March 5, 2010 by cpiatt.

NewSpin
By Christian Piatt

(Originally printed in PULP)

Love or hate it, we have a new cement plant in Pueblo. Yes, it will bring jobs, and yes, it will add pollution to our local environment. Spin it however you want, but no one can argue in good conscience that cement manufacturing has a positive – or even neutral – impact on the planet.

What we’re left with, then, is the challenge of at least mitigating those negative effects on our community. Already, we see growing numbers of respiratory-related problems in Pueblo. So what to do?

Some local media have celebrated the proposal to burn used tires for fuel in the plant, indicating that this is an excellent example of “real recycling” for our state to celebrate. Apparently, the other recycling efforts currently underway in Southern Colorado don’t qualify as “real.”

Granted, we have millions of tires that have to be disposed of every year, one way or another, and burning them for fuel does decrease the need for fossil fuels. But to tout tire burning as an alternative energy source is, at best, disingenuous.

As the Montana Environmental Information Center points out, “Tires contain chlorine. When chlorine is burned, it can form dioxin. DEQ (Department of Environmental Quality) admits that the dioxin emissions pose the greatest risk to health and the environment from tire burning.”

But dioxin is only one concern. The Energy Justice Network lists lots of other dangerous byproducts on tire burning:

“The fumes emitted are packed with the many toxic chemicals that tires contain (including volatile organic compounds such as benzene, metals such as lead, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons such as benzo(a)pyrene, and synthetic rubber components such as butadiene and styrene). Additionally, the chlorine content in tires leads to the creation of dioxins and furans (which are extremely toxic chemicals) when tires are burned.”

One argument that proponents of this energy strategy make is that, although these compounds created in the fires are highly toxic, the systems used to burn the tires can clean such chemicals from the gases emitted into the atmosphere.

They’re right that such systems exist. The problem is that cement plants that burn tires aren’t required to have them.
Said environmental researcher Dr. Neil Carman: “Cement kilns are not designed or required to have major fail-safe combustion devices such as large afterburners that all state-of-the-art incinerators must have by federal law today…”

Research for this piece yielded no federal or state standards to which polluters are held to determine if their tire-burnings are in compliance or not, and emissions from such plants generally are tested only 2 1/2 years, at most.

There is a fee that the state collects every time a new tire is sold. Approximately $1.50 of each sale goes to the state, supposedly for the purpose of subsidizing proper disposal of the tires once they’re out of commission. The problem is that this fund has regularly been raided, allocated instead for general fund expenses rather than being set aside to aid the purpose for which the tax was initially levied.

There are lots of other more Earth-friendly uses for old tires, especially once they are ground into “crumb rubber.” The byproduct is used for playground surfaces, running tracks and even in asphalt for roads. But these uses don’t fetch the same premium that they do as fuel. Meanwhile the shell game of environmental risk factors continues, and our community’s health suffers the inevitable consequences.

On a somewhat related topic, state manufacturers are incensed about proposed legislation that would lift the tax exemption for two years they’ve enjoyed on all money spent on energy to run their factories. The impact would indeed be close to home, with companies like Evraz Steel and Summit Brick realizing a significant tax increase.

The companies are fair in arguing such expenses may result in layoffs down the road. Pro-business advocates argue that the absence of such exemptions make us appear less business-friendly as a state. All of this aside, I have more of a philosophical issue with this complaint.

Personally, I get no tax break for the money I spend on electricity and gas in my home, and a big percentage of every dollar I spend on gasoline goes to the government coffers. Corporations don’t want to be treated like individuals because, theoretically, they bring more economic value to the table. They deserve special treatment.

Then the federal Supreme Court ruled recently that corporations indeed should have the same First Amendment rights to free speech that individual citizens have, which means they have free rein to donate to the political campaigns of their choosing.

It seems that businesses want to be treated as individual citizens when it benefits them, but not when it comes to taxation. This double standard not only serves to erode the confidence of a public already suspect of the impartiality of government; it also makes a mockery of the Constitution upon which our system of governance is based.

Posted in pueblo, current events, pulp, environment, economics, Columns, culture, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

March 3, 2010 by cpiatt.

