into a funk and "snapped" before erupting in unfathomable violence.

In Fayetteville, N.C., a faithful church deacon who was to all appearances loving and kind gunned down his wife and two children before killing himself: relatives and friends had apparently tried to boost his flagging spirits shortly before the shootings.

At Fort Hood in Texas, an Army psychiatrist unhappy about an upcoming deployment went over the edge and opened fire on a busy army base, killing at least 13 and wounding 30 fellow soldiers and some civilians. Although he is Muslim, he was a native born American who had been in the service since 1995. Much remains to be learned, but his actions appear to have stemmed more from a personal breakdown than a terror plot.

In the first case, the shooter was a beloved member of a community who cared about him and tried to help. In the second, the gunman was a trained psychiatrist who worked among people who knew that he was unhappy. Did they try to intervene? I don't know.

What internal workings drive someone to the point of losing all rationality and thinking even for a moment that the weight of a weapon, the sound of gunfire, and the cries of victims can salve the screaming soul within? In countless other cases, what inner demons could lead someone to beat a child, strangle a spouse, or drive into a tree?

I don't know. And, while mental health professionals could certainly offer considerable insight, it's hard to imagine that any of us could fully understand what's going on inside someone else's head.

I don't have the answers I'd like to have, but stories like this remind me of the need to be sensitive to others, to watch for signs of stress, and to offer a safe place for troubled folk to blow off steam before they explode. We can't fully know what's cooking inside our friends' and neighbors' heads, but we can care.

We can, and we must.

Lost in wonder

2009-11-03T20:47:00.009-05:00

I've been a space nut as long as I can remember. Trying to grasp even the smallest hint of the size and shape of the universe boggles the mind, but it is a good boggle.

Sometimes, when a busy day my head gets bogged down (bogged is less pleasant than boggled), I do a brief mental stretch by checking out the most recent pictures from the Hubble Space Telescope. The Hubble underwent the last of several repair and maintenance missions in May of this year, and the results are breathtaking.

Take the picture above, for example. It's a butterfly nebula called NGC 6302, in the constellation Scorpius. A huge cloud of gas and dust is blowing away from a central star hidden in the dark central cloud. I think it's beautiful.

And this picture of "Stephan's Quintet" -- it's a collection of five galaxies in the constellation Pegasus, four of which are colliding. The formation was first described in 1877 (by Edouard Stephan), but never before seen like this. Each of the galaxies contains millions and millions of stars in every stage of growth. Can you imagine?

I love the colors (digitally assigned though they are) in this stellar jet from a nebula in the southern constellation Carina, taken with the Hubble's new Wide Field Camera. It took 7,500 years for light from the nebula to reach the earth -- a relative neighbor in the vastness of the universe. The jet, which itself is three light years long, is a stellar nursery, a hot cloud of dust where new stars are born. Amazing.

When I ponder images like these and try to imagine a God who could create such marvels and still care about humans on our puny planet, I always find myself humming the last line of Charles Wesley's hymn "Love Divine, All Loves Excelling," for I inevitably find myself "lost in wonder, love and praise."

[Photos from www.hubblesite.org, credit NASA, ESA, and the Hubble SM4 ERO Team. Click on any of the photos for a larger image, or follow the links to the Hubble site, where high resolution images can be found.]

Hope is my oxygen

2009-11-02T05:47:00.005-05:00

With our son visiting a friend, Jan and I boycotted the Hallowe'en candy scene and drove down to Elizabethtown for a concert where local folk had arranged a youth event featuring contemporary Christian groups Chynna and Vaughan, Bluetree, and Newsong. We went early to grab a burger before Melvin's closed and to get a good seat, but the gym at Elizabethtown Middle School was more than large enough to accommodate those who attended.

We were there mainly to hear Chynna (pronounced "China") and Vaughan. Chynna Phillips, whose parents were part of the Mamas and the Papas many moons ago, formerly sang with the girl group Wilson Phillips, which had a good run for a while. Vaughan Penn has been known mainly as a very successful songwriter, but long before that, she participated in the Baptist Student Union at Appalachian State University, where she and Jan knew each other through involvement in singing and drama groups. Jan had not seen her since, and looked forward to having a chance to chat.

