Emotional Understanding

Dear Evangelicals:

It's heartening to see some of you at long last digging out from church culture to get closer to Jesus, who demonstrated profound emotional understanding here on earth.

Too often, Christian culture teaches us to treat our emotions like the monster under the bed. This approach is designed to instill emotional maturity. Instead, it has the opposite effect; Christians often display the hallmarks of narcissism when, in truth, they've simply been terrorized into foregoing their emotional development.

For those who seek to enter emotional adulthood, to be like Jesus on an emotional level, the following books are trustworthy guides.

The Enneagram: The first book I ever read about the Enneagram, and still my most treasured -- maybe because, like me, Palmer is a Type One. Initially, I found the questions at the conclusion of the chapter on my type to be almost unbearably-challenging. Now, I find Palmer's reasoned, ecumenical approach grounding as well as honest. (left)

The Enneagram in Love and Work: Helen Palmer applies her adjudicatory skills to the Enneagram in business settings and love relationships. The best part? Substantial discussions of how each type relates to the another in both settings. I consult this one more often than her first book these days. (above left)

Personality Types: Like Palmer, Don Richard Riso and Russ Hudson were part of the first wave of teachers of the contemporary Enneagram. This book was a classic when it was first published, but has benefited immeasurably from a major revision in 1996. The Levels of Development are key to identifying red flags for each type. The division into 18 types with wings is interesting, although I find myself using both wings, depending on the situation.

For conservative Christians, the most crucial reading will be the portion that debunks the theory of the Sufi origin of the Enneagram. FWIW, even before I became a Christian, I thought the Enneagram symbol of a nine-pointed star looked, if anything, like a crown of thorns. (above left)

Charles Marsh Reclaims Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Dear Evangelicals:

If you think you know Dietrich Bonhoeffer, think again.

The vast majority of you learned the name of Bonhoeffer -- but little else -- from Eric Metaxas' revisionist, right-wing fantasy, Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy.

Very dramatic, I'm sure, but all it's really done is convince you to martyr your common sense for an antichrist named Donald Trump.

Wanna know the real story? Read this piece, "Eric Metaxas's Bonhoeffer Delusion", by legitimate Bonhoeffer scholar, Charles Marsh.

Cooties and the Scales of Justice

Dear Evangelicals:

What. Is. Wrong. With. YOU?

Have you honestly never read the following passage in the Bible?

"I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. Yet I certainly did not mean with the sexually immoral people of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I have written to you not to keep company with anyone named a brother, who is sexually immoral, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or an extortioner—not even to eat with such a person.
 
"For what have I to do with judging those also who are outside? Do you not judge those who are inside? 

"But those who are outside God judges. Therefore 'put away from yourselves the evil person.'" (1 Corinthians 5:9-13, NKJV)

Oh, it's in there, all right. Yet you persist in doing exactly the opposite. You judge non-believers like there's a reward for it, yet leave professing Christians to commit the most heinous crimes imaginable, rallying 'round when someone actually dares to call Christian sinners to account.

Another thing -- and hang on to your hats because we're about to get intellectual up in here -- the subtext of this verse damns you all the more. 

The subtext is what the apostle Paul says without saying it. You'd have to go out of the world to avoid sinners who don't profess Christianity, he says, and his implication is that we cannot and should not go out of the world. In fact, Jesus said to go into all the world (You know: Great Commission. I'll let you Google it).

So when (gasp!) an unbeliever asks you to hang out or -- heaven forfend! -- offers to help you with something, don't be the high-handed jackass who quotes John 15:19 or Romans 12:2. The former is about how the religious establishment would feel about you if you were really following Jesus. The latter is about your behavior; not the behavior of non-believers.

Non-believers don't have some sort of spiritual cooties. And you don't have the authority to either judge them or spurn them. Get right with God!

Oh (spit take), that's what non-believers are supposed to do? Well, let me send you off with a quote from Frederick Buechner to help clarify just exactly who non-believers are:

"Many an atheist is a believer without knowing it just as many a believer is an atheist without knowing it. You can sincerely believe there is no God and live as though there is. You can sincerely believe there is a God and live as though there isn't."

Which camp do you fall into?

A Little Reading List From Ursula K. LeGuin

Dear Evangelicals:

First things first: LeGuin is a Christian; don't have a cow.

Even if she weren't, you shouldn't be going off like a stinkin' rocket.

Why? Because the apostle Paul was conversant with the most popular belief systems of the day. He didn't buy into this anti-intellectual hoodoo that says, if you're reading/watching/listening to non-Christian art, philosophy, and culture, you're "opening a door" to let the devil come waltzing in.

Don't be ridiculous! Everybody knows the devil can only dance to asymetric meter. 

Kidding!!!

I mean, you really do need to lighten up.

Second thing: I learned something crucial this week without intending to. Over the last few weeks, I've followed several Europeans on Twitter for entirely apolitical reasons. As time went on, their tweets turned increasingly political, due to the imminent Brexit vote.

What I learned was this: I don't care whether you're devoted to FOX News, MSNBC, or somewhere in-between. No talking head, no sound bite, no white paper on Earth can tell you what's really going on. For that, you must, must, must listen to the people themselves.

In short, you must do what Jesus did -- and does. What every author on Ursula K. LeGuin's reading list has done. If you're not hearing these voices, you're not equipped to vote this November, or to minister to anyone ever.

This list presents highlights from LeGuin's reading lists over the years. Just reading her descriptions of these books will give you an education unlike any you've ever had, but if you're any kind of decent Christian at all, these tidbits will light a fire under you to become even more educated and informed.

So, go. Read. Learn. And change your faith for the better.