God’s Power: Wrath or Restraint?
Smells Like Spirit
by Christian Piatt

(Originally printed in PULP)

When I was younger, there were many stories in the Bible that freaked me out. While the Sunday School classroom walls were covered with cute arks and animals walking two-by-two, the subtext is about an angry God exacting cataclysm on nearly every living . Is this really a kid’s story?

Then we have David killing Goliath with a rock, people being thrown into pits of lions, tossed into ovens … it’s enough to give a kid nightmares, especially if the lesson taken from the tales is “straighten up or God will make you dead meat.”

Two things happened as I got older, though, which helped me appreciate these stories rather than fear them. First, I began to understand Biblical narrative as metaphor, explaining basic truths about human nature rather than recording literal, historic facts. Second, I started recognizing something not pointed out in my youth: the restraint of power.

To me, the real message behind the flood story — incidentally, most world cultures have a similar story of their own — is about God holding back. First, God decides to wipe the whole slate clean and start all over. But mercy prevails and at least a few faithful are spared.

As far back as Adam and Eve, there are stories of people screwing up, despite the threat of dire consequence imparted by God, and then God backing off — changing the divine mind, if you will.

And so it goes, from Sodom and Gomorrah to Jonah and the Ninevites, someone’s always talking God into taking it easy on us humans. Now, I’m not one to believe that God’s actually that involved in daily life, doling out punishment like a high school principal. Actually, it’s we who to try to find reasons behind the bad things that happen to us. It makes it easier to swallow, after all, if we can convince ourselves that everything actually happens for a reason, rather than accepting the possibility that, sometimes, really bad stuff happens, even to really good people.

But back to the underlying theme in so many of these biblical stories. Like all metaphor, we have the opportunity to read any number of messages into them. For those intent on gleaning an image of an angry, vengeful God from the pages of Scripture, they most certainly will find it. I choose, however, to see a God of forgiveness and mercy.

Considering the example we’re presented with in the life and teachings of Jesus, it’s hard for me to conceive that someone who calls him- or herself a Christian would see anything else. At the heart of Jesus’ ministry was replacing a culture of vengeance and retribution with a new ethos of compassion, love and forgiveness.

So, if we’re called by the one who many claim embodies the wisdom of the Divine to be purveyors of compassionate mercy, why would we choose to conceive of a God whose essence is anything but the same?

Posted in pueblo, pulp, theology, church transformation, church, Columns, faith, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

March 2, 2010 by cpiatt.

I just posted a new podcast called “Time, Death and the Brain”

http://christianpiatt.podbean.com

Let me know what you think.

Peace,

Christian

Posted in parenting, children, current events, education, youth, young adult, Blogroll, technology, culture, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

February 24, 2010 by cpiatt.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last couple of decades, the recent results of a study by the Pew Research Center should come as no real surprise. In fact, at the risk of being self-referential, it confirms much of what my wife and I wrote in our book, MySpace to Sacred Space: God for a New Generation, more than two years ago.The Study arrives at a few key points, which include the facts that younger people are as interested in making space for both God and prayer in their lives as the generations that precede them (in some ways more so), but they increasingly don’t see the church as the necessary mediator for that experience.

There are tons of reasons for this, including general mistrust of and disaffection with institutions as a whole. Since Vietnam and Watergate, our perceptions of institutions have been in precipitous decline; add to that daily news stories of corporate malfeasance and millions of layoffs and you have a villain in the making.

And let’s not revisit the scores of religious figureheads who have succumbed to temptation and corruption, and the institutions that too often have tried to justify, minimize or even cover up the problems. On top of all of this, our understanding of community has become more disparate and virtualized with the advent of social networking. Though some may see this as a poor substitute for “real” community, at least it’s something.

After all, where were all these people when front porches were replaced by attached garages? Or when nuclear families gave way to professional upward mobility? Or when more than half of our parents got divorced and moved hundreds or thousands of miles apart? to blame social networking for the dissolution of physical community is to focus on the finger, ignoring the thing it’s pointing to.