Chynna and Vaughan started the show, but only got to do four songs before turning the stage over to Bluetree, an Irish group who found some East Bladen band uniforms backstage and came out looking like Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band. They were very loud and I couldn't understand the words. Only one band member sang, and it took me a while to realize that "High Grit Is Our God" was really "How Great Is Our God" with an Irish accent.

We didn't stay for Newsong, the headliner. I suspect they would have been very loud, too. I did, however, like one of the T-shirts Newsong was selling in the lobby. It said "Hope is my oxygen."

I've known days when hope was the main thing that kept me going, and I suspect you have, too.

Breathe deeply!

No joy in Uzbekistan

2009-10-30T06:24:00.005-04:00

Some American Christians claim government oppression because they are no allowed to use public schools or courthouses as means to propagate their particular understanding of faith. I occasionally get Facebook invitations to "Put God back in our schools" or something similar.

Such places must remain non-sectarian, of course, because it's part of our constitutional DNA. Both freedom of religion -- and freedom from religion -- are guaranteed in the Bill of Rights. And for every complaint about officials prohibiting Bible verse banners on the field at football games or monuments to the Ten Commandments in courthouses, there ought to be three cheers for a country where citizens are free to follow their own convictions and not impose them on others.

That is not the case in the Central Asian Republic of Uzbekistan, where three Baptist leaders were recently convicted of running a summer camp -- called Camp Joy -- where activities included Bible study. The case has been publicized regularly by Forum 18, an international religious freedom watchdog, but Uzbek authorities seem not to care about international condemnation.

The three men, including Pavel Peichev, president of the Baptist Union of Uzbekistan, were arrested last July and charged with teaching children about religion without their parents' permission, and of tax evasion, since the government doesn't recognize the camp as a religious non-profit. The men were recently convicted, fined about nine times the average annual income of Uzbeks, and barred from administrative or financial activity.

The accused insist that parents know the camp is operated by Baptists, and that the government is mainly trying to disrupt Baptist activity in the country by handcuffing its leaders.

The Uzbek constitution contains provisions guaranteeing religious freedom and separation of church and state, but a separate law restricts religious expression to groups that are registered with the government. In a thinly veiled Catch 22, groups not in favor with the government are not allowed to register, rendering their activities "illegal" despite the official stance of religious freedom. Reportedly, no Baptist groups have been permitted to register since 1999.

Although the population of Uzbekistan is predominantly Muslim, there are many different Muslim groups, and thousands of Muslims who disagree with the governmental restrictions have also been imprisoned. Groups that are not in favor with the government are routinely portrayed as extremists who are dangerous to the public welfare.

A government that gives special privileges to the favored religious group while restricting others is not upholding religious liberty. I hope the U.S. can find a way to pressure Uzbek leaders to allow more religious freedom in their country -- and that we'll be wise enough to maintain true liberty of conscience in our own.

Bad news about news

2009-10-28T06:01:00.001-04:00

I found two items of particular interest in Tuesday's News & Observer. Both were distressing.

The first was a front page story, along with several sidebars, regarding shenanigans carried on by former governor Mike Easley. Previous articles had revealed shady real estate deals that got the guv a big discount on a waterfront lot, and too much behind-the-scenes involvement in getting his wife a cushy job planning lectures at North Carolina State University. In hearings before the state board of elections on Monday, Easley's good friend and former chair of the N.C. State board of trustees McQueen Campbell admitted not only that he had provided nearly $100,000 in free but unreported airplane flights for Easley, but that Easley had asked Campbell to arrange $11,000 in repairs and upgrades to his personal home, then had him reimbursed from campaign funds that pretended to be for "unbilled flights." Doubtless, there is more scum to come.

The second story, less prominent at the bottom of a page in the B section, reported that newspaper circulation for April-September 2009 was down 10.6 percent from the same period in 2008, suggesting that the long term decline in newspaper circulation is accelerating. It has already gotten so bad that award-winning newspapers like the Rocky Mountain News and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer have shut down their print editions this year, and others are under intense stress as readers migrate to free news on the Internet or display news apathy altogether.

Here's the problem with that: as disquieting as news about the former governor's misbehavior is -- along with previous stories about other officials -- it's something the public needs to know. Public officials need to be held accountable, no one does that better than good journalists. It's likely, however, that none of those stories would have come to light if not for the faithful digging of newspaper reporters. With advertising down even more than subscribers, news budgets are shrinking and so are newspaper staffs: not only are there fewer pages in the paper, but fewer reporters digging for important stories.