But I digress…

A changing/evolving sense of community aside, there are some other interesting differences between younger people today and those older than them, summed up well by this paragraph in the Pew Study:

In their social and political views, young adults are clearly more accepting than older Americans of homosexuality, more inclined to see evolution as the best explanation of human life and less prone to see Hollywood as threatening their moral values. At the same time, Millennials are no less convinced than their elders that there are absolute standards of right and wrong. And they are slightly more supportive than their elders of government efforts to protect morality, as well as somewhat more comfortable with involvement in politics by churches and other houses of worship.

Though some may read these more “progressive” social values as an indicator of younger people straying from the moral values imparted by traditional church, we in mainline and more moderate to progressive independent congregations should see this as a tremendous opportunity for relevance. But be careful not to read this as an opportunity to pack your pews with youth and young adults. It’s more about a chance to connect over shared values of social justice and change, and in so much as we can be an agent or facilitator of that change younger people seek in their communities, they may find a great ally in the church.

But they still may never come to worship. So what’s it going to be, church? Real, relevant, gospel-inspired change, or survival of the institution of church as we know it/ There’s a real possibility we may not be able to have both.

When I speak and lead workshops for congregations and denominations, I often pose this question: if you could fully live in to you church’s mission today, but if the cost would be shutting your doors forever, would you do it? Of course this is a hypothetical posed in extreme language on purpose, to push people within the church to consider what’s really most important to them.

Consider Jesus (I know, a radical concept). He never had a church building, no budget and no salary. He walked around, noticed needs before him and went about meeting them, then he called others to do likewise. He shared wisdom through story and didn’t worry about retirement packages, balance sheets or mortgages. He focused instead on living out what he believed every day, and left the rest up to God.

Now, I’m not one to leave myself out of the group that this challenges. Though I don’t get paid by my church, my wife does, and the prospect of giving that up and simply walking the earth and meeting needs – especially with two kids – seems nuts. And I’m not saying this is necessarily what we’re all called to as church leaders, but it’s a question worth asking.

If, like the rich man in the Gospels, we’re coming to Christ and asking what is required of us, what will be our reaction if the answer is “leave everything behind and follow me”? What if the trend of younger people walking away from church is the kind of necessary pruning back that scripture calls for, rather than the cultural crisis of faith that many churches label it as?

Yes, there is still a need for communities of people offering one another love, wisdom, support and mutual accountability, to challenge people to put their faith into transformational action and to give them the tools to do so. And insomuch as institutional church can facilitate that, I believe there is a place for it in today’s culture. But the degree to which the existing buildings, paid staff, boards of directors and bylaws will – or even should – be a part of that, I’m not so sure.

Posted in youth, young adult, social networking, current events, church growth, theology, church transformation, emerging church, faith, Blogroll, church, technology, culture, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

February 23, 2010 by cpiatt.

Smells Like Spirit
Is faith hiding in the closet?
By Christian Piatt
(Originally published in PULP)

For a long time in American history, it’s been relatively taboo to admit you’re an atheist, or even an agnostic. In some ways, the bias favoring people of faith still holds. Imagine an atheist candidate for president trying to get nominated, much less elected, and the storm of controversy that would surround it.

Though some positions of political power may be out of reach for those who claim no faith, it has become more acceptable in recent years to admit agnosticism or even atheism. In fact, there’s even a bit of counter-culture hipness to confessing it.

While the relaxation of social strictures that allow people to speak freely about their faith – or lack of it – has opened up public dialogue in arguably healthy ways, the pendulum also has swung the other way, at least a bit. In a recent article on Salon.com, Ada Calhoun writes about an experience where a friend of hers caught her dressed up on the street on a Sunday morning, joking with her that she must be headed to church. She laughed it off and sheepishly continued on her way to Catholic Mass, too embarrassed to admit it to her friend.

“I’m not cheating on my husband, committing crimes or doing drugs,” says Calhoun. “But those are battles my cosmopolitan, progressive friends would understand. To them, my situation is far more sinister: I am the bane of their youth, the boogeyman of their politics, the very thing they left their small towns to escape. I am a Christian.”

Part of this is likely a normal social cycle, back and forth along the spectrum of the sacred and secular. However, Christianity in particular carries sufficient weight for the embarrassment these reticent faithful exhibit.

“Who wants to be lumped in with all the other Christians,” asks Calhoun, “especially the ones you see on TV protesting gay marriage, giving money to charlatans, and letting priests molest children? Andy Warhol went to Mass every Sunday, but not even his closest friends knew he was a devout Catholic until his death. I get that.”

So do I. As one who is seen both in our local community and in larger literary circles as a figurehead for postmodern Christianity, I spend as much time and energy responding to these negative connotations attached to my faith as I do speaking positively about what a community of faithful, committed to causes of service, compassion and social justice, can do to make the world a better place.

It’s important to understand how far and wide this disaffection for organized religion runs. There are huge groups of people who, though they study and practice the teachings of Jesus, choose not to call themselves Christians because of the baggage attached to the term. Instead, they prefer the term “Christ followers,” both because it is less encumbered with negativity, and also because it speaks of what they do, rather than define what group to which they belong.

There are lots of books on the subject too, such as “un-Christian,” by David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons, or “They Like Jesus but Not the Church,” by Dan Kimball. One common sentiment throughout these texts is that the image of God, or more specifically, Jesus, should not suffer because of the crap that humans do in their name.

Not surprisingly, there’s a healthy amount of blowback from the institution of church as well. While some faith communities see the writing on the wall and seek to learn from history’s lessons, others are building defenses still higher, lobbing verbal salvos from the other side.

Authors like Peter Rollins, who wrote “The Orthodox Heretic “and “How (Not) to Speak of God,” among others, have been labeled as brazen heretics, masquerading as Christ followers simply to further the mythical goal of reducing church to rubble.

Meanwhile, people like Ada Calhoun skulk in the shadows to practice their faith, worried that being associated with those with whom she strongly disagrees will be a social albatross around her neck. Though it will take much time and no small amount of effort, it’s my hope that Christians once again earn the respect and appreciation of the public, and that Calhoun and her peers can come out of the closet and be proud to openly call themselves “Christian.”

Posted in current events, young adult, pulp, theology, church growth, church transformation, emerging church, Blogroll, Columns, faith, church, culture, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

January 13, 2010 by cpiatt.

Admitting powerlessness
By Christian Piatt
(Originally published in PULP)

I travel sometimes for work. Every time I do, my wife, Amy, worries about me. Before a recent trip alone, she admonished me no less than four times to travel safely. Though I don’t have much control over that in flight, except for using my seat cushion as a flotation device in the event of a water landing, I told her I would.

What neither of us was thinking about was the safety of the family I left behind.

Amy joked that my little Prius was doomed for an apocalyptic fate, since she had cleaned it for me while I was out of town. An innocent joke, but it turned out to be eerily prophetic.

I got a call on Wednesday afternoon from Amy. She was crying.

“Everyone is all right,” she said between sobs, “but we got in a pretty bad wreck.”

With the kids in the back seat, Amy pulled out of a parking lot after being waved out by a driver in the right lane (what we’ve since learned is called the “death wave” by insurance folks), and was met by a full-sized pickup in the center lane whose massive grill guard lifted our little hybrid off the ground, shearing the front completely off.

She sent me a picture from her phone and my stomach sank. Even though I knew no one was hurt, just seeing the car so mangled and knowing my whole family had been so close to a similar fate, made me nearly sick.

Times like that make harshly real how tenuous our grasp is on anything in this life. I had no control over what happened, whether or not I had been there, or if I had spent more time worrying about what might – and this time, did – happen.

Strangely, this sense of powerlessness made me think of a friend of mine who has been working on his sobriety for some time, but who resists involvement in a 12-step group or any sort of faith community. The reason, as it’s been suggested to me by a couple of people, is because he has a hard time with the idea of handing over power to a higher authority.

Anyone in AA or the like can tell you that you don’t have to believe in God to have your recovery work. Your higher authority can be whatever you choose, but the idea is to admit your own powerlessness. After all, as one friend of his pointed out to him, he yielded to the higher authority of drugs and alcohol for long enough. Why not try something or someone else?