Sadly, many Americans still don't appreciate what newspapers do for them: a Pew Trust study published in March 2009 showed that only 43 percent of Americans said the loss of their local paper would be a detriment to the community, and just 33 percent said they would personally miss the local paper if it ceased to exist.

Something's rotten in the state of American minds. Dependable, investigative, community-oriented journalism is essential for an accountable and truly democratic society. If Americans want to maintain real freedom, they ought to be willing to pay the price -- including the minor cost of a quality newspaper.

Old friends

2009-10-26T06:35:00.006-04:00

I drove to my hometown of Lincolnton, Ga. this past weekend to visit with old friends and acquaintances at a 40 year reunion of my high school graduating class. It was quite an experience. We've done some changing.

Of the 61 people listed in the program, six are dead, two by their own hand. The rest of us are, for the most part, showing significant signs of aging. Some of us, I thought, looked a bit worse for wear, while others are better preserved.

I was thankful for name tags. Some class members still bear a close resemblance to their high school appearance, but others were harder to recognize, especially if they'd radically changed their hair color -- or lost it altogether.

We are generally 58-59 years old, and while many of us will be working for a while yet, at least a fourth of the class has retired already, most from state or federal jobs that pay full retirement benefits after 30 years. One is retired from several years in prison, and not as a guard or administrator. Locals believe he still has barrels of drug money buried somewhere. He was also the only person there who appeared to be under the influence of something other than the sweet tea and barbecue prepared by a classmate who runs a dairy farm and caters barbecue on the weekends.

That, I found, was a nice change: as we've grown older and perhaps more self-confident, fewer folk felt the need for excess alcohol as a social lubricant. Most of us were quite able to eat and converse and dance a little to music from the sixties, and find in that all the enjoyment we needed.

I was surprised to learn how many of my classmates still live in town, or have moved back after a time away. I was even more surprised, and a bit saddened, by how many of the local folk chose not to attend the gathering, including the three brave African-Americans who integrated our class back in the ninth grade. The way we treated them then remains one of my life's greatest regrets.

I enjoyed catching up with old friends and learning how they have spent the past 40 years. Some have known a lot of heartbreak. Some have surprised their parents by turning out good after all. Some have made a difference close to home, some in the wider world.

I was grateful for the experience, and especially for the small group of "girls" who formed a committee and put the evening together, and who spent many hours trying to locate everyone and invite them to attend. It wouldn't have happened if not for the women.

Some things don't change.

West Side Wishes

2009-10-23T06:14:00.004-04:00

Last night I took Samuel to see West Side Story at North Carolina Theater in Raleigh. He'll get school credit (once he writes a report about it); I got to see (and hear) a classic musical with several iconic songs and impressive choreography. The lead actors had terrific voices and played their parts with skill and feeling.

I wish the play left me feeling better. I'd seen West Side Story before, but had forgotten how dark it is and how sad the ending. Essentially, it's Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet reset in a New York ghetto neighborhood of the 1950s, with the Montagues and Capulets replaced with two street gangs, one of white kids (the Jets) who think they are the true Americans, and the other made of first generation Puerto Rican immigrants (the Sharks). Both gangs want control of the same neighborhood and neither wants to share; prejudice runs deep and the inter-ethnic hatred is visceral.

When Tony (who founded the Jets with friend Riff) falls head over heels in love with Maria (whose brother Bernardo leads the Sharks), the stage is set for trouble, and trouble happens. Tony's eyes are opened and he tries to persuade the gangs to get along, but before the play is over Riff is dead, Bernardo is dead, and in the closing scene, Tony is dead.

There are hints of growing acceptance between gang members here and there, or at least of a growing awareness that prejudice is wrong, but the nascent hope of a better day isn't enough to stop the violence.

More than 50 years after West Side Story first debuted, ethnic divides are largely unabated. There continues to be mutual and suspicion and rejection among the various ethnic groups that are predominant not only in America, but in the world. People die every day because of it.

There are hints, here and there, of greater understanding or acceptance, but true harmony remains a distant hope, visible only in the full manifestation of the Kingdom of God.

Christians -- who have all-too-often been major contributors to the problem -- have a lot of work to do if we're to take seriously the prayer Jesus taught us to pray: "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven."

Gambling making more inroads

2009-10-21T08:18:00.004-04:00

The lottery's no longer the only game in town, at least in many towns across North Carolina. Recent challenges to laws regulating video poker and sneaky ways of skirting the law have led to a boom in "Sweepstakes" outlets that often masquerade as Internet cafes. Unlike the typical Internet cafe where most users check email, do research, or update their Facebook pages, visitors to the sweepstakes parlors spend most of their time playing games that they hope will win money.

The new gambling houses skirt the law by selling what is technically a legitimate product -- prepaid phone cards or Internet time cards -- but the cards are then used to buy time on video gambling machines where the user can win prizes ranging from more Internet time to wads of cash. My understanding is that the payouts are random rather than based on whatever skill it takes to play poker with a software program, thus sidestepping laws governing video poker.

Proponents of the practice say it's no different than buying a Coke that has a code printed under the bottle cap, allowing the purchaser to visit Coke's website, punch in the code, and see if he or she has won a prize. Or, they cite games offered by fast-food franchises like McDonalds, where the purchase of food comes with a Monopoly token that could be worth real money.

I see the point, but I also see a difference. I don't know anyone who buys soft drinks, one after the other, for the express purpose of trying to win a rare cash prize. And, while some people may visit McDonald's more often in hopes of collecting all the Monopoly pieces (that's the idea, after all), they still get a tangible food item along with the game piece.

With the new sweepstakes gaming parlors, one might practically be able to use the prepaid Internet card to check e-mail, and operators tout the entertainment value of the games, but the obvious truth is that most purchasers plunk their money down in hopes of winning a jackpot.

In essence, the games are no different than buying a lottery scratch-off card, except that users have to go online to see if they win, and the state doesn't get a cut of the profits.

An added danger is that, in a room full of "legal" gaming machines, it would be easy for unscrupulous operators to sneak in a few machines that go over the legal line and rob users of even more grocery money.

I personally wish authorities could find a way to shut down all gambling outlets, including the lottery, because they take advantage of the poor and sell hope to desperate people who aren't good at math.

If they can't shut them down, they should at least find ways to regulate them closely and tax them heavily so operators wouldn't make such fat profits, and would be less inclined to get into the business.

If something isn't done, the state will soon be swamped with tacky gambling houses that not only pollute the landscape, but exploit human frailty. Our residents deserve better than that.

[Photo from the Laurinburg Exchange.]

Two messages to renounce

2009-10-18T17:26:00.006-04:00

When I read of fringe folks making fanatical comments, my first response is usually to try ignoring them, and hope others do the same. They're usually out for publicity, and I don't like contributing to their notoriety. Sometimes, however, their inanity gets enough traction to go viral, and there's no chance of it being ignored, so I figure it's better to say something than to let misinformation go unchallenged.

Two relatively recent things come to mind: one is an independent Baptist preacher in Canton, N.C. whose recently-started 14-member church (which appears to consist mainly of his family and one other) is sponsoring a book burning for Hallowe'en, and the books to be burned include Bibles. News reports including this video have taken delight in the story for its weirdness factor. Sadly the story has made news sources as far away as the United Kingdom and India.

Marc Grizzard is a true believer in the King James Version of the Bible, and labels all modern translations of the Bible as "Satanic" and "perverse." Thus, he's collecting other Bible translations to throw on the bonfire, along with books by Billy Graham, Rick Warren, Mother Theresa, and a long list of other authors that he considers to be heretics.

Grizzard, who preaches a hell-laced gospel of intolerance for anyone who disagrees with his views, gave his congregation the ironic name of "Amazing Grace Baptist Church." On the fairly elaborate website he had set up -- which has since been taken down by the webhost -- he set out a doctrinal statement that says more about allegiance to the KJV than to Christ. In a faux-academic note on the website, he pointed out that copies of the Geneva Bible would not be burned, or any others based on the Textus Receptus, a 16th century compilation of six Greek New Testament manuscripts. The combination text, put together by Desiderius Erasmus in 1516, was used as the basis for the New Testament of the KJV and some other Reformation-era translations.

Of course, very few people have a 400-year-old Geneva Bible laying around, so his caveat matters little. KJV-only folk believe as a statement of faith that the Textus Receptus is inspired by God, even though the most reputable scholars of the Greek manuscript tradition demonstrated long ago that manuscripts belonging to the Western Tradition (which formed the basis of the Textus Receptus) are demonstrably inferior to other manuscripts.

Grizzard is welcome to believe the KJV is the preferable translation, but making a spectacle of burning other translations and books is an act of violence against hundreds of translators and authors who love God deeply. I suspect that Grizzard truly believes that his attention-drawing witch hunt honors God, but the truth is that it makes him and his church -- and other churches by association -- look like narrow-minded bumpkins. Such publicity stunts work in direct opposition to the call of Christ to transform our world through compassion and care.

The second thing has been hanging around for the past three months or so, but only recently got enough momentum to find its way into millions of email in-boxes. It is an anonymous anti-Obama video that uses pseudo-scholarship and scare tactics to suggest that Jesus spoke the name of the antiChrist, and it would have sounded like "Barack Obama."

The video is wrong on so many fronts that they don't all bear discussion. Mark McEntire has done a nice job of debunking the claptrap at EthicsDaily.com, as have articles at Salon.com and at Snopes.com. I'm sure there have been others, but the video hasn't gone away and the author, rather than admitting his errors, inexplicably took some of the criticism as confirmation of his argument, and posted a "new and improved" version on YouTube.

McEntire identifies the video's producer as Carl Gallups, pastor of the Southern Baptist-affiliated Hickory Hammock Baptist Church in Milton, Florida. The church's website is chock-full of similar sensationalist videos, though I couldn't find this one posted among them, and I wouldn't expect to. A website called WorldnetDaily reported that the video originated with an "American Christian" who contributes to YouTube as "ppsimmons" and who agreed to be interviewed only on condition of anonymity "out of concern for members of his local church."

Whoever did put that piece of digital garbage together ought to be ashamed to admit it, because it's filled with half-truths, mis-truths, and an obvious effort to bear false witness against another. The sad thing is that his fake scholarship sounds just convincing enough that many uniformed viewers will be gullible enough to believe it, or to wonder if it could be true.

In short, the narrator says that Jesus' statement in Luke 10:18 ("I saw Satan fall like lightning from the heavens") could be Jesus' prediction that Barack Obama is the anti-Christ, claiming that in Hebrew "lightning from the heavens" would be "barak 0(u)bamah."

That's just wrong. The narrator starts by saying that Jesus would have spoken in Aramaic (probably true), then says Aramaic is the oldest form of Hebrew (not true -- they're both dialects of a common Northwest Semitic predecessor). Using Strong's numbering system (which reveals that he has no personal knowledge of Hebrew), he says that the Hebrew word for "lightning" is barak (that's one of several optional ways "lightning" can be expressed) and that the word for "the heavens" is bamah (false -- bamah means "high place," normally used for the top of a hill: the narrator uses some proof-texting sleight of hand to claim that it could just as well refer to the sky or the heavens). He then says that the Hebrew word for "and" is the letter waw, which can be pronounced as either "u" or "o" (that's true, except that it's never pronounced as "o" at the beginning of a word, and when it occurs before a "b" sound it changes it to "v").

Using this mis-represented Hebrew hodge-podge, he claims that "lightning from heaven" would sound like "barak 0(u)bamah." Nonsense. Not only would bamah never be used in that way, the preposition "from" (min) would have been used instead of the article. The video's claims to have grammatically "revealed" the sound of Barack Obama's name in Hebrew are nothing more than balderdash, blarney, or baloney -- take your choice. If you don't like those, try bilge, bunk, or bull.

Beyond his linguistic conjuring with Hebrew flash cards, the narrator appears to confuse Satan with the antichrist (clearly two different characters in the New Testament), and makes the common error of thinking that the so-called "Lucifer" (based on a Greek mis-translation carried on in the KJV) of Isa. 14:12 -- clearly addressed to a Babylonian king -- has anything to do with the Satan character of the New Testament.

The video, viral as it has become, is not only wrong, it is a mean-spirited attempt to deceive people who are uninformed and to undermine and discredit a fairly elected president that the producer apparently doesn't like. Despite the video's closing disclaimer, its intention is clear: it is a dirty trick, a low blow, a foul play. It is an open offense not only against the president, but against the one who said "I am the way, the truth, and the life."

With witnesses like these, is it any wonder so many people look askance at the church?

Life's Reward

2009-10-15T20:53:00.008-04:00

While on a writing retreat earlier this week, I took a walk around the Northwest Creek Marina near New Bern. I don't know a sloop from a ketch, but I enjoy taking note of the various names boat owners give to their yachts.

I saw one named "Stressless," which I thought was interesting, given that two years of owning a little runabout had brought me far more stress than relaxation. I can't imagine the trouble that a yacht would bring, unless you were rich enough to pay someone else to keep it up for you, and I can't imagine that, either.

One boat had a statue of Buddha on the back, perhaps an aid to peaceful meditation when the boat breaks down three miles offshore.

Other craft had playful names like "Skinny Dippin'" and "Killin' Time," drinking names like "Absolut," fanciful names like "Starship" and "Kizmet."

I saw a sailboat named "Hananiah," a Hebrew name that means something like "Yahweh is gracious to me." Whether it's a family name or reflects a belief that someone got the boat by the grace of God, I don't know.

Speaking of which, I couldn't help being taken aback by a floating oxymoron. On the back of a big cabin cruiser was the name "Life's Reward." Attached to the back window was a sign: "For Sale by Owner."

I paused. Can life's reward be bought and sold?

I couldn't help but recall the words of someone I admire greatly: "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth ..."

Knuckling down

2009-10-13T21:31:00.008-04:00

I've been holed up this week, while the divinity school is on fall break, working on a book. Jan was kind enough to let me sneak off to a condo near New Bern for several days, where I've been getting up at dawn and plugging away until my shoulders, neck, or brain (not always in the same order) can't take any more.

I eat, of course, though I haven't been out even once: leftovers from home, a pot of split pea soup, a bunch of bananas and an occasional pack of Ramen noodles have kept me going. I take breaks every now and then, and it's nice to step onto the deck for a minute, or walk around the pond, or climb on a bike for a bit of exercise. I jumped a deer while riding one day, a young buck that kept his distance, but didn't run away, apparently curious about the strange creature than ran on wheels.

Guys (and gals) like these I could see from the window, or within a few feet of the condo. Ducks and geese are plentiful, along with herons and crows. Seagulls, not so many.

Mostly, however, what I saw was this: a stack of books and a laptop, scribbled notes on a pad, a rough draft on the screen. I've managed to knock out about 60 pages so far. If my Old Testament students accomplish a quarter as much, they'll be nearly through with their exegesis papers.

It's tempting to leave my study space and drive down to Morehead City for some seafood, but I remind myself that I need to do what I came to do. More than once, I've found myself humming the inimitable words of the great Roger Miller, whose classic "You can't roller skate in a buffalo herd" includes this chorus:

"All you got to do, is put your mind to it,
knuckle down, buckle down, do it, do it, do it..."

Sometimes you just have to do it, or it won't get done.

BSCNC budget shrinking, SBC ties growing

2009-10-12T06:57:00.006-04:00

When messengers gather at Greensboro’s Koury Convention Center for the annual meeting of the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina (BSCNC) Nov. 9-11, they’ll be presented with a proposed budget for 2010 that’s 12 percent smaller than the current one. The current budget, optimistically approved back in 2007, calls for annual income of $39.2 million; the new one contracts to $34.8 million.

That should come at no surprise, because through the first eight months of the year, income for the BSCNC was already $4.26 million (16.6 percent) below budget, and 4.6 percent behind the previous year’s giving.

There’s no doubt that the troubled economy has played a role in the convention’s sliding income, but it’s certainly not the only factor – 2009 is the fifth year out of the past seven in which BSCNC income has fallen from the previous year.

That trend matches up with the accelerated exodus of moderates and even borderline folk from active roles in the BSCNC as the convention has adopted an increasingly harder line in relating to churches that are more comfortable supporting the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (CBF) than the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC).

Next year’s budget, which continues a five-year trend of increasing the SBC’s take of BSCNC income by half a percent each year, will be the first in nearly two decades to offer no option for supporting CBF instead of the SBC.

According to reporting by the Biblical Recorder, budget chair Steve Hardy explained the committee’s priorites to the BSCNC’s Board of Directors this way: “When people ask you about the budget I want you to say we are prioritizing three things: more money to our Southern Baptist ministry partners; evangelism and church planting.”

During the same meeting, BSCNC executive director Milton Hollifield reflected on ministry plans for 2010 by saying “This state convention could function without a relationship with the SBC. But we connect with, partner with the SBC entities because we are Southern Baptist churches. I’m pleased and proud of that relationship.”

Those statements should answer any and all questions about why churches who no longer feel at home in the SBC are also finding less reason to support the new BSCNC. It’s no wonder that BSCNC revenue is falling and church contributions through the missions resource plan of CBFNC have increased dramatically during the past year: the SBC-ification of the Baptist State Convention is complete.

Going the wrong direction

2009-10-09T06:38:00.006-04:00

My wife and I went to see the national touring company of "Grease" at the Durham Performing Arts Center, and we both came away a bit disappointed. The show's marketing efforts are built around having former American Idol winner Taylor Hicks play "Teen Angel," but you may recall that his character appears only once (to sing "Beauty School Dropout"). Aside from a hot harmonica riff, Hicks' performance wasn't memorable, and his one-song-from-his-latest-album encore tacked on to the end of the show was, well, obviously tacked on.

The touring cast seemed more like the "B Team" than what one would expect of a first-rate touring company, and few of the actors -- who portray high-schoolers -- appeared to be less than 30 years old. An understudy who played sleazy radio disc jockey Vince Fontaine was the most convincing of the lot.

No matter who's acting, however, I confess that my biggest gripe about Grease has always been the ending, in which formerly wholesome Sandy primps and pimps herself into a beer-drinking, cigarette-smoking vamp in order to win over her jerky heartthrob, Danny Zuko. I suppose it would have been harder to get a rollicking musical finale out of having Danny get a job or hit the books, but even so ...

I wonder if the show hit a nerve because there seems to be an increasing shift toward the acceptance of cussing and quaffing as normative aspects of a Christian lifestyle, and I'm too straight-laced to be comfortable with it.

I resonate with many aspects of postmodernism, and I understand the importance of trying to be relevant to society, but I'm just old-fashioned enough to think finding the lowest common denominator should remain in the domain of junior high math.

[Photos from www.greaseonbroadway.com]

Do-it-yourself religion

2009-10-07T05:58:00.001-04:00

Americans' proclivity for do-it-yourself projects appears to be extending more and more into the religious arena, a tendency that has serious implications for the church. Parade Magazine recently reported on a survey of "Spirituality in America," and some of the results were striking.

Forty-five percent of 1,051 respondents said they considered themselves to be religious, but 24 percent described themselves as "spiritual but not religious." Just 12 percent of respondents consider their religion to be "the" faith that has all the answers, while 59 percent preferred a belief that "all religions have validity." Thirty-eight percent of poll-takers consider themselves to be less religious than their parents, while 19 percent said they were more religious, and 43 percent said they and their parents has similar inclinations toward religion.

Church-goers who note declining attendance would not be surprised that just 30 percent of the respondents indicated that they attend church daily (three percent) or weekly (27 percent), and those who count noses might wonder if even those numbers are high.

When asked who they would turn to first when needing counsel, most respondents said they rely on family members (55 percent) or friends (24 percent). Just 17 percent indicated a preference for consulting spiritual leaders.

I found it interesting that the same percentage of people believe they've had contact with the dead (17 percent), and 12 percent say they believe in astrology and check their horoscopes regularly. A total of 13 percent of respondents said they have consulted a psychic in person (nine percent) or by phone (four percent). An additional nine percent said they have discovered their own psychic powers.

While some of these results were quite enlightening, other results meant little, because they were based on what I consider to be poorly designed questions. For example, a question asking "What do you typically pray for?" allowed respondents to check multiple options, but limited the options to these: "personal success," "money or other material things," "good health," "to get through a crisis," "for the well-being of others," "for forgiveness," and "none of the above." Jesus' teaching and example suggest that we should pray first for God's will to be done, but the question offered only self-serving responses. Does that tell us more about the respondents, or those who designed the survey?

Another question had a different problem: pollsters reported that 59 percent of respondents believe "Religion can help solve the world's problems and offer hope to the suffering," while 41 percent believe "Religion has too often led to war and suffering." The problem is, those were the only options given to a question asking "Which of the following statements do you agree with more?"

While one's response might indicate his or her general feelings about religion as a force for good in the world, both statements are completely true: religious beliefs at their best can motivate people to aid and bless humankind in incredible ways -- but distorted versions of religion can also inspire bloody war and horrific crimes against humanity.

Given the extent to which the mis-use of religion makes the news these days, it's not hard to understand why some people choose to give up on religion altogether, or to design their own do-it-yourself version of the faith.

[Editor's Note: No horoscopes or psychics were consulted in reaching these conclusions.]