One of the scariest things about admitting powerlessness, whether we’re addicts or not, is that we’re conceding the reality of suffering in our lives. We can’t stop it, and that angers us. To me, a healthy faith is not one that leans on promises of wealth, comfort or a lack of hardship, but rather one that strives for peace amid an unavoidably hard life.

In the end, my own peace is the only thing over which in fact I have any control.

Posted in emerging church, pueblo, pulp, theology, culture, church, Columns, Blogroll, faith, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

January 7, 2010 by cpiatt.

So, I’ve been working on this book about postmodern male identity for some time called BE A MAN, and Brandon, a colleague of mine, passed along the text of a recent Dockers ad campaign they’ve labeled the “Man-ifesto.” Here’s the ad content:

Once upon a time, men wore the pants, and wore them well. Women rarely had to open doors and little old ladies never crossed the street alone. Men took charge because that’s what they did. But somewhere along the way, the world decided it no longer needed men. Disco by disco, latte by foamy non-fat latte, men were stripped of their khakis and left stranded on the road between boyhood and androgyny. But today, there are questions our genderless society has no answers for. The world sits idly by as cities crumble, children misbehave and those little old ladies remain on one side of the street. For the first time since bad guys, we need heroes. We need grown-ups. We need men to put down the plastic fork, step away from the salad bar and untie the world from the tracks of complacency. It’s time to get your hands dirty. It’s time to answer the call of manhood. It’s time to wear the pants.

And here’s a revised version/response from a blogger known as Heartless Doll, which I think kinda rules:

Once upon a time, men didn’t have anyone questioning their shit. They wanted to be congratulated for opening doors and walking across streets. Men were in charge because they kept everyone else down. But somewhere along the way, women wised up and were like, these dudes are fucking assholes and we’d like some freedom and autonomy now, please. Somehow, dance music and delicious coffee made it so that men couldn’t wear the official pants of middle management, left stranded on the road between ageism and misogyny. But today, there are questions scholars, feminists and other people who speak truth to power would like some answers to. The world does not sit idly by as activists fight against the actual evils of the world while some pants company complains about coffee. For the first time since bad guys, we realized that the heroes were often the bad guys. We need grown-ups who don’t whine about dance music. We need men to not be ushered into oppressive gender roles and to eat salad if they want to, and ladies, too. It’s time for everyone to get their hands dirty. It’s time to answer the call of gender equality. It’s time to wear whatever the fuck you want.

Posted in sex, current events, books, men, BE A MAN, parenting, economics, culture, young adult, comedy, humor, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

December 22, 2009 by cpiatt.

I made a few T-shirts on Zazzle and thought I’d share:

See my shirts at Zazzle

Christian

Posted in politics, economics, WTF, men, humor, comedy, Blogroll, culture, young adult, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

December 14, 2009 by cpiatt.

Below is a link to a survey I’m conducting for my book on postmodern male identity and faith, tentatively called BE A MAN. Please take the 10-15 minute survey if you’re a guy, and pass it along to anyone else who might be willing to share their thoughts for this book.

You do not have to be practicing a particular religion or have any faith at all to take this survey. In fact, we want to hear from people inside and outside of organized religion, and those who believe in God, those who aren’t sure, and those who do not.

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/beaman

Thanks for your help with this. And please do pass this on to as many men as you can!

Sincerely,
Christian Piatt

Posted in parenting, 2.0, social networking, theology, sex, men, books, youth, young adult, faith, Blogroll, church, culture, church transformation, emerging church, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

December 5, 2009 by cpiatt.

I’m working on a new book lately called BE A MAN, which seeks to answer the question about what male identity looks like in the twenty-first century. Part of the project involves interviewing other folks about what they think it means to be a man in a postmodern culture. These two podcasts are excerpts from an interview I did with Ryan, who actually was born as Tiffany and has undergone the transgender process.

It turns out that there are lots of things about male identity that we men take for granted and are never consciously aware of. But for someone born as a woman who now identifies as male, there’s a heightened sensitivity around matters of gender.

To hear the interviews on my podcast, check outhttp://christianpiatt.podbean.com.

Posted in pueblo, politics, current events, theology, books, sex, young adult, church transformation, faith, Podcast, church, culture, emerging church, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »